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Andy Hickl

@andyhickl.bsky.social
923 followers 1.6K following 1.8K posts

CTO, AllenInstitute.org. Advisor, Fathom.org. He/him. Working at intersection of AI and biology.

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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 28/04/2025
Time to try something new.
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Stand Up for Science! @standupforscience.net · 12/02/2025
Welcome to the Bluesky account for Stand Up for Science 2025! Keep an eye on this space for updates, event information, and ways to get involved. We can't wait to see everyone #standupforscience2025 on March 7th, both in DC and locations nationwide! #scienceforall #sciencenotsilence
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Sarah Hörst @planetdr.bsky.social · 18/02/2025
Professors please pull up a chair. I’ve been talking to my classes about what has been going on. I explained indirect costs to them. I talked to them about what a probationary employee is in the government. At the end of class they asked if we could talk about it more. (1/)
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 18/02/2025
We’re #hiring a Director for Studio D3, our center for data-driven discovery at the @alleninstitute.bsky.social. 🧪 www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/41...
linkedin.com
Allen Institute hiring Director, Center for Data Driven Discovery in Seattle, WA | LinkedIn
Posted 3:19:54 PM. Director, Center for Data-Driven Discovery The mission of the Allen Institute is to understand…See this and similar jobs on LinkedIn.
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 15/02/2025
Mental health treatments should be guided by science, not misinformation. With 13% of American adults relying on SSRIs to manage depression and anxiety, the new HHS Secretary’s unscientific claims about these medications are cause for outrage 🧪 www.motherjones.com/politics/202...
motherjones.com
RFK Jr. is already taking aim at antidepressants
The new HHS secretary has made baseless claims that the drugs are addictive and cause violent behavior.
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Reposted by Andy Hickl
Tim Mosca (he/him) @drosophilosophy.bsky.social · 07/02/2025
Oh. My. God. grants.nih.gov/grants/guide...
grants.nih.gov
NOT-OD-25-068: Supplemental Guidance to the 2024 NIH Grants Policy Statement: Indirect Cost Rates
NIH Funding Opportunities and Notices in the NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts: Supplemental Guidance to the 2024 NIH Grants Policy Statement: Indirect Cost Rates NOT-OD-25-068. OD
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 06/02/2025
Seeing a lot of hype about AI models trained for “under $50.” Let’s be real—these models are distilled from much larger models trained with massive resources. Distillation is useful, but calling it “cheap training” seems misleading. What am I missing? www.theverge.com/news/607341/...
theverge.com
Researchers trained an OpenAI rival in half an hour for less than $50
Doing a DeepSeek.
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 06/02/2025
Aptly put: Tom Frieden, a former CDC director, compared the halting of outbreak updates to “finding out that your local fire department has been told not to sound any fire alarms”. www.ft.com/content/6067...
ft.com
US scientists must resist Trump’s efforts to tear down research
It is misguided for academics to pre-emptively self-censor, tempting though that may seem
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 05/02/2025
When the Trump administration took a key climate justice tool offline, a coalition of data scientist heroes restored it within 48 hours. 🧪 www.ehn.org/scientists-r...
ehn.org
Scientists restore climate justice data tool after Trump administration took it offline
When the Trump administration deleted a key climate justice tool, a group of data scientists raced to bring it back online — restoring access in under 48 hours.Anika Jane Beamer reports for Inside Cli...
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 05/02/2025
What AI should exist — but doesn’t yet — to transform biology? The Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group has launched the Ask Anything, Change Everything campaign to gather bold ideas on how AI can revolutionize our understanding of fundamental biology. alleninstitute.org/ask-anything...
alleninstitute.org
Ask Anything Change Everything
Submissions are open for ideas of how artificial intelligence (AI) could unlock discoveries that advance our knowledge of fundamental biology.
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 02/01/2025
Aviary from FutureHouse provides a new framework for training language agents on real-world scientific challenges, including protein stability, DNA engineering, and literature-based question answering. 🧪 arxiv.org/pdf/2412.21154
arxiv.org
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 25/12/2024
Merry Christmas (to those who celebrate) Photo credit: Grok
The Mandalorian and Grogu celebrating Christmas from an AI image generator
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Reposted by Andy Hickl
Laura McKnight @lauramcknight.bsky.social · 23/12/2024
Inside me are two wolves: one wants to make cinnamon rolls from scratch and the other doesn't want to go to the grocery store Okay they're not wolves more like sloths
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Todd A. Carpenter @9thprime.bsky.social · 25/11/2024
The Allen Institute and the University of Washington have released a new AI search tool to answer scientific queries of OpenAccess content Preprint released in @arxiv-cs-cl.bsky.social OpenScholar: Synthesizing Scientific Literature with Retrieval-augmented LMs arxiv.org/abs/2411.14199
arxiv.org
OpenScholar: Synthesizing Scientific Literature with Retrieval-augmented LMs
Scientific progress depends on researchers' ability to synthesize the growing body of literature. Can large language models (LMs) assist scientists in this task? We introduce OpenScholar, a specialize...
