Piet

“Why Are We Funding This?” Long-standing myths about “silly science” have contributed to the reckless slashing of government-supported research.

Researchers: please read & share this excellent piece in @sigmaxi.bsky.social ‘s magazine @americanscientist.org by @whysharksmatter.bsky.social about the importance of communicating about your work to non-scientists, and how to do it! #scicomm

www.americanscientist.org/article/%E2%...

New animal farm movie screenshot showing Napoleon doing a speech

www.ign.com/articles/ani...

5 small joys you can cut out of your life and still not be able to afford a home With home prices doubling in the last 5 years and increasingly divorced from the incomes of Canadians such that the real estate market has created a completely parallel universe devoid of anything res...

5 small joys you can cut out of your life and still not be able to afford a home

Meme with Luke and Leia in the field, where Luke is Microsoft saying PCs need to be updated for Windows 11, and Leia is asking if they made sure that it runs on slightly old hardware. Right?

This is after having recently learned from IT that all our perfectly fine lab computers will need to be replaced because they don't meet the upcoming Windows 11 system requirements. 💸💸/💸💸

Meme depicting Oprah announcing to her audience that everyone gets an invoice.

Learned this week that after having been forced to use Office 365, and only Office 365, for the entire lab, and having restructured all our collaboration and documentation practices to comply with that directive, we are now also expected to pay for every single account we have. 💸/💸💸

Our "goal is to create a stable, independent non-profit organization that ensures [bioRxiv & medRxiv] remain open...governed by and for the research community, not a single funder...or any one stakeholder."

Some common questions about openRxiv answered:

openrxiv.org/qa-governanc...

Session 2: Creating Clarity: Crafting Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) that Simplify and Succeed

We’ve just wrapped up Session 2: Creating Clarity: Crafting Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) that Simplify and Succeed! 👏

Thank you to Janet Rothberg, for leading such an insightful and interactive session on best practices for crafting SOPs that are clear, effective, and streamlined!

We’re excited to share the first publication from our lab, now out in @EMBOPress! @shayma-a.bsky.social @ucl.ac.uk
Using live imaging in the mouse embryo, we tracked how heart progenitors migrate and assemble into the heart tube.

🧵5 Top Free Alternatives to BioRender for Scientific Illustrations!

These five websites offer free scientific illustrations for biologists. Great for presentations, research papers and other research communication needs.

Save and share the post!

Close-up photograph of a person’s eye, with a vivid blue colouration.

“How about eye colour?” I hear you ask. “We all know the story behind blue eyes - caused by recessive alleles of a single gene. If both parents are blue-eyed, a child’s eyes must be blue, yes?” Nope! A myth busted long ago: a 1908 study found non-blue-eyed children in 12% of blue-blue pairings. 6/n

Selective inhibition of stromal mechanosensing suppresses cardiac fibrosis - Nature Inhibition of a cardiac stroma-enriched mechanosensor, SRC—in concert with suppression of the TGFβ pathway—potentiates the reversal of fibroblast activation and alleviates contractile dysfunction in f...

👇🏾💥💥💥
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

I am teaching my phd writing workshop course this quarter, question: are there any words/phrases said to you by an advisor/mentor that stuck with you, were memorable, or particularly helpful? If so please reply below!

WOWOWOW! What a race! What a finish 😍 #AGR25

🥇 Mattias Skjelmose
🥈 Tadej Pogačar
🥉 Remco Evenepoel

Photo of the three cobble trophies Mathieu van der Poel won at Paris-Roubaix shared on Instagram by his girl Roxanne Bertels

😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨 That’s a pretty good flex to be honest 💪🏻 #MvdP #ParisRoubaix 🪨🪨🪨

CODA for the masses!

Valentina Matos-Romero, Ashley Kiemen and team have put together an ultra detailed protocol to use CODA for 3D single-cell mapping of tissues, organs, and organisms.

