Sometimes, when I need a little pick-me-up, I remind myself that this is the top Star Wars fic on AO3
Dr. Alysa Orbits (Obertas)
@astroalysa.bsky.social
Queer & disabled astronomer formerly at UofT & CITA. Dynamics, planets, & ballet. Posts reflect opinions of Sailor Galaxia, not my employer. She/her 👩🔬💃
Cat orbits for anyone curious. You can ignore the caption's technobabble and just meow.
Dr. Alysa Orbits (Obertas)@astroalysa.bsky.social · 3mo agoWhy was I allowed to submit this?
I don't think I was okay when I was writing this.
Dr. Alysa Orbits (Obertas)@astroalysa.bsky.social · 3mo agoI forgot just how unhinged the footnotes are in my dissertation intro.
Classicist here to inform you all that this is ancient Greek for summoning a cat
Yiannis@yiannisbab.bsky.social · 3mo agoAh yes, the "Thdpsssps"
Does anyone have good resources (e.g. videos) for bridging the understanding between what something looks like in the sky and a top-down/side-view representation of the geometry in space?
The context for this is that Johannes Kepler's mum (Katharina Kepler) was arrested for witchcraft, possibly in relation to his story Somnium (17th century sci-fi about demons on the moon).
Dr. Alysa Orbits (Obertas)@astroalysa.bsky.social · 3mo agoI forgot just how unhinged the footnotes are in my dissertation intro.
I forgot just how unhinged the footnotes are in my dissertation intro.
"The thing is, even if you're just thinking in terms of fiscal value, having gone through a degree program and being able to put it on your resumé/CV isn't the most significant return on your investment: the way you have further developed your mind is."
Knowledge Is Worth Your Time
A few thoughts about why we must embrace the hard work of learning.
news.chanda.science
𝔻𝕪𝕤𝕥𝕠𝕡𝕚𝕒 𝔹𝕒𝕣𝕓𝕚𝕖@alcibiades1234.bsky.social · 9mo agoIf you are providing me with an education that is low utility in the world then it’s a disservice. My composition class spent four weeks on poetry. I’m sorry, but that only would’ve been useful if I wanted to be a poet. I don’t need to know iambic pentameter in order to be a victim advocate.
Some have argued to me strongly that even if Loeb is wrong, he’s getting people interested in 3I/ATLAS and that’s a good thing for science. But Loeb isn't just wrong, he's recklessly following an old playbook that got 39 people killed in 1997. sites.psu.edu/astrowright/...
Loeb’s Behavior is Reckless
I’ve largely ignored Loeb for the past few weeks. When he started in on his 3I/ATLAS thing, there were plenty of mainstream media outlets willing to give his claims a wide and credulous platform, and ...
sites.psu.edu
There's now a release date and news about pre-ordering for Cloudy With a Chance of Starships! bsky.app/profile/seve...
Seven Machina Rasmussen 🔜 DragonCon@toomanyspectra.bsky.social · 9mo agohi folks! CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF STARSHIPS has a release date: August 4, 2026! it also has a link! you can sign up here to receive a notification when the pre-order goes live ✨ press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...
hi folks! CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF STARSHIPS has a release date: August 4, 2026! it also has a link! you can sign up here to receive a notification when the pre-order goes live ✨ press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...
Cloudy with a Chance of Starships
An entertaining tour of the seemingly simple formula guiding the search for extraterrestrial intelligence
press.princeton.edu
Paper day! A new paper on existence of subNeptune magma oceans, arising from a collaboration between Cambridge and my group. Lead author Robb Calder is Oli Shorttle's doctoral student. subNeptune Magma Oceans are getting to be a hot topic! arxiv.org/abs/2512.05816
Most Rocky Sub-Neptunes are Molten: Mapping the Solidification Shoreline for Gas Dwarf Exoplanets
Sub-Neptunes are the most common type of detected exoplanet, yet their observed masses and radii are degenerate with several interior structures. One possibility is that sub-Neptunes have silicate/iro...
