iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 06/06/2026

Cat has turned into a triffid ahead of #caturday

Photo of a super floofy orange cat on a light green sofa, caught cleaning herself so her tail is wrapped up around her in a way that she looks completely round.

Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

Last week Thursday was my inaugural lecture here at @cambridgeastro.bsky.social (it's been a whirlwind with family in town so only posting about it now). The talk is about #blackholes 🧪🔭, pitched for non-experts, and you can follow it on Youtube (QR code on poster, or youtu.be/60hx7MXzxC4)!

Poster advertising the talk entitled "Staring into the heart of darkness: from theory to the direct imaging of black holes", with a photograph of me, a woman standing rather cheesily next to a telescope inside an observatory dome with wooden panelling. The yellow blocky script with my name is reminiscent of the Watchman comic :)

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 18/04/2026

It always throws me when I look at my French Vélib account and the page auto-translate to English helpfully also 'translates' my name:

Screen shot of account name showing "Will be Markoff" instead of Sera Markoff

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

Billy Bragg’s music was a big part of my teen years so seeing him live at the @togetheralliance.bsky.social march against the right, where he shouted out the bravery of my hometown Minneapolis, was incredibly meaningful ❤️💪

Photo of a stage with crowds and Billy Bragg performing, also projected on a larger screen.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

Black hole scientists against racism at the @togetheralliance.bsky.social March!

Photo of a group of smiling people in front of a large crowd at a big march against the right in London

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

No one told me my room in Oxford came with roommates! I’ve named them Bob and Marge.

Photo of a substantial spider on the wall with slippers for scale.

Photo of another substantial spider hunkered down along the baseboard of a wall.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

I wasn't kidding, there is bonified alpaca petting on our schedule for the "Blackholistic 2026" 🔭🧪 conference in Oxford next week!

Screen shot of a table schedule from a black hole conference showing black hole talks and discussion before/after an "Unconferencing" session and a photo of alpacas captioned by "Petting Alpacas"

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 05/03/2026

It was such an honour to celebrate my Africa Millimetre Telescope 🧪🔭colleague Prof James Chibueze’s Rising Star Africa Prize at the @royalsociety.org tonight!

Photo of Prof James Chibueze at the podium with his title slide projected in the background “Astronomy and Astrophysics as Development Drivers in Africa”

Photo of Prof James Chibueze receiving the prize from Prof Sheila Rowan of the Royal Society

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 25/02/2026

It's in the Dutch part actually but that is funny about the UK swans! 😂

Screenshot of Dutch explanation that the Amsterdam to London train is delayed because of "an animal on the tracks".

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

Just watched Marty Supreme and this more or less sums up how we feel #caturday

Orange fluffy cat lying belly up, staring off into space looking a bit stunned

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 07/02/2026

I have officially transitioned from Dutch to British!

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 28/01/2026

In a dark world at least there’s Ezra Fuhrman #secretlivesofscientists

Photo of the singer Ezra Fuhrman with her band on stage at the Tolhuistuin in Amsterdam. She’s holding the mic singing in a blue dress and the lights behind her are reddish and diffusing out in a starlike pattern through a bit of haze.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 18/01/2026

Meanwhile just returned from a fantastic conference at NYU Abu Dhabi on Cosmic Collisions. And I return bearing gifts. These are for my next group meeting, where we will be conducting a serious taste test of #Dubaichocolate to put the original Fix brand to the test!!

Photo of 7 bars/boxes of variations on Dubai chocolate plus a bag of white chocolate and orange peel covered dates!

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 13/12/2025

I know this is lowbrow but seeing the photos from a new story of a raccoon that trashed a liquor store and passed out in its bathroom has me LOL. This raccoon has it going on.

Two side by side photos, on the right is the aisle of a liquor store showing a trail of destruction left by the raccoon breaking (and apparently drinking) bottles, on the left is said raccoon, passed out splayed on its belly in a bathroom.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 12/12/2025

Our @api.uva.nl institute holiday party was yesterday and fellow faculty member Daniela Huppenkothen (I don't think she's on here?) is an amazing cake maker...behold what she crafted!

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

On the way up to #ALMA around 4000m we had to make way for one of the two massive telescope dish transporters, “Otto”. It weighs 130 tons and can lift 110 ton telescope dishes to reconfigure the array! 🔭🧪

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

An unbelievable privilege and experience today visiting the world leading #ALmA telescope at 5000m in Chile! 🧪🔭 Plus we saw some local fauna!

Photo of woman with hat and oxygen tube under nose in front of stunning desert landscape with an array of white telescope dishes spread out behind. In the background the iconic Licancabur volcano in the background.

Photo of a desert landscape with white telescope dishes scattered across the plane, with the Licancabur volcano cone looming over

Close up of the APEX single dish telescope with spikey sheets of ice in vertical formation in front and a dramatic sky behind.