Use CODA by downloading this protocol here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

I urge folks to sign this letter and share it with their university colleagues to get critical mass.

author list with George R. R. Martin highlighted. he's towards the back where you usually put the people who contributed but are unlikely to actually do anything in the writing of the paper.

first up, including "fantasy author who popularized a make-believe version of the species and also investor" as an author on this is, uhh, A Choice??

i know of PIs who won't give authorship to lab techs or undergrads bc "their paycheck is their compensation" so this is. hmm. not great imo?

Pfp crosses line with a butterfly in shot!!!

Float like a butterfly, sting like a BEE!!

How is this even real?!! 🥹🦋🐝

Instead of believing the myth that three expensive, genetically modified wolves are “de-extinct” dire wolves, let’s look at animals humanity has actually brought back from the brink of extinction using proven science and dedicated hard work: 🧵/6

Canada Excellence Research Chairs (CERC) - Montréal, Quebec (CA) job with University of Montreal (UdeM) | 12838461 Canada Excellence Research Chairs (CERC)

Fantastic opportunity if you are interested in moving your lab to Montreal, Canada! Through this program, Chairholders will be awarded up to $1 million per year for a period of 8 years.

Contact me if you are interested.

www.nature.com/naturecareer...

Canada Excellence Research Chairs (CERC) - Montréal, Quebec (CA) job with University of Montreal (UdeM) | 12838461 Canada Excellence Research Chairs (CERC)

If you’re interested in moving your lab to beautiful Montreal Canada, this program offers chairholders funding of up to 1M$ a year for 8 years. See link for details.
www.nature.com/naturecareer...

Bird flu is hitting the U.S. hard. Now, migratory birds are flying north | CBC News 5 years after COVID-19, scientists are watching another virus warily: H5N1. It’s been circulating widely in the U.S. — and now, wild birds are set to start north for migration season.

Bird flu is hitting the U.S. hard. Now, migratory birds are flying north. How Canadian scientists are ramping up efforts to curb the virus that could cause the next pandemic, by Jennifer Yoon www.cbc.ca/news/health/... via @cbcnews.ca #H5N1

Canada to invest $3 million for bike infrastructure in Quebec - Canadian Cycling Magazine The government is working to promote cycling and active transportation in the province, at a time when the same type of programs are under threat elsewhere

At a time when bike lanes are under threat—both in Ontario and south of the border—it’s great to see...

cyclingmagazine.ca/sections/new...

Come and Stand Up For Science in a city near you this Friday
standupforscience2025.org

Photographer who snapped fight between a bald eagle and Canada goose calls it 'very symbolic' | CBC News A bald eagle may have thought it spotted an easy lunch in a Canada goose sitting on an icy bay in Burlington, Ont., but according to Mervyn Sequeira — who watched and photographed a 20-minute battle b...

Fight between bald eagle 🦅 and Canada goose ‘highly symbolic, says photographer. Eagle gave up after 20 minutes of squawking.
www.cbc.ca/news/canada/... via @cbcnews.ca

Rescuing DNMT1 fails to fully reverse the molecular and functional repercussions of its loss in mouse embryonic stem cells Abstract. Epigenetic mechanisms are crucial for developmental programming and can be disrupted by environmental stressors, increasing susceptibility to dis

Happy to share the lab's latest publication from @eli-elder.bsky.social and team in @narjournal.bsky.social ! What happens when #DNAmethylation maintenance is transiently interrupted in mouse embryonic stem cells? Let's dive in (1/11). doi.org/10.1093/nar/...

The notion that one can build a virtual cell from its genes and their interactions www.cell.com/cell/fulltex... is an interesting folly that highlights the extremes the #GeneCentric view of Biology can reach 🧵

a cat is sitting on a couch using a laptop . ALT: a cat is sitting on a couch using a laptop .

Two days left to submit your abstract for #WeinsteinCVD2025! DEADLINE:
Friday, Feb. 21 @ 11:59 p.m. CST! Submit Here: www.cvent.com/c/abstracts/...

Abrupt Dismissal of NIH and NSF Staff Undermines Government Efficiency