Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

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Sean Carroll @seanmcarroll.bsky.social · Jul 16

Here is my colleague Adam Riess, Nobel laureate, sharing his thoughts on advocating for science at a recent event at the US Capitol.

aas.org/posts/news/2...

My Recent Experience Advocating for Science | American Astronomical Society

AAS member and Nobel Prize Laureate Adam Riess describes his experience giving a speech to Congress at a recent event at the Capitol, "A Science Fair of Canceled Grants."

aas.org

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Oscar Marín Lab @marinlab.bsky.social · Apr 30

1/10 Our latest research, led by @martijnselten.bsky.social, identifies a mechanism through which Parvalbumin (PV) interneurons regulate their activity in the #cortex. This is the story @nature.com
www.nature.com/articles/s41... ⬇︎ 🧵 @devneuro.bsky.social @kingsioppn.bsky.social @erc.europa.eu

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Science Magazine @science.org · May 2

President Donald Trump today asked Congress to make massive and unprecedented cuts to the 2026 budgets of major federal science agencies. scim.ag/3Yszqnm

Trump’s proposed budget would mean ‘disastrous’ cuts to science

Key research budgets would shrink by one-third to one-half in 2026 spending plan

scim.ag

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Ardem Patapoutian @ardemp.bskyverified.social · May 3

The president is recommending a 40% cut to next year’s NIH budget. This would be disastrous for our nation’s health and economy. Please contact your representatives, especially if they are Republicans, and tell them why this cannot happen. An easy option: 5calls.org

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NPR @npr.org · Apr 9

Effective immediately, the government says it will begin screening immigrant social media for activity that officials think indicates support for antisemitism.

U.S. says it is now monitoring immigrants' social media for antisemitism

Effective immediately, the government says it will begin screening immigrant social media for activity that officials think indicates support for antisemitism.

www.npr.org

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Li Wang @liwangneuro.bsky.social · Apr 4

Orderly specification and precise laminar deployment of mouse cortical projection neuron types through intermediate progenitors.
www.cell.com/developmenta...

Orderly specification and precise laminar deployment of mouse cortical projection neuron types through intermediate progenitors

Inside-out laminar patterning is a fundamental mechanism in cortical neurogenesis, but sequential specification and precise laminar deployment of projection-defined excitatory neuron types also arises...

www.cell.com

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c0nc0rdance @c0nc0rdance.bsky.social · Mar 26

This a sign of the dark times in which we live & I'm not bragging about it.

My team posted an open position for an industry research scientist and we got 20 times the response rate in the 1st week we normally would & the seniority of the applicants was way higher than the norm.

All from academia.

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bioRxiv Genomics @biorxiv-genomic.bsky.social · Mar 17

High-throughput single cell -omics using semi-permeable capsules https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.03.14.642805v1

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Johanna Joyce @johannajoyce.bsky.social · Mar 20

How does the #vasculature regulate #immune cell infiltration & function across different brain tumors? 🧠🧪

Excited to share our latest study in #Immunity where we uncover some interesting answers— led by the amazing @lbejarano.bsky.social 🤩👏🏻

🧵

@cp-immunity.bsky.social

www.cell.com/immunity/ful...

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Moritz Gerstung @moritzgerstung.bsky.social · Mar 17

Spatial transcriptomics holds great promise to understand biological tissue function, but the assignment of transcripts to cells has been a substantial bottleneck.

For this reason, Elyas Heidari, a student in my lab and in @steglelab.bsky.social built segger.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

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Li Wang @liwangneuro.bsky.social · Mar 18

This is amazing! I wonder if both nuclei and membrane boundary staining data could be simultaneously used as input.

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Kathleen Bachynski @bachynski.bsky.social · Mar 15

“Nobody feels like their job is safe. Everyone is on edge,” said Kim Hasenkrug, an NIH scientist emeritus… “Even the top people can’t keep track because they’re hiring and firing so much. Direct supervisors of those who were terminated didn’t even know that it was happening.”

At NIH, ‘everyone is on edge’ as they brace for deep cuts and more centralized control

As the NIH braces for cuts of up to 5,000 of its 20,000 positions, “people are scrambling and freaking out,” a researcher said.

www.statnews.com

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Nagissa Mahmoudi @nagissa.bsky.social · Mar 16

Wow this is a game changer. PhD scholarships and postdoctoral fellowships are now open to non-Canadians.

Dr Dan Shugar 🇨🇦 @watershedlab.bsky.social · Mar 14

🚨 HUGE news from Canada's tricouncils who are harmonizing their scholarship & fellowship programs, upping the total number (huzzah!), and critically, allowing foreigners to apply for doctoral and postdoc fellowships. Want to work with me? Get in touch! 🇨🇦🧪⚒️

www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/NewsDetail-D...

