Join me & the other 2025 @scicommlab.bsky.social Teacher Ambassadors on Thursday, January 8th @ 7pm ET. To end our year-long ambassadorship, we will showcase FREE lesson plans we authored around Science Communcation Lab films for our high school biology classes. Registration: bit.ly/sclambassado...

"...it checks all the boxes — authentic science, student-led inquiry, & ready-to-go NGSS-aligned materials..." 😊 Check out this guest post from @brewerbiology.bsky.social after teaching our free unit about @reichertfroglab.bsky.social's research 🐸🔊🧪 www.galacticpolymath.com/blog/what-ca...

"Pat, why do you carry that ridiculous 600mm lens on long hikes?" Buddy, I can see mountains reflected in the eyes of a trailside pika.

They ended the experiment when either copulation or cannibalism occurred with the pair! 😂

An inspiring workshop in Long Beach on ocean plastics hosted by Algalita Marine Research and Education. Highlights were collecting beach nurdles, seeing urban sea 🐢, & a homegrown dinner @ Captain Charles Moore's house, who raised the alarm on the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. #nurdlestoturtles

Looking to bring real-world stories into your classroom? I’ve been using free films + classroom guides from @scicommlab.bsky.social‬, and they have changed how I teach science. 🔗 Learn more: bit.ly/scleducators ✍️ Sign up: bit.ly/sclsignup 🎥 Explore films: bit.ly/freesciencef... #SCLAmbassadors

Spent a week in Oregon w/ Project ICE & COLDEX-Center for Oldest Ice Exploration. From holding 5,000 year old ice & seeing the gases trapped is inside, to sampling a 60,000 year old ice core (& keeping it afterward!), to seeing foraminifera fossils as climate indicators…it was an amazing week! ❤️🧊

They’re popular, they’re polarizing, and at this point, we’ve all heard about them: GLP-1 medications like Ozempic. Here’s how they actually work, from the former FDA commissioner who’s taken them.

Did you know that sea slugs steal chloroplasts from algae as portable snacks?! Neither did I, but a new Cell paper demonstrates that they do. 🐌🧪 My favorite part is the researchers called the storage for these stolen hors d’oeuvres “kleptosomes” 😂🥰 Summary from Nature & Cell paper linked below.

BIG NEWS! We’ve found that ash trees are fighting back against ash dieback disease! 🌳💪 Scientists at Kew & QMUL ‪@qmul.bsky.social have discovered that young ash trees are evolving resistance to this devastating fungus - & fast 🌍 Read the story👉 www.kew.org/read-and-wat... #PlantScience #SciNews

If, like me, you wore glasses in school, you're gonna have some empathy for our #FishOfTheWeek. In the photo below, the four-eyed fish doesn't look very strange at all. But trust me, these guys are far stranger than they seem at first glance 1/5

A new study confirms race and ethnicity are not valid substitutes for ancestry in genetic studies. scim.ag/3SNgwEo

RFK Jr.‘s extreme anti-vax views — and his related conflicts of interest — were a huge problem during his confirmation process. So he promised not to change the vaccine advisory panel. Today, he fired every single expert on that panel. It's a public health disaster.

One of the most thoughtful end of the year gifts from a student that used to live in Hawaii and he made it himself, so talented! Happy Summer everyone! 🥰 😎🌺

Students examined plastics in our environment by sampling the air for microfibers (there were lots!), viewing H2O samples from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, sifting through ocean beach sand (many nurdles & microplastics). Looking forward to learning more of the impacts this summer with Algalita!

Honored to be selected for the first cohort of SCL Educator Ambassadors! I love how the films are centered on getting to know the scientist behind the science, storytelling at its best! Thanks for the opportunity to uplift scientists. I am enjoying authoring for you & getting to know the SCL team!

Believe it or not, all three of these fish are the same species… the bluehead wrasse. Wrasses are protogynous hermaphrodites, meaning they transition from female to male over the course of their lives. Each phase can look radically different from each other as evidenced here #coralcitycamera

Using remote sensing, students tracked bats in the woodlot behind our school and learned about WNS (white-nose syndrome), a fungus spreading among native 🦇 populations, interrupting their hibernation and killing bats in Michigan and other states. #place-basedteaching

AP Bio learned about parental care to discover mom & dad pigeons make milk by performing a mock brain biopsy & ELISA test for the presence of prolactin. Then modeled prolactin gene activation & learned of other lactating non-mammals. The 3rd case study I authored for Science Communication Lab! 🙂

Ss predicted the “flashier sex” in Mexican boulder spiny lizards to learn females court males! Then did a dating card mingle w/ other examples & read abstracts before modeling how both nature (hormones) + nurture (nematode load) influence coloration. A case study I wrote for @scicomlab.bsky.social

Image of library book display labeled: “It's A Warning Not An Instruction Manual.” Books on display: • On Tyranny • Twenty Lessons From The 21st Century • 1984 • A Handmaids Tale • Diary of Anne Frank • Parable of The Sower • Fahrenheit 451 • Animal Farm • Brave New World ~TAiLS of a Bookworm

Look forward to this day every year where my students get to learn suturing from a real cardiac surgery PA. Thanks Dr. Jose Valdez, Dr. Thomas Meitzler, and Annie Meitzler, RN for teaching my AP Biology classes this skill!

