Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Fernán Agüero

paris martineau @paris.nyc · 3d

after the 10th radioactive shrimp recall in 7 weeks, i decided to do some digging

little did i know it would lead me to an underreported industrial accident that may have released an airborne plume of radioactive debris over swaths of indonesia
www.consumerreports.org/health/food-...

What Is Really Going on With All This Radioactive Shrimp? - Consumer Reports

Here’s the latest on how shrimp and spices got contaminated with cesium-137, how the FDA has responded, and why consumers should not panic.

www.consumerreports.org

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Marcel Dickmanns | 🌿❄️🔬 @madic.bsky.social · 6d

You can get MSAs directly from AlphaFold DB now (alphafold.ebi.ac.uk). I also missed the FoldSeek implementation, which lets you search for structurally similar proteins direktly.

This saves some clicking around. Neat!

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Stephan Hacker @stephanhacker2.bsky.social · 6d

Amazing news that the 5th Virtual @chembiotalks.bsky.social attracted 450 participants from 50 countries.

If you are as excited as we are, already mark next year's date (29th of September, 2026) in your calendars and make sure to suggest your favorite speakers!

#ChemSky #ChemBio #DrugDiscovery

Virtual ChemBioTalks @chembiotalks.bsky.social · 6d

We are excited that the 5th Virtual #ChemBioTalks attracted 450 participants from 50 different countries world-wide. Thank you all for making this such an engaging event!

If you want to suggest speakers and keynotes for 2026, please do so by October 31st at [email protected]

#ChemBio #ChemSky

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Kevin K. Yang 楊凱筌 @kevinkaichuang.bsky.social · 10d

Test the activity of 300+ natural enzymes against 100+ substrates, discover 200+ new enzymatic reactions, and train machine learning models to predict which enzymes can do which reactions.

@aepaton.bsky.social @gabegomes.bsky.social @alisonnarayan.bsky.social

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

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Michael Clarke @mtclarke.bsky.social · 11d

Yes, yes, Europe has its benefits. Walkable cities. Cultural heritage. Amazing food. Little gun violence. Healthcare. Governments that are not shut down. But the number of website pop-ups asking one to accept cookies renders the continent pretty much unlivable.

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Magdalena Skipper @magdalenaskipper.bsky.social · 11d

The obsession with economic output as a measure of human development puts sustainability on the back burner

Time to end the GDP mania

Our editorial inspired by a @nature.com paper that looks at how the world should really measure prosperity
🧪 #SGDs #doughnuteconomics
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

End GDP mania: how the world should really measure prosperity

The obsession with economic output as a measure of human development puts sustainability on the back burner. Researchers can now help to devise better indicators.

www.nature.com

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Kate Cavanaugh @katecavanaugh.bsky.social · 11d

See this? This = implanting mouse embryo. Usually this happens inside its mother and is invisible to us, but we can actually watch implantation ex vivo with the hope of understanding why implantation goes awry in embryos of older women. A 🧵...

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EMBL-EBI @ebi.embl.org · 12d

💊Did you know that ChEMBL @chembl.bsky.social isn’t just for bioactivity data?

It also curates open-access info on approved drugs and clinical candidates.

Explore why ChEMBL should be a go-to resource if you work in pharma, biotech & AI drug discovery.

📖 pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

#PharmSky

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Simon Dürr @simonduerr.eu · 12d

Cool work to design phospho-tyrosine binder by the Baker lab. They show it works but success rate is low (<0.1%) and binders are not super strong (>500nM, likely related to cost of desolvating the phosphate) .
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

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EMBL-EBI @ebi.embl.org · 13d

There are millions of openly available microbial genomes, but searching them can be slow.

