Siavash Ahrar

Call for contributions to our symposium on animal collective movement in complex environments at SICB 2026 in Portland, OR! Submit your abstract to our complementary sessions and join us for two days of fun discussing and exchanging research on the biomechanics and energetics of animal movement!

A Bar plot. It shows 2/3 of cats studied sleep leftward. The remaining sleep rightward. The plot has photos of two cats sleeping (one leftward, the other rightward) under each chart to demonstrate their results. Both cats look comfortable - deep in sleep.

One of the most fun papers (brief) I have read this year

www.cell.com/action/showP...

Cats prefer to sleep on their left side.
Also they sleep 12-16 hrs/day.
😸💤

Tube feet dynamics drive adaptation in sea star locomotion Sea stars use hundreds of tube feet on their oral surface to crawl, climb, and navigate complex environments—all without the coordination of a central brain. While the morphology of tube feet and thei...

Fascinating new work on mechanics and tube feet dynamics during starfish locomotion, which reveals a robust, decentralized strategy for locomotion on challenging terrain involving modulation of foot-substrate contact time in response to mechanical load: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Flyer from CSU Long Beach advertising for the position of Assistant Professor of Elasmobranch Biology. The flyer has a picture of a white shark in the banner. Application deadline is September 03, 2025. Christine Whitcraft can be contacted for details at Christine.whitcraft@csulb.edu Full job description can be found here: https://careers.pageuppeople.com/873/lb/en-us/job/549205/assistant-professor-of-biological-sciences-elasmobranch-biologist

The Biology Department at CSU Long Beach is now advertising for an Assistant Professor of Elasmobranch Biology. Refer to the attached flyer for details. @uwsafs.bsky.social @uwmarinebiology.bsky.social @misselasmo.bsky.social @whysharksmatter.bsky.social @official-bweems.bsky.social

How Simple Innovations are Fighting Fake Medicine: a discussion with Dr. William H. Grover, Associate Professor, Department of Bioengineering at the University of California, Riverside, and Shabbir Safdar, Executive Director, Partnership for Safe Medicines

Thanks to @shabbirsafdar.bsky.social and @safemedicines.bsky.social for having me on the Partnership for Safe Medicines podcast!

I had a great time chatting with Shabbir about my lab's work developing tools for fighting fake medicines. Listen to the episode here: www.podbean.com/media/share/... 🧪

And there is the end credit OST.

Sad what we think is funny these days....

I made a tool where you can check to see if a university is being frozen out of NIH payments
#academicsky #science 🧪 #NSF #NIH #MedicalResearch

uci-bme-jpbrody.shinyapps.io/DogeFreeze/

Lol what?!

""The Magic School Bus," "3-2-1 Contact," "Reading Rainbow," "Zoom" and "Bill Nye the Science Guy" were just a few of the early NSF-funded shows that took an innovative approach to bringing science to life on the small screen. "

www.nsf.gov/science-matt...

Michael Shannon is James Garfield

Nick Offerman is Chester A. Arthur

Learned last night that we’re getting a Netflix miniseries on the Garfield assassination with Michael Shannon as Garfield and Nick Offerman as Chester A. Arthur, and how are we not all talking about this? www.netflix.com/tudum/articl...

What are their dimensions ?

I am so glad that I am not a screenwriter for Black Midror or a staff writer for the Onion...

These moments will live forever.

The most beautiful club in the world. Liverpool !!
🏆 #YNWA

YNWA - let's go Liverpool !!

Rothko room at the Tate modern, London. Several dark red / purple canvasses with a rectangle or two painted on them.

I went to the Tate Modern yesterday. In the Rothko room with all the Serious Art Connoisseurs there was a ~5 year old kid who walked up to each painting, pointed at it and shouted 'RECTANGLE' at each one in turn, then left the room.

Book discussion event at the library.

Thanks and kudos to the library for hosting us.

(Photo credit Library's LinkedIn account)

They are the best!

Microfluidics chamber with Hydra on a microscope.

Close up of a Hydra (head in particular)

Hydra inside a chamber

Showed Hydra 🐙, microfluidics, DIY micrsocopes, and other cool things to folks visiting the campus for the Day at the Beach event. Thankful to all students who volunteered their valuable time to make the day awesome.

So excited to be part of this talk with @siavasha.bsky.social in just a few minutes!

Great news: NIH postbac program is recruiting again! If your grad school plans were affected by program cutbacks or admissions freezes this year I highly encourage you to apply, this could be a perfect opportunity. Please repost.

www.training.nih.gov/research-tra...

AI 👀

Text copied from website on April 7, 2025 stating "Recruitment of new postbacs has resumed. Please read program information below and use the 'Start your application' link to apply."

Recruitment of postbacs & postdocs in the NIH IRP has resumed. I have no additional info beyond what is publicly stated on the website. www.training.nih.gov/research-tra...

Nature review physics cover April 2025 - lots of cats playing in a physics lab.

The best cover I have seen in a long time

Looking forward to read the paper with my lab!

Many congrats.

Also TIL Lumon (Severance) is filmed at Bellworks in Homdel NJ.
😬🫣

Each time I talk with AT&T (about anything - but in particular service cancelation) I wonder if I am already in the bad place.

Paramount +

I am rewatching deep space nine.
🖖

My lab is planning to organize (over the summer) and send physical thank you letter/cards to authors of (some of) our faviorate papers.

We think it is a good idea.
And would perhaps spark some joy!

📝📮📤