In the face of ongoing pressures and critique (including here by many), the public reaffirmation of the core mission of the National Academy of Sciences is a much-needed signal from incoming NAS President Neil Shubin. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

First full day at #ASM2026 (mammals, not microbes)! I was so honored to give the Anna M. Jackson talk award this morning, going over [too] much of my dissertation work on Channel Island deer mice. Huge thanks to @mammalogists.bsky.social for the award and support throughout my graduate career!!

Not wanting to be snarky but this is true of every technological advance in science. My entire PhD in 1983 was the fitting and refinement of a single protein crystal structure. Today I could do the same within an hour - no AI required. Hyperbole does not help.

"AI is operating at a PhD level" oh, so it's replying 'sorry for the late response' to every email and complaining about its labor conditions?

amazing thread about our latest paper, out in Therya today!! really cool and unexpected find from my Channel Island mouse dissertation research. thanks @kaycebell.bsky.social for all your detective work in the collections!

Smithsonian NZCBI Center for Conservation Genomics is looking for a new center-head!! An awesome opportunity to work at the coolest lab around! 🧬🧑‍🔬🐘🐅🐢🐸🦜🦊🦉🐼🐿️ www.usajobs.gov/job/870869600

Art of the ancient Americas may not be your thing, but you have to love this earthenware crab vessel. I'm sorry, I don't make the rules. 🦀 This is going into our imaginary museum replica store, pronto. #LACMA Colombia, Calima style, Ilama period, ca. 1500 BCE-100 CE. 🏺 1/ 📸 me

I implore everyone to read this brilliant book review of Kathryn Paige Harden new book on the genetics of criminality. It cuts right through the bullshit to state plainly what Harden's project really is: eugenics bullshit and grifting lareviewofbooks.org/article/orig...

Squirrel of the Day for April 13, 2026 gazes at the fallen cherry blossoms and ponders the fleeting nature of life #sqrlpix

A star scientist showed that better genetics lessons could reduce racism. It was the death knell for his career The loss of Brian Donovan’s grants and job speak volumes about federal funding priorities — and academia www.statnews.com/2026/04/07/b...

The tech industry props up the richest people on the planet and pays far less than its fair share of taxes. It can absolutely afford its own R&D. But instead, it’s effectively hijacked our public science infrastructure because having more wealth than anyone could ever spend is still not enough.

MAMA HUMPBACK WHALE DEFEATS NILE CROCODILE! HUMPBACK WHALE is #2026MMM CHAMPION! Artwork by @veppart.bsky.social & @opellisms.bsky.social !!!

So, um... this is bad. Really bad. I looked at the letters that were translated by the AI, and the very first one I found was almost entirely hallucination. Thread:

Undergrad and graduate students! Could your work benefit from visiting one of the NHMLAC’s collections? Apply for our Collections Study Award, due Apr. 1. I’d love to have students make use of our Entomology collection! Details here: tinyurl.com/bdduefsy

Dental Formulas xkcd.com/3213/

🎉 Huge news for BHL: The Field Museum is taking over the hosting of BHL’s website, servers & infrastructure, ensuring long-term stability and access for its 63+ million pages of open biodiversity literature. Learn more: blog.biodiversitylibrary.org/2026/02/tran... #BHLTransition #ILoveBHL 🌍 📚 🧪

Defunding science on the lowdown. Even while the budget “looks” stable.

The genome isn't a blueprint. But what is it? I originally imagined this as a reported feature on metaphors of the genome, but it ended up being an essay. And at the end I share the metaphor I personally ended up landing on. If you want to tell me why it is wrong, you'll need to read the story ;)🧪

Happy birthday to one of my favourite haters, Charles Darwin

There’s a wolf in LA for the first time in 100 years. A collared gray wolf entered the mountains of north Los Angeles County yesterday. Known as “BEY03F” she traveled hundreds of miles from her pack in Plumas County crossing highways, mountains, creeks and valleys. www.latimes.com/environment/...

More than 10,000 Ph.D. scientists were fired by the Trump administration last year. Grant cuts affected more. "A few dozen got jobs in other countries" is not a serious solution. There are not enough jobs in the whole world. The result will be less science, not the same science just elsewhere.

