Orr laboratory

White House stalls release of approved US science budgets The US Congress rejected sweeping cuts to science agencies. But the NIH, the NSF and NASA have had their spending slowed.

Congress rejected massive cuts to US science budgets for 2026, but much of the money still isn’t flowing to researchers.

The culprit? The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is quietly slow-walking the release of funds. 🧵👇

CLCC1 promotes hepatic neutral lipid flux and nuclear pore complex assembly - Nature CRISPR–Cas9 screening identifies CLCC1 as a factor that increases neutral lipid flux to prevent hepatic steatosis and promotes nuclear pore complex assembly by promoting membrane bending and fusi...

Sooo happy to share our new paper in @nature.com “CLCC1 promotes hepatic neutral lipid flux and nuclear pore complex assembly.” A terrific collaboration with @arrudalab.bsky.social, led by co–first authors Alyssa Mathiowetz and Emily Maymand.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

What accounts for the progression from healthy aging to Alzheimer's disease over an extended period of time?
The critical role of the immune system, particularly T cells and microglia.
A new, excellent review
www.cell.com/immunity/abs...

Line graph of the number new and competitive renewal grants funded by NIH in fiscal year 2026 through February 20, compared to fiscal years 2020-2025. The fiscal year 2026 is well below the other curves.

New and Competitive Renewals

Only 803 grants have been made compared to ~2650 in fiscal years 2023 and 2024 through February 20.

All institutes and centers (include OD now) have made awards except NIAAA, NLM, NCCIH, and FIC.

3/4

Limit on multiyear funding of NIH grants is a sticking point in Senate budget talks A clause limiting the use of multiyear NIH grant funding has become a sticking point as the Senate appropriations panel finalizes the HHS spending bill

Pre-long weekend story:

Multiyear funding for NIH grants has become a sticking point in negotiating HHS’s appropriations package for 2026

www.statnews.com/2026/01/16/n...

Doing a PhD is - at heart - one long discussion with your mentor. The discussion changes over time - with unexpected turns and ups & downs - but through it all is a pair of people discussing a topic endlessly to make sense of it.
PhD students: choose someone you like to talk to!

Lesion-remote astrocytes govern microglia-mediated white matter repair - Nature After spinal cord injury, lesion-remote astrocytes acquire heterogeneous, spatially restricted reactivity states that shape neuroinflammation, neural repair and neurological recovery.

Lesion-remote astrocytes govern microglia-mediated white matter repair

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Phosphorylated tau exhibits antimicrobial activity capable of neutralizing herpes simplex virus 1 infectivity in human neurons
www.nature.com/articles/s41... @natneuro.nature.com

Neuronal fatty acid oxidation fuels memory after intensive learning in Drosophila - Nature Metabolism Neurons are shown to use fatty acid β-oxidation as a fuel source for memory formation upon intensive learning in Drosophila, challenging the view that neurons are unable to use fatty acids for energy ...

Textbooks said neurons don’t burn fatty acids for energy🤔. Our study delivers the first in vivo demonstration that fatty acid oxidation in defined memory neurons fuels memory formation.

Closing chapter of my PhD 🥳, out today in Nature Metabolism💥 @natmetabolism.nature.com

Metabolic, epigenetic and transcriptomic alterations in postnatal 16p11.2 deficient murine astrocytes Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) are associated with metabolic dysregulation. While astrocytes are integral to cerebral metabolism, their molecular and functional changes in ASD are poorly known. Using...

New preprint from the lab! For those who love astrocytes 🤩. We welcome feedback! #preprint #openaccess #astrocytes #autism

Update: a Targetome commentary by Zhao, Agarwal & Bai discusses our Cell paper as part of a broader paradigm of glia–glia coordination—linking microglia–astrocyte signaling in synaptic pruning to cooperative glial mechanisms in processes such as myelination.

www.maxapress.com/article/doi/...

Another great preprint on neuronal APOE4 from the Huang lab!

FSP1-mediated lipid droplet quality control prevents neutral lipid peroxidation and ferroptosis - Nature Cell Biology Lange et al. identify a lipid droplet quality control pathway in which FSP1 safeguards stored neutral lipids from lipid peroxidation, thereby preventing the induction of ferroptosis.

#NatMetabPicks | In @natcellbio.nature.com led by @olzmannlab.bsky.social ( @ucberkeleyofficial.bsky.social )

FSP1, localized to lipid droplets, protects stored lipids from oxidative damage and prevents ferroptosis.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The Energetic Collapse of the Alzheimer's Brain: Metabolic Inflexibility Across Cells and Networks Metabolic inflexibility in Alzheimer's disease. Schematic illustrating the biphasic trajectory of metabolic activity relative to canonical Alzheimer's disease (AD) biomarkers. In the presymptomatic p...

