Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
@plantepigenetics.ch
Head of the Crop Genome Dynamics Group at Agroscope, Switzerland.
Studying plant epigenetics and transposable elements and their use for crop breeding.
Views are my own.
#epigenetics #TransposableElements #breeding #crops #GMO #ClimateEmergency
Studying plant epigenetics and transposable elements and their use for crop breeding.
Views are my own.
#epigenetics #TransposableElements #breeding #crops #GMO #ClimateEmergency
Pinned
Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
@plantepigenetics.ch
· Nov 17
Current state of EU legislation on crop breeding summed up in one picture. Note that all plants carry the same mutation!
One does not need to be a scientist to understand the this legislation makes no sense. #GMOs #CommonSense @testbiotech
One does not need to be a scientist to understand the this legislation makes no sense. #GMOs #CommonSense @testbiotech
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
Switzerland is joining Horizon Europe!
We are uniting two research powerhouses.
For cutting-edge innovation that will boost our energy security, digital transformation, health and so much more.
Today is a good day for science, and for our EU-Switzerland partnership.
We are uniting two research powerhouses.
For cutting-edge innovation that will boost our energy security, digital transformation, health and so much more.
Today is a good day for science, and for our EU-Switzerland partnership.
November 10, 2025 at 2:58 PM
Switzerland is joining Horizon Europe!
We are uniting two research powerhouses.
For cutting-edge innovation that will boost our energy security, digital transformation, health and so much more.
Today is a good day for science, and for our EU-Switzerland partnership.
We are uniting two research powerhouses.
For cutting-edge innovation that will boost our energy security, digital transformation, health and so much more.
Today is a good day for science, and for our EU-Switzerland partnership.
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
The Double Helix shenanigans are getting a lot of discussion following Watson's death. This article is DJing the rounds. It's a really interesting read. But I'm interested in people's take on it.
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
What Rosalind Franklin truly contributed to the discovery of DNA’s structure
Franklin was no victim in how the DNA double helix was solved. An overlooked letter and an unpublished news article, both written in 1953, reveal that she was an equal player.
www.nature.com
November 8, 2025 at 8:45 AM
The Double Helix shenanigans are getting a lot of discussion following Watson's death. This article is DJing the rounds. It's a really interesting read. But I'm interested in people's take on it.
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Racism is a proof for lack of intelligence.
I, for one, won't miss this abject person.
I, for one, won't miss this abject person.
⚫ Le prix Nobel américain James Watson, qui révolutionné la science en découvrant la structure de l'ADN avec son collègue Francis Crick, est décédé à l'âge de 97 ans, a annoncé vendredi le Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL), avec lequel il a travaillé ⬇️
November 8, 2025 at 9:39 AM
Racism is a proof for lack of intelligence.
I, for one, won't miss this abject person.
I, for one, won't miss this abject person.
Horse meets cows at Agroscope close to Zürich.
November 4, 2025 at 7:59 AM
Horse meets cows at Agroscope close to Zürich.
If AI was really as good as OpenAI and Meta say, wouldn’t they actually earn tons of money by using it?
As of now they only lose money with no change in sight. A huge bubble.
As of now they only lose money with no change in sight. A huge bubble.
"Spending on data centres, which are filled with Nvidia’s chips, accounted for 92% of US gross domestic product growth in the first half of the year."
Consuming vast amounts of resources and energy. But what _good_ will they do?
observer.co.uk/news/busines...
Consuming vast amounts of resources and energy. But what _good_ will they do?
observer.co.uk/news/busines...
What could possibly burst Nvidia’s $5tn bubble?
Now more valuable than the German economy, the chipmaker has invested in AI ventures with unclear returns
observer.co.uk
November 2, 2025 at 9:47 PM
If AI was really as good as OpenAI and Meta say, wouldn’t they actually earn tons of money by using it?
As of now they only lose money with no change in sight. A huge bubble.
As of now they only lose money with no change in sight. A huge bubble.
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
🌿🌈 Less than a year for ISPP 2026 in Switzerland! 🇨🇭 Check our website ispp2026.unine.ch for more details.
October 31, 2025 at 5:54 PM
🌿🌈 Less than a year for ISPP 2026 in Switzerland! 🇨🇭 Check our website ispp2026.unine.ch for more details.
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
This great column from France, details how EU attitudes to ag technology have really harmed crop productivity, at least with corn/maize in that country. wikiagri.fr/articles/fil...
Filières maïs – une troisième année de pertes sans perspectives de redressement - WikiAgri - Actualité agricole
Après trois campagnes 2023, 2024 et 2025 déficitaires, les planteurs de maïs ne peuvent pas se permettre d’achever une quatrième campagne avec un revenu de nouveau négatif. Mais ils sont démunis pour ...
wikiagri.fr
October 31, 2025 at 12:25 PM
This great column from France, details how EU attitudes to ag technology have really harmed crop productivity, at least with corn/maize in that country. wikiagri.fr/articles/fil...
Sure, bit I suggest you start by working to save lives on our planet, submit a project!
✨ Searching for extraterrestrial life or combating speech disorders: The SNSF is awarding #SNSFStartingGrants to 41 outstanding researchers. They will receive a maximum of CHF 1 million to lead a project with their own #research team at a Swiss university. 🚀
ℹ️ sohub.io/aq26
ℹ️ sohub.io/aq26
October 31, 2025 at 10:05 AM
Sure, bit I suggest you start by working to save lives on our planet, submit a project!
