iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

This rematch is something, though...

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Space Telescope Science Institute @stsci.edu · 15/09/2026

#NASARoman activated the Wide Field Instrument—a 300-megapixel infrared camera that will allow it to explore wide swaths of the cosmos quickly. This test image captures the very first photons of starlight to reach the instrument—taken as an initial performance assessment: go.nasa.gov/4rg4qEc

$At the top, a grid of 21 panels shows a series of blue images with tiny neon green and yellow circles. A larger image highlights a section of the grid with circular patterns, and an inset presents a detailed star-like diffraction pattern. The colors consist of blue, green, and yellow.$

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Paul Byrne @theplanetaryguy.com · 09/09/2026

In honour of the day that's in it—the 60th anniversary of Star Trek.

A Constitution-class heavy cruiser on a shakedown test past the Moon. Crescent Earth is in the background.

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Astronomer Royal for Scotland | Catherine Heymans @astroroyalscot.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

This is a pleasing factoid: the Nancy Grace Roman space telescope is the same size and weight as a T-Rex! Countdown: 15 days to launch! 🚀 AUG 30, 2026 11:26 UTC ℹ️: science.nasa.gov/mission/roma...

A sketch of a T-Rex dinosaur (big feet, tiny hands) next to a sketch of the Roman telescope.

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Moira Donegan @moiradonegan.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

“If this was true, I would be in jail,” is not meant to convince you that this man did not commit gender violence. It is meant to remind you that we have collectively decided that gender violence will be de facto invisible to the law.

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David Dayen @ddayen.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

Four years ago, a coordinated right-wing smear campaign condemned Monticello for "going woke." Bridget Gillespie was working there at the time, and she gives this revelatory inside account of the harassment staff endured and ultimately how the institution buckled. Amazing piece.

prospect.org

What Broke Monticello - The American Prospect

How a right-wing smear campaign tried to silence the reality of Thomas Jefferson’s life, and in some ways succeeded.

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Benjamin Pope @benjaminpope.bsky.social · 03/07/2026

Super proud of @gradientrider.bsky.social winning the @astrosocaus.bsky.social ECR Software Prize for his optics code dLux!

Emerging Leaders in Astronomy Software Development Prize (sponsored by the Australian Research Data Commons)
Awarded to Dr Louis Desdoigts (Sydney, now at Leiden University) for ∂Lux - a physical optics simulation package that is fast, differentiable, and deploys to GPU and HPC environments. It is the base package behind AMIGO: a data-driven model of the Aperture Masking Interferometer (AMI), the only Australian hardware on JWST.

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Malaclypse the Middle @malaclypse.bsky.social · 13/06/2026

Live your life such that the Irish Literary Times never subskeets you like this.

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 07/06/2026

And then if orchestrated by a state advisory, you’ve essentially recreated the plot of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

As a research scientist, I’m feeling like The Captive’s War series is not giving the kind of escapism I need in this moment. Maybe I should just go back and re-read The Expanse?

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Steph Brown @stephjayb.bsky.social · 28/05/2026

This coming out on the same day as MIT announcing the closure of its libraries makes it hard to read it as anything other than yet another instance of the frankly exhausting story of sciences abandoning LIS/humanities/ed/social sciences. Posing as progressive 'resistance' makes it doubly gross.

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 10/05/2026

Found in the wild at Palabras Bilingual Bookstore in Phoenix, @chanda.blacksky.app.

Image of the book cover of The Edge of Space-Time by Chanda Prescod-Weinstein displayed prominently on the top shelf of new books section.

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Surprised Eel Historian, PhD @greenleejw.bsky.social · 02/05/2026

It's Friday, which is as good an excuse as any to remind you about my fantasy subway maps. The Middle Earth Public Transit Authority needs your support! #Tolkien #Subway #Maps #LoTR You can purchase prints and such (w/o the water mark) here: www.etsy.com/shop/Surpris...

Subway style map to go with The Lord of the Rings, showing the different pathways of various parties throughout the book. The title reads: "Lord of the Rings Transit Map: One Does Not Simply Walk Ino Mordor When One Can Ride." The map takes up the middle part of the page, and there are two keys. The one on the left is titles "Standard Service Lines, and has color keys matched to the subway lines on the map. Lines are named:
"Shire-Bree Commuter Line
Old Forrest Crescent
Wildland Scenic Line
Fellowship Line
Gollum / Sméagol Line
Uruk Hai Express
Three Hunters Line
Fangorn Slow Service
Rohan to Gondor Business Line
Black Ships Ferry Service
Oliphant Direct Line
Army of the West Line
Gandalf Express

A smaller key on the right side of the map is labeled: "Limited Service Lines" and has color keys matched to the following names lines:
"Eagle Express
Paths of the Dead Line
Nazgûl Search & Resuce
Valinor Ltd."

