David L. Stern
Biologist
A little obsessed by aphid galls
Run a little lab @hhmijanelia.bsky.social
Moving to @stowersinstitute.bsky.social Feb 1, 2026
Provide unsolicited advice to improve your science (or any) talk at howtogiveatalk.com
- Reposted by David L. SternRemember her name: Aliya Rahman Her testimony is everything and it deserves to be heard, by everyone. Decide for yourself. It’s powerful. It’s gut-wrenching. And no one should have to survive what she did. ICE MUST GO‼️
- Reposted by David L. SternThe invasive soybean pest Helicoverpa armigera has acquired resistance to Bt toxins from native H. zea in Brazil. We showing this in a time series of genome data from nearly 1000 individuals over 10 years, plus a lab strain experiment that verified the function
- Reposted by David L. SternExcited about our new preprint showing bidirectional adaptive introgression between invasive and native crop pests over ecological timescales www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
- Reposted by David L. SternHow has this pun never occurred to me?
- Watch the video. Classroom learning has approximately nothing to do with being a scientist. I fondly recall John sitting in the front row of seminars, shielding his eyes from the Powerpoint garbage so that he could listen intently to the spoken words. A true inspiration.
- It is with great sadness that the University shares the news of the death of Professor Sir John Gurdon, founder of the @gurdoninstitute.bsky.social Read our tribute to the visionary Nobel Laureate and watch an interview from 2012, just after he won: bit.ly/4mM8o3r
- Reposted by David L. SternMamdani talking lucidly and passionately about trans rights and history in a video that should frankly shame every politician who has hemmed and hawed and triangulated and said, "Well, but sports..." It's not that hard to tell the truth and stand for what's right. www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEvV...
- Reposted by David L. SternWhy would a healthy cell decide to die? Investigator Randal Halfmann joined @npr.org's "All Things Considered" to discuss his #research on how and why cells decide to self-destruct—a process known as programmed cell death. #SciSky 🎧 Listen here: n.pr/3L4i1gF
- Reposted by David L. SternIn the history of authoritarian regimes promoting pseudoscience for ideological reasons, one that I just learned about: "World Ice Theory" and the Nazis. www.laphamsquarterly.org/roundtable/s...
- Reposted by David L. SternVery sad to learn of the death of Sir John Gurdon. He made a huge contribution to developmental biology & should be an inspiration to anyone whose potential is dismissed in school. It was a pleasure to work with him when he was Chair of the COB Board. www2.mrc-lmb.cam.ac.uk/john-gurdon-...
- Reposted by David L. SternHigh levels of Cas9 are toxic in sensory neurons. Reducing Cas9 levels with uORFs avoids toxicity and is compatible with efficient editing. From @thompsonpeerlab.bsky.social. Fly lines @vdrc-flies.bsky.social #CRISPR #Drosophila www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
- Reposted by David L. Stern“Terrible things are happening outside. Poor helpless people are being dragged out of their homes. Families are torn apart. Men, women, and children are separated. Children come home from school to find that their parents have disappeared.” Diary of Anne Frank January 13, 1943
- Reposted by David L. SternThere's an update on the state of FlyBase on the FlyBase.org front page. You can contribute to FlyBase at this link wiki.flybase.org/wiki/FlyBase... We express enormous gratitude to the people, labs, groups, and foundations who have already helped us. #FlyBase #Drosophila
- Reposted by David L. SternThe Agrawal lab is moving! This January we will be setting up shop at #UBC in Vancouver, in the department of #Zoology! We are actively recruiting at all levels, especially masters and PhD students. These position are #funded! Please send anyone interested my way!
- Reposted by David L. Stern(Part 1) Hear from @hhmi_news Investigator David Stern about his research program and what he's uncovering in the lab. Stern will join the Institute in February 2026, bringing his lab and HHMI appointment to Kansas City. @hhmi.org Read more: bit.ly/4np96Fb
- Reposted by David L. Stern(Part 2) “From my first visit, I was struck by the energy and excitement...It feels like being a graduate student again, chasing curiosity wherever it leads." @hhmi.org Investigator David Stern will join the Stowers Institute in Feb. 2026 from @hhmijanelia.bsky.social. Read more: bit.ly/4np96Fb
- It's official! We are moving to Stowers! Very exciting opportunity to expand our studies of insect-plant interactions. We have many opportunities available in biochemistry, development, behavior, genetics, evolution, genomics, AI, and even pest control. Interested in any of these things? Reach out!
