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Tim

@timisstuck.bsky.social
923 followers 245 following 428 posts

Executive Editor at Life Science Alliance. I help decide how biology thinks 🤔 Views are my own and do not reflect editorial policy. www.timfessenden.com

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Reposted by Tim
Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 22h
Thanks to Russ Vought for exposing this woke research
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 20h
Needed to consult my editorial assistant on these critical reviewer comments.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
Approaching editorial policy solely through the lens of impact factor (wave of nausea) is like a high-risk high-reward gamble. A small number of papers are very highly cited, and they drag up the IF. Reflects how poorly this actually captures the overall significance/influence of the entire journal.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
Conversely Nature uses their flagship as their news magazine, which is why the Table of Contents is like 12 pages long (I always give up halfway through). The sane action might be to spin it off into a separate news magazine. But they won't because IF = $$$ of course.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
I think this surfaces interesting differences in these journal families. ACS could fold their exquisite news magazine C&EN into their flagship publication (this would be terrible). Some of those articles would be citable and thus nicely puff up their IF.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
Most researchers treat impact factor like an objective measure of some natural law that just flows directly from journal performance. Approximately zero researchers know that IF is "owned" by a single company, and that many other measures of journal performance might be used instead.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Today's seminar speaker at Rockefeller was Svante Pääbo, who was introduced with the appropriate list of accolades/prizes. Including the Time Magazine top 100 people in 2007, shared with Barack Obama and Oprah. He began his talk by telling us he also shared the Times list with Osama Bin Laden 😂
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
And then publish your negative results! bsky.app/profile/timi...
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
A v important question. I have to tap my sign that trust has always been a key ingredient in the publication process. AI presents new ways to cheat (and new ways to detect cheating!). But if authors want to cheat, they will find a way to cheat.
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Silas Maniatis @manimota.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
In 2022 we published an open-source hardware, software, and protocols ecosystem for repurposing sequencers as automated fluidics coupled imaging instruments. On Oct 13 @yougotkunal.bsky.social & @nygenome.org will host a workshop on current applications. Register here: regenseq.github.io/meeting/
regenseq.github.io
RegenSeq Community Meeting 2026
Bringing together the RegenSeq community across multiplexed imaging, spatial transcriptomics, and optical pooled screening.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Human vs murine IL-2?? If you are a mouse T cell, prevailing wisdom says it doesn't matter. But papers on IL-2 species specificity are ~30 years old. Here, Brian Sheridan and colleagues found a modest but persistent survival advantage for murine IL-2 👇 www.life-science-alliance.org/content/9/12...
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Richard Sever @richardsever.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
"All corners of academia will soon be flooded with AI-generated research....Maths and CS go first because their entire output is symbol manipulation...Biology comes later not because biologists are cleverer but because the rate-limiting step is physical" giorgio.gilest.ro/the-weimar-o...
giorgio.gilest.ro
The Weimar of knowledge – la bottega
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Immunology journal editor (in a webinar) "reviewers spend 1-2 hours to write a quality review" Seems kind of low to me? Is that true, immunologists?
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Reposted by Tim
Kevin A. Scott, PhD @sculpturatus.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
found at ucsf
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
It's Peer Review Week!! The one week a year when I actually read the peer reviews at LSA 😌 (this was a joke) But seriously this week I worked with a 1st time peer reviewer to significantly improve their comments which were initially not really appropriate. A win for us all!
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Congrats Max @maxkrummel.bsky.social and coauthor @danmucida.bsky.social !!
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
We are all watching this experiment! Whatever the outcome, Biology Open deserves credit for testing this out. In the meantime, I am confident that every researcher who is shouting "pay peer reviewers!!" is of course sending all of their own manuscripts to this journal 😉
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
New Attention metric for salmon-related research?? 🤞
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Do you think a seminar talk should be citable the way a paper is? Do you think oral presentations should be tracked and ranked the way clicks and citations on papers are? In this case I really worry about attention deficit disorder 😅
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Congrats Anh! Really nice insight into (probably) my favorite topic !!
