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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad

@babakvh.bsky.social
698 followers 676 following 21 posts

Incoming Assistant Professor, Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering at UC Berkeley Active soft matter, Fluid mechanics, Biophysics. scholar.google.de/citations?hl=en&u…

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Reposted by Babak Vajdi Hokmabad
Jörg Enderlein @joergenderlein.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Meta and X silenced dozens of LGBT+ groups the moment Türkiye's government asked – part of a crackdown where 110+ people now face legal action. Sign demanding they restore the accounts. a.allout.org/s/P8DJd/
a.allout.org
Meta and X: Stop blocking Turkish LGBT+ groups
Türkiye ordered Meta and X to block dozens of LGBT+ groups,Meta and X blocked dozens of Turkish LGBT+ groups the moment Türkiye asked – part of a crackdown where 110+ people now face legal action. Sign demanding they restore the accounts:
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Reposted by Babak Vajdi Hokmabad
Saverio E. Spagnolie @sespagnolie.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
CHAOTIC BUBBLEWHEEL says good morning, as it fights off your dark thoughts with its playfulness. It glides autonomously through distinct life stages for over an hour, as gas slowly escapes the environment, along the bifurcation diagram of the Lorenz system. (1/10) arxiv.org/abs/2608.17169
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Reposted by Babak Vajdi Hokmabad
Kirsty Wan @micromotility.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
What does a single-celled organism tell us about the origins of complex behaviour? Delighted to see the final version of our paper: Embodied behavioural complexity in a ciliated microorganism out in@natcomms.nature.com (Funded by @erc.europa.eu ERC) doi.org/10.1038/s414... #cilia #protistsonsky
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Mazi Jalaal @mazi1.bsky.social · 23/04/2026
Two open postdoctoral positions in my group at DAMTP, at University of Cambridge: Cell Biophysics & Biological Active Matter: www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/job/55046 Active & Intelligent Matter: www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/job/55141 Repost is much appreciated ! 🙏🏼 #Postdoc #CellBioPhysics #Robots #ActiveMatter
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 12/04/2026
- How do immotile microbes escape confinement? - They ferment, generate biogenic bubbles, and hitch a ride! 🫧 Very excited to release this work: lnkd.in/gwBEr3f7.
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Hanumantha Rao Vutukuri @raovutukuri.bsky.social · 10/04/2026
🔥Just out in @science.org Magazine 🔥 Our work on the emergent behavior of active polar rods is now online! www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... 🌟 Even more exciting: the work is featured on the cover
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The New York Times @nytimes.com · 27/02/2026
Students at universities around Iran have been staging campus protests calling for the government to be overthrown, in the country’s first large-scale demonstrations since a brutal state crackdown on nationwide dissent last month. Here’s what to know.
nyti.ms
Iran’s Students Are Protesting Again. Here’s Why.
The unrest underlines the intensity of domestic discontent, even as Tehran’s government grapples with the threat of U.S. strikes. Here’s what to know.
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 08/10/2025
Thank you, Saverio! It was a fun experiment, indeed, and there's so much more to explore :)
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 07/10/2025
Excited to see this paper out @pnas.org Microbial self-organization in response to self-made oxygen gradients! 🦠 🔄 🍥
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Katrina Velle @katrinavelle.bsky.social · 05/10/2025
PhD or Master's position available for Fall 2026! Interested in how actin drives cell crawling, eating, dividing, or osmoregulation? What about pathogenesis of a brain-eating amoeba? Or eukaryotic evolution? If so, apply through my website: katrinavelle.wixsite.com/science/cont... Please share!
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Kirsty Wan @micromotility.bsky.social · 06/08/2025
We have a postdoc opening for a protistologist with biophysics inclinations to join our @hfspo.bsky.social project! (focus will be on characterising the morphology, ultrastructure and behaviour of excavates) #protistsonsky Apply by Sept 17th (RTs appreciated!) jobs.exeter.ac.uk/hrpr_webrecr...
