Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
@needhibhalla.bsky.social
Cell biologist and geneticist, Professor, mom and consumer of alcohol. Those might all be related. I grind til I own it.
She/her/hers.
ORCID: 0000-0002-6859-0073
personal account
She/her/hers.
ORCID: 0000-0002-6859-0073
personal account
Pinned
Scaling back DEI programmes and the loss of scientific talent
Nature Cell Biology - Programmes that support diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in science are under attack in the USA. Data indicate that diversity in the scientific workforce increases...
www.nature.com
@joann-trejo.bsky.social, @marymunson4.bsky.social and I have a commentary in @natcellbio.nature.com on recent attacks on DEI in biomedical research: "If scientific research, especially biomedical research, is meant to serve everyone, then it requires that everyone has an opportunity to participate"
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
There’s much more in the manuscript than can fit in a Bluesky thread. The full story is here: www.nature.com/articles/s41... 13/14
Ancient co-option of LTR retrotransposons as yeast centromeres - Nature
Evolutionarily related ‘proto-point’ centromeres providing resolution to the evolutionary origins of point centromeres are identified in yeast, and comparison shows they evolved in an ancestor with re...
www.nature.com
February 18, 2026 at 4:03 PM
There’s much more in the manuscript than can fit in a Bluesky thread. The full story is here: www.nature.com/articles/s41... 13/14
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
In sum, point centromere DNA most likely arose by long-term domestication of Ty5-family LTR sequences (with identifiable intermediates, see also doi.org/10.1371/jour...), while 2µ is best explained as a later hitchhiker of the chromosome segregation environment rather than the source of it. 11/14
Centromeres in budding yeasts are conserved in chromosomal location but not in structure
Author summary Centromeres are an evolutionary paradox. Their molecular function is highly conserved, but their structures vary tremendously among eukaryotes. The “point” centromeres of the yeast Sacc...
doi.org
February 18, 2026 at 4:03 PM
In sum, point centromere DNA most likely arose by long-term domestication of Ty5-family LTR sequences (with identifiable intermediates, see also doi.org/10.1371/jour...), while 2µ is best explained as a later hitchhiker of the chromosome segregation environment rather than the source of it. 11/14
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
Even more striking was that in two Saccharomycodales species, these proto-point centromeres are embedded within dense clusters of Ty5 LTR retrotransposons.
These are effectively “living fossil” centromeres.
8/14
These are effectively “living fossil” centromeres.
8/14
February 18, 2026 at 4:03 PM
Even more striking was that in two Saccharomycodales species, these proto-point centromeres are embedded within dense clusters of Ty5 LTR retrotransposons.
These are effectively “living fossil” centromeres.
8/14
These are effectively “living fossil” centromeres.
8/14
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
We searched in the sister order Saccharomycodales and found what we term “proto-point” centromeres:
a single Cse4/CENP-A nucleosome
an AT-rich core
flanking motifs that are more relaxed and variable than in modern point centromeres
They look like evolutionary intermediates.
7/14
a single Cse4/CENP-A nucleosome
an AT-rich core
flanking motifs that are more relaxed and variable than in modern point centromeres
They look like evolutionary intermediates.
7/14
February 18, 2026 at 4:03 PM
We searched in the sister order Saccharomycodales and found what we term “proto-point” centromeres:
a single Cse4/CENP-A nucleosome
an AT-rich core
flanking motifs that are more relaxed and variable than in modern point centromeres
They look like evolutionary intermediates.
7/14
a single Cse4/CENP-A nucleosome
an AT-rich core
flanking motifs that are more relaxed and variable than in modern point centromeres
They look like evolutionary intermediates.
7/14
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
Our paper is now out in Nature:
“Ancient co-option of LTR retrotransposons as yeast centromeres”
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A short thread on how retrotransposons helped give rise to yeast point centromeres.
1/14
“Ancient co-option of LTR retrotransposons as yeast centromeres”
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A short thread on how retrotransposons helped give rise to yeast point centromeres.
