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Brandt Gaches

@brandt-gaches.space
113 followers 168 following 133 posts

Disabled astronomer/astrochemist. Emmy Noether group leader @ University of Duisburg-Essen.

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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 28/09/2026
I'm happy to announce that I will be starting as an associate editor for Astronomy & Astrophysics (@aanda-journal.bsky.social )! I will primarily be covering the fields of the interstellar medium and circumstellar medium. I'm excited to start this new role in science!! www.aanda.org/about-aa/edi...
aanda.org
Astronomy & Astrophysics (A&A)
Astronomy & Astrophysics (A&A) is an international journal which publishes papers on all aspects of astronomy and astrophysics
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 25/09/2026
I decided to finally modernize old heritage Python scripts I have into one package for protostar clusters: OcotilloPMF! Ocotillo allows the user to both sample masses from a protostellar mass function and generate synthetic clusters spatially. github.com/AstroBrandt/...
github.com
GitHub - AstroBrandt/OcotilloPMF: Python package for sampling steady-state clusters of protostars.
Python package for sampling steady-state clusters of protostars. - AstroBrandt/OcotilloPMF
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 18/09/2026
*Job hire announcement*: I'm hiring a postdoc in my group! The postdoc will work on a project to use molecular dynamics to build the first atomistic view of the chemistry of icy grains following heavy-ion impact. Ad: www.uni-due.de/karriere/ste... Deadline: Nov 15, 2026 Start: Mar 1, 2027
uni-due.de
Stellenausschreibung
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 04/09/2026
Also, the universities that kowtow to the Trump administration always inevitably see it come back to haunt them anyway. Placating the administration does nothing but signal that they can keep pushing and pushing and doing whatever they want.
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 04/09/2026
Two weeks now since my @github.com account was randomly suspended without any information (repositories were just astrophysics research code bases). Still no communication or anything from them. The plan was to host my database on GitHub for long term stability - not sure if that is ethical now...
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 02/09/2026
Finally finished the Dungeon Crawler Carl collection! Took some time to get the English hard cover first book here. And then found out that there are two different English editions sold here: one from US and one from UK that are slightly different sizes and different cover styles/textures...
Book set of the Dungeon Crawler Carl series on a shelf
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 26/08/2026
Still one of the best movies of my childhood. Certainly helped that it seemed like Tim Curry just viewed himself as another muppet.
static.klipy.com
Tim Curry as Long John Silver, Professional Pirate
ALT: Tim Curry as Long John Silver, Professional Pirate
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 25/08/2026
Last Friday, I tried to open a @github.com page I made for a conference of a 3D volume rendering, only to find out my account was randomly and without notice suspended. (I suspect a bot auto-flagged the plotly file due to the timing?) After filing tickets to try to get communication, they had 1/
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 14/08/2026
#Astronomy /Astrochemistry paper time! We built the first 3D Orion Bar-like photo-dissociation region model, resolving the relevant transitions, including full H2 level populations: arxiv.org/abs/2608.04116 I also made a fun data vis explorer for it: astrobrandt.github.io/3DPDROrionBa... #astrosci
arxiv.org
Resolving dense photo-dissociation regions: the structure of photochemical fronts in three-dimensional gas distributions
For decades, the Orion Bar has been the prototypical photo-dissociation region. Viewed nearly edge-on, it offers a unique window into the stratified chemical structure of the atomic-to-molecular trans...
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 01/08/2026
Heading to COSPAR next week in Florence, and the weather does...not excite me. Nearly 40C every day! Hopefully the venue and my hotel have working AC...
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 17/07/2026
The worst part about changing the morning alarm sound to Sam Reich singing the "Count the Rice" song from this past week's Game Changer on @dropout.tv is having to wait until the morning for the reaction. The best part is the "Really?!" after the realization hits first thing in the morning.
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National Radio Astronomy Observatory - NSF NRAO @thenrao.bsky.social · 01/07/2026
News You May Have Missed ⤵️ 3I/ATLAS Contains 30X More Semi-Heavy Water Than Comets In Our Solar System ALMA reveals interstellar comet’s home star system formed under far colder conditions than our own #RadioAstronomy #Astronomy #3iatlas #ALMA
public.nrao.edu
3I/ATLAS Contains 30X More Semi-Heavy Water Than Comets In Our Solar System - National Radio Astronomy Observatory
The latest news from the NSF's National Radio Astronomy Observatory.
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 01/07/2026
Dropout's Game changer this season has been the best type of unhinged!
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 01/07/2026
July is #disability Pride Month worldwide. As I progress more into my academic career, I notice time and time again that many institutions usually will only do what is minimally legally required for accessibility, and minimally regard disability in terms of diversity. 1/
The disability pride flag. A charcoal grey flag bisected diagonally from the top left corner to the lower right right corner by five parallel stripes in red, pale gold, pale grey, light blue, and green
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 29/06/2026
Have to hand it to Paraguay: as much as Germany is pushing heavily offensively, they've held up a pretty good defense!
