I do not do much on social media right now. Making an exception. I talked to a lot of reporters during the pandemic. I don't think any of them would be surprised or offended if I say Helen was the best 1/n

When is on-person evolution dominated by neutral vs adaptive forces? If you're looking for a postdoc position and this is a question that interests you, please see my lab website and reach out! [More info in next posts]

Excited to share our work on bacterial immune signaling! Our preprint reveals how RNA-guided Cas13 cleaves host tRNAs to generate small-molecule messengers that activate 2TMβ, linking RNA recognition to membrane damage and phage defense. 1/11

Maybe the only real lesson from the Russian PUE case has been that authoritative sources- medias, scientists, even the WHO itself- are overly uncritical of, and influenced by, misinformation and conspiratorial thinking. there is a need for more info hygiene and empirical skepticism in biosecurity.

RIP. Margaret Hamilton, computing pioneer who led software development for the Apollo program, dies at 90

According to MIT News, Margaret Hamilton died at the age of 90. "A profoundly influential computer scientist best known for leading the software engineering team at MIT’s Instrumentation Lab during NASA’s Apollo program". This famous photo 🔽 inspired the For All Mankind character Margo Madison.

yea I totally agree that a single animal *could* produce genetically non-identical spillovers, but IMO not the most likely model for the other reasons also striking that A and B are polytomies with different tMRCAs, which feels like 2 'events' (groups of animals? shipments? idk) more than 1 animal

I think this framing is both defeatist and wrong. We could get as many as 54-56 D seats in the senate, and if so, congress could then at least start to hold the administration accountable. And the current Senate's (ala Rand Paul) attacks on science would end.