Willem van Schaik

Assessing sequencing-based pathogen surveillance of a recreational swimming area in Oslo, Norway Sequencing-based surveillance can enable rapid and sensitive detection of environmental pathogens. The Oslofjord inlet is relatively narrow and is exposed to substantial human activity, including occa...

We’ve published a wee pilot study assessing the utility of metagenomics & full-length 16S sequencing for the detection of seasonal pathogens (and AMR) in our local urban recreational swimming hot-spot

Check it out if you’re into that stuff :)

www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/jour...

Really looking forward to this and also hearing all the other exciting talks! Big thanks again for then invite 😀

If you haven't watched 'Dirty Business' on Channel 4 yet, I highly recommend you do. Brilliant, angry TV.

🔔Seminar Opportunity🔔

We're looking for (self)recommendations for a Postdoc who is working in the area of AMR (any area, any discipline) to give an online seminar in May.

Reply, DM or email me, there will more opportunities in the future as well so will be good to have a list.

#MicroSky #AMR

AI Keeps Failing at Microbiome Prediction Why simple models keep winning, where deep learning still shines, and where the field is headed

AI has huge promise for genomics -- but it has consistently failed at microbiome-based prediction.

My new post on why simple models keep winning, where deep learning actually earns its place, and where the field is headed

blekhman.substack.com/p/ai-keeps-f...

Hang in there, your research is too important for the world right now.

That's a shame. Hope you will find a great place to move to.

Influencers in Dubai switching from “everybody should move here” to “this Is a crisis and the British government should get me out of here” without a single blink

Would you consider a move to the UK? My university is recruiting across all disciplines.

Treasury plans depend on net migration being much higher than current policy will deliver or current Home Secretary willing to accept.

Something will have to give. Will Labour deliver tax rises and spending cuts just before an election to keep net imm close to zero? Or let imm rise to avert this?

On app (Android): settings -> moderation

So I pleased to announce the conceptual spawn of FigTree: PearTree (acronym still to be finalised). If you want to dive right in it is hosted as a web app here: artic-network.github.io/peartree (click the “Example...” button for immediate candy and then click every button you can find).

There is never a good time to watch Threads so may as well do it today

What is happening in US politics is awful, but in some way guards as a vision of what could be to come if we vote for authoritarian ideas in the general election.

Unfortunately the band is not named 'Having Fun Amid Family Drama'

No!

Amazingly, this is not satire!

Source: www.instagram.com/reels/DVMMed...

Terrible headline (this is NOT what the new research - link below - shows!), terrible AI image! Argh!
Here’s the actual research:
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Where do I start?! 1/4

unsurprising though

How China’s universities joined the global elite Investment by Beijing has transformed the country’s institutions despite lingering questions about research quality and intellectual freedom

“Chinese universities’ climbing in global rankings is real. It’s not a ‘mystery bounce’ but the result of 3 decades of sustained, targeted investment,”

Sustained, targeted investment .. an innovative intervention!

An approach for the U.K. to consider?!

giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

Gorton and Denton first thoughts - incredible result for the Greens who won the long battle to be the best placed anti-Reform candidate - helped by being the obvious anti-Labour candidate for disappointed progressives. As I noted in the Observer last month, a Revolt on the Left is growing

When I told Gorton and Denton to ‘channel their patriotic Blitz spirit’ I didn’t mean ‘defeat the far-right fascists’, says Farage When I told Gorton and Denton to ‘channel their patriotic Blitz spirit’ I didn’t mean ‘defeat the far-right fascists’, says Farage

NEWS! When I told Gorton and Denton to 'channel their patriotic Blitz spirit' I didn't mean 'defeat the far-right fascists', says Farage newsthump.com/2026/02/27/w...

I currently have a Dutch passport and a (very recently) expired British one which I rarely use.
With these passports I can travel freely anywhere in the EU, US, Canada, Israel, all over Africa and Asia and Latin America. I can move to Lisbon or Berlin without a visa
but I cannot step foot in the UK!

Very sad news about the passing of Prof. Jeff Cole. Jeff was a central figure for biotechnology in Europe who inspired generations of researchers. R.I.P.🕊️

I am deeply saddened by Jeff's passing. Jeff lived and breathed microbiology, and was still very much part of the microbiology community in @imibirmingham.bsky.social until a few weeks ago. He was supportive to students and staff and will be sorely missed by many, here in Birmingham and elsewhere

I am not (but the US really needs to get their act together, last chance saloon at the mid-terms) and what has happened since with the US hockey team has further proven my point

“Keeping foreign criminals out of the US” update:

bsky.app/profile/adam...

Leuker van een afstandje

Job losses at research-intensive universities double in two years - Research Professional News Exclusive: Scale of redundancies revealed branded a “disaster” for UK research capacity

Job losses at UK research-intensive universities double in two years.

Exclusive: Scale of redundancies branded a “disaster”.

www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-u...

Novo Nordisk Foundation backs quantum computing and life sciences beyond Denmark World’s richest philanthropic organisation is co-ordinating with EU about research and innovation strategy

Novo Nordisk Foundation backs quantum computing and life sciences beyond Denmark

“We see ourselves as a private philanthropic partner to the EU,” Thomsen told the FT, adding that he was also keen to work with other European countries such as the UK.”

giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...