The Thermo Fisher situation keeps getting worse. We've now collected 450+ problematic images presented as verification data in TF's antibody catalog. This includes: 🖌️ Dozens more images with duplications or painting 🖨️ Hundreds of blots that all share the same background (behold slideshow below)

Of all the harm this administration has done to US science, today's proposed changes to the way federal grants are awarded and administered is the most damaging yet. The text of the federal register document is impenetrably tedious by design, so here's an excellent summary of what it says.

TL;DR: We've identified more than 100 cases of apparent manipulation in Thermo Fisher Scientific's antibody verification data. @sholtodavid.bsky.social @johanduchene.bsky.social reeserichardson.blog/2026/05/28/h...

shocking statistics, but only limited public outcry.. We should be more vocal about this tb.impactcounter.com

@johanduchene.bsky.social @sholtodavid.bsky.social Spent the last hour looking, found ten more apparently manipulated Western blots in Thermo Fisher's antibody verification data (across eight different catalogued products). Thread below. www.thermofisher.com/antibody/pro...

Surprised to discover that Thermo Fisher appears to show a fake western blot for the validation of one of their p53 antibodies. I've added a diagram to show the very similar bands. This does not appear to be one of the "published figures" but their own internal data.

CIHR has launched a trial ballon that suggests shifting to one competition a year. This is the worst idea I have heard in a long time. The only benefit is making top-line success rates look better than they are. Keep it as is, do in-person reviews, and keep the pain in the open.

Via @madhupai.bsky.social: "...every US$1 invested in TB yields $46 in benefits." "Greater investments by high-burden countries make them less reliant on development assistance and more likely to have a sustainable TB response"

BBSRC Early Independence Fellowships had an Outline stage this year to try help with amount of peer review. Turns out they received 586 applications, a 110% increase on 2025, and only typically fund 15 a year. They are cancelling this stage and going straight to full app with an institutional sift.

This is super cool. Perhaps finally pointing towards a purpose for vaults?

So we blocked IFNγ in Mtb infected macaques and….the animals were fine. Turns out mice overestimate the importance of IFNγ in TB because IFNγ drives iNOS in mice but not macaques or humans. This means we don’t actually know how T cells suppress Mtb. rdcu.be/ff9GB #tuberculosis #immunology

We have a PhD studentship open! (UK only sadly) but if you are or know a student keen to work on some *really* weird mycobacterial enzymes then get in touch! #glycotime Advert below www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Please repost! This comes from the good people at ChimeraX, who produce powerful up-to-date software to study protein (etc) structures, which are FREE to the community. 🙏 To stay viable and serve us, they need an experienced structural biologist to assume the leadership role on a funded project.

This is one of the cooler papers I have seen in a while: journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

New work from my team: pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/... We used probes to ID targets of carbapenems in M. abscessus. 17 targets active in both carbon starved and replicating cultures. Includes validation of 9 targets. Part of a special issue ("NTM Pathogens – Biology, Infection, and Drug Discovery).

Wonderful to have @pmoyniha.bsky.social from Western University, Canada (hosted by @lislowe.bsky.social) giving a @mhd-newcastle.bsky.social seminar @medicalsciencesncl.bsky.social @newcastleuni.bsky.social #mycobacterium #tb #cellwalls

Each publication in a #Microbio26 journal helps fund 4 student travel grants. Please publish with us if you can!

Always nice to have the chance to visit a UNESCO site. Giant’s Causeway, NI.

Looking forward to attending the @microbiologysociety.org annual general meeting in Belfast. I'll be speaking in the Mycobacteria session on Tuesday. Also plenty of posters from the group!

If you are working on staphylococci you might want to travel to Banff this September banff.isssi2026.com/event/ISSSI/...

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... If you ever need lto be convinced by how bad the "Contributed by" track is at @pnas.org ... Only author: David Lipman, handling editor: David Lipman. Only integrity-free person not embarrassed by such a paper: David Lipman. Even uses "I did" in the abstract. Shameful.

Please Repost 🔄 Global Staphylococcus research community is heading to the Canadian Rockies! Join the 20th International Symposium on Staphylococci and Staphylococcal Infections 📅 September 20–24, 2026 📍 Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, Banff, Canada #ISSSI2026 #Staphylococcus

PSA: If you are thinking about putting a 3D data plot into an output that will primarily be viewed in 2D, don't.

I should add this is just the tip of the iceberg. Plenty more to come on this story from our group, @proftracypalmer.bsky.social, @lislowe.bsky.social and others. There is such an astonishing diversity of toxins in these bacteria and so much we don't yet fully understand.

