Reminder: we are hiring a Research Software Engineer @flatironinstitute.org !

The entire NASA budget, which includes a lot of science that helps us fix earth, is still just 0.35% of the entire US federal budget. We can fix earth while also supporting research in the basic sciences.

It’s not an either/or choice! We can eliminate poverty and also fund research in astronomy/space science!

“Pope Leo is WEAK on Crime” is something that would be a dril post

i firmly believe that kennedy wants preventable diseases to rip through american communities since, in his warped mind, those who survive without vaccines will have proven themselves “healthy.”

Surprise inspection finds ICE stuffing migrants 'like sardines' into a facility with no bed, showers Three lawmakers visited a Mesa ICE facility unannounced and found overcrowding, with 250 detainees packed into rooms "like sardines"

“I’ve never experienced anything like this in my entire life,” Rep Adelita Grijalva (D-AZ) said, fighting back tears. The Tucson Democrat described the way people were laying down inside as “like sardines.” “It is frightening in there,” Grijalva said. “It is disgusting.”

Exciting good news- I’m delighted to share that the new astronomy minor at the University of Oregon has been APPROVED and sent to the registrar! Starting this Fall 2026 we will be offering the FIRST EVER astronomy program in the entire state of Oregon!!! 🥳🤩🔭🧪🎢

You can read more about Keith here: www.colorado.edu/asmagazine/2...
The world is certainly made less without him. I think we'll keep seeing far-reaching impacts of his work for many years to come.

This makes simulations difficult. In 2025, we (incl. Keith) did the asymptotic case of infinite diffusion and stratification. Here, I show how the same ideas Keith developed in rotating convection enable 3D simulations of thermohaline mixing in astrophysically relevant regimes.

My paper above is heavily inspired by Keith's work, and extends the idea to what stellar astrophysicists call thermohaline mixing (salt fingers, to oceanographers), a form of turbulence that drives chemical mixing in a wide range of stars. But stars are very thermally diffusive and stratified!

Keith finally answered that question a couple years ago, right around the time that he passed away. The papers were published posthumously, and an excellent, accessible summary can be found here: doi.org/10.1017/jfm....

20ish years ago, Keith showed how to simulate convection in the asymptotic limit of infinitely rapid rotation (QG, basically). But if you can do the infinitely rapid case and the moderate case, what does it take to do the extreme-but-finite case directly relevant to astro-/geophysical problems?

A similar problem has long plagued geophysical fluid dynamicists studying rotating convection (e.g., in planetary cores). People were able to simulate convection with moderate rotation, but never the rapid rotation relevant to real objects. Then, Keith Julien came around and revolutionized the field

Bridging the Prandtl Number Gap: 3D Simulations of Thermohaline Convection in Astrophysical Regimes Bridging the Prandtl Number Gap: 3D Simulations of Thermohaline Convection in Astrophysical Regimes, Fraser, Adrian E.

"It's never possible to directly simulate astrophysical regimes—the best we can do is study similar regimes and extrapolate" Nope! Check it out: 3D direct numerical simulations of chemical mixing in stellar interiors using the actual parameters of these regions iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3...

Star Wars would be a stronger franchise in 2026 if they had taken the feedback about the pod racing sequence in Phantom Menace and made that the entire franchise for a decade

If there is, then several of my papers are wrong. But no biggie

I need someone with an obnoxiously large computer allocation to spend 10’s of millions of CPU hours on one or two giant simulations of salt fingers/thermohaline convection and let me know if there’s an “ultimate regime” à la RBC, please and thank you

And coming soon to ApJ Letters 🥳

Submitted, and should be on the arXiv on Wednesday

To paraphrase Nixon, “It’s not new math when the President does it.”

For those of you who care about thermohaline convection in stars; coming soon to a preprint server near you:

LIGO Detected Gravitational Waves from Black Holes On September 14, 2015 at 5:51 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time (09:51 UTC), the twin Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) detectors, located in Livingston, Louisiana, and Hanford, Wash...

The @ligo.org and @egovirgo.bsky.social collaborations officially announced the first direct detection of gravitational waves #OTD in 2016.

Hard to believe we are ten (ten!) years into the gravitational wave era of astronomy and astrophysics. A remarkable tool for understanding our Universe. 🧪 🔭 ⚛️

Ducky Stardust

The thing where ICE parks masked men in school lots is something I would not have believed unless I saw it with my own two eyes. They do it constantly. It’s purely a terror tactic and they’ve done it to schools over the region. Our schools are collapsing - often at 50% attendance or less.

So I was just strolling through the area and out of nowhere three individuals apprehended me saying they will take me back to Hallownest whether I like it or not

mr president, you've lost the silksong subreddit

If only Americans had a recent way to know how crucial immigrants were for the success of the Manhattan Project. A big Hollywood movie where a lot of the nuclear scientist characters speak with accents and talk about fleeing Europe that makes tons of money and wins a bunch of Oscars, perhaps.

Imagine getting into nuclear fusion as a physics/engineering PhD student because you’re passionate about climate and energy, getting a job at one of the first handful of fusion startups, and 5 years later waking up to find that Trump is now your boss

*scratching head*

A friend points out: Maybe someone told dear leader you can fuse gold

Is it April fool’s day? Waiting for the NYT to post an update saying “sike!”

This was not on my Trump 2 bingo card