Noam Ross is #Hiring

How Congress can restore the independence of US science Members must go beyond reinstating US government research spending and re-establish decentralized governance at the National Institutes of Health and other agencies.

The most impt change at #NIH and to US science this year is bigger than grant cancellations— it’s how the agency is governed.

For 75 years NIH has been largely independent of presidential control. That’s changed this year. New piece from me and @nataliebaviles.bsky.social in @nature.com
🧪

All the systemic risk of credit default swaps plus a whole new kind of moral depravity!

Could someone make a derivative market on "Kalshi's market on X bet will not pay out?"

I have a new comment piece out in Nature today.

rdcu.be/e7LVS

1/6

The Pokémon Company Is Actively Recruiting PhD Holders With Backgrounds in Ecology to Work in Tokyo - IGN The Pokémon Company is actively recruiting PhD holders with backgrounds in ecology to work in Tokyo. This is perhaps the closest chance Pokémon fans have to channel their inner Professor Oak in real l...

Okay this is the only situation where I'd gleefully leave academia for industry (if only I had Japanese language skills)

www.ign.com/articles/the...

Stand Up for Science protests spread to more than 50 cities Speakers at the Stand Up for Science rally in Washington, D.C., criticized the politicization of science and cuts to research that serves the public

Stand Up for Science protests spread to more than 50 cities www.scientificamerican.com/article/stan...

Data Science Lab

I'm joining @libbyheeren.bsky.social and @ivelasq3.bsky.social at pos.it/dslab tomorrow to show you how to quickly and easily submit a dataset to #TidyTuesday! I can't wait to answer any questions you might have! #RStats #dataBS

Great group, great objective, great opportunity.

And Happy International Women's Day to the two most important people in science over the past year, @cdelawalla.bsky.social and @jenna-m-norton.bsky.social.

Because Iran's being bombed right now, I figured I'd share a thread of home videos of Iran (20+ years old) recorded by members of my family, just so people can see what Iran looks like without smoke/fire everywhere and to preserve those memories

January 2006, Tehran (I think)

Great opportunity!

I work fairly closely with the grant-witness team. Good humans and an impressive array of skill sets.

I always feel like a complete data science amateur during our calls.

New in SSM-Mental Health, by @albeccia.bsky.social, @scott-delaney.bsky.social, @noamross.net et al.: Congressional district mapping of the NIH/NSF/SAMHSA mental health/substance use grant terminations from early 2025
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

1/It was not possibly unlawful; it was unlawful; and it continues to be unlawful. In addition, NEH canceled statutorily required grants to state humanities councils many of which have had to close, harming state arts communities. And guess what: “Western Civilization” is not in the statute.

R-Ladies branded graphic with blue-to-purple gradient background. The heading reads "Our Values" in white. Six values are listed vertically, each with a blue accent dot: Diversity & Inclusivity (embracing all genders and backgrounds), Empowerment (resources, mentorship, and opportunity for all), Community (collaboration, knowledge-sharing, and support), Accessibility (making R learning open to everyone), Advocacy (championing underrepresented genders in tech), and Transparency (accountability, honesty, and fairness in everything).

What drives R-Ladies?

Our values:
→ Diversity & Inclusivity
→ Empowerment
→ Community
→ Accessibility
→ Advocacy
→ Transparency

These aren't just words — they shape everything we do.

rladies.org

#RLadiesIWD2026 #IWD2026

I'm better at math than slogans

Wearing my @skypeascientist.bsky.social swag for today's @standupforscience.bsky.social NYC rally!

Shared from my PhD lab’s WhasApp chat, how a journal published a paper about the Arctic fox which is 100% an AI hallucination, and journal isn’t retracting it.

www.canids.org/resources/Le...

Damn depressing how fake science and AI is increasingly flooding real science and real work.

Hope to see my NYC science friends tomorrow at City Hall Park!

Grant Witness is hiring! We're seeking a full-time data scientist to join our team building data resources to support journalism, litigation, and activism protecting science, public health, and the rule of law. grant-witness.us/apply.html #rstats

13/ “The categories of people I am being asked to remove from grants share the same identities of people being forcibly removed, detained, and killed in our country...

12/“I spent five hours creating a justification for why the word the screening tool picked up was a false positive - I was told my judgment was wrong. When I asked to document that my decision was overruled I was told that the decision memo could not include “dissenting language.”
- anonymous NIH PO

11/ ...When people are being shot, detained inhumanely, deported, and abused for having the same identities we are removing from grants, it is abundantly clear we are participating in hate.”

- anonymous NIH program officer

This middle part of the thread points to specific examples of potential/ongoing automation of ideology-driven evaluation, i.e., using tools to screen for alignment with administration priorities. There are significant implications here for oversight of what is unfolding with NIH grants & reviews.

Current NIH leadership want you to think they are using rigorous, consistent & scientific processes to screen studies to align them with agency priorities.

