David Ashbrook

So, #AcademicSky PIs, a few completely random questions for you:

What’s something you wish you had known/did when you started your own lab?

-or-

What’s something you did when you started your lab that worked out well?

Asking for a friend...

Meanwhile, in the office, we don’t even get *cubicles* anymore - a whole cube would be luxury wasted space! We get little rectangular stalls, hot desks, open plan offices. You can’t hear yourself think, much less the zoom call you’re always in. Is it any wonder people are less productive?

One thing that annoys me about these stories and the common depictions of working from home is this image of someone relaxing on the couch/in bed.

I like to wfh because I have faster internet, a bigger desk, better monitors, and an office with a door that shuts. I’m not lounging in bed.

AI Tools and Resources Repository for Behavioural Researchers | Behavioural Research UK (BR-UK) | Usher Institute This repository is designed to help you navigate the opportunities and challenges of using Artificial Intelligence (AI) in behavioural research. AI is not a replacement for rigorous methodology, but w...

🚀 Exciting news! Due to interest following our AI in Behavioural Research Webinar series, we have launched a new AI repository for behavioural researchers, packed with resources and tools!

my lab needs a repeat pipetter that can dispense 1ml 12 times. (can be analog or digital). i've never had one of these- does anyone have one to recommend?

(pls reski)

GitHub - guidomeijer/SerotoninStimulation Contribute to guidomeijer/SerotoninStimulation development by creating an account on GitHub.

All these data are open-source! 🎉 There's neural data 🧠, video data from three cameras 🎥, wheel movement trajectories 🛞, you name it!

You can easily access the data through our API and start your own serotonin project, for instructions see:

github.com/guidomeijer/...

(8/9)

Serotonin drives choice-independent reconfiguration of distributed neural activity Serotonin (5-HT) is a central neuromodulator which is implicated in, amongst other functions, cognitive flexibility. 5-HT is released from the dorsal raphe nucleus (DRN) throughout nearly the entire f...

🚨Pre-print alert🚨

We stimulated serotonin with optogenetics while doing large-scale Neuropixel recordings across the mouse brain. We found strong widespread modulation of neural activity, but no effect on the choices of the mouse 🐭

How is this possible? Strap in! (1/9) 👇🧵

doi.org/10.1101/2025...

You can even browse the data to search for your favorite longitudinal protein signature

mouse-dbs-profiling.serve.scilifelab.se/app/mouse-db...

@scilifelab.se @kthuniversity.bsky.social
@ki.se

We are pleased to announce our first workshop in Portugal, which will guide you step by step through the process of pose estimation and unsupervised behavior analysis, focusing on two powerful tools: DeepLabCut and Keypoint-MoSeq!
@deeplabcut.bsky.social

Marking telomeres on a simple ideogram in R How to make a basic telomere-marked ideogram using just ggplot2.

💬 "There are a couple of #Rpackages that can produce ideograms, but in this case, I wanted something even simpler... and instead made a very basic telomere-marked ideogram using just #ggplot2." - @rowenahill.bsky.social

📝 Marking telomeres on a simple ideogram in R: buff.ly/nyGwY5g

#coding #R 💻🧬

This is a billionaire-funded Tony Blair lobbying project being funnelled unchallenged onto the front page of a national newspaper.
1/

Unpopular opinion: I love posters and find them underrated as a form of less linear science communication. There should be platforms to publish in poster format, with supporting online material. My latest one, I loved to present in the Bohemian woods #theconferencetoendallconferences #tcteac

Low-dose metformin requires brain Rap1 for its antidiabetic action Metformin lowers blood glucose by inhibiting Rap1 in ventromedial hypothalamic neurons that regulate glucose balance.

Metformin, the first line drug for Type 2 diabetes, has been used for 60 years without a clearcut mechanism of action. It turns out it's not just reducing glucose output from the liver. Metformin also works via the brain www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Lucy Stafford - Take part in my research ⬇️Scroll down for links to the BODY experiment and the online surveys.⬇️

I'm looking for ~25 more people with a gastrointestinal disorder to complete an online survey on interoception. You can find this survey here: sites.google.com/york.ac.uk/l...