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Reposted by Andy Hickl
allen institute @alleninstitute.org · 12/12/2024
Meet ACE - a new tool for comparing annotations across Allen Institute transcriptomic taxonomies! Join us for a webinar on how to use it in your #neuroscience research, incl. studies using our Alzheimer's datasets. 📆 Dec. 18, 9:30am PT 💻 Webinar 🎟️ alleninstitute.org/events/cell_... #neuroskyence
alleninstitute.org
Cell Type Taxonomies A-Z: Webinar Series
Webinar series covering everything and anything cell types starting in January 2024. Hosted by the Allen Institute.
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Ben Pedigo @bdpedigo.bsky.social · 16/12/2024
alleninstitute.org/careers/inte... Internships and Postbac opportunities open at the Allen Institute, applications close January 7th 2025. Great opportunity for anyone interested in life sciences research or science-support careers. Spread the word!
alleninstitute.org
Internship & Postbaccalaureate Programs
Students and early-career professionals in lab research, biology, neuroscience, immunology, and others should apply for our internships and fellowships.
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 24/12/2024
Cool Yule read: this article highlights how behavioral diversity in artificial intelligence “teams” can significantly enhance problem-solving & adaptability, something that could change how we approach challenges in (AI) research. 🧪 arxiv.org/abs/2412.16244
arxiv.org
Neural diversity is key to collective artificial learning
Many of the world's most pressing issues, such as climate change and global peace, require complex collective problem-solving skills. Recent studies indicate that diversity in individuals' behaviors i...
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 20/12/2024
Whoa: 9 sea snake species have regained the genetic requirements for advanced color vision, showing that complex traits lost to evolution can be regained. phys.org/news/2024-12...
phys.org
Sea snakes regain advanced color vision, recovering a complex trait once lost to evolutionary time
Nine species of sea snakes have now been identified as having regained the genetic requirements for advanced color vision, demonstrating that once a complex trait has been lost to evolutionary time, i...
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 28/11/2024
I’m so stealing this idea. Such a cool way to ensure #deib is built into a team’s mindset. Thanks for sharing, @sarahstern.bsky.social
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 28/11/2024
The Washington Post nails it: AI is transforming healthcare, from diagnostics to personalized treatments. 2025 will be the year of AI in life sciences—thoughtful integration is critical. 🧪 Read more: www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...
washingtonpost.com
Opinion | This year, be thankful for AI in medicine
The technology is making health care more accurate and less expensive.
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 28/11/2024
🧪Abhishaike Mahajan examines Recursion’s shift from cell painting to brightfield microscopy. The piece highlights how #ml has unlocked brightfield imaging as a label-free alternative, addressing challenges of cell painting. A must-read: www.owlposting.com/p/why-recurs...
owlposting.com
Why Recursion Pharmaceuticals abandoned cell painting for brightfield imaging
5.7k words, 26 minutes reading time
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
I used to spend about half my time thinking about ways we can better understand how to use AI in #biology — but increasingly, I’m worried about how about how we scale platforms to cope with data volumes 🧪🧵
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
Predicting the results of experiments is challenging, especially in fields like neuroscience. This recent study shows that fine-tuned LLMs, like BrainGPT, can predict neuroscience results more accurately than human experts on benchmarks. 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/s41562-024-…
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 26/11/2024
@jshendure.bsky.social and team continually blow me away
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 26/11/2024
Moravec’s Paradox is such a fascinating concept: today’s AI can tackle complex tasks like reasoning or drug discovery—things that push human limits. But it still struggles with what humans find simple, like picking up a coffee cup. Biology & AI remind us how differently intelligence can evolve. 🧪
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 26/11/2024
This is a great fellowship for any postdoc who wants to work with #neuro data in a nurturing environment at @alleninstitute.bsky.social. Deadline is approaching!
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 26/11/2024
This is the best take on the potential of predictive biology I’ve come across 🧪 open.substack.com/pub/creode/p...
open.substack.com
Predictive biology
An emergent epistemology
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Reposted by Andy Hickl
Ted Underwood @tedunderwood.com · 24/11/2024
Tom suggests replacing the logic of prereg -> confirmation with the logic of train/validation/test splits. The place this approach is really, really needed is in historical data — where we can never get another equivalent sample! Our ordinary understanding of replication is broken there.
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 23/11/2024
I ran nearly 8,900 of my tweets through ChatGPT to analyze patterns in my digital footprint. It revealed insights into my political affiliation, career history, and personal life. Here’s what I learned. 🧵🤖
A word cloud of words used in my tweets
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 23/11/2024
I like this article, despite its clickbaity title — largely because there’s stuff for us to do as regular scientists 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/d41...
nature.com
AI could pose pandemic-scale biosecurity risks. Here’s how to make it safer
AI-enabled research might cause immense harm if it is used to design pathogens with worrying new properties. To prevent this, we need better collaboration between governments, AI developers and expert...