Until now 🥁

Introducing LexicMap, a new alignment tool that lets scientists search these data in minutes, helping track antibiotic resistance, trace outbreaks, and more.

www.ebi.ac.uk/about/news/r...
🦠

How to rapidly search the world’s microbial DNA

By making the world’s microbial DNA easier to explore, LexicMap helps researchers track outbreaks, study antibiotic resistance, and understand microbial diversity.

www.ebi.ac.uk

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Omaya Dudin 𓂆 ¦🍉¦🦠¦🔬¦ @dudinlab.bsky.social · 16d

So for >30y, it was thought that #MAPK cascade in #fission #yeast lacked a scaffold ! Like in #animals, or #budding yeast.

Well this changes today !

All hail #Sms1

Congrats @borissieber.bsky.social @sophiemartinlab.bsky.social and Team !!

Boris Sieber @borissieber.bsky.social · 17d

Mammalian cells have KSR, budding yeast has Ste5… and fission yeast has Sms1 as the MAPK scaffold for sexual reproduction!

Very excited to share my postdoc work where we discover that the hemi-arrestin Sms1 binds all components of the MAPK cascade, including ERK-like Spk1

doi.org/10.1101/2025...

Schematic of MAPK signalling in fission yeast, budding yeast and Metazoa. No MAPK scaffold was known for ERK-like MAPK in fission yeast, as opposed to budding yeast Ste5 and metazoan KSR1/2.

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Ghostly Bree @mostlybree.kitrocha.com · Sep 4

my stand mixer is older than most of gen z and I think about that A LOT every time something I bought in the last 5 years breaks after 6 months.

Dr. Damien P. Williams Wants A Better Sociotechnical Paradigm @wolvendamien.bsky.social · Sep 3

Reminder that things are in fact worse quality for more money, that no, Elder Gen Z/millennials/gen x, you're not imagining it, nor should you accept it as "the way things are."

Shirts I've had 30 fucking yrs are still wearable, but a shirt I've had 2 months & worn MAYBE twice is already unraveling

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Fernán Agüero @ferag.bsky.social · 19d

I was TODAY() years old when I learnt that using `Ctrl + ;` in Excel enters the current date into a cell.

I was breaking my mind trying to use TODAY() but then wanted the date to be fixed once I entered the rest of the data in a row.

stackoverflow.com/questions/31...

How to freeze the =today() function once data has been entered

I would like to use the =TODAY() function in a table in excel. However, once data has been entered into that table row, I would like it never to change dates again (effectively capturing the date t...

stackoverflow.com

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Wellcome Connecting Science Learning and Training @eventswcs.bsky.social · 21d

Register for your place at #Biodiversity25 by 29 September! ⏰

Connect with experts tackling the same #BiodiversityResearch challenges as you🌱

Learn how to apply the latest genomics tools and approaches to transform your eukaryotic genome studies🧬

📎 bit.ly/4j3vAZ9
#BiodiversitySky

Understanding Life: Using Largescale Biodiversity Reference Genomes by Wellcome Connecting Science

Conference dates: 27-29 October 2025,
Join us for a series of focused workshops into the methods and technologies transforming genomics and biodiversity research.

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The Washington Post @washingtonpost.com · 21d

If you are like a lot of people, you might be anxious about the risk of getting dementia as you age.

From a blood test to the unexpected role of lithium, these findings may lead to better diagnosis and treatment of the memory-robbing condition.

5 surprisingly hopeful things we learned about Alzheimer’s this year

From a blood test to the unexpected role of lithium, these findings may lead to better diagnosis and treatment of the memory-robbing condition.

wapo.st

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Martin Steinegger 🇺🇦 @martinsteinegger.bsky.social · 22d

MMseqs2-GPU sets new standards in single query search speed, allows near instant search of big databases, scales to multiple GPUs and is fast beyond VRAM. It enables ColabFold MSA generation in seconds and sub-second Foldseek search against AFDB50. 1/n
📄 www.nature.com/articles/s41...
💿 mmseqs.com

GPU-accelerated homology search with MMseqs2 - Nature Methods

Graphics processing unit-accelerated MMseqs2 offers tremendous speedups for homology retrieval from metagenomic databases, query-centered multiple sequence alignment generation for structure predictio...

www.nature.com

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Iris van Rooij 💭 @irisvanrooij.bsky.social · 23d

“When it comes to the AI technology industry, we refuse their frames, reject their addictive and brittle technology, and demand that the sanctity of the university both as an institution and a set of values be restored.”

zenodo.org/records/1706...

