The Orange Cat Brain Atlas is here. 🧠🐈 Today, we published the first comprehensive cellular map of the orange cat brain. The new atlas reveals a single, specialized neuron responsible for behaviors like staring at walls, knocking objects off tables, and the 3am "zoomies."

A piece of good news for basic scientists in training!

Eww.

His Harvard Lab Was Thriving. Then Came the Cuts. www.nytimes.com/2026/03/13/u...

“At the end of your life, who you are is the accumulation of the things you did. It’s not just about…money.”

Congrats to all the Weintraub awardees! I spy UCSF’s own Ayush Midha on this list - very cool!

New version of our preprint on bioRxiv about bioRxiv up. Now that’s what I call a revision – 6 years after the first version! It has new data about our progress and highlights from a massive user survey. 1/n www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

My lab @cri-utsw.bsky.social is looking for a highly motivated postdoct interested in mechanobiology! We are building a highly collaborative and interdisciplinary team working on how mechanical forces shape immune and cancer cell behavior. Come do cool science with me! lnkd.in/gKEXWUGy

Interested in transcriptional regulation, enhancers and 3D genome folding? In this new study we wondered about the role of cohesin loading at enhancers for long-range transcriptional control www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... detailed 🧵👇

We are starting Bay Area Chromatin Club up again in 2026! Fist event March 5th at UCSF Mission Bay! Details and registration HERE: If you like to nominate a person for a talk- DM me. It's been a great experience in the past. urldefense.com/v3/__https:/...

We are calling our senators right now and demanding that they vote no on the omnibus with DHS funding We are explicitly mentioning ICE’s murder in cold blood of a man on the streets of Minneapolis this morning

The video abstract that accompanies this paper is a delight.

We saw Jan 6, 2021 and Jan 7, 2026 with our own eyes. This is not Orwell's 1984.

T-minus 1 month to abstract deadline for the CSHL Genome Organization 7 Nuclear Function meeting! Hope to see you there, my fellow #genome and #nucleus nerds. meetings.cshl.edu/meetings.asp...

I think some folks might be happy to see this. NIGMS MIRA R35 for EI/NI has been published. PAR-26-121 files.simpler.grants.gov/opportunitie...

Submit your latest research to our upcoming special issue: Cell Biology of the Nucleus. This issue is being coordinated by Abby Buchwalter @abbybuch.bsky.social, working alongside Megan King @luskinglab.bsky.social. Deadline: 5 January 2026 journals.biologists.com/jcs/pages/nu...

Service dog being a Very Good Boy at #cellbio2025

It's an amazing time to be a cell biologist, as new tech makes probing cellular processes in physiological contexts more tractable. This is the theme of a Special Interest Subgroup that @iaincheeseman.bsky.social and I are hosting at #cellbio2025. Join us on Saturday 12/5! @ascbiology.bsky.social

The #cellbio2025 is starting this week! I’ll be giving a talk on the first 1st day, in the session organized by @iaincheeseman.bsky.social and @abbybuch.bsky.social (Thx for the invitation!). If you’re interested in #oocytes, #proteostasis, and #aging come by to attend! @ascbiology.bsky.social

Personal good news alert: I’ve been promoted to associate professor and it’s time to update the ol’ bio! Launching my lab at UCSF has been a privilege + I’m so grateful to my team and community here. More exciting science ahead! 🚀

Apple picking with the crew

Thrilled to announce the launch of my lab @cri-utsw.bsky.social at UTSW this January! We will explore how cells sense and respond to mechanical forces, focusing on membrane mechanics to reveal how tension and signaling work together to shape cell behavior.

OK, an NIH grant question that I would normally ask my PO but can't because of shutdown 🫠... Interested in applying for NIGMS RM1 team grant with colleagues. Several of us are NIGMS-funded. Are we eligible? Funds for lab but not our salary, or no more GM funds for us, full stop? (see screenshot)

We're still accepting submissions for our next special issue: Cell Biology of the Nucleus Guest edited by @abbybuch.bsky.social and Megan King @luskinglab.bsky.social. Submission deadline: 3 November journals.biologists.com/jcs/pages/nu... #cellbiology #nucleus #notforprofit #freetopublish

Back-to-school vibes with new PhD class arriving at UCSF… @devjanee.bsky.social rocked my world the other day with “happy 20th anniversary of being friends” text! We were those incoming PhD students at WUSTL 20 years ago. Yikes. Looking at you too @rolyanharas.bsky.social @thelucalab.bsky.social!

