Raise your voice against OMB's proposed rule, which threatens to reshape how scientific research is funded in the U.S. by prioritizing political agendas over scientific integrity. 📲Read statement & comment by 13 July. 🔗 spklr.io/63327EM0o7
Peter Roopnarine
@peterroopnarine.bsky.social
Scientist, Trini-Jamaican lover of very hot Indo-Caribbean food. Many loves, dislikes AI. Scientist at California Academy of Sciences, but opinions are definitely my own. Proud alum, UC Davis and Mt. Allison University.
"The sweeping new regulations proposed by OMB would subject every federal research funding decision to political review." This must be STOPPED! Contact your representative today, and prevent the politicization of US science. "E pur si muove" www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Another red alert for American science
Although research has bipartisan support in the US Congress, and trust in science is above 75% across the country, the Trump administration seems as determined as ever to mortally wound the nation’s s...
science.org
STOP the politicization and dumbification of American science. SPEAK UP! AAAS Statement on OMB Rule Politicizing Federal Grantmaking. www.aaas.org/news/aaas-st...
AAAS Statement on OMB Rule Politicizing Federal Grantmaking | American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
Click to read the full statement.
aaas.org
New paper out, led by Maddie Ess! "The effects of the Richmondian invasion on benthic invertebrate functional diversity during the Late Ordovician." www.frontiersin.org/journals/eco...
Frontiers | The effects of the Richmondian invasion on benthic invertebrate functional diversity during the Late Ordovician
Rising temperatures and globalization are enabling widespread biotic invasions today, particularly in marine environments. While the long-term consequences o...
frontiersin.org
Seeking a post-doc with interest and expertise in quantitative paleoecology, working with me and @aadineen.bsky.social at the California Academy of Sciences. Full announcement and application here: job-boards.greenhouse.io/californiaac...
Postdoctoral Researcher, Paleontology
San Francisco, CA
job-boards.greenhouse.io
Advice to Trump: Violent tantrums, & letters of rec from Netanyahu, will not win you this prize. Good thing still happen in this world. www.bbc.com/news/article...
White House blasts Nobel Committee for not awarding Peace Prize to Trump
A spokesman says the Nobel Committee placed "politics over peace" in awarding the coveted award to Venezuela's opposition leader.
bbc.com
"A request for comment from the U.S. Geological Survey, which is responsible for monitoring seismic hazards on the West Coast, resulted in an automatic reply stating no one could respond because of the ongoing government shutdown." www.science.org/content/arti...
Big U.S. West Coast earthquakes could come as a one-two punch
Cascadia and San Andreas fault zones appear to generate synchronized earthquakes
science.org
Reminder. Fretting about escalators? We live in a Western world; powers are Western, pro-Western (money & weapons), or anti-Western (so-called new world order). The majority couldn't care less, but is forced to. There is wisdom in the majority. I am proud to be Caribbean. youtu.be/_got5rApjJ4?...
Barbados PM’s extraordinary reply to Netanyahu for selective use of Bible in UN | Janta Ka Reporter
YouTube video by Janta Ka Reporter
youtu.be
Our new TREE paper is out! "‘Earth system engineers’ and the cumulative impact of organisms in deep time." "Over ~3.5 billion years our planet has become increasingly bioengineered...". www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
A #FossilFriday visual treat, the Cretaceous diatom Trinacria nitescens. In addition to their global ecological importance, diatoms are also a visual feast. Staring at this one enough will do wonder for your eyes. Scale bar = 10 microns. #paleontology @calacademy.bsky.social flic.kr/p/8cy7X6
This #FossilFriday we have a fish. An unidentified fish. Early Cretaceous from Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. So many fossils, so few names, so few taxonomists. The dark data of paleo and Earth's missing diversity. All suggestions are welcome! #paleontology @calacademy.bsky.social flic.kr/p/7yP95M
#FossilFriday trilobite Zacanthoides idahoensis! Great name. An early carnivore from the Middle Cambrian of Utah. #paleontology collections @calacademy.bsky.social flic.kr/p/7v2AFP
Happy #FossilFriday ammonite. Acanthohoplites barryana, from the Cretaceous of Shasta Co., California. #paleontology collections @calacademy.bsky.social flic.kr/p/Yx4fie
He gutted the intelligence networks, dismantled the anti terrorism task force, has the FBI working on deportations while headed by an imbecile, and then bombed Iran. Do all the miserable morons who voted for and support him feel safer today? I don't.
