“I’ve reviewed over 50 sticky toffee puddings” is an incredibly powerful way to begin a video

Yeah but he would say that wouldn't he

Your last week to visit the fantastic Wellcome Collection exhibition on water wellcomecollection.org/exhibitions/...

A few days ago, I stood in the graveyard of an 1100 year old church, getting damper and damper in the drizzling rain. A woman walked into the graveyard, waved, said hello, and, as we had previously arranged, handed me a paper bag full of human bones. The life of a churchwarden is a strange one...

Science can transform lives, but only if it reaches the people who need it most. That's why, last year, we invested £1.9 billion combining discovery with solutions and real-world action. Explore the impact in our annual report: wellcome.org/insights/rep...

@gregjhurst.bsky.social caught you on Times Radio earlier Greg - sounds like a great project. Hope all's well

Grading and googling hallucinated citations, as one does nowadays, and now that LLMs have been around for a while, I've discovered new horrors: hallucinated journals are now appearing in Google Scholar with dozens of citations bc so many people are citing these fake things

Horrifying/funny/horrifying again to spot how many of these were definitely written by ChatGPT giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

Baroness Nicola Blackwood has been appointed as Chair of the Health Data Research Service www.gov.uk/government/n...

More than 200 studies have provided compelling evidence of a link between rising temperatures and adverse pregnancy outcomes, including premature birth, stillbirth, low birth weight, congenital abnormalities and hypertensive disorders in mothers on.ft.com/4oNPZEX

Grist launches international reporting project on the impacts of climate change on human health. The year-long series called Vital Signs will include stories from the Americas, Africa, Asia, Europe, and Australia. grist.org/updates/gris... #News #Media #Health #PublicHealth

Extreme heat now kills roughly one person every minute, and about 550,000 a year, finds @lancetcountdown.bsky.social's new report. And scientists warn parts of the world may soon hit limits where it’s too hot and humid for people to survive. My latest for @bloomberg.com (free 🎁 link):

How government bureaucracy is hampering skilled researchers from coming to the UK, contributing to our economy, making scientific breakthroughs...

France has recorded nearly 400 locally-acquired cases of chikungunya this summer, French health authorities announced today, as tropical tiger mosquitoes also increasingly spread across Europe due to climate change.

The role of secretary of state for science is essential to the success of the government's aims, says Wellcome chief exec @jarottingen.bsky.social

Research England should not backtrack on their proposals on people, culture and environment as part of the next Research Excellence Framework, says @jarottingen.bsky.social www.linkedin.com/feed/update/...

New report 🚨 Our 2025 analysis shows the mounting impacts of the UK immigration system: over £870,000 cost, challenges to recruit and delays to life-saving cancer research. Read more: bit.ly/CRUK2025visasblog

'Climate change is well and truly transforming the experience of living in Britain’s capital'

Another one for the "we're all climate journalists now" pile

On the one hand, far fewer people are being killed. On the other, some people get to work two minutes later. So it's impossible to say whether it's good or not.

Motherfucking wind farms…

Thirst for knowledge: Free Wellcome exhibition charts our watery past and future www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/thi...

Extreme heat doesn’t receive the same “round-the-clock” coverage as wildfires, hurricanes, or floods. Yet, “Of all the climate disasters we face, heat is the most urgent, and its day-to-day effects are also the trickiest to talk about.” By Meg Bernhard @columjournreview.bsky.social

Cuts to the UK aid budget have led to the closure of the Fleming Fund, which has been tackling the growing global threat of antimicrobial resistance.

In which @whippletom.bsky.social agrees with our diagnosis on the shortcomings of the UK's "science superpower" sloganeering, though not our alternative suggestion www.thetimes.com/comment/colu...

Newly published research shows for the first time that eight healthy babies have been born in the UK following a pioneering IVF technique that reduces the risk of mitochondrial disease. We’re proud to have supported this work from the beginning: wellcome.org/news/mitocho...

Strength in science can help the UK find its place in a changing world. Wellcome has published a new report on how the UK can be the global partner of choice for R&D, and why investing in science supports diplomacy and security as well as economic growth.

And that's why this season, I'm favouring the Latin Chasuble over the Gothic (greater side-ventilation!).

Interesting insight on people rethinking their wardrobes to cope with heat caused by climate change www.ft.com/content/980a...

whenever i see grok screenshots i remember how it's running on methane-gas generators in a black neighborhood in memphis www.politico.com/news/2025/05...

Great to see the Government ambition to reinvent the NHS through science and tech in the #NHS10yearplan. To realise these changes, investment and a focus on delivery now needed.

"A 45C summer in the UK is now a near-term threat and we are dangerously unprepared." www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Good to see media reporting now routinely reflecting the real risks of extreme heat

Slowly, ever so slowly, the British public is abandoning the idea that "hot weather = good", proving that the arc of history bends towards progress after all.

Some remarkable figures in here www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Superb to see so many recognised in science and public health in the King's birthday honours. Congratulations in particular to former @wellcometrust.bsky.social director of infectious disease Gordon Dougan and @lshtm.bsky.social director Liam Smeeth.

Please enjoy this table of possible future scenarios from a 1990s paper in a peer-reviewed journal on how to deal with nuclear waste storage in underground repositories in New Mexico. I found it while doing research for an article on nuclear waste storage. "WIPP" means "Waste Isolation Pilot Plant".

It's Spending Review day! The Chancellor has announced £86bn for research over the next four years A big number, particularly in the economic context... ...but it also amounts to a reduction in ambition. Here's why 🎞

Spending review research commitments are "a reduction in ambition at a time when the UK desperately needs the economic growth that investing in science brings" Wellcome ceo @jarottingen.bsky.social says

Today, the Government launches plans to fast-track driverless vehicle trials in the UK. One of the companies involved says London presents a big challenge: “It has seven times more jaywalkers than San Francisco.” Except… it doesn't. 🧵

I would rather a colleague didn't respond than send an automated AI response without reading it. I cannot think of anything more contemptuous you could do as a response to a colleague who has used their work time to contact you.

The case for using "global majority" by institutions should be rejected unless + until it can be shown - most people understand what it means (most don't) - most people it is about would like it used (most don't) I find it a deeply incoherent fiction + a highly regressive term in some many ways

What spoils our crops, kills about six times more people than malaria every year and is breathed in by each of us every single day? It’s not a virus or bacteria, but something even more formidable: fungi 🍄 via @opinion.bloomberg.com www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

Quite apart from anything else, I never trust anyone who centres text, for God's sake. openai.com/sam-and-jony/

*crab-walked

Set the "techbros reinvented the bus" timer back to zero

Lovely little interview from @afpnews.bsky.social with one of the new pope's brothers www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2_R...

The hit series The Last of Us conjured a fictional apocalypse caused by brain-altering fungi. But the real world threat from this mysterious biological kingdom is itself disturbing. Killer fungi to spread as climate heats up www.ft.com/content/506f... via @financialtimes.com www.ft.com/register

NEW from me: Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company is operating 35 gas turbines without any pollution permits, belching asthma-worsening emissions into an area that leads Tennessee in ER visits for asthma. www.eenews.net/articles/elo...