Michael Muszynski

I have a lot to say about what is going on right now with our democracy and the impact it is having on free and fair elections in 2026 and 2028. You can have it all sent straight to your inbox by becoming a Democracy Docket premium member now. hubs.ly/Q03CbHTt0

In the wake of another fatal shooting in Minneapolis.
AG Pam Bondi sends Gov. Walz a letter today making several asks including:
"Allow DOJ Civil Rights division access to state voter rolls"

Live with Adam Kinzinger- Minneapolis A recording from Adam Kinzinger's live video

This is a recording of my live on substack. I discuss what happened today and where we go from here

adamkinzinger.substack.com/p/live-with-...

Vigils were held around Minneapolis and beyond Saturday night in the wake of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by federal agents.

Photo and video: Jeff Wheeler, Anthony Souffle, Simon Peter Groebner/The Minnesota Star Tribune.

January 3, 2026 Today was the legal deadline for the Department of Justice to submit to Congress a written justification for any documents from the Epstein files that the department had redacted or withheld.

January 3, 2026

Intracellular accommodation of bacteria, fungi, and oomycetes by plants analyzed using transmission electron microscopy Transmission electron microscopy was the key for revealing structural similarities between intracellular plant-microbe interactions.

Beautiful EM images of my favorite plant-microbe interactions -> Intracellular accommodation of bacteria, fungi, and oomycetes by plants analyzed using transmission electron microscopy | PLOS Pathogens

BREAKING: Here’s the 60 Minutes Segment Trump and CBS News Executives Don’t Want You to See Hours before it was set to air last night, CBS News executives pulled the segment, but Canada’s Global TV app received it prior to broadcast.

Share before this gets blocked.

www.thereset.news/p/breaking-h...

There are at least two other crises that need Congressional attention right now (war powers, ACA subsidies, I'm probably forgetting six others) but I really think folks should be calling Congress about NCAR, this needs legislators' attention fast

This handsome beast is the larva of the spurge hawkmoth (Hyles euphorbiae) of Europe, Asia & N. America. It feeds on Ephorbia spp., sequestering toxic diterpenes from its host. 📷: Wolfgang Ahlmer CCBY4. #Euphorbiaceae #Aposematism #TeamMoth #Botany 🌾🧪🌱

An AINTEGUMENTA phosphoswitch controls bilateral stem cell activity during secondary growth | PNAS Plant stem cells have the remarkable ability to give rise to distinct tissues and organs throughout development. Two concentric cylinders of active...

It’s finally out! 🎉
Work led by former PhD student @wei-xiao-botany.bsky.social , in collaboration with @bayerlab.bsky.social and @bertderybel.bsky.social
AINTEGUMENTA phospho-switch regulates bilateral stem cell activity during secondary growth.

🔗 www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

#PlantSciences

We missed you. So sorry.

In this study, Gallicchio et al. describe how cleavage factor II (CFII) components serve as a mechanistic switch that controls alternative mRNA cleavage and polyadenylation during spermatogenic differentiation.

Learn more here:
➡️ tinyurl.com/gd351649

Fig. 1.Morphology of Phlebodium pseudoaureum. (A) A fertile frond of Phlebodium with attached sori. (B) An individual sporangium. (C–L) Representative images of gametophytes at different days after inoculation onto growth medium: (C) 20, (D) 31, (E) 86, (F–J) 111, (K) 133, and (L) 129. Arrows in (G–K) indicate meristem notches. The dashed circle in (L) highlights a cluster of multiple meristems and prothalli derived from a single gametophyte body. Scale bars are 5 mm in (A, L) and 100 μm in (B–K). The gametophyte shown in (I) developed independent new meristems (arrows); the one on the left is also shown in Supplementary Fig. S2C. The images shown in (C–E) and in (F–K) are representative of at least 40 and 12 independent gametophytes observed during the developmental stages, respectively.

🔬🌱 RESEARCH 🌱🔬

Continuous cell proliferation and de novo meristem formation drive clone-forming growth and prolonged longevity in epiphytic fern gametophytes - Wu et al.

