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Ethan Solomon

@esolomon.bsky.social
495 followers 566 following 87 posts

Instructor on K99/R00 in psychiatry @ Stanford, MD/PhD @ Penn, SB @ MIT. Interested in the neural electrophysiology of cognition, perception, and psychiatry. ethanasolomon.com

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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Nobel Prize @nobelprize.org · 05/10/2026
Congratulations to our first Nobel Prize laureate of 2026 🎉 Early this morning Karl Deisseroth found out he was awarded this year's Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. He seems very happy with the news!
Karl Deisseroth on the phone looking happy
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Huge thanks to @coreykeller.bsky.social, @neuro-engineer.bsky.social, Charlie Dickey, Chris Cline, and many others from @stanfordmedicine.bsky.social, as well as generous support from the NIH/NIMH for making this work possible.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Finally, in collaboration with Aaron Boes, Nick Trapp, and Josh Tatz at UIowa, we extended these findings to patients who underwent TMS-delivered iTBS, showing that suppression-rebound effects are likely not limited to direct electrical stimulation and may be a general feature of iTBS itself.
Demonstrating of post-iTBS suppression of cortical reactivity following iTBS delivered via transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS).
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
But this was not the end of the story. In the aftermath of iTBS, cortical reactivity began to increase with the passage of time (about 10 minutes), eventually surpassing baseline levels. This suggested that neural excitability follows a suppression-rebound pattern after iTBS.
Figure demonstrating how cortical reactivity increases over time following sessions of iTBS.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Using single pulses to probe cortical reactivity, we were surprised to find that the most immediate effect of iTBS was inhibitory -- high-frequency activity *decreased* in the initial wake of iTBS. This effect was most pronounced in the network of brain regions strongly connected to the stim site.
Figure demonstrating how cortical reactivity in the HFA band is reduced from pre- to post-iTBS, specifically within the network of regions strongly connected to the stimulation site.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
The field *thinks* that iTBS enhances excitation and long-term potentiation (LTP) in the human brain -- this is partly why we use it in clinical depression -- but the evidence for this is shaky. So we measured it as directly as we could: from patients with electrodes implanted in cortex (iEEG).
Figure demonstrating methodological approach: electrical stimulation was delivered via indwelling electrodes, alternating between single pulses and sessions of iTBS or Sham. Evoked potentials can be extracted from single-pulse data to estimate connectivity to the stimulation site.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Excited to share a new discovery from @stanfordpntlab.bsky.social about the effects of neurostimulation on brain activity. www.medrxiv.org/content/10.6... With our colleagues at the University of Iowa, we explored how intermittent theta burst stimulation (iTBS) changes neural excitability. A 🧵
medrxiv.org
iTBS induces a suppression-rebound pattern in human cortical excitability
Intermittent theta burst stimulation (iTBS) is a widely used form of brain stimulation, developed on the premise that it promotes long-term potentiation (LTP) and neural excitation. However, this is n...
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Terence Tao @teorth.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
A group of 25 Fields Medalists, including myself, have made a joint declaration on Math and AI: mathandai.org . We welcome additional signatories. See also this article in the Economist announcing the declaration: www.economist.com/science-and-...
mathandai.org
Declaration — Math and AI
Read the declaration and add your name.
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Sam Wang @samwang.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
More on the big picture and what we have to be doing in the months ahead: samwang.substack.com/p/building-h...
samwang.substack.com
Public Comments Form Half Of A Plan To Stop the Takeover of Science...
...here's the second half.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 04/07/2026
Might be more considerations for feeding grants (at least those which are not meant to be published broadly) into a model for review -- your grant becomes part of the training set and what's contained in it could show up for others in unexpected ways.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 04/07/2026
How does grantwriting fit into this framework?
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Jeremy Berg @jeremymberg.bsky.social · 10/06/2026
Science story about today’s Bethesda Declaration report. www.science.org/content/arti...