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 23/11/2024
Framing AI as a threat to human agency oversimplifies its role and potential. We need to focus on how AI can complement human decision-making — especially in fields like life sciences, where it’s accelerating discoveries 🧪 www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...
journals.uchicago.edu
How Might Artificial Intelligence Influence Human Evolution? | The Quarterly Review of Biology: Vol 99, No 4
Abstract As artificial intelligence (AI) becomes more common and sophisticated, its effects on human lives and societies are attracting considerable attention. The question of how these new technologi...
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
This idea is still good
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Pew’s latest report on public trust in scientists is a must-read: Public Trust in Scientists and Views on Their Role in Policymaking. Trust is strong, but transparency and inclusivity are key to keeping it. 🧪🧵 www.pewresearch.org/science/2024...
pewresearch.org
Public Trust in Scientists and Views on Their Role in Policymaking
Americans’ trust in scientists is slightly higher than it was last year, but remains lower than before the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Been away for a few days; big storm knocked out power and Internet at home. Won’t be restored til Sunday. Sigh…
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
I’m finding myself thinking more and more about how we can continue to advance state of the art in science despite a funding climate that is likely to change 🧪🧵 www.instagram.com/p/DCUUYoBuiS...
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🌈Dr. Frizzle @swilua.bsky.social · 17/11/2024
The first known use of singular “they” is so old that not only does it pre-date singular “you,” it wasn’t even spelled with a “th” When William and the Werewolf, in 1375 CE, used singular “they,” it was spelled with a Thorn
The excerpt from William and the Werewolf showing singular they spelled with a Thorn
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 17/11/2024
This is cool: Boltz-1 by the MIT Jameel Clinic supports biomolecular interaction modeling, offering an open-source tool that matches the accuracy of leading proprietary models 🧪
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 17/11/2024
Work (or play) with multimodal data from thousands of cells across three species using the Cell Type Knowledge Explorer from @alleninstitute.bsky.social knowledge.brain-map.org/celltypes 🧪
knowledge.brain-map.org
Brain Knowledge Platform
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 17/11/2024
Dan Goodwin and @homeworld.bsky.social get it — fabulous and wide-ranging conversation with George Church
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 16/11/2024
Froyo good. (Science still good, if you are wondering…)
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 16/11/2024
This would be much more fun to read if the stakes weren’t so high techcrunch.com/2024/11/15/o...
techcrunch.com
OpenAI's tumultuous early years revealed in emails from Musk, Altman, and others | TechCrunch
A lawsuit by the world's wealthiest man against one of the fastest growing companies of all time is necessarily interesting stuff. But while the
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 16/11/2024
No surprise: AI in genome studies is running into problems like biases and false positives, often due to incomplete or unbalanced datasets. So, what can be done? 🧪🧵 www.the-scientist.com/ai-assisted-...
the-scientist.com
AI-Assisted Genome Studies Are Riddled with Errors
Researchers used artificial intelligence in large genomics studies to fill in gaps in patient information and improve predictions, but new research uncovers false positives and misleading correlations...
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 16/11/2024
spot on: “If we can’t simulate the whole dynamic process in a computer, we have to experiment with it in reality. This is Amdahl’s Law: a process is only as fast as its slowest required step. To break through, we need to solve fundamental wet lab bottlenecks, not just improve code.” bit.ly/3CGMb5t 🧪
bit.ly
🔮 The Sunday edition #499: Biology’s bottlenecks; scaling economics; talent divides; human rhythms; interface futures & organ ageing ++
An insider’s guide to AI and exponential technologies
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 16/11/2024
Having flashbacks to the Biden debates
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
What I’m reading: RNA-GPT aligns RNA sequences with natural language for better research insights. Wonder if it can generalize well across diverse RNA types and tasks? 🧪 arxiv.org/abs/2411.08900
arxiv.org
RNA-GPT: Multimodal Generative System for RNA Sequence Understanding
RNAs are essential molecules that carry genetic information vital for life, with profound implications for drug development and biotechnology. Despite this importance, RNA research is often hindered b...
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
I wouldn’t be surprised if this post was written by an AI agent dreaming of one day ”going rogue” metr.org/blog/2024-11...
metr.org
The Rogue Replication Threat Model
Thoughts on how AI agents might develop large and resilient rogue populations.
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
My best received thread was me responding to @scrippsocean.bsky.social who profoundly posted “science good”. It is indeed good.
Science good
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
This is hard to hear. A lot more cuts to Federal science funding are likely in the offing. We need to find new/better/more ways to drive interdisciplinary collaboration and cooperation in science 🧪
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 14/11/2024
Science needs Englebart’s notion of IA (intelligence augmentation) as opposed to McCarthy’s AI — don’t tell me an answer, help me find answers that I wouldn’t have thought of myself 🧪
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Andy Hickl @andyhickl.bsky.social · 14/11/2024
#TeamScience is one of our core tenets at @alleninstitute.bsky.social, but sometimes it’s hard for humans to break through prejudices/pride related to disciplines. Important to remember that **no one is “science adjacent”** (not finance, admin, or any other role)
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