I’m on hols. & these are khai. Tiny Thai bananas. Which are 1. Delicious and 2. Remind me of a scientist I interviewed, whose job I really wanted. She travelled the world looking for local bananas, to breed resilience into the monocrop most of us eat in supermarkets. Banana Hunter = cool job.

Tired: Everything evolves to be a crab. Wired: Everything evolves to eat ants.

Some really interesting details in here: changes to the vaccine schedule for US kids, appeals to reason with ‘bringing it in line with Denmark’ plus various holes in that rational, and problems with the launch of this change.

This person went on a buying spree over the past 24 hours. Fresh wallet. Only existed since Dec 27th and has only bet on Venezuela-related markets. polymarket.com/@0x31a56e9E6...

This is just such a damned disgrace. A crime against knowledge and humanity itself.

My mate Marnie @amsterdammed.bsky.social Chesterton doing Quantum in Helgoland (Heligoland for the purists). Absolutely sublime wireless-output! :-) <3 And you lot moaned about the lack of Wizard of Oz this year!? www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

This is a photo of the surface of an asteroid It was taken from the *surface*I of that asteroid By a *bouncing rover* the size of a lunchbox (1/2)

Tomorrow, 9.30am, you know what you need? Half an hour of me trying to understand why Quantum is so hard to understand. Includes Carlo Rovelli, Elise Crull and @philipcball.bsky.social being brilliant. Solutions? less clear

Ever since the Oliver Sacks article in the New Yorker, I've been mulling why he embellished his stories of his patients. The lure of a good story over truth. Pleasingly, so have Tom Chivers and Stuart Ritchie in their excellent podcast. sciencefictionspod.substack.com/p/episode-92...

Dear maths people: How would you say this equation in words? X.sum()%2 (friend of mine narrating a book wants to know)

Help! Does anyone know what this is? I bought it at my local south Asian veg store because they didn’t have any spinach. The guy said it was something that sounds like “hosu hosu” but I clearly misheard. Anyway, I tried a bit of stem and it felt like I’d put a nettle in my mouth.

Arrived in Brooklyn just in time for Mamdani’s victory. Hilarious scenes as the cars slow down to shout at the cheering crowds. Car1: “I love socialism” Car2: “Fuck you, commies”

For 61 years the #BBCWorldService has been broadcasting the latest in science via its weekly Science in Action programme. That dies in the next half hour, with this final edition, reflecting on the fall in trust in expertise driven by malign interests over recent years.

Minority representation on TV causes outrage From the new Private Eye, in shops now.

It's a very interesting development because i know many in the industry expected to see chocolate substitutes / alternatives come in more gradually / subtly than this. But taking the "🎵if you like a lot of chocolate on your biscuit join our club!🎵" bar is a surprise. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

I'm recording a World Service show with a guest in Bengaluru.... and Diwali has kicked off big time - every time he talks, it sounds like there's a war zone in the back ground! 🎆

Just about to do Inside Science on Radio 4, featuring @pennysarchet.bsky.social talking fit mice, the moon & Shackleton; comedian @josielong.bsky.social on Megafauna and @philipcball.bsky.social unpicks the quantum in the Nobel Prize for Physics

Everybody makes money out of academic authors except the authors...News. Wiley is the latest academic publisher to reach a multi-million deal to allow access to its content to AI developers, with no opt out, let alone payment, for the authors who created that content.

Imogen was a novella about a pasty lumpen teenager who accidentally goes on holiday with a glamorous St Tropez gang. Pasty lumpen teenage me loved it. Even with the terrible puns.

My Queen is dead. Jilly Cooper is gone 💔

Conventional wisdom says motherhood should wait for tenure as before you land a permanent post, #academia is just not that family friendly🙁 @carersinstemm.bsky.social are calling for change and to celebrate their new report, a Saturday🧵on parenting & academia! 1/9 👩‍🔬🧪🔭⚛️ ℹ️: carersinstemm.co.uk

Right now, I’m on Radio 4’s Inside Science with @amsterdammed.bsky.social, chatting about my favourite science news: 🪐 potential signs exoplanet Trappist 1e could be habitable 🐨 a new vaccine for koala chlamydia www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

Just discovered that Jane Goodall like this! We discuss her life and legacy on Inside Science tomorrow. #RIPJaneGoodall

Someone, or some group, has cable-tied 16 union jacks around the BBC. Which feels excessive. I’d love to know if any outfit has a flag budget?

Simply astonishing. Maybe Lecturer A should not have to mark over 100 essays in a two-week window in the first place? Invest in qualified staff and reduce impossible workloads FFS www.kcl.ac.uk/about/strate...

Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, UN commission of inquiry says www.bbc.com/news/article...

Dear internet- if I’m doing a science show about trains for the World Service, what should I absolutely cover, topic-wise?

I can’t read this as anything other than sarcastic trolling from the NYT puzzle bot

Last week, I joined @amsterdammed.bsky.social on Radio 4’s Inside Science to chat about my favourite science news: 🌋 How a volcanic eruption might have sparked the French Revolution ☀️ A new way to detect worrying solar storms 🐕 Dogs can thrive on a vegan diet www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

‘On 18 August, judicial police showed up at the Research Institute in Health Sciences (IRSS) in Bobo-Dioulasso, a key partner in Target Malaria, to stage what scientists described as a “brutal, humiliating” raid.’ My story on mosquitoes, malaria and misinformation in @science.org 🧪

Alert for Train Fans: I’m doing a special episode of Unexpected Elements for the 200th anniversary of passenger trains. It’s for the BBC World Service and is science themed, so any stories or experts I should be looking at? Please let me know/retweet

This week on #bbcinsidescience: solar panels in space, @simonparkin.bsky.social and @valmcdermid.bsky.social talk about Simon’s book, The Forbidden Gardens of Leningrad, shortlisted for the @royalsociety.org Trivedi Book Prize. @adamhartscience.bsky.social talks hunting for conservation.

On Science in Action today: the editor who won't be cowed. Following RFKjr's astonishing attack on a vaccine safety study published in Annals of Internal Medicine, editor Christine Laine defends the research, and explains why his demand for its retraction is rebuffed. www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w...

What really killed Napoleon’s soldiers? I was on Radio 4’s Inside Science yesterday with @amsterdammed.bsky.social. Our favourite news: - what divorce looks like in birds - can we redirect spacecraft to look at a mysterious object which has entered our solar system? www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

This is the best threat for parents forced to look after the longed-for and neglected pet: “if you don’t clean its cage, it’s going to the zoo.”

We reported on this for BBC World Service’s Unexpected Elements last week… it seemed to make no sense to not use data you’re gathering anyway, so glad there’s been a u-turn on this matter

this week on #InsideScience. tsunami warnings, a Summer of Sports... data. And Scrumping. Primate scientist Cat Hobaiter explains why she's taken the word to describe how apes eat boozy fruit. Plus studio guest @garethmitchell.bsky.social on the best tech news. www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...

What flavour of quantum physics do YOU believe? @lizziegibney.bsky.social has done a helpful quiz in Nature: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

In November of 2016, nearly 60 years after the paper was published internally, I had discovered the joke. A few years later, I filed to have the paper declassified, and the NSA eventually agreed, and even put it up on their webpage: media.defense.gov/2021/Jul/14/...

Top UN court says countries can sue each other "over historic emissions of planet-warming gases." www.bbc.com/news/article...

Octopuses fall for the “rubber arm” illusion, just like us. Learn more: scim.ag/40xyT4y

Lots about the material of our age on #insidescience this week

🚨2 months ago, every National Weather Service Director of the last 34 years took the unprecedented step of signing a joint, open letter. “Our worst nightmare is that weather forecast offices will be so understaffed that there will be needless loss of life.” The Houston office is 44% UNDERSTAFFED.

Thanks to @amsterdammed.bsky.social for this episode of Unexpected Elements, taking my report on the wreck of the X-Press Pearl for a journey through the impact of the chemical disaster on plankton, shipping pollution, & protecting caribou from shipping lanes. www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w...

Proposed NOAA Budget Calls for $0 for Climate Research eos.org/research-and...

Europe’s heatwave: leaders should remind the public why ambitious targets matter With net zero targets under attack from the populist right, dangerously high temperatures should refocus minds #climatechange www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

On #insidescience this week - @chrislintott.bsky.social on the delights and demands of Vera Rubin images, @tweetisaurus.bsky.social on the new dino at @nhm.org and Simon Middleburgh on the air strikes at enrichment sites. Plus @carolinesteelscience talks through the week’s best science.

A HISTORIC MILESTONE: For the first time, solar power generated more electricity globally than nuclear, making it the world’s 4th largest power source. In just 5 years, solar output nearly tripled—from 79 TWh (Apr 2020) to 233 TWh (Apr 2025). The energy transition is speeding up. @ember-energy.org

The all excellent @carlzimmer.com was on Inside Science this week, talking about aerobiology, its history, Covid and more, all featured in his book AIRBORNE

People are having very strange conversations with ChatGPT, in which they discover secret cabals or conspiracies or that we are all in fact living in The Matrix. It sends these people into delusional spirals. Then ChatGPT tells them to email me about it. www.nytimes.com/2025/06/13/t...