Cathie Klapperich
@cathieklapperich.com
Scientist. Women’s health. Figuring out how to protect reproductive rights without getting hacked. If you make me laugh out loud, I’ll follow you. https://www.cathieklapperich.com/ The painting is by David Gonville https://www.gonville.com/
In bioengineering there are routinely 400+ applicants per job. In my experience, the top 30+ are indistinguishably qualified. The next 50+ have one or more minor "negative," like a "non fancy" PhD ("pedigree" 😑), as Dr. Perry points out. The majority of these folks would succeed given the chance.
THERE ARE NO JOBS IN ACADEMIA! NO JOBS! DOZENS OF HYPER QUALIFIED APPLICANTS PER JOB!
December 19, 2025 at 1:42 PM
In bioengineering there are routinely 400+ applicants per job. In my experience, the top 30+ are indistinguishably qualified. The next 50+ have one or more minor "negative," like a "non fancy" PhD ("pedigree" 😑), as Dr. Perry points out. The majority of these folks would succeed given the chance.
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
Leah Foley, U.S. Attorney for MA, says that authorities believe the two knew each other but declined to say whether investigators can now confirm the crime was targeted.
Authorities believe Claudio Neves Valente, the now-deceased Brookline and Providence murder suspect, went to the same university in Portugal as MIT professor Nuno Loureiro, who he shot and killed on Monday.
brookline.news/suspect-in-b...
brookline.news/suspect-in-b...
Suspect in Brookline and Providence killings found dead in New Hampshire, authorities say - Brookline.News
Claudio Neves Valente, 48, is responsible for killing MIT professor Nuno Loureiro and two Brown students in separate shootings, law enforcement officials said Thursday night. Valente died by suicide o...
brookline.news
December 19, 2025 at 3:59 AM
Leah Foley, U.S. Attorney for MA, says that authorities believe the two knew each other but declined to say whether investigators can now confirm the crime was targeted.
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
Y'all, I just got out of the NSF-BIO webinar where they explained changes to peer review. It's not good. 🧪 scienceforeveryone.science/changes-to-n...
Changes to NSF peer review
They're not good. At all.
scienceforeveryone.science
December 18, 2025 at 7:52 PM
Y'all, I just got out of the NSF-BIO webinar where they explained changes to peer review. It's not good. 🧪 scienceforeveryone.science/changes-to-n...
for everyone watching and waiting, @brooklinenews.bsky.social had the first story on the MIT Prof murder, and they will likely have the next bit of credible information out of Boston. brookline.news/as-homicide-...
As homicide investigation continues, neighbors, colleagues gather to remember 'extraordinary' Brookline scientist - Brookline.News
Nuno Loureiro was shot and killed at his Gibbs Street home on Monday night.
brookline.news
December 18, 2025 at 10:11 PM
for everyone watching and waiting, @brooklinenews.bsky.social had the first story on the MIT Prof murder, and they will likely have the next bit of credible information out of Boston. brookline.news/as-homicide-...
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
Today, ProPublica launched a first-of-its-kind app to help you find out where your generic drugs come from and what the factories that made them are like.
Here’s how to use it.
Here’s how to use it.
Rx Inspector: ProPublica’s New Tool Provides Drug Info the FDA Won’t
We’ve launched a first-of-its-kind app to help you find out where your generic drugs come from and see the track records of the factories that made them.
www.propublica.org
December 18, 2025 at 3:34 PM
Today, ProPublica launched a first-of-its-kind app to help you find out where your generic drugs come from and what the factories that made them are like.
Here’s how to use it.
Here’s how to use it.
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
I subbed. McMansion Hell is both educational and some of the most hilarious stuff I've ever read. Truly one of the "this is why the internet needs to exists" corners out there.
a subscription to McMansion Hell is literally a dollar a month and in exchange you get some of my best and most thorough essays (the regional car dealership rococo one, the one about gray floors, this one)
for patreon i wrote about getting stranded in tomorrowland as an 8th grader, michael sorkin's classic essay "see you in disneyland" and the legacy of 1990s disneyfied architecture and urbanism today
www.patreon.com/posts/see-yo...
www.patreon.com/posts/see-yo...
December 17, 2025 at 10:47 PM
I subbed. McMansion Hell is both educational and some of the most hilarious stuff I've ever read. Truly one of the "this is why the internet needs to exists" corners out there.
A mentor told me early on not to worry about getting scooped. "If you only have one idea to steal, you won't be a very good academic."
December 14, 2025 at 3:46 PM
A mentor told me early on not to worry about getting scooped. "If you only have one idea to steal, you won't be a very good academic."
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
People who say tenure makes professors lazy because they know they can’t get fired are funny, because like, you think we’d go into this underpaid hellscape of a profession without the promise of job security?
December 14, 2025 at 3:09 PM
People who say tenure makes professors lazy because they know they can’t get fired are funny, because like, you think we’d go into this underpaid hellscape of a profession without the promise of job security?