Here we go again America. Supporting warmongering and bombing the Middle East. Old habits die hard; easier to kill people apparently.
This week's featured article in Nature Protocols @natprot.nature.com . Big shout out to former student, post-doc and now colleague, Yuangeng Huang (China University of Geosciences, Wuhan).
New paper out online, "A modeling approach to quantify ecological dynamics and functional structures of paleocommunities", Nature Protocols. W/ Yuangeng Huang & ZQ Chen.
A modeling approach to quantify ecological dynamics and functional structures of paleocommunities
Nature Protocols - This Protocol outlines the steps to reconstructing ancient food webs using a variety of fossil data and applying the cascading extinction on graphs model to infer the effects of...
url.avanan.click
For #FossilFriday we celebrate Los Angeles w/ the round slipper snail, holotype of Crepipatella charybdis, from the Pleistocene of Los Angeles Co., California. Og genus Verticumbo (rev. J. McClean), still a part of California's great diversity. #paleontology @calacademy.bsky.social flic.kr/p/fmfhE7
"The right of #dissent ... is most secure where the system contemplates the right of dissenters to organize separately...the right to dissent is the foundation of liberty and liberty is the climate within which man's creativity flourishes best." Michael Manley, "The Politics of Change"
#FossilFriday clam. Venericardia merriami holotype, Oregon, USA. From the Eocene, shortly before the planet changed, transitioning from a Warm House to the Cool/Ice House planet that we currently have (for now). #paleontology @calacademy.bsky.social flic.kr/p/pUwnwu
#FossilFriday foram! Vaginulinopsis verruculosa, Eocene Lodo Fm. of California. The Lodo records the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum when global average temp. rose more than 5 C, lasting ~200,00 years! A time of big biotic change. #paleontology #foraminifera @calacademy.bsky.social flic.kr/p/rBMU4y
Attorney General Bonta (California) Sues to Stop Termination, Withholding of National Science Foundation Grants oag.ca.gov/news/press-r...
Attorney General Bonta Sues to Stop Termination, Withholding of National Science Foundation Grants
OAKLAND – California Attorney General Rob Bonta today filed a lawsuit to stop the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) from: (1) terminating grants for scientific research that seeks to promote and understand diversity in higher education and the workforce, and (2) imposing a 15% cap on indirect cost reimbursements for research projects.
oag.ca.gov
Subjecting international students to more extreme social media vetting so they can study in the U.S. will only further chill free speech on campus. The Trump administration must not double down on this discredited and discriminatory approach.
Trump team pauses new student visa interviews as it weighs expanding social media vetting
It’s the latest salvo against universities, many of whom rely heavily on foreign students for funds.
politico.com
“The protection of at-risk scholars is not just a moral duty — it is an investment in science itself.” Our community needs to define and recognize who among us needs help, and organize ourselves to do whatever we can. There is no one coming to the rescue until we act. www.nature.com/articles/d41...
‘Science saved my life’ — and it must save other at-risk scholars
The global scientific community must do more to offer safety and support to displaced academics and others.
nature.com
Are Humans Apex Predators? (Oceana.org) In 2013, Sylvain Bonhommeau and colleagues published a study (Eating up the world’s food web and the human trophic level) in which they defined a Human Trophic Level (HTL). It’s a very neat study, in which the researchers examined human diets globally, with…
Are Humans Apex Predators?
(Oceana.org) In 2013, Sylvain Bonhommeau and colleagues published a study (Eating up the world’s food web and the human trophic level) in which they defined a Human Trophic Level (HTL). It’s a very neat study, in which the researchers examined human diets globally, with a goal of providing the means of comparing trophic levels among nations and regions, examining trends over time, and providing a baseline for comparison going forward.
proopnarine.wordpress.com
It's #FossilFriday! Holotype of the Pleistocene diatom Rouxia leventerae, McMurdo Sound, Antarctica. Scale bar=10 um! Diatoms produce up to 50% of Earth's oxygen each year. They remind us that small can be mighty, and of the power of numbers. #paleontology @calacademy.bsky.social flic.kr/p/dT1BWa
New paper out today in PNAS, with Geerat Vermeij and Rick Grosberg, "Energetics and evolutionary fitness", in which we take a look at the Equal Fitness Paradigm. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Energetics and evolutionary fitness | PNAS
It has long been recognized that energy is the currency of evolution, but contrasting conceptions of the relationship between energy and adaptation...
pnas.org