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 24/06/2026
BlueSky #coffee people: a recent fire that impacted my flat caused too much smoke damage to my Timemore C2 grinder! So, I have to look for a replacement. Does anyone have any good recommendations for solid manual (or electric) grinders for filter strength? (There is, of course, just the C3...)
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 16/06/2026
We had a car fire outside our house, impacting our flat this morning. I learned through this that a Mercedes hearse burns hot enough to melt/incinerate an aluminum bike, but not melt steel. The picture of our garage next to the car shows this - two ash piles from bikes in the metal garage!
Photo showing a garage destroyed by a fire, with two piles corresponding to bikes that were totally destroyed, and a metal frame of a cart.
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 31/05/2026
Astronomy has a number of cursed units and conventions. While on my parental leave time, the lack of good sleep time has brought me to these new cursed units: 1 parmilliarcsec (pmc) = 1 kpc 1 parmin (pn) ~ 3438 AU 1 pardeg (pg) ~ 57 AU 1 parrad (pd) ~ 0.6421 AU Maybe this is why one needs sleep?
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Jonathan O'Callaghan @astrojonny.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
A nice paper by @asborlaff.bsky.social showing that launching telescopes to space doesn't necessarily solve the light pollution issue from satellites. These are satellite trails seen by NASA's SPHEREx space telescope, which appear in 73% of all its images. Eek. arxiv.org/abs/2605.27501
Satellite trails seen by NASA SPHEREx telescope
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Linn Boldt-Christmas @nplinnspace.bsky.social · 07/05/2026
🔭 A cautionary tale for undergrads (and above!) using AI for #astro plots: our BSc student wanted to make a "quick" HR diagram showcasing M-dwarfs & thought some chatbot could make one and... well... ...extra credits are now offered to students who can correctly find all errors on cursedHR.png 🫠 🧪
A pathetic attempt by AI sloppery to make a HR diagram, generated by one of our BSc student, and shared here with their permission. Honestly, I can't even begin to explain all the deviations. Imagine a normal HR diagram but one that appears to you in a fever dream. It gets so much worse the longer you look at it. WHY IS THIS ALLOWED TO EXIST AAAAA
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 07/05/2026
It makes me quite depressed when I see a paper whose abstract looks interesting and I load up the PDF and the introduction was clearly written by an AI model . Complete with garbage or weird citations and all! Especially when I see that even the methods section seems to be written by an AI model...
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 07/05/2026
This week I had another horrifying experience with the SOCIALIST healthcare system in Germany! I needed new crutches for long term use. It took me 6 days to get my appointment (sure 2 were the weekend and 1 was a holiday, LAZY!!). They had the audacity to charge 5€ for them! For SHAME! (!sarcasm!)
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 01/05/2026
It took me way longer than I care to admit, but I figured out how to get the journal style of DOI links in bibliographies in #typst. A combination of weird, janky hacks into the csl and regex matching in the template, but it seems to work! (The templates will be public if/when I get the ok!)
Example bibliography section of a Typst template showing links for the journal section of the reference that point to the DOI if it exists
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 30/04/2026
Two HPC clusters in separate countries sent emails today saying they have to disable login access due to security vulnerabilities...
media.tenor.com
a close up of homer simpson 's face with a beard
ALT: a close up of homer simpson 's face with a beard
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 24/04/2026
The award for the most bizarre #coffee I've had yet now goes to this coffee from Concept. It actually smells of strawberry, which is a very bizarre experience. However, it is also one of the best coffees I've had in my office! Sadly, this one was a limited run, so I can't get it again!
A picture from Kofio for the container of the coffee concept of LOVE from Concept coffee roasters. Shows the tasting notes of vanilla, white chocolate, strawberries, chocolate-covered cherries, and amaretto. The container is a dark brown cylinder with a screw on top and a pink middle band saying "filter roast, concept of love".
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 01/04/2026
"Humanity's next great voyage begins" - from the broadcast
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 01/04/2026
1 minute!!
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 01/04/2026
10 minutes until launch! www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tf_U...
youtube.com
NASA's Artemis II Crew Launches To The Moon (Official Broadcast)
YouTube video by NASA
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 24/03/2026
All that can be said about the announcement can be summarized as follows...
media.tenor.com
elmo and kermit from sesame street are standing next to each other and kissing .
ALT: elmo and kermit from sesame street are standing next to each other and kissing .