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
AND!! Custom M&Ms
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
For the 125th birthday of @rockefeller.edu my colleagues at @rupress.org created this beautiful booklet ✨✨
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Not at all surprised 😎
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
I need to hear from the people about italicizing "in vitro" and "in vivo" in manuscripts: Should @lsajournal.org stick to the Council of Science Editors and various others' conventions and force authors to remove italics for these? I have heard that this request makes some authors unhappy...
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Reposted by Tim
Drummond Lab @drummondlab.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
We are hiring! 🌟 Dept of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Chicago is searching for a tenure-track assistant professor. It's a broad search: we want great colleagues doing serious biological work at the molecular scale. Join us! apply.interfolio.com/191981 bcmb.uchicago.edu
A picture of the University of Chicago campus, with downtown Chicago in the distance and Lake Michigan on the horizon. The campus's central quad is pictured, a classical collegiate quad with paths and old trees and stone architecture. It's really pretty and I love it.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Here in lovely Woods Hole for the annual meeting @sgpweb.bsky.social, where I am delighted to chat about both @lsajournal.org and @jgp.org A great theme this year on excitability in human reproduction!! (My congrats to Sue on her impressive puddle)
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
But I'm constantly told by potential authors that @lsajournal.org impact factor is not high enough for tenure/funding requirements. These "hidden gems" we all applaud were complete failures, according to institutional/grant review/prestige metrics!! Link: www.nature.com/articles/d41...
nature.com
This AI tool claims to pick the top 1% of preprints. Should researchers trust it?
QED Science says that its metrics reduce bias by assessing papers solely on the basis of their originality and validity.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
...We all know and recognize papers whose quality and significance seems discordant with the journal's impact factor. I think everyone feels really good pointing to unsung heroes, super important papers that were totally missed by editors and/or reviewers of competitive journals.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
By pointing to a discordance between their article-level QED score and (perceived) journal prestige, they are reinforcing this toxic and flawed connection. (reminder journal impact factor was conceived as a tool solely for librarians to make subscription decisions) But this raises a paradox...
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
QED Science correctly celebrates high-scoring preprints that were later published in lower impact journals. This is a helpful time to remind everyone that impact factor is a journal-level metric, was not, and still is not, any kind of metric for a single paper. But also...
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Reposted by Tim
Triangle Cytoskeleton Meeting @tricytomeet.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
Final call for early registration! 📢 The 2026 Triangle Cytoskeleton Meeting is coming up on September 21st. 🧬 Early Registration ($80): Ends Aug 24th 🧬 Late Registration ($100): Ends Sept 14th Sign up now to lock in your spot. Visit our website for more info trianglecytoskeleton.com
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
The Risca lab at @rockefeller.edu asked what the hell is going on with this weird flavor of senescence and SASP that can arise from CDK4/6 inhibition. Important implications for treating tumors with this powerful therapy, now out at @lsajournal.org www.rockefeller.edu/news/40361-c...
rockefeller.edu
The Rockefeller University » How cellular senescence triggers cancer-promoting inflammation
Researchers show how the senescent state induced by sarcoma and breast cancer drugs drives inflammation—and how it could be suppressed.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 09/08/2026
This is why editors want to attend conferences btw
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 08/08/2026
A belated congrats Ankita!!