Hot take: folks are too focused on the AI emphasis of the PRFB & missing the most concerning part of the solicitation. The heavy emphasis on bio-AI integration for “technological advances” is a concerning degradation of NSFs mission to fund basic biological research.

it's the AI PRFB now 🙃

This is the most astonishing graph of what the Trump regime has done to US science. They have destroyed the federal science workforce across the board. The negative impacts on Americans will be felt for generations, and the US might never be the same again. www.nature.com/immersive/d4...

The National Science Foundation sign on our Eisenhower Av building is now gone. The NSF mural in the foyer is removed and torn off in sheets. We were supposed to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the agency in May 2025. That never happened.

metro rewind >>>>>> spotify wrapped metrorewind.com/rewind/

You will be visited by three spirits

Geneticist here. Anyone telling you that they can just change intelligence (which isn't what IQ measures well anyways) by fiddling with a few genes is just straight-up grifting, it doesn't work like that. And yes it's basically definitionally eugenics.

Yes please

Here's my latest contribution to the "Lost Science" series at the New York Times: Jay Falk, a scientist who studies why some female hummingbirds look just like males. Gift link: nyti.ms/4qF7Qje

Neat opportunity at George Mason University for #consbio #consgen undergrads. Paid NSF Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute. smconservation.gmu.edu/nsf-reu/

Look I’m willing to say it: maybe James Watson got two things right

big misunderstanding here. obviously this isn't about the pedophile stuff—he's just coming up with topics for evo psych grants he's about to fund 😆

the year i’m having

That’s because the purpose of biology for the right is naturalizing social hierarchy and defining a subaltern “other” to stand in contrast to the “normal”.

Sharing my portrait of Isabella Aiona Abbott for #AdaLovelaceDay to celebrate #womenInSTEM and #IndigenousPeoplesDay. 🐡🧪👩🏻‍🔬 #histsci #ald25

In 2018, Charles Murray challenged me to a bet: "We will understand IQ genetically—I think most of the picture will have been filled in by 2025—there will still be blanks—but we’ll know basically what’s going on." It's now 2025, and I claim a win. I write about it in The Atlantic.

I am deeply grateful for the work of NSF staff this year to keep research & grants moving in a difficult environment. I view this petition as a means to demonstrate impact & interest in ensuring access to a vital grad research program. 450+ signees and counting: laurenkuehne.github.io/grfpChanges/

I can't keep up with DC these days

Are you an undergraduate or graduate student whose research would benefit from visiting a collection at the @nhm.org? Apply now for our Collections Study Award! Deadline is Oct. 1; learn more at nhm.org/student-coll...

🦇 Outlined in a new paper published online in the Journal of Mammalogy, our Ranges Digitization Network will bring even more detail to digitized mammal collections in western North America, including biodiversity hot spots like L.A.: go.nhm.org/digitized-ma...

While full solicitation isn’t up, looks like we have 2025 proposal deadlines for the GRFP: www.nsf.gov/funding/oppo...

Today 14 scientific societies in #ecology #evolution and #marineScience are publishing the results of a survey that finds negative impacts of federal policies on food security, flood mitigation, infectious disease preparedness, and wildlife conservation: 🧪👩‍🔬 www.firsthandaccounts.org/impacts/2025...

Obviously a lie, since the definition of PhD-level expertise, standard across universities worldwide, is that you can produce original knowledge.

“If the DOJ can investigate faculty governance bodies for citing a university's own strategic plan, then no campus is safe. "Let's call this what it is: a gross misuse of federal power to chill speech, silence faculty, & undermine shared governance.” — Todd Wolfson, AAUP President

🌊❄️🧪 🇦🇶 Please share: We have learned that the National Science Foundation is moving ahead with plans to decommission the U.S. Research Vessel/Ice Breaker Nathaniel B. Palmer this October. If you care about Antarctic research, please read on (1/n)

there is a certain liberal anti-affirmative action scholar who has insisted, like a rube, that once racial preferences are gone we can build support for class-based affirmative action. but the people who oppose affirmative action also very obviously oppose redress for class inequality!

The US government is aiming to get rid of a quarter million people involved in science research and education by 2026.