Philipp Schlegel @uni_matrix@qoto.org

Excited to share our latest work - expressing the bacterial sodium channel NaChBac in fly Kenyon cells surprisingly *decreases* their excitability, thanks partly to decreased endogenous sodium channels. This prevents learning and decreases odor-evoked calcium influx https://doi.org/10.1113/JP288790

The current administration in the US has, through various funding agencies such as the NSF and NIH, has recently suspended virtually all federal grants to my home university, UCLA (including my own personal grant, although that is far from the most serious impact of this decision), on the grounds that UCLA was “failing to promote a research environment free of antisemitism and bias”. One can certainly debate whether these grounds were justified, or whether they merit the extremely draconian damage to the very research environment that this decision is claiming to protect, but if nothing else this unprecedented decision does not appear to have followed the usual standards of due process for actions of this nature; for instance, there appears to have been no good faith effort by the administration to receive a response from UCLA to its allegations before implementing its decision.

The suspension of my personal grant has a non-trivial impact on myself (in particular, my summer salary, which I had already deferred in order to allow the previously released NSF funds to support several of my graduate students over this period, is now in limbo), and now gives me almost no resources to support my graduate students going forward; but this is only a fraction of a percent of the entire amount being suspended. A far greater concern is the impact on the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics (IPAM) https://www.ipam.ucla.edu/, which despite receiving preliminary approval earlier this year for a new five-year round of funding (albeit at significantly reduced levels) from the NSF, now only has enough emergency funding for a few months of further operation at best if the suspension is not lifted. (1/4)

Two open positions in my lab to develop scientific software with python and javascript.

Software: CATMAID

Documentation:
https://catmaid.readthedocs.io/en/stable/

Source code:
https://github.com/catmaid/CATMAID/

Example:
https://l1em.catmaid.virtualflybrain.org/?pid=1&zp=108250&yp=82962&xp=54211&tool=tracingtool&sid0=1&s0=3&help=true

If you have experience with #SQL (#postgresql), #python and its many libraries (particularly #django), #rust, and #javascript, write to me and let's discuss.

Examples of open issues: https://github.com/catmaid/CATMAID/issues

Today we’re quietly (and finally!) opening up Railfinder to the public! This is our beta version and - hopefully - the first step towards that one booking site for trains across Europe that we all dream of.

Lots of work has gone into this and equally lots still to do before reach that vision, but if you’d like to try what we’ve built you can now just go to https://www.railfinder.eu and have a go!

Any and all feedback more than welcome 🙏

Use Signal. We promise, no AI clutter, and no surveillance ads, whatever the rest of the industry does. <3

Davi Bock on the fly connectome, its uses, its impact beyond – and his life.
https://www.uvm.edu/magazine/news/thoughts-fly
#neuroscience #neuroscientists #biographies #connectomics

Fuck.
Elsewhere in their profession, some scientists are starting to look away. “We know quite a number of entomologists who have experience dating back to the 70s, 80s or 90s,” Hallwachs says. “One of our very good friends – he now does not have the emotional courage to hang up a sheet to collect moths at night. It is too devastating to see how few there are.”

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jun/03/climate-species-collapse-ecology-insects-nature-reserves-aoe

What's been lost...
Entomologists from Krefeld, Germany, collected flying insects for two weeks in August 1994 (left) and—at the same site, with an identical trap— in August 2016 (right). Similar data from 63 German protected areas overall gave a shocking result: a 76 percent drop in insect biomass between 1989 and 2016.
It has worsened significantly in the past 9 years.
Photographed at Entomological Society of Krefeld

Two multisite projects aimed at scaling up mouse connectomics lost federal funding in recent cuts to Harvard University grants.

By @avaskham

https://www.thetransmitter.org/funding/multisite-connectome-teams-lose-federal-funding-as-result-of-harvard-cuts/?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=org-social&utm_campaign=20250528-federal-funding-harvard-cuts

For the first time, researchers at #UniLeipzig and other institutions have gained comprehensive insights into the entire nervous system of the fruit fly. The findings were recently published in Nature, marking the first study to describe in detail the neurons that span the entire nervous system of the adult fruit fly: https://www.uni-leipzig.de/en/newsdetail/artikel/eine-strassenkarte-fuer-das-gehirn-der-fruchtfliege-2025-05-07

Photo: Tomke Stürner/Uni Cambridge and LMB Cambridge

2-year Postdoc Position: Evolution and Organization of Ant Olfactory Systems

– in Carlotta Martelli's lab at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany.

https://mrtlllab.uni-mainz.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/PostDoc-Position-Neuro-Ants-150125.pdf

"The ideal candidate should have a strong background in bioinformatics, ideally with practical or theoretical experience in single-cell transcriptomics or comparative genomics. A keen interest in neurobiology is essential. Additional skills in evolutionary biology, insect handling, and programming (preferably in Python) would be advantageous, but are not mandatory."

Position still open!

#ants #PhDJobs #postdocJob #neuroscience #entomology #olfaction #bioinformatics

How do #NeuralNetworks generate diverse and variable outputs? This study of the larval #fruitfly locomotor system shows that relatively simple sets of #inhibitory circuit motifs can generate a surprising degree of diversity & variability in motor programs @PLOSBiology https://plos.io/3GpT3pR

Maggots. We really don't give then enough credit. They can do so much with so little:

"Sensation of electric fields in the Drosophila melanogaster larva", Tadres et al. 2025 (Matthieu Louis' lab).
https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(25)00299-4

#neuroscience #Drosophila #ElectricSensing #DrosophilaLarva #Diptera

1 Join us for a 4-year PhD in Newcastle on a fun project (literally)!
 
Building on our recent publication about Drosophila playing on a carousel (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2025.01.025), we will explore:
1)        the genetic underpinnings of play,
2)        the neuronal circuits involved in play, and its adaptive benefit,
3)        how environmental context impacts play behaviour.

This is what we mean when we say the regime is censuring science.

“CDC staff should not be co-authors on manuscripts/abstracts with WHO staff,” nor publish papers on work "funded by WHO.”

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/cdc-who-publication-memo_n_67c1eb34e4b0bf54864084cf

If we're headed into a world of minimal federal support for academic research, can I propose that we no longer view training for non-academic research as a major goal of PhD programs? 1/2

Lagged signal propagation through a dynamic graph

#openrndr #particles #graph

One of the most interesting illustrations I've seen in a while: from H. Knyazeva, S. Kurdyumov "Fundamentals of Synergetics". A stunning case of the hysteresis (history dependence) of the inference.
What are the consequences for bio- and cultural evolution?