4/🧵

Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia

Under the banner of progress, products have been uncritically adopted or even imposed on users — in past centuries with tobacco and combustion engines, and in the 21st with social media. For these col...

zenodo.org

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macinchem.bsky.social @macinchem.bsky.social · 23d

The ChEMBL team is providing a free “Drug Design” webinar chembl.blogspot.com/2025/09/make...

Make the most of the ChEMBL interface with our newest webinar!

Before starting a new drug discovery project, it’s useful to compile existing data on compounds and targets of interest. Open access bioacti...

chembl.blogspot.com

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Iris van Rooij 💭 @irisvanrooij.bsky.social · 23d

🧵 Thread with my favourite quotes from:

📝 Guest, O., Suarez, M., Müller, B., et al. (2025). Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia. Zenodo. doi.org/10.5281/zeno...

1/🧵

Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia

Under the banner of progress, products have been uncritically adopted or even imposed on users — in past centuries with tobacco and combustion engines, and in the 21st with social media. For these col...

doi.org

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Oded Rechavi @odedrechavi.bsky.social · 24d

Geographic distribution of human toxoplasmosis

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Jorge Bravo Abad @bravo-abad.bsky.social · 24d

DeepSeek-R1, now published in Nature, shows how reinforcement learning can turn AI into more than an imitator. By rewarding correct answers, it develops reasoning strategies on its own—achieving breakthroughs in math, coding, and STEM problem-solving. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

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Julia M. Rohrer @dingdingpeng.the100.ci · 24d

Fun article about “outsider” scientists and their breakthroughs.

“Academia filters most funding, publishing, and hiring decisions through senior insiders, which favors ideas within existing paradigms.”

worksinprogress.co/issue/why-sc...

Why science needs outsiders - Works in Progress Magazine

Science has forgotten that the greatest breakthroughs often come from outsiders who are able to take a fresh perspective.

worksinprogress.co

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C&EN (Chemical & Engineering News) @cenmag.bsky.social · 25d

News headlines have blasted in recent weeks that the carrier of the potentially deadly parasite Trypanosoma cruzi—the cause of Chagas disease—has been detected in 32 US states. cen.acs.org/biological-c... #chemsky 🧪

Chagas disease isn’t increasing in the US. Testing just lags behind

Americans in the southern US often go years without knowing they’re infected with ‘kissing bug’ disease

cen.acs.org

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British Society for Parasitology @bspparasitology.bsky.social · 27d

Join us for upcoming BSP Tryps Club meetings! Schedule here ⬇️

Leon Walther @trypsleon.bsky.social · Sep 4

The British Society for Parasitology (BSP) Tryps Club is pleased to share our upcoming series of events. These sessions will bring together leading experts and the wider community to exchange knowledge, highlight research, and foster collaboration in parasitology. (1/5)

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Conrad Hackett @conradhackett.bsky.social · 27d

This graphic shows about two-thirds of all antibiotic drug classes were developed during the "Golden Age of Antibiotics" from the early 1940s through the mid-1960s.

Since 1970, just 8 new classes of antibiotics have been approved.
ourworldindata.org/golden-age-a... (by @scientificdiscovery.dev)

A timeline titled "The Golden Age of Antibiotics" shows when each antibiotic drug class was first available for medical use, with example antibiotics labeled. Classes are color-coded by their source: actinomycetes, other bacteria, fungi, or synthetic. Milestones include the first antibiotics (arsphenamines in 1910), as well as the discovery of many actinomycetes-derived antibiotics, such as streptomycin, and sulfonamides, penicillins, and tetracyclines. Data: Hutchings, Truman, Wilkinson (2019). Created by Saloni Dattani for Our World in Data.

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