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Mike Lee

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Reposted by: Mike Lee

meidastouch.com
🚨 BREAKING: James Comey posts a video statement following his indictment

"My family and I have known for years that there are costs to standing up to Donald Trump...But I'm not afraid. And I hope you're not either...And I'm innocent. So let's have a trial and keep the faith."
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Reposted by: Mike Lee, Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe, Dana Howard

nature.com
We used machine-learning tools in an attempt to recreate the method for cutting funding, and then applied it to past US NIH grants to reveal the broad-reaching consequences

go.nature.com/4pBArFH
What research might be lost after the NIH’s cuts? Nature trained a bot to find out
We used machine-learning tools in an attempt to recreate the method for cutting funding, and then applied it to past US National Institutes of Health grants to reveal the broad-reaching consequences of such action.
go.nature.com
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by Mike Lee

theleelab.bsky.social
A nice Q&A with Nick Harper about the discovery of PDAR, and his road to becoming a scientist @umasschan.bsky.social

www.umassmed.edu/dsb/dsb-comm...
Picture of Nick Harper, a graduate student in the Lee Lab at UMass Chan Medical School
4

by Mike Lee

theleelab.bsky.social
Congrats to Nick Harper and the rest of the team!
7/end 🧪
1

by Mike Lee

theleelab.bsky.social
A 3rd surprise: PDAR accounts for the activity of many cancer drugs, including several that have never been considered transcriptional inhibitors.

Drugs that cause bulky DNA lesions activate many stress pathways… but activating PDAR accounts for their ability to kill cancer cells.
6/n 🧪
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by Mike Lee

theleelab.bsky.social
The 2nd surprise is related to how PDAR works: cells sense the loss of the hypo-phosphorylated (i.e., not actively transcribing) forms of RNA Pol II.

Yes, this is about loss of gene expression, but it doesn’t really have anything to do with loss of transcriptional activity or loss of RNA 😳
5/n 🧪
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by Mike Lee

theleelab.bsky.social
With activation of PDAR, cells die proactively. This occurs before cells really experience any stress from the dysregulated gene expression, and the outcome isn’t left to chance.
4/n 🧪
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by Mike Lee

theleelab.bsky.social
The 1st surprise is simply that PDAR exists.

Intuitively, complete loss of gene expression should be sufficient to kill a cell… and that is true, but it takes a LOOONG time and cells die using an array of different mechanisms (e.g., inflammatory/necrotic, apoptotic, etc.).
3/n 🧪
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by Mike Lee

theleelab.bsky.social
We call this pathway the Pol II Degradation-dependent Apoptotic Response (PDAR).

Our study highlights 3 major surprises about PDAR:

2/n 🧪
The image shows the pathway called the Pol II Degradation-dependent Apoptotic Response (PDAR), highlighting the 3 mechanistic steps leading to cell death: Pol II degradation, PTBP1 and BCL2L12 translocation, and activation of cell intrinsic apoptosis
1

by Mike Lee — Reposted by: Kelly Ward

theleelab.bsky.social
I’m excited to highlight our latest paper, just published in Cell 🎉

We report the existence of a previously uncharacterized signaling pathway that is responsible for activating cell death upon loss of gene expression.

1/n 🧪

www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
RNA Pol II inhibition activates cell death independently from the loss of transcription
When RNA polymerase II (RNA Pol II) is inhibited, the inhibition is sensed and signaled to mitochondria, leading to programmed cell death independently of the loss of RNA Pol II transcription activity...
www.cell.com
3 25 53

Reposted by: Mike Lee, Jennifer Bussell

adernburg.bsky.social
For who still thinks this can’t happen here… it’s already happening.
www.theatlantic.com/science/arch...
Every Scientific Empire Comes to an End
America’s run as the premiere techno-superpower may be over.
www.theatlantic.com
2 35 61

by Mike Lee

theleelab.bsky.social
awesome work Steve and team!
1

by Joshua S. Weitz — Reposted by: Mike Lee

joshuasweitz.bsky.social
"[A] sleeper issue is the proposed 40 percent cut to the National Institutes of Health, in the White House’s proposed budget for the next fiscal year."

Perhaps injecting some economic impact data may help awaken what should not be a sleeper issue... @prospect.org

scienceimpacts.org/fy26
Economic loss due to NIH budget cuts by Congressional district, scienceimpacts.org/fy26
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by Mike Lee — Reposted by: Kelly Ward

theleelab.bsky.social
Things have been challenging over these last few months, but we also had a lot to celebrate...

