Dr. Raven the Science Maven Profile picture
Raven Baxter, Ph.D. ✨ Molecular biologist, science educator. Director @TheScienceHaven. Views are my own. 🥰💌 contact@thesciencemaven.com
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Feb 6 4 tweets 1 min read
I'm going to let a virus rip through the country that can hide out in tissues in your body for months and mimic proteins in your body and cause autoimmune responses and potentially activate other viruses in our bodies linked to MS and cancer... what can possibly go wrong? nature.com/articles/s4158…
Jan 27 11 tweets 3 min read
So the videos of me breaking down primary sources + literally holding the primary sources of information in my hands, in the video, + showing my notes on the articles, keep getting taken down for misinfo on TikTok. I guess they would rather lobotomize us with those dumb dances 🤷🏾‍♀️ Image Tried to appeal @tiktok_us and it got denied. SMH.
Jan 25 15 tweets 5 min read
SO MANY new people here, glad that you're here! I'm Dr. Raven Baxter. I'm a molecular biologist and educator. Rapper, model, fashionista, spicy shenanigan. I believe in the power of accessible science communication, and building community in STEM. There's so much I've done+do 1/ Dr. Raven Baxter posing on a sidewalk, she's smiling. I have a BA and MA focused in molecular biology from @buffalostate. My first job as a drug discovery scientist was across the street from a homeless shelter. It wasn't lost on me that I couldn't share my science with them. I passionately left the lab for an education PhD. 2/ Dr. Raven in the lab
Jan 24 4 tweets 1 min read
The SARS-CoV-2 COVID virus is a total a-hole that can suppress our innate AND active immune response. It sets up shop in our tissues, exhausting our T-cells for weeks, months. Which for some has reactivated latent "sleeping" viruses that many of us have. 1/ Anti-viral T cells are a key component of the adaptive immune response and contribute to the elimination of acute infections, restrict the reactivation of latent viral infections, and control viral loads at steady state levels during chronic infections. 2/
Jan 19 14 tweets 4 min read
So the virus that causes COVID has the ability to hide from your immune system and mutate in different parts of your body. Places like your nervous system, gut, and more. So you'll have a negative PCR test and everything but your body is actually still being EFFED UP, BAD 😭😭 I'm reading these papers and WHEW, this virus is absolutely disrespectful. Like, a complete violation
Oct 3, 2023 8 tweets 3 min read
I was having random dreams about some person since 2008, not a real person. Y'all. The person ended up being real. We met last year and now we're best friends. They just showed me pictures they had been drawing, posted in 2008 🫨 and they exactly match pictures I took in 2012... I am a molecular biologist, not a quantum physicist but this is really making me develop some ideas in quantum biology and consciousness. Things we don't have the tools to measure or directly observe yet. But super intriguing and now I wanna go deeper than the molecular level 😭
Jul 21, 2023 14 tweets 4 min read
Y'all I am on an Ancestry dot com rabbit hole tracing my history back and learning who my grandparents are and I'm at this dude named Oliver Cromwell???? And this dude was WILD. Jaw on the floor. Jaw on theeee floor. Oliver Cromwell (25 April 1599 – 3 September 1658) was an English statesman, politician and soldier, widely regarded as one of the most important figures in the history of the British Isles. He came to prominence during the 1639 to 1653 Wars of the Three Kingdoms, initially as a senior commander in the Parliamentarian army and latterly as a politician. A leading advocate of the execution of Charles I in January 1649, which led to the establishment of The Protectorate, he ruled as Lord Protector from December 1653 until his death in September 1658. Cromwell remains a controversial figure due... I have NEVER heard of him. I literally traced the family tree straight from my grandma right to him. It just kept going. From what I'm reading on the website, seems like everybody in my family tree was on foolery. His descendants came over to the USA and ACTED A FOOL.
Jul 18, 2023 12 tweets 3 min read
1/ I haven’t dated since 2015. My stories of re-entering the dating pool are comedy. Went on a date. Awkward small talk. He reached across the table and HIT me, HARD. I said WTF is wrong with you? He said he just killed a HUGE bug on my shoulder. Bug goop EVERYWHERE 😭 I left 😭 2/ Atlanta: A dude called me bougie via text bc he found out I was an AKA 🙄, but HE canceled on our first lunch date last minute because he couldn’t squeeze me in for lunch. He had to “get a mani pedi 💅🏾 for his vacay”. I called him Mr. Bad and Boujee. Never talked to me again.
Jul 12, 2023 15 tweets 5 min read
1/ This is the story on how I almost didn't become Raven the Science Maven because a Chief Marketing Officer of a huge science ed company asked me to mask my Blackness. When I was first getting started in science communication, the company reached out to me for a partnership... 2/ The CMO set up a Zoom call with me to further discuss. I was so excited! When the video came on, I learned that he was a Black man, and I was excited to see him working as a higher-up at a science ed company. We're talking and he pulls up my science rap videos on YouTube...
Jun 11, 2023 8 tweets 2 min read
Since I lost a significant percentage of my hearing from COVID, I’ve learned to be extremely unapologetic about telling people “I CANT HEAR YOU” 🫠

