Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · 6d

🚨 Patriots, the "Compact for Academic Excellence" claims to fix colleges but stomps on 1st Amendment rights. It threatens YOUR jobs by diverting tax $$ to elites. FIRE calls it "McCarthyism 2.0." Fight for free speech & heartland jobs! #AmericaFirst www.thefire.org/news/fire-st...

FIRE statement on the White House’s Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education

The Wall Street Journal has reported the White House is asking colleges to sign an agreement to secure preferential treatment for government funding.

www.thefire.org

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · 6d

Gift link www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/o...

Opinion | Trump’s ‘Compact’ With Universities Is Just Extortion

www.nytimes.com

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · 7d

🚨 Patriots, the "Compact for Academic Excellence" betrays hard working families! It diverts YOUR tax dollars to elite universities, starving heartland schools and risking 200K+ jobs in R&D and local businesses. Demand fair funding for YOUR community! 🇺🇸 #AmericaFirst

The Tennessee Holler @thetnholler.bsky.social · 7d

HIGHER ED EXTORTION: Trump offers “compact” to top universities—including Vanderbilt. Grants in exchange for: fewer foreign students, conservative gender policies, protected GOP ideology & speech limits on staff.

Will Vandy to submit to bullying for a bag of cash? www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/u...

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · 8d

🚨 The gov shutdown is costing taxpayers $400M/day, killing jobs, stalling NIH/NSF innovation, & letting China gain on us. 🇺🇸 needs action, not gridlock! 🙏Thank you, federal workers, for your service. Let’s end this now! #MAGA #GovernmentShutdown #AmericanStrength

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · 13d

UP NExT empowers trainees to bridge computation, cellular biology, and translational neuroscience, preparing the next generation to tackle complex neurological challenges. #NeuralEngineering #FutureScientists #TranslationalResearch

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · 13d

Congrats to Adam Forrest (therapeutic ultrasound for neuroinflammation) & Sharada Narayanan (electrochemical sensors for neural immune responses). Also Ian Eder (actin cytoskeleton & immune infiltration) & Katarina Martinet (vascular graft remodeling). #PittEngineering

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · 13d

🎉 Exciting news! Nearly half of Pitt Bioengineering UP NExT PhD trainees earned NIH F31 Fellowships this year—showing the strength of our neural engineering training. #UPNExT #NIHF31 #NeuralEngineering
news.engineering.pitt.edu/four-bioengi...

Four Bioengineering PhD Students receive NIH F31 Fellowships

Four Bioengineering PhD students at the Swanson School of Engineering will receive funding toward their studies in 2025, thanks to prestigious awards from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Pred...

news.engineering.pitt.edu

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Reposted by TK (Takashi DY) Kozai

Jason Williams @jasonwilliamsny.bsky.social · 14d

Please share with anyone who cares about NSF support for graduate students and take 30 seconds to sign and leave a comment.

The deadline for the 2025 Graduate Research Fellowship Program is about one month away and literally no one can apply. #NSFGRFP

jasonjwilliamsny.github.io/grfp2025/

An Open Letter to U.S. STEM Leadership on the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program

jasonjwilliamsny.github.io

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Sep 6

Trump praises COVID & polio vaccines as "amazing," calls Florida's move to end student vaccine mandates a "tough stance." Urges caution on skipping shots that "pure and simple work." #Vaccines #Florida #PublicHealth

www.foxnews.com/politics/tru...

Trump calls Florida's move to eliminate vaccine mandates a 'tough stance': 'You have vaccines that work'

President Donald Trump called some vaccines "amazing" while calling Florida's decision to move toward eliminating all state vaccine mandates for students a "tough stance."

www.foxnews.com

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Sep 4

Understanding these eye movement changes helps design better therapies for kids after hemispherectomy, improving independence and reducing long-term healthcare costs (saving taxpayers money and improving quality of life). #NeuralEngineering www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Bidirectional and asymmetric smooth pursuit deficits in childhood hemispherectomy patients

The neural circuitry engaged in supporting eye movements has been well characterized, but fundamental questions remain about the necessity and suffici…

www.sciencedirect.com

TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Sep 4

New Paper: Univ of Pittsburgh Cross-Translational (UP NExT) Prog: Kids with a hemispherectomy show uneven eye movements: slower toward the removed side, faster the opposite way, with quick “catch-up” saccades, regardless of which hemisphere was removed and not due to general vision or motor issues.

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Sep 2

The answer is no. Because OMB will move to maximizing multi year grant, maximize pocket recession, and tying up funds in courts, which will tank the number of awards. And the ~43% IDC rate (30% of TC) will only affect about ~40 institutions, so won't affect the bottom line much.

TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Sep 2

appropriations.house.gov/news/press-r...

