The NIH is an ENORMOUS bargain for the American people. Do folk think that private industry will do the background slog work for drug discovery for 250K direct costs?

Absolutely this. Bell Labs was very productive when I was a kid. But they, as a monopoly, basically had the ability to tax the entire US population. Moreover, while they published or otherwise disseminated some of their findings, they kept some just for A T & T.

Atlas: "Abolish the NIH" I think this article needs peer review.... www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

California’s Point Reyes is getting a chance to rewild after a 2025 legal settlement led 10 of 12 commercial cattle operations to leave the park. Around 69 km² of former ranchland is slated for restoration, including some of California’s last native coastal prairie. buff.ly/0SFCvpP #ShareGoodNewsToo

4/ Remember that flu vaccine that RFK Jr.’s FDA said they wouldn’t review and then, after immense backlash, reviewed again? Well, we got exciting news: An FDA advisory panel voted 9-0 to back Moderna's mRNA flu vaccine, mFlusiva.

WindWaterSolar has met 58.7% of all demand in '26 (v 48.9% in '23) and >100% for an avg of 5.33 h/day. 91 of the last 92 days and 157 of 182 days (86.3%) in 2026 with WWS > 100% of demand for part of the day.

California may soon be able to eliminate entirely fossil gas peaker plants because a combination of batteries, hydro, and imports (which themselves are 58% WindWaterSolar and growing) provide the exact same service but at a much lower cost and faster ramp rate (and more cleanly and safely).

Important to understand how Rs in Congress are attempting to weaponize a many decades old scandal to undermine the credibility of the government and scientists today. Great piece from @elizabethginexi.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/elizabet...

Everybody in the "climate space" (which means everyone on earth...) needs to understand these mind-blowing figures. Google's "total electricity consumption jumped from 31 terawatt hours (TWh) in 2024 to 43 TWh in 2025." In ONE year. The AI corporate arms race is eating the world.

More weird RNAs! 🤯

The image here borrows its title from Grant's 1868 presidential campaign slogan, "Let us have peace." Here's what Frederick Douglass had to say about that sentiment.

Did you know? Renewables have just overtaken coal as the world's largest source of electricity 34% – global renewable share, up 2x in 20yrs 48% – EU 37% – China 26% – US 24% – India

This is my lane. I went through the 194 Trump v Barbara opinion from yesterday section by section, noting what they got right about US migration and citizenship history, and what the dissents get wrong. Please share if you think it is helpful to others.

We're no longer asking whether mRNA works. We're refining it. New in Nature: ac4C, an mRNA modification that boosts protein yield AND accuracy, reducing translational errors. This is what a maturing platform looks like—precision, molecule by molecule. 🔗 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Not Claude advertising their new model to me using a left-handed helix

Really, I mean it. No more metaphors.

Forever grateful to Michele Goodwin for getting Erwin Chemerinsky, @sifill.bsky.social, @moiradonegan.bsky.social, @jamellebouie.net, @mjsdc.bsky.social, & I together to talk through the SCOTUS term each year. It's so important to be able to process it all with such an incredible group of people.

One of the oddest things to get across to non-genetics/genomicists is just how weird and varied hetreogametic sex development pathways are. You just ... could not make it up. (eyes sideways to the platypus - in particular you!). So - ribosomal protein as sex determining factor. Just normal crazy.

My quote of the day What is considered the best presently available climate model for treatlng the Greenhouse Effect predicts that a doubling of the C02 concentratlon ln the atmosphere would produce a mean temperature increase of about 2°C to 3°C over most of the earth. James Black Exxon, 1977

A University of Hawaiʻi report says that building more solar farms with battery storage is the most cost-effective way to power Oʻahu, rather than building new power plants. The electricity company doesn’t agree. Lol.

Just like Jesus Christ, famous hater of the poor

Crónicas de una muerte anunciada

Incredibly proud of Messi Haile @mehsehret.bsky.social, a founding member of the Ho Lab, for her beautiful work uncovering the inner workings of a central piece of the malaria parasite invasion machinery: the malarial moving junction, out today in @cellpress.bsky.social! tinyurl.com/4p3md2eb 🦠❄️🔬

I’ve got a piece in the @nytimes.com this morning about yesterday’s decision in Slaughter - and also about how any post-Trump response *must* include Supreme Court reform www.nytimes.com/2026/06/30/o...

My first PhD paper is out in Nucleic Acids Research! We describe "Ab-trapping" - an antibody artifact that distorts assays relying on antibody diffusion (microscopy, CUT&Tag, CUT&RUN). The revisions made the story much stronger. Check it out! doi.org/10.1093/nar/...

