Author | Lightnews

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Needhi Bhalla 💅🏽 @needhibhalla.bsky.social · 6d

We have to absolutely hammer this home: Science suffers without the values embedded in DEI 🧪

Trevon Logan @trevondlogan.bsky.social · 7d

The Python Software Foundation was recommended for a $1.5M grant from the National Science Foundation. The terms of the award said PSF could not work on DEI, whether or not the grant funding was used for it.

PSF therefore declined the funding.

Science suffers, but commitment to core values remains

Python Software Foundation @python.org · 7d

TLDR; The PSF has made the decision to put our community and our shared diversity, equity, and inclusion values ahead of seeking $1.5M in new revenue. Please read and share. pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-...
🧵

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Mike Moore @moore-evo-eco.bsky.social · 11d

Bumping this up one last time. I'm looking to hire graduate student(s) to work on an NSF-funded project to study elevational range shifts among dragonflies here in Colorado. @cudenverclas.bsky.social 🧪🌍🐙

Applications will be considered until Nov 1. See post below for more details

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Blake Ushijima, Ph.D. @vibriosoup.bsky.social · 10d

😢
theconversation.com/2-iconic-cor...

2 iconic coral species are now functionally extinct off Florida, study finds – we witnessed the reef’s bleaching and devastation

The crucial reef-building corals were decimated by a marine heat wave in the Florida Keys. Can advances in restoration help them recover?

theconversation.com

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Alexa Ray Corriea @alexaray.bsky.social · 28d

It’s boiling in October because you’re using ChatGPT to write your emails, Janice.

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Kate Starbird @katestarbird.bsky.social · Oct 4

Dartmouth’s response to the Trump admin’s corrupt contract, short and sweet: “You have often heard me say that higher education is not perfect and that we can do better. At the same time, we will never compromise our academic freedom and our ability to govern ourselves.”

Daniel P. Moriarity @dpmoriarity.bsky.social · Oct 4

Dartmouth response to the Trump Administration Compact

president.dartmouth.edu/news/2025/10...

Response to the ‘Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education’ | Office of the President

president.dartmouth.edu

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Costa Samaras @costasamaras.com · Oct 1

Thank you to the career federal employees, who show up to work every day and improve people's lives across the country.

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Skype a Scientist @skypeascientist.bsky.social · Sep 30

Alrght everybody, get your Tin Can Telephones out. We need your help!

We reach new people by word of mouth. Send all your educator friends this pic! Teachers, librarians, scout troop leaders, etc! We offer our program for free, so we need help getting the word out without advertising $$.

A purple and red octopus talk to each other on the tin can telephone. Purple octopus says “want to connect your students with real
Scientists?” Then red octopus says “Skype a scientist matches groups with scientists for virtual q&as. It’s free!” And then an orange flapjack octopus says “get a match at skypeascientist.com”

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Mongabay @mongabay.com · Sep 28

In a crumbling four-story wada in Pune’s old quarter, an upstairs room stayed stubbornly off the grid.

There, a small woman in a plain cotton sari wrote longhand by daylight or by kerosene lamp.

This was Hema Sane, a botanist who turned her life into an experiment in ecological consistency.

Hema Sane, botanist who lived without electricity, died on September 19th

In a crumbling four-story wada in Pune’s old quarter, where temple bells compete with motorbike horns and hawkers press against the walls, an upstairs room stayed stubbornly off the grid. There,…

news.mongabay.com

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Erica D. Pratt @pratted.bsky.social · Sep 26

Announcing such a major change to NSF GRFP this late in the cycle is incredibly cruel. 2nd yr students (mine included) have been working so hard on their proposals despite ongoing uncertainty. They are driven and passionate about being outstanding scientists and helping those coming up behind them.

This means individuals in the following statuses at the time of application are eligible:

Undergraduate in the final (senior) year of a bachelor’s degree program
Bachelor’s degree-holder with NO enrollment in a graduate degree program (non-degree graduate coursework allowed)
Individual enrolled in a joint bachelor’s-master’s degree program with at least three undergraduate years completed
First-year graduate student in their first graduate degree program with less than one academic year completed in the degree program (according to institution’s academic calendar)
Individuals enrolled in joint bachelor’s-master’s degree programs are considered graduate students. For GRFP, joint bachelor’s-master’s degrees are defined as degrees concurrently pursued and awarded.
Not be a current NSF employee.

