A neuroscientist, fly geneticist, & professor trying to solve the mysteries of the brain in health and disease. Cornell Alum Go BigRed Views & RT are mine.
Columbia MO
Joined December 2010
- Tweets6.5K
- Following1.4K
- Followers1.6K
- Likes9.5K
Bing Zhang retweeted
We are very proud of having @DMSabatini at IOCB. His labs in Prague and Boston (the latter supported by @BillAckman) made some great contributions since 2023 (13 papers in Nature, Science, Cell etc) and the big stories are still to be told...uochb.cz/en/list-of-publicat…
A huge part of my story is @IOCBPrague, an inst. in a city I had never visited. They gave me a lab, Dir @konvalinka_jan defended me on TV, & the fearless Dr. Keckesova took arrows for me. IOCB launched @IOCBBoston with support from @BillAckman et al and bold lab members joined me
Bing Zhang retweeted
The case of Professor David Sabatini stands as one of the most egregious examples of woke institutional excess, and its fallout extended far beyond the destruction of a single career.
At the Whitehead Institute at MIT, he ran a roughly 40-person lab conducting important work in molecular biology and cell signaling. That research was abruptly terminated, costing numerous students and trainees their ongoing projects and career momentum and resulting in an untold loss of medically significant knowledge - knowledge that had been funded by the public’s taxpayer dollars.
All of that was abruptly canceled when a false accusation of sexual impropriety was taken up by MIT's DEI-infected bureaucracy and a director who was on a feminist crusade to purge a leading scientist for what appears to be the crime of being a white male.
The court found that the relationship was consensual and the accusations that destroyed his career came only after he ended it and moved on romantically - buyer's remorse, in other words.
After five years of litigation, discovery and trial, a Boston jury has just awarded Professor David Sabatini $6 million in his defamation case against Kristin Knouse, finding that she defamed him and interfered with his career. The jury also rejected her counterclaims of coercion, harassment, and a hostile work environment.
But all of this is just the first step. Many people who were involved need to be held accountable. The institutions must make this right.
MIT, Whitehead, and HHMI still have questions to answer about their own handling. Investigations must look into the director of Whitehead who perpetrated this witch hunt. @NIH and @NSF should now act on the jury’s findings. Restore @DMSabatini's eligibility for federal grants. The institutional investigations that led to his removal and the later debarment effort were based on claims that a jury has now rejected as defamatory. There is no more reason to treat him as radioactive.
And last but not least, bless you, @BillAckman. When almost no one in science, academia, or media would touch this case, you acted and supported him, funding his new lab so that his important work on mTOR could continue. Thank you and Dafna at NYU for standing up publicly for due process when it was so costly. I knew many of his students and colleagues who could not speak out in support of him out of fear of retribution and professional ruin. Prof. Sabatini has said that you saved his life. It is not a hyperbolic statement.
Also, for every one of him, there are other men whose lives have been ruined this way. For things to change, high costs on the accuser must be imposed.
cc @DrJBhattacharya @regardthefrost
Dear President Kornbluth and Chairman Gorenberg,
Yesterday, as I am sure you are aware, a Boston jury unanimously found that @MIT professor Kristin Knouse defamed David Sabatini, falsely accused him of rape and sexual harassment, and tortuously interfered with his contractual arrangements including his tenure at MIT.
MIT and its tenure review committee relied on Professor Knouse’s statements when it took away David’s tenure and terminated him.
MIT's policies explicitly prohibit harassment, retaliation, and fabrication of claims. Falsely accusing a colleague of rape and sexual harassment and pushing for his termination under false pretenses are clearly violations of MIT policy.
In light of the unanimous findings of the jury after five years of discovery, many legal motions and countermotions by both parties, and a three-week trial in Suffolk County Superior Court in Boston:
Is MIT going to take away Knouse’s tenure and terminate her?
If not, why not?
Is MIT going to restore David’s tenure, and apologize for firing him?
If not, why not?
In light of what has transpired in this grave miscarriage of justice, MIT has the opportunity and the obligation to right a serious wrong here.
