Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Dr Mel T

@drmel.bsky.social

1.4K followers 3.2K following 2.5K posts

🇦🇺Microbiologist in 🇬🇧 again adrift from Academia…. Disabled STEMMinist who has grown weary of discrimination in STEMM. #FuckMS #OneHealth 🌈 pan&poly she/her

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Pinned

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · Oct 18

Welcome to BlueSky! This is my vibe, new followers! (There will also be #SciComm #DisabilityInSTEM #OneHeakth #Microbiology and nostalgia for the quaint (now obsolete) concept of Public Health. Ah, remember when we cared for the vulnerable? And had IPC? THOSE WERE THE DAYS, my friends!

Stuffed raccoon wearing a pinny and a shower cap holds a martini and a cigarette

Punk stuffed squirrel with Mohawk sticks middle finger up with one paw and clutches a beer bottle in the other paw

6 4 33

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 13m

Hey Britain! This is the welfare reforms they are trying to bring in here. See also the restricted Indue card instead of cash payments.

Jeremy Poxon @jeremypoxon.bsky.social · 11h

Great run-down of the mutual obligations system — both it's current unlawful administration, and it's rotten ideological underpinnings that destroys lives — by @amyremeikis.bsky.social here: www.thenewdaily.com.au/news/politic...

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 18m

We had a digger knock out the power for my entire Uni campus, (York, UK) taking down our -80C freezer farm. I was staring down the barrel of having to make up 200 agar plates to save my frozen ecoli and neiserria mening mutant strains. Mercifully, they got power back on at Lunchtime, only off 4 hrs

Reposted by Dr Mel T

Marc Veldhoen @marcveld.bsky.social · 3d

Debunkinhg takes hours, misinformation seconds.

Don´t just post. If you didn´t read or understand the paper, don´t post it with conclusions from others. Be very careful with low-impact journals and with predatory journals as well as with pre-prints! If unsure, ask experts, or wait for them.

1 34 110

Reposted by Dr Mel T

Helene von Bismarck @helenebismarck.bsky.social · 1h

This is very much worth reading by @andrewduffeu.bsky.social . It is not 2016 anymore. The world has changed and so has the EU. Which means that Britain AND EU member States should review their experience of Brexit. verfassungsblog.de/the-case-for...

The Case for a Royal Commission on Britain and Europe

verfassungsblog.de

2 11 24

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 1h

I watch the space closely. I’d like to get my CD20+ naive B cells back (suppressed by mAbs currently) before another emerging disease comes along! But I had a good 21 years post EBV before MS dx, just a shame it killed my nascent academic career!

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 1h

Cue all the British migrants to Oz complaining about the weather 🤣

Extreme Temperatures Around the World @extremetemps.bsky.social · 12h

Preliminary data suggests that today's
42.5C at Telfer ,Australia might be the world's highest temperature,since maximums in Iran,Senegal,Mauritania and Mexico have dropped.

This would mark the first day of the season with the Southern Hemisphere recording the hottest spot.

Extreme Temperatures Around the World @extremetemps.bsky.social · 2d

Exceptional heat in AUSTRALIA

In New South Wales max. temperatures yesterday >35C and today tropical nights in some areas.
In fact, the minimum of 20.4C at Mount Seaview is the highest ever recorded in October.

Next days heat wave in Western Australia with up to 44C/45C

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 1h

Bless! The black and lavender ones look like Arucana crosses. The White one looks like a White Sussex. I miss keeping chickens! I would get some but I’d have to rent land. And bird flu puts me off a bit. I still have my vet handbook on chicken diseases. I had one with Marek’s once. Awful disease.

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 1h

Cream leg bars or Arucanas?

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 1h

👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼

Prof Nisreen Alwan @nisreenalwan.bsky.social · 3h

Let’s be real - this is a bit inconvenient but not a big deal in the long run. The big deal with Brexit is the economic destruction it inflicted and the xenophobia monster it unleashed.

Peter Stefanovic @peterstefanovic.bsky.social · 3h

UK travellers should expect "four-hour queues" as new EU border system comes into force. Brexit really is the gift that keeps giving

www.itv.com/news/2025-10...

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 1h

I went into the pandemic already carrying ‘Long EBV’ (MS) as my underlying condition. Having the COVID virus 3 times since has hastened my MS, to the point I can no longer work due to cognitive decline. But I’ve got so many co-morbidities, it could be any of them (Incl perimenopause) causing it!

Marc Veldhoen @marcveld.bsky.social · Apr 23

Some people do not fully recover from an acute viral infection and experience persistent symptoms or incomplete recovery for months or even years. This is not unique to the SARS-CoV-2 virus and history shows that post-viral conditions like post COVID-19 condition, referred to as LC, are not new
1/7

1 3

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 2h

I only follow parody politicians on here!

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 2h

I already have who ever this is blocked. They must be on more than one block list!

