Covid lab leak “theories” are my new litmus test to establish if a commentator/intellectual is worth being taken seriously in any capacity.

New Yorker cartoon feels about right

Patent citations are one way to examine how academic research flows into commercial innovation. Which scholarly papers have patents cited the most? go.nature.com/4w45J9Z

Exclusive: the science papers that patents cite the most

Nature reveals the studies that are mentioned most often in patent filings — and why.

go.nature.com

“Kaseya pointed out that some 60-70% of the new cases were recorded from spreading within a community, not from contact tracing… “Contact tracing is not working,” said Kaseya, “we don’t like the trajectory of this outbreak, and it’s already the second largest outbreak (ever) in the world.”

Ebola kills 1,700 in eastern Congo as the fastest-growing outbreak surges

Ebola has killed more than 1,700 people in eastern Congo in what has become the fastest-growing outbreak of the disease.

statnews.com

We're hiring 4 postdocs at @unibo.it to study nervous system evolution. Seeking expertise in single-cell genomics, molecular or developmental biology in ctenophores, cnidarians, echinoderms, flies or human stem cells. 2+2 yrs contract. Deadline: 26 Aug. Please share! bandi.unibo.it/s/apos7/proc...

Procedura di valutazione comparativa per titoli e colloquio per il conferimento di n. 4 contratti di ricerca presso il Dipartimento di Scienze Biologiche, Geologiche e Ambientali - SSD BIOS-04/A - GSD...

bandi.unibo.it

Yahoo News highlights four disease outbreaks making headlines this summer, including #Ebola, #measles, #cyclosporiasis, and the MV Hondius #hantavirus event. The story features #GVN's expert perspective on the Andes virus cluster. Read the article: https://ow.ly/P4UM50Zv37n

"...success could be measured by looking at scientists’ best work instead of the number of papers they’ve written or the number of citations their papers have garnered." But, without structural change, things would quickly devolve into relying on shortcuts again. www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Scientists using LLMs will ‘do more, less well’, modelling study predicts

Research suggests that the combination of incentives to publish and the use of large language models will lead to more papers, but they will be less refined.

nature.com

Those wishing to donate blood can go to various locations across the country.

Plea for blood donations as supplies of certain blood types hit ‘worrying’ levels

Plea for blood donations as supplies of certain blood types hit 'worrying' levels

brusselstimes.com

Nature did a short piece on our preprint about how LLMs will affect the practice of science; my more detailed thread is below.

Scientists using LLMs will ‘do more, less well’, modelling study predicts

Research suggests that the combination of incentives to publish and the use of large language models will lead to more papers, but they will be less refined.

nature.com

Carl T. Bergstrom@carlbergstrom.com · 2w ago

1. We—@eduede.bsky.social, @mjcrockett.bsky.social, Kevin Gross, and I—have a new preprint on the arXiv today, based on ideas that emerged during an @sfiscience.bsky.social workshop in November 2024: The unintended consequences of large language models as a labor-augmenting technology in science.

One of the major pains of academia is having to click through labyrinths of webpages to submit papers. Now, thanks to Joe Rich (and AI), problem solved! His tool is called PaperPush and is available at github.com/pachterlab/p... It's super easy to use! 1/🧵

GitHub - pachterlab/paperpush

Contribute to pachterlab/paperpush development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

🧪 Signatures of #aging and disease in a single organelle | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Signatures of aging and disease in a single organelle

Changes in lysosomal metabolites are associated with both aging organs and lysosomal storage diseases

science.org

🧪 #Inflammaging = #inflammation + #aging Explore this gift article from The New York Times. You can read it for free without a subscription. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Inflammation Keeps Us Alive. It's Also Making Us Sick. (Gift Article)

The discovery that chronic inflammation is a cause of myriad illnesses could be this century's biggest medical breakthrough.

nytimes.com

The genomic identity of early #smallpox in South America | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

The genomic identity of early smallpox in South America

Smallpox was a major driver of population collapse in the Americas after European contact, yet the genetic identity of the causal strains remains unknown. Here, we report the first ancient smallpox ge...

science.org

30 FL high school students explored virology, outbreak response, vaccine science, and public health through #GVN's Global Guardians for Pandemic Preparedness Program, hosted with the support of the University of South Florida. Read the release: https://gvn.org/globalguardians2026/

Persistent cytolytic CD8+ T cells recognize SARS-CoV-2 and herpesvirus epitopes in long COVID @CellRepMed www.cell.com/cell-reports... @gladstoneinst.bsky.social @evnewell.bsky.social @fredhutch.org

"the scientists deduced that the outbreak in northern Chile occurred between 1492 and 1631 C.E. The date and the strain’s clear European relatives confirm it came to the Americas with colonialism."

