iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Dr Áine O’Brien

Kirsty Grainger @kirstygrainger.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

"snowballing grant application numbers" Yet UKRI's published grant application figures show a drop in numbers which I cannot explain; more off system, closed invitation, demand management not accounted for? 24/25 - 24,775 25/26 - 21,637 Make it make sense. www.ukri.org/what-we-do/w...

ukri.org

UKRI investment and outputs publication

Explore the latest figures on UKRI funding and research outputs providing an 11-year overview of each financial year from April 2015 to March 2026, reviewing and updating all previously published figu...

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Jordan @jordanpfot.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Can’t wait for Mick Herron to bring together the Danny Tommo A-plot and the RAF Fairford B-plot in an unexpected but satisfying way.

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Robin Hayward 🌳 🏳️‍⚧️ @canopyrobin.com · 25/09/2026

We're publishing new guidance to support trans people who do fieldwork (any work outside the office)! Now we need your help to get them seen so please share! inclusivefieldwork.leeds.ac.uk/trans/

a cartoon of three fieldworkers. One has a small trans flag. The logos of the university of leeds, research england, and canopy robin are shown, as well as the URL: InclusiveFieldwork (dot) Leeds (dot) AC (dot) UK (slash) trans

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Dr Florence H R Scott @florencehrscott.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Macklemore of this story please

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Bex Luther @superbreeze.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

BREAKING: Ed Sheeran to represent Piddington at Eurovision

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Institute of Physics @iop.org · 16/09/2026

Scotland recruited just 28 trainee physics teachers this year against a target of 131. Without action, shortages will continue to impact pupils, schools & future workforce. @iopscotland.bsky.social's new report calls for a 10-year plan focused on Retention, Recruitment & Retraining: bit.ly/4h3M2K0

bit.ly

Retaining, Recruiting, and Retraining Physics Teachers for Scotland’s Future

Read our report to see how the Scottish Government can get physics teaching in Scotland on a more sustainable footing.

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Eve Ettinger @eveettinger.com · 15/09/2026

someone is gonna give ed his ipad for screen time in a few hours and it is gonna be bad

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Lucien Heurtier @lucienheurtier.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

But also: "31% of the UK government's target number of physics teachers have been recruited" My take: this country desperately needs more physicists, or we can all forget about the UK being at the forefront of quantum/space/computing/engineering/finance/biophysics/...

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Lucien Heurtier @lucienheurtier.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Striking quotes and figures from an @IOP report this month 🧪🔭 "A quarter of state schools in England have no specialist physics teacher, while over half of physics lessons (...) are taught by teachers who never studied physics or a related subject beyond 18." 👇🏻

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The Empty City @davidallengreen.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

NEW Why holding a placard is a terrorist act, while causing disruption in a balaclava is not The mess caused by ministers and the police not taking terrorism law seriously By me at @prospectmagazine.co.uk www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/ideas/law/th...

Recent events in England now reveal the practical difference between terrorists and protesters. It would seem that terrorists peacefully hold placards and get immediately arrested, while protesters wear black uniforms and balaclavas and disrupt infrastructure and do not get arrested.

How did we get into this mess? How have we placed ourselves in the position where terrorism legislation is used to detain and prosecute peaceful protesters, while those adopting the terror tactics of private armies seem to be free to do as they wish?

The reason is that for some time British politicians have not taken terrorism legislation seriously, and that ministers have got into the habit of misusing terror laws for easy targets.

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EDI Caucus @edicaucus.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

"Black/ethnic minority researchers're less likely to receive £ & statistically tend to receive smaller £ than white researchers,” Oliver cont. “Longer, larger awards tend to go to older white men; prioritising such risks funnelling more towards that demographic, exacerbating existing inequalities”.

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Dr Áine O’Brien @aineclareob.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Thanks @sophieatrpn.bsky.social for covering this, glad to have had the chance to be heard (and remain so gutted we are losing the vital work of RPN)

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Dr Áine O’Brien @aineclareob.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

McDonald says having fewer grants should reduce uncertainty for postdocs?? In what way does having fewer grants, therefore presumably at fewer institutions, do this? Is it genuinely that it makes us more certain we won’t get a job next, or at least without moving to the golden triangle lol.

