Karen Fleming
karenfleming.bsky.social
Karen Fleming
@karenfleming.bsky.social
Scientist & Professor #JohnsHopkins - I work in discovery to fill the scientific pipeline. #Biophysics #PilatesIsForEveryone #Knitter #Broomsquire #Genealogist Advocate for #WomenInSTEM #ScienceIsReal Views are my own. Alternative Facts are not Facts.
Pinned
There is a lot of pressure on academics to be extraordinarily successful. Is it worth it?
‘Success Addicts’ Choose Being Special Over Being Happy
The pursuit of achievement distracts from the deeply ordinary activities and relationships that make life meaningful.
www.theatlantic.com
Reposted by Karen Fleming
Turns out Representative tradwife is not so fun
December 4, 2025 at 2:51 AM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
My quote of the day

There are a lot of things that people go through, and maybe they don't know how to get through it, and maybe you do, and if you have some sort of knowledge or power, share with the world.

Sabrina Carpenter
December 4, 2025 at 12:42 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
All I want for Christmas is for the worst people in the world to experience some consequences
December 3, 2025 at 8:03 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
My quote of the day

We can disagree and still love each other unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist.

James Baldwin
December 2, 2025 at 10:42 AM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
New York Times article on science funding with some depressing but familiar curves with interactive graphics.

www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
The U.S. Is Funding Fewer Grants in Every Area of Science and Medicine (Gift Article)
A quiet policy change means the government is making fewer bets on long-term science.
www.nytimes.com
December 2, 2025 at 11:57 AM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
Join your biophysics community and get valuable feedback on your work in San Francisco! Late abstract submission is open through January 6
www.biophysics.org/2026meeting#/
BPS2026 Annual Meeting | Biophysical Society
One-on-One with a MentorEducation & Career FairUPACJUST-B Poster Session
www.biophysics.org
November 26, 2025 at 8:50 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
@jenna-m-norton.bsky.social has more integrity and spine than the entire HHS "leadership"
In a video, Norton confirms the news and says: "I strongly suspect it is because I have been speaking up in my personal capacity about the harms I have been witnessing inside the NIH.

Putting me on admin leave was designed to scare and silence me. I will not stop speaking out," she says.
I guess I am hitting a nerve, because they just put me on admin leave.
TikTok video by Jenna
www.tiktok.com
November 14, 2025 at 3:30 AM
November 1, 2025 at 10:41 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
This is not a fight about tax credits.

This is a fight over your ability to go to a pharmacy and afford your insulin.

We have the chance to protect the health care of millions of Americans. We need to take it.
October 1, 2025 at 12:29 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
Good morning.

The government is shut down because Trump wants to act like a king and steal from you.

Democrats have no obligation to support a budget that funds the destruction of our democracy - and DOUBLES health premiums to fund a tax cut for billionaires.
October 1, 2025 at 1:37 PM
Gorgeous landing tonight. I ❤️ Southwest.
September 29, 2025 at 11:10 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell could not have sold children for sex without rich perverts buying children for sex. I feel like more people should mention that.
September 16, 2025 at 7:21 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
Remembering MN house speaker Melissa Hortman, her husband Mark and their beloved dog Gilbert. Murdered in June at their home by a rightwing Trump-voting evangelist, who also shot another MN lawmaker and his wife at THEIR home, 9 and 8 times, respectively (miraculously, they survived).
September 11, 2025 at 5:50 AM
Does anyone else think he will bestow the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Giuliani at the Four Seasons? It is after all special place for them.
September 3, 2025 at 12:53 AM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
If you wait long enough to cook dinner, everyone will eat cereal.

Follow me for more recipes.
August 30, 2025 at 8:37 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
It bears repeating that nearly the entire US enterprise in science and technology has been irreversibly gutted. This is shocking.

All this loss has occurred without any real benefit to the average US citizen. Except we now have the biggest, best funded secret police force perhaps ever.

Yay for us!
August 23, 2025 at 4:25 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
My Letter to the Editor in the Washington Post is online

[Gift Link]

wapo.st/415HpYM

1/4
Opinion | AMA president: NIH is wrong to pivot from mRNA vaccines
Trump once oversaw historic mRNA vaccine development. Why is he abandoning it?
wapo.st
August 14, 2025 at 8:20 PM
August 15, 2025 at 12:08 AM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
Imagine being a science professor and thinking the threat to the university is coming from humanities disciplines rather than fascists.
August 14, 2025 at 3:48 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
I did a thing. I wrote a textbook about #RNA. I wrote it so that those without formal science training could understand what RNA is and how it is used in medicine. It releases in the US and Europe on September 8th. www.worldscientific.com/worldscibook...
August 14, 2025 at 4:55 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
NIH is considering changes in supporting publication costs--some ideas are quite radical and would endanger our ability to publish at all. I don't love the cots from the big for-profits but it does cost$ to run a journal. Please repost. Comment at:
osp.od.nih.gov/comment-form....
August 11, 2025 at 11:30 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
The rest of the world, fortunately, will not ignore the huge potential of RNA vaccines. The result will be loss of leadership in the US and delay of benefits to Americans. The promise of personalized anti-cancer vaccines alone is incredible. #OwnGoal
"The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) today announced the beginning of a coordinated wind-down of its mRNA vaccine development activities...."

cc: Sen. Bill Cassidy
August 5, 2025 at 11:36 PM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
“This is a bad day for science,” said Scott Hensley, an immunologist at the University of Pennsylvania who has been working to develop an mRNA vaccine against flu…With this move, the department is “undermining our ability to rapidly counter future biological threats,” said Rick Bright, a flu expert”
Trump Administration Live Updates: R.F.K. Jr. Cancels mRNA Vaccine Contracts
www.nytimes.com
August 6, 2025 at 12:56 AM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
RFK Jr and HHS just ended all US supported mRNA vaccine development
www.hhs.gov/press-room/h...
www.hhs.gov
August 6, 2025 at 12:49 AM
Reposted by Karen Fleming
Extra kudos and thanks to all the staff at NIH and NSF and other federal funding agencies for working extra hard in very small windows of opportunity to get grants reviewed and funds released before the attention-addled federal policies change again (on an hourly basis).
July 30, 2025 at 8:41 PM