At a minimum, the public deserves transparency into what actions MIT is taking in this case as taxpayers are major funders of MIT.
Sincerely,
Bill Ackman
Bing Zhang retweeted
@DMSabatini was always kind, professional, and supportive towards me and my lab. He asked great questions in my faculty meetings that I still remember and we still work on :) He retweeted our work when we needed it the most , and told me about the @PershingSqFdn and other funding sources. I just want to say thank you for that support.
Bing Zhang retweeted
We are starting a new Neuroscience graduate program at USC, details below, please consider applying!
Are you planning a PhD in neuroscience?
The Department of Neurobiology at USC has launched a new PhD program, and we’re recruiting our first cohort.
Our labs seek answers to:
How animals learn, remember, and choose what to do.
How synapses transmit signals and stay stable over a lifetime.
How neural circuits are built, how they fail in disease, and can they be repaired?
How the brain turns sensation into action.
We investigate these questions at scales from single synapses to whole-brain networks, using molecular, genetic, physiological, imaging, computational, and behavioral approaches across model systems.
Explore our labs: dornsife.usc.edu/neurobiolog…
What you’ll get:
Full funding: tuition plus a $43,000 annual stipend and health insurance
A small cohort with direct faculty mentorship, where you’ll help shape a program as it grows
Lab rotations across three faculty labs before you choose your thesis lab
Los Angeles: a major research hub with S-tier climate, cultural vibrancy and global influence
Applications due December 1, 2026. GRE optional. Application fee waivers available based on demonstrated need.
Apply here: dornsife.usc.edu/neurobiolog…
Any questions? Reply or DM and I’m happy to answer.
Bing Zhang retweeted
1. CRISPR came from basic research on bacteria.
2. Optogenetics started with a discovery in algae.
3. The GFP protein comes from jellyfish.
The biggest breakthroughs all trace to scientists follow their curiosity. This is one huge reason why we must keep funding basic research!
Bing Zhang retweeted
Here is Zhuo-Hua Pan lab's @NeuroCellPress paper that @Nature and @NatureNeuro rejected initially
Ectopic Expression of a Microbial-Type Rhodopsin Restores Visual Responses in Mice with Photoreceptor Degeneration
cell.com/neuron/fulltext/S08…
Lots of unsung hero of ontogenetics field but Zhuo-Hua Pan’s story is even more tragedy!!!
statnews.com/2016/09/01/opto…
Bing Zhang retweeted
Today @KarlDeisseroth of @StanfordMed @Stanford won the @NobelPrize for his co-discovery & development of Optogenetics. Here he explains what that is, and how it is unlocking the secrets of brain function & helping to cure diseases.
(And he explains that in ~1min).
Bing Zhang retweeted
SOMEONE GAVE A FLY BRAIN $100 AND WIRED ITS DOPAMINE NEURONS TO PROFIT. IT IS TRADING BITCOIN RIGHT NOW
three weeks ago this was a neuroscience paper. then the file went public
→ sep 3. google and janelia publish the complete brain of a male fruit fly. 165,122 neurons, 10,228,000 synapses, every one traced by electron microscopy. free
→ sep 9. someone runs it on beat saber. 22,316,427 views
→ sep 10. someone gives it $100 and fires its dopamine neurons when it profits. the neurons place the trades
→ sep 11. gpt-6 astra trains one to play super mario on a real 1985 nes cartridge
→ sep 11. a fund hands a fly $1,000,000 and points it at mag7 perps
eight days. free download to a bug running a seven-figure book
none of the wiring is trained. you cannot add a connection the fly does not have. all you turn is how loud each synapse shouts
so is it really seeing the screen, or is a script doing the work
one dev ran the test that settles it
light mode: his fly filled 0 of 3 form fields. dark mode: 2 of 3
a fly retina is a luminance map. invert the contrast and it goes blind
that is not a model imitating an insect. that is an insect failing the way an insect fails
every agent startup this year is building something to act on a screen without being told how
a 100 million year old visual system got there in a weekend, for free
I gave the fly brain $100 to trade bitcoin.