A note at the bottom reads:
"* Mount Doom station only accepts Rings of Power in payment. Plan accordingly."

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Yeah, sometimes I just zoom around this for fun. Advanced challenge: locate the brown dwarfs! jades.idies.jhu.edu/goods-s/?ra=...

jades.idies.jhu.edu

FitsMap

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Emily Lakdawalla 🏳️‍⚧️ Uranus Expert @elakdawalla.bsky.social · 05/04/2026

I wrote THE book about The Design and Engineering of Curiosity: How the Mars Rover Performs Its Job. And because space robot design is conservative, it’s a pretty good resource for both the Perseverance rover and the Dragonfly Titan quadcopter. link.springer.com/book/10.1007...

Book cover, featuring a low-angle self-portrait of the rover on Mars.

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

We can all use a little joy right now.

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Erin Keane @erinkeane.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

I was never cool enough to be on a first-name basis with Ani, but listening to "You Had Time," I feel like had this been my intro to her, I would have been. She has my vote now.

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

Alright, folks. November Rain needs some help in the March Sadness tournament. Only 40 minutes to play! And while you’re add it, Ani DiFranco over Ben Folds. marchxness.com

marchxness.com

March Sadness 90s Edition

A yearly March Madness-style tournament of essays about songs we love (and occasionally loathe)

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John Scalzi @scalzi.com · 13/03/2026

Also this bookstore in the Tucson airport now has several signed copies of When The Moon Hits Your Eye. Signed by me, to be clear.

It's an "Ink by Hudson" store, all of which appear to have circular bookshelves in the center of the store

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 13/03/2026

Excited to help see this project through!

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András Gáspár @andrasgaspar.bsky.social · 13/03/2026

1/5! Considering the 10x oversubscription and that I've seen more than one first quintile rejections, I am satisfied. So, what will we be doing? We are going to bring JWST/NIRCam coronagraphy into the optical! We tested a flight spare mask and surprise surprise ... it is transparent.

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Emily Hunt @emily.space · 07/03/2026

i love this little website youraislopbores.me

A prompt: "Draw a cat riding a skateboard in space." What follows is an AMAZING drawing of a little pixel art cat on a skateboard, surrounded by stars and a planet

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Phil Plait @philplait.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

Elon Musk has already started plans to launch a million satellites. Yes. A MILLION. This is a colossally bad idea, and it's not too late to make your voice heard. I explain everything: www.scientificamerican.com/article/ramp... 🔭 🧪

scientificamerican.com

Don’t let mega-constellation-building billionaires steal your night sky

Satellites are wonders of modern technology that have improved all of our lives. But having more than a million of them in orbit could destroy our view of the heavens and seriously damage our planet

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Phil Plait @philplait.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

The American Astronomical Society has a page with more info and how you can submit comments to the FCC to stop this travesty. Hurry though; submissions end today. aas.org/action-alert...

aas.org

Action Alert: Provide Input to the FCC on Proposed Satellite Systems | American Astronomical Society

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 05/03/2026

We're hiring a Research Engineer at the U. Arizona's Imaging Technology Lab (ITL; itl.arizona.edu). If you have hands-on lab experience and are interested in working on cutting-edge tech development for astronomy / scientific sensors, I encourage you to apply! arizona.csod.com/ux/ats/caree...

arizona.csod.com

Research Engineer, Steward Observatory

Assist and support engineering functions such as operation, programming, and maintenance of equipment involved in image sensor production such as flip...

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Laura Lopez @ohdearz.bsky.social · 02/03/2026

Follow-up comment on how bad it is on the ground at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. 🔭

Screenshot of additional comment in telecon from Person 4: "Just an FYI for non-NASA folks: it is hard to overstate how rough things have gotten at GSFC over the past year. Half the center is being shut down. 1/4 of the workforce is gone. Center management is giving us one direction, NASA HQ SMD is giving another. As _______ said, however bad you've heard things are through the news, it's worse on the ground. The commmunity needs to know this."