Last day to submit abstracts! Nuclear cell biologists, mechanobiologists, et al. don’t miss out - amazing interdisciplinary line up: computational biology, biophysics, development, genomics - we will have it all!

I am delighted to announce that the UW Department of Biochemistry has opened searches for TWO tenure-track positions. Descriptions and links in the following two posts.

Truth.

New preprint with @gfudenberg.bsky.social We find the rate of cohesin loop extrusion in cells is set by NIPBL dosage and tunes many aspects of chromosome folding. This provides a molecular basis for NIPBL haploinsufficiency in humans. 🧵👇 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

The basic sciences are HIRING at UCSF: open recruitment in the Department of Biochemistry & Biophysics. Please share and please apply! aprecruit.ucsf.edu/JPF05702

Just catching up to this - so many inspiring scientists among this year's ASCB awardees! Congrats, all. www.ascb.org/society-news...

Good news for NIH MIRA applicants. Grants.gov recently published the forecast notice for the reissuance of the EI/NI MIRA notice of funding opportunity. As indicated at the link, the estimated post date for the NOFO is Nov 3. www.grants.gov/search-resul...

Big congrats to UNC's @cohenlaboratory.bsky.social , winner of the @ascbiology.bsky.social's WICB Junior Award for Excellence in Research. Sarah's work on organelle contact sites has helped revolutionize the field. 🧪 www.ascb.org/society-news...

1/3 It's official, our grants from the NIH/NIEHS have all been suspended. We were aiming to understand how arsenic, a chemical that millions of Americans are exposed to at high levels, is disrupting the epigenetic machinery.

Weekend reset in the Sierras - Lake Schmidell, Desolation Wilderness.

1 month to abstract deadline for the first cell biology of the nucleus meeting at @embl.org in many years - organised by the stellar @luskinglab.bsky.social @sarawickstrom.bsky.social Tom Quail & Simone Koehler Tons of open slots, invited and selected speakers all get 20 mins ❤️ #EESNucleus

Another paper bluetorial! Today: how does the spatial location of genes influence their function? (1/n) www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The nuclear lamina strengthens the nucleus and organizes the genome. So what happens when you acutely degrade it in living cells? Not what we thought! (1/n) www.molbiolcell.org/doi/10.1091/...

San Francisco summer is in full effect: a soggy bike ride through the fog this AM.

Obviously, the nucleus is the best organelle. If you agree and have a story to share in the realm of nuclear cell biology, it may need a home in this upcoming special issue at @jcellsci.bsky.social. More details at the link below.

🧪 BREAKING (good news): Senate subcommittee says NO! to Trump's proposed slashes to NASA & NSF funding. Today, the subcommittee said to keep NASA + NSF funding at $33.9 billion, the same as in FY24. See 7:15 below. Full Senate appropriations committee meets tomorrow about it. 🧵 1/3

An actual good thing coming from this NIH nightmare? www.nih.gov/news-events/...

BREAKING: A federal judge in Massachusetts (the Reagan-appointed William Young) has declared the Trump administration's cuts to NIH grants — ostensibly over Trump's EOs on gender ideology and DEI — are "illegal" and "void." He's ordering many grants restored.

In case you need to see a silly thing

Signed!

Dear lord: "On Capitol Hill, at least one committee was told recently by a whistleblower that all research grants to the state were going to be cancelled." The U of Cali system alone accounts for $4B+ per year in federal R&D. If true, let's hope for another all-or-nothing fight like Harvard's.

I'm thrilled to announce that my lab is opening this August in the Department of Cell & Tissue Biology @ UCSF! We will study airway stem cells and explore how they generate multiciliated cells (my favorite!) to keep pathogens and debris out of the lung. Check out choksilab.org for more!

Talked to @KateZernike at @nytimes about my journey and the current moment for scientists in the U.S. “Ardem Patapoutian’s story is not just the American dream, it is the dream of American science.” Read the article here. No subscription required: www.nytimes.com/2025/06/03/u...

Mechanisms and timing of programmed DNA elimination in songbirds www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...