One of the many sources cited in the new papal encyclical is... Gandalf

“Academic science is not only about productivity, it is also about deep understanding, exploring creative solutions and training critical thinkers to be the next generation of researchers.” www.nature.com/articles/d41...

This is awful to hear, describing how Sean Eddy (HMMER, infernal, pfam, rfam) has been defunded. The letter said his work "had been determined to be of absolutely no value to the US taxpayer, and therefore it was being specifically terminated," www.npr.org/2026/05/21/n...

very sad news. Peer Bork was one of the leaders of our field, a wonderful scientist, and he's much too young to be gone. www.embl.org/news/embl-an...

We selected the laziest mouse at each round to inoculate the next batch of germfree mice: over rounds of selection and passaging, behavior shifted without changes to the mouse genome: rdcu.be/eM3rO 🦠🧫

Imagine we could travel back in time ⏪⌛️to explore the world of bacterial pathogens before humans discovered and industrialised antibiotics We just did that to study the history of #AMR spread @science.org doi.org/10.1126/scie... If you like time travel & biology, this 🧵is for you👇

My colleagues are using ChatGPT to source data and plot analyses for them. I'm literally reviewing papers written this way. Meanwhile....

A new study found that we share parts of our microbiome with people in our social networks, beyond family members. Dr. @nachristakis.bsky.social joins us to discuss the research and how scientists can identify your friends—just by looking at your poop.

<taps the sign> This chart is a decade old, and that gap between the United States and the rest of the developed world, which has better health outcomes by the way, has gotten larger. We should morally, ethically, and fiscally move to a single payer system. It’s also a national security issue.

There are already many articles for which there is more attention on Bluesky than on other comparable micro-blogging sites, meaning the academic community and the general public have clearly adopted Bluesky as one of its core places to disseminate and discuss new research. A Place of Joy.

Letter sent in to the Editor of the Guardian on brain microbiome nonsense.

Interesting look at gut strain-level dynamics: The human gut has low strain variation compared to other environments and has a limited capacity for strain richness. #microbiome www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Excited to share our last work on microbiome transmission and social interactions published on Nature! The more people you interact with, the more similar your microbiome is. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

📣 Big news! Our tag-team effort on common variants in rare neurodevelopmental conditions is now out in Nature 📣 Co-first authoring with the brilliant Qinqin Huang🌟—proof that teamwork does make the dream work. 💪 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The bacteria in your gut depend on where you are in the social network around you. The microbes within us treat our social networks as the extended environment in which they thrive. They can spread from person to person. New #HNL work out today in @natureportfolio.bsky.social . 1/

Excited to share our last work on microbiome transmission and social interactions published on Nature! The more people you interact with, the more similar your microbiome is. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

🥁 New Publication Alert: Our manuscript on the ☕️ and #microbiome relationship is out in #NatureMicrobiology: www.nature.com/articles/s41... 1/12

for Coffee fans #microbiome www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The march of the mRNA vaccines goes on. Clostridiodes difficile (C diff) next... #IDSky #MicroSky #MedSky 🧪 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Align to AllTheBacteria with low RAM (1-2Gb) and quickly (seconds if just 1000s of hits, 15 mins for a gene present in all 2.4 million genomes) using @shenwei356.bsky.social Lexicmap. So you can basically BLAST AllTheBacteria locally - but need 3-4Tb disk for index www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

New GPU-based MMseqs2: 20x faster searches on a single L40S (approx. as fast as a RTX 4090) vs. a 128-core CPU. This work enables to set up a very cost-efficient ColabFold MSA GPU server. 🧵🧵 📄 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... 💾 mmseqs.com 🗞️ developer.nvidia.com/blog/boost-a...

Geometriphylogenetics xkcd.com/3010

Dear International Taxonomy Committee. I am yet again proposing a series of changes to the common names of animals for the Internet Era. Your prompt response is appreciated. 1. Texas Turtle-Rat. Alternative: Tactical Assault Possum

Fantastic investigation by Rina Raphael on Viome, which sells you a problem and then sells you a solution. It's microbiome diagnostic scienceploitation + a supplement bonanza. She spoke to a dozen former employees. www.bloomberg.com/news/feature... (Readable through Apple News, BTW)

Now this is REALLY scary!