Dr Michelle @Drosmel@qoto.org

Given the awful news, I can only keep posting this. xx

#rwanda #rwandabill #compassion

We are hiring a podcast editor for Scientific American's multimedia team. (Sharing again because weekends are a good time to think about a new job). Thanks for considering or sharing with anyone looking to join a creative, welcoming, humane & fun team https://careers.springernature.com/job/New-York-Multimedia-Editor%2C-Audio%2C-Scientific-American/1058691801/

Carol Jennings, RIP

Carol Jennings was an amazing woman who letters wrote letters to Alzheimer's researchers about her family. That led to the discovery of the APP gene and, in turn, the amyloid hypothesis of Alzheimer's. (Her family carries a rare form in which mutations to the APP gene cause Alzheimer's with certainty). She devoted the rest of her life to Alzheimer's advocacy. Tragically, she acquired the disorder later in life herself.

Thank you, Carol Jennings. Rest in peace.

https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/blog/honouring-couple-dementia-their-contributions-research

Who are giant viruses infecting in the ocean?

In a collaborative paper with the Vardi lab, we were able to link many giant virus lineages to protist hosts using #SingleCell #RNASeq. One #protist host (leucocryptos) made up less than 1% of the community, but we could still identify a cryptic viral lineage infecting it, leading to population collapse.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41564-024-01669-y

#marine #viruses #microbiology

Are there any #scientists studying #extremophiles here avaliable for some short talk?

5 new lectureships advertised at UCL History including one in environmental history! https://www.ucl.ac.uk/history/opportunities

Hey, Mastodon! Indiana's attorney general has created an anti-teacher snitch portal for people to report school teachers for being too woke. It allows you to upload files and everything!

There appears to be no safeguard against entering any text you want in any of the boxes, and no location/residence checking.

Dare I ask you to do your thing?

https://www.in.gov/attorneygeneral/education-liberty/

Boosts welcome!

#academicChatter #education #bts #taylorSwift

When eight-year-old Emma Glenfield wanted to know more about why magpies swoop at people, her teacher (Luke Carr) encouraged her to gather data and analyse it.

She noted that the birds seemed to target tall balding men, and created an online survey with the help of her mum. The survey went viral, with over 30,000 respondents.

The results, as shown in a brilliant Lego graph, demonstrated that the birds do target balding men more frequently (with less than 1% margin of error, thanks to the large sample size).

"According to magpie expert Darryl Jones, professor emeritus at Griffith University, it's the first time anyone has ever examined the link between magpie swooping and appearance."

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-01-09/magpies-swoop-bald-more-often-survey-finds/103297520

The ABC article includes more details, along with this excellent Lego graph (and other great pictures).

#MathEd #Magpie #Lego #Australia