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Reposted by Tim
Total Internal Reflection🇬🇧🇺🇸🇺🇦 @tirscienceblog.bsky.social · 07/08/2026
🚨🚨🚨 #Editor Job alert! I’m not an editor, but if I decided to pursue career in scientific #publishing, then Company of Biologists is the organisation I’d most want to work for, & @jcellsci.bsky.social is the journal I’d want to work at 🤩 Details + link to job description in the link 👇
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 01/08/2026
This reflects a pathological conservatism of the glam journals, terrified of any potential blemish on reputation/prestige. But if we have journals for anything, surely it is as a venue to air these discussions. Anyway here's the link: doi.org/10.1038/s443...
doi.org
Limitations of the p16-3MR mouse model for detecting and eliminating senescent cells - EMBO Reports
The p16-3MR mouse model, designed to express Renilla luciferase, mRFP, and herpes simplex virus 1 thymidine kinase (HSV-TK) under the p16INK4a promoter, has been widely used to visualize and ablate senescent cells in vivo, but our analyses revealed critical limitations. Bioluminescence signals in p16-3MR mice were extremely weak and virtually indistinguishable from those of wild-type mice injected with coelenterazine-h, indicating that previously reported signals largely reflected substrate background rather than authentic reporter expression. Signal intensity remained unchanged with aging, doxorubicin treatment, or cutaneous wound healing, failing to replicate earlier observations. Furthermore, RFP signals were undetectable in senescent fibroblasts from p16-3MR mice, and senescent cells were not eliminated by ganciclovir treatment, suggesting poor expression and lack of functional activity of the mRFP and HSV-TK transgenes. These results demonstrate functional deficiencies in all three transgenes, highlighting the importance of using wild-type controls and calling for careful reevaluation of studies employing this system.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 01/08/2026
Weekend reading: this back and forth about a p16 reporter mouse for senescence and aging research. Read here in @emboreports.org and many more comments PubPeer. It seems to me that many journals are quite reluctant to publish these correspondences, to their great detriment.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 30/07/2026
I’ll try 🫡
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Reposted by Tim
Richard Sever @richardsever.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
"7 days after the medical team infused trillions of viruses carrying the recipe for the base editor into her spinal fluid, she died of a severe immune reaction" www.science.org/content/arti...
science.org
Exclusive: Death of girl in Chinese gene-editing trial was never made public
Parents want accountability after study went disastrously wrong, Science and Retraction Watch investigation reveals
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Reposted by Tim
Sean Gibbons 🦠💩 @gibbological.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Dear microbiome enthusiasts: I'm excited to be moving my lab to New York University this fall (& the NYU Institute for Engineering Health); with joint-appointment @isbscience.org I'm hiring a postdoc @ NYU to look at diet-driven evolution in the gut: apply.interfolio.com/189980 Please share! 🦠🤓
apply.interfolio.com
Apply - Interfolio {{$ctrl.$state.data.pageTitle}} - Apply - Interfolio
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
They've been playing us for absolute fools. 8 basic sounds?? Completely derivative, no creativity whatsoever.
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
Here is the preprint: arxiv.org/pdf/2605.29468
arxiv.org
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
Nice benchmarking resource for publication integrity guardrails with AI They prompted agents to generate false data or other forms of misconduct. Prompts were overt or covert attempts at misconduct, compared against a benign request. Strong showing for Claude, quite poor for DeepSeek
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
"Please address all comments by Reviewer 21"
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Rebecca R Helm @rebeccarhelm.bsky.social · 20/07/2024
People say scientists are serious but marine biologists will spend hours quietly sitting around tables drawing on styrofoam cups and then tying said cups to deep sea submarines Because ocean pressure will squeeze the air from the cups And we are but human & we want tiny cup
A hand holding four shrunken styrofoam cups the size of shot glasses. Two with jellyfish colored on them and two with black and white lines
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
Congrats on this important babysitting adventure!
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Journal of Cell Biology @jcb.org · 16/07/2026
This collection explores emergent phenomena in #CellBiology incl. how cellular events are rapidly coordinated by waves of chemical & electrical signals, how tissue patterning is governed at the cellular level & how cellular interfaces guide cellular migration & morphology rupress.org/jcb/collecti...
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ceej @ceej.online · 16/07/2026
gonna start talking like this to my boss
screenshot where claude is saying "Good catch -- I fabricated that figure."
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 14/07/2026
It puts the journal decision letter in the basket
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Tim @timisstuck.bsky.social · 13/07/2026
🤣
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