Queer latine scientist; something approximating a microbiologist; they/he, in all my non-binary finery 🏳️🌈🌵🌱🦠
Joined February 2019
- Tweets 686
- Following 830
- Followers 431
- Likes 882
66 Photos and videos
Pinned Tweet
21 Apr 2022
Just a broad reminder that I'm a "man" in the same way that a Muppet is a person. It's not. It's absolutely not. But I can see how you might be confused.
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25 Mar 2023
I love my project. I love my lab. I am determined to succeed come Hell or high water. I am also determined to rest and spend time on the other things I love. I am determined to respect myself and the quality of my work by not pushing past my healthy limits.
23 Mar 2023
So many of the responses apparently can’t conceive of a person who is excited about doing research and determined to be successful, even in exchange for some amount of personal enjoyment or free time. It is pretty hard to have a productive PhD with a clock-in clock-out mentality.
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17 Mar 2023
I've been watching this gif on loop for longer than I care to admit.
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Ryan A Valdez retweeted
3 Mar 2023
I want to glue a worm (C.elegans) to a flow cell so that I can flow different concentrations of zinc over it. I want to observe lysosomes in these conditions in the same worm so it has to stick. So far I’ve tried poly-L-lysine and meh. Any alternatives? Please RT!
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14 Jan 2023
If that city is St. Louis... well, good luck.
13 Jan 2023
the saddest thing is when you visit a city that’s not new york or chicago and they’re like “we also have a distinctive pizza style!”
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Ryan A Valdez retweeted
16 Nov 2022
In all seriousness the debate over grad school rotations or not (assuming funding permits) is a debate between anticipating best case scenario (often we view science only from lens of successful scientists) vs planning to avoid worst case scenario (bad fit, abusive advisors).
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16 Nov 2022
Rotations are a lifesaver. In fact, I generally recommend undergrads avoid applying to programs that don't do them. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and all that.
16 Nov 2022
(Really) unpopular opinion: a year of rotations is a waste of time and resources. If your PhD is interesting you'll anyway collaborate with other labs and learns different techniques (and travel, and see how things are done elsewhere). I know no one agrees with me about this.
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Ryan A Valdez retweeted
16 Nov 2022
Counterpoints: IMO the *most* important part of a rotation is giving students enough time in labs to recognize & avoid toxic mentors and lab environments. This is *most* important for students who have less experience in lab environments- e.g. firstgen & underrepresented students
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27 Oct 2022
For just a dash of chaos, pronounce anole like canoli and refuse (under any circumstances) to say it any other way.
This tweet brought to you by: I grew up saying it that way and now it's stuck.
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Ryan A Valdez retweeted
26 Oct 2022
My somewhat cynical take on bullies in academia is that they’re a feature, not a bug. I touched on this with an earlier tweet, but the qualities we commonly associate with “top scientist” in academia are extremely present in the kinds of people who bully others.
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14 Oct 2022
I have absolutely told my boss "yeah, I would love to do that, but my brain is a little broken right now" verbatim.
12 Oct 2022
How do you say “I promise I’m smart my brain is just fried” professionally??
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8 Oct 2022
The status of the presentation I'm giving Monday is "my car hasn't been this clean since I bought it"
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8 Oct 2022
My path has been edu psych -> institional leadership -> carbon partitioning -> microbial ecology -> microbial physiology. All else equal, I think I would be just as happy doing a PhD in any of those other things. It's way more important to be curious than obsessed with a topic.
7 Oct 2022
Unpopular opinion I find myself sharing with lots of undergrads lately: The “only pursue a PhD if you’ve found the topic that’s your One True Passion & keeps you up at night” advice is bs. I think I could have pursued several different paths happily.
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Ryan A Valdez retweeted
7 Oct 2022
Thank you so GPC/GSS and SAC for making the continued effort to give stipend equality across all PhD programs at WashU! This is a HUGE deal!!!!
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5 Oct 2022
My dog knows how to ask me to take her outside. But sometimes if I'm trimming her nails or doing something she doesn't like, she'll ask. Her ability to say "This is hard for me. Can we take a little break, please?" far exceeds most humans I know.
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2 Sep 2022
One time, I told someone who organized a tutor "training" that learning styles, which were part of the session, were not backed by science and I was basically told "who cares if it's true?"
1 Sep 2022
Had to give my students “the talk” yesterday.
(About how learning styles are not a thing.)
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2 Sep 2022
Really fun thing happening with my dog - she can't have walks rn for medical reasons, so instead she manifests the Devil's mischief at every opportunity.
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31 Aug 2022
On the one hand, I'm working at the boundary of human knowledge with the hope of expanding it by some infinitesimal amount. On the other hand, I'm an adult with a backpack who uses a sticker chart to track experiments. I contain multitudes.
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