OMB just published 412 pages in the Federal Register (Docket OMB-2026-0034) giving political appointees authority to terminate any NIH grant, override peer review scores, and block you from publishing with federal funds. Comment period closes ~July 13. Thread 🧵

Writing a manuscript is like making a documentary. Instead of a film, it’s in writing and figures. Writing a proposal is like writing evidence based science fiction.

For 40 years the 8-nt ‘Kozak Sequence’ was thought to mark sites of translation initiation. In a new study, we revise this model by identifying an ~80-nt sequence—the extended Translation Initiation Sequence (eTIS)— that guides ribosomes to correct start sites. 🧵 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Someday, When the madness is done, And there is a true accounting, Of the lives that were saved, And those that were lost, I know we will find the name of Ralph Baric On the right side of the ledger. I, for one, am grateful.

Hey @nature.com are you cool with this? It would be great if you got your parent company to use their windfall publishing profits to, I don’t know, sue OpenAI perhaps?

What if you're not interested in ribosomes? First, HOW DARE YOU. Second, MissAlignment's got you covered. We took a tiny subset of EMPIAR-11830 containing parts of the nucleus and looked for nucleosomes. Here, further reference-based alignment with M made no difference.

It’s brutal in academia right now. A lot is out of our control, but it doesn’t cost anything to remember that there are humans behind papers and grants…reviewers, program officials and funders can be more empathetic in the face of unprecedented chaos in the US scientific enterprise.

Wonderful essay. Also inspiring to read a science primer that isn’t as dry as a typical review.

"Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are." One of my favourite quotes, attributed to St Augustine and embodied by @drkatemarine.bsky.social today.

Excited to share our @natprot.nature.com paper on using RNA proximity labeling to map subcellular RNA transcriptomes. We’ve been working in this area for a while and wanted to create a resource paper to guide the uninitiated reader. rdcu.be/fblvI

Excited this is out. Congrats on the paper Rory!

Are you excited by virology? Would you like to do a PhD? Three fantastic opportunities are available to do joint PhDs between @cvrinfo.bsky.social and @pirbrightinst.bsky.social Details in the thread below - please share! Deadline 8th May 2026, fully funded for UK Home students (1/4)

🚨 Postdoc position open - please repost! Join our lab in Lausanne🇨🇭to study KSHV, virus–host interactions & RNA decay + great quality of life right by Lake Leman and the Alps ⛰️ Apply here 👉 sites.google.com/view/muller-...

Today we tried our first "cold read" journal club on this preprint. Cold read in the sense that no one read it beforehand; we read and discussed it together, live, for an hour, on the big screen. What a journey! 1/

Today we report single-cell APEX-seq (scAPEX-seq)—a method for unbiased mapping of subcellular transcriptomes at single-cell resolution. It reveals cell states invisible to standard scRNA-seq and identifies regulators of CAR T function that improve solid tumor killing. tinyurl.com/32pf6b8p

One of my favorite meetings in one of my favorite cities. #HCV-Flavi2026

Ohioans are in crisis – gas prices are soaring, utility bills are at an all-time high, health care is becoming a luxury, and our grocery bills continue to climb. But Jon Husted says affordability is a “buzzword.”

RNA really can do it all!

For the night is dark and full of RNAses

This is insanely cool and provokes so many questions. Congrats on an incredible story!

Excellent synthesis. I love how the bake good quadrant, while depicted here as a triangle, occupies a satisfying quarter of possible breakfast space. IIRC this insight settled key questions during the Morning Meal Mapping expeditions of the 20th century. Still much to explore!

🎉Proud to present our latest paper, out now in Nature Communications: www.nature.com/articles/s41... RNA Binding Proteins (RBPs) are often full of intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs), but what these regions do during RNA recognition is often unclear. 1/10 #RNA #IDR #RBP

It is almost five years since I first applied AlphaFold to a handful of viral proteins. Today, hundreds of thousands of predictions and many discoveries later, we are delighted to announce the integration of our Viro3D dataset into the @ebi.embl.org and Google DeepMind AlphaFold Database.

This is such a fun thread on a conceptual head twister of a paper. Bold hypothesis and clever selection scheme. Kudos to the authors!

I am languid and bedeviled and hate writing and hate everybody is a mic drop of a sentence

I started offering career advice to two junior colleagues today in separate meetings, and both times I caught myself thinking that, if I'm honest, I don't have very good advice on navigating the current funding and job climate. I think it's important to say that no one does.