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Randall Munroe @xkcd.com · 23/03/2026
Star Formation xkcd.com/3222/
4-panel comic. (1) [Glowing black dot surrounded by clouds.] DOT: I think I did a good job with this universe. Pressure waves dance through gas clouds. They clump together and then pressure pushes them apart. (2) [Some of the clouds are clumping together.] DOT: Oh weird, that big clump of clouds is staying together. Their gravity is overcoming the pressure and more gas is falling in. (3) [More clouds are sucked in.] DOT: It’s not stopping! The heat is rising but the collapse is only accelerating! I messed up. I messed up *bad*. (4) [The clump has become a shining star.] DOT: NOOOOOOOO!!! My beautiful clouds! Ruined! It’s all ruined!
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Dr. Emily Gilbert @emdwarf.bsky.social · 23/03/2026
Reminder! Just over one week left to apply to come to IPAC as a visiting graduate student! www.ipac.caltech.edu/page/graduat... We've got lots of great potential projects, including one option working with me and Aurora Kesseli on Pandora data! Click the link for more info and projects!
ipac.caltech.edu
2027 IPAC Visiting Graduate Student Research Fellowship
IPAC at Caltech partners with NASA, NSF, JPL and the world-wide research community to advance exploration of our Universe.
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dame @dame.is · 20/03/2026
if you can afford it, you should start using @kagi.com, it’s 100% worth the cost to 1) not see ads, 2) not see unwanted AI summaries, and 3) not see what other batshit stuff Google keeps doing like this
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Randall Munroe @xkcd.com · 19/03/2026
Landscape Features xkcd.com/3221/
Comic. [Small panel overlaying large panel.] PERSON 1: What’s up with this weird landscape? PERSON 2 with ponytail: Oh, it was caused by… [Large panel is map of the United States with with red overlays denoting landscape phenomena. Mega-floods in the northwest, a plate tectonics speedrun on the west coast, volcanoes next to the west coast, water and time in the southwest, geology in the west, a supervolcano within the west, glaciers in the north, farming in the middle, rivers in the mideast, geology in between rivers and farming, ??? toward the northeast, farming on the east coast, continents colliding next to the east coast, ongoing disputes between limestone and water in the south of Florida, volcanoes in Hawaii, geology in Alaska with volcanoes and glaciers below.]
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 20/03/2026
Apparently, arXiv has been looking into adding support for @typst.app! I had idle hands during a day off, so I wrote up a template for the Open Journal @ojastro.bsky.social that is fairly complete with features (see image). It can actually do a bit more than the LaTeX template, from Typst!
Screenshot of a new Typst template for the Open Journal of Astrophysics, highlighting the title block, abstract, and section headings.
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 13/03/2026
German is filled with wonderful compound words, like Handschuh (hand + shoe = glove) and Bahnhof, composed from Bahn + hoffen, to mean a place you go to hope your train arrives. And yes, me learning German means I can start to make bad jokes in both languages!
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 10/03/2026
Reducing radio interferometer data for the first time. It makes my mind wander to cursed thoughts, such as convenient but cursed units. We use SI sometimes and abandon it other times, like km/s but also Msun/yr! But scaling Msun/Myr makes some things cleaner! Or how 1 pc/Myr ~ 0.98 km/s, hm neat! 🫪
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 13/02/2026
I've been playing around exploring @typst.app quite a bit. It's been quite interesting to see how different it is from LaTeX, but I have definitely found it much easier to make what I want. I decided to remake a recent A&A paper I wrote, with a full template, and it came out pretty darn close!
Typst version of the Gaches 2020 A&A Letter paper "An analytic formalism to describe the Neff(H)-nH relationship in molecular clouds"
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Universität Duisburg-Essen @unidue.bsky.social · 04/02/2026
In kosmischen Dunkelwolken bestimmt Strahlung die Chemie des Gases. Ein internationales Team konnte das erstmals direkt messen. Modelle kamen von @brandt-gaches.space. Veröffentlicht @natastron.nature.com. www.uni-due.de/2026-02-03-i... 📸 ESO, CC BY 4.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/...)
Farbkomposit aus Aufnahmen der Dunkelwolke Barnard 68 im sichtbaren Licht und im nahen Infrarot, die mit dem 8,2-m VLT-Teleskop ANTU und dem FORS1-Instrument im März 1999 entstanden sind. In diesem Wellenlängenbereich ist die kleine Wolke vollständig undurchsichtig, da die Staubteilchen in ihrem Inneren das Licht weiter entfernt liegender Sterne verdunkeln. Text: Forschende messen erstmals Ionisation in Dunkelwolke. Kosmische Strahlung sichtbar gemacht.
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Universität Duisburg-Essen @unidue.bsky.social · 04/02/2026
In cosmic dark clouds, radiation determines the chemistry of the gas. An internat. team was able to measure this directly for the first time. Models were provided by @brandt-gaches.space. www.uni-due.de/2026-02-03-f... @natastron.nature.com 📸 ESO, CC BY 4.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/...)