Our new review is out today!

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗘𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗴𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗰 𝗖𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗮𝗽𝘀𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗔𝗹𝘇𝗵𝗲𝗶𝗺𝗲𝗿’𝘀 𝗕𝗿𝗮𝗶𝗻: 𝗠𝗲𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗰 𝗜𝗻𝗳𝗹𝗲𝘅𝗶𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗔𝗰𝗿𝗼𝘀𝘀 𝗖𝗲𝗹𝗹𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗡𝗲𝘁𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸𝘀

We argue that Alzheimer’s disease is not just a problem of brain hypometabolism, but a disorder of metabolic inflexibility.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

The Cummings Lab is hiring a postdoc to work in the areas of reward and addiction! Please see the ad below:

Molecular profiling of brain endothelial cell to astrocyte endfoot communication in mouse and human - Nature Communications Deciphering body-brain communication pathways is key to a deeper understanding of brain physiology and pathology. Here, the authors define the astrocyte endfoot proteome and show dynamic vascular-to-a...

#astrocytes #endothelium #cerebrovascular 😱🤩🤩

Check out the latest WCM Newsroom article!! tinyurl.com/mry78yh8

Congratulations to the first author Daniel Barnett, a student in the @weillcornell.bsky.social Neuroscience Graduate program, and big thanks to our superb collaborators @liganlab.bsky.social @wjnyc.bsky.social, Haopeng Xiao, and Ed Chouchani🙏🙌

Thrilled to publish our new study on #mitochondrial ROS coming from complex III, revealing this key site in #astrocytes 🎯as a crucial immunometabolic signal transducer🤯 and potential therapeutic target for #dementia #FTD 💊 rdcu.be/eOc0m 👈💪 Great commentary by H. Pan and F. Yin🤩! tinyurl.com/4hdytw4c

Figure 1 showing the strategy to isolate nuclei from the brain including blood vessels and the epigenetic profiles of 6 major brain cell types.

Happy to share our latest work led by @kevincziegler.bsky.social and Aydan Askarova, examining cell type contributions of vascular cell types to dementia risk. Many thanks to the donors, and for support from @ukdri.ac.uk and @alzassociation.bsky.social.
www.cell.com/neuron/fullt...

TT faculty job opening in #Neuroscience!
We are looking for a colleague to join us in our fantastic Biology Department and Neuroscience Program at Brandeis. We are a group of *very* collaborative, supportive, and productive scientists (& humans!) so please apply
academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/30961

ATTN: Two faculty positions are available in my department (neuroscience) at the University of Minnesota. This is a general search with no topic focus. November 20th application deadline.

Apply here: hr.umn.edu/jobs/Find-Job
Assistant Prof job code: 364920
Associate/Full Prof job code: 364921

If you’re interested in glia and you’ll be at SfN in San Diego, please join us!

FSP1-mediated lipid droplet quality control prevents neutral lipid peroxidation and ferroptosis - Nature Cell Biology Lange et al. identify a lipid droplet quality control pathway in which FSP1 safeguards stored neutral lipids from lipid peroxidation, thereby preventing the induction of ferroptosis.

Excited to share our study out in @natcellbio.nature.com! Led by @mikelangelipid.bsky.social, we identify the first #LipidDroplet lipid quality control pathway: LD-localized FSP1 protects stored lipids from oxidative damage and prevents LD-initiated #ferroptosis.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

We are #hiring for a Tenure Track Assistant Professor position in the Department of Molecular&Cellular Physiology (med.stanford.edu/mcp.html) at @stanfordmedicine.bsky.social. Please apply or forward the opportunity to anybody who might be interested.
facultypositions.stanford.edu/en-us/job/49...

Primary cilia signaling in astrocytes mediates development and regional-specific functional specification - Nature Neuroscience Astrocyte diversity is greatly influenced by local environmental modulation. Wang et al. report a critical role for astrocytic primary cilia in transmitting local cues that drive the region-specific diversification of astrocytes within the developing mouse brain.

💡 Research Spotlight: Primary cilia in astrocytes are key for their development, metabolism & synaptic regulation. Defects lead to neuronal and behavioral issues in mice, offering new insights into neurodevelopment & ciliopathies.
🔗 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-024-01726-z

what Piali said! Looking to recruit a new assistant professor to our fabulous neuroscience group and department at Brandeis. Please circulate far and wide and alert anyone you know who is on the job market!
#neuroscience