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Hardeep Matharu @hardeepmatharu.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

A criminal investigation is underway by Met Police into allegations Reform broke the law in relation to foreign funding, following a C4 broadcast involving James Orr. James Orr is Associate Professor of Philosophy of Religion at the Faculty of Divinity. Any media interest in hundreds of articles?

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John Oxley @joxley.jmoxley.co.uk · 09/09/2026

Also, why is this basically written up as "quirky crowd make an embarrassing mistake" and not "violent racists form mob because Asian people use hotel"?

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ESA Operations @operations.esa.int · 07/09/2026

Metre-sized meteoroid 2026 RW1 (previously known as CERNQ52) hit the ocean off NW Australia on Sunday afternoon - but the impact was forecast roughly six hours in advance, using ESA’s Meerkat automated system for predicting imminent impactors! neo.ssa.esa.int/imminent-imp...

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Andy Scollick @andyscollick.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

Thank you @gilltav.bsky.social for reminding us all of the Police response in 2021 👇 when some 40 environmental activists of Insulate Britain blocked the Port of Dover: 39 arrests. Compare that to yesterday when 200-400 fascist paramilitaries intimidated Dover town and blocked the Port: 0 arrests.

bbc.com

Port of Dover: Arrests made as Insulate Britain blocks port

Queues form at Europe's busiest ferry terminal as Insulate Britain shift their protest from the M25.

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Kamaljeet Gill @kamgill.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

The most influential poster on bluesky has real 'Best swimmer in the desert' vibes.

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Henry Mance @henrymance.ft.com · 03/09/2026

We are currently clean on OPSEC!

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Sunder Katwala (sundersays) @sundersays.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

I wonder what supporting actor role awards the Verbatim undercover reporters could be eligible for after this lengthy investigation in character

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It's Pipes, Mum! Pipes is here! @scriblit.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

Also since Orr is an academic at Cambridge who has actually been caught lying I look forward to the month of hounding on a deeply personal level and strokey chin pontificating about whether any white men should even get to be professors

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Jay Zedbee @jayzedbee.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

Channel 4 reporter: Hello. I am Mr. Alias and this is my extremely suspicious comically large donation that i can only make in the form of a bag of money with a dollar sign on it. every other reform guy: seems legit! let me tell you every single way in which i and my boss have broken the law

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Malcolm V Tucker @tuckerslaw.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

The term ‘marmalade dropper’ has improved my day immensely.

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Sunder Katwala (sundersays) @sundersays.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

"Nigel Farage's Home Affairs spokesperson is a Muslim with parents born in Sri Lanka. Can't you see what's happening yet?" would obviously be a despicable racist attack on Zia Yusuf - very close to his own racialised attack on the leader of Camden Council. It is made by some racist opponents of his.

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Astronomer Royal for Scotland | Catherine Heymans @astroroyalscot.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Incase you missed this last night .... thank you PM! This is an excellent start which I hope will lead to the reversal of the very damaging UKRI policy decisions that have resulted in countless first-class research projects facing significant funding cuts.

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Conor Fitzpatrick @fitzparticle.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

@andyburnham.bsky.social is doing the right thing here! Now that it has been shown the @ukri.org process was flawed, the rest of the cuts to STFC facilities, labs and projects are in question. There is so much more damage to UK-led science that needs to be addressed urgently.

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Astronomer Royal for Scotland | Catherine Heymans @astroroyalscot.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

MP now noting that the STFC cuts are disproportionately impacting the North...

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Dr Áine O’Brien @aineclareob.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

29 years ago I woke my parents up telling them the tv was broken because none of the cartoons were on

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elia ayoub @ayoub.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

900+ academics and others have so far defended this man on grounds of academic freedom. That’s how easy it was for them to support a openly racist man. They didn’t even bother to double check whether the racist happens to also be against academic freedom. Total surprise, he is.