- NEWS🎉 We’re excited to announce @hhmijanelia.bsky.social Investigator David Stern will join the Institute from Janelia Research Campus. His lab studies how aphids transform plants at the genetic level, uncovering secrets of #evolution & new strategies for pest control. @hhmi.org bit.ly/4np96Fb
- Reposted by David L. SternI get that the news cycle is packed right now, but I just heard from a colleague at the Smithsonian that this is fully a GIANT SQUID BEING EATEN BY A SPERM WHALE and it’s possibly the first ever confirmed video according to a friend at NOAA 10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)
- Reposted by David L. SternThe final version of our paper on how ants and possibly other insects use a crazy mechanism involving extensive transcriptional interference to regulate odorant receptor expression is now open access in my favorite journal, @currentbiology.bsky.social authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S...
- Reposted by David L. SternHow do neurons deal with fitting large regulatory proteins into small spaces to control plasticity and memory? By generating micropeptides via local translation of circRNAs, of course! Here’s to shedding new light on the ‘dark’ proteome in the brain. www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...
- Reposted by David L. SternGPU-accelerated MMseqs2 offers tremendous speedup for homology retrieval, protein structure prediction with ColabFold, and protein structure search with Foldseek. @martinsteinegger.bsky.social @milot.bsky.social @machine.learning.bio www.nature.com/articles/s41...
- Reposted by David L. Stern#PhD applications are NOW OPEN! Hear from an alum⬇️
- “Support. Connection. Coffee.” ☕ Three words Melvin Noe Gonzalez uses to describe their Stowers #PhD experience. Independently fully funded, hands-on, and collaborative, join a community that fuels curiosity. Apply now: bit.ly/44VM6DI
- Reposted by David L. SternRecalling this bit of history — When the shooting of a German diplomat in 1938 was used by the Nazis as a pretext for Kristallnacht. Individual violence doesn’t justify state bigotry and oppression, ever. www.history.com/articles/kri...
- Reposted by David L. SternLooking for a PhD? I am advertising two industry sponsored PhD projects. One on black soldier fly genetics with #betabugs and another on searching insect biodiversity for novel enzymes #Syngenta. Get in touch if you are interested!! bbsrcdtp.lifesci.cam.ac.uk/available-ic...
- Reposted by David L. SternAs the world rapidly heads into #climate #overshoot I've noticed a disturbing pattern in journal articles recently. I'll summarize it quickly in this thread 🧵
- Reposted by David L. Stern
minimap2.com is potentially a phishing site. Please don't use anything from that website. github.com/lh3/minimap2... - Reposted by David L. SternWe're going to see a lot of bullshit in the coming days and weeks about "causes of autism", and most will be based on flawed, over-interpreted observational studies (1/n)
- Just imagine, to these ants, giving birth to individuals of only one species is weird.
- The discovery of an unusual reproductive system for one ant species solves a long-standing puzzle go.nature.com/47mxGkM
- Reposted by David L. SternPlease join us in welcoming Arvind Pillai, our newest Assistant Investigator! He’s exploring how #evolution creates proteins: the intricate molecules that power life. This #research could unlock breakthroughs in drug delivery & #Alzheimers treatment: bit.ly/4lYqIWO
- Reposted by David L. SternThe discussion of this paper is more fun to read than a scifi novel…wild!
- 🚨 🐜 is there a Bluesky starter pack for researchers who don’t study ants but who get lightheaded every time there’s an awesome ant paper? CC @mariusw.bsky.social @jrichardalbert.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...
- Reposted by David L. Stern[This post could not be retrieved]
- Reposted by David L. SternSo, let's unpack the whole mess of human hubris surrounding everything #AI and why this is so dangerous. The hubris demonstrated by GenAI companies is of course well documented. But it's also very evident in the criticism, and in a way that is distorting the real issues here. 1/7
- Reposted by David L. SternThis is flat out unacceptable. Shut the whole fucking thing down immediately
- Reposted by David L. SternFrom #amyloid polymerization to phase separation, emergent protein behaviors remain one of biology’s greatest challenges. This fall, learn how #AI is helping researchers make sense of complex protein interactions at #SRCKC25. 🧠 Register here: bit.ly/3GgsQtC
- Reposted by David L. Stern
- Third Era of Phylogenetics! 1️⃣ Era 1: Morphology 🦴 2️⃣ Era 2: Sequences 🧬 3️⃣ Era 3: 3D Structures ⚛️ Solving deep evolutionary puzzles like never before. Our new review in GBE explores what's next in #phylogenetics academic.oup.com/gbe/article/... #structuralbiology #evolution #AlphaFold #SciSky
- Reposted by David L. SternNIH: After review, we note that you have a large unspent balance on your grant. Please explain immediately. me: well, uh, yeah, one reason we're not spending on that grant is because NIH terminated it in May along with all the rest of federal funding to Harvard, maybe you don't remember
- Reposted by David L. SternIf you’re interested in ants, olfaction, gene regulation, or all of the above, here’s a new preprint from the lab for you. It describes an unorthodox mechanism of transcriptional interference by which ant olfactory sensory neurons produce a single functional receptor. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
- Reposted by David L. SternIt is really surreal how hard most scientific publishing sites fight to prevent you from downloading even a single graph. Figure embeds with authorship chains can't happen soon enough. youtu.be/A2JpI-5NIsc?...