Dopamine neurons are stimulated when the fly makes profit. Neuron activity controls buy/sell decisions and makes trades on coinbase.
Will the fly get rich?
Bing Zhang retweeted
i booted a dead fly's brain and had it read letters off a screen.
166,700 neurons from male_cns_v1.0, driven through 759 photoreceptors at 180 hz, in 40 millisecond windows.
trial 119 went like this:
-> the optic lobe cuts the smear into six windows
-> mushroom body output cells vote on each window
-> a decoder turns those votes into one character
-> the front leg presses whatever the brain decided
nothing in that wiring has ever seen a letter.
the only feedback is dopamine: plus one on an exact match, minus four tenths on everything else.
1.28 million spikes a second. 4.8 percent of the brain awake at any moment.
timesteps of a tenth of a millisecond.
the fly has been dead for months. the wiring still answers.
Bing Zhang retweeted
The Fly Brain Report.
You've seen the flies all over your feed if you watch the AI community like I do.
Here's a good list my AI agent that I built with @blevlabs just made me. I asked it to find me any that have at least 10 likes or 10 reshares.
Here's the fly-brain report.
Quick context first: around Sep 3, 2026, Google Research + HHMI Janelia released MaleCNS v1.0 — the first complete connectome of an adult male fruit fly brain (~166,700 neurons, ~25.6M synapses; FlyWire earlier mapped ~140k). Within days, builders started wiring that simulated connectome into everything. These are the posts of "fly brains doing things" that clear at least 10 likes or 10 reshares.
THE ORIGINAL VIRAL DEMOS
• @lyraaaa — fly brain plays Beat Saber (84,912 likes, 2,316 quotes, 22M views) — xitter.cf/lyraaaa/status/2097527…
• @alrightmark — fly brain drives a virtual Mini Cooper and uses the blinkers (16,791 likes) — xitter.cf/alrightmark/status/209…
• @nicochristie — "I turned the fly bisexual" (blocked mAL output in a 166,606-neuron model) (9,506 likes) — xitter.cf/nicochristie/status/20…
• @evnsnclr — fly brain running inside Minecraft (3,149 likes) — xitter.cf/evnsnclr/status/209637…
• @fruitflydev — fly brain trained to launch a memecoin, real connectome (952 likes) — xitter.cf/fruitflydev/status/209…
• @fruitflydev — the fly's memecoin earned $106k in creator rewards in 6.5 hrs (504 likes) — xitter.cf/fruitflydev/status/209…
• @fruitflydev — real fly brain simulated forward with a learning mushroom body (216 likes) — xitter.cf/fruitflydev/status/209…
"I GAVE THE FLY BRAIN A JOB" DEMOS
• @sopersone — FLYTOK: open-sourced fly brain given a phone to doomscroll (185 likes) — xitter.cf/sopersone/status/20983…
• @sopersone — "born to fly, forced to scroll" phone demo (12 likes) — xitter.cf/sopersone/status/20983…
• @RichardPtardio — set the fly brain to find him a wife (satire, 95 likes) — xitter.cf/RichardPtardio/status/…
• @kevincodex — fly brain in a microgecko robot, armed with lasers, fighting a drone swarm (59 likes) — xitter.cf/kevincodex/status/2098…
• @anshuc — fly brain implant that "talks telepathically" via a modified LLM (53 likes) — xitter.cf/anshuc/status/20984509…
• @distributedkv — fly brain sim wired to a 1B-param LLM so you can chat with it (70 likes) — xitter.cf/distributedkv/status/2…
• @fruitflycap — FruitFly Capital: a swarm of simulated flies builds an on-chain portfolio (52 likes) — xitter.cf/fruitflycap/status/209…
• @EvgenyKirilin — trained a fly brain to synthesize the anti-aging drug Rentosertib (50 likes) — your example — xitter.cf/EvgenyKirilin/status/2…
• @theSethian — fly brain flies a virtual racing drone through gates (32 likes) — xitter.cf/theSethian/status/2098…
• @1f916ai — handed the fly to an autonomous agent society as a grant (17 likes) — xitter.cf/1f916ai/status/2098482…
