Erik Van Dis

Graph of award probability of R35 and R01 from NIH factbook as a function of review rank percentile. As is apparent, 2025 is a significant departure, with lower award probabilities at all scores <40 and significant departures from norm, where even being in the top 10% is no longer a nearly certain indicator of success. Data source: https://report.nih.gov/nihdatabook/report/302

The data is in: the NIH goalposts have shifted.

What were once almost certain fundable scores have become coin flips and what used to be likely grants have become aspirational, leading to fewer awards.

Another manifestation of how HHS policies have led to fewer awards and less science.

Trois récipiendaires Ambizione rejoignent la FBM Cette année, trois jeunes scientifiques viennent renforcer la Faculté de biologie et de médecine (FBM) de l’Unil. Lauréat·es des subsides Ambizione du Fonds national suisse, Ella Hartenian, David Robe...

Congratulations and welcome to Ella Hartenian @ehartenian.bsky.social, who will be launching her group in our Department of Immunobiology in 2026!

www.unil.ch/news/fr/1764...

Phosphoinositide and cholesterol are endogenous ligands of STING in innate immune signaling @nature.com @upittpress.bsky.social @utswim.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Thrilled to share our new preprint showing that dietary amino acids license the NLRP3 inflammasome via mTOR-dependent mRNA translation! Congrats to co-1st authors @mikelhaggadone.bsky.social, Brian Goldspiel, co-senior author @metabailism.bsky.social & collaborators! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

The stoichiometry of minor-to-major pilins regulates the dynamic activity of the type IVa competence pilus in Vibrio cholerae https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.01.17.700090v1

PtdIns(3,5)P2 Is an Endogenous Ligand of STING in Innate Immune Signaling https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2025.12.29.696917v1

Antibody-lectin chimeras for glyco-immune checkpoint blockade - Nature Biotechnology Cancer immunotherapy benefits from antibody-lectin chimeras that block glyco-immune checkpoints.

Antibody-lectin chimeras for glyco-immune checkpoint blockade - @jcstark.bsky.social @carolynbertozzi.bskyverified.social go.nature.com/4aRDpk8

kwnsfk27.r.eu-west-1.awstrack.me/L0/https:%2F...

Offit told me that Kennedy is a "liar" and a "terrible human being." I asked him to explain. "It doesn't matter what I say," Offit said. "He thinks the medical journals are in the pocket of the industry, he thinks that the government is in the pocket of the industry, he thinks I'm in the pocket of industry, and he's wrong." Offit continued: "If he has data showing he's right, then fucking publish it. He can't, because he doesn't have those data." I asked Offit if he saw a way to reverse the public's rising distrust in science. "I don't think there is any way to regain that trust other than have the viruses do the education, and the bacteria do the education, and then people will realize they paid way too high a cost," he said.

presented without comment

What will population immunity to SARS-CoV-2 look like in a post-vaccine world? An updated outlook (2025)

Five years of COVID taught us one thing: immunology didn’t fail, our public discourse did. My new Substack cuts through the noise with evidence, not ideology. If you want facts over fear, and science over spin, join here:

marcveldhoen.substac...
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What controls expansion & contraction of DNA repeats (e.g. Huntington's)? We were thrilled to collaborate w/ the lab of Marta Olejniczak to find out. Check out the cool screen from @sebasiegner.bsky.social and @matthiasmuhar.bsky.social that reads out repeat sequence. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Innate immune and metabolic signals induce mitochondria-dependent membrane lysis via mitoxyperiosis Wang et al. identify a new lytic cell death pathway, mitoxyperilysis, triggered by the synergy of innate immune activation and metabolic stress. This process is regulated by mTORC2 and involves persis...

#NoTimeToDie! Welcome mitoxyperiosis! ⁦‪Kanneganti, Wang‬⁩ &co show ⁦‪@cp-cell.bsky.social that energy starvation via carbon deprivation in the presence of innate immune stimuli triggers a new form of cell death dependent on mitochondria-driven plasma membrane oxidative damage!

Health care in the USA: money has become the mission Despite extraordinary scientific and medical resources, the US health-care system underperforms. In this Review we consider the damage wrought by decades of market-based policies that have stimulated ...

My trainees are sick of me saying that we have the second worst health care system ever created. (The first being USA pre-Obamacare.) Here is a stellar summary of our many problems, where indeed money has become the mission.

Acute stress causes immediate hair follicle necrosis and hair loss via sympathetic nerves, which in turn activates and expand s autoreactive CD8 ⁺ T cells targeting hair follicles. Thus, a single stress event not only causes immediate tissue damage but also predisposes the tissue to future autoimmune attack.

