Happy to share our paper now out in @cp-cellreports.bsky.social - and check out our thread about the findings at bsky.app/profile/vale...

The Leading Edge Fellows gathered this week to celebrate Zara Weinberg, a beloved member of our community. Our 7th cohort of Leading Edge Fellows (2026) will be named in her honor. The Zara Weinberg Leading Edge Cohort application is now open! Due Feb 2. www.leadingedgesymposium.org/apply/

What cell states are possible when they are missing key factors - Nanog, Pou5f3 (Oct4), & Sox19b (Sox2) - that are required for the first embryonic reprogramming steps? Follow along with our latest publication, finally out at doi.org/10.1016/j.ce... #devbio #reprogramming #zebrafish #embryo (1/6)

The President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship Program, PPFP, has been a jewel in the crown for faculty development and recruitment at the University of California for years and the results have been an expanded faculty with almost 100% tenure rates — unprecedented success.

Zara Weinberg passed away earlier this week. She joined my lab earlier this year when her postdoc lab formally closed. She was a brilliant scientist, supportive mentor, dear friend, avid music fan, rabid believer in public transit, open science champion, and above all just an amazing human.

Please help distribute this announcement for the Ph.D. in Biology Program @stowersinstitute.bsky.social

I have been trying to get this published as an op-ed, but I am going to post it here since I think it is timely in light of the "consent" extortion events. Deafening Quiet from the Scientific Establishment jeremymberg.github.io/jeremyberg.g... 1/14

As of this week, every public university in California is under investigation from the Trump administration for alleged antisemitism www.latimes.com/california/s...

“I will end my career writing dissent, that is my future. And you understand that you’re writing for a future society. That dissents are not about today. Dissents are writing for a future society that will take that dissent, that will be ready for that dissent, & enact it” @nhannahjones.bsky.social

I wrote this for my US friends and colleagues, but also for all of us. Lessons from the past. open.substack.com/pub/verakemp...

Trump wants UCLA to pay $1.2 billion to settle allegations it violated civil rights law. I took a look at the more than 7,300-word proposed UCLA settlement. Here's the detailed breakdown of Trump's plan to remake one of the nation's top public campuses: www.latimes.com/california/s...

Last week, Boston received a letter from AG Bondi threatening to prosecute officials and withhold funds unless we cooperate with carrying out mass deportations. The US Attorney General asked for a response by today, so here it is: stop attacking our cities to hide your administration’s failures.

A massive attack on several humanities units (Arabic Studies, Judaic Studies, Holocaust Studies, Classics, Religion, German & Scandinavian, Russian/East European/Eurasian Studies) *and* tenure now unfolding at the University of Oregon (a blue state!). Closure of units and faculty layoffs threatened.

*Please read and share!* My NIH funds at UCLA were suspended last week. It's hard to find the words to describe the impact of these grant suspensions. I have felt speechless and heartbroken that people in my lab, my friends, colleagues, researchers, trainees, and undergrads 1/9

BBC International Editor Jeremy Bowen has confirmed that the entire Al Jazeera team in Gaza City has been killed.

There is no nice, gentle way to say, “okay so a nation is, in effect, a currency, a military, and resource allocation. If you break all of those, you do not…have a country.”

The billion dollars is the least of it. It’s universities’ autonomy, independence, and integrity that Trump is really after. www.cnn.com/2025/08/08/p...

Well, this is a huge Executive Order power grab... www.whitehouse.gov/presidential... 1/3

The constitution. They sliced out the parts of the constitution that they don’t like from the government website. Yet another reminder that in an aspiring authoritarian government, you should never rely on online document as definitive sources.

“It backfired,” said one senior administrator at UCLA, reflecting the sense of whiplash felt among many who were interviewed. “Within hours of announcing our settlement, the DOJ was on our back.” www.latimes.com/california/s...

Terence Tao (@teorth.bsky.social) has written a thread on Mastodon about the impact of the federal grant freeze to UCLA, particularly to his own field of Mathematics. UCLA's IPAM (Institute of Pure and Applied Mathematics) could shut down entirely mathstodon.xyz/@tao/1149568...

Suspension of all grants to UCLA www.latimes.com/california/s...

Transitions in development – an interview with Jeffrey Farrell @jeffreyafarrell.bsky.social talks about becoming a group leader, his insights on advocacy for developmental biology and his belief in unifying single-cell biology with classical approaches. journals.biologists.com/dev/article/...