Photo of three guanacos, a type of Andes camelid related to alpacas and llamas, with cute black faces and tan hides, on a scrubby plain with valley in background.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 10/11/2025

My first ever view of the amazing #ALMA telescope 🧪🔭 at 5000m in Chile, that forms the core of the @ehtelescope.bsky.social!

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 24/10/2025

Just one week until the @mayodarkskies.bsky.social festival! I'm excited to give a public talk, but also to see @paraphrasestudio.bsky.social again. Rae achieves the impossible by making insane visualisations of talks in real time! 🔭🧪Here's the one she made during my #blackhole talk back in 2022:

3 colour illustration/visualisation of a talk about black holes. There is a drawing of a woman in a jacket holding open an interstellar like black hole that says "What will an 'activated'" black hole look like? Surrounding this drawing is a dynamic panorama of text and images relating to quotes and questions from the talk like "Black holes spend most of their time being rather harmless..." with cartoons of adorable little black holes with arms and legs being cute, and eating (with text "...until they get hungry!").

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 12/10/2025

It’s starting!! @spacerocksofficial.bsky.social stage at #ESAOpenDay with mission update by ESA DG, Joseph Aschbachen. 🧪🔭 We’re up next!

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 11/10/2025

Bandida has a serious foot fetish. Caught in the act on a lazy #caturday.

Fluffy orange cat lying belly up on a wooden floor, looking at the camera, with a bit of a twist so she can drape he arms over some house slippers.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 07/10/2025

I went to a gastropub with my group today while visiting the UK and they had this adorable doggy menu!!

Photo showing a wicker basket dog menu full of little fancy dog meals by “Sir Woofchester’s” available to order in the pub. Flavored include Sleepy Bones, Bark Burgers, Sunday Roast, Bark Bangers and Fish and Chips dog bowl!

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 05/10/2025

My mom posted this picture of a scale from her primary care clinic, which I absolutely love, being an astrophysicist. But also the messaging is great!

Photo of a scale in a doctor's office and on the wall above it is a sign that reads "PLEASE REMEMBER: This scale can only give you a numerical reflection of your relationshp with gravity. That is it. It cannot measure (each word in a different colour): beauty, talent, purpose, possibility, strength, love or character."

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 04/10/2025

It’s a special happy birthday #caturday, this little lady is 8 today!

Photo of a fluffy orange cat in a black cubby box looking a bit startled, on a wooden window bench

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

But wait, there's more! Our @ehtelescope.bsky.social outreach folk made a fun explanatory movie of the new M87* #blackhole results, complete with Game of Thrones style soundtrack! 🧪🔭

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

Check out our new results on the M87* #blackhole w/ @ehtelescope.bsky.social ! We now have 3 frames in a 4yr "movie", including polarisation ⇔ magnetic fields. It's like tracking extreme sunspots just outside a black hole, the brightness and fields flip, yet the shape stays the same bc...gravity!

A tryptich of three images of the M87* black hole, from April in 2017, 2018 and 2021 (we lost 2019-2020 campaigns to technical/pandemic reasons). The fuzzy red donut shape is the same but the bright spot shifts in 2018 and seems to reset in 2021. Streamlines in the image indicate the polarisation vectors, that trace the magnetic field configuration. This too seemed unusual in 2018 and the whole field configuration flipped direction over the 4 year period!

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 11/09/2025

Very proud to have won the @api.uva.nl 1 minute elevator pitch prize, from the last year of pizza lunches! Whomever our wheel randomly selects has to give a 1 min pitch about their work, and mine came in at 59s! I now get the trophy for the next year, complete with a picture of pizza on it! 💪🍕

Photo of three women standing in front of a table full of pizzas at a gathering, the aftermath of our pizza lunch talks. The middle person (me) proudly clutching the pizza-topped prize trophy, the other two women are postdocs in my group.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 21/08/2025

My favourite ship from yesterday’s #SAIL festival sail-in parade. This one looks like it’s right out of #GameofThrones, about to attack Amsterdam central station!

Photo of a large galleon style ship with multiple masts and sails incongruously on the Amsterdam IJ river, surrounded by close to 100 smaller boats milling around it. Along the shoreline are crowds of onlookers cheering the parade of tall ships.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 20/08/2025

Enjoying the chaos of #SAIL in Amsterdam after 10 years

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 13/08/2025

We just heard that there's a #BurningMan art installation that looks a lot like our polarised #BlackHole images w/ the @ehtelescope.bsky.social🧪🔭. I wish I could have a (smaller) version for my office, this is super cool! If someone sees it IRL pls post a pic! 🙏 burningman.org/event/2025-a...

