Ishi

Woah- i know this isn’t revolutionary but using AI to interpret my hand written notebook notes is very helpful.

Opinion | What Autocrats Want From Academics: Servility In 1931, Italian scholars were made to take loyalty oaths. Will that happen to us?

"On October 8, 1931, a law went into effect requiring every Italian university professor to sign an oath pledging their loyalty to the government of Benito Mussolini. Out of over 1,200 professors in the country, only 12 refused. All of them were immediately fired." www.chronicle.com/article/what...

Catch up

NH’s new ID requirements send some would-be voters home to grab passports, birth certificates The law requires all new voters to show proof of their U.S. citizenship. For some, that meant making multiple trips to and from the polls before finally casting a ballot on Tuesday.

As predicted, women in New Hampshire had a hard time voting yesterday because of the new proof of citizenship law:

“It doesn’t have my married name on it,” she said. Town voting officials then sent her away a second time, to get her marriage certificate.

www.nhpr.org/nh-news/2025...

If you wanted to decrease the cost of homes, one thing you wouldn’t do is put a flat tariff on your main source of timber.

I'm very sad that "I have a paper on this" continues

Funding delays of > 30 days lead to, after 5 years:

- 40% increase in scientists exiting US labor force (constrained among those born in the US)
- 20% decrease in wages
- Burden is born by postdocs, grad students, and staff

National Science Foundation suspends salary payments, leaving researchers unable to pay their bills An NSF online payment system remained down after the federal funding freeze was lifted, leaving early-career scientists scrambling to pay bills

National Science Foundation suspends salary payments, leaving researchers unable to pay their bills www.statnews.com/2025/01/30/t...
Story by @ericboodman.bsky.social

Took less than a minute to call my congressman this morning to talk about what they see as the fate of congress when executive orders reign.

Reach out to them. They are the ones who get voted out in 2 years.

Call Script to Urge Congress Members to Defend the Constitution Introduction: "Hello, my name is [Your Name], and I am a constituent from [Your City/State]. I am calling to express my deep concern about President Trump's recent actions that undermine the U.S. Constitution." Key Points: "President Trump's executive orders, including the attempt to end birthright citizenship, blatantly violate the 14th Amendment, as affirmed by longstanding Supreme Court precedent135." "His disregard for constitutional principles, such as the emoluments clause and appropriations authority, demonstrates a pattern of undermining our nation's foundational laws24." Request: "I urge you to take all possible steps to hold President Trump accountable and protect the Constitution. This includes supporting lawsuits, legislative actions, and public statements condemning these violations." Closing: "Thank you for your time and for defending our democracy."

Call Script to Urge Congress Members to Defend the Constitution

Find your members of Congress using your address
www.congress.gov/members/find...

Call daily!!?

The "Viromics measurement" day 1 will include some breakout groups and brainstorming activities with onsite participants, so please come along with your strong opinions on what should be done / avoided / developed in this area :-)
And as usual, DM (now possible here!) / email for any questions !

VEGA conferences are great and unique opportunities (in my unbiased opinion) to get a sense for some of the latest viral ecogenomics research. This one will have a day 1 dedicated to "Viromics measurement", and day 2 around "virus-host interactions" and "atypical viruses

News Scream GIF ALT: News Scream GIF

Conference announcement: VEGA 2024 is officially *on* \o/ Will be Nov. 12 - 13, 2024, in Berkeley, in collaboration with NIST. More info to come soon re: speakers, etc, but in the meantime you can already check the provisional agenda and register at jgi.doe.gov/events/vega/

WWC Goers!
Outsourcing to the group because I can't find this answer: Do you know if the first/ last day of the IWA WWC are full days?

I recently got bit by this because I assumed the dates listed for a conference would have talks.... Flights seem to be on an exponential increase...

My institution is hiring for an Assistant Research Scientist for Environmental Biotechnology! Come work with us!!
www.employment.mtu.edu/en-us/job/49...

So excited to share that our work assessing antibiotic resistance in two full scale water reuse systems using meta genomics is published!
doi.org/10.1016/j.wa...
@emilydgarner.bsky.social

Please consider joining the NMDC as an ambassador for #microbiome data standards. Applications are now open!

New website idea: automatically calculate federal travel estimates for a given destination. I use so much time doing this

Detecting Mpox Cases Through Wastewater ... This report describes mpox detection using wastewater surveillance.

www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes...

This holiday season, radicalize the boomers in your life by loudly announcing no one's getting grandkids without student debt cancelation at the family dinner table ✨️

Do your part to fill every lawmaker's inbox with angry emails from would-be grandparents, godspeed 🫡

It's incredible how accurately Shel Silverstein predicted AI decades ago

Yep!

Exciting find of the day! A second edition of Brock’s microbiology from 1974 that my dad used in med school! Excited to see how things have changed from 2-7th edition. Also he paid 16$ for it…

Couldn't sleep Saturday... mentioned this to spouse "Yea maybe we shouldn't have gotten those 4pm lattes with double shots of espresso" bad life decisions all around

There's bad life decisions and then there's I just made myself a whole pot of black tea at 9:30pm bad life decisions

Journals that include references in the word count: WHYYY! Are you trying to make my methods section less reproducible??

Associate/ Full Professor of Virology in Molecular Biology & Biochemistry (Tenure-Track) University of California, Irvine is hiring. Apply now!

Katrine Whiteson (not here) just shared - "My department (mbb.bio.uci.edu) is hiring a virologist Assoc/Full Professor Deadline: 12/5/23. Great colleagues, great students, great weather.. feel free to ask me about it!" - here's a link to the description recruit.ap.uci.edu/JPF08644 #VirEvol #phagesky

so... anyone have any winter driving tips?

🚨My department is HIRING🚨
Microbiology & Molecular Genetics at University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine invites applicants for tenure-track microbiology faculty at the Assistant or Associate Professor level. Our scope is broad, we seek creative colleagues! More info: tinyurl.com/PittMMG-Jobs

Does anyone have journals to publish successful citizen science campaigns/designs? How is that field learning, growing and sharing with each other?

I think it is also compounded by moving to a new place so finding friends is also a new challenge