Andy Read 🌱🦠

The strike and protests in the Twin Cities yesterday were incredible.
Today, the force terrorizing the city executed someone in the street. They are not making our city safer. I'm tired of the lies. I’m tired of the fear. I’m tired.

There is video circulating on social media of a group of ICE agents beating a man near 26th and Nicollet in south Minneapolis, then one of the ICE agents shoots the man while he's on the ground numerous times. A witness can be heard yelling that the victim is dead.

Engineering plant immune responses (Plant BioDesign JIC project) at University of York on FindAPhD.com PhD Project - Engineering plant immune responses (Plant BioDesign JIC project) at University of York, listed on FindAPhD.com

We have a PhD studentship available for a student who wants to engineer immune responses by tinkering with the connectivity between cells. Based at JIC, collaboration with the Ezer lab, deadline 19th Jan, UK students only. Get in touch for more info! #PlantSciJobs

www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Looking forward to watching!

Follow the schematics and instructions Dave! Build the invention.

@letterboxd.social - how can we get Listers: a glimpse into extreme birdwatching on the app??? 🎥 🦅 📖

Led by talented international postdoc, @harsimargill.bsky.social, we sourced seeds for most entries tested in the USDA coordinated spring #wheat nursery over the last HUNDRED years! We genotyped them and quantified diversity and gene presence 🌾🧬

Me, Sarah and Harsimar with the UMN Borlaug statue

A panel from a scientific manuscript made up of four panels each representing a different public spring wheat breeding program. The panels show stacked orange and blue bars with each bar represents a decade and the proportion of blue shows how often a reduced height gene is found in material tested in that decade. The data show that the programs in minnesota, montana, and north dakota all include Rht-B1 in most of their material, while South Dakota does not.

New from the team: A century of breeding has preserved genetic variation, accumulated favorable alleles, and shaped the Rht genes portfolio in North American spring wheat
shorturl.at/LYYvr

Part of my favorite figure showing how different breeding programs use various reduced height genes.

a figure from a scientific papers composed of three panels. A single petunia flower is photographed in each panel. The left petunia is mostly red or purple but has areas of white at the margin of each petal. The center panel is a completely red or purple flower - this is what we expect wild type flowers to look like. The third panel shows an almost completely white petunia flower

another seed, appropriately, came from plants!
Here's a figure from shorturl.at/0S5l5 showing what we now know is silencing of the gene for purple pigment in petunias. And an important one from Baulcombe digging into mechanisms: shorturl.at/eP2qX
Hooray for basic research in all its forms! 🌸🪱🦠

It's beautiful 😍😍

Hundreds of wheat plants occupy two benches in a greenhouse with LED lights overhead. A yellow hose is stretched out between the two long rows of plants.

This is a great time to check-in with your international post-docs, students, and staff.

This picture of our wheat plants has nothing to do with the post, but I felt like I needed some cheering up.

Hundreds of wheat plants occupy two benches in a greenhouse with LED lights overhead. A yellow hose is stretched out between the two long rows of plants.

This is a great time to check-in with your international post-docs, students, and staff.

This picture of our wheat plants has nothing to do with the post, but I felt like I needed some cheering up.

'now with even more transposable elements' -- they always seem to find ways to expand their footprint in genomes (and in manuscripts)

This is great. Is the decision to deposit fastq and not pod5 because of data size, repository requirements, something else?

Join us on Bluesky and find out more about the www.wheatinitiative.org

The resistosome story continues...
Another beautiful structure - this time from a (modified) wheat NLR 🌾

nice! Download the Merlin App :)

Any bird highlights so far? Keep me updated!

I have a 'life goal' of giving a talk with walk up music -- do you have a song picked?

Genetic gains from 60 years of spring wheat breeding in the Northern Plains of the United States A significant positive genetic gain of 0.61% per annum was observed for grain yield in hard red spring wheat released in the Northern US region over the past six decades. Sustained yield improvement...

I'm very proud of this USDA funded work led by @harsimargill.bsky.social to analyze tons of spring wheat uniform nursery data painstakingly digitized by the Blueskyless Sarah Blecha. Lots more in the pipeline but this marks my official introduction as part of #wheat world. 🍞🌾👋
shorturl.at/v2nmk

Wish I was there! Thanks for posting so many updates and tell everyone I say 'hi' :)

BLS Meeting committee left to right: Andy Read, Thomas Baldwin, Robyn Roberts, Jonathan Jacobs, Rebecca Curland, Liz Brauer, Gazala Ameen

Gazala presents to a full room

Mug that says "I delivered an outstanding talk at the 4th Annual Bacterial Leaf Streak Initiative Conferene in Saint Paul Minnesota 2025"

photo of all BLS researchers, shot from above, all smiling with hands up

Bacterial Leaf Streak Meeting 2025 is over! Thank you so much to the organizers, attendees, presenters, staff, and volunteers who made it a success!

Experts foresee negative ripple effects in termination of USDA scientists in St. Paul lab A team at the U.S Department of Agriculture’s Cereal Disease Lab in St. Paul got notice last week that some of their jobs were getting cut. Experts warn that cutting jobs in this area will harm resear...

USDA scientists terminated from Cereal Disease Lab in St. Paul www.mprnews.org/story/2025/0...

Mass firings decimate U.S. science agencies White House dismissals and rationale challenged by dismissed scientists and lawsuits

"I’m feeling betrayed, gutted, lost, anxious, and furious."

Our story for @science.org—on the ongoing mass firing of federal employees and reactions in the scientific community.

www.science.org/content/arti...

Trump Cuts Target Next Generation of Scientists and Public Health Leaders (Gift Article) A core group of so-called disease detectives, who track outbreaks, was apparently spared. But other young researchers are out of jobs.

Here is a gift link to the article...

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/18/u...

3/3

In US, MN ranks #1 in oats; #3 in spring wheat; #9 in barley. $380M in #wheat exports alone.

Scientists are needed to support farmers producing these crops!

What's the future of #agriculture if we dismantle #AgriculturalScience research?

#PlantScience #USDA-ARS #AttackOnScience #PlantPathology

This is a closeup image of wheat plants in a disease trail nursery. There are yellow streaks on the otherwise healthy and green leaves caused by bacterial leaf streak

Tough day for small grains research in the Twin Cities. Myself and four scientist colleagues have all been let go from the USDA because we haven't completed our 3 year probationary period - effectively gutting the Cereal Disease Lab.
Taking a few days to be sad before I think about what comes next.

US Undergraduates! You still have until next Friday to apply to the Plant Health Fellows internship program in New Haven, CT. Learn about plant health research and careers for 9 weeks, includes $5,000 stipend and apartment housing: www.southernct.edu/plant-health...

No Kneecap?