Your brain on drugs: different psychedelics work in surprisingly similar ways Hundreds of scans hint at how substances such as psilocybin, LSD and ayahuasca alter connections between key areas of the brain.

Hundreds of scans hint at how substances such as psilocybin, LSD and ayahuasca alter connections between key areas of the brain

go.nature.com/3QamxwN

Belated congratulations!!

I have to say this: please do not keep defaulting to When2meet for scheduling the meetings. For me the big limitation is that it does not sync with Google Calendar or other calendars. Two alternatives that I have liked are WhenAvailable and Timeful. Both allow syncing with Google Calendar.

Embracing Bayesian Methods in Clinical Trials This Perspective discusses the importance of the US Food and Drug Administration’s draft guidance on the use of bayesian methods in clinical trials because it underscores its commitment to modernizing...

Celebrating the draft FDA Bayesian guidance document with our perspective in @jama.com. Honored to co-author w/Jack Lee (MD Anderson), Lisa LaVange (past director of Office of Biostatistics FDA CDER&president of ASA),& my Bayesian inspiration Sir David Spiegelhalter jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...

NIH is ending continuous submission for permanent study section members after August 10, 2026. Given the heavy, essentially unpaid burden of peer review, this change will matter for many NIH reviewers.

The new issue of the ISBA Bulletin is out! 🎉
isba-bulletin.github.io/ISBABulletin/

"Effective US biomedical research is rooted in reliable federal investment"

Abrupt NIH cuts in 2025 canceled ~2,300 grants disrupting thousands of projects and disproportionately affecting training and early-career research.

www.pnas.org/doi/epdf/10....

Biased AI writing assistants shift users’ attitudes on societal issues Biased AI writing assistants shift people’s attitudes about societal issues; common interventions do not prevent this influence.

"Emerging work has identified how AI writing assistants can be biased and how they can influence users’ communication behavior and perceptions [...] AI suggestions can influence people’s attitudes across a range of politically charged societal issues"

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Why I may ‘hire’ AI instead of a graduate student “It can competently perform a lot of the work I need immediately,” this professor writes

𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝗜 𝗺𝗮𝘆 ‘𝗵𝗶𝗿𝗲’ 𝗔𝗜 𝗶𝗻𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗮𝗱 𝗼𝗳 𝗮 𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗱𝘂𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝘀𝘁𝘂𝗱𝗲𝗻𝘁 -
"The issue is not whether my students are valuable. In the long run, they are invaluable. The issue is that their value emerges slowly, whereas AI delivers immediate returns."

www.science.org/content/arti...

Slides: app.icerm.brown.edu/assets/535/1...

Recording from my talk

“𝙳𝚢𝚗𝚊𝚖𝚒𝚌 𝚁𝚊𝚗𝚍𝚘𝚖 𝙿𝚊𝚛𝚝𝚒𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗𝚜: 𝙰𝚙𝚙𝚕𝚒𝚌𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗𝚜, 𝙾𝚙𝚙𝚘𝚛𝚝𝚞𝚗𝚒𝚝𝚒𝚎𝚜, 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝙲𝚑𝚊𝚕𝚕𝚎𝚗𝚐𝚎𝚜”

at the ICERM Workshop: 𝐍𝐨𝐧𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐜 𝐁𝐚𝐲𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐚𝐧 𝐈𝐧𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 -𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐮𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐈𝐬𝐬𝐮𝐞𝐬

Video: icerm.brown.edu/video_archiv... #BayesianNonparametrics

Pentagon declares Anthropic a threat to national security Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth declared Anthropic a “supply-chain risk,” blocking all federal agencies and contractors from doing business with the company.

The Blackmailer-in-chief is maddening himself up again. There’s nothing wrong with Anthropic, except they have a backbone. That backbone which was used to be a symbol of American exceptionalism.

wapo.st/4aLHqF6

Some Universities apparently are not real Universities

If you are on the job market this year, take notice. If you are a faculty at those Universities, also take notice.

Statistics, Data Science, and the Connectome Statistics and data science are central to brain connectivity research, enabling extraction of meaningful patterns from complex neuroimaging data and advancing understanding of functional architect...

The paper discusses key themes, including:

• Functional and effective connectivity
• Network and graphical modeling frameworks
• Dynamic connectivity
• High-dimensional inference
• Reproducibility and computational challenges

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Statistics, Data Science, and the Connectome Statistics and data science are central to brain connectivity research, enabling extraction of meaningful patterns from complex neuroimaging data and advancing understanding of functional architect...