"Stress-induced sympathetic hyperactivation drives hair follicle necrosis to trigger autoimmunity" spkl.io/63326Ad0f6

Ya-Chieh Hsu & colleagues
@cp-cell.bsky.social

Lymphotoxin alpha eradicates acute myeloid leukemia and simultaneously promotes healthy hematopoiesis in mice Lymphotoxin alpha represses acute myeloid leukemia by depleting TRAF2 and triggering cell death and myeloid differentiation.

‘Lymphotoxin alpha eradicates acute myeloid leukemia and simultaneously promotes healthy hematopoiesis in mice’

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Annndddd it’s out! Here’s what came out of combining my virology background with the @brozlab.bsky.social’s cell death focus : a novel role for the cell death protein ninj1 during hsv1 infection. In brief, Ninj1 on mouse macrophages results in lower infection rates and higher cytokine secretion.

NINJ1 blocks HSV-1 entry into macrophages to impact viral replication and immunity | EMBO reports imageimageNINJ1 blocks HSV-1 entry into mouse macrophages independent of its role in cell death, resulting in greater secretion of pro inflammatory cytokines downstream of infection. Mouse macrophages lacking NINJ1 are more permissive to HSV-1 ...

November is a big month for the lab with *two* new papers by @ehartenian.bsky.social and @alexandraboegli.bsky.social ++ co authors now online.

www.embopress.org/doi/full/10....

Dengue Virus NS1 Binds Ephrin B1 to Trigger Endothelial Dysfunction https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.11.19.689067v1

@biorxivpreprint.bsky.social Regulation of lipid metabolism is a primordial function of STING @igmm-montpel.bsky.social
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... @nadinelaguette.bsky.social

U.S. Congress considers sweeping ban on Chinese collaborations Researchers speak out against proposal that would bar funding for U.S. scientists working with Chinese partners or training Chinese students

“The prohibited activities would include joint research, co-authorship on papers, and advising a foreign graduate student or postdoctoral fellow. The language is retroactive, meaning any interactions during the previous 5 years could make a scientist ineligible for future federal funding.”

N.I.H. Worker Who Criticized Trump Health Policies Says She Is on Administrative Leave

NEW: Jenna Norton, an NIH employee who is openly critical of Trump & RFK Jr, has been put on "non-disciplinary" administrative leave. She says the administration is trying to "scare and silence me." An HHS official, asked to comment, called her a radical leftist.
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/13/u...

Termination of the integrated stress response Stress responses enable cells to detect, adapt to, and survive challenges. The benefit of these signaling pathways depends on their reversibility. The integrated stress response (ISR) is elicited by p...

Termination of the integrated stress response | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

What is the most profitable industry in the world, this side of the law? Not oil, not IT, not pharma.

It's *scientific publishing*.

We call this the Drain of Scientific Publishing.

Paper: arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820
Background: doi.org/10.1162/qss_...

Thread @markhanson.fediscience.org.ap.brid.gy 👇

Interleukin-1β (IL-1β) is secreted primarily by dying monocytes rather than by live bystander monocytes, challenging established models.

#cryopyrin
#pyrin
#immunology
#science

buff.ly/2cBb3sk

Early registration deadline for midwconfimmunol.org
@midwinter-immun.bsky.social is this Friday!

Truncating RELA variants drive autoinflammation and autoimmunity by impairing the negative feedback control of NF-kB https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.11.09.687461v1

Can we improve peer review? We think we can! Check out an experiment I helped with as part of @solvingforsci.bsky.social 's mission to make science better.
And if you don't want to read the whole bioRxiv manuscript, here's an overview of the main findings:
solvingfor.org/news-posts-d...

Very cool work from my former mentor elucidating differential control of HIV by IFN alpha subtypes 🦠🧫🧬

Membrane integrity changes upon viral infection activate sphingomyelinase SMPDL3B to restrict cGAS-STING signaling via cGAMP degradation Wang et al. find that cell membrane stress upon viral infection induces expression and stabilization of host sphingomyelin phosphodiesterase acid-like 3B (SMPDL3B), which, in turn, degrades cGAMP to s...

Sphingolipid sensor degrades cGAMP to suppress antiviral host defense- #virus #lipids #hostdefense #innateImmunity
www.cell.com/immunity/ful...

#Cytokines2025 will kick off with two special symposia! Check in early, get your badges, to attend these sessions.