Jane Qiu, PhD

@janeqiu.bsky.social

Globe-trotting, award-winning independent science writer in China | Words in @nature.com, @sciam.bsky.social, National Geographic and more | Writing a book on emerging diseases for @scribnerbooks.bsky.social | Ex: @ksjatmit.bsky.social, @nature.com

@matthewcobb.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

Well, Bradshaw likes it, the trailer looks fab and the French have flocked in their millions. A pretty measly distribution in Manchester but I’ll be going.

theguardian.comDe Gaulle: Résistance review – a galloping bromance for Churchill and France’s wartime heroThis biopic of the great Gallic general – which culminates at Bir Hakeim, in advance of a second film – is a fine, quietly amusing romp with a touch of classic 60s war films
@colinschultz.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

"A massive flood potentially caused by a chunk of ice breaking off from a glacier has swept away bridges, schools, and other buildings and killed at least 160 people"

www.scientificamerican.com/article/wall...

scientificamerican.comWall of floodwater sweeps away villages in Nepal, with hundreds missingA massive flood potentially caused by a chunk of ice breaking off from a glacier has swept away bridges, schools, and other buildings and killed at least 160 people
@deborahb.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

So did the FDA lie about the food recall rate? The problem is that today we all believe they would.

marlerblog.comFDA Told the Country Not to Believe the Fake News and Posted a Chart. Susan Mayne Pulled the Same Dashboard and Found the Chart Is Not About Food, and That Food Recalls Are Running Toward an Eight-Yea...The FDA’s official account posted a chart on August 21 under the words do not believe the fake news, reporting 1,836 recalls in fiscal 2026 and calling
@davidheniguk.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

This piece rather misses the fact that large corporates are increasingly becoming direct political players, and arguably in doing so undermining the notion of free markets that The Economist is supposed to support.

Archie Hall@archiehall.bsky.social

BRITAIN WOULD BE BONKERS TO DITCH PALANTIR New @economist.com leader from me on Palantir. I most wanted to highlight its critics' troubling illiberalism—many seem far too blasé letting politics determine which businesses governments buy from. You can read it here: www.economist.com/leaders/202...

@philipcball.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

The recent paper in Science by Bill Martin's team on a vent form of LUCA and a possible "dual origin of life" got some coverage last week. I took a somewhat deeper dive for @sciam.bsky.social
www.scientificamerican.com/article/life...

scientificamerican.comLife’s ‘last universal common ancestor’ may predate life itselfA groundbreaking study hints at a hazy boundary between “life” and “non-life,” as well as two distinct origins of biology on Earth
@deborahb.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

Unfortunately, even more valid today.

costumeface@costumeface.bsky.social

"I'm talking about the 1906 Meat Inspection Act and the 1906 Food and Drug Law, which laid the foundation for all consumer protection laws that followed in this country."

@rbreich.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

Food companies wanted deregulation. Now there are dozens of recalls across the country. Mining companies wanted deregulation. Now the black lung rate is at a 45-year high. Financial companies wanted deregulation. Now financial losses to fraud are the highest on record. Noticing a pattern?

@alexwitze.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

Do you want to write a story about volcanoes that changed history? the editor asked.

Why yes. Yes, I do.

My piece in @knowablemag.bsky.social on the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad days that can transpire after an eruption:

knowablemagazine.org/content/arti...

🧪🌋

knowablemagazine.orgVolcanoes that made historyLong after the lava stopped flowing, enormous eruptions altered Earth’s climate and societies all over the globe
@newscientist.comReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

The use of explosives to kill fish is widespread across the tropics, and acoustic monitoring in an Indonesian archipelago detected more than 3500 explosions in 483 days

newscientist.comFishers detonate a bomb every hour on one Indonesian coral reef | New ScientistThe use of explosives to kill fish is widespread across the tropics, and acoustic monitoring in an Indonesian archipelago detected more than 3500 explosions in 483 days
@sarahdeweerdt.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

Thrilled to share my new feature about a plucky group of scientists investigating the effects of rising temperatures on animal nervous systems. Come for The Blob, stay for the "unflappable" bird brains!

The Transmitter @thetransmitter.bsky.social

Many aspects of animal physiology contribute to temperature tolerance. But “the nervous system is one of the major drivers of animal expansion,” says Wolfgang Stein. #neuroskyence By @sarahdeweerdt.bsky.social www.thetransmitter.org/environment/...

thetransmitter.orgClimate neuroscience needs integration and guided researchFive years after a groundbreaking paper, can a young field move beyond piecemeal studies?
@dangaristo.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

Scoop: For nearly a year, NSF has struggled to make new grants. Now we know that it will not catch up. In fact, NSF will award just 6,100 new grants—a 30% y/o/y decline, itself down from a previous avg. of 11,000+. In fact, the last time NSF awarded so few grants was in the early '80s.

nature.comExclusive: NSF set to issue lowest number of new grants in four decadesThe US science-funding agency is withholding $1 billion of its budget so that the money can go to a special White House project.
@knowablemag.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

😱 What do Edvard Munch’s The Scream, the fall of the Mongol Empire, and the Black Death have in common? 🌋 Volcanoes! Scientists are finding links between these events and works of art and huge volcanic eruptions that happened hundreds—sometimes thousands—of miles away. ✍️ @alexwitze.bsky.social

knowablemagazine.orgVolcanoes that made historyLong after the lava stopped flowing, enormous eruptions altered Earth’s climate and societies all over the globe
@kakape.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

Hackenburg’s paper is the latest in a string of studies showing the power of AI to sway people. “It’s a whole new field that is emerging,” says @profsanderlinden.bsky.social. “People are very interested in the persuasive powers of AI, I think, both for ethical and unethical reasons”🧪
In @science.org

science.orgAI chatbots are becoming experts at changing people's minds. What's their secret?ChatGPT and other AIs use a flood of facts, and the occasional lie, to persuade humans
@philipcball.bsky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

So Odin and Loki are now apparently "left-leaning". OK.

Deborah Blum@deborahb.bsky.social

"Dr. Bell removed two weeks of study about Viking men and women. He said Viking mythological poems often featured gender-changing gods like Loki and Odin, material he no longer felt comfortable teaching."

nytimes.comA Texas University Becomes a Petri Dish for a Conservative Overhaul (Gift Article)Texas Tech is using A.I. to cut left-leaning content in its curriculum. Some say the effort to ferret out forbidden topics is a dystopian academic nightmare.
@flodebarre.eurosky.socialReposted by @janeqiu.bsky.social

Pretty amazing timing: basically the opposite viewpoint was recently published in Science

"Except I did not author most of those texts. I came up with the idea, the experiments, the data, and the references. But the process was devoid of writing, and really, of me."

www.science.org/content/arti...

Richard Van Noorden@richvn.bsky.social

Dean of Science at Stellenbosch University writes that although AI generates almost all the words for his articles (including this one): "AI did almost all of the writing. I remain the expert and the thought leader behind the piece." www.nature.com/articles/d44...

nature.comWhen AI writes the words, who is the author?After an AI detector classified one of my opinion pieces as entirely AI-generated, I found myself questioning where authorship ends, where expertise begins and what readers deserve to know.
science.orgI had to unplug from AI to rediscover my love of writingI realized relying on AI was making me a less critical scientist, this clinician-researcher writes
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