Sophie Westacott

“By placing the blame where it belongs (academia), you may find more peace in your science.”

Amen, I had a very similar realization about 6 or 7 years ago; and, like this author, found a solid fit for my career (which is dissimilar from the traditional arc ingrained in us by the old guard).

Happy #fossilfriday everyone,

Enjoy a feel good story about one of the Museum of the Earth's high school supporters!

Thanks to big giving Tuesday support, PRI is now within ~400,000 of its end of year goal of ~4 million for the mortgage+ops. We can #SavePRI !🧪⚒️🦣🐚

www.localsyr.com/news/local-n...

What Scientists Found When a Deep Sea Mining Company Invited Them In

Benthic forams in the news www.nytimes.com/2025/12/05/c...

Glass radilaria exhibit

Microfossil exhibit

Radiolarians

Radiolarian model

Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan has a neat little natural history museum on campus with a wonderful microfossil exhibit featuring hand-made glass radiolarians and 3D printed foraminiferans.

Who else is running the vacuum around today? Sunday chores brought to you by this Gastropod larva 😍
#marineplankton 🦑

Cosupervising x2 🇬🇧 PhD projects advertising now:

'The effects of climate cooling on evolution of Antarctic Eocene benthic communities' (BAS/Bristol) shorturl.at/MiWqJ

'Testing novel archives of seawater chemistry in biogenic carbonate' (Leeds): share.google/dbojTRZme92R...

Deadlines early Jan '26

when we say we want more streets to be pedestrianized, this is what we mean

Sign the Petition Save Geology at the University of Leicester

Petition to save Geology at the University of Leicester
c.org/h9rysz2C9x
Finances are extremely stretched in UK higher education, but it's hard to understand a university drastically cutting a field critical to the energy transition and understanding of the changes taking place in the world today.

As an Leicester palaeo PhD alumni, I am shocked and appalled by this seemingly uncosted and short sighted descision by the @uniofleicester.bsky.social.

Please sign the petition.

A picture of a frog on a leaf with the SICB and Skype a Scientist logos on the bottom right with the following words on top: "Call for Artists!" Learn about the latest animal research adn create art inspired by the science at the SICB meeting in Portland, OR. Deadline to apply: dec 12, Project dates Jan 3-7, Stipend $1000"

ARTISTS!
I need your help!

In collab. w/the Society for Integrative & Comparative Biology, I'm organizing a group of artists to come to our Jan. meeting! We're looking for artists to create based on what they learn at the conference. $1000 stipend.

Application is V short! forms.gle/ah1i8KwNJinZ...

It's Friday, and apparently bluesky is ready for this fun revelation:

Dinosaurs lived on the other side the Galaxy.

I attended a talk by a scientist at a Chinese University and realized that all the background climate data that she used came from the US (CO₂ Keeling Curve, global temperature time series, etc.). Although China funds a lot of research, the destruction of US science will affect science globally.

Image description: LEGO figures in a mock press conference setting with 'EGU General Assembly' logos.Text reads: 'WE ARE HIRING! EGU26 Press Assistant. Apply by 26 November 2025. More details.'

#JobAlert 🚨: Press Assistant

Are you a science communicator with experience in science writing? We are looking for your support during the press conference at #EGU26.
📨 Send your application by 26 November to vacancy@egu.eu.
👉 More information: egu.eu/1H0J7I

We have so much work to do!!

James Watson, dead at 97, was a scientific legend and a pariah among his peers James Watson, the co-discoverer of the structure of DNA who died Thursday at 97, was a scientific legend and a pariah among his peers.

A Sharon Begley byline, almost 5 years after her death.

Upon hearing the news James Watson had died, a STAT reporter said in our Slack, "I wish I could read what Sharon would have written."

Incredible news: Sharon in fact did pre-write a Watson obit. And it is masterful and excoriating.
🧪🧬🧫

Diatoms from 77° North

I was awarded the Alan Higgins Award by @micropalaeosoc.bsky.social for my work on planktonic foraminifera reproduction and culture. I feel very honored and can only thank all the great colleagues who supported me along the way in Norway, Ireland, the UK, Germany and France!

You know what? There's actually a tested solution to this! it is brilliantly simple, and it WORKS.

I would love to see @bsky.app and @support.bsky.team test this out.

www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2023/ju...

10 Years After the Paris Climate Agreement, Here's Where We Are (Gift Article) Has anything really changed in the decade since the Paris Agreement was reached? Actually, quite a lot.

Although we're not where we should be, we're on a significantly better trajectory than we were 10 years ago.

In case anyone is wondering if Watson was really THAT bad, @lpachter.bsky.social compiled a list of quotes that are absolutely not for the faint of heart.
liorpachter.wordpress.com/2018/05/18/j...

This is fascinating because this is such a new field and somehow they are going to hire 100 tenure-track faculty in the next 5 years who specialize in it. And yet when asked to fill spots with faculty of color/women/marginalized groups, administrators often cry about how the pipelines don't exist.

GitHub - hadley/genzplyr: dplyr but make it bussin fr fr no cap dplyr but make it bussin fr fr no cap. Contribute to hadley/genzplyr development by creating an account on GitHub.

Do you teach #rstats? Do your students complain about how lame and old-fashioned dplyr is? Don't worry: I have the solution for you: github.com/hadley/genzp....

genzplyr is dplyr, but bussin fr fr no cap.

Meta's fraud problem: The social media giant projected 10% of its 2024 revenue would come from ads for scams and banned goods, documents seen by @Reuters show reut.rs/4qJTpdH

To put this in scale, Elon Musk's salary from Tesla alone could fund the SNAP program for the entire country into 2034.

The amoeba Difflugia bacillifera builds its shell from things that contain silica, and it is not particular about the source. These ones have incorporated whole shells from another testate amoeba (Euglypha), along with diatoms, algal cysts and chunks of rock. #Amoebae #ProtistsOnSky #peatlands

Just began @peterbrannen.bsky.social's new book and already came across this gem 🤌 „If you really wanna have good fun, be a geologist. Geologists often know 2 or 3 languages and they always know the best places to drink.“ followed by a shout-out to IODP, the JR, and Exp399. Promising start!
1/2

Speed reading "Science under Siege" - ahead of next week's recording of BBC Science in Action, where co-author @michaelemann.bsky.social joins a panel on the front line of the current assault on science, to answer what can be done.
An appropriate topic for the last edition of the 60yr old series.

The incredible tragedy for #ArcticScience of NOAA shutting down their #methane monitoring data. 5th May 2025 is the last data we'll ever get.
#NCKF25

“Cellular Olympics” our catalog of freeky ultra fast cellular superhero’s is freely available “Ann Rev of microbiology”

www.annualreviews.org/content/jour...

This is a compilation of world’s fastest single cell organisms - enjoy this buffet of rare delightful protists with mind bending speeds. 🧪