Cathy Abbott

Well, Heather organised it, but I did write about it 😊

An image montage advertising NeuroBioUK - 11th of September 2026 in York. The image is York cathedral superimposed over a fluorescent cortex mouse section coloured to look a bit like a dawn sky.

Save the date for #NeuroBioUK26

Do you like neurons? Maybe glia? Molecules? Cell biology? - The venue is booked and we are excited to see you and your incredible science there on the 11th of September! Please do join our email list to stay up to date.

neurobiouk.sites.sheffield.ac.uk

For what it's worth this is my full quote. I would love to understand from @ukri.org why this call has been restricted to 4 weeks (with no advanced warning) going against it's own EDI commitments. The response so far doesn't explain why only 4 weeks nor why not 8 weeks.

Beautifully clear recap of important findings 👏

Yes, for sure.

That's quite the bucket (vat?)

Just when I thought I couldn't despair of UKRI any more. This is no way to run a call, let alone one with funding of this magnitude.

❌Dear staff, here is your periodic reminder to do <thing>. Please do <thing> every period as it is incredibly important.

✅Dear staff, please periodically do <thing>. CLICK THIS LINK TO FIND OUT IF YOU ALREADY DID <thing> THIS PERIOD. If you haven't please do.

Wow, amazing- congrats to you both!

Young woman holding prize and certificate flanked by organisers of the meeting

Congratulations to Nika Balkic, doing a PhD on the @epilepsyinst.bsky.social DTC
with me and @sulsergonzalez.bsky.social on winning the trainees talk prize at the Scottish Paediatric Epilepsy Network meeting on Friday 🎉

Upside down plug sockets on a train table to accommodate chunky chargers

A simple but effective move- well played ScotRail 👍

'For example, in Edinburgh, the university sector's contribution is reckoned to be equivalent to ten Commonwealth Games as the University generates £7.52 billion per year to the UK economy compared with £740 million over seven years by the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth games'.

"Universities are not peripheral to Scotland's economy, rather they are anchor institutions that can generate £28.30 billion in annual economic impact, support 34,000 jobs through research funding, and create employment multiplier effects..."

digitalpublications.parliament.scot/ResearchBrie...

I would probably have had the same problem with male authors to be fair! Dickens, Jonathan Coe, Patrick Gale and err..

Uni leaders: We stand at an inflection point of unprecedented possibility, where the convergence of exponential technologies, human-centered innovation, and courageously reimagined mindsets.

Us: Can we get toilet paper with tensile strength greater than the torque needed to rotate the roll?

This is so interesting. I have been reading a lot of references for several recruitment rounds and just read a few that were generically positive and supportive but somehow told me *nothing* about the actual applicant. I am certain they were LLM generated- so different from the human-penned ones 😢

what even is the fucking point

Five women authors by whom I’ve read (and loved) at least five books:
Elinor Lipman
Anne Tyler
Kate Atkinson
Nina Stibbe
Joanna Trollope

(I could do this for ages, especially if I included children's authors -Noel Streatfeild, LM Montgomery, and dozens more if we dropped to 4 books)

"Precarity is the one constant of academic science. Themes of instability thread themselves through everything we do."

A brief blog post from me about the @ukri.org funding pause and who the real victims will be.

occamstypewriter.org/mindthegap/2...

#AcademicSky

If you want to tackle the "biggest problem holding neuroscience back right now" - comparing mechanisms of cognition across species - join us in @ox.ac.uk and @tcddublin.bsky.social . Please share!

3x Job Details below:

(fantastic article @suthanalab.bsky.social ) #neuroskyence #neurojobs

hahaha, perfect!

"innocently" 😀

(I should add that I said this in response to Mandelson being cleverer, I don't think this is AMB's defining characteristic- I'd go more for arrogant, predatory...)

I knew someone at uni who had been at school with AMB- I asked her what he was like and her one word description was "thick"

Please spread the word: the Structural Studies Division @mrclmb.bsky.social is looking for a new tenure-track, independent group leader with an exciting plan in any area of Structural (Molecular & Cell) biology, in discovery biology and/or methods development. 🥳

mrc.tal.net/vx/mobile-0/...

I used to work beside a group who identified the testis determining gene in mice- they told me there was a bit of the sequence, MALE, that was mutated in sex reversed mice. I think they were absolutely serious (and I could of course check if I could be bothered...😀)

Execllent meeting yesterday. Highlighted the pretty dsimal stats for progression for women academic staff but countered with a fantastic engagement session (I am barely visible above the monitor ☺️) and really superb talk from Omer @bayraktarlab.bsky.social

It's international day of women & girls in science. Whilst there's lots to celebrate, there remains much work to do to increase representation of women in science. At our event on Thurs, we'll reflect on barriers to career progression and the lack of parity at senior levels.
#WomenInScience

Even aside from the immediate issues around this specific vaccine, imagine the chilling effect this will have on R&D in future. What drug company is going to take this level of financial risk, only to be undone by some sort of pathological political lunancy?

The International Day of Women and Girls in Science is definitely one to celebrate. We have come a long way, and the future is bright and hopeful. But to get there, we need to keep acknowledging the systemic biases that sadly still exist nowadays 👇🏻

A year of inaction: why has the Royal Society allowed itself to be hollowed out by Elon Musk? occamstypewriter.org/scurry/2026/...