BTW, any story about a possible Northwestern capitulation should include this detail (screenshot is from the oped linked below)

"A 25-person startup" should not be allowed to "disrupt" fundamental inputs to the Earth's ecosystem, hydrosphere, and atmosphere. Like, what are we even thinking here?

In case you aren't already aware of one of the nerdiest, nich-est online games: TeXnique, where the goal is to type LaTeX formulae as quickly as possible. texnique.xyz It is "fun."

Dick Durbin’s Rock Island office is taking voicemails if you are, like me, a betrayed constituent: 309.786.5173 (I called hours ago, but understand it’s still taking messages with no problem, and none of his other numbers allow you to leave a voicemail.)

#nasa is shuttering the Goddard #space #flight center in a move that may not be entirely legal, according to critics. For months, our #staff #writer @joshdinner.bsky.social interviewed NASA #employees, read #senate reports and more to give you the deepest dive yet. www.space.com/space-explor...

Ozempic, MRI machines and flat screen televisions all emerged out of fundamental research decades earlier — the very types of study being slashed by the US government go.nature.com/47hn0n5

It's becoming increasingly clear to me that Reflect Orbital's fucking stupid giant mirror satellite, with absolutely NOTHING useful to offer, which will cause countless safety issues, ecological disasters, and destroy the night sky, is going to launch. A bunch of astronomers and I have sent out […]

Today my @nytimes.com colleagues and I are launching a new series called Lost Science. We interview US scientists who can no longer discover something new about our world, thanks to this year‘s cuts. Here is my first interview with a scientist who studied bees and fires. Gift link: nyti.ms/3IWXbiE

This is why we fund scientists to study things like oyster slobber even if you don’t think it sounds important

A leading Democrat in the Senate just released an important report documenting how NASA has been working to implement the president's proposed budget, not Congressionally approved funds, in slashing missions. Read more ⬇️

Big fan of observing in person 🔭

I really dislike how science has started calling almost any fancy computational technique AI. 🧪 The framing of this entire article makes it sound like a benevolent AI independently made these drugs. That is *pure fantasy*. Instead: a team of scientists made a machine learning model for a study.

For the morning crowd, here are all the observations stored in the Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes. A visual created by Julie Imig, one of our amazing astronomical data scientists. Follow the link below for more colors and even a movie.

Now formally published! It really is perfect that this code, named both for the PSF spikes and as a nod to a favorite Buffy character -- hence the logo, should find its home in JOSS... github.com/avapolzin/sp... 🔭🧪☄️

Are you from one of these states? Then we need your help to save American science! The Senate Appropriations Committee will be marking up the President's Budget Request for science on Wednesday. People have been saying the proposed cuts "decimated" US science, but that's wrong: they are apocalyptic

NASA just won an Emmy for our live broadcast of the total solar eclipse last year. We produced a documentary film about the James Webb Space Telescope that's out in theaters and on Netflix. We have podcasts, we write feature stories. People wear the agency logo on t-shirts. We're still getting cut.

NASA is being told to cancel 19 *active* missions to save $6B, which looks to be less than the ICE *hiring/retention* budget going forward. I need people to let that sentence sink into their bones for a minute.

Definitely using the novel Ji (@alexji.bsky.social) mass-based dwarf galaxy classification scheme moving forward 🔭

Introducing...your sneak peek at the cosmos captured by NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory! Can you guess these regions of sky? This is just a small peek...join us at 11am US EDT for your full First Look at how Rubin will #CaptureTheCosmos! 🔭🧪 #RubinFirstLook ls.st/rubin-first-look-livestream

"You’re punching a generation-size hole, maybe a multigenerational hole, in the scientific and technical workforce. You don’t just Cryovac these people and pull them out when the money comes back. People are going to move on.” www.scientificamerican.com/article/prop...

Cuts have consequences, illustrated. As seen on TV 📺

Bear Lodge 🌌🐻 If you can’t secure the giant bear of legend for your cliff-scarring needs, Ursa Major will do in a pinch. 🏷️: 📸🌿🐡🔭

Bonus: here's an animation I generated showing how the sausage was made. Each frame is one commit from the paper repo.

Looks like Fefe has been reading the news…

Hey I’m hiring a 4-year PhD student in #astronomy at UCC to work on studying massive black holes in cosmological simulations! Fast turn around on this bc it is so late (due 6 June) but please pass on to any interested and qualified students! Feel free to dm/email me! 🔭🧪 www.ucc.ie/en/astro/job...

NOAA's new GOES-19 satellite continuously monitors solar activity, to protect satellites, communications & electrical systems. (It also catches the Earth & Moon photobombing its view of the Sun.) One small example of what NOAA funding does... 🧪🔭 www.nesdis.noaa.gov/news/noaas-l...

⭕ A stunning cosmic lens! A distant background spiral galaxy appears to be wrapped around a closer foreground elliptical galaxy, forming an Einstein ring. Captured by the NASA/ESA/CSA James #Webb Space Telescope. Read more 👉 www.esa.int/ESA_Multimed... 🔭 🧪 ☄️

#NASAWebb provides high-resolution details of Herbig-Haro 49/50—an outflow from a nearby still-forming star and background galaxies. Webb reveals the fuzzy object at the tip of the outflow in the Spitzer image is actually a distant spiral galaxy: webbtelescope.pub/4iGQg9K 🔭 🧪

In the same vein as albumpl and for talks, posters, papers, or even March Madness, here's a little package with >80 university-inspired, matplotlib color palettes and colormaps :) github.com/avapolzin/ra...