But the process that they have put down on paper is a sham.

It’s important to know NIH is not following its own guidance. Here’s why:

🧵1/

Page 2 of letter by Daniel Swain. It begins: constructive suggestions regarding how the already remarkable institutional efficiency and societal impact of NCAR could be further enhanced through increased (not decreased) federal support in the years to come. Please note: To ensure the highest level of technical rigor, this response focuses exclusively on the core atmospheric and natural hazard science topics within the author’s primary domain of expertise; for this reason, I have omitted a response to Topic 4 (Space Weather)." NCAR weather modeling and atmospheric observing capabilities a) Management and operations of weather-related observational platforms, modeling and science as a stand-alone activity. The proposed management of weather-related research as a stand-alone activity is a scientifically regressive path that ignores the fundamental physical reality of the Earth system. Modern atmospheric science has demonstrated (largely, it is worth noting, due to groundbreaking researc

Page 3 of letter by Daniel Swain. It begins: b) Management and operations of weather-related observational platforms, modeling and science as combined with other NSF investments/facilities. The highly specialized nature of the NCAR-Wyoming Supercomputing Center (NWSC) infrastructure represents an extraordinary value proposition that cannot be replicated by combining it with more generalized NSF programs. The NWSC is not a generic high-performance computing (HPC) facility; it is a laboratory uniquely optimized for atmospheric science workflows, with a hardware and storage architecture specifically designed to handle the massive, high-bandwidth data demands of Earth system modeling. Furthermore, its model of providing an excellent, free-at-point-of-use technical support team ensures that the focus remains on the science rather than the overhead of systems administration. This centralized expertise allows individual researchers, smaller labs, and even entire universities—who would otherwi

Page 4 of letter by Daniel Swain. It begins: NCAR Mesa Lab (located in Boulder, Colorado) a/b) Ownership of the NSF NCAR Mesa Lab building for public and private use. Far more than just an office building, NSF NCAR Mesa Lab is an iconic and purpose-built facility designed specifically for the study of atmospheric science. Its position at the physical interface of the Rocky Mountain foothills and the Great Plains is a deliberate reflection of its mission, serving as a visible symbol—in an iconically American setting—of the federal government's enduring commitment to science in service of society. For many in the field, including myself, the Mesa Lab holds singular importance as a focal gathering point for the global atmospheric science community. My own early career exposure to weather and Earth system modeling, in fact, occurred within these walls, and I have long felt that the facility’s architecture and location inspire a necessary sense of awe regarding the atmosphere’s complexity a

Page 1 of letter by Daniel Swain. It begins: Dear Acting Director Stone and the NSF NCAR restructuring team: I am writing to provide a formal response to the Request for Information (RFI) regarding the proposed restructuring of the NSF National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and its critical weather science infrastructure contained within the January 23, 2026 Dear Colleague Letter (DCL) entitled “NSF Intent to Restructure Critical Weather Infrastructure.” I submit these comments in my professional capacity as an atmospheric research scientist within the University of California, where my research focuses on the physics and dynamics of atmospheric processes related to extreme weather events and their role in shifting natural hazard and disaster risk. My perspective is informed by a public-sector career dedicated to bridging the gap between fundamental atmospheric research and real-world application in an academic context, with a particular focus on understanding and mitigating

I just submitted my letter to NSF responding to its proposal to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). I argue that doing so would be an astonishing and avoidable misstep, and that federal support for the institution should in fact be *increased.* [1/4]

"There is perhaps no stronger evidence of the administration’s objectives to reduce the quality of the US scientific workforce than its treatment of the National Science Foundation’s flagship Graduate Research Fellowship Program."

Thanks @holdenthorp.bsky.social for a clear-eyed view of the facts.

The Unraveling of Public Science A nonprofit, nonpartisan organization working towards effective government for the American people.

Learn how one year dramatically changed the federal science landscape and share with your networks with consequences of these cuts. ourpublicservice.org/the-unraveli...

Our newest product, The Unraveling of Public Science, documents the administration's most crucial public science cuts in 2025. From uprooting nearly a hundred thousand jobs to slashing one-quarter of spending obligations that support scientific research, these cuts harm millions of people.

Stark Divide: Americans More Confident in Career Scientists at U.S. Health Agencies Than Leaders | The Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania When it comes to reliable health information, Americans are more confident in federal health agencies' career scientists than their leaders.

A new Annenberg poll shows Americans trust federal career scientists and independent medical groups more than in the political leaders running U.S. health agencies
www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/stark-divide...

nasa logo to left of openscapes logo

✍🏼📣We're expanding our support of open Earth science with NASA Openscapes Mentors, with additional focus supporting suborbital science teams to develop reproducible workflows.
Welcoming Ronny Hernández Mora to the Openscapes team to support this work!
nasa-openscapes.github.io/news/2026-03...