Author | Lightnews

Burr Ito

@ututuy.org

1.6K followers 1.6K following 340 posts

Geophysicist | Astrophysicist at the Royal Observatory of Belgium. Fluid Dynamics of Rotation | Helio/Asteroseismology | Planetary Fluid Cores. Mostly pics of clouds and timelapses. All media by me. He/him.

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Burr Ito @ututuy.org · Nov 20

The #core of the #Earth spins around a slightly different axis compared to the #mantle. In this animation we start in a space frame and switch gradually to the frame spinning with the mantle. In that frame the core appears to wobble. The mantle precesses and the core, being fluid, lags a bit. 🧪 🔭

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Burr Ito @ututuy.org · 3d

🔭🧪

Dr Robin George Andrews @squigglyvolcano.bsky.social · 3d

Hey there astronomy community! If anyone has any information or new footage of that impact flash on the Moon, please let me know—I’d love to see it/hear about it.

📸: @dfuji1.bsky.social

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Dr. Craig DeForest ☀️ @craig.deforest.org · 5d

This is exactly the reason every mission and scientist should have a wide-open data policy! PUNCH has specific science objectives (looking at the solar wind) – but in the right hands the data can reveal amazing things NOT part of our original science. Giving those hands access is best for all. ☀️🔭🧪

kwalsh4a.bsky.social @kwalsh4a.bsky.social · 5d

Interstellar comet 3I Atlas from all clear filter data from PUNCH's WFI3 satellite on October 29th. This is the combination of 134 separate images. It's again visible in single frames (moving coming next). Probably visual magnitude ~9.5ish.

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Sarah McAnulty, Ph.D. @sarahmackattack.bsky.social · 5d

The amount of AI generated art in slides at this conference, primarily used by older scientists, is killing me. Scientists please. Don’t use these ai platforms to make your figures or slides. They look bad and I have yet to see them meaningfully improve the message of talks.

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Dr. Nicole Gasparini (she) @nicolegasparini.bsky.social · 5d

A weird thing about scientific research in academia is that you are less valued if you can do your science on the cheap. Ultimately what most universities care about is how much you spend, bc that is how they get overhead. Total dollars brought in is the metric that seems to matter

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Belgium @brussels.bsky.social · 6d

👇

𝚃𝚊𝚛𝚊𝚜 𝙶𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚌𝚘𝚎 🚇 @taras-grescoe.com · 6d

"Sometimes, a shop owner claims his business was ruined because the city removed 4 parking spaces. With surveys, our mayor can say: ‘6,000 more people pass your shop a day thanks to a new bike lane. Are you sure you’re a good businessman?’”

— Jan Gehl of #Copenhagen, quoted in #Straphanger.

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Dakota Smith @weatherdak.bsky.social · 6d

Alrighty, ready to see something really cool? (and maybe a little nauseating)

The evolution of Hurricane Melissa's mesovortices at peak strength.

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Keith Smith @drkeithsmith.bsky.social · 6d

Construction of the 40-m China-Argentina Radio Telescope (CART) has halted, when already 90% complete.

The facility is caught up in Argentine president Javier Milei's attempt to secure an economic aid package from the US, which objects to China's involvement. 🔭
www.science.org/content/arti...

Argentina’s move to woo Trump has derailed South America’s largest radio telescope

U.S.-Chinese tensions have left nearly complete observatory in limbo, jeopardizing research into pulsars and other celestial objects

www.science.org

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Thomas @thomasfuchs.at · 6d

We have the most powerful personal computers ever at home and in our pockets yet we use them mostly as gloried terminals to Big Tech mainframes

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Dr. Laci Brock 🪐 @stellerarts.com · 7d

The painting that gave me the confidence to leave academia & start an art business. I worked on it in 2022 while I was still a postdoc. Just finished painting a mini version of it & have submitted it to a local gallery “small art” exhibition. I find out in a couple weeks if I get accepted🤞

A large painting of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot hanging on the wall. There is a rectangle in purple showing the spot in ultraviolet light and another one on the right in reds/oranges showing infrared. I am holding a mini version of the same painting closer to the camera. 🐡🔭🧪

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Matthew Noe @noethematt.bsky.social · 7d

"I DON'T NEED YOU TO FUCKING REWRITE WHAT I'VE JUST WRITTEN!"

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Andrea Luck @andrealuck.bsky.social · 9d

Fresh JWST view of Uranus taken Oct 6 2025 with NIRCam.

Full size & more info: flic.kr/p/2rByidu 🔭🧪
Credit: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/Andrea Luck CC BY

Proposal PI: Varun Bajaj
Proposal ID: 8975
Filters: F150W2-F162M, F410M

Image of Uranus taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, showing a whitish north polar region, vivid blue-greenish atmosphere and a few whitish elongated storms visible around the pole. The planet is surrounded by clearly defined ring system set against the black background of space.

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Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 11d

Another comet Lemmon image, taken on 21 Oct.