Gaza doctors ‘becoming too weak to treat patients’ as hunger crisis deepens

Last chance to sign up for the #GordonResearchConference on #Microproteins. Join us to learn about all things #DarkProteome / #RiboSeq! Poster awards are still available for trainees! Get your abstracts in by July 20!!! #Proteomics #RNASky #GENESky #Bioinformatics www.grc.org/decoding-mic...

“When the Executive publicly announces its intent to break the law, and then executes on that promise, it is the Judiciary’s duty to check that lawlessness, not expedite it.” -Justice Sonia Sotomayor

The UFW can confirm farm workers were critically injured yesterday during chaotic raids in Ventura County, CA. Other workers, including US citizens, remain unaccounted for. UFW staff is on the ground supporting impacted families. Our full statement below. ⬇️ 1/

Bass: I just signed an executive directive that puts all city departments and leadership on notice to protect Angelenos—essentially from the federal government. We’re also filing a FOIA request because we want to know: Who are these masked men, and why are they masked in the first place?

A major problem in the US is that many people understand freedom to mean “I should be free of any inconvenience” instead of “we should all be free”

1) it was always fascism and fascism was the right word to use 2) they are building concentration camps and concentration camps are the right words to use 3) they are banning books and book bans is a fine way to describe the myriad ways they are banning them

If the GOP reconciliation bill passes, ICE gets through FY2029: - $45 billion for detention, on top of the current annual budget of $3.4 billion - $14.4 billion for transportation and removal, on top of the current annual budget of $750 million - $8 billion for hiring/retention - Billions more.

"No right is safe in the new legal regime the Court creates. Today, the threat is to birthright citizenship. Tomorrow, a different administration may try to seize firearms from law-abiding citizens or prevent people of certain faiths from gathering to worship... I dissent. " - Sotomayor

I'm going through the (extensive!) literature about making STEMM, and biomedical research in particular, more equitable and y'all, I see why they were so triggered: It's COMPELLING AF

Want to write to your community about the importance of science funding? Join me on zoom this Friday at 12pm ET / 9am PT to learn to write an op-ed as part of the #McClintockLetters initiative! Sign up to write a letter and register for the workshop here: blogs.cornell.edu/asap/events-...

Happy Pride Month, shoalmates! 🏳️‍🌈 🏳️‍⚧️🐟 Our own Danny-O the #zebrafish is rockin’ the rainbow guitar this month 💪 #NewProfilePic

If a foreign government conspired to decimate US science and technology in a manner akin to what Project 2025 architects purport to do, we would go to war. Just because they are under a cloak of self declared patriotism does not mean that they are not effectively acting as enemies of the state.

You see, when your whole life has been a series of transactions, designed for personal gain, it’s perhaps impossible to comprehend the idea of public goods. When government has only ever been an obstacle for your personal goals, you can’t appreciate it as a system that creates things for others.

We are thrilled to announce the 2025 Leading Edge Fellows! 40 outstanding postdoctoral fellows doing pioneering research in a wide range of biological and biomedical disciplines. Learn more about these exceptional scientists: www.leadingedgesymposium.org/fellows

Now is the time to reserve your spot for the 2025 Gordon Research Conference on #microproteins. Come join us in beautiful Barcelona in August! www.grc.org/decoding-mic...

“The fact is, the battle over “DEI” has always been a fight about labor, work, and who has access to the jobs and political institutions that build and protect wealth. If we ever forgot that, we’re learning it again now.”

Science under siege: protecting scientific progress in turbulent times journals.biologists.com/dev/article/...

My latest post is now out. I show how Trump's attacks on science and universities are neither random nor new - they fit very precisely into the authoritarian playbook. This means we can guess what might come next and prepare - and we must! christinapagel.substack.com/p/censor-pur...

The United States government just disappeared a lawful US resident because it didn't like his speech. You should care about this because it shouldn't happen to anyone, but you should also care because it could happen to you. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/09/n...

Toni Morrison:

UPDATE—Mahmoud's attorney says they do NOT know where he is. They were first told he was sent to an ICE facility in Elizabeth, NJ. But when his 8-month-pregnant wife tried to visit him, she was told he's not there. They've received reports he may be sent as far away as Louisiana.

"No one is coming out of the sky to give you your grant money. Your citation portfolio won’t survive this market crash. Your credentials mean nothing. Everything is going to change." New for @undark.org undark.org/2025/03/06/o...