Paper day! I introduce a new all-in-one tool to generate and drizzle/resample space-based point spread functions for more accurate photometry 🔭🧪 arxiv.org/abs/2503.02288

Tomorrow! Join us — in person or online at 6:30pm Chicago time — for the last Picture an Astronomer public lecture with galactic archaeologist Anna Frebel (MIT), who will describe the cosmic origin of the heaviest elements. More (incl. registration) at pictureanastronomer.github.io 🔭🧪👩‍🔬

Join us online (tickets for in person attendance at the Adler Planetarium sold out!) for Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell’s public lecture tomorrow night (7pm CT)! Second to last Picture an Astronomer public lecture 🔭🧪👩‍🔬 More at pictureanastronomer.github.io/lectures

Last day to register! 🔭🧪👩‍🔬

Registration ends Feb. 15! 🔭🧪👩‍🔬 We encourage *all* professional astronomers/astrophysicists to attend (in person or remotely)! More at pictureanastronomer.github.io/symposium

Our second Picture an Astronomer public lecture -- in person (Chicago) and online Friday! Hear @astrokatie.com talk about the end of the Universe! More information + registration at pictureanastronomer.github.io/lectures/ 🔭🧪👩‍🔬

Hear the President of the American Astronomical Society, Dara Norman, talk about the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, participatory science, black hole-galaxy coevolution, and more on Monday (Feb. 3)! In person (Chicago) and online! Registration at: pictureanastronomer.github.io/lectures 🔭🧪👩‍🔬

“Vera herself offers an excellent example of what can happen when more minds participate in science,” the observatory’s website said of Rubin — up until recently. I wrote about chaotic edits of a renowned astronomer's bio on a federally funded observatory site: www.propublica.org/article/vera...

TOMORROW! 🔭🧪👩‍🔬 If you plan to attend remotely, you'll receive a Zoom webinar link to the email with which you registered. Otherwise, we'll see you on the University of Chicago campus for an evening celebrating astronomy and the scientists that do it :)

The US Constitution does not grant the President this unilateral authority. In Illinois, we will stand against unlawful actions that would harm millions of working families, children, and seniors.

Join us (in Chicago and online) for the Picture an Astronomer Kick-off Celebration in just under a week! Lectures from, and Q&A with, astronomers at the University of Chicago! Bingo with prizes! A free book! More, including registration, at pictureanastronomer.github.io/kickoff 🔭🧪👩‍🔬

If our kick-off celebration (incl. a talk from @highzclouds.bsky.social) on Jan. 30 isn't sufficient diversion, come hear Dara Norman talk about global scale astronomy from the Windy City on Feb. 3! Free for the public in person and also streamed online! More at pictureanastronomer.github.io 🔭🧪👩‍🔬

Our Picture an Astronomer series starts in just over a week! Free to attend (in person in Chicago and online) and an incredible opportunity to engage directly with the scientists behind cutting edge astrophysics research. More info (including registration) at pictureanastronomer.github.io 🔭🧪👩‍🔬

Oh come ON now. This new JWST image is just ASTOUNDING. I feel like I’m falling looking into it, and that I would fall forever, and that I would enjoy it. NASA, ESA, CSA, K. McQuinn (STScI), J. DePasquale (STScI)

Congratulations, @avapolzin.bsky.social, a PhD candidate in astrophysics at The University of Chicago, who was recognized for exemplary promise as a future leader in #highered, with a focus on equity, community engagement, and teaching and learning. www.aacu.org/about/awards...

In the last year, in addition to work through SIRIUS B and all of the immense response online, hard copies have been shared at five universities, and the book is now being translated into other languages! Here’s to another year of trying to make astro more accessible! 🧪🔭 arxiv.org/abs/2312.04041

New Publication at the Open Journal of Astrophysics: "On the universality of star formation efficiency in galaxies" by Ava Polzin & Andrey V. Kravtsov (U. Chicago) and Vadim A. Semenov & Nickolay Y. Gnedin (CfA Harvard), all based in the USA astro.theoj.org/article/1270...

You can learn about this discovery directly from Jocelyn Bell Burnell during one of our Picture an Astronomer events! More information at pictureanastronomer.github.io, including registration (in person and remote). For astrophysicists, come to our symposium, too -- all genders welcome! 🔭🧪👩‍🔬

Figured I would get in on this whole starter pack thing and list (in whatever order bsky chooses) scientists working on studying galaxies (broadly defined, including galaxy formation/evolution + near-field cosmology). If I missed you and you'd like to be added, let me know! 🧪🔭 go.bsky.app/5ZZtqDy

It got a bit lost with everything else going on this week, but my (high school!) research student, Jack, has been working with me on building a low-cost home radio telescope to map Galactic 21 cm features, and his tutorial for others to do the same is now up: arxiv.org/abs/2411.00057 🧪🔭

Perhaps more timely now than ever: We are hosting a scientific symposium (among other events -- see pic) at UChicago, focused on promoting and retaining women in astrophysics. Symposium registration (link in next tweet) is open through Jan. 30 and we offer hybrid attendance. 🔭👩‍🔬🧪