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Laura Lopez @ohdearz.bsky.social · 02/03/2026

Anonymized chat from a telecon right now on the scale of destruction at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and how the best news source about it is the volunteer Greenbelt News Review (www.greenbeltnewsreview.com). ☹️ 🔭

Screenshot of zoom chat. "Person 1: Its hard to convey the depth of the destruction of GSFC and the lack of planning - this has not been well covered by the press or communicated to the community; Person 2: I strongly agree ^^; Person 3: Agreed. It is a shame that the best source of what is going on at GSFC is the Greenbelt News Review, so a weekly volunteer newspaper that typcially mainly reports on church meetings, Roosevelt high school, and the Greenbelt city council (but their articles on GSFC ARE very good)."

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Nick Kodama 🌳👻 @nickkodama.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

roses are red cherenkov is blue just use a screwdriver what's the worst it could do

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 10/02/2026

It occurs to me that I never announced my *major* career news on this site. A little over year ago, I took over as Director of the Imaging Technology Lab (ITL; itl.arizona.edu) at U. of Arizona. Founded by Mike Lesser when I was still a nascent proto-astronomer, ITL makes scientific imaging sensors.

Fish-eye view of a 2000 sqft clean room (ISO 7) showing a series of work tables and semiconductor manufacturing and analysis equipment. One person stands on the right working on a wafer probe station while another person to the left works on an automated wire-bonding / stud-bumping system.

Optics bench populated by an integrating sphere, monochromator, and laser-drive plasma light source. A TEC camera is mounted at the entrance port of the integrating sphere, which also houses LN2-cooled cryostats (not pictured).

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Heidi B. Hammel @hbhammel.bsky.social · 07/12/2025

As an astronomer I get asked a lot what kind of telescope 🔭 so-and-so should get for themselves or their [spouse/kid/etc]. I’m clueless. I use BIG telescopes and have never purchased one in my life. But @philplait.bsky.social knows! Thx, Phil! badastronomy.beehiiv.com/p/ban-275-te...

badastronomy.beehiiv.com

BAN #275: Telescope buying advice, Book: It’s Alive, Dial-A-Moon 2021

30 November 2020 Issue #271

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 07/12/2025

Find a person who will not only buy you a Galaxy-class starship, but get in line early enough to get the limited-edition bonus gifts.

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 04/12/2025

brush boops borb* *that's "bunny orb" not to be confused with "bird orb"

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 22/11/2025

The Florence Project does great work. I highly recommend them for your charitable giving this season. Especially if you’re an AZ resident and are looking for an organization to provide for this year’s Charitable Tax Credit (1:1 tax reduction up to $495/$987 for those filing single/joint this year).

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Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 21/11/2025

FIRRP does great work, give them your money and support.

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Sarah Kendrew @sarahkendrew.bsky.social · 27/10/2025

Are you an IR detectors nerd, or need to go deep into detector systematics for your #JWST MIRI science? You might be interested in this paper on MIRI's Reset Switch Charge Decay effect (RSCD) by Mike Ressler et al 🔭🧪https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1538-3873/ae0afb

iopscience.iop.org

Radware Bot Manager Captcha

To ensure we keep this website safe, please can you confirm you are a human by ticking the box below.

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Anthony Moser @anthonymoser.com · 25/09/2025

i made a template you can use to think about what "frame/negation/kirby" looks like for other issues. For example: Frame: DOGE is a govt efficiency project to save $ Negation: Actually it made things less efficient and cost $ Kirby: DOGE was a project to break and privatize federal bureaucracy

Top is an empty rectangle with a jagged line in the middle.
The left side is labeled "Frame" "F is happening!"
The right side is labeled "Negation" "F is not true!"
Below is a large image of Kirby, a round pink blob with eyes with a small version of the Frame F shape flying into his mouth. To the right is a large pink rectangle labeled "Kirby" "K is happening, that's why they're saying F"

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Andrea Luck @andrealuck.bsky.social · 26/10/2025

Fresh JWST view of Uranus taken Oct 6 2025 with NIRCam. Full size & more info: flic.kr/p/2rByidu 🔭🧪 Credit: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/Andrea Luck CC BY Proposal PI: Varun Bajaj Proposal ID: 8975 Filters: F150W2-F162M, F410M

Image of Uranus taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, showing a whitish north polar region, vivid blue-greenish atmosphere and a few whitish elongated storms visible around the pole. The planet is surrounded by clearly defined ring system set against the black background of space.

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Dr. Laci Brock 🪐 @stellerarts.com · 04/10/2025

Ahhhh gorgeous! Sample print of Leviathan’s Wake has arrived. Just have to decide on a couple sizes, which is a bit tricky since the original was an awkward size

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 30/09/2025

Somehow I missed that there’s a new Neko Case album out?

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Jarron Leisenring @jarron.bsky.social · 14/09/2025

I 100% thought this was meant to be an image/drawing of a nautilus or some relative.

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