Im so glad I took that sign language course in college. I took it to talk to one of my friends not realizing I would need it for ME I’m nervous about wearing a hearing aid because some sounds I can hear really clearly it’s just people talking is very muffled. Even music I’m sitting somewhere public right now and a song is playing and I can mostly hear the cymbals on the drum set I can’t hear the lyrics
Jul 7, 2022 27 tweets 8 min read
Big news-- I'm declaring my full recovery from #LongCOVID as of June! For me, #LongCOVID lasted SIX MONTHS. This thread details my experience in its entirety-- feel free to share so that others can be informed of what the #LongCOVID experience can look like. Buckle tf up! 1/ I tested positive for COVID on December 13, 2021. While I was in the thick of it, I (painfully) wrote about my experience being a 28 year old with no preexisting conditions, and what a moderate COVID case looked like for me. I had ALL of the symptoms👇🏿2/ scienceandtheculture.bulletin.com/covidjourney
Jun 2, 2022 9 tweets 4 min read
If you've been following me since last year, you'd know that I got COVID then and have been recovering with #LongCOVID. For almost 6 months now. In this thread I want to bring awareness to some of the very generous people I've met in the group who really need your support. 1/n Dave @D_Bone, with Angela @TheExtraFiles, hosts 24hr zoom chats for #longhaulers. Like many, he is no longer able to work because of complications from Long COVID. He created the @initfortheLHpod platform. Please support if you can ♥️ bit.ly/3GIoWGj 2/n
May 26, 2022 6 tweets 2 min read
I wanna know how professionals with ADHD manage long form writing tasks. My dissertation almost killed me. What accommodations have you asked for in your professional life? Y’all I am looking for solutions for severe ADHD. The pomodoro method does not work for me. I mean like actual accommodations
May 26, 2022 7 tweets 6 min read
Last week on Diversity in Entertainment Day, I attended the @STARZ @STZTakeTheLead #TakeTheLead event and spoke on the Advancing Equity Across Industries: Finding Strategies for Better Representation Panel alongside others making their own unique strides in DEI efforts! 1/ A group of six people standing in front of a purple backdrop You may recognize this amazing guy— Cliff @methodman who plays Davis Maclean on @Power_STARZ. You may also know him from I don’t know… a little group called the @WuTangClan 😆. @Methodman spoke on the importance and impact of authentic character representation on screen. 2/ A man and a woman shown posing together
Feb 28, 2022 10 tweets 3 min read
I think I'm finally out of the woods with post-COVID psychosis. Mine lasted for about two months. Y'all. Scariest shit in my life. Researchers think COVID causes direct damage to the brain, triggers an immune response that negatively affects the brain, or changes blood flow 1/ It was bad. At one point I was having six panic attacks a day. Before COVID I had never had a panic attack in my LIFE. I didn't even know what was happening. It wasn't triggered by anxiety. I would wake up and as soon as I opened my eyes my body would go into panic for hours 2/
Feb 20, 2022 7 tweets 2 min read
If you’re talking about COVID and not including conversations about Long COVID, you are ignoring a HUGE part of the conversation about COVID. I am out on DISABILITY right now. You’re talking about cases & mortality. There are even some people who survived this that wish they died You can get vaccinated boosted wear a mask still get Covid and be sick for weeks… MONTHS. Many people who got COVID during the first wave before the vaccines came out are STILL freaking sick with multiple body systems impacted
Feb 18, 2022 6 tweets 1 min read
I finished crocheting the top I’ll be wearing this every day because I worked so hard on it lmao
Jan 17, 2022 4 tweets 1 min read
This is the deepest pit of sadness that I have ever been in my entire life I don't think I'm ever going to be the same again
Jan 16, 2022 4 tweets 1 min read
Todays wins 🏆 Thanks to brain fog lifting a bit, I was able to deposit my dissertation with ProQuest ✅ I’m officially done!

I rested in bed most of today bc yesterday was a heavy lift. I can’t do much physically. VERY fatigued. Didn’t cry today!

Learned new crochet stitch
1/
Didn’t cry today! First day I haven’t cried in a while. Probably my medication kicking finally 😂 thank you mental health team. Either that or my brain is recovering or both. Who knows 🤷🏾‍♀️ I was tired of crying.
Jan 14, 2022 4 tweets 1 min read
Drove myself to doctors appt. Walked in the office and during appt. I guess I just needed to know I could do it. It took everything I had. I'm totally exhausted. So, a win that I could do it. But, really just disappointed at the long road ahead of me. But I've already come so far Idk, it's been a month now and at this point I'm just like... when will this end... the doc said give it more time... I'm trying to hang in here

This is so hard
Jan 8, 2022 14 tweets 3 min read
A big reason I’m sharing so much about what’s happening with me right now is because I didn’t hear these conversations happening before I got sick. It’s just people saying get vaxxed & boosted but people don’t talk about that you can do both of those things AND get LONG COVID 1/ I know a lot of people (especially myself) have been very vocal about things happening with the pandemic. We can’t ignore the fact that you can get vaccinated and boosted and still get sick. It’s not just the unvaccinated people that need to be cautious. 2/