David Byrne’s ‘One Fine Day’ is keeping me (relatively) sane right now.

Simultaneously a good thing and not a good thing to be reading when planning a programme of fundamental research.

Leigh Bowery! at the Tate Modern. Artist, fashion designer, performer, provocateur. The full retrospective really makes you stop, think, reflect. Triptych of Bowery in “looks”; portrait by Lucien Freud; still from Charles Atlas’s “Hail the New Puritan” featuring Bowery, with music by The Fall.

Bucket list (and proud to be Irish) day at the start of Stage 14 in Pau. @cyclingireland.bsky.social @efprocycling.com

Absolutely buzzing seeing Ben Healy in yellow, and enjoying it so much. @cyclingireland.bsky.social @ciarancannon.bsky.social @efprocycling.com

France 2025 Day 10 last day: 140km from Dax to Oloron-Sainte-Maire. A day of riverside riding, from Dax along the north bank of the Adour to the bridge at Urt, the Pyrenees coming into view.

France 2025 Day 9: 148km from Arcachon to Dax. Out, along the southern shore of Le Bassin d’Arcachon, and a short climb past the Dune du Pilat, the highest sand dune in Europe…

When cycling through France, I always bring one book to be with in the evening; this year it’s Roland Barthes’ “Mythologies”. The essay “Toys” is so resonant; though published almost 70 years ago, it is disturbingly timely.

France 2025 Day 8: 158km from Royan to Arcachon. The e day began with a ferry crossing from Royan to Le Verdon-sur-Mer, and down the western side of the Medoc on greenways, from the old rail lines that crossed the region.

France 2025 Day 7: 179km from La Roche-sur-Yon to Royan. The weather gods sent a cooling northwesterly tailwind, so today was easier than recent days. First, through the vastness of the Vendée to Lucon.

France 2025 Day 6: 172km from Redon to La Roche-sur-Yon. Grateful for a cool morning and a sprinkle of rain, cycling along the canal from Redon to Blain

France 2025 Day 5: 164km from Rostrenen to Redon, along the Nantes-Brest canal. Given that I ‘climbed’ yesterday to the summit level near Carhaix, this was ‘downhill’ losing 1 metre per kilometre, but you can feel that and you just cruise along by the water.

France 2025 Day 4: 193km from Le Conquet to Rostenen in the searing heat. The first half was hilly and scenic, with temperatures peaking at 36C in the afternoon.

France 2025 Day 3: Roscoff to Le Conquet, 140 km. A cool and misty start from Roscoff, along the granite northern coast of Brittany.

France 2025 Day 2: Cullen, Co. Tipperary to Ringaskiddy. Head down into the headwind again. The Galtee mountains looking alternately mysterious and beautiful.

France 2025 Day 1: Kilcock to Cullen, Co. Tipperary. 174km head down into the teeth of a strong southerly wind; lovely dinner with my uncle and aunt.

The out-of-office is on after a busy and productive year back at @MaynoothUni. I’m really grateful to colleagues for their support in re-establishing my research programme. We’ve laid the groundwork for an exciting and collaborative year to come.

One to watch: there’ll be lots of really interesting fundamental research and scholarship here, with surprising and unpredictable applications and impacts. A great way to celebrate an institutional birthday.

Don't forget Brexit taught European trade officials how to deal with an intransigent, irrational country intent on sabotaging its own economy to make a far-right political point. This is not our first ride on the clown-car rodeo.

A really stimulating afternoon at the first HypoxEU Connect event at the UCD Conway Institute: great talks from Cormac Taylor and Eoin Cummins on the cellular effects of hypoxia and hypercapnia, and from Dmitri Papkovsky on optical sensors for oxygen. Read more here: www.linkedin.com/posts/philip...

The attack on science and reason perpetrated by la Maison Blanche is front page news in France …. making obscurantism topical again!

I dropped into the wonderful CAPC (Musée d’art contemporain) in Bordeaux, to find an exhibition that felt especially mounted for me! “Air de repos - Breathwork”. It was … well … inspiring!

Finding strange solace in Barthes’s 1957 introduction to “Mythologies”; it certainly feels like a moment to “live to the full the contradiction of [our] time” which may well indeed “make sarcasm the condition of truth” (though not, perhaps, of effective diplomacy)

Spéir gorm, Domhnach Deá, Cill Dara.

Museo Galileo, to see his telescope. The next displays showed how Renaissance physics was then applied in navigation, artillery and surveying. Fundamental research quickly applied to war and colonisation. A reminder that every research decision (what to do, what to fund) has deep ethical dimensions

Firenze, Gallerie degli Uffizi. The extensive collection of self-portraits includes one of/by Sir William Orpen.

Santa Croce, Firenze. A pilgrimage, of sorts, to the monumental tomb of Galileo

An interesting morning ahead at the @ria.ie Symposium on Fundamental Biomedical Research … an important and timely discussion.

I have stayed away from social media for the last nine months, but 2025 brings a fresh start. I'm really enjoying being back @maynoothuni.bsky.social researching some fundamental questions in the physiology of the control of breathing in humans. If you're interested, more to follow here!