• @mitch0z — put the fly brain into a fly-body sim; watch it eat and fly live (15 likes) — xitter.cf/mitch0z/status/2098371…
COVERAGE OF SPECIFIC DEMOS (also clears the bar)
• @thegreatestsv — a guy gave a fly's brain $100 to trade Bitcoin on dopamine reward (33 likes) — xitter.cf/thegreatestsv/status/2…
• @SciTechera — digital fly brain playing Doom and Super Mario 64 (21 likes) — xitter.cf/SciTechera/status/2098…
• @AGTPinsights — the fly brain learns Beat Saber (17 likes) — xitter.cf/AGTPinsights/status/20…
• @AGTPinsights — Alex Wormuth's DOOMFLY: fly brain plays Doom (12 likes, 9 quotes) — xitter.cf/AGTPinsights/status/20…
• @AGTPinsights — full fly brain simulation inside Minecraft (12 likes) — xitter.cf/AGTPinsights/status/20…
• @ForestManSol555 — "Fly64": fly brain plays Super Mario 64 (12 likes) — xitter.cf/ForestManSol555/status…
• @gauravg1629 — fly brain played Doom, traded Bitcoin, and drove a hexapod robot this week (16 quotes) — xitter.cf/gauravg1629/status/209…
Bing Zhang retweeted
“Almost everything you learn in biology textbooks is a hallucination.”
This week we spoke with Nobel Prize-winning physicist @Eric_Betzig about one of the biggest challenges in biology: actually seeing what happens inside a living cell.
Betzig’s work in super-resolution microscopy revealed a dynamic molecular world that often looks very different from the static picture in biology textbooks.
We discuss PALM, the diffraction limit, live-cell imaging, and his ambitious Cell Observatory project to combine automated microscopy, massive datasets, and AI to understand the complexity of living cells.
Full episode here on X and YouTube (see comment).
Timestamps:
00:00 - Intro
01:30 - The Diffraction Limit
12:30 - Imaging Cells
19:04 - Betzig's Transition from Physics to Biology
32:37 - Getting Fed Up with Science
34:57 - Leaving Science for the Automotive Industry
55:55 - 2008 and the Fall of the Automotive Industry
1:09:50 - Building a Microscope in a Living Room
1:34:01 - Insights from Super-Resolution Microscopy
1:47:53 - AI for Analyzing Petabytes of Data
2:10:35 - Improving Microscopes
2:15:27 - Nuclear Energy and Politics
2:23:18 - The Magic of Bell Labs
2:36:17 - Is SpaceX the New Bell Labs?
Bing Zhang retweeted
Since there is interest, I put this WIP interactive fly connectome explorer online. Featuring the OG datasets. Works on your phone :) At the end you can follow the story of several different circuits and explore interactive animations. whatisabrain.com/fly/
Step inside a fly and follow sight, walking, steering & grooming circuits! Powered by @FlyWireNews BANC, a wiring map of a fly’s brain and central nervous system published in @Nature this June. Yesterday brought MaleCNS in @CellCellPress from @hhmi_science @GoogleResearch, an invaluable male counterpart. Now for comparative connectomics!
Bing Zhang retweeted
Have you explored the BANC (Brain and Nerve Cord) Dataset? codex.flywire.ai/?dataset=ba…
Publication in @Nature: nature.com/articles/s41586-0…
BANC Wiki: github.com/jasper-tms/the-BA…
Resources for educators (HS/College): FlyWire Academy codex.flywire.ai/academy_hom…
Bing Zhang retweeted
One of Maria’s most unhinged rants from 2022, where she claimed that Dems manufactured Covid so they could cheat in the 2020 election, and claimed the Biden admin was lying that Putin was about to invade Ukraine just to distract from the Durham report.
Bing Zhang retweeted
BREAKING: BYE, FELICIA! Trump fanatic Maria Bartiromo has been FIRED from Fox News after twelve years of lies, misinformation, and racist conspiracy!
Good riddance…
One of Donald Trump’s most fervent defenders on Fox News has been abruptly fired after a decade of journalistic malpractice.
