Off to the first of five “Summer of Nanopore” workshops. More than 100 faculty across the U.S. be trained, joining a growing network of educators making genome sequencing a routine part of classroom learning and research experiences. Box 1 of 3; water surveillance mobile lab!

The UK has avoided the need for gas imports worth £1.7bn since the start of the Iran war, as a result of record electricity generation from wind and solar. 🔎 This is according to a new analysis by Carbon Brief. www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-win... #DonaldTrump #ActOnClimate #ClimateActionNow

Pleased to talk about two related papers from our lab this Spring in GENETICS @genetics-gsa.bsky.social. These two studies are each the work of graduate students in my lab, with contributions from our colleagues. I will describe our system first and then each of the studies /1

Cool, so NSF is now going to be used to essentially launder money to tech bros because universities are just too cumbersome and disciplinary oversight and regulations and accountability are all just too stifling for innovation. $1.5B for “X-Labs.”

Butterfly eggs, perfected micro-geometry which distributes stress across the shell resisting impact, pressure and deformation.-Alix Willemez

Dinner: Wood-grilled wild salmon with berbere spice over homemade pesto genovese on reginette pasta, with tomatoes and white balsamic.

Unearthed reports reveal that RFK Jr. fired every full-time CDC cruise ship sanitation inspector ahead of the Hantavirus cruise ship outbreak. www.cbsnews.com/news/cdc-cru...

These viruses have been known problems in Korea for so long that there’s literally a M*A*S*H episode about them. People work their whole careers on viruses most people have never heard of…so that you never have to hear about them.

i think i'm going to lose my mind since there's a significant chunk of our society who reacts to science being prepared for or solving any issue as proof of a conspiracy. they just keep getting louder.

PEOPLE WORK THEIR WHOLE CAREERS ON THINGS MOST PEOPLE HAVE NEVER HEARD OF SO THAT YOU NEVER HAVE TO HEAR ABOUT THEM

It’s not too late to submit your work to #BOSC2026! The Late Poster submission deadline is a week from today: Thursday, May 7. We’d love to hear about what you’re doing in the wide world of #OpenSource #Bioinformatics, #OpenScience, or #OpenData! 🍐 More info: www.open-bio.org/events/bosc-...

This is essentially the basis for our vision of "the article of the future" as a constellation of linked web elements. The data cannot be contained in the paper but a representation is shown. Ideally this is linked to auditable data in a repository 2/n journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

Just a reminder: the biggest killer of children under 5 years old in the world is rotavirus. Roughly 128,000 to over 200,000 children die every year. Vaccination has reduced global deaths by over 65% since 2000 and much of that was USAID. USAID also distributed Pedialyte saving more lives.

So, friends: I promised I'd tell the story. Now I shall. Let a (former) psych nurse tell you the true (gods help us) story of a night in a big-time NYC emergency room: and the arrival of The Man With The Bloomingdales Bag. (1/n)

The Flower Moon rises over Manhattan skyline in a stunning astronomical spectacle

Going full @jasonwilliamsny.bsky.social on this: Consummé and carmelized allium/wild mushroom/ricotta handmade ravioli. Will be served in arugula pesto. Whole wheat sourdough. Still to come: butternut squash purée and blanched English peas. Everything handmade from first principles.

Monopolies just make things worse, example infinity (this is just really bad)

Excellent deep dive. Lots to absorb and good resources for actions to take.

Speaking with a colleague tonight about the logistics of rebuilding science. Both of us agreed that 1) the amount of damage to science is currently under appreciated and 2) it will likely take a decade to fix the damage that has already been done. We have lots of work to do.

A modest proposal for the @asterainstitute.bsky.social "Why Every Scientist Should be a Member of the National Academy of Sciences — Making the Invisible College transparent in the age of AI-amplified error" jasonwilliamsny.substack.com/p/why-every-...

While the non-disclosure of the conflict of interest is a serious issue, it is also important to point out that @sholtodavid.bsky.social and others found several instances of image duplication in this paper. pubpeer.com/publications...