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
To build the body plan of an animal, cells must adhere to one another via cell-cell junctions. We now know these assemble as punctate protein complexes containing thousands of proteins, but how this occurs remains mysterious. 1/n 🧪
www.molbiolcell.org/doi/full/10....
www.molbiolcell.org/doi/full/10....
December 14, 2025 at 2:59 PM
To build the body plan of an animal, cells must adhere to one another via cell-cell junctions. We now know these assemble as punctate protein complexes containing thousands of proteins, but how this occurs remains mysterious. 1/n 🧪
www.molbiolcell.org/doi/full/10....
www.molbiolcell.org/doi/full/10....
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
speaking as a first-gen, this op ed is very very good. we are powerhouses and it truly is a sign of USHE times if they want to try (are you not entertained?) to erase us.
Being the First in Your Family to attend College Is Not a Deficit—It’s a Distinction www.insidehighered.com/opinion/view... "It means learning how to do college while doing college—a dual curriculum that tests not only intellect but resilience, adaptability and faith." #edusky #firstgen #college
In Praise of Being First-Gen (opinion)
We should not retire the label; we should reclaim and revere it.
www.insidehighered.com
December 14, 2025 at 2:06 PM
speaking as a first-gen, this op ed is very very good. we are powerhouses and it truly is a sign of USHE times if they want to try (are you not entertained?) to erase us.
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
December 14, 2025 at 2:01 PM
My kids were in kindergarten when Sandy Hook happened. I shielded them from the news completely. Now they are college freshman and found out about Brown via cellphone bc a friend was in lockdown. Nothing has changed.
December 14, 2025 at 1:51 PM
My kids were in kindergarten when Sandy Hook happened. I shielded them from the news completely. Now they are college freshman and found out about Brown via cellphone bc a friend was in lockdown. Nothing has changed.
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
on this day in 2012, 20 children and 6 adults are killed in mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. And with the awful shooting at Brown University yesterday, we still haven't done anything on meaningful national gun laws. Enough is enough.
December 14, 2025 at 12:55 PM
on this day in 2012, 20 children and 6 adults are killed in mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. And with the awful shooting at Brown University yesterday, we still haven't done anything on meaningful national gun laws. Enough is enough.
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
NSF
- Forced reorg
- POs down ~ 40% (DRP, most rotators not renewed, retirements)
- Forced move (and we have to pack and clean) to a building with no furniture, little to no conference space for panels, inadequate 🛜, …)
I personally love the boxes they gave us for packing.
“Details matter” 🙃
- Forced reorg
- POs down ~ 40% (DRP, most rotators not renewed, retirements)
- Forced move (and we have to pack and clean) to a building with no furniture, little to no conference space for panels, inadequate 🛜, …)
I personally love the boxes they gave us for packing.
“Details matter” 🙃
December 11, 2025 at 11:16 AM
NSF
- Forced reorg
- POs down ~ 40% (DRP, most rotators not renewed, retirements)
- Forced move (and we have to pack and clean) to a building with no furniture, little to no conference space for panels, inadequate 🛜, …)
I personally love the boxes they gave us for packing.
“Details matter” 🙃
- Forced reorg
- POs down ~ 40% (DRP, most rotators not renewed, retirements)
- Forced move (and we have to pack and clean) to a building with no furniture, little to no conference space for panels, inadequate 🛜, …)
I personally love the boxes they gave us for packing.
“Details matter” 🙃
Bulgaria’s Prime Minister Resigns in the Face of Mass Protests
www.nytimes.com
December 11, 2025 at 6:12 PM
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
“New Lizza post is up!” I shout from my room. The only reply is my own echo; this house has been empty for thirty-five years.
December 11, 2025 at 2:14 AM
“New Lizza post is up!” I shout from my room. The only reply is my own echo; this house has been empty for thirty-five years.
When AI is writing all the PhD theses not too long from now, I will miss this semi annual end of semester face off with "the library guy."
December 10, 2025 at 11:03 PM
When AI is writing all the PhD theses not too long from now, I will miss this semi annual end of semester face off with "the library guy."
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
NEW (but deja vu): Texas and Florida are suing the FDA over its approval and regulation of the abortion drug mifepristone. The states are asking Judge Reed O'Connor to declare the 25yo approval unlawful and yank mife from the market—but judges can't do that
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
![screenshot of complaint in a lawsuit
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
WICHITA FALLS DIVISION
THE STATE OF FLORIDA and THE STATE OF TEXAS, by and
through their Attorneys General,
Plaintiffs,
v.
U.S. FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION; U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES; MARTIN A. MAKARY, M.D., M.P.H., in
his official capacity as Commissioner of Food and Drugs, U.S. Food and
Drug Administration; RICHARD PAZDUR, M.D., in his official capacity as Director, Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, U.S. Food
and Drug Administration; and ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR., in his official capacity as Secretary, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services,
Defendants.
Case No. ______________
COMPLAINT
1. The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is responsible
for “protect[ing] the public health by ensuring that . . . drugs are safe and effective.”21 U.S.C. § 393(b)(2)(B).
