I do find it stunning, for all of the NYT's criticism of postmodern constructivism and "woke" ideology, that most of their editorialising signals a deep nihilism towards empirical reality, where science is just annother perspective, and voter polls decide what's moral or political reality.

Instead of a decline in the disruptiveness of scientific and technological knowledge, the data mainly show an increasing metadata quality over time: relatively fewer papers with zero references due to database errors. 7/8

Science is a global pursuit. This undermines our leadership in science. And it harms young scientists trying to start their careers here.

MagnoliaBouton@magnoliabouton.bsky.social · 3w ago

NIH plans to block international researchers on visas from accessing key funding avenue: the K99/R00. Devastating news for the international research training community, who strongly contribute to US biomedical research. All will feel this great loss! www.statnews.com/2026/08/07/n...

have I mentioned that I teach first year writing here and that I am being laid off

Sarah Osment@smosment.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Hahahahahahahhahahahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I know it’s hard to decide which battle to fight some days. Pick this one.

Mark Peifer (He, him)@peiferlabunc.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Russell Vought, Director of the OMB, has issued a set of proposed changes that would dramatically alter federal grant funding. However, we can each take action to prevent these from taking effect. Here's how, a 🧵 🧪 1/n www.science.org/content/arti...

🧪Totally disingenuous. The question is not whether the speakers you chose are popular or unpopular. The question is whether or not they are qualified. And an administrator cutting science for political purposes and suppressing scientific studies is not "advocating for scientific reforms".

“It was Barry who discovered that lymphocytes-not macrophages, as some hypothesized-that carry immune memory. showed that lymphocytes signal to macrophages through a chemical they termed MIF-which, together w/ interferon, were the 1st cytokines discovered” www.statnews.com/2026/03/30/b...

Remembering public health pioneer Barry Bloom: a scientist, a mentor, a mensch

Marc Lipsitch and Yonatan Grad pay tribute to their former colleague and mentor Barry R. Bloom.

statnews.com

The data is in: the NIH goalposts have shifted. What were once almost certain fundable scores have become coin flips and what used to be likely grants have become aspirational, leading to fewer awards. Another manifestation of how HHS policies have led to fewer awards and less science.

Here’s the full clip @whyshoulditrustyou.bsky.social

Michael D. Green, PhD@michaeldgreen.phd · 6mo ago

Below is the response to my question. The funny part of his response is that my research needed a control arm. My study actually did have a control arm (about 80% of the sample never reported discrimination). So the answer itself makes me even more confused.

Dr. Bhattacharya recently came to U. Chicago for an "off the record" event. My strong impression was that he is truly unfamiliar with how most biomedical research works.

Jeremy Berg@jeremymberg.bsky.social · 6mo ago

A second email, this with a more substantial insight about "The Replication Crisis"... 1/5

We found that while close contact contributed to elevated risk (rate ratio 1.16 per doubling daily time, 95%-CI 1.01–1.33), time spent in shared classrooms and poor air quality had larger effects (RR 3.17, 95%-CI 1.96–5.17 and RR 1.90 95%-CI 1.23–2.94) respectively).

This is a targeted attack on science media. Bhattacharya has slammed science media for what he calls biased coverage, but how are our readers — the global scientific community — supposed to understand his new agency priorities if we can't even get in the door?

Just spoke to The Hill about how the dismantling of the NIH is impacting science in America. We still face a cliff of unfathomable heights, w easily 1000+ labs poised to close in the next year due to funding ending. A generation of young scientists lost because there is nowhere for them to train.

Yes, we have a problem. The problem starts at the top. The problem is worsened by leadership of @nature.com & other journals & professional organizations who think that power demands a platform without scrutiny.

A bad thing is unfolding at NIH this week: It looks like the Trump administration is trying to replace key civil servant scientific leaders, the Institute Directors, with political hires. These directors control the NIH budget, tens of billions. A bit of a video explainer here: 1/ 🧪

It was surreal to be quizzed on “freedom of inquiry” and other values in my mandated U. Chicago/NIH/NSF research security training tonight given the restrictions to our research over the past eight months. Jeremy describes the experience perfectly below. (His piece is outstanding.)