Needs a “Correct an error no one else seems to notice” option.

this would fix the website

More details on the firing of the National Science Board. The NSF now has no director, deputy director, or board. They have issued almost no new awards in 2026. The plan appears to be to completely destroyed the agency. The details are horrifying and have Russ Vought written all over them.

From @ppalagi.bsky.social, @jasonwilliamsny.bsky.social and colleagues in @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social | #Community needs for #FAIR #pathogen data | #Education #Bioinformatics #Proteomics #Genomics #OpenScience | 🧬 🖥️ 🧪 🔓 ⬇️ www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

I want those who destroyed USAID to understand the enormity of what they have done. AIDS assistance has saved hundreds of thousands. Rotavirus is the largest killer of children under 5 in the world. Malaria, nutrition, clean water, etc... USAID saved an estimated 92 million lives over 20yrs.

Pollution levels in Paris after 10 years of advancing sustainable transport.

Heading into May of 2026 and so far this year, no new grants have been issued by the National Institutes of Health, National Eye Institute. No council meetings have been scheduled. An absolute, unmitigated disaster for vision research is setting up.

Blog post summarizing today's #IntegrityNASEM workshop, focusing on Bhattacharya's "fireside chat." TL;DR - Chat with the NIH director was the WORST part of the entire event. Pretty dire. Includes some choice quotes from @jenna-m-norton.bsky.social. neurodojo.blogspot.com/2026/04/nati...

This picture is more American than anything Norman Rockwell could have ever dreamed up

The comments and quotes are worth a read.

Flying with mom on this leg of the journey.

Let’s do this. JFK >SJU >JFK >HNL >ITO >HNL>JFK>ZRH >JFK

You have a little under two weeks to apply for BSA's @botsocamerica.bsky.social Impact Award! Deadline 5/1. Reach out with questions or with nominations, and apply! 💚

In August, Jay Bhattacharya said “Training future biomedical scientists” was the 1st priority for his version of NIH. But talk is cheap. Let’s see how JB’s doing. 🤔 NIH supports trainees mostly via fellowship (F), training (T), and career development (K) awards. Here are funding curves for each.🧵

"Much of OA policy is grounded in an ideology that treats everything as a market problem to be fixed through market instruments....neoliberal logic that gave rise to APCs" Whether or not you agree with the main thrust of this article, the above is accurate. 1/2 www.samuelmoore.org/2026/04/14/w...

Nice comprehensive science spending site from @jdworkin.bsky.social sciencespending.org#methods

HHMI CEO: "diamond funding should be deployed to sustain repositories [i.e. preprint servers] and connective infrastructure that focus on researcher-shared outputs" zenodo.org/records/1960...

Our first preprint from the outreach and training efforts of Pathogen Data Network. Follow up work and activities to build on this are underway. Community needs for FAIR pathogen data www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Poor Sleep Linked To Gong https://theonion.com/poor-sleep-linked-to-gong/

Greatest living musician still performing today. Martha Argerich Mischa Maisky Play Shostakovich Sonata for Violoncello ... youtube.com/shorts/fh7dt...

If you have never spent your days trying to juggle five unfunded mandates, please refrain from suggesting that we “save science” by adding a sixth.

More awards through GRFP this year! Yay!! Quick back of envelope comparison of awards by category to 2024 (skipping 2025 b/c it was weird): Life sci: 486/2599 18.5% ('26) 499/2036 25% ('24) ☹️ Eng: 914/2599 35% ('26) 532/2036 26% ('24) Comp sci: 261/2599 10% ('26) 151/2036 7% ('24) 🧪

The ultra-wealthy can’t cheat death, but they can use death to cheat taxes. Let me explain.

Now that my standard funding curves are updated weekly automatically on grant-witness.us (grant-witness.us/funding_curv...), I have been working on some other important items to track. One is the amount of funding committed to multi-year grants. 1/6

Stop tying my hands 😭!

Sullivan the foster kitty was really invested in the splashdown and capsule retrieval!

Why are their eyes giving off red flashes?