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Erin Purcell

@erinpurcell.bsky.social
1.3K followers 800 following 401 posts

Alarmone signaling and stress survival in C. difficile. Why are these bacteria so hard to kill? I sort of love them for it. Books, board games, and baking when I remember to protect the time. She/her. Views my own.

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Reposted by Erin Purcell
Claire Willett @clairewillett.bsky.social · 21h
it’s also not NOT giving Moopsy which RED FLAG
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Prasad Jallepalli, MD, PhD @prasad.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
5 potatoes cubed is still 5 potatoes because potatoes are root vegetables
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emma burnett @slashnburnett.bsky.social · 20h
Amirite tho
White text on yellow-orange ombré background that reads:
Don't let Al ruin your writing.
It's your writing.
Ruin it yourself.

Amirite
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Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
When they get back in power, Democrats need to go all-in on higher education. We need a campaign of reinvestment in public universities across the country that makes the Morrill Land-Grant Act look like nothing by comparison *and* a GI Bill of Rights-style program of tuition grants.
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Anna Holmes @annabookwriter.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
“I put the books back where I found them! Isn’t that great?” *library worker unhinges jaw, prepares to devour*
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Erin Purcell @erinpurcell.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
'We have replaced the danger of mouth-pipetting with the danger of a generation of scientists spending their most productive years writing grants that will not be funded. This is its own form of danger, just slower and less honest than the phenol.' Onion-level satire with a side of 'oooof.'
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Karen Fisher, PhD @fisherke.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
This just seems to have gone from bad to worse, with the image's creator either not understanding or admitting what is wrong and Nikon pretty much staying silent. I am glad (and hopeful) that that the vaast majority of the microscopy community seems united on how imaging should be handled/treated.
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Josh Chafetz @joshchafetz.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
The more we buy into the logic that academia needs to be more like "the real world"--the more we buy into the idea that all we're doing is training students to go out and be good workers--the less we are fulfilling any sort of distinct mission, and the less exciting our work is our students.
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Josh Chafetz @joshchafetz.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
On the one hand, it's just dumb. Universities are, in fact, real, and they exist in the world. American universities employ about 3x as many people as there are active duty servicemembers, so if soldiers are "real," then so are academics.
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Senator Patty Murray @murray.senate.gov · 23/09/2026
NIH funding doesn't belong to Donald Trump—it belongs to the patients and families waiting for the next medical breakthrough. We cannot let Trump politicize federal research grants and give right-wing extremists a veto over lifesaving work. SPEAK UP FOR SCIENCE.
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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.
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Stephen Curry @scurry.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Very much enjoyed @mjrobbins.com conversation-paced rant about the supposed threat of so-called superintelligent AI. martinrobbins.substack.com/p/the-ai-apo...
Screenshot from linked article reads: 