science.org
NIH’s destruction continues, Bethesda Declaration signers say
Follow-up report by current and former agency employees describes ongoing science censorship by political appointees and “culture of fear”
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Jeremy Berg @jeremymberg.bsky.social · 29/05/2026
Once again, @dereklowe.bsky.social is not holding back and I am here for it. www.science.org/content/blog... 1/2
science.org
The Current Crisis: What's Happening to Science in America
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Mark Peifer (He, him) @peiferlabunc.bsky.social · 21/05/2026
I hope all interested in science are paying attention: Trump and Vought are bypassing the strong bipartisan support for biomedical science and halting funding thought administrative delays. Call Congress if you want to save American science 🧪
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Mark Histed @markhisted.org · 09/03/2026
The most impt change at #NIH and to US science this year is bigger than grant cancellations— it’s how the agency is governed. For 75 years NIH has been largely independent of presidential control. That’s changed this year. New piece from me and @nataliebaviles.bsky.social in @nature.com 🧪
nature.com
How Congress can restore the independence of US science
Members must go beyond reinstating US government research spending and re-establish decentralized governance at the National Institutes of Health and other agencies.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
Stand Up For Science, SF! #standupforscience
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Peter Tennant @pwgtennant.bsky.social · 25/02/2026
This recent RCT of an "AI stethoscope" claims the technology "shows promise" for diagnosing cardiovascular conditions. It does not. It is a textbook example of the risks of conducting unprincipled 'per protocol analyses'. Once again, peer review at a major medical journal has failed. 🧵 1/
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 15/02/2026
💯! But something similar, though less overtly political, is happening with the rise of donor-funded science. Donors have agendas too, and it's not realistic for scientists to think they can stay uncorrupted by that. Plus, the donor class is increasingly right wing, even if they don't advertise it.
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Philip Ball @philipcball.bsky.social · 14/02/2026
Just added this to my WordPress site, so it's free to read. homunculusmusic.wordpress.com/2026/02/14/e...
homunculusmusic.wordpress.com
Epstein’s ugly world of science
As with Peter Mandelson, so in the science world: the Epstein files are not telling us anything that most ordinary punters didn’t already know, but are revealing the full, rotten, appalling extent …
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Max Kozlov @maxkozlov.bsky.social · 22/01/2026
🚨 New from me: Grant review at more than half of NIH's institutes could be frozen by the end of the year. That's because crucial NIH grant-review panels are slated to be empty at those institutes by Jan 2027. A wonky bureaucratic problem with big implications. A short 🧵
nature.com
Exclusive: key NIH review panels due to lose all members by the end of 2026
Thirteen of the agency’s advisory councils, which must review grant applications before funding is awarded, are on track to have no voting members.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 05/01/2026
Honestly, maybe! There are lots of transcribers out there, integrations w/ EHR, and for sure OpenEvidence, which has taken the academic medical community by storm. We're gonna have to be clear-eyed about how medical AI is being used if we want to stand a chance of reforming it for the better.
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Mark D Humphries @markdhumphries.bsky.social · 30/12/2025
Just published my review of neuroscience in 2025, on The Spike. The 10th of these, would you believe? This year we have foundation models, breakthroughs in using light to understand the brain, a gene therapy, and more Enjoy! medium.com/the-spike/20...
medium.com
2025: A Review of the Year in Neuroscience
Enlightening the brain
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 25/11/2025
Exactly right! iTBS studies are ongoing and will definitely help us build out the picture.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
While limited by the very small N=2 sample (in an epilepsy cohort!), this is intriguing evidence from direct in-vivo human recordings that depression treatment w/ TMS specifically affects the sgACC, in the direction of neural suppression. Next steps: Do we observe similar effects using iTBS?
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
Replicating findings from the fMRI literature, we also observed anticorrelated HFA between the DLPFC and sgACC following TMS pulses. The sgACC was particularly anticorrelated with the DLPFC relative to other brain regions (meaning, this relationship was anatomically specific and not brain-wide). 4/
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
Using combined TMS and intracranial EEG in two neurosurgical patients, we showed that single TMS pulses caused brief, transient suppression in high-frequency activity (HFA), generally considered to be reflected of population-level spiking. Sham stimulation showed no effect. 3/
Depiction of TMS-iEEG experiments and spectral activity provoked by single pulse TMS; marked decreases in HFA are noted in active but not sham conditions.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
A big (unanswered) question in the TMS field is: Does it matter that we hit the "right spot" on the DLPFC to treat depression? Many believe that we need to hit nodes of anticorrelated connectivity in order to suppress aberrant sgACC activity, but we're not sure if that actually happens. 2/
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
New paper from @stanfordpntlab.bsky.social in collaboration with @coreykeller.bsky.social, @neuro-engineer.bsky.social, Nick Trapp, and Aaron Boes at UIowa! We explored how TMS to the DLPFC changes neural activity in the subgenual anterior cingulate cortex, a key mood regulator. 1/
brainstimjrnl.com
DLPFC TMS suppresses high-frequency neural activity in the human sgACC
Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) to the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) is increasingly used to treat major depressive disorder and has demonstrated durable improvements in d...
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 22/11/2025
Agreed it's concerning, but p-values shouldn't be considered in isolation. I'd much rather see p=0.048 from a well-motivated, well-controlled study than p=0.0001 from a study/test with a terrible control or inappropriate null model.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 11/11/2025
Thought I didn't click it, been getting a ton of spam anyway, figured I accidentally clicked it...now I'm not so sure again.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 07/10/2025
Fully agree!