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 27/02/2025
Excited to release our latest work: doi.org/10.1101/2025... Here, we describe how confined bacterial suspensions self-organize into structured domains of different motilities, in response to oxygen limitations🦠🍥 Bluetorial follows! [1/8]
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Will Ratcliff @wcratcliff.bsky.social · 05/03/2025
1/46 Hey folks, we have a new paper out on the MuLTEE. Strap in and I’ll tell you the story of how this “little paper on polyploidy” turned into the most data rich paper our lab has produced, largely thanks to the leadership and work ethic of @kaitong25.bsky.social. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
Genome duplication in a long-term multicellularity evolution experiment - Nature
In the Multicellularity Long Term Evolution Experiment, diploid yeast evolve to be tetraploid under selection for larger multicellular size, revealing how whole-genome duplication can arise due to its...
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 27/02/2025
It was fun to uncover this story—bridging microbial physiology, biological pattern formation, & active matter physics. The results may even have implications for controlling microbes in applications. We'd love your feedback. Please report/share with whoever might be interested! [8/8]
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 27/02/2025
Many biological fluids are polymer solutions, whose viscoelasticity can enhance cell swimming and promote large-scale mixing. We showed that the core-shell organization also arises in polymer solutions, but with fascinating additional flow fluctuations. [7/8]
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 27/02/2025
We then developed a biophysical model describing this interplay quantitatively. The model recapitulates the experiments, and also yields criteria for predicting the different ways in which confined bacterial populations self-organize under different conditions. [6/8]
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 27/02/2025
Cells consume O2, creating a gradient that alters motility: (i) They move up the gradient toward the droplet boundary via aerotaxis, & (ii) They stop swimming in the anoxic droplet core and accumulate. These motility variations in turn reshape O2 fluxes. A feedback loop! [5/8]
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 27/02/2025
By simultaneously measuring cell distributions, oxygen concentration, and swimming-generated fluid flow, we figured out that this spatial organization is driven by the interplay between cell metabolism-generated oxygen gradients and collective motility. [4/8]
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 27/02/2025
Surprisingly, when the droplets are big and concentrated, the cells self-organize into a concentrated inner "core" of immotile cells surrounded by a more dilute outer "shell" of highly motile cells. (See movie in 1st tweet.) In some cases, the core shrinks and disappears. [3/8]
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 27/02/2025
Bacteria often inhabit confined spaces, such as biological tissues/gels & soils/sediments, where metabolites are scarce. What influence does confinement have on a population of motile bacteria? We addressed this question by studying quasi 2D droplets of swimming E. coli. [2/8]
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 27/02/2025
Excited to release our latest work: doi.org/10.1101/2025... Here, we describe how confined bacterial suspensions self-organize into structured domains of different motilities, in response to oxygen limitations🦠🍥 Bluetorial follows! [1/8]
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Fernando Rossine @fernpizza.bsky.social · 21/02/2025
I'm so happy that I can finally share the results of my first postdoc paper with @baym.lol!!! Turns out plasmids are an amazing system to study multi-scale evolution and we can track within-cell and between-cell dynamics! (1/n) www.biorxiv.org/content/earl...
biorxiv.org
Intracellular competition shapes plasmid population dynamics
Conflicts between levels of biological organization are central to evolution, from populations of multicellular organisms to selfish genetic elements in microbes. Plasmids are extrachromosomal, self-r...
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Reposted by Babak Vajdi Hokmabad
Antoine Deblais @antoinedeblais.bsky.social · 13/02/2025
The 🪱 mania continues! In our latest study, led by Rosa, we explored the locomotion and dynamics of living worms—acting as active polymers—navigating a porous environment made of 3D-printed pillar arrays. And we found something surprising...
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Ákos T Kovács @evolvedbiofilm.bsky.social · 13/02/2025
Spatial population dynamics of bacterial colonies with social antibiotic resistance #PNAS by @marlis.bsky.social and late Kevin B. Wood www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
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Alban Sauret @albansauret.bsky.social · 03/02/2025
Stickiness matters! From powder handling to geophysical flows, cohesion in granular material plays a crucial role. We review in Soft Matter @roysocchem.bsky.social experimental approaches to create and control inter-particle adhesion pubs.rsc.org/en/content/a...
