The Grass Foundation

Do you love quantifying animal behavior as much as we do? We have just the tool for you! Presenting #OCTRON - a pipeline that helps you create rich annotation data and enables training of custom segmentation models. Have a look, particularly if you work with non-model / invertebrate organisms!

APPLY NOW: 2026 Grass Fellowship. Support for investigator-designed, independent research projects by scientists early in their career. Deadline December 1, 2025

ONE WEEK UNTIL THE DEADLINE!

Spend the summer in the Grass Lab at the @mblscience.bsky.social in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, conducting your own original neuroscience research in a richly supportive shared environment.

grassfoundation.org/application-...

A photo of a booth at the Society for Neuroscience Meeting, with a big banner that says The Grass Foundation and an enlarged photo of a bobtail squid.

Come see us at booth 3816 at #SfN25!

Grass Community Guide: SfN 2025 San Diego

See you at #SfN25! Catch up with Grass Fellows and activities supported by The Grass Foundation. The full Grass Community Guide is right here for you!

grassfoundation.org/grass-commun...

The priority deadline for the 2026 Grass Fellowship is 2 weeks away!

Apply by October 15 for the opportunity to receive technical feedback on your proposal and make changes before the final December 1 deadline.

grassfoundation.org/application-...

Many thanks to Grass Laboratory Director Heather Rhodes for the photo.

A photo of a man at a conference table with a pitcher of margaritas in the middle, and a display screen showing a slide about Stephen Kuffler.

The neuroscience community has lost a dear friend and mentor. Ed Kravitz passed away on Sunday, September 21, 2025.

Here he is this past summer speaking with (and making margaritas for) the 2025 Grass Fellows, as he's done for more than two decades.

Rest in peace.

Apply now 2026 Grass Fellowship Priority Deadline: October 15, 2025 Final Deadline: December 1, 2025 GrassFoundation.org

Now accepting applications for the 2026 Grass Fellowship!

Do you have a great idea for a project you can do next summer in the Grass Lab at the @mblscience.bsky.social?

Get working on that proposal!
grassfoundation.org/apply-for-th...

Grass Fellows Symposium. Alex Chen, David Hildebrand, Zeeshan Banday, Sam Chakrabarti, Hannah Oberle, Christian Hoffmann, Kyra Schapiro, Alexandra Yarger

Want to hear some amazing science talks from Grass Fellows? Tune in to the 2025 Grass Fellows Symposium tomorrow morning!

Thursday, August 28. 9am-noon ET
Zoom Link:
mbl.zoom.us/j/9313786881...

We are pleased to announce the 2025 Henry Grass Rising Stars in Neuroscience Awardees, Christian Cazares @fleabrained.bsky.social and Eddy Albarran
@albarran.bsky.social! ‬

grassfoundation.org/2025-henry-g...

SfN and Grass Foundation logos. Fostering Authenticity and Cultural Awareness in Your Scientific Ecosystem. Wednesday, July 23, 11 a.m.–noon EDT. Carmen Maldonado-Vlaar, PhD, University of Puerto Rico-Rio Piedras Campus. Tracey Hermanstyne, PhD, WashU Medicine. Brian Dias, PhD, USC Kreck School of Medicine & Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. Chanel Matney, PhD, UCSF Bioethics.

Each scientist brings a unique identity and cultural background into their professional space.

Join SfN and the @grassfoundation.bsky.social's upcoming webinar to learn how you can navigate these dynamics and create a more inclusive scientific community.

🔗: vist.ly/3y9i7

#NeuroSky

Comb Jellies Uniquely Evolved  to Sense Their World  | Marine Biological Laboratory In 2023, the ctenophore made a splash, surprising researchers at the MBL with its bizarre biology.    Ctenophores, also known as comb jellies, are gelatinous invertebrates that beat their iridescent c...

At @mblscience.bsky.social, Grass Lab Associate Director Oscar Arenas Sabogal is peering into ctenophores’ puzzling physiology to determine how their nervous system transforms sensations into behavior.

"The more we investigate, the weirder it gets."

www.mbl.edu/news/comb-je...

Excited to see what Schapiro discovers during her Kavli-Grass Fellowship!

cc @kavlifoundation.org

Do Light and Darkness Shape the Patterns on Shells? A Grass Fellow Investigates | Marine Biological Laboratory Kyra Schapiro knows how to find a good shell. A self-professed sheller – “ Yes, it’s a noun,” she said – Schapiro has amassed hundreds of seashells. “It’s the patterns and the beauty” that compels her...

Zebra nerite snails have diagonal stripes painted across their shells. But sometimes, a dramatic change will pause and switch their shell pattern to something new. 🐌 Kyra Schapiro investigates how these shell patterns emerge in the Grass Lab.

Learn more: bit.ly/4llySJ7

Do Light and Darkness Shape the Patterns on Shells? A Grass Fellow Investigates | Marine Biological Laboratory Kyra Schapiro knows how to find a good shell. A self-professed sheller – “ Yes, it’s a noun,” she said – Schapiro has amassed hundreds of seashells. “It’s the patterns and the beauty” that compels her...

