Well my 🚴🏼year is over.
Over 5000 miles and C2C in a day. I doubt I'll get to that next year 🤔 (I will be travelling until May!)
Happy peddling in 2026

Sheffield management have withdrawn their threat of a lockout for w/c 5 Jan to facilitate further discussions with our excellent @sheffielducu.bsky.social negotiators. Massive thanks to the ucu team, and to everyone for having our backs. It’s not over yet, but maybe there’s a path to get there!

Drones detect deadly virus in Arctic whales' breath Whale breath collected by drones is giving clues to the health of wild humpbacks and other whales.

As someone with an interest in comparative aspects of mammalian innate immunity in the nasal cavity this is a really cool study.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Express support for our chemistry lecturers! YouTube video by Hector HH

Awesome from the chemistry department students at @sheffielduni.bsky.social in support of @sheffielducu.bsky.social 👌

youtu.be/TxdDV0G9Ys0?...

Now it does 😂

That's sh*t.

Still it's a nice photo?

As someone who delved into the world of the neutrophil when I first started @sheffielduni.bsky.social this is quite a paper!
As we cyclists say "chapeau" to all concerned.😎

Will it ever comeback @sheffielduni.bsky.social?
Remember the Section 188 notice in 2020?
@sheffielducu.bsky.social

University of Sheffield staff 'intimidated' by pay forfeit warning University of Sheffield to withhold pay if staff do not make up for teaching missed while striking.

Great to see media coverage of the hostile and punitive approach taken by management at @sheffielduni.bsky.social towards @sheffielducu.bsky.social staff striking to protect jobs. Threats and intimidation won't work. We're out until we win!
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Hello from the #DigitalPicket line. I'm simultaneously disappointed by senior management's communication around negotiations and impressed with all the amazing @sheffielducu.bsky.social colleagues that have been on the picket lines and continue to engage in constructive discussions Solidarity!

Check out this post about our current situation from a colleague at another university. @sheffielducu.bsky.social

I am guess if you can't take your staff with you on your journey then perhaps you just get rid of the staff. Where's the problem?
@sheffielducu.bsky.social

This is quite an advance. I well remember visiting the @sangerinstitute.bsky.social when they were assembling Chromosome 20 (where favourite genes are). The place was full of MJ Tetrad DNA engines and huge sequencing machines. How times have changed.

A picket line outside a unversity building

A picket line outside a unversity building

A picket line outside a unversity building

A picket line outside a unversity building

Tuesday my union offered to call off 2 weeks of strikes, in return for postponing the redudnacy of, maybe, 5 people for three months. Yesterday the uni wrote to all staff saying "not interested", unless we completely caved. Today we toured picket lines across campus:
@sheffielducu.bsky.social

Looking to attend exciting meetings and training events in 2026? View our calendar, register your interest for a range of events, and be notified when registration opens! buff.ly/5FTNeIW

Early engagement with professional societies such as the @biochemsoc.bsky.social is a great way to interact with your scientific community and to build networks. There is no telling how this may help your career.

So I posted these musings on BPIFB4 to a preprint server as I was not really sure what to do with them. They have been stuck in my head for too long. Let me know what you think?
www.preprints.org/manuscript/2...

The Beginner's Guides are the most accessed content in The Biochemist. If you have a topic that you think might fit and better still if you would like to write one, then contact the editorial office.

Donate to the Sheffield UCU Industrial Action Solidarity Fund What is the Sheffield UCU Industrial Action Solidarity Fund, and how to contribute.

We’re on our 3rd day of (v cold) strike today @sheffielducu.bsky.social @ucu.org.uk

HE is being dismantled by mgmt on eye watering salaries, whilst staff delivering teaching, research & admin are casualised, burnt out & forced out

Pls donate to our fighting fund if you can shorturl.at/EpeTe

An outstanding opportunity. @ukcilianetwork.bsky.social could amplify this (maybe they have)?

Ecology and spread of the North American H5N1 epizootic - Nature The panzootic of highly pathogenic H5N1 since 2021 was driven by around nine introductions into the Atlantic and Pacific flyways, followed by rapid dissemination through wild migratory birds, primaril...

Here's a great paper tracing the molecular evolution of the H5N1 avian influenza outbreak.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Screen shot of text reading: This Spring, the University Executive Board (UEB) announced reviews of academic staffing in five work areas: Chemistry Civil Engineering The Management School Materials Science and Engineering The School of East Asian Studies In September, staff in five additional work areas were told they face targeted voluntary severance (VS): Medicine and Population Health School of History, Philosophy, and Digital Humanities School of English School of Sociological Studies, Politics and International Relations Research Partnerships and Innovation Restructures are anticipated to follow in some, perhaps all, of these areas. UEB aim to save at least £5m through cuts to staff costs across these areas, but have also been clear that they will potentially pursue cuts beyond this figure with a view to changing departments’ ‘size and shape’. The University is also undertaking restructures of IT Services, and language teaching staff in the School of East Asian Studies, and at the conclusion of the five Professional Services restructures in June, at least 20 staff still remained at risk of redundancy.

I am on strike this week, in support of colleagues placed at risk of compulsory redundancy.

www.ucu.org.uk/article/1423...

If you a student and want to know more/how to support the strike, see here: ucu.group.shef.ac.uk/industrial-a...

@sheffielducu.bsky.social

Heartbroken to be on strike (again) - never an easy decision 👍 We cannot accept a university in which staff jobs, student education, and research progress are under threat by major (and financially unnecessary) change management processes. @sheffielducu.bsky.social #Sheffield #DigitalPicket

Solidarity with all my former colleagues @sheffielducu.bsky.social out on strike yet again after years of uncertainty and restructures due to shambolic management decisions.

@sheffielducu.bsky.social Do the University’s financial reports support the need to make job cuts? #DigitalPicket #Sheffield

t.co/pmTtz6x6kx

BMJ places expression of concern on heavily criticized stem cell paper The BMJ has issued an expression of concern for a paper claiming stem cell therapy can reduce the risk of heart failure. The move comes after sleuths and scientists critiqued the “complete mismatch…

@bmj.com has issued an expression of concern for a paper claiming stem cell therapy can reduce the risk of heart failure. The move comes after sleuths and scientists critiqued the “complete mismatch” between the study data and the article itself.

A beginner’s guide to evidencing the impact of outreach url: portlandpress.com/biochemist/a...

One of the things that academics should understand is that not only do professional societies offer you pathways to involvement in the shaping of the society and it's research objectives but that this can also be enjoyable as well.
I have had 20+ years of engagement with the Biochem Soc.