Here is the "effective payline" for each institute, estimated (by Claude) as the percentile where one can expect 80% probability of funding from a logistic regression fit. The effective payline has gone from a historic ~12% to 6% in 2025.
Current NIH leadership want you to think they are using rigorous, consistent & scientific processes to screen studies to align them with agency priorities.
But the process that they have put down on paper is a sham.
It’s important to know NIH is not following its own guidance. Here’s why:
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Even more excited — our paper is featured on the cover of Science Advances!
Huge thanks to @alexandrejan.bsky.social who took this incredible photo of a ctenophore (aka comb jelly) and the editors.
Here’s the cover 👇
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
To increase the use of gene editing in corals, we have made a comprehensive methods paper describing the protocol. We hope this helps the field of functional genetics in corals. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
David Botstein has passed away. A true pioneer in the genetics and biotechnology industry, known methods to map genes. While at Stanford he collaborated with Pat Brown in microarrays, co-founded the Gene Ontology and became the CSO of Calico. He worked again with Pat Brown at Impossible Foods. RIP.
Final version @nature.com of our paper describing unconventional multicellular development in a choanoflagellate inhabiting an extreme environment. A ton of new data since the first @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social preprint (which we've kept updating).
A brief 🧵 (carried over from the old place)
Congress rejected massive cuts to US science budgets for 2026, but much of the money still isn’t flowing to researchers.
The culprit? The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is quietly slow-walking the release of funds. 🧵👇
We're on a roll here. Check out this cool paper by @scienceleah.bsky.social et al. on not one, but two types of sperm (!) in the silk worm Bombyx mori. Happy to have contributed. #meiosis4ever
"Your h-index will thank you" 😂 The professor's answer to students using Einstein has arrived www.professorfeynman.com
Both beautiful but I’d want to put the right on a coffee table.
Our department at Genentech is hiring. We're looking for a freshly-minted PhD (0-3 years) protein biochemist / structural biologist to join as a Sr Scientist. A rare opportunity to join our group leader job family at a more junior level than we usually hire.
I am excited to share the main piece of work from my PhD! In this paper, we investigated the propensities of distinct transcripts in associating with biomolecular condensates, mainly focusing on how heat-induced mRNAs escape condensation and are properly translated.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
An Advanced Mobile Laboratory to enable field-based microbial ecology and cell biology across scales https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.02.23.707475v1
Gotta admit, I’m somewhat heartened by this recent post (not WHAT it is reporting but that it IS reporting):
grants.nih.gov/news-events/...
We’re excited to announce @tarnopol.bsky.social as the recipient of the 2026 Larry Sandler Award! 🎉 She’ll present the Larry Sandler Memorial Lecture during the #Dros26 opening session on March 4—she'll share how her research explores how protein toxins evolve to shape host–parasite interactions.
Know a promising undergrad who wants more time before applying to grad school? Pitt has a funded postbac program for students from underrepresented groups.
This year, my lab will consider applications for solo supervision or to be co-supervised by @mehrgol.bsky.social!
App deadline is March 15!
Not sure if celebrate is the right word but I'll tell you it's not paying rent in my head
we need to talk about that Ring Super Bowl ad
This is a genuinely huge, sweeping victory today for the University of California—or rather, for us, its faculty, acting through our faculty associations, while the UC itself maintained a strict policy of deer-in-headlights silence.
The Trump admin has given up its appeal of a powerful injunction:
Recently, a Hypothesis was posed in @jcellsci.bsky.social in which the root of eukaryotes was placed between kinetoplastids and all other eukaryotes. From this, it was implied that LECA did not have a kinetochore. We argue this is highly unlikely. A 🧵(1/12)
Read our reply here: tinyurl.com/n87myhpr
I am seeking a postdoc to join my group at UCLA -- ideally the candidate would have some experience in either population genetics or microbes/microbiome (computational background needed). We have a range of projects and are happy to tailer to your interests. Please dm/email me if interested.
Happy to share this new, very intentional chapter. I have left UCLA after 14 years to join the University of Colorado Anschutz as Professor of Biomedical Informatics and Neurosurgery and the inaugural Marsico Chair in Excellence in Functional Precision Medicine/n
news.cuanschutz.edu/dbmi/cu-ansc...
Some news: excited to share that I'm building @dittobio.bsky.social with @adairb.bsky.social and Emily Weiss as part of the @ycombinator.com.web.brid.gy W26 batch!
We're discovering drugs for autoimmune disease by harnessing parasite biology.
www.ycombinator.com/launches/PNb...
We're excited to be recruiting an NIH funded postdoc to work in the Coop lab at UC Davis. We're specifically interested in candidates who are want to work at the intersection of human genetics, GWAS, and population genetics modeling. Please RT
This is a beautiful case of how real science happens & serious scientists work. Kudos to both set of authors: “This has been a humbling experience, but one that speaks to the self-correcting nature of the scientific endeavor.” www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Thank you Chrystal for your continuation of this effort to uplift and highlight Black Scientists. A wonderful gift of service for #BlackHistoryMonth
Lecturer in Ecology and Evolution position available in Biology Department at Stanford University. Apply by April 1, 2026. (Photo by Rick Morris)
academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/31606
Not new, but a new to us update:
The first preprint out of my lab! We joined forces with @kinasekid.bsky.social @jasonzxzhang.bsky.social and David Baker to study protein phosphorylation! Congrats to Isabella from my lab on her first first author paper! tinyurl.com/43jwwfua
Exciting new preprint from Jonathan Long’s lab @stanford-chemh.bsky.social, including collaborators Nathanael Gray & coworkers
“I want the NIH to be a central driver of the MAHA agenda,” Bhattacharya said. “Essentially, it's kind of the research arm of MAHA.”
NIH is not an ideological toy or 'arm'. We must insist on its scientific independence, especially if its Director will not.
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www.dukechronicle.com/article/duke...