arxiv.org
A story in my save files (read from bottom up)
We remember them always. Geneviève Bergeron Hélène Colgan Nathalie Croteau Barbara Daigneault Anne-Marie Edward Maud Haviernick Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz Maryse Laganière Maryse Leclair Anne-Marie Lemay Sonia Pelletier Michèle Richard Annie St-Arneault Annie Turcotte
Ok activists and nerds... I promised that I was SO MAD ABOUT HOW CONFLICT-AVOIDANT "CENTRISTS" UNDERMINE RESISTANCE TO FASCISM that I would resort to math to make this point and that I would write it up in a paper. So, here ya go. Share, enjoy, and get up on that soapbox. osf.io/preprints/so...
Academic freedom is applicable to anyone with a teaching role. You can’t ask graduate students to teach, advise students, and evaluate student work with granting them academic freedom. The recent debacle at OU and a previous one in the School of Social Work at UT Austin illustrate this.
Pittsburgh's Public Source@publicsource.org · 9mo agoPitt’s graduate student union sees bargaining for academic freedom as a “no-brainer.” The university sees it differently: “Graduate students are not faculty members and therefore academic freedom is not applicable.”
Finished my first Crusader Kings 3 game by reaching the end date. Played the suggested Ireland game. Made an empire spanning most of Europe. I think my favourite achievement was founding my own religion and arresting the Pope.
a close up of a man 's face with the words `` it 's done '' written on the bottom .
Alt: Close up of Frodo's face from Return of the King (the lava of Mt. Doom can be seen in the background). He looks utterly broken and is saying, "It's done."
media.tenor.com
Astro and physics folks, do you know of any good (& free) online resources for learning general relativity? I tend to do well with structured courses, even if I'm just learning on my own. But recorded lecture series, supplemental notes, suggestions for textbooks & notes, etc. would be helpful!
A great thread that I recommend reading through! I'll add that I've never regretted learning more physics. Granted, I was in an astro programme and I didn't do grad-level physics courses. But astrophysics has a bit of everything & it'll give you such a strong foundation. It's worth the work!
Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌@chanda.blacksky.app · 9mo agoA note on learning physics ⚛️ for starting PhD students: At the risk of saying something completely useless because everyone has it worked out There is no magic trick, your classmates *may* be faster than you, but they are still studying as long as they need to and you are quite capable of the same
A note on learning physics ⚛️ for starting PhD students: At the risk of saying something completely useless because everyone has it worked out There is no magic trick, your classmates *may* be faster than you, but they are still studying as long as they need to and you are quite capable of the same
An excellent thread on structural bullshit in academia, how to avoid mental traps, and encouragement to people from marginalized backgrounds. The system isn’t fair, but it can be gamed and it’s designed to intimidate people into failing. Don’t let them fool you.
Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌@chanda.blacksky.app · 9mo agoA note on learning physics ⚛️ for starting PhD students: At the risk of saying something completely useless because everyone has it worked out There is no magic trick, your classmates *may* be faster than you, but they are still studying as long as they need to and you are quite capable of the same
Published in #MNRAS: "Redefining interiors and envelopes: hydrogen–silicate miscibility and its consequences for the structure and evolution of sub-Neptunes", Rogers et al. This is Fig. 2: for the caption & to read the paper please visit academic.oup.com/mnras/articl...
Hi all! If you are looking for a conference in exoplanet interiors in 2026, check out "Layers of Understanding: Model Intercomparisons of Exoplanet Interiors": layersofunderstanding2026.github.io It will take place in MPIA's campus in April 13-17th. The registration deadline is 15 January 2026
Interested in finding transiting planets at long periods, e.g. with the @platomissioncon.bsky.social? We just published a Research Note led by Geert Jan Talens, showing that such transits can be much longer or shorter than usually assumed iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3...
This is actually quite brilliant, up to and including the final sentence 🔥
🎉 Planetary Resarch, our diamond open access journal for #PlanetaryScience, will open for submissions on January 1, 2026 (or earlier for beta testers)! 🎉 planetary-research.org
