Keri Martinowich

Two neurobiologists win 2026 Brain Prize for discovering mechanics of touch Research by Patrik Ernfors and David Ginty has delineated the diverse cell types of the somatosensory system and revealed how they detect and discriminate among different types of tactile information.

Two neurobiologists who helped decipher how the somatosensory system detects touch and pain have won this year’s Brain Prize, the largest award in neuroscience.

By @helenak.bsky.social

#neuroskyence

www.thetransmitter.org/somatosensat...

Cell types: encoding the brain's BIOS Inferring the structure of primary rewards from connectomics

What are cell types good for, computationally? Encoding innate behavior! In this 2-parter, I break down the relationship between cell types—which I had, in years prior, dismissed as mere implementation detail—and computation. I changed my mind!

www.neuroai.science/p/cell-types...

Warm congratulations to The Brain Prize winners 2026, Professor David Ginty and Professor Patrik Ernfors, for their pioneering work on how the nervous system detects and processes touch and pain.

Karolinska Institutet
HHMI

#Neuroscience #BrainPrize2026

UC Irvine Center for Addiction Neuroscience (ICAN) Symposium - Charlie Dunlop School of Biological Sciences Bridging the Lab and the Clinic to Address Addiction and Comorbid Affective and Psychosis Disorders Please register below for the UC Irvine Center for Addiction Neuroscience (ICAN) Symposium on Wednes...

Interested in addiction and cormorbid disorders?
Join us for our ICAN symposium on Mar. 18 in @ucirvine.bsky.social, featuring Josh Gordon, @neurovoice.bsky.social, Tony George, @nanopharmnc.bsky.social, Khaled Moussawi, Meg Fox, Firoza Mamdani, & more! All welcome!
www.bio.uci.edu/event/ican-s...

NIH Office of Extramural Research announcements of feedback sessions for NIH-wide strategic plan for March 16 and April 8.

IMPORTANT---IMPORTANT---IMPORTANT

NIH is seeking input for the NIH-wide Strategic Plan. Open to everyone but Registration is Required!

Your chance to listen and get your 2 or more cents in.

grants.nih.gov/news-events/...

A dorsal hippocampus-prodynorphinergic dorsolateral septum-to-lateral hypothalamus circuit mediates contextual gating of feeding Goode et al. show that prodynorphin (Pdyn)-expressing neurons of the dorsolateral septum (DLS) receive substantial dorsal hippocampal (DHPC) input and inhibit lateral hypothalamic (LHA) GABAergic neur...

Restaurants, billboards, commercials… what brain circuits link context to appetite? 🧠🌎🍽️

Very happy to finally share a major update in our work exploring the hippocampus and lateral septum in calibrating food consumption! 🍩

Major thanks to our lab and collaborators! ⭐️⭐️

www.cell.com/neuron/fullt...

Got stunning fluorescence microscopy images? 🌈🔬 SDB wants to feature YOUR work for #FluorescenceFriday! We highlight images from SDB members with a short description and the image creators 📸. Fill out the form to be featured: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Congrats Josh! Really exciting to see this - we have been thinking about a molecular connectomics experiment in human brain profiling both the LC and amygdala - I'm excited to chat more with you about this idea to hear your perspective in light of these data!

A neuromodulatory circuit-to-molecular pathway for reformatting aversive memories during recall Tan et al. identify a neuromodulatory circuit-to-molecular pathway in rats that updates aversive memories when they are recalled. Noradrenaline from the locus coeruleus triggers synapse-to-nuclear tra...

Excited to share our new paper:
We uncover a locus coeruleus→amygdala circuit linking β-adrenergic signaling to transcription regulation in defined amygdala cells during memory reconsolidation—+ stress or elevated noradrenergic signaling at recall can strengthen memory.
www.cell.com/neuron/abstr...

UAB is recruiting neuroscience faculty at two different levels - come join our vibrant neuroscience community!

Semi-close-up of a cluster of penstemon seedheads with snow on top of them

These goth beardtongue seedheads looked great in the snow today. They’re eaither penstemon digitalis or penstemon hirsutus; I have a mix of both.

