Looks like an iris

Yes, it is still a wonder that we head out each morning with a GPS, compass, high res camera, computer, inclinometer, accurate clock that does all time zones, and can also make phone calls in our pocket

Nice to see a role identified at last. It was pure luck that we used ACP as a keystone to unlock much about the apicoplast in the early days and it turns out to be a hub for more than just FASII.

I’ll try it. Looking at one’s own cells is not to be underestimated as an impactful experience.

Are there sufficient loose cells in saliva to find them easily? We used to do a prac class where students scraped cells off the inside cheek with a popsicle stick and stained them after smearing, but OH&S canned it deeming the risk of putting objects in the mouth in a lab space too high.

Smooth-leaved mountain gum from SE Australia.

There is something genuinely troubling about a machine challenging me to prove I’m not a machine. I mean really, who is actually in charge here?

Passed 2k emails unread. The sky hasn’t fallen. No lightning bolts frizzling me from on high. I still have a job. I have found you get a lot less email if you don’t reply 🙄

Bit of summer evening malariology at a rooftop bar downtown.

Cuckoo wasp from SE Australia. Lays her eggs in the larvae of mud daub wasps, which become food for the hatching cuckoo wasp larvae. Remarkably beautiful little insect, and I’m pretty happy with this iPhone shot as she is only 10mm long.

RHS

I picked up a horse blanket at ALDI. Don’t even own a horse.

My immunology friends use our malaria parasite sporozoites to study the immune system's response to infection. The papers have titles I can barely understand, appearing to be in foreign language. Nice work.

"γδ T cell-derived IL-4 initiates CD8+ T cell immunity"

www.doherty.edu.au/articles/fro...

We get it along my coast each summer. The phosphorescence isn't as good as I have seen it at Woods Hole, but it is very good and super fun to swim in at night.

Is it a Dinophysis?

Nice to see this work out Frankie, Mel and Wai-Hong

Such a lovely meeting for science, community, and sweet location.

If you are a committed scientist who wishes to work with Toxoplasma or with organelles (or both!!) - come work with us:
www.jobs.gla.ac.uk/job/research...

Plasmodium: More Don’ts In a previous missive I explained why you cannot turn the genus name for malaria parasites (Plasmodium) into a plural noun [1]. Here I tackle fallacious anthropocentrisms in our literature.

Definitely. In this piece I made the point that humans are an amplification host AND an efficient vector of Plasmodium, whereas mosquitoes are the definitive host (in which sex occurs).

www.cell.com/trends/paras...

Cows With Guns - The Original Animation YouTube video by Thermosion

Uh oh

m.youtube.com/watch?v=FQMb...

As the disgruntled owner of 463 different log ins, I totally agree with this. Passwords are the bane of the internet, and when the enforced changes take several days to roll out across the many devices and tools one uses at a university, it is quite chaotic every 6 months. Chip me now please.

Spooky. My kid gave it to me knowing I’d love it. It will be a challenge for the movie makers not to make it too mawkish.

Excellent piece and the journalist knew the subject.

Makes sense. Whiskey relies on complex processes like mashing, fermenting and cask maturation. Gin just needs botanicals soaked in alcohol. If the botanicals can be extracted in aqueous rather than a strong polar solvent like alcohol, you get most of the taste and only miss the alcohol mouth feel.

The temple to Life on Earth

Hope it keeps its style. Always considered it a museum of a museum.

We may just be at peak AI right now. The tools will get better but the ads, enshitification, and monetisation can’t be far away.

“Every AI ever built has an electromagnetic shotgun wired to its forehead”.

William Gibson in his multi-award-winning Neuromancer, 1984. Reread it 41 years on & there’s some spooky foresight by a remarkable future gazer. Fun part is he didn’t foresee wifi. People tote cables & dongles to ‘jack in’.

It’s not every day that a Nobel Laureate drops in for an update on your lab’s work. Liz Blackburn co-discovered telomeres and still asks hard questions.