Tony Harrison, poet and dramatist, dies aged 88

63 years ago, on the 27th of September 1962, Rachel Carson's book Silent Spring was published. It handled the environmental harm caused by the pesticide DDT and the disinformation spread by the chemical industry. Carson managed to sway public opinion and even policy. #otd #history 🗃️

We really enjoyed putting together this Darwin Review for JXB. Fun to think about how carboxysomes work and why plants don't have them. @jxbotany.bsky.social Function, Evolution, and Future of Carboxysomes url: academic.oup.com/jxb/article-...

Thinking about Carole Cadwallader right now

This is an excellent example of the slimy lying tactics employed by the political right. @mrjamesob.bsky.social on @lbc.co.uk sets up the frame nicely here. #NigelFarage moves the goalposts on his lying by later demanding that others prove a negative re his utterly dishonest claims backing up Trump

From the newly released Epstein docs submitted to congress "Elon musk to island Dec. 6"

Earth’s journey through the Milky Way’s dense spiral arms might have churned up the planet’s surface go.nature.com/3Ildx4C

Chief executive Ben Lamm says the name of Colossal Biosciences aims to capture biodiversity challenges and excite children about a flagship species go.nature.com/47Y7KMJ

The paper we have just published is better, but I also touched on some of the topics detailed there in this short #scicomm talk on the value of "negative" results, #reproducibility and research evaluation... The talk is in Spanish, but you can tweak the YouTube subtitles. youtu.be/DnZ3Q8IJxWo?...

The impact dinosaurs had on Earth was so big that their extinction seems to have caused dramatic and wide-ranging changes to the planet’s landscapes, such as by shifting rivers.

I get that the news cycle is packed right now, but I just heard from a colleague at the Smithsonian that this is fully a GIANT SQUID BEING EATEN BY A SPERM WHALE and it’s possibly the first ever confirmed video according to a friend at NOAA 10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)

Looking for some clarity in the labyrinth of terms regarding lateral root initiation (priming, founder cell specification, pre-branch sites, oscillation zone, root clock,...)? Here is our new paper hopefully bringing some light in the darkness: track.smtpsendmail.com/9032119/c?p=...

Mrs R: "There was a woman on the ward today who didn't want to take paracetamol. We've had to explain that we're not giving it to her because she's got a fever and we want her to feel better, but because she's got a fever and if we don't get her temperature down then her baby is going to die."

Some of us do.

This is exactly the kind of studies we should be doing. LLM are good at some things and bad at others. We need a more comprehensive cataloging of what they are good and bad at. Combating LLM by proactively declaring they are bad at everything won't work, because they *are* good at something.

What on Earth is this? An "in depth" BBC article about free speech in the UK that only cites examples of right-wing/ 'anti-woke' speech being suppressed. How can you mention Lucy Connolly but completely ignore Palestine Action / Just Stop Oil? Gob-smacking. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

🚨 Calling all #PlantScience ECRs! 🚨 JXB is now inviting applications for its 2026 Editorial Internships 🌱✍️ 🧪 ✨ You’ll gain: 🌿 Behind-the-scenes publishing experience 📝 Write commentary pieces 🤝 Join our 2026 Editorial Board meeting 👩‍💻 🗓️ Deadline: 30 Sept 👉 bit.ly/jxbinterns @sebiology.bsky.social

Kenneth Clark on the virtue of kindness. Kindness. When he recorded this, its place as the core value of modern civilization must have seemed firmly established. Yet look at us now. (And yes, he's white, patrician, and complacent. But he's also right.) www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p...

🌱 Fully funded PhD scholarship in Environmental Humanities at Ghent University! A unique opportunity to collaborate with Marco Caracciolo, Elly McCausland, and me on innovative research connecting literature, culture, and ecology.

1/ 🌱 When plants face stress, they often suppress growth to save resources. In our new Science Advances paper, we reveal how: plants repurpose their ER quality control machinery (ERAD) to regulate auxin compartmentalization and thus growth. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Insect-derived long non-coding RNAs function as epigenetic effectors to reprogram plant immunity https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.09.21.677575v1

New Senedd report: 📉 Exports to the EU down 31% 💷 Businesses facing spiralling costs and red tape 🇪🇺 Wales sidelined in UK–EU talks It's time for all politicians in Wales to help reverse this mess, to make our economy stronger and households better off. 👇🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 nation.cymru/news/major-r...

Pet parrots which typically live alone (whilst those in the wild live in large flocks) were given the technology to call each other. They would use it for up to three hours a day, and developed favourite friends 💔 on.ft.com/3K05vhS

“Harvard geneticist David Reich said … increasingly sophisticated analysis of genetic material made possible by technological advances shows that virtually everyone came from somewhere else, and everyone’s genetic background shows a mix from different waves of migration that washed over the globe.”