- Reposted by David L. SternTo all post-docs: The Genome Biology dept @embl.org has an Independent faculty position. Fantastic place to set up your lab –great package: core funding, fantastic Ph.D. students, cutting edge core facilities & great colleagues. Closing date Sept 19th embl.wd103.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/EMBL/j...
- In case anyone was wondering what the hell I've been doing at @hhmijanelia.bsky.social the past 14 years.
- Reposted by David L. SternRegistration & abstract submission now open for #SRCKC25 AI-Driven Approaches to Emergent Protein Behaviors Oct. 22–24. Join a community of researchers exploring how artificial intelligence is advancing our understanding of complex protein behaviors. #ResearchSky Register: bit.ly/3GgsQtC
- Reposted by David L. SternHumans have many unusual traditions. But did you know animals’ strange behaviors can become culture too? Out now in Current Biology (doi.org/10.1016/j.cu...) we show the rise and spread of a surprising tradition: interspecies infant abduction. Interactive timeline (www.ab.mpg.de/671374) 🧵 (1/12)
- Reposted by David L. SternA great collaborative effort of many labs across continents: @vbcscitraining.bsky.social, WACCBIP, TReND in Africa and more. Now a first paper on #open-source RT-LAMP #diagnostics is out: urldefense.com/v3/__https:/... Congrats to the whole team. We hope this pushes affordable diagnostics in #LMICs
- Reposted by David L. SternIn the greenhouse, #Arabidopsis with hyperactive ACD6 have stronger pathogen defenses but are smaller & make fewer seeds. @derekseveri.bsky.social @plantevolution.bsky.social &co show that in the open field both advantages & disadvantages of the allele disappear @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/465XPDR
- Reposted by David L. SternHappy 107th Birthday, Brenda Milner! Her contributions to neuropsychology shaped the way we understand the human brain. From surviving two world wars and two pandemics, to paving the way for future generations of researchers, Milner’s legacy continues. @mcgill.ca @cusm-muhc.bsky.social
- Reposted by David L. Stern🐸 Imagine you’re sitting by a pond listening to the din of croaking frogs. What if you could use the changes in volume of the combined croaking to figure out how many frogs are in the pond? 🔬 That’s the idea behind a new method to count the individual molecules in fluorescence microscopy images.
- Reposted by David L. SternRecently, my book THEY CALLED US ENEMY was banned – again – in Tennessee. Book bans are out of control. Huge parts of American history are being restricted. To join me in standing up for the freedom to read, go to pen.org/action. @penamerica.bsky.social @topshelfcomix.bsky.social @idwpublishing.com
- Reposted by David L. SternIf you want something very simple but does a great job visualizing. Just need input genbank files: github.com/gamcil/clinker
- Reposted by David L. SternToday in the journal Science: BioEmu from Microsoft Research AI for Science. This generative deep learning method emulates protein equilibrium ensembles – key for understanding protein function at scale. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
- Reposted by David L. SternYAY! Data ellipses are the best simple bivariate summary ✅
- Reposted by David L. SternNew paper: More than 2700 human 3′UTRs are highly conserved. These 3′UTRs are essential components in mRNA templates, as their deletion decreases protein activity without changing protein abundance. Highly conserved 3′UTRs help the folding of proteins with long IDRs. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
- The context, that may be missing for some. They came here with nothing, slowly building a life working miscellaneous jobs in NYC. Poverty and potatoes, at least in my imagination, is what they were trying to escape.
- Potatoes. No politics. No science. Just potatoes. Though, harvesting potatoes always reminds me of my paternal grandparents, who emigrated from Poland over 100 years ago. I wonder, at these times, what they might have thought of their grandson digging potatoes out of the earth with his bare hands.
- Reposted by David L. SternSpeak up to prevent a major loss for the field. CASP, which helped shaping structural biology including AlphaFold is on the verge of shutting down. NIH funding has lapsed, UC Davis support ends and the core team is being let go. Painfully shortsighted.
- Reposted by David L. SternOur latest! K63-polyUb of the ERECTA receptor kinase by PUB30/31 is required for the ligand induced receptor endocytosis for stomatal patterning. Our results show that ERECTA signals at the PM. Congrats, Liangliang, Minh & the team🌱! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
- Reposted by David L. Stern[This post could not be retrieved]
- Reposted by David L. SternEver had an injection or surgery? If so, you benefited from the horseshoe crab Its blood lysate clots when exposed to bacterial toxins & is used to test sterility of medical equipment & injectable drugs, saving countless human lives Not bad for an animal inhabiting Earth for ~445 million years