Applications that do not meet eligibility requirements will be returned without review as being ineligible for a fellowship.

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Methods in Ecology and Evolution @methodsinecoevol.bsky.social · Sep 12

📖Published📖

Pappalardo et al. developed taxon-specific confidence thresholds for eukaryotes at different taxonomic levels to optimize the accuracy of BLAST-based taxonomic assignments for metabarcoding 🧬 🌍 🧪 Read more here 👇

Taxon‐specific BLAST percent identity thresholds for identification of unknown sequences using metabarcoding

The identification of organisms in environmental samples using metabarcoding relies on factors such as taxonomic assignment methods, genetic markers, reference databases and confidence thresholds ...

buff.ly

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Angelo Villagomez @taotaotasi.bsky.social · Aug 31

We used to call reverse DEI "racism"

www.nytimes.com/2025/08/31/u...

In Trump’s Federal Work Force Cuts, Black Women Are Among the Hardest Hit

www.nytimes.com

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Jean-Pierre Gattuso @jpgattuso.bsky.social · Aug 27

A disaster for ocean and climate research is unfolding before our eyes. #NOAA 🌊
"The White House Office of Management and Budget is pulling back $239 million in funds Congress already provided. The biggest hits fall on climate and ocean research."
oceanpolicy.substack.com/p/roundup-un...

Roundup: Unobligated but Not Unnoticed: OMB Pulls Back NOAA Funds

August 12-26, 2025

oceanpolicy.substack.com

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Dr. K. Lotterhos @drk-lo.bsky.social · Aug 25

Today 14 scientific societies in #ecology #evolution and #marineScience are publishing the results of a survey that finds negative impacts of federal policies on food security, flood mitigation, infectious disease preparedness, and wildlife conservation: 🧪👩‍🔬 www.firsthandaccounts.org/impacts/2025...

This infographic describes the main results from a survey of members of 14 scientific societies. There is a pie chart showing that both academic (58%) and non-academic (42%) responded to the survey. It lists statistics: 85% of respondents reported uncertainty about the future; 71% reported federal training programs were "very" or "extremely important"; 83% reported negative impacts or irreparable harm on their field of science. There is a word cloud summarizing open-ended responses with the largest words "student research fund federal grant". Eight major themes in the responses are listed: disruption of research with societal important; concerns of closure of the USGS Bird Banding Lab; Early Career Bottleneck; Restricted Freedoms including travel and speech; Decline in Government Efficiency and Expertise; Concerns about Biased/Removed Data and Data Gaps; Concerns about the Ability to Meet Legal Mandates; and From Positive Impact to Irreparable Harm. There are icons for each participating society and a QR code for website and data availability.

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Alexander Luckmann @aluckmann.bsky.social · Aug 20

Academia may not give you job security, flexibility, or wealth, but it will let you unexpectedly connect to eduroam in foreign cities

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Sam Yeaman @samyeaman.bsky.social · Aug 20

I'm looking to recruit a PhD student to study patterns of local adaptation and introgression across the spruce hybrid zone in the Rockies near Calgary. Projects can include field work, bioinformatics, pop gen theory, or comparison to plant/ conifer species
yeamanlab.weebly.com/uploads/5/7/...

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Sharon Lerner @fastlerner.bsky.social · Aug 20

My latest on the Health Sec who promised to figure out what causes autism and the autism research that's been stopped along the way www.propublica.org/article/rfk-...

RFK Jr. Vowed to Find the Environmental Causes of Autism. Then He Shut Down Research Trying to Do Just That.

While touting a $50 million initiative to identify the causes of autism, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is helping lead an administration that is rolling back protections against pollution and toxic chemicals,...

www.propublica.org

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Dr. Lauren E. Fuess @laurenfuess.bsky.social · Aug 12

🚨🚨We’re hiring a postdoc!🚨🚨

Min two year contract; start in 2026 (flexible) & contribute to this project focused on understanding the link between bleaching recovery and disease in cnidarians!! Opportunities to work on side projects too!