Civilisation is the gearbox for the engines of our minds; human intelligence is its attribute. The scale of that intelligence is not governed by the person or entity with the highest IQ. You can't make a car that goes at 3000mph by just putting a rocket in it. I'm not sure it's possible to be superintelligent. To me it's like saying you're going to make the ocean superwet by pouring more water into it.
Rationalists desperately wish this wasn't the case, because it means the promise of the Al priesthood, the promise of a world where being smart and thinking better magically solves all your problems - could lead you to the gates of heaven itself! - is a lie: that the world isn't changed by thinkers, but doers. That's why every contrived thought experiment that involves an AI triggering the end of humanity involves, ultimately, human beings doing something incredible stupid with real stuff, like shipping a super-virus to an angry teenager or firing a nuclear arsenal. The boring risks of human agency that we already face today.
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Erin Purcell @erinpurcell.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
This makes me very angry, because the show was so fun, and made me want Hannah Waddingham as Bond, and I know we can never have that.
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Prankster Spiced Latte Or Whatever @prankster36.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Honestly wonder what evangelicals reading that book especially think when Aslan basically turns to the camera and goes "I made this world so why would I have a problem with people trying to understand the rules I set up" which obviously applies to science too
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Aparna Nair @disabilitystor1.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
LLMs seem to me a way, a shortcut, for some academics to build reputations (as "fast" reviewers, as "good" colleagues) rather than foundations of solid academic labor however difficult that labor is. This is about being seen to be doing the work rather than actually doing it
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Annalee @flowerhorne.com · 19/09/2026
This is why I think it's so important to push back against the personification of LLMs. If a person shoots someone while wearing a hand puppet, they can't claim the hand puppet did the murder.
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Petra Levin @redrockcity.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
4 years (!) in the making, in this review Jade Wang and I detail the fundamental processes underlying growth, the cell autonomous nature of homeostatic control, and the contribution of stochasticity to both. TL;DR Bacteria are more like teenagers than you think. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
Bacterial growth rate in populations and single cells - Nature Microbiology
In this Perspective, Levin and Wang give a brief history of bacterial growth rate and discuss how it is connected to nutrient availability and macromolecule synthesis, with a focus on (p)ppGpp as a ce...
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Tyler King @tyleraking.com · 17/09/2026
“A senior executive at Microsoft said A.I. systems built on the work of others will be seen as ‘an astonishing theft of unprecedented proportions’ and possibly the greatest robbery of labor in human history, according to court documents unredacted Thursday in an ongoing Manhattan lawsuit.”
orlandosentinel.com
Docs in A.I. copyright suit reveal startling admission by Microsoft exec over ‘astonishing theft’
The admission appeared in a newly unredacted filing in the landmark copyright infringement legal battle playing out between newspapers like the Orlando Sentinel and tech companies Microsoft and OpenAI...
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Erin Purcell @erinpurcell.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Very cool story! The interplay between stress response and metabolism is SO complex!
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Erin Purcell @erinpurcell.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
My kids were lucky that reading came pretty easily & they already viewed it as a source of fun by 1st grade, bc the required edutech programs make it a chore & breaking pieces into chunks to gameify finishing them robs everything of meaning. Heartbroken for kids whose schools ruined reading for them
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Aparna Nair @disabilitystor1.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
"stores and tracks faculty CVs and productivity" in the hands of private equity can't go wrong can it
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Tobias Wilson-Bates @phdhurtbrain.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
I would not like an AI summary, I would not like it on a boat, I would not like the email bloat, I do not like it on a chair, I would not like it anywhere! I do not like them on a phone, I do not like them in my home, I do not want them on a search, I do not like them in a church
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ashley fairbanks @ziibiing.com · 12/09/2026
i am incredibly excited to share our research about how paying people’s rent through mutual aid made an impact on minnesota this year we accidentally collected more data than anyone ever has for an effort like this, and can very seriously say we prevented an eviction bubble that everyone expected
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Naomi Klein @naomiaklein.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
"People are really mad and however mad you are, it’s not enough. Because there is something so profound about no longer believing in the future, about seeing no value in our shared home, in the natural world. They’re traitors to creation.” www.theguardian.com/books/2026/s...
theguardian.com
Naomi Klein: ‘Extreme wealth has a deranging effect. It turns you into a supremacist’
She’s tackled neoliberalism and the digital world, now the writer and activist is taking on tech billionaires. She explains how the super-rich are capitalising on climate and financial chaos in pursui...
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Erin Purcell @erinpurcell.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Kid picked Gremlins 2 for movie night... I'm sure plenty of people have realized this before, but Gizmo is a tribble. That's why they let him back into their lives despite knowing better-- the hypnotic trilling!
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Chise @sailorrooscout.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
GOOD NEWS! A personalized mRNA vaccine has SUCCEEDED in keeping melanoma, a deadly skin cancer, from returning. Phase III trial results in MORE THAN 1,100 patients shows the vaccine SIGNIFICANTLY extended the time patients lived without their melanoma returning AND reduced the risk of metastasis.
statnews.com
Moderna and Merck say mRNA cancer vaccine succeeded in late-stage melanoma trial
A personalized mRNA cancer vaccine succeeded in a late-stage melanoma study, results that could herald a new, powerful approach in oncology.
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U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission @cpsc.gov · 10/09/2026
Good morning. It's Baby Safety Month and you've got things to learn.
A hawk with the head of a human baby -- soaring through the blue skies with glee -- its talons extended and ready to strike. The text reads: Babies don't have talons. You need to keep them safe. Your human baby needs a safe sleep space. Bare is best - make sure to remove all suffocation hazards like toys, blankets, pillows, and padded crib bumpers from your baby's sleep space.
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Erin Purcell @erinpurcell.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
I want a 'fight enshittification' political platform. 'Phones will be small and solid! We'll stop changing the clocks twice a year! You can buy software once instead of subscribing forever! Clothing will be made of durable materials! Senders of fundraising texts gets ants released in their homes!'
