Will Glynn

Two books in my hand. One is “Icelandic Folk and Fairy Tales” from Iceland Review, and the other is Penguin Classics’ “A Celtic Miscellany”

My mini-haul from the second-hand bookshop at the Weald and Downland Living Museum, Sussex. Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of Björk and trying to improve my Gaeilge, so I thought this was an apt selection 📚💙

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

A pale blue dot, though not as hospitable as Carl Sagan’s pale blue dot

For comparison here’s a cropped picture of Uranus I took on the 24th October

Image of Uranus taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, showing a whitish north polar region, vivid blue-greenish atmosphere and a few whitish elongated storms visible around the pole. The planet is surrounded by clearly defined ring system set against the black background of space.

Fresh JWST view of Uranus taken Oct 6 2025 with NIRCam.

Full size & more info: flic.kr/p/2rByidu 🔭🧪
Credit: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/Andrea Luck CC BY

Proposal PI: Varun Bajaj
Proposal ID: 8975
Filters: F150W2-F162M, F410M

My favourite space artist, do give him a follow #sciart 🔭

Chromosome segregation dynamics during the cell cycle of Staphylococcus aureus - Nature Communications Our understanding of chromosome organization and dynamics in spherical bacteria, such as Staphylococcus aureus, remains limited. Here, the authors show that chromosome replication and cell division cycles are not synchronized in S. aureus, with cells exhibiting two segregated origins of replication at the start of the cell cycle.

Chromosome replication and cell division cycles are not synchronized in Staphylococcus aureus, with cells exhibiting two segregated origins of replication at the start of the cell cycle

#bacteria #microbiology

Inside the cave, looking out

Open area with steps outside the cave entrance. The River Nidd is visible.

Blue plaque for St. Robert

Information board outside the cave with a floorplan of the interior

Here are some of the photos I took in my August 2024 visit

The broad zoomed out picture: a foreground of dark trees and fields; constellations visible include Perseus at the top, Pleiades at the centre and a partially obscured Taurus at the bottom.

A zoomed in version of the previous picture, Uranus is circled

The clouds parted just long enough tonight for me to photograph an ice giant — #Uranus. The planet is currently situated between the Pleiades and Lambda Tauri (part of the constellation Taurus) 🔭🧪

A fascinating (and satisfying) aspect of the #NoKings protests is how frogs have been reclaimed as a symbol from the far-right 🐸🐸🐸

From Antarctic eelpouts to African cichlids, the percomorph (literally “perch-like”) fishes have been a remarkable system for studying how genomic changes underpin evolution by natural selection 🐠🐟🧪

Thrilled to announce that I’ve started studying for a Postgraduate Diploma in Biomedical Science with the University of Greenwich. My first module is Advanced Human Genetics 🧬🧪 🥼

The guidebook for each stage actually lists key vocabulary, as opposed to stock phrases on the owl app

So far so good!

Launch screen for the Lingonaut app

Trying out the beta version of the new Lingonaut app #langsky 🇫🇮

Disc of the sun touching the horizon between two trees

Disc of the sun dipping below the hills

Sunset over the South Downs 🌅🔭

Lundi, on fête les 30 ans de l'annonce de la détection de la 1ère exoplanète à avoir été découverte en orbite autour d'une étoile de type solaire, par Didier Queloz et Michel Mayor, prix Nobel de physique 2019. C'était le 6 octobre 1995 à Florence, et c'était 51 Pegasi b, la 1ère "Jupiter chaude" 🧵👇

An Oxford World Classics edition of the Kalevala. In the background, through the caravan window, one can see the Shropshire hills

The Kalevala in the caravan 🇫🇮 #booksky

Fleshy sheets of white fungus blooming from log. A parabolic cut has been made in one of the sheets, suggesting an animal took a bite

Something has taken a bite out of this wood fungus, which looks like a relative of chicken-of-the-woods #FungiFriends #MushroomMonday

The best characterised oncogenic gene fusion is that of BCR and ABL1, made by translocation from chromosome 9 to 22 (aka a Philadelphia chromosome). Targeting BCR::ABL1 has already revolutionised treatment of chronic myelogenous leukaemia. How many other cancers could be managed in a similar way?

This isn't all I'd hoped it would be, due to less than ideal sky conditions and an equipment issue. But this is the transit of Titan and its shadow on Saturn. Ideally the photograph would resolve the moon from its shadow, but I'm still hoping for points for effort. #Astronomy #Astrophotography

Zeitserie der Venusbedeckung vom 19. September 2025: Montage von fünf Aufnahmen der abnehmenden schmalen Mondsichel am blauen Taghimmel. Ein heller Punkt verschwindet etwas unterhalb der Mitte am Rand der Sichel

Es hat etwas gedauert, aber hier nun endlich die entscheidenden Momente der gestrigen Venusbedeckung durch die schmale Mondsichel 😊🔭

Ein weißer, plattenförmiger Pilz ins Unterholtz

Wie ein Stück Meissener Porzellan #FungiFriends 🍄🍄‍🟫

Quote from Ed Davey which reads: What is happening in Gaza is a genocide. And the President of the United States, who wants a Nobel Peace Prize, is doing nothing to stop it. We have long said that Hamas is genocidal and condemned them for their actions. Now I think we have to say that what the Netanyahu Government is doing amounts to genocide.

A genocide is unfolding, and Donald Trump is the one man in the world with the power to make it stop.

If the Prime Minister is going to wine and dine Donald Trump, he must also him to finally take action to end the assault on Gaza City, stop the aid blockade and secure the release of hostages.

A chest X-ray dated 18th September 2024, showing an implanted cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD). The ICD sits on the left side of my chest and has two leads: one going into the right ventricle and the other in the right atrium

Happy first birthday to my ICD! I’m eternally grateful for the new lease of life it’s given me #cardiology #ARVC #cardiomyopathy

Mechanisms of human germ cell development Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology, Published online: 16 September 2025; doi:10.1038/s41580-025-00893-6Human germ cells are specified during early development and eventually differentiate into sperm and oocytes. Recent studies have revealed key signalling pathways and epigenetic mechanisms of their development, enabling in vitro reconstitution and potential treatments for germ cell-related diseases.

New Online! Mechanisms of human germ cell development

The UK must also end its complicity #StopTheGenocide

Constraints on chromosome evolution revealed by the 229 chromosome pairs of the Atlas blue butterfly The genome of the Atlas blue butterfly contains ten times more chromosomes than most butterflies, and more than any other known diploid animal. Wright et al. show that this extraordinary karyotype is ...

How many chromosomes can an animal have?

In our paper out now in @currentbiology.bsky.social we show that the Atlas blue butterfly has 229 chromosome pairs- the highest in diploid Metazoa! These arose by rapid autosome fragmentation while sex chromosomes stayed intact.
www.cell.com/current-biol...

If you see headlines claiming NASA's found life on Mars - these are new studies of features in rocks which, if they were on Earth, look like the kind of thing caused by microorganisms. But they could very well - are most probably in fact - be caused by chemistry, not biology.

Bunch of blackberries in various stages of ripeness hanging in front of a wooden post

Closing blackberries of the season did not disappoint 😋🌱

Minerals have been found that ~^*might*^~ be the result of carbon undergoing redox reactions, which in turn could indicate past biotic metabolism 🔭🧪