2. Yet the FDA’s approval and deregulation of abortion drugs have placed women and girls in harm’s way](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:4fdfjfnhhyeo4hsmoxpeazsg/bafkreiad4xu6gssl7uhp2x6zz2vomvxl6rkftyopu46yzghz7wcbtxu73i@jpeg)
December 10, 2025 at 6:48 PM
NEW (but deja vu): Texas and Florida are suing the FDA over its approval and regulation of the abortion drug mifepristone. The states are asking Judge Reed O'Connor to declare the 25yo approval unlawful and yank mife from the market—but judges can't do that
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
Holy CRAP.
Retired engineer takes random pics of *kids*, without consent or attribution, bins them into “autistic” or “not autistic”, and uploads that “data” for free on Kaggle.
Well over a HUNDRED papers are published, 38 in Springer Nature, 25 in IEEE, using it.
And no reviewers objected? WTF.🧪
Retired engineer takes random pics of *kids*, without consent or attribution, bins them into “autistic” or “not autistic”, and uploads that “data” for free on Kaggle.
Well over a HUNDRED papers are published, 38 in Springer Nature, 25 in IEEE, using it.
And no reviewers objected? WTF.🧪
Springer Nature retracts, removes nearly 40 publications
The dataset contains images of children’s faces downloaded from websites about autism, which sparked concerns at Springer Nature about consent and reliability.
www.thetransmitter.org
December 8, 2025 at 11:49 PM
Holy CRAP.
Retired engineer takes random pics of *kids*, without consent or attribution, bins them into “autistic” or “not autistic”, and uploads that “data” for free on Kaggle.
Well over a HUNDRED papers are published, 38 in Springer Nature, 25 in IEEE, using it.
And no reviewers objected? WTF.🧪
Retired engineer takes random pics of *kids*, without consent or attribution, bins them into “autistic” or “not autistic”, and uploads that “data” for free on Kaggle.
Well over a HUNDRED papers are published, 38 in Springer Nature, 25 in IEEE, using it.
And no reviewers objected? WTF.🧪
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
The Bay took over the highway during this morning's #KingTides in Marin.
December 4, 2025 at 10:25 PM
The Bay took over the highway during this morning's #KingTides in Marin.
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
This story is going under the radar: hundreds of public housing agencies around the country are short on funds and were unable to pay some/all of their Section 8 landlords on Dec. 1.
It's a remnant of the shutdown. Here's our local take at @brooklinenews.bsky.social
brookline.news/bha-late-on-...
It's a remnant of the shutdown. Here's our local take at @brooklinenews.bsky.social
brookline.news/bha-late-on-...
BHA late on December payments to hundreds of Section 8 landlords in Brookline because of federal funding delays - Brookline.News
The same situation is facing hundreds of public housing agencies across the country, and industry leaders say the recent federal government shutdown is to blame.
brookline.news
December 4, 2025 at 11:34 PM
This story is going under the radar: hundreds of public housing agencies around the country are short on funds and were unable to pay some/all of their Section 8 landlords on Dec. 1.
It's a remnant of the shutdown. Here's our local take at @brooklinenews.bsky.social
brookline.news/bha-late-on-...
It's a remnant of the shutdown. Here's our local take at @brooklinenews.bsky.social
brookline.news/bha-late-on-...
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
avg linkedin user like "i'm happy to announce i'm starting a new position as part of the how to kill superman by blocking out the sun research team at luthorcorp" & the comments are all goons from similar branches of the legion of doom going "omg congratulations 🎉"
December 3, 2025 at 12:32 AM
avg linkedin user like "i'm happy to announce i'm starting a new position as part of the how to kill superman by blocking out the sun research team at luthorcorp" & the comments are all goons from similar branches of the legion of doom going "omg congratulations 🎉"
this is one thing that slid in under the wire just before the FDA turned to shit
“An accessible alternative to the Pap smear has been endorsed by the American Cancer Society. On Thursday, it released new guidelines saying that self-collection is an acceptable way to test for the virus that causes cervical cancer.
The guidelines reflect years of data &recent regulatory approvals”
The guidelines reflect years of data &recent regulatory approvals”
American Cancer Society Endorses Pap Smear Alternative
www.nytimes.com
December 4, 2025 at 9:11 PM
this is one thing that slid in under the wire just before the FDA turned to shit
Reposted by Cathie Klapperich
#Microplastics are increasingly detected in human tissues, with potential links to cognitive, cardiovascular, and inflammatory outcomes.
💡 Learn more in this JAMA Insights:
ja.ma/44tEyub
💡 Learn more in this JAMA Insights:
ja.ma/44tEyub
December 2, 2025 at 5:00 PM
#Microplastics are increasingly detected in human tissues, with potential links to cognitive, cardiovascular, and inflammatory outcomes.
💡 Learn more in this JAMA Insights:
ja.ma/44tEyub
💡 Learn more in this JAMA Insights:
ja.ma/44tEyub