AP Bio students determined why okapi at the local zoo are not breeding by analyzing their urine cortisol levels, examining their zoo enclosure, modeling the HPA-axis, & redesigned their zoo enclosure to reduce their stress & encourage breeding. Based on @BeccaCalisi research & a @scicommlab film.

Fun day having students listen and view 🐸 call spectrograms then calculate the call durations and frequencies to determine who will attract the most frog ladies! Students learned about tradeoffs, either long calls or frequent calls, you can’t have both! Great lessons by @galacticpolymath.com

Students listened to 🐸 calls and analyzed their spectrograms to learn about tradeoffs in nature: frogs can have long calls or frequent calls, not both! Then tried to figure out which call attracts more ladies. Great lesson set called Balancing Act by Galactic Polymath! www.galacticpolymath.com

People sometimes think of Antarctica as being barren and devoid of life, but the ocean surrounding the continent is incredibly rich with wildlife and biodiversity. Photos of new discoveries and insights from our wonderful Australian colleagues… 🧪🥼❄️🌊🦑 www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Enjoyable day at the For-Mar Nature Center in the greater Flint area designing watershed models, river testing, & my favorite part…seeing a taxidermy passenger pigeon and orioles (my first time ever)! Lots of great bird watching there & invigorating to connect with nature. Thank you MI STEM Network!

Scientists have birthed a ‘super cannibal’ that never grows up. Could it be key to combating Australia’s cane toad menace?

I just heard former Senate staffer Gabe Garbowit say that EVERY sign at EVERY protest needs to say “IMPEACH, CONVICT & REMOVE” and nothing else. Without a clear, specific demand, Congress can just ignore us. We have to be crystal clear about what we want them to do! PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD!!!

Our cover this week.

Breast cancer diagnoses rose by over 300% between 1973 and 1992. Was there a breast cancer epidemic?! NO. Mammograms were implemented for screening in 1976. PREVALENCE is a function of being able to correctly diagnose something. This is also about autism.

Thank you to the American Association for Laboratory Animal Science (AALAS) Foundation for sponsoring an opportunity for students to learn the benefits of animal research & for Dr. Lucy Kennedy from @uofmichigan.bsky.social coming out to Troy High to present Angela with her award!

With the recent claim that science brought back the dire wolf 🐺 and is attempting to bring back other extinct animals like mammoths 🦣, these images summarize my thoughts on this. We might want to first take care of the extant species before attempting to resurrect the extinct species.

Thank you to the Bembenek Lab at the C. S. Mott Center for Human Growth & Development at @waynestateclas.bsky.social who trained me over Spring Break on how to have AP Bio students do RNAi with C. elegans. From seeding the plates to chunking the worms, we learned so much about gene silencing. 🪱💜

Do you incorporate research & invention into your teachings & guide students in science competitions? As the 2024-2025 High School Invention Education Ambassador, along w/ Rachna Nath, our yearlong ambassadorship is ending soon. @society4science.bsky.social is seeking new ambassadors. bit.ly/4l4R6im

@charles_h_martin, not on #Bluesky, on #23andMe

Reminder that a study on lizard saliva eventually led to the development of Ozempic so be real wary of the criticism of studies and funding that sounds non-sensical when presented with no context.

Teaching the next generations of young scientists a practical course about biofilms in building plumbing potable water... these are some fabulous images from their own shower hoses 🦠🧫

Enjoyed learning along with my students about pregnancy, cancer, epigenetics, and developmental research at @waynestateresearch.bsky.social and excited to get training on working with C. elegans and getting my AP Biology classes knocking out genes with RNAi.

The people who produce this Mauna Loa atmospheric CO₂ record have a lab in Hilo, Hawaiʻi, about 50 miles (80 km) from the observatory. By closing the lab, it'll be really difficult to maintain the CO₂ observations.

Ss examined transgenic organisms to understand how GMOs ameliorate anthropogenic changes to our planet. They did a speed dating activity, card sort, Socratic discussion, & watched a @tangledbankhhmi.bsky.social film Wild Hope: Mission Impossible before modeling the benefits of transgenic organisms.

Left: Cleveland's burning river, before the EPA. Right: The burning river today, after the EPA. Any questions?

An expedition finds #H5N1 in 13 bird and seal species on the Antarctic Peninsula. scim.ag/3DGKl5w

The data is already clear on this one…there is NO correlation between vaccines and autism. To cancel NIH grants for important research then fund this already debunked association is egregious.

Strong turn out at the Lansing @standupforscience.bsky.social rally! Motivational speakers and uplifting to be around likeminded science-supporters. Great to unify our voices and ready for actionable next steps. Stand Up For Science!

"Despite multiple attacks by the eagle, the goose remained unbowed. The raptor, defeated, flew off." www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Francis Collins, the NIH Director for 12 years, led the Human Genome Project and other NIH efforts for 32 years, resigned today. Key words from his resignation letter www.nytimes.com/2025/03/01/u...

Remember, EuropePMC is actually better than #PubMed because it includes ALL preprints in search results, not just those including NIH-funded research. europepmc.org

Cartoon by David Sipress.