1/14
Ancient co-option of LTR retrotransposons as yeast centromeres - Nature
Evolutionarily related ‘proto-point’ centromeres providing resolution to the evolutionary origins of point centromeres are identified in yeast, and comparison shows they evolved in an ancestor with re...
www.nature.com
February 18, 2026 at 4:03 PM
Our paper is now out in Nature:
“Ancient co-option of LTR retrotransposons as yeast centromeres”
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A short thread on how retrotransposons helped give rise to yeast point centromeres.
1/14
“Ancient co-option of LTR retrotransposons as yeast centromeres”
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A short thread on how retrotransposons helped give rise to yeast point centromeres.
1/14
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
My friend @alexisgoldstein.bsky.social was fired from the CFPB for standing up to DOGE. Now she’s running for Congress. www.democracynow.org/2026/2/18/al...
CFPB Staffer Alexis Goldstein Fired for Confronting DOGE Members, Announces Run for Congress
The Trump administration has fired Consumer Financial Protection Bureau program manager Alexis Goldstein for documenting a meeting a year ago between the agency and Elon Musk’s Department of Governmen...
www.democracynow.org
February 18, 2026 at 4:08 PM
My friend @alexisgoldstein.bsky.social was fired from the CFPB for standing up to DOGE. Now she’s running for Congress. www.democracynow.org/2026/2/18/al...
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
In departure from norm, Coast Guard demands immigration papers on Louisiana docks
In St. Bernard Parish, fishing deckhands fear death and detention amid regular immigration sweeps – not by ICE, but the Coast Guard
lailluminator.com/2026/02/18/c...
In St. Bernard Parish, fishing deckhands fear death and detention amid regular immigration sweeps – not by ICE, but the Coast Guard
lailluminator.com/2026/02/18/c...
In departure from norm, Coast Guard demands immigration papers on Louisiana docks • Louisiana Illuminator
Seafood workers say that the Coast Guard, in a departure from the norm, has conducted about seven sweeps since early November, resulting in multiple arrests.
lailluminator.com
February 18, 2026 at 3:57 PM
In departure from norm, Coast Guard demands immigration papers on Louisiana docks
In St. Bernard Parish, fishing deckhands fear death and detention amid regular immigration sweeps – not by ICE, but the Coast Guard
lailluminator.com/2026/02/18/c...
In St. Bernard Parish, fishing deckhands fear death and detention amid regular immigration sweeps – not by ICE, but the Coast Guard
lailluminator.com/2026/02/18/c...
Just the biggest fucking losers
February 18, 2026 at 4:03 PM
Just the biggest fucking losers
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
There hasn't been enough of a look back at agencies that have seen significant attrition during Trump's assault on the federal workforce. Today we do that with a profile on those who departed the VA health care system, many of them vets themselves. The system is struggling to survive.
How Trump Put Veteran Care in Crisis - The American Prospect
Thousands of staff have left the health care side of the Department of Veterans Affairs, and those who remain are approaching burnout.
prospect.org
February 18, 2026 at 4:01 PM
There hasn't been enough of a look back at agencies that have seen significant attrition during Trump's assault on the federal workforce. Today we do that with a profile on those who departed the VA health care system, many of them vets themselves. The system is struggling to survive.
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
Great to see folks increasingly use "Epstein Class" as moniker. More potent and accurate still would be "Epstein Regime" as it's not merely a cohort but rather tied to the folks in political power and determined to rule over us.
February 18, 2026 at 1:46 AM
Great to see folks increasingly use "Epstein Class" as moniker. More potent and accurate still would be "Epstein Regime" as it's not merely a cohort but rather tied to the folks in political power and determined to rule over us.
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
i have come to the view that there is an extent to which elites are projecting the salience of bigotry on the broad public. *they* are preoccupied with this stuff and so they imagine the public must be obsessed with it.
February 18, 2026 at 2:09 PM
i have come to the view that there is an extent to which elites are projecting the salience of bigotry on the broad public. *they* are preoccupied with this stuff and so they imagine the public must be obsessed with it.
