Gregor Kalinkat
@gkalinkat.bsky.social
2.8K followers 3.6K following 1.8K posts
biodiversity scientist | ecologist | science communicator & educator based in Berlin, DE posts in EN and DE, occassionally in ES https://linktr.ee/gkalinkat
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gkalinkat.bsky.social
Reposting this for obvious reasons, particularly for my friends and colleagues in the US (but by no way limited to them). May Otto Krayer serve as your role model during those coming months and years 🧪🎓
gkalinkat.bsky.social
On this day 125 years ago Otto Krayer was born, a pharmacologist and professor who has shown "Resistant Behaviour in a Sea of Enthusiasm, Opportunism and Antisemitism" like no other in Nazi-era Germany 🧪

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Kr...

#OTD #neveragain
Photo of bald Otto Krayer wearing suit and tie from 1957
Reposted by Gregor Kalinkat
jeremymberg.bsky.social
This is a powerful account from a PhD student whose fellowship was terminated by NIH because it was part of a "diversity" program without any other considerations or understanding of what the program or the students were actually doing.

undark.org/2025/10/09/o...

1/2
NIH Student Grant Cancellation Will Weaken Scientific Innovation
The termination of federal F31 diversity fellowships puts many graduate students in a bind — and U.S. science at risk.
undark.org
gkalinkat.bsky.social
I can imagine the influx of high skilled workers from Ukraine over the last years also played a part?
gkalinkat.bsky.social
Climate change policies fail to protect child health 🧪🧒⚕️

globalizationandhealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.... 🔓
Climate change policies fail to protect child health - Globalization and Health
National policies are essential for countries to adapt to the negative health impacts of climate change. Children are disproportionately affected by these impacts and must be at the heart of adaptation policies to address their vulnerabilities. Adaptation commitments worldwide are integrated into national adaptation plans, nationally determined contributions, national communications, and other multisectoral policies. We aimed to evaluate how effectively national climate change policies worldwide plan to protect child health, considering a range of determinants for successful child-health adaptation. We collated each country’s most recent national climate change adaptation plan published up to 12 July 2024. We created a checklist to assess how effectively policies were designed to protect child health, considering five determinant areas: policy background, goals, resources, monitoring & evaluation, and implementation. We assigned each policy quality categories (weak, needs improvement, or strong) for each determinant area, and an overall score (0–23) based on how many items were achieved from the checklist. National adaptation policies worldwide had poor planning to adapt to the harms climate change will cause child health, with 43% not mentioning child health at all. Around half acknowledged the disproportionate impacts of climate change on children, but most did not specify these impacts. Twenty-seven per cent of countries described goals and/or actions to promote child health but lacked clear targets for success. Seven per cent outlined monitoring and evaluation mechanisms, but none measured child health outcomes directly. Twelve per cent involved multiple stakeholders in policy implementation but rarely described their obligations. The design of national policies must be strengthened to protect child health from the harms of climate change. Policies should explicitly acknowledge children and their unique health risks. Goals should be both time- and age-sensitive with clear health targets, accompanied by actions that holistically address child health risks in the region concerned. A clear strategy for resource allocation and mobilisation will improve the success of policy actions. These interventions should be monitored and reviewed regularly to facilitate continuous adaptation to the changing climate. Multi-level stakeholders must be involved in policy design, and their responsibilities defined to improve implementation success. Not applicable.
globalizationandhealth.biomedcentral.com
Reposted by Gregor Kalinkat
elisabethbik.bsky.social
Trump Administration Lays Off Dozens of C.D.C. Officials
“Disease detectives,” high-ranking scientists, the entire Washington office and the staff of a weekly public health journal were among those who learned late Friday that they would lose their jobs.
#GiftLink

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/11/u...
Trump Administration Lays Off Dozens of C.D.C. Officials
www.nytimes.com
gkalinkat.bsky.social
Deswegen sind marginalisierte Gruppen auch sowohl in der Politik als auch in der Wissenschaft unterrepräsentiert und bei der Union meint m anscheinend dass das auch so bleiben soll 🫠
Reposted by Gregor Kalinkat
kathleenclark.bsky.social
A master class from MIT in responding to authoritarian overreach:

Your “premise … is inconsistent with our core belief that scientific funding should be based on scientific merit alone.
… America’s leadership in science & innovation depends on independent thinking & open competition for excellence.
Dear Madam Secretary,
I write in response to your letter of October 1, inviting MIT to review a "Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education." I acknowledge the vital importance of these matters.
I appreciated the chance to meet with you earlier this year to discuss the priorities we share for American higher education.
As we discussed, the Institute's mission of service to the nation directs us to advance knowledge, educate students and bring knowledge to bear on the world's great challenges.
We do that in line with a clear set of values, with excellence above all. Some practical examples:
• MIT prides itself on rewarding merit. Students, faculty and staff succeed here based on the strength of their talent, ideas and hard work. For instance, the Institute was the first to reinstate the SAT/ACT requirement after the pandemic. And MIT has never had legacy preferences in admissions.
• MIT opens its doors to the most talented students regardless of their family's finances. Admissions are need-blind. Incoming undergraduates whose families earn less than $200,000 a year pay no tuition. Nearly 88% of our last graduating class left MIT with no debt for their education. We make a wealth of free courses and low-cost certificates available to any American with an internet connection. Of the undergraduate degrees we award, 94% are in STEM fields. And in service to the nation, we cap enrollment of international undergraduates at roughly 10%.

source: 
https://orgchart.mit.edu/letters/regarding-compact • We value free expression, as clearly described in the MIT Statement on Freedom of Expression and Academic Freedom. We must hear facts and opinions we don't like - and engage respectfully with those with whom we disagree.
These values and other MIT practices meet or exceed many standards outlined in the document you sent. We freely choose these values because they're right, and we live by them because they support our mission - work of immense value to the prosperity, competitiveness, health and security of the United States. And of course, MIT abides by the law.
The document also includes principles with which we disagree, including those that would restrict freedom of expression and our independence as an institution. And fundamentally, the premise of the document is inconsistent with our core belief that scientific funding should be based on scientific merit alone.
In our view, America's leadership in science and innovation depends on independent thinking and open competition for excellence. In that free marketplace of ideas, the people of MIT gladly compete with the very best, without preferences. Therefore, with respect, we cannot support the proposed approach to addressing the issues facing higher education.
As you know, MIT's record of service to the nation is long and enduring. Eight decades ago, MIT leaders helped invent a scientific partnership between America's research universities and the U.S. government that has delivered extraordinary benefits for the American people. We continue to believe in the power of this partnership to serve the nation.
Sincerely,
Sally Kornbluth
Reposted by Gregor Kalinkat
drkatemarvel.bsky.social
my takeaway from climate week nyc is that "climate storytelling" is a little too much "we must reimagine our deepest souls in relationship to mother nature and the moral abyss of the polycrisis into which we must now stare" and not enough "ok but get a heat pump"
gkalinkat.bsky.social
😢
thelabandfield.bsky.social
Well, it's official. After our paper last year (onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....), the Slender-billed Curlew is officially declared Extinct today.

Scientists dream of describing new species, not writing their obituary and epitaph, knowing that they are gone forever #ornithology
gkalinkat.bsky.social
Here's a how to join

bsky.app/profile/dani...
danirabaiotti.bsky.social
Welcome to the Science feed!

Please read our FAQs for instructions for how to be added as a contributor: bossett.io/science-feed/

Mod introductory posts linked below⬇️

Use the test tube emoji on posts you want to appear in the feed🧪

Please like the feed and make sure you follow our feed rules:
Science Feed Rules:
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Reposted by Gregor Kalinkat
kellyhereid.bsky.social
PS - did you know there's a science feed? This one is from the very early days of bsky, for interesting nuggets from across the world of science.
Reposted by Gregor Kalinkat
tbrresearch.bsky.social
A new Special Issue on aquatic invasions has just been released in NeoBiota. Read the editorial to gain an overview of all the papers: Invasions in aquatic systems.

Use this link:
neobiota.pensoft.net/article/1678...

#bioinvasions @neobiota.pensoft.net
Reposted by Gregor Kalinkat
sohkamyung.bsky.social
My first pseudoscorpion observation was pure luck. Happen to see this wasp and took a shot. It was only later did I see what was hanging on the antenna.

On iNaturalist [ www.inaturalist.org/observations... ]
A brown pseudoscopion hanging on to the antenna of a wasp. The wasp is yellow with black stripes and transparent wings.
Reposted by Gregor Kalinkat
sholtodavid.bsky.social
Recent MDPI paper including diagram of a bacterial cell with a mitochondrion 🤦‍♀️ The authors propose a mechanism for the toxicity of silver nanoparticles: "Ag+ ions in AgNPs bombard the bacterial mitochondria’s electron transport chain, resulting in cell death".
Reposted by Gregor Kalinkat
paulisci.bsky.social
A Brief History of Men are Becoming Less Manly

🧵