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Nicholas Grossman @nicholasgrossman.bsky.social · 17/09/2025
Ezra Klein went beyond opposing political violence to extol Charlie Kirk for doing politics "exactly the right way," making up a fictional version of Kirk to praise. That distortion, with its indulgence of bad faith, is a perfect illustration of the larger media failure that helps Trump. My latest
arcdigital.media
Ezra Klein Accidentally Shows How the Media Brought Us Trump
The prominent liberal pundit made up a fake version of Charlie Kirk to praise, laundering his reputation the way a lot of mainstream media launders MAGA
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 21/08/2025
From @coreykeller.bsky.social's amazing team, led by @chrisclineneuro.bsky.social: x.com/DrCoreyKelle...
x.com
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 02/08/2025
Would love some insight into what has happened to @nytimes.com. Is a president embroiled in a child sex trafficking scandal with underwater poll numbers on a "winning streak"? Is Trump usually cool, calm, and collected, only now "displaying his volatile side"?
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 29/07/2025
Even if you think these deals are worth the tarnished academic integrity and freedom (they're not), paying an extortion fee to get your grants back doesn't make much sense when the rest of the government is working hard to gut NIH/NSF/etc on a larger scale anyway.
nytimes.com
Harvard Is Said to Be Open to Spending Up to $500 Million to Resolve Trump Dispute
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Michael Clemens @mclem.org · 24/07/2025
Calling these outcomes 'deals' or 'agreements' is in the interest of both university administrators (who do not want to appear passive) and the White House (which does not want to appear authoritarian). They are extortions—displays of power & dominance designed to coerce all universities watching.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 25/06/2025
I'm here, would be great to catch up!
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 23/06/2025
Understandably so, given it's easier to operationalize sensation than it is something more integrative, global, and context-dependent like emotions.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 23/06/2025
Introspection isn't useless, but e.g. introspection did not teach us how the visual system worked and I'd argue if we had clung to introspection too tightly we'd still not understand vision as well as we do. Something like that might be happening with emotion research.
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 23/06/2025
The underlying idea here I agree with is that hypotheses about emotions are at high risk of being framed more by introspection on the part of the researchers than prior objective evidence (but they'll go to great lengths to convince you -- and themselves! -- otherwise).
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 18/06/2025
My favorite is PCR, which essentially underlies the entire trillion-dollar biotech industry. It grew out of (NSF funded) research on bacteria living in Yellowstone hot springs!
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 17/06/2025
Wait, most blue state universities don't say anything publicly either! (At least in an institutional capacity.)
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Reposted by Ethan Solomon
Bruce Hinze @brucehinze.bsky.social · 14/06/2025
“No Kings” demonstration, Ocean Beach, San Francisco
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 09/06/2025
Excited to announce award of my K99/R00 "Theta burst modulation of hippocampal-cortical rhythms in schizophrenia," under amazing mentors at Stanford including @coreykeller.bsky.social! We will ask whether hippocampal oscillations can be systematically influenced by stimulation in schizophrenia.
reporter.nih.gov
RePORT ⟩ RePORTER
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Jackson Powell @powellj.bsky.social · 29/05/2025
New paper showcasing the incredible effort from the amazing Human Neural Circuitry (HNC) team! Beyond the great science, one can appreciate the poetic story told about human emotions. Looking forward to what's coming next! www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
science.org
Conserved brain-wide emergence of emotional response from sensory experience in humans and mice
Emotional responses to sensory experience are central to the human condition in health and disease. We hypothesized that principles governing the emergence of emotion from sensation might be discovera...
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 02/05/2025
Keller lab is an awesome place to work! Great science, great mentorship, amazing group of people at a world-class institution.
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Rosa Lafer-Sousa @rosalafersousa.bsky.social · 28/04/2025
🚨 This MUST READ essay and call to action spells out, in very clear terms, how the Trump administration could get away with slashing the NIH budget. NIH scientists and Dems in congress need to read and understand it. This is where we win or lose the battle to save the NIH and US science. 🧪 🧠 🧬 🔊
donmoynihan.substack.com
The NIH budget is on a fast track to disaster
An NIH insider explains what Republicans are likely to do next, and what we can do
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 23/04/2025
Why is Stanford not a signatory? President Levin has already publicly supported Harvard's stance against the administration -- strange he would do that yet find this objectionable. www.aacu.org/newsroom/a-c...
aacu.org
A Call for Constructive Engagement | AAC&U
A Call for Constructive Engagement
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Ethan Solomon @esolomon.bsky.social · 21/04/2025
Plainly unconstitutional.
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