Brain connectivity data are high-dimensional, structured in space and time, and often dynamic.

Scientific investigation requires formal modeling, principled inference, uncertainty quantification, and scalable computation.

I’m pleased to share a recent paper published in Statistics and Data Science in Imaging (2025): “𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐬, 𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐚 𝐒𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐨𝐦𝐞” by Lindquist et al.

A thoughtful overview of statistical methods in connectomics, the study of brain connectivity derived from neuroimaging data.

Happy to announce a new special issue of 𝘚𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘋𝘢𝘵𝘢 𝘚𝘤𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘐𝘮𝘢𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘨 (a journal of the 𝘈𝘮𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘚𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘈𝘴𝘴𝘰𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯) on 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐅𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐜𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐈𝐦𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐠.

📅 Submission deadline: 𝟑𝟏 𝐃𝐞𝐜𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟔
💡 𝐍𝐨 𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐥𝐞 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐬

More details:
think.taylorandfrancis.com/special_issu...

The focus of 𝘕𝘦𝘶𝘳𝘰𝘪𝘮𝘢𝘨𝘦 has clearly shifted, and it now feels closer to the space occupied by other broad, albeit high-visibility, neuroscience outlets rather than a primary home for field-defining methodological work. So in this way, the "essence" of the journal has indeed traveled away.

So... IS the Essence of a Journal Portable? Checking in on _NeuroImage_ and _Imaging Neuroscience_ - The Scholarly Kitchen How are two competing neuroscience journals faring since the editorial board of one departed to create the other?

The early read is basically “both can win”: NeuroImage didn’t collapse, Imaging Neuroscience is gaining traction, and the field just got more publishing bandwidth:

My take is that I don’t expect 𝘕𝘦𝘶𝘳𝘰𝘐𝘮𝘢𝘨𝘦 to publish truly foundational papers anymore, say like Friston’s earlier contributions.

Interesting report from The Scholarly Kitchen @scholarlykitchn asking a simple question after the 𝘕𝘦𝘶𝘳𝘰𝘐𝘮𝘢𝘨𝘦 editorial board split and launched 𝘐𝘮𝘢𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘕𝘦𝘶𝘳𝘰𝘴𝘤𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦: does a journal’s “essence” travel with the editors.

I feel like this should be the headline of the day

“Anyone” can but not anyone “can”

Possibly, but difficult. But I think it’s just a new state of things. By the way, I need to update my count: 17 invited, 15 declined, 1 accepted, 1 still waiting.

15 invited referees, 14 declined, 1 accepted (so far).

Could be 𝙮𝙤𝙪𝙧 paper.

A conceptual illustration of multiple people looking to center, with conversation bubbles with baby and academic related drawings inside. Hedline is: As women in academia, having children can feel impossible. Talking about it makes us feel less alone

"The academic structure … makes planning for a family feel like an impossible luxury."

In this #ScienceWorkingLife, two postdocs share how, as women in academia, having children can feel impossible—and how talking about it makes them feel less alone. https://scim.ag/46uBWgD #WomenInScienceDay

Making sense of data The Open Visualization Academy—a first-of-its-kind platform recently launched by a faculty member at the University of Miami—offers free courses on designing data-backed charts and maps to communicate...

An in-depth article about the Open Visualization Academy in the University of Miami's News news.miami.edu/stories/2026... #dataviz #infographics #dataVisualization #dataJournalism

Also, once the odds are widely watched, they can shape expectations and behavior, sometimes in a self-fulfilling way, and occasionally in bubble-like ways.

Hence, best to see them as a complement, not a substitution for theory-driven models.

However, the prices often reflect the same forecasts, datasets, and models that other analysts are already using, so they’re aggregating inputs rather than forecasting in a vacuum. So, I would not see them as a "substitution for PhD-level expertise" as the title suggests. More like an aggregator.

Thousands of Amateur Gamblers Are Beating Wall Street Ph.D.s

Interesting article by @lydiadepillis.bsky.social Prediction markets can be a useful input because betting agents often quickly pull together dispersed information.

www.nytimes.com/2026/02/11/b...

Also, am I wrong to say that the paper does not appear to highlight the limitations of the approach itself? 4/4