Keaton Schuster

Why We Still Need Animal Research in a World of AI and Organoids The portrayal of uncaring scientists without any thought for the animals being used in their research is far from the truth.

While I’m a big fan of new technologies that help us study human biology…there’s still no replacement for animal research! See my article in Gen News. www.genengnews.com/topics/trans...

The pioneer transcription factor Zelda controls the exit from regeneration and restoration of patterning in Drosophila The pioneer factor Zelda activates a specific set of developmental and structural genes to end tissue regeneration.

So excited that our latest work is out! We have been working to understand how damaged tissue exits regeneration and returns to normal gene expression, and found a major role for the pioneer transcription factor Zelda in flies. Kudos to @anishbose.bsky.social @keatonschuster.bsky.social et al!

There is no replacement (yet) for animal models in medical research The NIH is “reducing animal use in research.” But there is no replacement for animal models.

www.statnews.com/2025/05/19/a...

Three pods of a sea squirt called the skeleton panda, so named because they have white blood vessels and black stripes across the anterior portion. They look like skeletons of a fish with panda stripes, anchored to colorful coral with red, orange and pink coloration.

Off the coast of Japan live a species of sea squirts, Clavelina ossipandae, the SKELETON PANDA SEA SQUIRT. These ascidians anchor to coral and spend their lives filter-feeding.

Clavelina is Latin for "little bottle", and ossipandae means "panda bones". 🐼💀

Lungfish xkcd.com/3064

I’m crying, this is so funny

WEAPONIZED MANSPLAINING FOR ESPIONAGE ☠️☠️

Harvard alum here to say that what happens to Univ of Maine and other public universities like it is way more important than anything financial that is happening to Columbia right now because Columbia can withstand the financial storm. and our public unis serve people Columbia wouldn’t sniff at.

Kamala was right. And it only took him less than 30 days to roll over for Putin.

Remember, EuropePMC is actually better than #PubMed because it includes ALL preprints in search results, not just those including NIH-funded research.

europepmc.org

🚨ISRB Webinar - Zone 2: Europe, West Asia & Africa on March 11th at 4pm Central European Time 📷 featuring Uri Frank and Stefano Tiozzo #ColonialRegeneration

The thing about destroying NIH is NIH’s scale in medical research just dwarfs everyone else.

For ex, in 2023 the American Cancer Society gave out $64.5 million worth of grants. Sounds big, right?
But NIH’s budget was $49 billion. With a B.

Kill NIH and the floor drops out of US science.

Thou shalt not let the foreign billionaire whose rockets blow up all the time anywhere near the air traffic control system.

Donold is blaming a plane crash that killed 67 people on “DEI” with zero evidence.

He is attempting to use racism to deflect from the fact it is HIS fault. He had just removed 100 FAA senior officials.

It’s been 11 days and there are 67 bodies in the Potomac in Washington DC because of him.

RFkJr is a threat to human health: when the next pandemic hits we need disease tracking (CDC now silenced) and fast vaccine development (which he opposes). If you live in ME, NC, SD, LA, AK, ID, KY or SD call your senators to oppose his confirmation (hearing this Wed.).
(continued, please retweet):

New insights into sea squirt physiology allow for better inland cultures By conducting systematic observations of animals in the laboratory, researchers in the Christiaen group uncovered crucial information on the post-embryonic development of Ciona. Their results, includi...

A team of researchers from the group of @lionlchristiaen.bsky.social has established a new inland culture system for #Ciona 🌊🧪 Without the limitations of field collection, they are ready to tackle their next research goals 🙌
Out now in Open Biology @royalsociety.org ⤵️
🔗 doi.org/10.1098/rsob.240340

Pathway to independence: a new initiative supporting postdocs on the job market

Our Pathway to Independence programme aims to support postdocs going on the job market in 2025 with training, mentorship, profile-raising and networking opportunities.

Apply by 31 Jan 2025: https://buff.ly/3VJGgDC

#DevBio #StemCells🧪

"What trillion-dollar problem is AI trying to solve?"

Wages. They're trying to use it to solve having to pay wages.

And my mom is always proud of me, no matter what Reviewer 2 says.

🧪 #academicsky

1. I feel like this is such obvious advice that it gets taken for granted & consequently no one says this to young scientists but READ PAPERS, read all the papers. As you move up in your career you will have less & less time to do this. Read everything that appeals to you not just in your field

In case some mentors may want to read this. #Nature #PhD #scisky #student #mentor

Source:
www.researchgate.net/publication/...

Jesus welcomed sinners, tax collectors and Samaritans, so yeah, pretty sure he’s okay with diversity, equity and inclusion.

High content of nuclei-free low-quality cells in reference single-cell atlases: a call for more stringent quality control using nuclear fraction - BMC Genomics The advent of droplet-based single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) has dramatically increased data throughput, enabling the release of a diverse array of tissue cell atlases to the public. However, we...

Not checking nuclear markers like MALAT1 or intronic reads in your scRNA-seq data?🚨
We show their power to flag low-quality cells—even in top public datasets. It’s time to prioritize better QC for cleaner, more reliable genomics research!
Read more: bmcgenomics.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....
1/8

South Korean President backs down from declaring martial law. Why? Because people showed up to protest.

Just want folks to remember this.

This is a fantastic program! It has been an amazing experience and has been super helpful with my application process. Please consider applying if you are going to be on the job market next year.

“NIH produces an astounding return on investment to the American taxpayer. In Fiscal Year 2022, NIH research funding supported 568,585 jobs and generated $96.84 billion in economic activity — that’s $2.64 of economic activity for every $1 of research funding.”
www.researchamerica.org/2023-oped-us...

It seems easy to make fun of basic science – for example why would you want to study bacterial immune systems? But then you would have to admit that that’s exactly what led to the discovery of using CRISPR as an insanely good technology for genome engineering.

No need to travel very far to find our favorite organisms - check out this beautiful Ciona colony immortalized by @emclaereboudt.bsky.social near one of Bergen's neighboring islands 😍🧪

Respect/beware of His tags

If you share our enthusiasm for #regeneration, share, follow, and (self-)nominate people to the list.

🧪

go.bsky.app/MGXL9Ra

This is a great list! Can I be added as well?