Today in blurry photos, a really delicious La Diablada pisco sour with homemade rose lavender syrup and peach bitters

yes that was a wild sentence — how did that get past the fact checkers? I graduated 20 years ago and every exam was hand-written.

I’m apparently 118 years old😭 www.nytimes.com/2026/05/17/o...

11.25 HOURS LATER WE GOT THE BIKE LANES!!!!!

The public hearing after party is at GW Masonic Memorial tonight

Sulfuric acid is the most widely produced chemical in the world. The Persian Gulf is a key source of the sulfur used to make sulfuric acid. But now the war in Iran is causing chaos in the flow of sulfur, threatening to increase prices across the economy. cen.acs.org/business/eco... #chemsky 🧪

Researching while Chinese: The full story of what is happening to Chinese postdocs--and faculty members--at the University of Michigan and Indiana University www.science.org/content/arti...

Here's what the US National Science Board wanted to say about competing with China before its members were fired www.science.org/content/arti...

Soumitra Athavale, an Assistant Professor at @uclacb.bsky.social and one of C&EN's 2026 Talented Twelve, is engineering iron-containing enzymes to do chemistry they’ve never done before. Read more: cen.acs.org/synthesis/bi... #CENT12 #chemsky 🧪

"American Jews can accommodate disagreement on theology, halachic observance, intermarriage, LGBTQ inclusion and American politics — but not Israel." forward.com/opinion/8245...

Qatar's helium has been off the market since the war in Iran begun in February, and tight supplies have scientists who depend on superconducting magnets worried. Read more in @cenmag.bsky.social cen.acs.org/business/spe... #helium #Iran #NMR #chemistry #NMRchat

Want to stay close to science, but you've decided the lab isn't right for you? Have you considered a career in editorial? Well, if you have a background in biomedical engineering or biomaterials (or materials science more generally - see linked ad) then your next job could be at Nature Materials!

Due to inflation, I've only got one turntable and half a microphone

It is hard to put into words how Mark impacted my life. His most incredible talent was in making people feel smarter than they actually were. 1/n

We're teasing T12 recipients in the lead up to our Talented 12 issue. Let us know if you can guess the T12-er based on their responses and stay tuned for the full Talented 12 feature publishing soon! #CENT12 #chemsky

Saw Project Hail Mary last night and I think the most interesting thing in the context of the time we’re in right now is that neither civilization tries to do the mission just with robots.

From all over the world from the very beginning, of disparate experiences, climates, and expectations, they quickly found that the best way to communicate is through music, dance and humanity. These are our best impulses and the things to celebrate the most.

Tailors, singers, builders, farmers, djelis, bards, princes, mothers, wives, sons, daughters, husbands…. People not often given a lot of choice, but who persisted and who make up the true tapestry of American culture.

We did it! Another sold out night at Carnegie Hall in the books. Thank you to everyone who was a part of my show: The Hidden Soundtrack of America. As I said onstage, WE get to choose the parts of America’s history that we celebrate.

Breaking news: Indiana University plant microbiologist Roger Innes has been locked out of his laboratory by the school in response to a request by one of his federal funders. The move comes after Innes complained about the government’s prosecution of Chinese postdocs. https://scim.ag/4tsDqRr

NEW: I wrote about a, quite frankly, fascinating form of energy storage. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Teamwork makes the dream work! #MerckChemistry

Hello #Chemsky.

ICYMI: My column on why we need to stop justifying human spaceflight with techno-myths. www.thenewworld.co.uk/philip-ball-...

Hi #chemsky were you affected by the Canvas outage? We at @cenmag.bsky.social would love to hear from you for a potential story! My DMs are open!

Anyway on another topic congrats Michigan www.nytimes.com/2026/05/07/e...

Is it too early to start drinking

I'm not the right person to post through this but living in Virginia right now (and over the past decade) gives you a vivid sense of just how many hurdles there are if you're committed to playing this game fairly.

This was not my favorite referendum! But it feels deeply undemocractic to let everyone vote and then decide after the fact they really would have preferred some other outcome.

The thing about the Virginia referendum is everybody had a chance to vote on it, and the lead-in was extraordinarily well-publicized. Extraordinarily. I realize the timing issue was real but the notion people had it front of mind last fall and felt meaningfully deprived seems thoroughly unlikely.

People here love books but I also think it’s true that they don’t organically *discuss* books they love here as much as on other platforms like Bookstagram, Book Threads, and Book Tok. It’s good for those of us who have followings to make our followers aware but that’s not a whole book culture.

So what happens next with the cruise ship MV Hondius and its passengers and crew? My story about how little we know about Andes virus transmission and deciding what to do now.“Honestly, I feel lucky that I am not in a situation that I need to make any decision,” says virologist Gustavo Palacios. 🧪

I really love this series from the NYT and this is an all-timer www.nytimes.com/2026/05/08/a...

This amazing image really captures the Tennessee fight and it's all over the internet. I am reposting it to encourage people to credit photographer Nicole Hester and the Tennessean.

After 15 years of reporting on infectious disease outbreaks, what continues to fascinate me about them is the challenge of making high-stakes decisions under uncertainty. The hantavirus outbreak on the MV Hondius is a perfect example My story in @science.org is here (and a thread to come): 🧪 #IDsky

My favorite thing about this post being at the top of a search for “canvas” is that there’s a book in it—history’s most reliable technology

Rule of 5…dimensions

Very complex

Not even one d-block element. smdh

Honestly look at this molecule—it’s ridiculous

Biocatalysts can build big molecules. A team at Merck & Co. developed a suite of enzymes that stitch together their oral PCSK9 inhibitor enlicitide. My latest for @cenmag.bsky.social cen.acs.org/pharmaceutic... #chemsky

Big news out of #EGU26 by @elisecutts.bsky.social for @science.org: Measures of the record-setting 1.2-million-year-old continuous ice core drilled by Beyond EPICA show that CO2 swings likely did help cause the mysterious transition to 100,000-year-long ice ages.

Also in @science.org for chemsky this week, Eugene Chen's group and Gregg Beckham's group team up to make more sustainable and recyclable PHA plastics www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

From Joelle Pelletier and Rebecca Buller in the Perspective "...seven engineered and three auxiliary enzymes, including industrially atypical enzyme classes...which each required extensive engineering (more than 50 mutations per enzyme on average)" www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

In @science.org for chemsky this week, we've got a blockbuster result from the Merck process team engineering enzymes to make the extraordinarily complicated macrocyclic peptide enlicitide. Follows in the footsteps of sitagliptin and islatravir. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Holden talks to Tim Snyder for @science.org www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWND...

A giant fish called the arapaima is the focus of a conservation success story in the Brazilian Amazon. Learn more in this week's issue of Science: https://scim.ag/3PtCVIN

Every quote in this @policyhound.bsky.social piece is more maddening than the last. Basically just hitting ourselves in the head with a hammer in this country right now.

In making the move, Meng is also stepping down as director of the $62 million Energy Storage Research Alliance (ESRA) based at Argonne National Laboratory [...] “The last 15 months have been extraordinarily difficult for the energy storage field...."