Lara K. Mahal

The quest to understand where atoms end Atomic size measurements like van der Waals and covalent radii are central to chemistry, but are they grounded in reality?

How big are atoms? That depends where you decide to put the edge. My article for @chemistryworld.com on the latest efforts to define atomic radii.
www.chemistryworld.com/news/the-que...

a headshot of David Botstein

We are deeply saddened to share the news of the passing of David Botstein, a towering figure in modern #genetics and a foundational force behind SGD.
www.yeastgenome.org/blog/in-memo... #yeast #modelOrganism

Total Lunar Eclipse on March 2–3, 2026 – Where and When to See Total lunar eclipse on March 2–3, 2026: Where and when is the Blood Moon visible and what will it look like? Visibility map, animation, and local times.

🌕➡️🔴 Lunar eclipse alert!

Depending on where you are (mostly: Central/Eastern Asia, Oceania, most of North/Central America), you may be able to see a TOTAL LUNAR ECLIPSE ("blood moon") overnight!

You can find information about timing and viewing locations here: www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/luna...

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Helsinki just went a full year without a single traffic death The capital city is Finnish’ed with car-related fatalities.

“Helsinki hasn’t registered a single traffic-related fatality in the past year…Citing data that shows the risk of pedestrian fatality is cut in half by reducing a car’s speed from 40 to 30km/hr, city officials imposed the lower limit in most of Helsinki’s residential areas and city center in 2021.”

Science of sex and gender being misrepresented by Trump officials, experts warn Scientists say crackdown on gender-affirming care could have impact on healthcare of all Americans

Major thanks to @melodyschreiber.com for interviewing me about what biology actually says about sex & gender

Unscientific attacks on trans rights are fueled by fascism, not science, and harm all of us - cis or trans

Excellent reporting 🧬🏳️‍⚧️

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

Private money cannot replace public funding of science Who should pay for American science? In the current political climate, many are looking to the private sector to compensate for cuts in public funding. At the Harvard School of Public Health—particula...

A response to the opinion that private $ can replace the NIH.

Businesses are not charities. They work on profit margins. Decades of $ is essential for research to progress from an initial discovery to treatment. Most of the dirty work goes on in academic labs.

🧪 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

This week's cover @thelancet.com

The media and academia have an obligation to not remain neutral in the face of authoritarianism. These institutions need liberal institutions to exist in any meaningful way. Authoritarianism is an existential threat. Our devotion to "neutrality" will keep us from fighting for our own survival.

Science is wild y’all.

journals.asm.org/doi/pdf/10.1...

White House stalls release of approved US science budgets The US Congress rejected sweeping cuts to science agencies. But the NIH, the NSF and NASA have had their spending slowed.

Congress rejected massive cuts to US science budgets for 2026, but much of the money still isn’t flowing to researchers.

The culprit? The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is quietly slow-walking the release of funds. 🧵👇

COVID-19 vaccination status during pregnancy and preeclampsia risk: the pandemic-era cohort of the INTERCOVID consortium COVID-19 vaccination with a booster reduces the odds of PE by 30% approaching 60% reduction among women with pre-existing morbidities.

Remember when RFK Jr. unilaterally decided that COVID19 vaccines should no longer be recommended during pregnancy?

Well, COVID19 increases the risk of preeclampsia.

And it turns out that getting boosted, either before or during pregnancy, significantly reduces the risk of preeclampsia.

This movie has nonstop depression jokes (who eats meat anymore?), women that could only be described as hoofers, a song called Pettin’ in the Park, a non-boxer described as a palooka, and an actor too old for his part getting laid up with lumbago. Four stars.

"The judiciousness of stepping away from WHO and other multinational public health entities, rather than working to improve and supplement them, is likely to be tested by the next pandemic," writes Seth Berkley in a new #ScienceExpertVoices article. https://scim.ag/4aW8SkS

This is so logically pleasing and yet absurdly like a science fiction story

Always good to see people collecting data but not super surprising: iirc there is literature on men being hired on promise/potential and women on demonstrated accomplishment. This would seem to fit that pattern.

Huh

Good news: after 390 years of manels, single-gender events are officially forbidden at Harvard.

Oh. Never mind. Single-gender events are fine as long as all participants are men and occur "accidentally".

If any 2d animators are out there looking for some immediate paid work, I’ve got something short and fun for you on a live-action short film about kids with disabilities in a hospital.

DM me with your reel/work if you’re interested.

Women’s Rights Are Democratic Rights The global authoritarian backlash to gender equality.

Autocrats stoke anxieties about women’s independence, sexuality & authority. Because women who dissent defy political & gender hierarchies, they are targeted twice: 1st for threatening the regime & 2nd for violating expectations of docility & deference. www.foreignaffairs.com/united-state...

Do you have what it takes to win Science’s #DanceYourPhD competition?

The deadline for submissions is 20 February 2026. Learn more: https://scim.ag/3LuVObX

BREAKING: The Department of Education has ended its directive that attempted to restrict diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in schools nationwide.

This is a victory for academic freedom and education equity.

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This is simply an amazing response…

Ramadan Mubarak to all those who celebrate!!!!

Another NIH institute loses its director Health department declines to renew Lindsey Criswell, head of arthritis institute, to another 5-year term

The chief of NIAMS, Lindsey Criswell, has told her staff that her 5-year leadership appointment had not been renewed, meaning 16 out of 27 NIH institutes and centers will be operating without a permanent director. https://scim.ag/4cr5wHI

Can confirm

A flaw in using pretrained protein language models in protein–protein interaction inference models - Nature Machine Intelligence The usage of pretrained protein language models (pLMs) is rapidly growing. However, Szymborski and Emad find that pretrained pLMs can be a source of data leakage in the task of protein–protein interac...

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www.nature.com/articles/s42...

CU Anschutz Recruits National Leader to Launch Functional Personalized Medicine Initiative CU Anschutz welcomes Alice Soragni to launch a Functional Personalized Medicine Initiative using rapid tumor organoid testing to guide treatment decisions.

Happy to share this new, very intentional chapter. I have left UCLA after 14 years to join the University of Colorado Anschutz as Professor of Biomedical Informatics and Neurosurgery and the inaugural Marsico Chair in Excellence in Functional Precision Medicine/n

news.cuanschutz.edu/dbmi/cu-ansc...

NEW: Another NIH institute director hasn't been renewed — the director of NIAMS (arthritis, musculoskeletal and skin diseases institute).

That leaves a whopping 15 of 27 institutes and centers without a permanent director.