Heidi Ledford

Too kind, Nick! Can't wait to listen to the podcast

Inspired by Fred Rogers, @nature.com asked readers to help us 'find the helpers' amid the crisis in American science. What emerged were inspiring stories of researchers, legal experts, data hounds and government scientists who are fighting the dismantling of the US research enterprise. 🧪🧵1/6

Scientists take on Trump: the researchers fighting back Through lawsuits, grant tracking, whistle-blowing and more, resistance to the US war on science is growing.

Often the news happens so quickly that there's little time for it, so we took a step back to talk about the stories of the researchers who have been fighting back against the Trump administration's assault on science.

w/ @maxkozlov.bsky.social and @heidiledford.bsky.social

a group of people are dancing in a room with the words `` happy dance '' . ALT: a group of people are dancing in a room with the words `` happy dance '' .

YES!!!! So happy to see @maxkozlov.bsky.social recognized for the total rockstar he is: casw.org/news/max-koz...
So many more schmancy journalism awards in this guy's future.

Brain editing now ‘closer to reality’: the gene-altering tools tackling deadly disorders Nature - Stunning results in mice herald gene-editing advances for neurological diseases.

Scientists are closing in on the ability to apply genome editing to a formidable new target: the human brain

go.nature.com/45uKWT1

RFK Jr demanded a vaccine study be retracted — the journal said no In a rare move for a US public official, health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr called for a Danish paper finding no link between aluminium in vaccines and disease to be retracted.

The claim that aluminium in vaccines causes autism has been debunked “again and again”

go.nature.com/4mY7OQQ

Hidden in Plain Sight: Using Public Documents to Report on Elusive Stories - The Open Notebook People, companies, and government agencies don’t always return your phone calls. To investigate secretive subjects, reporters can make creative use of documents that are out in the open. Lawsuits, Ins...

In which @stephaniemlee.bsky.social reports for @theopennotebook.bsky.social on using public documents for investigative science journalism. With @laurenweberhp.bsky.social @naveenasadasivam.bsky.social @primateyell.bsky.social @dangaristo.bsky.social & more:

www.theopennotebook.com/2025/08/12/h...

Ageing accelerates around age 50 ― some organs faster than others An analysis of how various tissues age is the latest to suggest that ageing does not march to a steady beat.

Ageing accelerates around age 50 ― some organs faster than others, suggesting that ageing does not march to a steady beat @nature.com @heidiledford.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Turbocharged ‘killer’ cells show promise for autoimmune disease @nature.com
@heidiledford.bsky.social
nature.com/articles/d41...
on
@cellcellpress.bsky.social
doi.org/10.1016/j.ce...

NIH grant cuts will axe clinical trials abroad — and could leave thousands without care US agency’s new policy could abruptly end studies of infectious diseases and cancer, leaving researchers scrambling for funds.

NIH director Jay Bhattacharya posted on X: "No clinical trial has been delayed, nor has any participant been dropped from clinical trial. These are the facts."

Malaria, tuberculosis, cancer trials abroad have all been on the chopping block, leaving participants stranded, I reported in this story.

Judge rules against NIH grant cuts — and calls them discriminatory The decision means that the US biomedical agency has to restore funding to hundreds of research projects, but the government will likely appeal.

After ruling the NIH grant cuts were illegal yesterday, Judge Young, a Reagan appointee on the bench since 1985, ended the hearing with a blistering 15-minute speech.

I've cleaned up my notes — here are his remarks in full. 🧵

An NIH staffer reacts to today's ruling:
"I'm looking forward to the day that we are so slammed with work trying to reinstate everything that we had to terminate illegally — I'll work 24/7 to make that happen if I can."

Caricature of McClintock by David Levine for The New York Review of Books.

Barbara McClintock was born OTD in 1902.

“I start with the seedling, and I don't want to leave it. I don't feel I really know the story if I don't watch the plant all the way along. So I know every plant in the field. I know them intimately, and I find it a real pleasure.”

🌱🐋🧪 #HistSTM #PhilSci

A lightning-fast, in-depth look into who RFK Jr selected for the vaccine advisory committee. One of whom was an expert witness against Merck's vaccine, despite RFK's stated reason of reducing conflicts of interest, per @reuters.com.

