Profile avatar
jayatirsharma.bsky.social
🧬 genetic epi + public health in diverse pops 📚 PhD-ing @ JHU Genetic Epi 📝 Editor @genebites.org | AAAS MMF ‘22 pronounced “JAY-uh-tea”
25 posts 229 followers 407 following
Prolific Poster

The fact many of us are completing degrees while the world is on fire is a lot to unpack. What’s disgusting is how many in the academy refuse to acknowledge the climate we are in and continuing status quo. Don’t “not this academic” me either. Read the damn room. #PhdSky #AcademicSky

“My name is Mahmoud Khalil and I am a political prisoner.” www.documentcloud.org/documents/25...

The GOP plan is to "reform" NIH by reducing the number of research institutes in the NIH from 27 to 15. This article includes a link to the GOP plan (link says "whitepaper"), which does not include a National Human Genome Research Institute. What you're seeing is probably the first salvo of that.

Defend the liberty of a stranger as you would defend your own, or that of a loved one, because that is what's actually on the table—whether we are a society that will sit still as our neighbors are snatched in the night, and disappeared into darkness, or a society that will fight for each other.

UPDATE: Mahmoud Khalil is being held by ICE in the Jena/LaSalle Detention Facility in Louisiana, per ICE detainee tracker Khalil was detained Saturday night from his New York apartment building

I see a lot of folks treating "science under attack" as an apolitical existential threat and "DEI under attack" as a political/moral threat. Stop. Good, rigorous science is diverse & inclusive. Shutting down science by and/or for those previously excluded *is* an existential threat to many of us.

There's a SCOTUS case for that: City of Grants Pass v. Johnson Grants Pass is in Oregon, as well. Good to note that criminalizing unhoused people and consigning them to preventable illness and premature death are on the same spectrum.

I quit my job at the NIH last month, in large part because it seemed like I could no longer honestly write about topics like health equity. so I wrote about it for Slate instead 🧪 slate.com/technology/2...

How long does PubMed have? How long will BLAST be up? Genome browser? We have the funding to keep these tools up, we have the expertise, we have the people. Loss of these tools would cost billions to replace by the private sector and academia. Inefficient destruction with no upside

just a student, trying to write her dissertation, incessantly reloading pubmed in the hopes it returns 🙂

THEM: you look tired ME: I am tired THEM: oh right because of the… ME: the horrors yeah THEM: right right, that’s right

Personally I think popular communication about public health should move away from “what’s going to happen?” and towards “what do we know and what can we do?”

📣 Want to DONATE to help us Stand Up for Science on March 7th? Make a tax-deductible donation using the QR code below!

wake up babe, new banger by @ashihipar.bsky.social dropped

🌍🔬 Diverse representation in genetic data is crucial for effective health research. GeneBites writer ✏️ Sarah Lester explores the impact of missing diversity—and the initiatives working to fix it. 🧬💡 Check it out here: genebites.org/2025/02/17/d...

It's my book birthday! I am beyond excited that this day is here and that I can finally share Where Biology Ends and Bias Begins: Lessons on Belonging from Our DNA with all of you! In addition to reading, I'd love if you came to one of my upcoming author events: www.shoumitadasgupta.com/events-1

NEW: I wrote about a new study on the rapid evolution of purring crickets and parasitic flies—and what scientists dealing with federal funding cuts can learn from these resilient lil guys 🧪 read it in @atmosmagazine.bsky.social:

Today is a wonderful morning to sit down and write an opinion piece defending NIH & NSF. They're not much longer than a paper abstract and sciencehomecoming.com has resources with all the numbers you need.

Thanks @mtosterholm.bsky.social for pointing this out—agreed. I teach ID Epi to grad students, & the tension in class is real. Seeing public health leaders pushed out is making students lose confidence in career prospects. It’s short-sighted & will have consequences for years. #PublicHealth

IMPORTANT ACTION in response to the illegal firings of scientists and public health workers at HHS, NIH, CDC, and other federal agencies by the Trump administration. Rally at HHS this Wed, Feb 19 at 12 pm. Show your support! RSVP here: docs.google.com/forms/u/0/d/... @nihfellowsunited.bsky.social

This does away with awards based on underrepresentation, student support services based on race, scholarships, etc. Let me explain, pre coffee (wrote this morning, no time to update, you're getting a cut n paste), why this is a bad idea. 🧵 www.insidehighered.com/news/diversi...