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Dr Áine O’Brien @aineclareob.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

I had my entire opinion on this flipped on its head by @pjvogt.bsky.social interviewing a Blind man who struggles to get to work because taxi drivers don’t want to pick him up. open.spotify.com/episode/33fx...

open.spotify.com

The Trial of the Driverless Car

Search Engine · Episode

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Marie Le Conte @youngvulgarian.marieleconte.com · 25/08/2026

see you're going to read the headline and you're going to think "hmm, but how bad can it be" and then you're going to click on the link and go OH, OH QUITE BAD YEAH

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Riding With Robots @ridingrobots.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

From NASA: It happened again! Here's Phobos passing in front of the Sun as seen by the Perseverance rover from the surface of Mars on Aug. 12. science.nasa.gov/photojournal...

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Dr Holly Nielsen @hollynielsen.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Fucking hell this is shameful

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👻madeline bOoOoOoOodent👻 @oldenoughtosay.com · 23/08/2026

where’s that essay that the fascists really mean it. they really mean that they should be allowed to be racist. they really do think that academic freedom allows that.

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Aparna Nair @disabilitystor1.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

"yes, I might hold racist beliefs, but is it fair to call me a racist"

I’m an easy scapegoat because I hold views about race that are controversial and easily misunderstood. I argue that differences between ancestral populations aren’t entirely due to environmental forces, and that some group disparities stem from natural differences for which no one is to blame. I made a widely quoted statement: “Under a colorblind system that judged applicants only by academic qualifications, blacks would make up 0.7% of Harvard students.” That sentence has been cited repeatedly as evidence that I’m a racist.

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👻madeline bOoOoOoOodent👻 @oldenoughtosay.com · 15/08/2026

checking aside, even- look at how Cambridge handled Arday vs O'Reilly. They had choices here and they chose to feed Arday to the wolves. They aren't just complicit, they were active.

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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

Microsoft significantly reduced its CO₂ removal (CDR) purchases by 80% in the first half of 2026. Microsoft bought 93% of all CDR credits globally last year. This is absurd, and no way to determine which method might actually work and scale. CDR R&D should be government-funded and government-led.

seattletimes.com

Microsoft cuts purchases of carbon removals by 80% amid AI push

That puts Microsoft on track for its first retreat since 2023 from a market it entered in 2020.

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Alex Says Stuff @alexsaysstuff.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

It's so blazingly obvious that this is true. A university lecturer being fired for plagiarism would not be national news >99% of the time. It was inflated into one this time purely because it fit into racist "culture war" narratives about "DEI".

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Dr Áine O’Brien @aineclareob.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

Nice when an optics company sponsors your space conference that happens to coincide with an eclipse @zeiss-microscopy.bsky.social

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👻madeline bOoOoOoOodent👻 @oldenoughtosay.com · 08/08/2026

Listen, I am *aware* of this, because I too was 9 years old on 9/11, but tf do you mean somebody MY AGE is the entire MAYOR OF NEW YORK. i don't even know where my phone is right now how is he running the capital of the USA

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Michael Merrifield @astromikemerri.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

I am all for saving Jodrell Bank, but please don’t lose sight of the fact that it is simply the most visible manifestation of a much bigger problem, which isn’t solved if someone magically finds the money to keep it going, simply to shut people up. 🔭🧪

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Prof Jim Wild @jim-wild.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

Like many colleagues across our community, I’m dismayed by these cuts. The UK should be building on its scientific strengths, not retreating from them, especially as a new government and new science minister seek to define the country’s future ambitions.

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Dr Áine O’Brien @aineclareob.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

And here we are in another week of bleak stfc news

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Lucien Heurtier @lucienheurtier.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

What UKRI calls a "prioritisation exercise" is, in fact, a massive butchery. Don't trust their numbers (in particular the idea that PPAN is only cut by 2.7%...); they are hiding the sad reality: entire projects are defunded. Some are brutally cut. Science will suffer from it. So will the UK.🧪🔭

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Chris Lintott @chrislintott.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

Short-sighted, stupid cuts to the UKRI budget include shutting down Jodrell Bank, the icon of British astronomy. (Many other cuts too, including 20% to our brand new @vrubinobs.bsky.social). Interesting politically to shut down a major facility in...um..Manchester 🔭 www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

bbc.co.uk

Jodrell Bank's Lovell telescope faces axe in science cuts, BBC understands

Astronomers warn it would tear the heart out of UK science, and leave a generation untrained.

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