Committee Releases FY26 Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Bill

Washington, D.C. – Today, the House Appropriations Committee released the Fiscal Year 2026 bill for the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Subcommittee. The bill will be...

appropriations.house.gov

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Sep 2

House & Senate reject Trump's ~40% NIH ($27.5B) & 57% NSF ($3.9B) cuts, backing $48-48.7B NIH, $7-9B NSF. 🇺🇸 wins: counters China’s $172B annual S&T surge (7,100 trials vs. US 6,000), boosts heartland jobs & drives medical breakthroughs. #AmericaFirst #NIH #NSF #Innovation

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 29

🚨🇺🇸 RED ALERT: Chinese gov’s dumping $47B+ into brain-computer interfaces to CRUSH US tech by 2030, while we’re stuck at $0.2B from DARPA/NIH/NSF! They’re stealing OUR jobs & security! DEMAND $20B/yr NOW to back USA Neurotech!
www.wired.com/story/china-...
#AmericaFirst #TechWar #NIH #NSF #DARPA

China Is Building a Brain-Computer Interface Industry

A new policy document outlines China’s plan to create an internationally competitive BCI industry within five years, and proposes developing devices for both health and consumer uses.

www.wired.com

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 26

Patriots! NIH cuts kill cures for cancer, HIV, opioid research, hitting red states like hardest with lost job & lost cures for you kids. Longer, costly waits for care. Rural families pay the price. This ain't America First. it's hurting real Americans! Demand better! #NIHcuts

Nancy Kanwisher @nancykanwisher.bsky.social · Aug 24

This is a superb short video on the consequences of the ongoing destruction of American science. Please watch and circulate.
@sebastianseung.bsky.social is fantastic here.
www.nytimes.com/2025/08/24/o...

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 23

doi.org/10.1287/orsc...

TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 23

Golden fuses K-pop precision + Western pop structure. Like integrative scientists, hybrid talent drives breakthroughs. Reward synthesis, don’t punish it. #NIH #NSF #Innovation #Multidisciplinarity

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 21

SCOTUS letting NIH pause $783M in grants screws taxpayers! $1.4B of OUR money already spent is wasted if stopped. Kills 🇺🇸 scientist & supplier jobs, lets China beat us in medical breakthroughs. This isn’t draining the swamp, it’s draining our wallets! #AmericaFirst

www.npr.org/2025/08/21/g...

Supreme Court allows NIH to stop making nearly $800M in research grants for now

But the court, in its emergency docket order, also left in place by a 5-4 order a lower court ruling that threw out NIH memos that enforced the administration's policies.

www.npr.org

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 17

Trump's AI Action Plan pushes U.S. leadership, but cutting science funding (57% NSF, $18B NIH) threatens the AI we love; self-driving cars, ChatGPT, face recognition. Neuroscience fuels these tools! Let’s keep America #1 in AI. #MAGA #TechForAmerica

Mark Histed @markhisted.org · Aug 15

While the effects on AI of [science] funding cuts might not be obvious in the next year or two, they threaten “the whole ecosystem that we have built around AI, which has been created by public support.”

Yes. The US AI ecosystem grew from universities, from free academia and public funding. 🧪

Trump cuts to science research threaten his administration’s own AI action plan

Experts warn of undermining environment that fostered foundations of artificial intelligence as federal agencies hit

www.theguardian.com

TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 14

Funded by NIH & NSF—taxpayer investment driving brain health innovation.

rdcu.be/eAcMD

#NeuralEngineering #BCI #MedTech

Monolithic three-dimensional neural probes from deterministic rolling of soft electronics

Nature Electronics - Soft electronic probes for measuring neural activity can be made scalably in an initially planar form and turned into various three-dimensional geometries through a controlled...

rdcu.be

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 14

PITT NExT collab: Nature Electronics: ROSE Probes – 3D neural probes from Rolling-of-Soft-Electronics.

✅ Custom 3D geometries
✅ Flexible polyimide reduces brain strain
✅ 5-week stable recordings in rodents
✅ High-fidelity 3D spike mapping in rodents & NHPs

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 11

books.google.com/books?hl=en&...

A Companion to Doing Ethics

A comprehensive guide to practicing ethics across disciplines and contexts in the 21st century In an era of rapid technological advancements and complex societal challenges, A Companion to Doing Ethic...

books.google.com

TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 11

Maintaining trust in ethics & research means more than disclosure, it requires accountability. As a leader in the field, Pitt NExT Initiative is committed to setting high standards & advancing best practices for managing conflicts of interest. #Ethics #HigherEd #ResearchIntegrity

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TK (Takashi DY) Kozai @bioniclab.bsky.social · Aug 11

Cutting NIH funding now is a bad move. It drives biomedical breakthroughs, supports jobs, and keeps the U.S. competitive. China’s racing ahead in brain-computer tech. Slashing $18B could cost us leadership and health progress.
share.google/YKsMLlLCQ356...
#NIH #ResearchMatters

Chinese brain chip project speeds up human trials after first success

A tie-up between a Chinese research institute and tech company said on Monday that it aims to implant its brain chip into 13 people by the end of this year, in a move that could see it overtake Elon Musk's Neuralink in collecting patient data.

share.google

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