David Chang van Oordt

Co-option of primate-specific retroelements creates an alternative IL-13Rα1 subunit that tunes type 2 immune responses @sciimmunology.bsky.social
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Simons Graduate Fellowships in Ecology and Evolution The purpose of these awards is to provide support for students entering U.S.-based Ph.D. programs with a plan to perform research in ecology and evolution. While we will consider all projects in ecolo...

There is one month left to apply for our Simons Graduate Fellowships in Ecology and Evolution! These awards provide support for students entering U.S.-based Ph.D. programs with a plan to perform research in #ecology and #evolution. www.simonsfoundation.org/grant/simons... #science

Something I've been feeling a lot lately, but haven't heard much about is the grief that comes with being an early career scientist in America in 2025.

I think we all understand that, even if things turn out well, there is no going "back to normal" now.

A (sad) thread /1

Am I looking at the right table? Is this an 89% cut to DEB? 😰

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Amidst all the posts about how NSF funds the basic science that (eventually) leads to marketable products, its role in funding data infrastructure is getting lost.

The GSS (1972), ANES (late 1960s), and PSID (1968) are rounding error in the discretionary budget but vital national resources.

1/6

Here is what is happening in Florida after reductions in tenure protections. The exodus is measurable. Beware Texas... this could happen here too.

Trump administration revokes Harvard's ability to enroll international students International students make up more than a quarter of Harvard University's student body. Harvard says the government's actions, which could cut off a major revenue stream, are "unlawful."

International students upend their lives to join American science, bringing their novel insights that drive innovation.

Now, they are being illegally targeted by Trump, because Harvard won't back down.

Classic bully behavior.

We Stand Up for International Students.

www.npr.org/2025/05/22/n...

Trump officials take steps toward a radically different NSF Efforts to shrink staff, budget, and focus have alarmed members of Congress

Another scoop from Jeff Mervis (@policyhound.bsky.social): NSF's ~1400 grant terminations have disproportionately affected PIs from groups underrepresented in science: women, racial & ethnic minorities, & those with disabilities. 1/3
www.science.org/content/arti...

what is fascinating to me is the number of people whose “knowledge” of government appears to just be an accumulation of cliches and stereotypes + an inchoate sense that if something is big and costly then it must necessarily be “wasteful”

I worry about food. Do Americans know how heavily we’ve been subsidizing Ag to make our food cheap and abundant? Do they know what happens when that system is dismantled?

"A report by economists at American University in Washington DC estimates that a 50% reduction in federal science funding would reduce the US gross domestic product by approximately 7.6%."

Science is an amazing engine of economic activity and progress for the US ... or at least it was.

Come join us for a 2-year postdoc focused on Roseate Terns!!! We're two weeks away from application review. Reach out to me with any questions.

This is really terrible, I’m sorry Jay.

My NSF PRFB on the genetics of female polymorphism in hummingbirds was terminated yesterday.

I don't have much to say, I'm just sad. We've discovered so much, and could have gone so much further.

If anyone else is in the same boat, esp postdocs, please reach out, it would be good to connect.

Defend Scientific Progress and Protect the NIH ⭑ 5 Calls The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the largest sponsor of biomedical research in the world, driving essential innovations in disease detection …

For the next 2 weeks, @defendpublichealth.bsky.social is asking for everyone to call their members of Congress about the cuts to and political interference at NIH by the Trump White House. 1/ 5calls.org/issue/nation...

Folks, while much of the attention is on Harvard and Columbia's response to the Trump/Musk/RFK Jr. administration, I'd like to point out how #NIH terminations and funding cuts go far beyond this war with the nations' elite universities. 🧵🧪

Exclusive: US NIH scientists barred from attending conferences on their own time and dime Researchers at the U.S. National Institutes of Health have been told they cannot attend scientific conferences and meetings without official permission, even if they pay their own way and go during time off, three current and former NIH scientists told Reuters.

"We will never use this agency to censor scientists who disagree. If scientists are censored, we can't have excellent science."

-NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya.
9 days ago on Fox and Friends.

Donation spike gives Museum of the Earth new life but future remains uncertain - The Ithaca Voice ITHACA, N.Y. — Following a surge of donations sparked by The Ithaca Voice’s reporting, the Museum of the Earth — one of the last natural history museums in upstate New […]

I've got some GOOD NEWS for once! Surge of donations to the PRI museum in New York is going to let it stay open for at least a few more months. Keep going! ithacavoice.org/2025/04/dona...

“What difference does it make if a biotech company promotes misunderstanding about the practical and implications of their technology,” you ask, having apparently not noticed how the Trump administration is using that misunderstanding to weaken actual endangered species conservation policy.

This is a devastating and essential read. Here is a gift link for those without subs. The part about outside perceptions of scientists compared with almost a blue-collar reality is spot on (without even mentioning meager salaries). www.nytimes.com/2025/04/03/o...

Non-pharmaceutical interventions and covid-19 burden in the United States: retrospective, observational cohort study To evaluate the adoption and discontinuation of four broadly used non-pharmaceutical interventions on shifts in the covid-19 burden among US states. Retrospective, observational cohort study. US state...

I just listened to #TheDaily episode on "On COVID's Wake" with Frances Lee & Stephen Macedo where they make a categorical statement that non-pharmaceutical interventions didn't work during the pandemic. The evidence does not support this categorical claim. 1/
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...

What Vance is doing here is ENORMOUS disinformation. International students at the undergrad level typically pay full tuition, which subsidizes tuition for American students on financial aid by keeping tuition costs lower. At the grad level, domestic students are harder to recruit!

Musk and Trump could not possibly be sending a clearer signal that the Tesla protests are working than this pathetic stunt today.

In case the ongoing slaughter of research and training at Columbia feels distant at the moment, it's coming to a university near you soon. They are on a mission to destroy American academia.

ICE Arrests Pro-Palestinian Activist at Columbia Mahmoud Khalil, who recently completed a graduate program at Columbia, has legal permanent residency, his lawyer said.

The United States government just disappeared a lawful US resident because it didn't like his speech. You should care about this because it shouldn't happen to anyone, but you should also care because it could happen to you. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/09/n...

"Developing a device that could treat severe bleeding. It seems to have caught the committee’s attention for using the words “victims” — as in gunshot victims — and “trauma.” Creating biosensors to detect infectious diseases. The grant appears to have been tagged for the repeated use of “POC,” an acronym often used for “people of color” but in this context meaning “point of care” — that is, the place where people receive medical treatment — and “barrier,” referring to a part of the biosensor itself. Designing eye-tracking technology for diagnosing and treating concussions. It appears to have gotten flagged for referencing “traumatic” brain injuries and the “status,” meaning the condition, of patients."

ProPublica looked into science grants that Ted Cruz's team flagged as "radical" and "neo-Marxist" and, uh.

This would be good comedy if it didn't matter so much www.propublica.org/article/ted-...

NEWS: The USAID official put on leave for disseminating two memos about Rubio's failure to push through life-saving foreign aid was in the process of writing a THIRD memo when fired. We obtained it. It's far more alarming than the first two.

www.thebulwark.com/p/what-a-wee...

If you have experienced direct harm to your work/lab/job due to recent changes at US NSF, & are willing to share this on behalf of the Am. Society of Naturalists and NSF, please DM/ email me ASAP (this is time-sensitive) or submit story here sites.google.com/view/scienti...
Please share widely

It is worth paying close attention to the new bill "Dangerous Viral Gain of Function Research Moratorium Act" introduced by Senator Roger Marshall.

If enacted, it will effectively stop all of virological research, including for vaccines.

www.marshall.senate.gov/wp-content/u...

🧵👇