Sign in

chasingmicrobes

@chasingmicrobes.bsky.social
3.8K followers 9.7K following 4.1K posts

All posting done on personal time, using personal device, and only reflect my personal opinions. Founder- @evoquant.bsky.social

PostsRepliesMedia
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 2h
😑
blockclubchicago.org
ICE Says It Can't Find Its Own Records Of Teargassing And Arresting Broadview Protesters
ICE's own rules require reports every time an agent uses force. But the agency says it can't find any from its attacks on protesters on Sept. 19, 2025.
010
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Feels like executive branch is waiting patiently for the midterms to be over. Feels like a regrouping of Project 2026.
020
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
To avoid CNN:
theguardian.com
Trump administration diverts human rights funds to push far-right agenda abroad
Support such as for white Afrikaners and anti-communism reveals how US is redefining what qualifies as human rights
010
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
cnn.com
Trump administration shifts funds from human rights to supporting far-right causes | CNN Politics
The US State Department directed millions of dollars originally earmarked to promote human rights to promote far-right causes including Afrikaner rights in South Africa, safeguarding “Western civiliza...
110
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Botched administration "lifelong blood disorder that made it tough to get needles into her veins" 90 minutes, a half dozen needles
101
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
chicago.suntimes.com
Early voting kicks off in Chicago for 2026 midterm election
On Thursday, early voting for the midterm general election on Nov. 3 began for Chicagoans, at the city's Early Voting Supersite, at 137 S. State St., and at the Chicago Board of Elections offices, at ...
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Yep
010
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
"Funding Rate Data for R01-Equivalent and R21 Awards by Career Stage: Encouraging Early Stage Investigators to Pursue Larger Awards"
grants.nih.gov
Funding Rate Data for R01-Equivalent and R21 Awards by Career Stage: Encouraging Early Stage Investigators to Pursue Larger Awards | Grants & Funding
100
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔
nature.com
Function-preserving watermarking of AI-generated proteins - Nature
SynthIDBio watermarks AI-generated protein sequences and structures while preserving function, enabling provenance detection and offering a proof-of-concept tool for biosecurity and information integr...
010
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
I know there's a lot going on, all the time, but please watch because this is really important.
youtube.com
How Trump is meddling in Brazil's election | Explainer
YouTube video by Guardian News
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Fund pre-k to grad school at levels we've only dreamed of; that includes making sure kids aren't going to class hungry. Stop the ideology warfare.
010
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
3 things: 1) Holy shit 2) "upfront payment ​of $400 million" for a 2 year old company pre-IND program 🤯 3) China is here to eat our breakfast, lunch, and dinner Postscript #4: US-legislators need to stop ignoring what MAGA is doing to our scientific and industrial base.
reuters.com
Merck licenses SciBrunch cancer drug in deal worth up to $2.13 billion
Merck said on Monday it would pay up to $2.13 billion ​under a global licensing deal with China's ‌SciBrunch Therapeutics for rights to develop, manufacture and sell an experimental cancer treatment.
142
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Glancing over at my un-hung diplomas when I read pre-1980's chemistry papers
youtu.be
We're not worthy!!
YouTube video by asfwefghweh
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Can we go back to "machine learning"?
030
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Superdee duper intelligence
131
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
nytimes.com
Supreme Court Allows Rapid Third-Country Deportations, for Now (Gift Article)
The court also announced it would hear arguments in December on the legality of the Trump administration policy to swiftly deport immigrants to countries not their own.
000
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
c0nc0rdance @c0nc0rdance.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
The obvious conclusion (to me): if you have proprietary research & you upload it into the Plagiarism Nexus, it's not YOUR proprietary research anymore. Behave accordingly.
726589
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Eric Columbus @ericcolumbus.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
"The sources added that Patel consistently kept Bailey at arm's length and cut him out of meetings the deputy FBI director should attend because Bailey was constantly flagging things that were unconstitutional." www.cbsnews.com/news/top-fbi...
cbsnews.com
Top FBI official Andrew Bailey, who was once widely seen as Patel successor, resigns
Bailey was originally brought in to help ease tensions between former Attorney General Pam Bondi and former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino.
331199451
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
I finally took time to read it. The relevant part, unfortunately, was literally the second to last sentence. "Both signals therefore respond to repeats that are not DNA; neither is specific to DNA" Which begs the question even more of how DNA/AA seqs are tokenized.
010
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Makes my earlier question more pertinent
nytimes.com
Did Anthropic’s A.I. Really Make a Scientific Discovery on Its Own? (Gift Article)
An expert at the University of Copenhagen said his team had been sharing its research with the company’s A.I. model, Claude, and that its new finding matched their work.
110
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
nytimes.com
Opinion | In the New World Taking Shape, We’re All on Our Own (Gift Article)
The Trump administration’s policy of deporting migrants to third countries is undermining a bedrock notion of international law for the past 75 years.
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
"Together, the two projects could need nearly a quarter of what our entire country consumes today, a share comparable to the per-capita electricity use of more than a million Costa Ricans."
ticotimes.net
Who is behind Costa Rica's proposed AI data centers?
Proposed AI campuses in Limón and Bagaces could need nearly a quarter of Costa Rica's electricity and vast water supplies, yet their investors remain unnamed.
011
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
And now DHS is out with a FAST denial, considering it’s midnight on a Saturday.
Post at 11:50 PM: Homeland Security @DHSgov
X.com
This is false. No one is off the table. We will continue to arrest any and all illegal aliens that come into our path.
Anyone in our country illegally will be arrested and deported.
In an effort to protect American citizens, ICE has initiated a nationwide public safety surge in sanctuary cities where our brave officers will be targeting criminal illegal aliens—many released from jails by sanctuary politicians—including murderers, rapists, child predators, and gang members.