🙏

1/N What are the organizational principles underlying crossmodal cortical connections?
We address this in this new preprint, led by @alexegeaweiss.bsky.social & ‪@bturner-bridger.bsky.social‬ in collab w/ ‪@petrznam.bsky.social‬ @crick.ac.uk
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Colin Wright is a major "Gender Critical" activist. Along with Dr Emma Hilton he's looked to as a top level apologist for their "sex is binary" claim

He's now claiming, despite literally being famous for being a science denier, that he's been discriminated against for being white. Yes, really

Someone asked me just today if RSS is “still a thing”.

Friends, it definitely is! Though I will always sigh for google reader, RSS remains a fantastic way to pull in news from the sources you want to read, without “the algorithm” sucking you into rage and despair.

GLP-1 receptor agonists (like semaglutide) are transforming diabetes & weight management.

But what about mental health effects?

This new meta-analysis reviewed 80 RCTs to explore risks & benefits across 60,000+ participants.

#GLP1 #Diabetes #MentalHealth #Obesity

🧵THREAD

🚨 Calling all MRI researchers!
Submit your Registered Report to the late-breaking abstract track at #ESMRMB2025.
It’s your chance to highlight strong methods & reproducible science.
🧠 Need inspiration? Check out real examples: buff.ly/JbkaB4m
Submit here: buff.ly/g2G4FSA
#OpenScience #MRI

Good news! Our Behavioural Brain Research special issue on "Ultrasonic Communication in Rodents" is growing. Two new studies are available online!

And an important update: The submission deadline has been extended: 31 October 2025

More information here: www.sciencedirect.com/special-issu...

To be a pedant, shouldn't this be "how the C57BL/6J brain ages"? B6/J is weird in several ways.

🧪🧠

Vitally important to wash your cybertruck with salt water and lemon juice. You'll need 1/8 cup of salt per gallon of water, plus 1/4 cup of lemon juice. Stir well, then use it to wash the vehicle. It's the only way to get a really thorough cleaning.

All historians know the sinking feeling of tracking an "authoritative" reference back through several generations of writers to an unsourced assertion by someone nobody's ever heard of.

Now AI can make up new ones in no time at all.

Actually my favorite bird etymology is that in 1400s England they gave human nicknames to birds (Jenny Wren, Tom Tit) but some of them stuck. Jack Daw became Jackdaw, Maggie Pie became Magpie. With Robin Redbreast they just dropped the original name of the bird entirely.

Let's please keep the remaining staff at NIH, NSF, etc in our thoughts even as you lose sleep over your own lab and scientific career.

They are enduring pure chaos to try to hold the fort.

See snapshot from wapo.st/4feKKuu (gift 🔗) saying they are "barely holding it together"

Trump administration halts, then releases, NIH research funding The decision temporarily froze $15 billion in federal funding, according to one senator. It came as Trump officials wrestle over federal spending levels.

A senior leader at one NIH institute said: “At my level we are legitimately trying to figure out how to keep funding high-impact science given what we expect will happen.”
The senior leader added: “Our grants people are barely holding it together because they are at the center of this chaos.”

This man is pure evil.

Two new chapters from my free online book in human genetics out this weekend!
These complete Part 3 of the book, on human population structure and history:
3.3: Human prehistory [separate thread]
3.4: Ancient DNA: a genetic time capsule [this thread]
web.stanford.edu/group/pritch...

Hints of hidden heritability in GWAS - Nature Genetics Although susceptibility loci identified through genome-wide association studies (GWAS) typically explain only a small proportion of the heritability, a classical quantitative genetic analysis now argu...

Does anyone know who first used the term "Manhattan Plot"?

Wikipedia links to a 2010 paper by Greg Gibson. I haven't yet found an earlier use, but Greg's phrasing suggests that he did not invent the term.
doi.org/10.1038/ng07...