Well done @heidiledford.bsky.social and @rfieldmouse.bsky.social

#OpenToWork: how laid-off US scientists are coping with shattered careers Unemployed researchers face some tough career choices as they flood the job market after the Trump administration’s cuts to science.

"US scientists who find themselves abruptly unemployed are turning desperation and defiance into fresh coping strategies and advice. But one thing is clear: whether they move abroad, pivot to other research areas or leave science altogether, their deep expertise is likely to be lost." 🧪

Check out this news story that @nature.com wrote describing our recent preprint where we tested our H5 mRNA vaccine in calves.

The data look good and we are currently testing the vaccine in lactating cattle...more to come!

World first: ultra-powerful CRISPR treatment trialled in a person Immune-cell function improved in a teenager whose DNA was altered using prime editing.

The CRISPR family’s most versatile member has made its medical debut: a cutting-edge gene-editing technique known as prime editing has been used to treat a person for the first time

https://go.nature.com/3YNta9V

Today the 1st case of CRISPR 3.0 (Prime genome editing) announced for a teenager with chronic granulomatous disease
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

So maybe the same will be true for these n=1 gene editing treatments. Or a new model for development/payment will emerge. Maybe this really will be the "future of medicine", a phrase that came up a lot in articles about KJ.
I have hope, I just don’t know how long it will take us to get there. 12/12

But…I remember back when cell therapies were deemed too complex and expensive to be commercially viable, and now look at all the CAR T cell therapies. (Those still need to be cheaper and less complex, too, but researchers are working on that. Step-by-step.) 11/12

Each therapy would have to be designed, tested, produced fresh for each recipient. Gene therapies and gene-editing therapies on the market now are already staggeringly expensive, and those companies can spread the cost of development over many recipients, not just one. 10/12

Lots of other parents of children with rare genetic disorders would like their kids to have more joy. For now, it’s hard to know how many of them will have an option like KJ. The usual biotech/commercial models won't work well for this. 9/12

Hope, despair and CRISPR — the race to save one woman’s life Researchers in India fought to develop what could have been the first therapy to use gene-editing to halt a rare neurodegenerative disease. The efforts hold lessons for the messy state of modern drug ...

Last year, I spoke to researchers who tried to develop a base-editing therapy for a young woman with a devastating genetic illness. www.nature.com/articles/d41...
They worked round the clock but didn't make it in time. Thankfully KJ’s case was different and, so far, he's doing well. 8/12

KJ’s parents decided to take a chance on CRISPR, and the clock started ticking. Gene editing therapies are complicated to design, test, produce. Each day brought added risk that KJ might die or become disabled. 7/12

KJ’s dad said that until then, most discussions about KJ had been about the chance that he might die or be severely disabled. KJ's dad worried his son would suffer.

“You want your kids to have joy, right?” he said. That’s the quote that didn’t make it into our story but keeps me up at night. 6/12

At first, KJ’s parents weren’t sure what to do. They questioned everyone they could, debated with family members, prayed. 5/12

But it had not been used in a sick baby, like KJ, and had not been used to rewrite an individual’s specific genetic mutation. KJ’s condition is very rare, his specific mutations even rarer. This CRISPR therapy would be designed for him and only for him. 4/12

CRISPR ‘cousin’ put to the test in landmark heart-disease trial Gene-therapy test launches pivotal year for precise genome-editing technique known as base editing.

They suggested a gene editing technique based on CRISPR called base editing. Base editing has been performed in people before, in clinical trials like his one: www.nature.com/articles/d41... 3/12

Soon after KJ was born, his parents learned he has a very rare, very dangerous genetic disorder. The best treatment is a liver transplant, but he might not have lived long enough to receive one. Eventually, his doctors presented his parents with a very out-of-the-box suggestion: gene editing. 2/12

World’s first personalized CRISPR therapy given to baby with genetic disease Treatment seems to have been effective, but it is not clear whether such bespoke therapies can be widely applied.

Plenty of cool science behind this CRISPR news, but it’s that cute baby and the personal story his parents shared that keeps me up at night 🧵🧪https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-01496-z