New paper out in @PNASNews from joint collaboration with Dan Goldman's lab on collective dynamics in worm and robotic blobs.. A thread...

pnas.org/content/118/6/… Back in 2016/17, i stumbled upon these california blackworms in Lake lagunita at Stanford during my postdoc... i vividly remember this since it had recently rained and i was out there sampling the water curious to what organisms appeared in a dry lake...

So today, one of the first "macro" organism story from our lab came out in Current Biology - on the extraordinary Slingshot Spiders! Work led the by awesome postdoc in the lab @SymoneAlexander. Thread below👇
Paper Link: authors.elsevier.com/a/1bazA3QW8Ru8… When I started my lab in 2017, I went to the Peruvian Amazon Rainforest for some research on leaf-cutter ants. On one of the nights studying ants, with Jaime Navarro (local field guide), we saw one of these slingshot spiders and snapped our fingers to see it move quickly..

In our philosophy of frugal science, we are sharing today our latest tool from the lab: a 20-cent electroporator, which we call an ElectroPen. Almost a year ago, when I started my lab @GeorgiaTech, a team of high school students @lamberths_iGEM led by @jastandeven reached out... as part of iGEM, these students were engg living cell sensors for disease diagnostics, but needed an electroporator for genetic modification. Electroporators are expensive. They cost between $2500-$10,000, and that doesn't include the cost of cuvettes, which adds up...

Received a letter of gratitude from a student from my graduate fluid dynamics class. Sharing a small section here.. "I will recall when I visited you in your office in the beginning of the semester: I lacked confidence as a new graduate student. I was shy but felt it was... ...important to explain my non-traditional situation for the upcoming semester in case that work might interfere with school, for say a meeting, etc. I was surprised and touched that you took a moment to ask about the path that led me to this semester and of my interests.