Colour composite of visible and near-infrared images of the dark cloud Barnard 68. It was obtained with the 8.2-m VLT ANTU telescope and the multimode FORS1 instrument in March 1999. At these wavelengths, the small cloud is completely opaque because of the obscuring effect of dust particles in its interior. Text: Researchers Measure Ionisationin Dark Cloud for the First Time. Cosmic Radiation Brought to Light.
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 26/01/2026
Deadline is at the end of the week! This will be a fantastic conference for those interested in star formation and the interstellar medium, at a beautiful venue in view of Mount Olympus!
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Space Telescope Science Institute @stsci.edu · 16/01/2026
Did you know that processing a #NASAWebb image from data to finish can take anywhere from four hours to two months depending on the complexity of the observation? Check out all the details about how the images are made at STScI: go.nasa.gov/4pi2Rny
Three-part image shows an almost completely black image at left. At center is a black-and-white image of the Pillars of Creation. At right is a full-color composite of the Pillars of Creation. The third image has crisp layers of semi-opaque rusty red colored gas and dust that starts at the bottom left and goes toward the top right. There are three prominent pillars rising toward the top right. The left pillar is the largest and widest. The peaks of the second and third pillars are set off in darker shades of brown and have red outlines. These details are mostly clear in the second image, but only appear in black and white.
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 04/01/2026
One of the weirdest emails I received recently was from an AI company - cold emailing me to advertise a new AI paper reviewing system. They dumbly decided the best approach was to attach "AI referee comments" for my recent review article. But it was all just plain garbage.
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 04/01/2026
For all my fellow #astronomers studying the ISM and star formation! Only a few more weeks until the talk abstract deadline for the Olympian Symposium 2026 (Jan 30). We have an amazing set of invited speakers and a great beachfront venue! Submit and register online: olympiansymposium.org
Conference poster for the Olympian Symposium 2026: The Evolution of Interstellar Medium Across Cosmic Times. Conference dates are May 18 - 22, 2026. Location: Paralia Katerini, Greece. Conference deadline Jan 30, 2026.
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 13/12/2025
The #astrochemistry review I wrote with my colleague, Serena Viti, has now been accepted by ACS Space and Earth Chemistry! We review ISM high-energy astrochemistry (X-ray and cosmic ray) and present a unifying definition of "high-energy astrochemistry" #astronomy #astrosci arxiv.org/abs/2512.10060
Image abstract for the review article "High-energy astrochemistry in the molecular interstellar medium." The image has two halves. One the left side it shows the gas-phase chemistry response to cosmic rays and X-rays, including the production of ions such as H2+, H3+, HCO+ and N2H+. On the right side is the ice-chemistry response showing production of complex prebotic molecules, including formamide and glycine by radical-radical reactions. The top left and top right show thumbnail images of a radio telescope and the James Webb Space Telescope. Bottom caption reads "Enegetic radiation processes in the molecular interstellar medium."
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 03/10/2025
It was recently international #coffee day! As everyone knows, coffee fuels science! For fun, I recently decided to add to my group page also what coffees I currently have! I found a really great whiskey-barrel aged coffee, but it makes it smell like I'm having routine morning irish coffees...
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Science Explorer (SciX) @scixcommunity.bsky.social · 29/09/2025
We have lift-off! Science Explorer, or #SciX to its friends, is excited to be your new home for open, connected, and trustworthy science. Explore. Share. Discover at scixplorer.org #OpenScience #ResearchInfrastructure #SpaceScience #EarthScience #PlanetaryScience
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 22/08/2025
I decided to make a little graphic demonstrating with actual #data (the awesome Cas A supernova remnant observed by #JWST) to highlight how different data looks depending on the colormap. I chose a few that I have seen used a bit from matplotlib & cmasher. What colormaps do you often use and why?
Cassiopeia A as observed from JWST, shown using four different color maps, clockwise from top left: lilac (cmasher), rainbow (matplotlib), torch (cmasher), gist_stern (matplotlib)
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 14/07/2025
Another bit of sharing about my experiences as a disabled astronomer, for Disability Pride Month. While I was studying for and taking my qualifying exams (oral), I was studying, finishing up research, and going to physical therapy and speech therapy (both once to twice a week).
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 04/07/2025
For those who may not know, July is #disability pride month. Within #academia (& #astronomy), there are still many pitfalls and barriers that make things difficult for astronomers with disabilities. So, I figured throughout the month, I would share some of what I have experienced with my disability
Disability pride flag - a charcoal grey flag bisected diagonally from the top left corner to the lower right right corner by five parallel stripes in red, pale gold, pale grey, light blue, and green (Credit: Wikipedia for alt text)
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Brandt Gaches @brandt-gaches.space · 03/07/2025
Given the looming massive budget slashes back in the US, any US early career researchers who are looking for options - Germany has several really great funding schemes! The Humboldt fellowship and Walter Benjamin (DFG) program are excellent for 2 year fellowships!
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