1 1

Reposted by Dr Mel T

Helen King @helenking.bsky.social · 2h

When I am #bloomscrolling I am always aware of the long history of women doing botany - and of the weird idea that this is somehow endangering their purity! Which I wrote about on oro.open.ac.uk/92600/

The Open University

oro.open.ac.uk

1 1 6

Reposted by Dr Mel T

Lauren "Hope is Praxis" Lastname @verbingnouns.bsky.social · 3h

Now is the time to support DarkSky International and/or your local branch darksky.org

10 16

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 2h

*season

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 2h

It’s October. It’s stock market crash session. And with 40% of the ‘value’ of the US markets being tied up in AI slop ‘investments’ plus Trump doing disaster capitalism - crash seems more than likely

Richard Murphy @richardjmurphy.bsky.social · 2h

Is the crash happening? www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2025/10... Cryptocurrency markets crashed yesterday. More than $800bn was wiped off values. With stock markets massively overvalued at present, will the same thing happen there this week?

Is the crash happening?

I have long suggested that the crypto market is all based on hype and has nothing to do with reality. I have also suggested that the crypto market is massively overvalued and due for a crash. Yester...

www.taxresearch.org.uk

1 1 2

Reposted by Dr Mel T

Tom Yates @tomayates.bsky.social · 1d

NEW EDITORIAL!

Me, @drjesspotter.bsky.social and Rouxjeane Venter argue

- that rapid near patient DST should be developed alongside new RRTB treatment regimens
- for changes in the design of Phase 3 treatment trials
- we must oppose unprecedented cuts to research funding and development assistance

Priorities in addressing rifampicin resistant TB

Progress in testing and trial design are needed Rifampicin is a critical component of tuberculosis (TB) treatment regimens. Recent positive developments in rifampicin resistant TB—the emergence of ne...

share.google

4 5

Reposted by Dr Mel T

The Guardian @theguardian.com · 4h

‘Brummies united against racism’: poster campaign takes on the far right

A message of neighbourly solidarity is thriving in Birmingham against a backdrop of racist intimidation When Mus unfurled the leaflet lying on her driveway, she was left shocked, angry and upset. “White Britons are already a minority in London … it is clear that if these trends continue white people will become a minority in Britain,” it read. The leaflet, written by a far-right group, was distributed along her street three years ago in Moseley, a leafy suburb of Birmingham. It went on to blame NHS waiting lists, a shortage of social housing and even traffic on “the rising population”. Continue reading...

www.theguardian.com

9 92 420

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 2h

It’s RyanAir pushing to get rid of paying ground crew. If you need to speak to a human at the airports these days, it costs you £££

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 3h

It’s the photo & finger prints. But I think you only have to do biometrics once, to get loaded onto their system then can just use your passport at e-gates. But it’s going to be a shit show for the first year. My iPhone lets me upload biometric data from my Oz passport chip to get on EU flights.

1 1

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 3h

Good effort!

Reposted by Dr Mel T

Michael Brown @mjibrown.bsky.social · 2d

A US tech startup is proposing to use mirrors in space to power solar farms on Earth at night. Is this even feasible? And what are the light pollution dangers?

Myself and @mattkenworthy.bsky.social have crunched the numbers for The Conversation.

theconversation.com/a-us-startup...

A US startup plans to deliver ‘sunlight on demand’ after dark. Can it work – and would we want it to?

Satellites beaming sunlight down to Earth sound like science fiction – and they have astronomers very worried.

theconversation.com

4 9 15

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 1d

So many folks wishing that plane had crashed harder back in 2010….

Dr Mel T @drmel.bsky.social · 1d

Not just Texas. Academic freedom has been under attack globally since the powers of neoliberalism foisted corporate ‘values’ onto academics whilst simultaneously pushing them to demonstrate ‘impact’. If you start advocating for anything discomforting to PR and HR depts, you cop it in the neck.

sonja dolinsek @sonjdol.ohai.social.ap.brid.gy · 1d

“There is currently no academic freedom in Texas” – The University Star
#uspol #academicchatter #academic #texas

https://universitystar.com/33199/news/there-is-currently-no-academic-freedom-in-texas/

“There is currently no academic freedom in Texas”

The order for system-wide course audits by the Texas State University System (TSUS), which was sent out on Oct. 1, has sparked fear among faculty teaching about gender and LGBTQ+ studies. The call for audits comes less than a week after Texas State removed an LGBTQ+ communication studies class from the course registry and the Texas...

universitystar.com

1 3

Reposted by Dr Mel T

Joshua Erlich @joshuaerlich.bsky.social · 4d

endlessly embarrassing that the powers that be here banned Link. just disqualifying.

Thinking Person's Guide to Autism @thinkingautism.com · 5d

“As a neurodiversity advocate and as an autistic person, I’m really grateful for so much of the work that’s been done that allows me to be myself and to be successful being myself.” Link, who has been *banned*!?!? from this platform?

thinkingautismguide.com/2025/06/spac... #AutisticWhileBlack

Space Law, Race, and Neurodiversity: Autistic Advocate AJ Link

We live in a country & society that is built on racism. The neurodivergent community isn't free of that racism—per Autistic advocate AJ Link.

thinkingautismguide.com

7 160 670