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ᐯIᑕTOᖇ ᑎIᘔET, ᗰᗪ @nizet.bsky.social · 19/01/2025
🄱🄸🄾🄵🄸🄻🄼 🄱🄸🄾🄿🄷🅈🅂🄸🄲🅂 Fascinating work from Sebastian Gonzalez La Corte, Sujit Data, et al at CalTech on polymer-induced entropic attractions that hinder diffusion and lead bacteria to form long spaghetti-like cables within mucus and biofilms Paper in Science Advances: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
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Joel Marthelot @joelmarthelot.bsky.social · 11/12/2024
Fresh off the press, our work on wing deployment in Drosophila 🪰: www.nature.com/articles/s41... Work by: Simon Hadjaje, Ignacio Andrade-Silva, Marie-Julie Dalbe and Raphaël Clément
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Ars Technica @arstechnica.com · 03/12/2024
arstechnica.com
Vodka can propel tiny robots across the water
A popular science classroom demonstration could one day lead to applications in powering tiny robots.
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Can I please be added here?
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
This is a beautiful work Nico! Congrats!
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Maik Bischoff @maikbischoff.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
Starter Pack: Collective #CellMigration /Dynamics is growing. Looking at related emergent phenomena eg. #intercallation, dorsal closure or branching #morphogenesis? Reach out! Also modelers, soft-matter physicists & YOUNG scientists etc etc! go.bsky.app/DLUDYX3 #cellbio #SoftMatterPhysics #science
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Can I please be added here?
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Can I please be added here?
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Can I please be added here?
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Can I please be added here?
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Yeah, right 😅
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Reposted by Babak Vajdi Hokmabad
Nico Schramma @nicoschramma.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
💥Beyond happy 💥 Our work is now published in PNAS! www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... With Gloria Canales & @mazi1.bsky.social we studied how the single celled alga Pyrocystis lunula 🌙 move their chloroplast in response to strong light. Get ready for some fun mechanics, signals and organelle motion! 🧵
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Can I be added please? Thank you!
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Saverio E. Spagnolie @sespagnolie.bsky.social · 20/11/2024
Deformable bodies relaxing in a nematic liquid crystal. (I settled on Paraview!) I want to eat them. A review of 'Rigid and deformable bodies in nematic liquid crystals', with the amazing Tom Chandler, is out today in Phys. Rev. Fluids. @apsphysics.bsky.social 🧪⚛️ journals.aps.org/prfluids/abs...
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Yahya Modarres-Sadeghi @thefsilab.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
Hello Bluesky! I will post about what we do in my lab on Fluid-Structure Interactions, Fluid Mechanics, Flow Visualizations, and Nonlinear Dynamics. www.umass.edu/fsi/index.html
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Anu Sharma @anu-sharma.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
Do you feel stressed? Is it one thing or a combination? Turns out bacteria can’t handle stress either! Excited to share my first first author paper out now in @currentbiology.bsky.social! Combining multiple stressors blocks bacterial migration and growth! www.cell.com/current-biol...
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The New York Times @nytimes.com · 06/10/2023
Narges Mohammadi, an Iranian activist who is serving a 10-year sentence in Tehran, was awarded the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize on Friday “for her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all.” nyti.ms/3Q6O3sL
Narges Mohammadi, an Iranian activist who is serving a 10-year sentence in Tehran, was named as the recipient of the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize on Friday “for her fight against the oppression of women in Iran and her fight to promote human rights and freedom for all.”
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Katrina Velle @katrinavelle.bsky.social · 07/10/2023
7/ #31nightsofhalloween #microscreepy Gummy worms! ... or the tracks of cells before (green) vs after (orange) being squashed to a 5 micron ceiling. They tend to crawl faster when squished. Circles are the pillars holding up the ceiling.
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 13/09/2023
We had a lot of fun doing this experiment! amoebae in a microgel ball pit!
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Ákos T Kovács @evolvedbiofilm.bsky.social · 02/09/2023
The non-attached biofilm aggregate CommsBio Review by Kasper Kragh, Tim-Tolker Nielsen and Mads Lichtenberg www.nature.com/articles/s42...
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Babak Vajdi Hokmabad @babakvh.bsky.social · 23/08/2023
Excited to share our latest work on the captivating "Interfacial activity dynamics of confined active droplets" now published at Journal of Fluid Mechanics www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
cambridge.org
Interfacial activity dynamics of confined active droplets | Journal of Fluid Mechanics | Cambridge C...
Interfacial activity dynamics of confined active droplets - Volume 966
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