An image of a (proposed)?sculpture for Burning Man of swirling lines spiralling around a hole, very similar to the streamlines of polarisation vectors seen in Event Horizon Telescope's two polarised black hole images. An abstract adult figure is placed next to the sculpture to show scale is about twice the figure's height.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 03/08/2025

The only thing better than having a boat in Amsterdam is having friends with a boat in Amsterdam 😁🛥️

Photo of a group of friends in an open motor boat on a canal with houseboats along the side and Dutch style houses off in the distance behind

Photo of a woman in a cap steering a motorboat with an iconic Amsterdam apartment building (nicknamed the toilet) behind her

Photo of a group of friends in an open motorboat on the IJ river that divides the city of Amsterdam

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 02/08/2025

Bandida’s contemplating her long week this #caturday

Photo of an orange fluffy cat sprawled on her pedestal, head tucked down between her front legs, staring off into space in a way that makes her look a bit sad

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 21/07/2025

Someone's having fun with their hotspot name 😂

Screenshot showing list of available personal hotspots, including "Pretty fly for a WiFi"

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 05/07/2025

Guest book from our team meeting at @issibern.ch on the #BlackHole in our galaxy’s centre, Sgr A*🔭🧪. PhD student Nicole Ford reimagined the river flowing through Bern as a magnetic flux tube in the accretion disk interacting with a current sheet, a potential site of high-energy flaring!

Photo of page of guestbook with a beautiful pen drawing like a map of the river flowing through Bern, Switzerland, reimagined as a flux tube interacting with a current sheet in an accretion disk. Also many small individual thank yous to the ISSI host centre.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 23/06/2025

Watching with awe the first images from @vrubinobs.bsky.social 🧪🔭 Congratulations to the team, it's an amazing achievement and going to be so exciting to see what new things we learn about the universe! Here are a couple screen shots from the broadcast that don't do it justice! 10M galaxies/image!

$screengrab of a small fraction of a new Vera Rubin Observatory image showing stunning galaxies and stars of many colours.$ $screengrab of a small fraction of a new Vera Rubin Observatory image showing stunning galaxies and stars of many colours.$

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 20/06/2025

Yesterday my PhD student successfully defended his thesis, but even more amazing was that they had a mini version of the traditional professorial robes for his son (which is possibly the cutest thing I’ve ever seen that isn’t a cat)! Here he is super proud of his dad, with the doctoral committee! 🧪

Photo of five adults donning the traditional robes and funny hats that Dutch professors wear at formal occasions. Amongst them is a young boy proudly dressed in his own mini version of the robes and hat.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 02/06/2025

Here's another shocking infographic made by @planetarysociety.bsky.social that shows the impact of the 2025 presidential budget cuts on almost 20 successful space missions. The scale of US tax-payer-funded investment waste is really unprecedented.

A chart showing 19 active space missions that will be cut because of the new budgets. This is just a subset of the overall active missions that will be cut including astronomy. At the top are the words "These projects reflect more than $12 billion of investment by US taxpayers and 180 of combined years to build".

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 01/06/2025

Many others are posting abt this too but this graphic viscerally shows how dire the presidential budget is for NASA 🔭🧪and worldwide astronomy. I can’t express how sad this makes me, as an American scientist. And it’s mostly already paid for projects, so also no logic in terms of saving money.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 22/04/2025

I’ve gone silent bc lots of hiking up to craggy castles these weeks

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 10/04/2025

It's crazy to think it's already been 6 years since we presented the first black hole image made by @ehtelescope.bsky.social to the world. We've been observing annually every since, and yesterday just tied up our 2025 campaign. Next year we hope to make the first movies instead of just snapshots! 🧪🔭

Photo taken from the US National Science Foundation press event in D.C. on 10 April 2019, where the team of us plus then NSF director France Cordova are on stage, with the first iconic black hole image of M87* looming over us.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 08/04/2025

Our 2025 black hole spotting campaign🧪 is in full swing with the @ehtelescope.bsky.social, which is a challenge given weather conditions need to be good at most participating telescopes across the globe. If you're curious how we do this, check out wiki.ehtcc.org/~glindahl/eh..., 🟩=👍 for that 🔭 !

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 05/04/2025

We interrupt your doom scroll for yet another shitty #Caterday in Amsterdam. Trees starting to flower and someone is enjoying a warm belly.

Photo of living room with typical Dutch three windows showing blue skies and white and pink blossoms on trees. And a large fluffy orange cat sprawled in the middle of the floor, perfectly positioned so sun is shining on her lower belly.

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Sera Markoff @profsera.bsky.social · 03/04/2025

It’s that time of year again! Starting our annual campaign with @ehtelescope.bsky.social and happy to share that our first night has been triggered!! Telescopes across the planet and in space are looking at some supermassive black holes! 🧪🔭

ChatGPT generated image of the two iconic images of black holes Sgr A* and M87 looking like cute cartoons with buggy eyes, courtesy of EHT member Saurabh!

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