Sciences@sciences.skyfleet.blue · 6d ago

Ancient DNA confirms historical accounts of how smallpox got to the Americas

Elon Musk is expected to spend $100 million to $120 million in at least eight states to help GOP candidates in November, according to people briefed on the plans.

Elon Musk Plans at Least $100 Million in Midterm Spending to Help Republicans

Elon Musk, a year after a huge blowup with President Trump and the Republican Party, is said to be planning to spend in at least eight states to help them in November.

nyti.ms

In the US, single women 20M homes; single men: 17M. Some of these women get backlash from potential dates. One man questioned his date: "Why would you want to buy a house? What would a guy do for you?" www.pbs.org/newshour/sho...

Single women are outpacing single men in homeownership, but some face backlash

In the U.S., 20 million single women own homes, almost three million more than single men. Economics correspondent Paul Solman explores why women are deciding to buy and the unexpected fallout some fa...

pbs.org

Portugal approves 33% windfall tax on oil companies' excess profits reut.rs/4xdkjNr

Portugal approves 33% windfall tax on oil companies' excess profits

Portugal's government said on Thursday it had approved a 33% windfall tax on extraordinary profits earned in 2026 ​by oil and refining companies benefiting from an energy ‌price surge triggered by the Iran war.

reut.rs

I stand with Dr. Fauci, one of the most consequential scientists of the last century.His ability to listen to the Act-up community helped change the response to HIV/AIDS & his leadership in the response to Covid saved millions. A Gig poster from Bob G thanking St Anthony (Fauci) hangs outside my lab

In contrast to mice, human lungs retain a stable and varied pool of pathogen-specific TRM cells www.nature.com/articles/s41... @natimmunol.nature.com @lji.org

Haven't seen this shared, but it's a great one by a giant in the field, Trevor Bedford. Finds that fastest SARS-2 fitness growth was 2021 to mid-2022. Since then there's been a steady rate of evolution ("fitness flux") >4x faster than H3N2 flu A, a benchmark for rapidly evolving RNA viruses. 1/2

Killer T cells (CD8+) in Long Covid directed to SARS-CoV-2 and Herpes virus antigens are persistent and may have a causal role www.cell.com/cell-reports...

Persistent cytolytic CD8+ T cells recognize SARS-CoV-2 and herpesvirus epitopes in long COVID

Ma et al. perform deep-phenotyping of CD8+ T cells specific for viruses implicated in LC pathogenesis: SARS-CoV-2, CMV, and EBV. These T cells from LC individuals share features of terminal differenti...

cell.com

It's not hyperbolic to say that these companies are literally the enemies of humanity. novaramedia.com/2026/07/29/a...

AI Firms Are Buying up Old Books, Then Scanning and Destroying Them

The world’s biggest AI companies are buying antiquarian books en masse so they can be scanned to train their large language models (LLMs) before being destroyed.

novaramedia.com

Research that used a federal grant to pay for asthma patients to have their gas stoves replaced showed a dramatic fall in asthma attacks. The program was cut short after President Trump took office.

The EPA halted a study on gas stoves and asthma. But even partial results were striking.

Research that used a federal grant to pay for asthma patients to have their gas stoves replaced showed a dramatic fall in asthma attacks. The program was cut short after President Donald Trump took of...

washingtonpost.com

Cellular permissiveness, innate immunity and viral properties collectively explain why human coronavirus HKU1 replicates more efficiently at nasal temperature www.nature.com/articles/s41... @natcomms.nature.com

In @nytopinion.nytimes.com Why do politicians, journalists and commentators treat Elon Musk’s “far-right racist radicalism as a sideshow rather than the core of his political, ideological and industrial project?” our columnist Jamelle Bouie writes.

Opinion | Why Do We Tolerate Elon Musk’s Racist Commentary?

Why does the owner of X get a pass for what he says and does there?

nyti.ms

Still thinking about genderfluid avocados

Jeff Groh@jeffgroh.bsky.social · last wk.

Avocados come in 2 varieties - A-types start each day female and switch to male midday. B-types do the reverse. In work just published from the last chapter of my PhD, we show this system evolved 40+million yrs ago and is regulated by alleles of 1 transcription factor www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...