Tiana and Mika joining the lab 🎉,
Kelly passing her QE 🎉,
Gavin publishing a paper and submitting another 🎉,
Megan publishing a paper 🎉,
Nick getting excellent reviews 🎉

...so we did a paint nite.
The Lee Lab at Paint Nite at Nu Kitchen in Worcester, MA
5

by Brian A. Nosek — Reposted by: Mike Lee, Timon McPhearson, Richard Betts , and 2 more

michaelemann.bsky.social
Trump’s new ‘gold standard’ rule will destroy American science as we know it" by Colette Delawalla (@cdelawalla.bsky.social), Victor Ambros, Carl Bergstrom, Carol Greider, Michael Mann and Brian Nosek for @theguardian.com: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
Trump’s new ‘gold standard’ rule will destroy American science as we know it | Colette Delawalla
The new executive order allows political appointees to undermine research they oppose, paving the way to state-controlled science
www.theguardian.com
12 220 370

Reposted by: Mike Lee

bloodgenes.bsky.social
www.forbes.com/sites/johndr...
Trump’s NIH And NSF Cuts Estimated To Cost The U.S. Economy $10 Billion Annually
Economists find public R&D drives U.S. productivity growth — and pays for itself
www.forbes.com
4 4

Reposted by: Mike Lee

neildegrassetyson.com
Not that anyone asked, but during my tenure on the Pentagon’s Defense Innovation Board, under part of Obama-2 and all of Trump-1, we visited Military Bases domestically & abroad.

At no time did any member of the Armed Forces I met say to me: “America needs less science funding.”
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by Carl T. Bergstrom — Reposted by: Mike Lee

carlbergstrom.com
If you use your position as the head of HHS to ratfuck a country's vaccination programs and future vaccine development efforts, your opinions on vaccines are very definitely NOT irrelevant.
Kennedy if he would vaccinate his own child for measles. “For measles? Probably for measles I —” Mr. Kennedy began to answer before stopping himself. “You know, what I would say is, my opinions about vaccines are irrelevant. “I don’t want to seem like I’m being evasive, but I don’t think people should be taking medical advice from me,” he said.
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Reposted by: Mike Lee, James Q. Wilson, Jessica E. Tierney , and 2 more

baym.lol
Yesterday, the NIH R35 “Outstanding Investigator” grant to fund scientists in my lab studying antibiotic resistance was terminated for reasons not related to the content of the science, or any actions taken by me or members of my lab
A screenshot of the termination notice showing "Outstanding Investigator Grants" A screenshot of the termination notice with "This award is terminated effective the date of this award, due to unsafe antisemitic actions that suggest the institution lacks concern for the safety and wellbeing of Jewish students." highlighted
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Reposted by: Mike Lee

boehninglab.com
www.thenation.com/article/poli...
Inside the Bloodbath at the NIH
Sources say that a climate of fear has spread throughout the agency as the Trump administration takes a hatchet to its core functions.
www.thenation.com
3 3

Reposted by: Mike Lee

itsafronomics.bsky.social
Northwestern just announced that the university will meet the funding needs of any research that is being impacted by stop orders. LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOOO! #edusky #academicsky

wgntv.com/evanston/nor...
Northwestern University to self-fund research despite Trump administration freeze
While university officials said they’ve still not received official word of such action, they acknowledged receiving about 100 stop-work orders from the federal government on roughly 100 fede…
wgntv.com
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Reposted by: Mike Lee, Scott L. Althaus, Tom Broekel , and 1 more

chrisbail.bsky.social
www.nytimes.com/2025/04/18/u...
How Universities Became So Dependent on the Federal Government
For decades, universities got billions in federal dollars for research. The relationship was mutually beneficial, until President Trump decided it wasn’t.
www.nytimes.com
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Reposted by: Mike Lee

adamserwer.bsky.social
What we saw today was two jumped up thugs and their bootlicking sychophants laughing at the US Constitution, the supreme court, and the idea that anyone can stop them from doing anything they want www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...
The Constitutional Crisis Is Here
The Supreme Court told the Trump administration to “facilitate” the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia from El Salvador’s infamous CECOT prison. So far, the administration is pretending to comply while re...
www.theatlantic.com
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Reposted by: Mike Lee

carolynbertozzi.bskyverified.social
Harvard steps up

www.harvard.edu/research-fun...
www.harvard.edu
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Reposted by: Mike Lee

atrupar.com
🔥 @ninajankowicz.com: "Mr Taibbi said when he was first searching through the so-called Twitter files he didn't know what he was looking at. Well, he still doesn't. Everything looks like a conspiracy when you don't know how anything works."
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Reposted by: Mike Lee

jeremymberg.bsky.social
New F awards
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Reposted by: Mike Lee

solomonmissouri.bsky.social
Explore this gift article from The New York Times. You can read it for free without a subscription. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/28/o...
Opinion | Hillary Clinton: This Is Just Dumb (Gift Article)
The Signal group chat is only the latest in a string of self-inflicted wounds by the new administration.
www.nytimes.com
20 38

Reposted by: Mike Lee

seanryderphd.bsky.social
Six masked agents in street clothes disappearing a Tufts Ph.D. student in broad daylight on the streets of Somerville. There is video footage out there every person should watch.
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by Ryan Enos — Reposted by: Mike Lee, Rosie A. Fisher, Fatih Guvenen , and 7 more

gravelinfluencer.bsky.social
Not sure if this has been shared here yet, but this is video of Rumeysa Ozturk's arrest posted by WCVB. It's terrifying.
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Reposted by: Mike Lee

evanhill.bsky.social
Some pretty stunning answers here from DHS Deputy Secretary Troy Edgar in today's interview with NPR's Michel Martin, in which Edgar equates pro-Palestinian protests with terrorist activity and can't point to any crime committed by Mahmoud Khalil: npr.org/2025/03/13/n...
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