Jeremy Berg@jeremymberg.bsky.social · 11mo ago

6/14

Job alert ‼️ UChicago Micro is hiring! Open to tenured/tenure track faculty at all levels in any area of microbiology. Come join our amazing and growing department. apply.interfolio.com/174404

Immigrants, particularly on H1Bs, are the lifeblood of American innovation. If you wanted to hurt US competitiveness in the next century, I can think of few more effective ways than a move like this Even when found illegal, the mere intent will have irreparably harmed our future

But it does not *want* to do that. It has the personality and confidence of a 10x coder, and *absolutely lies to your face* to maintain the illusion. It races to establish huge frameworks, call up parallel agents, and build you something that gives an output.

NEW: I just observed two interesting data deletions from the CDC's website. Both having to do with vaccine surveillance in children. There's nothing about these datasets that would have tripped any "gender" flags. You can still download them from our site: www.statnews.com/2025/02/14/t...

Just few days left to apply to one of these postdoc positions in my infectious disease modelling Unit at @pasteur.fr in Paris!

Simon Cauchemez@scauchemez.bsky.social · last yr.

New postdoc positions with a number of exciting epidemic modelling projects opening in our Unit at @pasteur.fr in beautiful Paris. Deadline for applications: 26th June. research.pasteur.fr/en/job/postd...

Sang Woo (Daniel) Park and I are excited to share a new preprint, "Susceptible host dynamics explain pathogen resilience to perturbations" [1/8] www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

🧪 You can sign a supporting letter in solidarity with the NIH scientists here: www.standupforscience.net/bethesda-dec...

Bethesda Declaration — STAND UP FOR SCIENCE

Support NIH Staff Now!

standupforscience.net

Alt NIH Bluesky 🧪@altnih4science.bsky.social · last yr.

“We urge you as NIH Director to restore grants delayed or terminated for political reasons so that life-saving science can continue.” Over one hundred NIH employees publish a letter of dissent to Trump administration attacks on medical research, the “Bethesda Declaration.” 🧪

More of this, please: a class action lawsuit by UC Berkeley researchers to restore illegally cut federal grants. www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news...

UC Berkeley researchers team up for first-of-its-kind lawsuit over Trump funding cuts

University of California staff members hope to use a class action lawsuit to restore their research funding.

nbcnews.com

How bad will it be? Catastrophic. Proposed cuts to #NSF, #NIH, and #NASA will set the US R&D landscape back 25 yrs+, cause economic and job loss now, and undermine innovations to come. But, this is the WH's *proposed* budget. Speak up now before it is too late. (inflation adjusted $-s below)

A not very happy Friday. CERI had 6 NIH grants canceled, which will impact operations, surveillance and response to epidemics. We are working to try to minimize disturbance but not easy with 6 grants terminated at the same moment. A crisis is unfolding in SA www.news24.com/southafrica/...

SA universities face funding crisis as US federal agencies freeze research grants | News24

An investigation into the impact of the US aid freeze on research funding to South African universities has found that 44 programmes worth R2.5 billion were affected.

news24.com

I was working on a proposal in response to one of these calls. Submission deadline next week. The proposal was 95% done, and I only learned about the cancellation from this post. 🤷‍♂️

Gabi Serrato Marks@gserratomarks.bsky.social · last yr.

NIH moved up the expiration date for some funding opportunities, effectively *canceling* the next application date without removing it from the standard table. I can't even imagine how many people are still prepping these grants. 👀 List of impacted opportunities: grants.nih.gov/grants/guide...

Yes, that’s exactly what they are doing. They are trying to hurt Harvard by destroying my research

Things are going from bad to worse at NSF; www.science.org/content/arti...

Exclusive: NSF faces radical shake-up as officials abolish its 37 divisions

Changes seen as a response to presidential directives on what research to fund

science.org

But it seems disingenuous to bluntly and severely penalise researchers (and with zero advance notice) for focusing on issues that you’ve built your own career on.