I just added more things to this list today: docs.google.com/document/d/1...

If you are one of the #CDC #HHS #FDA #NIH employees who have learned today that your employment is being abruptly ended, we want to hear from you. @altcdc.bsky.social www.statnews.com/2025/02/14/f...

Two weeks ago we wrote about why things had been relatively quiet from science activists Things are changing — two separate protests are being planned, one by @nihfellowsunited.bsky.social and one by @standupforscience.bsky.social www.statnews.com/2025/02/13/r...

Get in dorks, we're going protesting! STAND UP FOR SCIENCE WITH US ON MARCH 7TH, 2025 WASHINGTON DC AND EVERY STATE CAPITOL Because science is for everyone! Find us at www.standupforscience2025.org #standupforscience2025 #scienceforall #sciencenotsilence

Yes. Also, NIH itself has stopped recruitment of PhD students, postbacs, and postdocs at all its campuses. The nat'l recruitment cycle is closing, everyone will be done soon. It's already a lost year of talent coming in to do great science at NIH. Damage to 🧪 is real. (Story linked below, see 🧵.)

happy International Day of [banned] and [banned] in Science [under review] from the US

My feed is overwhelmed with scientists right now calling out the catastrophic consequences of the NIH indirect cost order from last night. If those same people aren't also speaking out against the anti-trans, anti-DEI, anti-immigrant orders...we are lost. The only path forward is solidarity.

It’s widely known that the field of human genetics was founded on racist ideals. 🛑 In this opinion piece, GeneBites writer Zach Patterson (@pattersonhabitat.bsky.social) explains how “humane genomics education” in K-12 📚 can help counter racist biases and beliefs early in our exposure to science 🤝

Research universities are often the largest employers in their region. They are often the primary health care providers to communities. This funding shift will not only reduce US research leadership, it will put working people out of work and reduce healthcare access.

LA STUDENT STRIKE DAY 5 - RIGHT NOW: Pasadena High School has just joined the dozens of other schools all over LA that have staged walkouts throughout this week. This is the 6th straight day of anti-ICE, immigrations rights protests in LA.

This is what grounds me at the end of the day, I think. There are lots of examples out there of radical community building achieving goals at smaller local levels that can be pushed to scale. Relatedly, read about historical labor movements (and planned ones)! Those are things that give me hope.

I agree community is going to be what it takes, but I have the opposite view that desperate times will call for radical community building and that can happen within this lifetime.

✨ Today, February 7th, is National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day #NBHAAD. Sharing a recent article about why Black cis women make up 50% of new HIV diagnoses among cis women & are 10 times more likely to have an HIV diagnosis than their White counterparts. www.unclosetedmedia.com/p/the-hiv-cr...

Folks are out of practice at making things. They are very practiced at commentary though. Much safer.

Just in case you thought that removing DEI criteria would mean that everyone is competing equally: NIH is removing grad students from underrepresented backgrounds from the applicant pool altogether. Their applications will not be considered. Other students, not from these backgrounds, will be.

Many scientists upset with HHMI's decision to stop funding and scrub websites of a program that promoted inclusive evidence and helped diversify STEM. The are listed as the second wealthiest philanthropic organization in the U.S. with an endowment of $22B. Private philanthropy will not save science.

🧵 When Medicine and Science Ignores Diversity, People Die. 1/ Ignoring diversity in medicine and science is deadly. From unethical experiments to life-threatening misdiagnoses, history is replete with examples of how neglecting race, gender, and identity costs lives. A thread of concrete examples.

I feel like pointing out the “legitimate scientific use” of words like ‘bias’ and ‘systemic’ in basic science is missing the point. Culture, activism, and race are also scientific topics of interest. An assault on ANY of these terms is an assault on science as a whole.

“….the government is terminating a four-year contract for health services for transgender people. More than 500 transgender patients annually receive comprehensive HIV prevention medication or treatment under the contract.” Devastating. It’s crucial we give to trans-led & serving orgs…

I would love for someone who knows how to do these things to find out 1. the # of current grants impacted by this list 2. the amount of $$ for a given state this impacts 3. whether this effects any grants that fulfill the legal obligation that the US has to fund Indigenous education

We’ll have more to say about this later, but: Just as the NSF politicies now are reflected in this prior stuff from conservatives in the Senate, Jay Bhattacharya has a large amount of prior writing we should all read to predict what he’d do at NIH. (It’s not good, folks.)