Underlying quote tweet excerpted below. 
Jennie Taer • @JennieSTaer • 2h
SCOOP: ICE officers across the country were told this weekend to stop arresting non-criminals, agency sources tell @realDailyWire
Now, ICE may only arrest illegal immigrants…
47747169
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Prasad Jallepalli, MD, PhD @prasad.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
“1st, rather than cut NIH by nearly 40 percent, as the OMB proposed last year, we should double its $48 billion budget within five years. These are big numbers, but if they yield discoveries that trim the nation’s $5.3 trillion health bill by just 1 percent, they will more than pay for themselves.”
12514
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Drug Monkey @drugmonkey.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
It’s going to be really interesting to see how many scientists are willing to cede control of what gets funded to political agendas in exchange for promises of a larger NIH budget.
052
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Jacob Schriner-Briggs @jschrinerbriggs.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
This point has been exhausted, but it really is worth sitting with: under any other administration in recent memory, the ejection of disfavored news outlets followed by flagrant disregard of court orders would get wall-to-wall coverage and end political careers.
622368
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Evan Bernick, a finite mode with a smol hooman and a lorg floof @evanbernick.bsky.social · 08/07/2026
Not that this is news to anyone, but the Kavanaugh opinion in the Title IX case is quite bad and could potentially screw up a ton of equal protection scrutiny doctrine if it’s taken seriously
67612
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Daniel Suitor @danielsuitor.com · 24/09/2026
I don't have time to write more, but ICE is working to remove people to third countries in violation of D.V.D. v. DHS. I've been up since 5:20 A.M. working with two other attorneys to prevent our client from being shipped out. If you rep someone at risk of third country removal, check on them NOW
2722961006
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
4 days later...
nbcnews.com
Costa Rican man complained of lack of care for diabetes before his death in ICE custody, family says
Carlos Josue Marchena Marchena’s condition worsened after he arrived at Winn Correctional Center in Louisiana, and he died less than a week later, his family said.
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
4 days later...
nbcnews.com
Costa Rican man complained of lack of care for diabetes before his death in ICE custody, family says
Carlos Josue Marchena Marchena’s condition worsened after he arrived at Winn Correctional Center in Louisiana, and he died less than a week later, his family said.
000
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Wtaf is this question my university just asked me about my project?
Does the project involve any work that could be interpreted as promoting DEIA, climate change research, or non-compliant to any Presidential Executive Orders?
15145821297
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
biopharmadive.com
Young startups miss out on biotech venture funding rebound, MassBio says
A new report found that the sizes of seed rounds and Series A financings for Massachusetts biotech startups are going in opposite directions, as funding slows for young companies with the “riskiest sc...
000
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Jon Passantino @passantino.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
NEWS @status.news: The anonymous source behind one of the stories the White House cited to justify banning POLITICO was none other than Vice President JD Vance. The full story: www.status.news/p/white-hous...
status.news
The Source Behind The Ban
The anonymous source behind one of the stories the White House cited to justify banning POLITICO was none other than Vice President JD Vance, Status has learned.
17623203
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Technical question. What does "I can see by eye a tandem repeat array" even mean? I would assume it means the model didn't use external tools. But while I don't know how Anthropic tokenizes I would imagine it would be bad at tokenizing nuc/aa sequences in a way that allows pattern recognition.
anthropic.com
Claude discovers a novel enzyme system
