Prof Emma Flynn

Carving of a hippopotamus figurine made from calcite, featuring a stocky body, prominent bulging eyes, short legs, and textured surface, displayed on a glass shelf.

Apparently it's #WorldHippoDay! 🦛🦛
Let's celebrate with this #Egyptian carving of a Hippo, made 5.000 years ago from calcite.

Hippopotami were associated with life, regeneration, and rebirth.

On display at Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek

📷 me 🏺

Latest drop in UK student visa applications ‘deeply concerning’.

There were 19,800 applications last month—a 31 per cent decrease on January 2025, when there were 28,700. It is the fourth month in a row that monthly visa applications have been at a four year low.

I spent several hours with Gisele Pelicot in Paris

She is remarkable

This Sunday her only UK TV interview airs across the BBC

I changed the audio

This teenager saved his neighbor's dog from drowning in a freezing pond. This is Bernard. His family contacted emergency services right away, but high school senior Hugh Pinneo got to Bernard first. Hugh said he's "just glad I acted that day and saved the dog's life." We are too. 12/10 for all

I'd watch a muppet show movie where the muppets infiltrate an academic conference.

YouTube video by Johns Hopkins University Apes Share Human Ability to Imagine

Imagination in bonobos!

I am thrilled to share a new paper w/ Amalia Bastos, out now in @science.org

We provide the first experimental evidence that a nonhuman animal can follow along a pretend scenario & track imaginary objects. Work w/ Kanzi, the bonobo, at Ape Initiative

youtu.be/NUSHcQQz2Ko

Gladys Mae West obituary: mathematician who pioneered GPS technology She made key contributions to US cold-war science despite facing huge barriers as a Black woman.

No joke: I got angry hate mail today for writing an obituary of a Black woman scientist—because the person felt she did didn’t deserve the recognition.

Which just makes me want to share it again: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

A very loose, spare, painterly watercolour of a long view over a flat expansive landscape dotted with winter trees in broken sunshine under a cloudy sky

Other work of the Ladybird artists.
A February Day
Artist: Rowland Hilder

New wadertales blog on how quickly juvenile godwits learn to feed efficiently through their first winter:
wadertales.wordpress.com/2026/02/05/l...
From new @asab.org paper led by Josh Nightingale:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
#ornithology

Last week, RPN broke a string of stories on significant changes to funding across a number of research councils (see thread below)

This morning, UKRI chief executive is appearing at the Commons science committee, where he is being asked about them by MPs

Here are some key moments so far 🧵

bsky.app/profile/long...

Decorative flowers and stems on balustrade of curving staircase

Can't resist revisiting this Art Nouveau winding staircase decorated with metal flowers and vines, designed by architect Ede Magyar, at Reök Palace in Szeged, Hungary (1907)

“Ambitious” plans to use research funding to attract industry investment of £25 billion by the end of the decade are likely to prove “extremely challenging” given falling levels of university-business spending, experts have warned. @jgro-the.bsky.social reports #academicsky
https://ow.ly/CKxs50XTrmp

I’d like to double/triple like this.

I caught this beautiful sunset today. #London #HousesofParliament

Could you post the full portrait? It would be nice to see the whole thing.

University fees and migration numbers threaten Brexit reset youth deal Talks also set to start on making touring easier for musicians and artists

"University fees and migration numbers threaten Brexit reset youth deal"

🚨Roll up, roll up, fully-funded #PhD deadlines approaching...

6th Jan: tinyurl.com/aja54nr6

8th Jan: tinyurl.com/4jfy47pp

Social monitoring & manipulation
#meerkats #mongooses #macaques #fieldwork #long-termdata

@patrick-kennedy.bsky.social @ljnbrent.bsky.social
@bristolbiosci.bsky.social

a man in a green elf costume is standing in a hallway . ALT: a man in a green elf costume is standing in a hallway .

‘You sit on a throne of lies’ - Christmas has officially begun.

Blue painted circle over waved horizontal line on a cream background

Georgia O'Keeffe,
You Are The Sun, 1977
#Womensart #Solstice

How should universities work with combined authorities and business to support inclusive growth in our city-regions? Some reflections on my five years in Greater Manchester, to mark the year of my retirement from the University of Manchester.
softmachines.org?p=3213

This illustration was originally the front cover picture of the ladybird book. Two herons and clusters of other birds stand around a partially frozen lake under a yellow winter sky

Ladybird Artists Advent Calendar, window 21

Artist: CF Tunnicliffe
(What to Look for in Winter, 1959)

'Bananas.' (1956) Throughout his career Lucian Freud was fascinated with plants and approached the painting of them without smothering them with symbolic meaning much the same as his mentor Cedric Morris, himself an evocative and unsentimental flower painter.

It is a really interesting concept and the first two books take different approaches to the idea of time and continuity and how to live within them when they become displaced.

Books I have read and enjoyed on my holiday: The Original by Nell Stevens, the second of the ‘On the Calculation of Volume’ by Solvej Balle, and The List of Suspicious Things by Janine Godfrey.

Many plausible candidates contributing to this dismal performance, from the factors leading up to the 2008 crisis, post-crisis policies that made the situation worse, and the shocks of the last decade
My blogpost: The UK's continuing economic growth crisis
softmachines.org?p=3206

Looks excellent!

This new issue of #PhilTransB expands the field of cultural #evolution and shows why it matters for today’s biggest challenges. It highlights research funded by the @culturalevolsoc.bsky.social's Transformation Fund, which focused on #DEI: royalsocietypublishing.org/rstb/issue/3...