Glad to see this story and coverage of an important paper. www.statnews.com/2026/06/17/n... 1/16

The famous "Wedges" paper was used repeatedly to shut us up when we argued against the continued use of fossil fuels, and, esp, against carbon capture and storage and the mass use of bioenergy. "But these eminent scientists say ..." Now we learn BP co-authored it. www.propublica.org/article/wedg...

The Kaplan Lab at the University of Pittsburgh has received funds to recruit a postdoctoral fellow to establish a multiplexed assay of variant effect for a disease gene. This relates to our studies on RNA Polymerase II. This project requires experience with human cell lines and genomics 1/

This is what we are losing—giants in their fields are facing lab closures. We MUST fight as hard as we can, right now, TOGETHER. @standupforscience.net

One prominent group has been totally silent about the Trump administration’s latest attempt to grab control of all federal science funding. That’s the biopharma companies, and their suddenly shy, quiet CEOs. Here’s the calculation they’re making:

You may have heard about the OMB rule change that will put politics over federal grants. However bad you think it is? It's probably worse. Thanks to @theverge.com for letting me report this one out. There is still time to comment. bit.ly/4v2X4nQ

Terrific resource, now on @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social: The Vertebrate Genomes Project Phase I: A global reference genome resource 🧪🧬 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

So @propublica.org came in with guns blazing after CMI, PEI, and my good friend and mentor, Rob Socolow. www.propublica.org/article/wedg... I worked with Rob and Steve and debated the potential efficacy of CCUS all the time (I was not, and am not, a fan).

RECORD YEAR: 2025 was the biggest year ever for renewables. A record 692 GW was added, mostly solar. More importantly, non-fossil sources generated 43% of the world's electricity and fossil generation fell. More in Bright Spots: open.substack.com/pub/janrosen...

The minute I saw QED’s “top 1%” my allergic reaction was: there we go, biases will now become *entrenched* but under the guise of a bloody machine that purports to be unbiased. But my colleague Ran’s analysis is quantitative and shows that. 👏👏👏

NIH grants have been under political scrutiny since early 2025. But what does the screening process actually look like? What is being flagged? I spent a month digging into leaked docs and emails. We've published the 235-word list that are being flagged by an internal AI tool. And so much more. 🧵

If you want to know JD Vance’s character, he demonized Haitians with an ugly and pernicious lie that they ate dogs and cats, joked about it. The Supreme Court has killed their Temporary Protected Status and they are scrambling. www.thebulwark.com/p/after-supr... www.thebulwark.com/p/after-supr...

A few days ago I posted about a funny and smart interview Ezra Klein did with writer Gary Sheyngart. They discussed his prescient novel about a pathetic dystopian society where everyone is constantly being officially ranked based on every possible criteria. And then I hear about QED! 👌

The entire fuckin point of the national mall is loitering

The scientists behind Climate.us are the same experts Trump fired because they were researching and reporting on climate change. Formerly NOAA’s Climate.gov. They didn’t disappear. They rebuilt.

Fresh off of endorsing Chris Rufo —by name—and his vision to destroy higher education, Yale is rushing to help the Trump admin resegregate education. An absolute disgrace.

„The machine had not read her paper. It had converted it into tokens, multiplied them through several billion weights trained on PubMed and whatever the hell else was on the internet the day they scraped it, and output a percentile.“

Maine produced 65.2% of its electricity demand Q225-Q126 from WindWaterSolar, a higher percent than California. What was Maine's largest WWS electricity source? Solar. Solar: 23.14% (12.04% utility, 11.1% BTM) Water: 22.20% Wind: 19.84% Table 2 at web.stanford.edu/group/efmh/j...

Efficient sampling of reads (with replacement). www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

🔬 Your tax dollars once paid a physicist whose own colleagues told him he was wasting the university's money. In 1951, Charles Townes sat on a D.C. park bench and worked out, on the back of an envelope, how to force molecules to release coherent radiation. 🧵 1/5

"NIH officials are telling grantees who submitted annual progress reports [...] to remove papers that name co-authors affiliated with foreign institutions if NIH had not previously approved a foreign component." Sad and absurd in so many ways.

In the face of ongoing pressures and critique (including here by many), the public reaffirmation of the core mission of the National Academy of Sciences is a much-needed signal from incoming NAS President Neil Shubin. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Borrowing from @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social: I do not regret to inform you that we are going to win.