For this one I used my mono camera with red, green and blue filters to capture colour data, which I added to the main mono image to create an LRGB colour image.

Scope was a 550mm focal length Esprit 100.
🔭

Comet Lemmon against a static star field

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Jess Zimmerman @jesszimmerman.com · 11d

I mean this is remarkable for a number of reasons but especially striking to me is that they’re Nuremberging so hard they’re not waiting to get the orders before insisting they were only following them

Chris Murphy @chrismurphyct.bsky.social · 11d

So you should really watch this. Just 2 minutes. But a window into the truly radical nature of the people Trump is nominating.

When pressed today, the nominee to be Ambassador to South Africa refuses to oppose reinstituting laws to prevent black people from voting in America.

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Aida Alvera-Azcárate @aida-alvera.bsky.social · 11d

A cool sea surface temperature pattern in the Alboran Sea, seen yesterday by #Sentinel3. We have the typical Alboran gyre, being squeezed by warmer water coming from the northwestern Mediterranean. Cold upwelled waters along the Spanish coast are getting trapped between the two warm water masses 🤩🌊

Sea Surface Temperature in the Alboran Sea. Land is in grey, water temperature goes from 19 degrees C (blue shades) to 23 degrees C (red shades)

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Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · 11d

cannot believe on some level I & my colleagues have turned the tide on this, but also it was in some senses inevitable as why not! Humans can do anything; we still have a way to go however of course, but:

banning AI in the classroom should be as uncontroversial as banning calculators in early maths

Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · 11d

“I already ban the use of generative AI in my own courses, and as a promoter of master’s theses. I explicitly tell my students they won’t learn anything by using it. [...] A general ban is necessary, but nobody dares to say so.”

🙋🏻‍♀️🙋🏻‍♀️🙋🏻‍♀️

apache.be/2025/10/24/b...

Belgian AI scientists resist the use of AI in academia

Several AI scientists have published an open letter calling for a ban on AI use by students.

apache.be

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Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · 11d

I am close to tears; they listened and made an english version apache.be/2025/10/24/b...

@apache.be you rule 🖤

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Belgium @brussels.bsky.social · 12d

antwerp 😟

Bart⚓️ @bartgonnissen.bsky.social · 12d

36 nautical miles inland on a river

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Patrick Koppenburg 🐧 @koppenburg.ch · 12d

It's mole day! 🧪

Patrick Koppenburg 🐧 @koppenburg.ch · Oct 23

A mole of moles weigh a little less than the moon. Now you know it. #MoleDay

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Mara Wilson @marawilson.bsky.social · 15d

This is one of the first things you see in the airport in Medellín.

T-shirts in a gift shop reading “It’s Colombia, not Columbia”

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Jen Cross @jencross.bsky.social · 16d

Here's a fabulous arachnid for the feed tonight, a Giant Velvet Mite. Their bright colors appear to be aposematic, warning potential predators of their unpleasant taste and smell.
(Dinothrombium sp.) Portal, AZ 2025 #Arachtober

A furry red and white mite on a white background.

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Prof Katherine Schofield 🇬🇧🇦🇺🇪🇺 @katherineschof8.bsky.social · 20d

I'm not a keen follower of the Epstein case. Maybe this is something everyone knows.

But I'm shocked and revolted by the male academics who one after another raped trafficked children. My god I hope you are all found and punished.

Solidarity with the survivors.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Snippet from the linked Guardian article beginning "The second person I was lent out to was a psychology professor"

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derek guy @dieworkwear.bsky.social · 21d

You gently run your hand through the rack. You can feel it—pure cotton, rich wool, Irish linen. The plump buttonholes are handsewn; the buttons attached with a firm shank. You flip the price tag over. It's affordable

You buy the jacket and go home, which is only 15 mins away. Your apt is $600/month

Headline reads: Altman says ChatGPT will soon allow erotic for adult users.

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Sarah Kendrew @sarahkendrew.bsky.social · 21d

Increasingly in favour of the Marie Kondo approach to collaborations in science. Does your collaborator spark joy? If not ➡️♻️🗑️

No one's skills or knowledge are so unique or indispensable that they get to make your day miserable with every interaction. 🧪🔭

a teddy bear is standing in front of a blue door

ALT: a teddy bear is standing in front of a blue door

media.tenor.com

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Matti Vuorre @matti.vuorre.com · 21d

Against Publishing: universonline.nl/nieuws/2025/...

Preprints are read, shared, and cited, yet still dismissed as incomplete until blessed by a publisher. I argue that the true measure of scholarship lies in open exchange, not in the industry’s gatekeeping of what counts as published.

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derek guy @dieworkwear.bsky.social · 23d

This two-parter below is exactly why it's hard to make clothes in the United States.

Let's look at how much it costs to produce a button-up shirt in the US. 🧵

Someone on Twitter replies to me: "meh. buy american or stfu."

Two hours later, in a separate thread, the write: "$30 for a single button-up is ridiculous unless it is decent quality silk."

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