NSERC - Latest News - Launch of the new Harmonized Tri-agency Scholarship and Fellowship programs

As announced in Budget 2024, the scholarship and fellowship programs administered by the three federal research funding agencies – the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) – have been streamlined into a new harmonized talent program called the Canada Research Training Awards Suite (CRTAS) that will open for applications in summer 2025.

www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca

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The Wall Street Journal @wsj.com · Mar 11

The Trump administration has terminated $800 million in grants to Johns Hopkins University, spurring the nation’s top spender on research and development to plan layoffs and cancel health projects

Johns Hopkins Plans Staff Layoffs After $800 Million Grant Cuts

Local and international health research efforts are already winding down as the university braces for even more potential cuts.

www.wsj.com

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Catherine Dulac @dulaclab.bsky.social · Mar 5

After last week publication from the lab on circuits of social isolation/satiety, today we publish a different line of research by @harriskaplan.bsky.social et al., on the development trajectories of hypothalamic POA cell types driving survival and social behavior.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Sensory input, sex and function shape hypothalamic cell type development - Nature

Paired transcriptomic and chromatin accessibility profiling are used to examine the developmental trajectories of neuronal populations in the hypothalamic preoptic region, including cell types with ke...

www.nature.com

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Dr. Anusha Seneviratne @anushans.bsky.social · Mar 1

🧪 This study highlights why we should not focus so much on genetic factors or drug targets. The #exposome (environmental exposures) has greater impact on disease patterns and premature mortality than genetic factors. www.nature.com/articles/s41... #planetaryhealth #academicsky #medsky #idsky

Integrating the environmental and genetic architectures of aging and mortality - Nature Medicine

Based on a systematic analysis of environmental exposures associated with aging and mortality in the UK Biobank, the relative contributions of such exposures and genetic risk for mortality and a range...

www.nature.com

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Li Wang @liwangneuro.bsky.social · Feb 24

Congratulations, Esther! Glad to see this beautiful work finally out!

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Esther Klingler @estherkli.bsky.social · Feb 20

✨ We tend to think of species-specific differences as resulting from the presence of species-specific genes. In our latest work with @djabaudon.bsky.social, we show that building brains is not only about which genes you use, but also about when and where you do.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

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BWJones @bwjones.bsky.social · Feb 20

It’s @katherinejwu.com with the receipts.

The NIH memo undercutting the NIH came directly from Trump officials.

www.theatlantic.com/health/archi...

The NIH Memo That Undercut Universities Came Directly From Trump Officials

NIH officials said they were given no advance warning and less than an hour to post the memo publicly.

www.theatlantic.com

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Nick Burton @nickburton.bsky.social · Feb 18

One of the coolest and most novel findings I’ve seen in years. This is why I work in worms. To find things no one even really knew to look for. Like a conserved system that splices transposons out of mRNAs to prevent otherwise lethal insertions in essential genes! - www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

An RNA Splicing System that Excises Transposons from Animal mRNAs

All genomes harbor mobile genetic parasites called transposable elements (TEs). Here we describe a system, which we term SOS splicing, that protects C. elegans and human genes from DNA transposon-medi...

www.biorxiv.org

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Slim Mzoughi @sleemmz.bsky.social · Feb 12

🔈We've got the cover of the 2nd NG issue for 2025🙌
Read about the cover: In the comment👇
Also check out our research briefing🚨 (link below):
nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com/articles/s41...

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Jeremy Berg @jeremymberg.bsky.social · Feb 12

The no cost extension button is back and at least some are being granted. If this applies to you, go for it.

PLEASE SHARE

a man in a suit and tie says go for it in white letters

ALT: a man in a suit and tie says go for it in white letters

media.tenor.com

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Mark Peifer (He, him) @peiferlabunc.bsky.social · Feb 5

Another crazed change from the Trump Administration: removing the NIH No-cost extension form

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Aurina Arnatkeviciute @aurinaarn.bsky.social · Feb 9

Do psychiatric GWASs find drug targets?

Excited to see our work linking GWAS and pharmacological treatments in psychiatric disorders now published in JAMA Psychiatry jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...
🧬💊🎯

Big thanks to
@bendfulcher.bsky.social
@alexfornito.bsky.social
Mark Bellgrove

🧵👇

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Joseph Yaroch @jcyaroch.bsky.social · Feb 2

Today is Retraction Day, when we observe the anniversary of the retraction (Feb. 2, 2010) of the fraudulent paper that purported to show a link between vaccines and autism. 🧪#medsky

This is the front page of a fraudulent research article that purported to show a link between vaccines and autism. The word "RETRACTED" is written across it in large red letters.

Wikipedia: On 28th February 1998, a fraudulent research paper by physician Andrew Wakefield and twelve coauthors, titled "Ileal-Lymphoid-Nodular Hyperplasia, Non-Specific Colitis, and Pervasive Developmental Disorder in Children", was published in the British medical journal The Lancet.[1] The paper falsely claimed causative links between the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine and colitis and between colitis and autism. The fraud involved data selection, data manipulation, and two undisclosed conflicts of interest.

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