Gabe Lynch

NASA Aims to Fly First Quantum Sensor for Gravity Measurements This mission will pave the way for groundbreaking observations of everything from petroleum reserves to global supplies of fresh water.

I guess there is a funded mission to do something very close to this www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasa-ai...

And there is a cool video...

lunar new year and fat tuesday falling on the same day this year suggest the possibility for some very interesting pączki options

“Measure Fails” Budget Phasing Strategy Phase 1 - In January 2027: • 63% train hours cut and 10 station closures (20% of stations) • 30% fare increase • Target $30M of (half-year) reductions in fleet/non-fleet maintenance, police, and system support • Balance remainder of FY27 with one-time resources and financial deferrals • Assess: ridership/revenue impacts; performance of system support; impacts/risks of asset closures; and determine if Phase 2 can be safely implemented Phase 2 - If feasible, in FY28 (July 2027 service change): • Cumulative 70% train hours cut, 15 station closures (30% of stations), and segment closures (32 miles or 25% of system length) • Cumulative 50% fare increase • Target over $130M of cumulative budget reductions in fleet/non-fleet maintenance, cleaning, police, and system support • Defer remaining capital allocations • Based on observed conditions of closed system segments, study options and tradeoffs for stopping train service Phase 3 - When required: • If determined BART can’t safely or legally operate with available resources, stop passenger service • Use existing District tax revenues to secure system assets • Work to determine system’s future

BART's newly released concepts for what they'll do if Connect Bay Area transit funding measure fails are terrifying.

Phase 1: 63% train hours cut & 10 station closures
Phase 2: Cumulative 70% train hours cut, 15 station closures
Phase 3 (if required): END BART SERVICE

We must pass the measure!

🧵

A line plot with the numbers of NSF awards for fiscal years 2021-2026. The curve for fiscal year 2026 is quite a bit lower than those for 2021-2025 while the curve for fiscal year 2026 (in red) is much lower than all through the same date.

But, as they say, there is no time like the present

[OK, maybe the 1930s if you want to nitpick]

But, with some data wrangling, my first NSF Funding Curves!

2/3

let’s go hang out in the IRC channel

Are female economists treated differently than males in academic seminars?

These authors wanted to know whether gender shapes how scholars are treated when presenting research.

So they built a massive dataset of 2,000+ economics seminars, job talks, and conference presentations from 2019–2023...

This is super cool stuff!

We can verify our method with a simply logic: if we are really reconstructing the 3D dark matter field (δ) of the Universe, then the light from the Cosmic Microwave Background should be passing through this δ-field, imprinting a correlation between the two.

We find a 3-4σ detection of this signal!

Reconstructing the largest scales of the Universe with field-level inference applied to the Quaia Quasar Catalogue The recently released Quaia quasar catalogue, with its broad redshift range and all-sky coverage, enables unprecedented three-dimensional reconstructions of matter across cosmic time. In this work, we...

It's cool #PaperDay today @oskarkleincentre.bsky.social, #Astronomy #Cosmology!

arxiv.org/abs/2602.02363

We used a physics informed Field Level Inference method applied to a large Quasar sample to reconstruct the inicial conditions, matter field and dynamics of the Universe at the largest scales!

Two CBP Agents Identified in Alex Pretti Shooting The two federal immigration agents who fired on Minneapolis protester Alex Pretti are identified in government records as Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raym...

BREAKING: The two federal immigration agents who fired on Minneapolis protester Alex Pretti are identified in government records as Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raymundo Gutierrez.

An immediate shutdown of DHS is better because passion and resolve is strongest now. That’s why Republicans wanted a 6-week CR. And it’s why we demanded only 2 weeks.

But working from a place of only DHS being on the line is maximum strength.

Crucial we make sure Ds do not shy away from the moment

New SPT-3G constraints on CMB secondary anisotropies, including the thermal and kinematic SZ effect! "At ℓ=3000, we find thermal SZ power at 143 GHz of DtSZ=4.91±0.37μK2 and kinematic SZ power of DkSZ=1.75±0.86μK2" @NSF #southpole #Antarctica arxiv.org/abs/2601.20551

Border Patrol official Gregory Bovino has not been relieved of his duties, DHS says Tom Homan is headed to Minnesota after the fatal shooting of ICU nurse Alex Pretti in an encounter Saturday with federal agents deepened outrage over the Trump administration’s surge, part of its nati...

Border Patrol official Gregory Bovino has not been relieved of his duties, DHS says

From CNN's Aditi Sangal

this is a good response and the reason is that democrats look for any opportunity at all to back away from confrontation and it needs to be made clear that this doesn’t cut it in terms of consequences. i will be calling my representatives saying as much!

the amazing thing is that this shift is almost uniquely due to the actions of organizers, activists, and community members who have been documenting the human toll of immigration enforcement. Now just imagine if we had an opposition party that understood this and got behind the people.

Evening all,

Thank you to everyone who followed along with my coverage of this demonstration in Chicago today.

I love this work, but as an indie journo, for the moment, I'm pretty reliant on community support to do it.

Your support helps me to keep on reporting.

I think there is, but I unfortunately think it involves more people dying

I want as may off-ramps as possible because I want Trump, Miller, Vance and I others to feel very alone when they reach the end of this road.

Just want to chime in and say thanks for everything you do here (and offline). I can always trust information that I see you post — no easy task these days! Take care.

Jeff Wheeler, The Minnesota Star Tribune

Minnesotans are showing the soul of the United States to the world.

NYT video analysis confirms victim’s gun was removed before he was shot. So he was unarmed. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/24/us/minneapolis-shooting-federal-agents-video.html

Our initial analysis is up.

The video footage appears to show that the gun was taken away from the man before he was shot.

He was UNARMED before any of the shots were fired.

NB from the bottom of that page: "The age of the man who was shot has been corrected to 37, per information from the police chief. The AP previously reported his age as 51 based on a hospital record."

Support Impacted Union Families! | Working Partnerships

"This is a verified page fundraising support for the Minneapolis Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO and Working Partnerships' 2026 rapid response effort to meet the needs of impacted union members, worker center members, and their families..."

workingpartnerships.betterworld.org/campaigns/su...

One time I waited for >20 minutes and actually got a successful result

Orion, Jupiter, and Gemini all are visible here too

caught the nasa crew return from my backyard after being tipped off by @noahk.bio !

Oh great! Cheers