2025 Kavli-Grass Fellow Kyra Schapiro is spending this summer in the Grass Lab (@grassfoundation.bsky.social) understanding how environmental factors shape shell patterning in Zebra nerite snails and how the nervous system might control this process.

Learn more here: bit.ly/4llySJ7

Tardigrade-obsessed: meet the researchers trying to turn water bears into neuroscience models For water-bear enthusiasts, it’s the creature’s legs that make it stand out.

Huge thanks to Benj Plackett & the @nature.com journalism team for featuring our tardigrade 🧠🔬🧬 work! Means so much as an early-career researcher building community + tools (neural atlas, GCaMP strain, behavior) now based in @gaou-ak.bsky.social Lab @ IAB Tsuruoka 🇯🇵 www.nature.com/articles/d41...

A photo of a 1955 postcard of a chicken walking a tightrope. Overlaid are the words, "How do birds balance?"

Birds have a structure called the lumbosacral organ at the base of their spinal column, and we don't know yet what it does. But 2024 Grass Fellow Hannah Martin wanted to be among the first to investigate its neurons in detail.

grassfoundation.org/how-birds-ba...

2025 Grass Fellows Zeeshan Banday - University of Chicago Mechanoelectrical transduction in jellyfish Sam Chakrabarti - Max Delbruck Center Pain sensation in sharks Alex Chen - Harvard University Ctenophore nerve net development David Hildebrand - The Rockefeller University Face recognition in paper wasps Chris Hoffmann - German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases Ocean acidification and behavior in sea slugs Hannah Oberle - University of Michigan Synaptic plasticity in mouse inferior colliculus Kyra Schapiro - Brandeis University Molluscan shell patterning Alex Yarger - Imperial College London Dragonfly flight control

It's going to be a great summer with this group!

grassfoundation.org/announcing-t...

Please help us welcome the 2025 Grass Fellows! The Grass Fellowship program brings early-career investigators to the MBL to pursue a self-designed, independent research project in neuroscience.

Learn more here: bit.ly/3H57boR

📷 Credit: Scott Bennett

2025 Grass Fellows: Zeeshan Banday - University of Chicago Mechanoelectrical transduction in jellyfish Sam Chakrabarti - Max Delbruck Center Pain sensation in sharks Alex Chen - Harvard University Ctenophore nerve net development David Hildebrand - The Rockefeller University Face recognition in paper wasps Chris Hoffmann - German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases Ocean acidification and behavior in sea slugs Hannah Oberle - University of Michigan Synaptic plasticity in mouse inferior colliculus Kyra Schapiro - Brandeis University Molluscan shell patterning Alex Yarger - Imperial College London Dragonfly flight control

Looking for some good news today?

We have eight inspiring early-career scientists heading to @mblscience.bsky.social to spend the summer conducting research on topics ranging from pain sensation in sharks to ocean acidification and behavior in sea slugs.

grassfoundation.org/announcing-t...

Please help us welcome to campus the students in our Frontiers in Reproduction Course! For the next 6 weeks, they will learn state-of-the-art methods and current concepts in reproductive biology.

Learn more here! bit.ly/43nKfK0

We will likely announce the awardees in July.

No apologies necessary! We are working on that and will have news soon!

Neurobiology in Changing Environments Program 2025 - YouTube

Missed the Neurobiology in Changing Environments #NiCE symposium? Watch the full event on YouTube!
Explore how nervous systems respond, resist & recover from the challenges of a rapidly changing world. 🌎 🌊 🧠 🧬
#KavliNeuro #FrontierScience #Neuroscience

www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...

With all their complexity in a tiny transparent package, could tardigrades be a useful organism for neuroscientists to study as they unravel the many mysteries of the brain?

@tardi-neuro.bsky.social thinks it’s time tardigrades have their moment!

grassfoundation.org/time-for-tar...

She investigated how gliding tree frogs differ from their non-gliding tree frog cousins. She also looked at terrestrial frogs, and even alligators for comparisons. grassfoundation.org/how-gliding-...

What is it like to do a Grass Fellowship at @mblscience.bsky.social, spending a summer doing intensive research in this amazing community of scientists?

For early-career researchers like Andrea Gaede, it's a boost of enthusiasm!

🐸 How do gliding tree frogs see the world?

➡️ What are the mechanisms of their visual motion processing?

➡️ How do they make the split-second decisions?

➡️ What can this tell us about the evolution of neural systems?

grassfoundation.org/how-gliding-...

Horseshoe crabs are amazing, and last summer one of our Grass Fellows successfully made the first genome-edited horseshoe crabs while he was at @mblscience.bsky.social!

grassfoundation.org/first-genome...

Congratulations to A. Kimberly McAllister, one this year's @aaas.org Fellows! She is a Trustee at The Grass Foundation, as well as a former fellow!

Congratulations to all this year's amazing fellows, and thank you for the work you do!

www.aaas.org/programs/fel...