In early results from our new life sciences research lab, Claude agents found an enzyme system whose function is still unknown.
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
100
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Nothing on Enveda. VC money is just really concentrated right now.
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
200
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Wasn't sure if it was related (and has since been rescinded)
grants.nih.gov
NOT-OD-26-089: RESCINDED - Notice of Change to Eligible Organizations for PAR-26-106 "Development of Collaborative Research Facilities or Research-Resource Facilities (C06 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)"
NIH Funding Opportunities and Notices in the NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts: RESCINDED - Notice of Change to Eligible Organizations for PAR-26-106
010
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Yeah
020
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
And also why a functioning NIH SBIR program is so important.
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Happy for them. But $835 million is wild.
businesswire.com
220
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Mark Histed @markhisted.org · 20/09/2026
“The arrangement would give Vought, the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, a direct role in determining how NIH distributes its $48 billion in congressionally-appropriated money.” Bypassing the many checks and balances at NIH on grant funding decisions.
8271193
Reposted by chasingmicrobes
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
God everything is SO dumb. This is a transparent litigation ploy, but TBH will probably backfire in this case.
2339854
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Things other countries are seeing in their news that we aren't seeing in the US. Another Costa Rican dies while detained by ICE, after 10 months of detention
teletica.com
Muere otro costarricense detenido por ICE en Estados Unidos | Teletica
Carlos Marchena estuvo detenido durante 10 meses, esperando su deportación a Costa Rica.
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Pessimistic take: Anthropic *pours* money into their internal drug discovery efforts. They announce, with fanfare, drug candidates right alongside their IPO. After IPO the bio unit is disbanded as a money-suck. Maybe that doesn't happen because they are a PBC, but.
020
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
edition.cnn.com
Exclusive: US military moving drones to South America ahead of anticipated counternarcotics operations | CNN Politics
The US military is expected to send MQ-9 Reaper drones operating over Africa to the US command responsible for South America, six sources familiar with the planning told CNN, part of a wave of militar...
001
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Ecotuorist hotspot "roughly 80 percent below normal rainfall for the month" (it's peak rainy season)
ticotimes.net
El Niño Hits Very Strong Intensity and Could Last Until June 2027 : The Tico Times | Costa Rica News | Travel | Real Estate
Costa Rica's El Niño has reached very strong intensity and may last until June 2027, the IMN says. Pacific waters are the warmest in 38 years and the rainy season is expected to end early.
000
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
m.economictimes.com
Central America is running out of water and food as El Nino kills cattle and wipes out harvests
The region of Central America is grappling with a catastrophic El Niño event that has led to widespread hunger. Farmers are witnessing their crops wither away, while livestock are perishing in the par...
100
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
gizmodo.com
El Niño Is Just a Fraction of a Degree Away From Becoming the Strongest on Record
Sea surface temperatures in a key region of the tropical Pacific are on the cusp of history.
100
chasingmicrobes @chasingmicrobes.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Not a good time for climate change denial to be a strong as ever.
joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu
El Niño drives crop failure in Central America and East Africa and threatens the next season in Southern Africa, East Africa, Western South America, and Southeast Asia
The August edition of the JRC's Anomaly Hotspots of Agricultural Production (ASAP) assessment is now available.
100