🔗 doi.org/10.1093/jxb/...

#PlantScience 🧪

Regulation of arbuscular mycorrhiza development by environmental stimuli: Many roads lead to strigolactones The majority of land plant species recruit fungi of the phylum Glomeromycotina to form one of the most widespread plant symbioses called arbuscular mycorrhiza (AM) for mutual nutritional benefit [1–3]. Arbuscular mycorrhiza fungi (AMF) take up mineral nutrients from the soil through an extended hyphal network that forms outside the root and transports the nutrients directly into the root cortex, where they are released to the plant from highly-branched fungal structures, the arbuscules [4]. In turn, the fungi obtain photosynthetically fixed organic carbon from their host plants in the form of sugars and lipids [5,6]. AM is often described as a strategy for plants to obtain inorganic phosphate, but it also improves uptake of other inorganic nutrients, such as nitrogen, potassium, and sulfur [7–9].

Plants cry for help to their closest friends! -> Regulation of arbuscular mycorrhiza development by environmental stimuli: Many roads lead to strigolactones | PLOS Pathogens

 An intergenic bidirectional promoter driven novel lncRNA (LjPLR) modulates the gene expression of a late nodulin in Lotus japonicus | Research Square

KATANIN promotes cell elongation and division to generate proper cell numbers in maize organs Microtubule severing is essential for proper eukaryotic cell elongation and division. Here we show that the microtubule severing protein, KATANIN, is encoded by two genes in Zea mays (maize) called Di...

Excited to share this preprint on the microtubule severing protein Katanin, and its role in cell elongation and division in maize. First author Stephanie Martinez worked collaboratively with many folks to bring you this preprint. Check it out! 🔬🌽 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

T0 DNA prep time. Go Jerry!!! 💪🏼🌽🙏🏽🙌🏽

Scarlet eggplant plant, showing black stems and bright red-orange fruit.

My scarlet eggplant F1s are doing great. After they're done, I will have so very many F2 seeds stashed away.

Even with my goal involving several genes, I should easily be able to recover several plants.

Some of the early generation diploid potatoes from today, 2nd or 3rd year in the field and putting out some interesting colored flesh 🌈

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ggplot2 4.0.0 A new major version of ggplot2 has been released on CRAN. Find out what is new here.

I am beyond excited to announce that ggplot2 4.0.0 has just landed on CRAN.

It's not every day we have a new major #ggplot2 release but it is a fitting 18 year birthday present for the package.

Get an overview of the release in this blog post and be on the lookout for more in-depth posts #rstats

Pivot to Plants: Training Program for Plant and Data Science | Danforth Plant Science Center The Pivot2Plants Fellows Program is a 1-year training program for people interested in pivoting to a career in plant science or data science but have limited research experience.

Applications for the 2026 Pivot to Plants Fellows Program at the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center are now open.

Location: St. Louis, MO
Application Deadline: October 15, 2025
Dates: Jan. 5, 2026 – Dec. 23, 2026
Estimated Stipend: $37,275

Learn more: www.danforthcenter.org/our-work/edu...

Everyday trump does horrible stuff that erodes democratic norms and also the administration should release all the Epstein documents

This always blows my mind. Dude mapped qtl for a quantitative trait to a chromosome in 1923!

Arrived and ready for #PDevSRC!! 🌱🧪

Partial retention of ancient function increases genetic pleiotropy in grass evolution https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.08.22.670905v1

Popgen day 8: mutation/selection balance, genetic load and inbreeding depression (and Darwin studying corn!), migration, aliens, a brief aside on the structured coalescent, 2Ns>>1 for selection to win, and Tomoko Ohta being a badass

Please listen to @justinwolfers.bsky.social. Boom.

In 2005, a small team of researchers asked:
What if undergrads didn’t just learn genomics, but contributed to real discoveries?

That question launched the Genomics Education Partnership (GEP).
#GenomicsEducation #UndergradResearch #GEPCUREs