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
This makes it four Polk Awards for @statnews.com in five years — a credit to an incredibly talented staff.
www.prnewswire.com/news-release...
www.prnewswire.com/news-release...
LONG ISLAND UNIVERSITY ANNOUNCES 2024 GEORGE POLK AWARDS IN JOURNALISM
/PRNewswire/ -- Incisive reports from four areas of bloody conflict — Sudan, the Russian-Ukraine war zone, Israel's West Bank and Haiti — are among 15 winners...
www.prnewswire.com
February 18, 2026 at 3:38 PM
This makes it four Polk Awards for @statnews.com in five years — a credit to an incredibly talented staff.
www.prnewswire.com/news-release...
www.prnewswire.com/news-release...
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
I argued in a piece I wrote in 2013 called ‘the frustrated gene’ that caps are an antiviral defense. Hence some viruses steal caps, other have their own capping enzymes, while others evolved IRESs. Here’s a virus that captured the entire cap recognition machinery. Conflicts begets comlexity.
Max Fels @mfels.bsky.social from our lab discovers giant DNA viruses that infect amoeba encode eIF4E and the entire suite of 4F complex proteins to control mRNA translation, including beautiful crystal structures of viral 4E bound to modified mRNA 5' caps:
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
February 18, 2026 at 7:08 AM
I argued in a piece I wrote in 2013 called ‘the frustrated gene’ that caps are an antiviral defense. Hence some viruses steal caps, other have their own capping enzymes, while others evolved IRESs. Here’s a virus that captured the entire cap recognition machinery. Conflicts begets comlexity.
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
News piece in Science @science.org about Max's research:
"Giant viruses hijack their hosts’ protein factories"
www.science.org/content/arti...
"Giant viruses hijack their hosts’ protein factories"
www.science.org/content/arti...
February 17, 2026 at 6:18 PM
News piece in Science @science.org about Max's research:
"Giant viruses hijack their hosts’ protein factories"
www.science.org/content/arti...
"Giant viruses hijack their hosts’ protein factories"
www.science.org/content/arti...
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
Six backcountry skiers were found alive and 10 others were still missing Tuesday after an avalanche in Northern California during a powerful winter storm moving through the state. https://to.pbs.org/3ZETVxp
6 backcountry skiers rescued alive, 10 missing after California avalanche, authorities say
Six backcountry skiers were found alive and 10 others were still missing Tuesday after an avalanche in Northern California during a powerful winter storm moving through the state.
to.pbs.org
February 18, 2026 at 12:52 AM
Six backcountry skiers were found alive and 10 others were still missing Tuesday after an avalanche in Northern California during a powerful winter storm moving through the state. https://to.pbs.org/3ZETVxp
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Tesla collectively received $51 billion in tax breaks, thanks to the Trump and GOP corporate tax cuts signed into law last year.
Together they effectively paid a federal tax rate of 4.9%, according to @itep.org.
itep.org/trump-meta-t...
Together they effectively paid a federal tax rate of 4.9%, according to @itep.org.
itep.org/trump-meta-t...
Four Big Tech Companies Avoid $51 Billion in Taxes in Wake of One Big Beautiful Bill Act
Four of the corporations whose CEOs flanked President Trump at his 2025 inauguration ceremony have now disclosed that they collectively received $51 billion in federal tax breaks in 2025, much of that...
itep.org
February 18, 2026 at 2:02 PM
Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, and Tesla collectively received $51 billion in tax breaks, thanks to the Trump and GOP corporate tax cuts signed into law last year.
Together they effectively paid a federal tax rate of 4.9%, according to @itep.org.
itep.org/trump-meta-t...
Together they effectively paid a federal tax rate of 4.9%, according to @itep.org.
itep.org/trump-meta-t...
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
Happy birthday Audre Lorde
February 18, 2026 at 3:26 PM
Happy birthday Audre Lorde
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
It’s not like I didn’t suspect it, but since the Epstein files, I will never not believe they aren’t all conspiring to keep working people from any power. And if they all don’t want her in power that is a good piece of information.