A Type VII-secreted toxin enables inter-mycobacterial competition https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.03.26.714487v1

#Microbiology The anti-tuberculosis drug bedaquiline targets the mycobacterial ATP synthase, but how that leads to bacterial death is unclear Here the authors clarify how bedaquiline works @jnblab.bsky.social @morwan.me #TBSky #antibiotics #AMR http://dlvr.it/TQjZ0W

We've been we've been working on this for quite a while now (hopefully published soon). Grateful to @proftracypalmer.bsky.social for concinving me & @lislowe.bsky.social that mycobacteria produce inter-bacterial toxins. Team science, led by @sambenedict5.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

With the rumblings around CIHR wanting to move to one cycle per year not going away, in consultation with a diverse stakeholder group, we have put together a letter for CIHR leadership. Please consider signing this letter and share/RT: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F... @cannabrain.bsky.social

This job really knows how to ruin your day sometimes.

Two post-doctoral positions open in our lab. We're looking for people with expertise in molecular microbiology and/or genome-scale tools. Initially 3 yrs, posts could be extended for upto 8 yrs. If you'd like to know more about us take a look at www.graingerlab.com www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DQY475/r...

New paper showing how tailed #phages recognize diverse #Pseudomonas #T4P! Outstanding work by PhD candidate Ikram Qaderi, building on work started a decade ago during my sabbatical in the McArthur lab and in collaboration with the Guarné lab, now at #McGill. @mcmasteriidr.bsky.social

When it rains myco publications in pours myco publications! Now out in PNAS tinyurl.com/2a6833n4 When @zestytoast.bsky.social accidentally isolated the long-chain acyl-CoA carboxylase, we quickly realized we were looking at a fascinating machine essential for building the mycobacterial membrane...

Out now in EMBO J ahead of World #TB day! Our friends at the TB Drug Accelerator identified EtfD as a high-priority target for fast acting treatments so @courbongautier.bsky.social jumped into action. Our EtfD assay & struct are already being used to help find new therapeutics tinyurl.com/3cb2j5k9

Does anyone know why Alphafoldserver.com has gotten really really slow lately?

In 1968 Finland banned for profit education, the few private schools that exist in Finland have to reinvest any profit they make or pay it back to parents. It has been in the Top 3 in education for the last 20 years. There should be no profit in education or healthcare.

I've seen a couple posts on here about Cerillo plate readers. Is there someone out there actively using one now that I can ask a few questions of?

On old twitter you could mute specific phrases. It worked well for his first term. Does anyone know how to do this on here? I can’t seem to find it.

One of the best parts about being an Editor at @microbiologysociety.org journal is sending out paper acceptance letters.

CIHR funding rate: 13.6%. Early 2000s: 30%+. Canada’s new $1.7B Impact+ program recruits talent — but without increased Tri-Council base funding, we risk further strain on an already stretched system. We’re calling for $1B over 5 years. Support here: tinyurl.com/33c5av46

Always surprised when I talk to non-scientists about TB and they assume it is no longer an issue.

If you do TLCs and need to dip for staining, either get or find someone with a 3D printer that can print polypropylene or buy a printer. We've been making custom dip tanks for a bit now and it's great. Can print a tank for 1/100th (orless?) of the cost Sigma sells them for, and at more useful sizes.

In our most recent work David Forrest has discovered a widespread mechanisms linking transcription initiation to DNA supercoiling... www.nature.com/articles/s41...

How are Americans not in the streets? Why is this being allowed to continue? The French get what they want because they start protesting and don’t stop until they achieve change.

NO OF COURSE THERE ISN'T YOU DOORKNOB WHY DOES THIS CHUCKLEFUCK HAVE TENURE AT HARVARD AND I'M SLINGING DRINKS TO SCOTTSDALE'S MOST ENTITLED CHILDREN

Report card day for 3 kids - they are killing it. Manuscript revisions finally resubmitted. Nice data in the lab. Been a good friday.

Finally comms from UKRI - on a Sunday evening. No mention of the hundreds of ECRs who will see their careers ended by these decisions and notably no explanation for MRC retrospectively applying cuts and wasting all the work that went into writing, reviewing and scoring applications - £millions

Do you think since UKRI are pausing funding they wouldn't mind if I paused filling out ResearchFish?

Truly heroic effort by Robin Lissner in @wilbertbitter.bsky.social's group to knock out every single lipoprotein in Mycobacterium marinum. He found a lot of cool stuff, and we were fortunate to help out with some of it. Check out the paper here: journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

If you or someone you know is looking for a post-doctoral position working on mycobacterial envelope biology, please get in touch. I am recruiting here at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, Canada.

Federal funding announced today will support #WesternU's newest Canada Research Chair, @schulichmeddent.bsky.social prof Patrick Moynihan, & seven renewed chairs across campus. Western also receives $13.9M from Tri-agency Institutional Programs Secretariat to support the indirect costs of research.