Experiments on Earth indicate some common species of bacteria and fungi could survive for several days on the moon's surface, suggesting missions must take stronger precautions to avoid contamination

It's hiring season at @iast.fr! - 2y research postdoc contract - Full autonomy, you are your own PI - Awesome multidisciplinary environment - All social and behavioral sciences welcome - Seed funding for projects and workshops - Gorgeous city in the south of France www.iast.fr/research-fel...

Transgenerational decline through insidious effects of #drought memory A #Letter by Pantin et al.👇 📖 nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... #LatestIssue

For the first time, researchers have mathematically proven that a quantum computer can solve a particular task faster than an ordinary computer, in a way that can never be beaten

It can’t be true if we hide it from you.

This is my new Tom Holland "Umbrella" video.

'food scarcity, poor crop yields and rising prices, with some hard-hit regions already experiencing tensions and migration' River basins, breadbaskets of the world - hit hard by climate change, sand mining + dams blocking replenishing sediment. share.google/H0AKSWKmBQNl...

🚨 NEW: Climate change is already causing 30,000 deaths per year - a global annual economic loss of $100-350B USD - but the true damage is probably 10x higher. Out TODAY in Nature Climate Change: the first systematic look at the science of "health impact attribution" 🔓 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Making all shampoo or detergent bottles look the same isn't anti-capitalist, and it's the only way to make a truly circular economy for plastics, says Saabira Chaudhuri

Oh, because NOBODY did it before HE did. Yes, I get rageful when I think of how the literary luvvies trip over themselves to throw flowers at his feet as if he invented the things science fiction writers have been doing for decades (but they don't get the accolades because ew SFF cooties!)

After today's hearing, @drdebhoury.bsky.social told me, “The CDC director should be given autonomy on how to lead the agency. We really need physicians and scientists to raise their voices” at a time when radical transparency and gold-standard science are not happening at the CDC. Read more below!

Welcome to the Potemkin state: Trump’s second state visit as free speech protesters are arrested As Trump’s red carpet rolls out, police crack down on dissent - raising fears that Britain’s silencing free speech northeastbylines.co.uk/news/opinion...

Mini-scoop: After resisting pressure to strip Elon Musk of his fellowship for months, the Royal Society is meeting on 1 October to discuss his removal – following his decision to address Tommy Robinson's far-right rally on Saturday. www.thenewworld.co.uk/james-ball-r...

Call for a tenure-track position at our Department of Plant Molecular Biology in Lausanne! We are searching for promising early-career researchers in the broad field of plant-organismal interactions. Deadline: November 30, 2025 - Please re-post! career5.successfactors.eu/career?caree...

📢 Come work in Bochum! - 3 year PostDoc Position in an edition and research project on Ernst F. Apelt - PhD in philosophy or history of science and very good German language skills required - PI: Prof. Helmut Pulte - Deadline: 6.10.25 All information here: jobs.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/jobposting/d...

Bacillus subtilis reprograms host transcriptome and rhizosphere microbiome via systemic signaling to confer alkaline stress tolerance in garden pea https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.09.13.676035v1

✨ Paper spotlight ✨ (🧵 1/5) Trehalose 6-phosphate – a central regulator at the crossroads of sugar signalling, metabolism, and development doi.org/10.1111/nph.... This Tansley insight explores the emerging complexity of trehalose 6-phosphate (Tre6P) signalling in flowering plants.

How dandelion plants evolved to spread seeds in the same direction that the wind blows go.nature.com/4phtmK2

As for biodiversity, a brand new study also confirms what's well established: overall ruminant meat, especially from grazing animals (which require more land, entailing more carbon & biodiversity opportunity costs) has the biggest 'extinction footprint' of all foods: www.nature.com/articles/s43...

Nature research paper: Fluctuating DNA methylation tracks cancer evolution at clinical scale go.nature.com/4pzikAa

And yes, I was the last Black full-time columnist in the Opinion section. Washington Post -- operating in a city which for a long time has been majority Black, is now without any full-time Black opinion writers.

Scientific societies, journals, editors and researchers are pushing back against mean-spirited peer reviews go.nature.com/4mXJjn6

It’s time to move beyond the individual… link.springer.com/article/10.1...

The Black community around Princeton gave Einstein an entrance into the civil rights movement. He joined the NAACP and the American Crusade Against Lynching (ACAL), an organization founded by Paul Robeson. Einstein had a 20-year friendship with Robeson; he also wrote for W.E.B. Du Bois's mag.