Been hearing some horrifying chatter about dealing with the new #NIH common form and #ScienCV system, so I put together a short video with some tricks for mitigating some of those pain points. Hope it helps? 🧪 open.substack.com/pub/emptymod...

Finally finished this gorgeously written tome on mostly North American geology. What does one read next if they want to become a hobbyist rock person? Like birding but for rocks? I’m 100% serious

There are great in vivo and in vitro translation reporters, but here we invent the first “in morte” system 🎃

A milestone worth celebrating: this past weekend I co-organized the 31st Rustbelt RNA Meeting (RRM) with @schafferlab.bsky.social. 324 scientists, 180 posters, and 23 talks spanning undergrads to faculty from across the Midwest and beyond. What an incredible community!

The NIH institute director firing last Friday is very bad. I made a video explainer about why. Stay for last post, w link to @science.org story from @jocelynkaiser.bsky.social 1/4 🧪

I don’t know who needs to hear this but the CDC is being eviscerated right now. America is not going to have any kind of outbreak response capacity after tonight. Americans’ health data is no longer secure. Say goodbye to federal public health in any capacity. It’s a disaster. We won’t recover.

“I found my footing surrounded by people who took for granted that of course I would succeed.” My advisors had similar faith in me, and though I felt it a tad misplaced, I see such talent and dedication in my students, that now I get it. They’ll succeed, and I’m stoked I get to help them get there!

I made a sign for the lab with our informal lab motto, inspired by this convo between @itaiyanai.bsky.social and Martin Lercher: nightscience.buzzsprout.com/1744020/epis.... A good reminder that talking is among the best forms of thinking!

How do cells sort which RNAs to keep or destroy? New preprint from THJ, Brenneke and Plaschka labs shows that export and decay machineries (TREX2/PAXT) both recognise UAP56-bound RNAs. Whether they’re exported or degraded depends on where in the nucleus this happens. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Regulation by RNAs might be even more extensive than we thought. Many enzymes and other proteins not previously considered as RNA-binding proteins do seem to fall into this class & might have their activity regulated by RNA. www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

What a towering loss! Jim was as kind as he was brilliant and he was very, very brilliant.

To have this paper appear the same day that RFK Jr is canceling all mRNA vaccine funding is further indication that irony is not dead, even though we might all be soon.

"We reviewed the science, listened to the experts, and acted..." Words really don't mean anything anymore, do they? The incompetence is staggering, the political motives, clear as day. www.hhs.gov/press-room/h...

I’m lucky to celebrate this RNA day by completing the West Highland Way. 96 miles in 8 days, and a ton of memories. Time for a pint!

do you ever stare at the ceiling and think about how the worldwide scientific establishment did the impossible and created a COVID vaccine in under a year and the response of the general public has been to go on an unstoppable rampage to destroy science and scientists

Advice distilled from an NSF PO: Apply for NSF funding this year. Because NSF's current policy is to forward-fund active projects (e.g. pay down their mortgage on the future years of funding), there are plausible budget scenarios where NSF has a LARGE budge to spend next fiscal year (on your grant)

Just finished reading Eco's "How to Write a Thesis" before adding it to the lab library. "First, writing a thesis should be fun. Second, writing a thesis is like cooking a pig: nothing goes to waste." So many gems of advice, clever sourcing ideas, and encouragement, even for modern scientists.

Have a random Wednesday timeline cleanse in the form of this iridescent tRNA! 🤩🧬

“A thesis represents an investment with an uncertain return, mostly because its life-changing aspects have to do with process.” So true! Very thoughtful write up here

Dear science journalism, Please start including the funding source and whether it has been imperiled by the coup in your coverage of cool new science papers. The public should know the floor is being cut out from under us.

🚨 A new rule would let career scientists like NSF/NIH program officers be replaced by political appointees Already 14,000+ public comments, deadline is Friday 📣 Comments can be short. Courts consider them—and scientists with NSF/NIH experience are especially impactful Speak up! shorturl.at/WKuBj

important historical perspective on the value of federal funding of basic research at universities: "These are the building blocks of America's extraordinary strength, created over the last 100 years, and they are now being dismantled in 100 days" 🧪 www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Qk4...

NIH is allowing us to recruit postbacs and postdocs again. Please reach out if you are interested in working with us! Ad: genomeinformatics.github.io/jobs2025/

As new PhDs graduate, I'm reflecting on the below convocation address I delivered at my own PhD ceremony about science's most essential question: "How do we know that?" Equal parts #NightScience meditation and a call to action. Sometimes we need to hear from our younger selves. #StandUpForScience