Deadline Nov 1!

Info here: tinyurl.com/y2abjsem

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Science and Freedom Alliance - SAFA @safa-science.bsky.social · Aug 7

The Supreme Court is reviewing a vitally important NIH case on its shadow docket.

It is likely that the Court will back Trump, and say his (illegal) grant terminations are ok.

We must speak up now.
1/

Tell the Supreme Court: No Stay. Hands off NIH

The Supreme Court is poised to allow Trump to illegally terminate NIH grants. Let's speak out. There is not much time.

scienceandfreedomalliance.substack.com

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Aparna Nair @disabilitystor1.bsky.social · Aug 5

not my job to see the "utility" of AI; NOT MY JOB.
If I am ALLOWED TO DO MY ACTUAL JOB of teaching history/humanities to my students and supported the way my students deserve to be supported, they will know enough to know when AI will fail them/be critical of the tech/use it wisely, if at all.

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Charlotte Lydia Riley @lottelydia.bsky.social · Aug 5

ACADEMIC READING ALREADY COMES WITH A SUMMARY IT IS CALLED THE ABSTRACT

John Warner @biblioracle.bsky.social · Aug 5

The Appendix on an AI policy is actually quite bad. Having an AI deliver a summary before reading has major implications in terms of the experience of student learning. What we want students to do and how they do it is the question. The experience of reading is not the same as reading a summary.

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Caspar Henderson @casparhenderson.bsky.social · Aug 2

“People find it easier to imagine that we can build intelligence on silicon than we can do democracy at scale, or that we can escape arms races. It’s complete bullshit…We’re a naturally social, altruistic, democratic species and we all have an anti-dominance intuition.” [?]

George Monbiot @georgemonbiot.bsky.social · Aug 2

For thousands of years, we have been parasitised, exploited and destroyed by elites. Our survival depends on overthrowing them.
Fascinating article by @dpcarrington.bsky.social
www.theguardian.com/environment/...

‘Self-termination is most likely’: the history and future of societal collapse

An epic analysis of 5,000 years of civilisation argues that a global collapse is coming unless inequality is vanquished

www.theguardian.com

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Scott McGrath @smcgrath.phd · Jul 31

🧪 A new DOE climate report, used by the EPA to justify rolling back regulations, is under fire. Multiple scientists cited in the report say their work was cherry-picked and fundamentally misrepresented to downplay the risks of climate change. #Climate

Scientists Say New Government Climate Report Twists Their Work

A new Department of Energy report “fundamentally misrepresents” climate research and leaves out key context, multiple scientists cited in the report tell WIRED.

www.wired.com

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pentathlos.bsky.social @pentathlos.bsky.social · Jul 27

A very interesting idea....
#skybrarians #academicsky #APC #openaccess

Dorothy Bishop @deevybee.bsky.social · Jul 27

here’s a positive suggestion for academic publishing.
Journals need to be accredited as meeting integrity standards in order to qualify for APCs
enviromicro-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Journals Operating Predatory Practices Are Systematically Eroding the Science Ethos: A Gate and Code Strategy to Minimise Their Operating Space and Restore Research Best Practice

Scientific research seeks to extend knowledge and understanding, an activity that perhaps more than any other advances society and humanity. In essence, it is the search for truth. But, because it se....

enviromicro-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Prof Sam Illingworth @samillingworth.com · Jul 26

🌊 Oceans overheated in 2023

Marine heatwaves hit record highs in 2023: hotter, longer, and wider than anything seen in 40+ years.

These extreme ocean temperatures put sea life, weather, & coastal economies at serious risk.

🔗 doi.org/10.1126/scie...

#ClimateCrisis #Oceans #SciComm 🧪

Record-breaking 2023 marine heatwaves

The year 2023 witnessed an extraordinary surge in marine heatwaves (MHWs) across Earth’s oceans, setting new records in duration, extent, and intensity, with MHW activity totaling 53.6 billion °C days...

doi.org

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