Today I've written for Arguably on one big mystery in our public life: why does no-one care about the existential crisis of our universities? Read all about it... 👇 www.arguably.uk/p/the-quiet-...

Professor Mark Chaplain FRS is elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. He is an applied mathematician whose main area of research is mathematical oncology – the mathematical modelling of cancer – a field which he has pioneered since the early 1990s. #RSFellows https://bit.ly/4vfM4DZ

I’ve officially resigned as Associate Editor for Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience. It used to be a reputable journal, but became a case study in how forced automation destroys academic integrity. 👇

Two telescopes, two epochs, the same nebula. You might have to stare for a little bit to fully appreciate all the movement going. Apologies to any faint stars who got deleted. I tried to remove the NICMOS PSFs from the Hubble view (which is lower resolution/blurrier)

Did I wake up in an alternative reality at some point?

On Choosing an Academic Career … what it takes, what it offers, and what it demands profserious.substack.com/p/on-choosin... by @profserious.bsky.social #HigherEducation #Universities

I predicted 10 out of 17 studies correctly in Guess the Replication, reaching the rank of "Reviewer 2"! Can you do better? Play here: t1p.de/guther #GuessTheReplication

Steam loco royalty visiting Nottingham Transport Heritage Centre this weekend. Kids loved the Flying Scotsman footplate visit - with exit through the corridor tender too - plus a train ride pulled by Tornado. I loved it even more.

Design legend Margaret Calvert is 90 today. Look at that cake! If you've ever admired a road, rail or metro sign in Britain it's likely she had something to do with it. One of Britain's design heroes - happy birthday to her. Photo by: @oshgallerylondon (IG) Cake by: mybaker.co

Due to #Microsoft price hikes our uni have started archiving #Office365 things >90 days old. Emails and calendar items go into an archive. To-do list (to-do.office.com) items disappear into the ether, never to be seen again. Sorry if I owe something you told me about >90 days ago. It is gone.

Hominins built with wood 476,000 years ago www.nature.com/articles/d41...

NEWS: The ERC Scientific Council has listened to the concerns from members of the research community about changes to the re-submission rules, intended to manage the surge in demand for grants. The Scientific Council will readjust some of the changes: link.europa.eu/TBqRQJ

John Gurdon (1933-2025) by Jim Smith journals.biologists.com/dev/article/...

Curious about how we assess grant applications? We’re inviting researchers to observe a Wellcome funding advisory committee in action. Apply by 11 May 2026 ⤵️ wellcome.org/research-fun...

Don't you f**king dare.

🚨 Latest paper out now 🚨 by @mattjowen.bsky.social and me: "Continuation methods as a tool for parameter inference in models of biological oscillations: A case study in electrophysiology modeling" in doi.org/10.1016/j.ph... short tweetorial follows ..... 🧵1/6

New post, on how AI is normalising n=1 experiments: kucharski.substack.com/p/ai-has-an-...

Me writing EU grant applications: Part B1: I can't possibly squeeze everything they need to know in there. Part B2: but I already explained exactly what you need to know precisely and accurately, I can't make it longer now

How can this go on for another 3 years?

Every day is a good day for sharing one of the most useful papers about research data ever written. PLEASE get your people to understand and follow this advice. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

So, BlueSky, one of my passions is the study of tea in WW2. I need you to watch this oral history from three ex-tea ladies from the Bermondsey WVS. Because you could guess for ONE THOUSAND YEARS and you would not guess where it is going... #skystorians #history #tea

Peak time express train 6.02pm out of St Pancras. In the 12 seats around me there is one other person. Pricing must be significantly higher than optimal for (a) customers, (b) income for train company, (c) the wider economy. On the plus side it's very pleasant.

Explainer: UK government has announced a suspension on student visa applications from nationals of Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar and Sudan. Details here www.gov.uk/guidance/vis...

Data

Pretty convinced that nursery fees being in the basket of goods is solely responsible for keeping inflation above 2%. ...<googled>... Oh look, nursery fee inflation actually is 8% 🤯! www.ons.gov.uk/economy/infl... Not sure whether to be relieved ours isn't an outlier or to start a nursery.

It's never not been crazy-making to me that we'll have hundreds of thousands of words written about a 2% change to income tax either way and the impact it'll have in the economy, but 9% of half the population under 35 is waved away as a private matter, or "only the price of a gym membership".

Abysmal, immoral, cruel, small hearted, tiny minded, ineffective, undemocratic, and just generally utterly indecent. What a bitter godforesaken disappointment these people are. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

New Ep now up. Stewart Lee and I discuss swearing at the BAFTA’s, Blair’s legacy and Gerry Adams trampolining naked with a dog. #StrongMessageHere www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

I'll just repost this today #ByElection #UKPolitics

The government's immigration plans: a dog’s dinner of half-conceived policy, Reform rhetoric, mean-spirited sentiment, and profound intellectual muddle iandunt.substack.com/p/can-we-ext...

‘Is university still worth it?’ is the wrong question - giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/... via @FT

NEW: The FDA just shot down Moderna's new flu shot. From me: www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

Paradise Bay, Urupukapuka. Not bad!

Die, Dichotomy. www.linkedin.com/pulse/die-di... A brief post encouraging you to read the original paper with @erik-van-zwet.bsky.social and @f2harrell.bsky.social . onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10....

#TheBomb podcast is excellent. Season 3 about the Cuban Missile Crisis is inspired, narrated by family of the two leaders - Max Kennedy and Nina Khrushcheva - really enlightening about how both sides were thinking: www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p...

Just tried to unlock my office door with car key fob. Is it only two weeks since Christmas break?

another robot highlight for 2025: man wearing humanoid mocap suit kicks himself in the balls

"more than a dozen ex-[Tory] MPs and one sitting member have defected to Reform since the election (admittedly to the improvement of both parties)." 🔥 from @financialtimes.com ! www.ft.com/content/d79f...

‼️Two new PhD positions open! One experimental, one modelling, exploring these beautiful collective dynamics in mitochondria across species. 🇳🇴, good pay, full staff benefits. [Shares much appreciated] Lab: www.jobbnorge.no/en/available... Modelling: www.jobbnorge.no/en/available...

Generative AI is amazing at tasks where I am not qualified to judge the output.

PhD position with John King at University of Nottingham @ University of Nottingham, UK Deadline: 9 Jan 2026 www.nottingham.ac.uk/mathematics/...

At the @uniofnottingham.bsky.social faculty of Science Christmas lecture. Here's a sustainability periodic table showing the abundance of the elements.

Can't help but think the best way to assess a research strategy is to assess the research it produces. Are the people that told #REF2029 they need to assess the strategies the same people who create strategies? www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-r...

NEW BLOGPOST Abolishing trial by jury: why is the government overlooking the obvious? thesecretbarrister.com/2025/12/02/a...

Quite enjoying #StrongMessageHere podcast @aiannucci.bsky.social : I'm an influencer. No you're not. Get to school 🤣

Friends. Comrades. I have QUESTIONS, especially about item 4 there.

📝 Excited to share our latest work, now out at European Heart Journal! We studied 252 SCN5A variants previously found in patients with Brugada Syndrome, an inherited arrhythmia disorder linked to sudden cardiac death. [1/4]

I hope @teamlabouruk.bsky.social are getting some statistical input. If 84% of your landslide-victory voters have unfavourable view of Farage, adopting policies he likes is not going to be a winning strategy (as you can see from how well Davey and Polanski are polling amongst your core vote).