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Dr. Katharine Dickson @metaomicsnerd.bsky.social · 09/08/2025
What I would like to remind everyone talking about Sam Altman talking about the “PhD level intelligence” of the new ChatGPT is that Sam Altman dropped out of college so he… has no experiential construct for what grad school even is.
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Odd Future Wolfgang Pauli @ofwp.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
Every new "innovation" in teaching amounts to teachers doing twice as much work to track something that has nothing to do with their job and won't improve student learning
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Haider Manzer @haidermanzer.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Is asymptomatic colonization with Clostridioides difficile (C. diff) early in life truly “silent?” In my first publication from the Zackular Lab, out today in @science.org, I teamed up with my amazing lab-mate, Alexa Semon, to find the answer. Link here: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
science.org
Early-life colonization with Clostridioides difficile remodels the developing gut
Clostridioides difficile causes severe disease in adults but commonly colonizes infants asymptomatically. The consequences of early-life colonization on host development remain unknown. In a neonatal ...
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Funranium (AKA Phil Broughton) @funranium.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
It pleased me to no end to have a student tell me “Edgelords do not belong on the chemistry bench.” This combined with the Ethics in Engineering requirement gives me hope for the research community of tomorrow.
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Harmit Singh Malik @harmitmalik.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
The current NIH Director’s animus against NIAID to sign away much needed research funds so we can continue bombing another country is… a staggering betrayal of Congressional intentions and authority. Not surprising but still staggering.
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Mgindmv @mgindmv.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Please share AND respond to this one-question survey, should Virginia ban ALPRs? Thank you!! #deFlock #Fairfax
12onyourside.com
Virginia lawmakers consider ban on Flock cameras
There’s a growing chorus from members inside the Virginia General Assembly to make those flock cameras illegal in every part of the commonwealth.
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Freya Harrison @friendlymicrobe.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
It's taken 12 years and a lot of work from many fantastic people, but we have published an analysis of how our reconstruction of Bald's eyesalve kills bacteria. This was driven by @tosinorababa.bsky.social & Jess Furner-Pardoe through their PhD work #MicroSky journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/... [1/n]
Jess in the lab, holding an onion and a garlic bulb and talking; Tosin in the lab holding a petri dish and inspecting it; two glass bottles labelled "eyesalve 33/6/14"
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Drew McKevitt @drewmckevitt.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
This is a good thread! There are legit thoughtful uses for AI among trained and experienced professionals. Almost none of these uses apply to the classroom or (undergraduate) students.
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Itai Yanai @itaiyanai.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Advice for new PhD students: choose a mentor who is committed to your training, not just your project. The most important product of your PhD - even more important than the science - is YOU, a newly trained scientist.
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Emily Nussbaum @emilynussbaum.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
COFFEE RULEZ, ANTI-CAFFEINE BIASES DROOL www.scientificamerican.com/article/has-...
scientificamerican.com
How healthy is coffee, really?
Doctors used to warn coffee drinkers. Now research reassures them
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Erin Purcell @erinpurcell.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
I'm getting used to the grungy songs of my youth showing up as easy listening covers, but it still cracked me up when a mellow bossa nova cover of I'm Only Happy When It Rains started playing at the ramen shop. I had to play the original for my kid when we got home so he'd get why I was laughing.
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Joey Politano🏳️‍🌈 @josephpolitano.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Official monthly data is in today, and US solar power generation hit a new record high, up 20% compared to this time last year!
a graph of US monthly solar generation
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STCmicrobeblog @stcmicrobeblog.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
the vibrios are setting off fireworks for you, bonnie, and your well-deserved copley medal
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Dr. Fim @fim.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
Ansel Adams on assignment for IBM - one of my favourite shots. Not the usual landscape but the skill of a woman weaving magnetic core memory. The beat up nails captures total “woman in STEM” vibes.
A woman with extremely short painted nails weaving magnetic core memory. A series of rows and columns of wires in a grid.
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Erin Biba @erinbiba.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
(AI actually has been used in science and medicine for decades and is incredibly good at doing things like finding cancer that can’t be seen with the human eye but that is a completely different type of AI then we’re all angry about it and we shouldn’t discuss them in the same conversations TBH)
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AAMC @aamc.org · 20/08/2026
NIH funding equates to $138 per American per year. And the return on investment is millions of lives saved. Read more about the extraordinary medical progress NIH funding supports: bit.ly/4i1ewX9
usatoday.com
How Biomedical Research Moves From a Lab Into Patient Care
Physicians work on both the research side and at the patient bedside, translating questions raised in clinical practice into rigorous scientific investigations and bringing those discoveries back to p...
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Erin Purcell @erinpurcell.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
I am torn between 6 and 7
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Michael Hobbes @michaelhobbes.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
It's true that *at an individual level* you should be kind. Don't scream at your anti-vaxx neighbors or whatever. But when it comes to *public discourse* the most important message is that vaccines save lives and anti-vaxx beliefs kill children. If they feel attacked by that, it's not my problem.
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Charles Louis Richter @richterscale.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
John Enders, who discovered a method to culture poliovirus, allowing vaccines to be developed, said there was a clear lesson to be learned from the failure: “We must never again allow decisions about essentially scientific matters to be made for us by people without training or insight.” 2/2
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Dan Silverman @dmsilverman.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
I‘m far from an AI doomer, but it is amazing how many serious voices — on LinkedIn, no less! — are sharing stories about how AI slop is quickly becoming one of the top problems they see in academic writing and research “AI will 10x our research!” doesn’t seem to be surviving encounters with reality
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