I see they settled on a framing in the donor group chat
February 18, 2026 at 3:19 PM
It’s not like I didn’t suspect it, but since the Epstein files, I will never not believe they aren’t all conspiring to keep working people from any power. And if they all don’t want her in power that is a good piece of information.
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
My department is hiring a Biological Anthropologist, spread the word!!!
jobs.radford.edu/jobs/teachin...
jobs.radford.edu/jobs/teachin...
Teaching Faculty, FTT -Department of Anthropological Sciences - Radford, Virginia, United States
Title: Teaching Faculty, FTT -Department of Anthropological Sciences
Application Review Date: March 16, 2026
Campus Location: Radford City - Main Campus
Work Authorization: Radford University employs ...
jobs.radford.edu
February 18, 2026 at 2:28 PM
My department is hiring a Biological Anthropologist, spread the word!!!
jobs.radford.edu/jobs/teachin...
jobs.radford.edu/jobs/teachin...
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
One day Elmo is really gonna crash out on someone in one of these interviews, and it will be warranted 😂
February 18, 2026 at 1:02 PM
One day Elmo is really gonna crash out on someone in one of these interviews, and it will be warranted 😂
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
I hope New Yorkers will challenge Mamdani about this. Too often, people feel they need to be absolutely for or against a politician — ignoring their missteps or throwing them out with the bathwater. You can like and/or believe in someone and still challenge them to deliver on their promises.
Mayor Mamdani Breaks His Promise to NYC Public Libraries
The Struggle Against Defunding Libraries Continues...
prisonculture.substack.com
February 18, 2026 at 3:20 PM
I hope New Yorkers will challenge Mamdani about this. Too often, people feel they need to be absolutely for or against a politician — ignoring their missteps or throwing them out with the bathwater. You can like and/or believe in someone and still challenge them to deliver on their promises.
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
The fact that so many billionaire Californians are each dedicating tens of millions of dollars to fighting a proposed wealth tax — rather than using those funds to pay the tax — demonstrates just how much play money they have and evidences the extent of their delusional entitlement
February 18, 2026 at 3:19 PM
The fact that so many billionaire Californians are each dedicating tens of millions of dollars to fighting a proposed wealth tax — rather than using those funds to pay the tax — demonstrates just how much play money they have and evidences the extent of their delusional entitlement
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
a) Sticky Toffee Pudding Man is on Bluesky!!! and b) if people don't start giving him enough sauce I'm going to take up arms
Thanks for the support! and joining us on this important journey. bsky.app/profile/stpg...
I've just reviewed my 51st Sticky Toffee Pudding. But what did it get out of 10?
February 18, 2026 at 3:21 PM
a) Sticky Toffee Pudding Man is on Bluesky!!! and b) if people don't start giving him enough sauce I'm going to take up arms
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
Thanks for the support! and joining us on this important journey. bsky.app/profile/stpg...
I've just reviewed my 51st Sticky Toffee Pudding. But what did it get out of 10?
February 12, 2026 at 8:47 PM
Thanks for the support! and joining us on this important journey. bsky.app/profile/stpg...
Reposted by Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽
New from me: @govpritzker.illinois.gov will use his State of the State address to push a sweeping housing plan that’d permit multi-unit buildings on most residential lots, legalize granny flats and slash red tape that’s slowed homebuilding in recent years. capitolnewsillinois.com/news/pritzke...
Pritzker to propose statewide zoning laws to spur homebuilding, limit local control
Article Summary JB Pritzker will propose a plan during his State of the State address to drastically limit local governments’
capitolnewsillinois.com
February 18, 2026 at 2:03 PM
New from me: @govpritzker.illinois.gov will use his State of the State address to push a sweeping housing plan that’d permit multi-unit buildings on most residential lots, legalize granny flats and slash red tape that’s slowed homebuilding in recent years. capitolnewsillinois.com/news/pritzke...