This photo is part of my ongoing quest to appreciate the beauty in the non-blossom parts of the garden.

#maryland #nativeplants

Lack of reviewers threatens robustness of neuroscience literature Simple math suggests that small groups of scientists can significantly bias peer review.

Broad peer review is crucial for a healthy scientific literature, but neuroscientists turn down review requests too often. Simple math suggests that small groups of scientists can significantly bias the literature, writes @jvoigts.bsky.social.

#neuroskyence

www.thetransmitter.org/publishing/l...

See public.csr.nih.gov/EvaluationIn...

This is figure 2, which shows global diversification dynamics of six diverse butterfly families.

Butterflies and moths are key indicators of functioning and healthy ecosystems. A Review in Nature Reviews Biodiversity describes the evolutionary history of the order Lepidoptera and tracks shifts in researchers’ understanding of the clade in the genomic era. go.nature.com/4r0kbgS 🌍 🧪

Has anyone heard what happens with chartered members whose terms aren’t finished yet? Have they been notified?

They are going from 10 to 15 study sections (surprising) - public.csr.nih.gov/EvaluationIn...

NAL is dead

NMB is dead

ARM is dead

Some shit is about to go down with NIH study sections, friends. Keep your eyes peeled for change that may affect your grant submissions.

Family friend who runs this - South Point Oyster Farm, which is located at the intersection of the Sinepuxent and Newport sections of Chincoteague Bay!

Meet the neuroscientist running for Congress Sam Wang, a neuroscientist running for the U.S. House of Representatives, has been interested in “fixing bugs in democracy” for decades.

Neuroscientist @samwang.bsky.social, whose research implicated the cerebellum in autism, now hopes to “fix bugs in democracy”—by running for Congress.

By Lauren Schenkman

#neuroskyence

www.thetransmitter.org/policy/is-th...

Central Maryland native plant people: the big Howard County plant share will be on May 30 at Howard County Conservancy from 11-1. 🌱🌿

www.facebook.com/share/1CHJXL...

Preprint Editors – Development's next step into the preprint landscape Summary: This Editorial announces a call for Preprint Editors in Development to help expand the journal's relationship with preprints by curating our ‘In preprints’ articles.

New from @dev-journal.bsky.social: we're launching a new initiative and hiring Preprint Editors to help navigate the growing world of preprints in developmental & stem cell biology

Join our community & shape the future of research

journals.biologists.com/dev/article/...

ICYMI - part of special issue of @phimisci.bsky.social on Representations in the Neurosciences and AI
cc @tjryan.bsky.social @gualtiero.bsky.social @johnwkrakauer.bsky.social

🧪Frances Arnold was a single mom of 3.

That didn’t stop her from doing pioneering work that would eventually change biotechnology.

Her method of directed evolution created enzymes that
had broad implications in industry.

She was the first American woman to win the Nobel in Chemistry in 2018.

Opened oyster cage pulled from water onto a boat surface

Oystering 🦪🦪🦪

The impact is already hitting science agencies hard. The NIH—the world's largest public biomedical research funder—has had to rely on leftover stopgap funds.

New grant awards have slowed to a trickle — exacerbating the effects of a record-long shutdown in October.

(h/t @jeremymberg.bsky.social)

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. 🧵👇

A line graph showing NSF grant awards made through 2/27/26 for fiscal year 2026 compared with grant awards for fiscal years 2021-2025.

NSF Update (Awards through 2/27/26)

Directorates to follow

1/10

Call for Applications - Max Planck Postdoc Program, apply now!

The Max Planck #PostdocProgram offers top emerging talents a range of attractive measures and opportunities. The current call for applications is open from March 1st until April 13th, 2026. Please share or consider applying! 🙏
www.mpg.de/en/max-planc... #careerinscience #sciencecareer

A classroom/lab full of scopes. There's a projector with some info about the zebrafish course we're teaching

Back at it again #zebrafish 🐟🧪