The main reasons I see for french universities to underperform at @erc.europa.eu is the way they hire professors: It is not open to true international competition.
Get rid of the “concours” and hire the best in the world and not nationally.
Get rid of the “concours” and hire the best in the world and not nationally.
Coucou @phbaptiste.bsky.social
Vous avez oublié de dire que les taux de succès de l'ERC sont en baisse, certains atteignant à peine 10%. Le nombre de dossiers déposés explose et dépasse largement les fonds disponibles. #ESR
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Vous avez oublié de dire que les taux de succès de l'ERC sont en baisse, certains atteignant à peine 10%. Le nombre de dossiers déposés explose et dépasse largement les fonds disponibles. #ESR
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
October 31, 2025 at 10:00 AM
The main reasons I see for french universities to underperform at @erc.europa.eu is the way they hire professors: It is not open to true international competition.
Get rid of the “concours” and hire the best in the world and not nationally.
Get rid of the “concours” and hire the best in the world and not nationally.
It would be great if researchers would work more on crops than Arabidopsis for a start…
Then field trials will automatically become more common (if legislation permits for GM!).
Then field trials will automatically become more common (if legislation permits for GM!).
New Correspondence: "Rethinking the need for field trials" rdcu.be/eM96P
October 31, 2025 at 6:01 AM
It would be great if researchers would work more on crops than Arabidopsis for a start…
Then field trials will automatically become more common (if legislation permits for GM!).
Then field trials will automatically become more common (if legislation permits for GM!).
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
China Agrees To Purchase 11 U.S. Soybeans
China Agrees To Purchase 11 U.S. Soybeans
SEOUL—In a historic trade agreement that President Donald Trump touted as a major win for an American farmer, China reportedly agreed Thursday to purchase 11 U.S. soybeans. “I am extremely honored tha...
theonion.com
October 30, 2025 at 9:00 PM
China Agrees To Purchase 11 U.S. Soybeans
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
#TEsky Do duplication-inducing elements ‘cooperate’ with genes in evolutionary arms races? A case study on cereal crop pathogenesis doi.org/10.1186/s128...
Do duplication-inducing elements ‘cooperate’ with genes in evolutionary arms races? A case study on cereal crop pathogenesis - BMC Plant Biology
Crop improvement depends on the human ability to harness naturally- or artificially-occurring gene variants. Genomic segmental duplication can create redundant gene copies that can more freely ‘explor...
doi.org
October 30, 2025 at 1:25 PM
#TEsky Do duplication-inducing elements ‘cooperate’ with genes in evolutionary arms races? A case study on cereal crop pathogenesis doi.org/10.1186/s128...
Finally I have found the perfect screen to look at sequence alignments!
"You'd expect one of the best-selling home computers in Japan to have a specification list as big as its memory. But the Toshiba HX10 doesn't just limit itself to that." (Source.)
October 30, 2025 at 12:11 PM
Finally I have found the perfect screen to look at sequence alignments!
Europe is the continent that is heating up the fastest and Bill Gates thinks we worry too much.
Are all billionaires so “ill informed”, to put it politely?
Are all billionaires so “ill informed”, to put it politely?
“I mean, God bless the Europeans for caring about climate. You worry they care so much about it that the people you talk to, you won’t be able to meet with them again, because they won’t be in power.” heatmap.news/climate/bill...
7 New Takes From Bill Gates on Climate ‘Doomsday’ Talk and Global Health
“I mean, God bless the Europeans for caring about climate.”
heatmap.news
October 30, 2025 at 6:58 AM
Europe is the continent that is heating up the fastest and Bill Gates thinks we worry too much.
Are all billionaires so “ill informed”, to put it politely?
Are all billionaires so “ill informed”, to put it politely?
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
📣 A very nice place to learn about TEs and bioinformatics👇
Internship position open at INRAE-URGI for 2026, more details available here www.sfbi.fr/emplois/offr...
Optimisation de la classification automatique des éléments transposables par des approches d’IA | SFBI Société Française de Bioinformatique
Emploi en bioinformatique à None Stage Stage M2
www.sfbi.fr
October 29, 2025 at 12:16 PM
📣 A very nice place to learn about TEs and bioinformatics👇
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
@tobybarilbio.bsky.social and I are very excited to release MycoMobilome! A very extensive effort to discover, QC and annotate TEs across the fungal kingdom.
👉 Ready-to-use for your own genome with a simple tutorial!
👉 Metadata about TEs discovered in your genome!
👉 Contribute and get recognition!
👉 Ready-to-use for your own genome with a simple tutorial!
👉 Metadata about TEs discovered in your genome!
👉 Contribute and get recognition!
1/ Ever needed to annotate TEs in a fungal genome, but didn't know where to start?
We have released #MycoMobilome, a community-focused non-redundant database of transposable element consensus sequences for the fungal kingdom, constructed from >4,000 fungal genomes!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
We have released #MycoMobilome, a community-focused non-redundant database of transposable element consensus sequences for the fungal kingdom, constructed from >4,000 fungal genomes!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
October 29, 2025 at 4:32 PM
@tobybarilbio.bsky.social and I are very excited to release MycoMobilome! A very extensive effort to discover, QC and annotate TEs across the fungal kingdom.
👉 Ready-to-use for your own genome with a simple tutorial!
👉 Metadata about TEs discovered in your genome!
👉 Contribute and get recognition!
👉 Ready-to-use for your own genome with a simple tutorial!
👉 Metadata about TEs discovered in your genome!
👉 Contribute and get recognition!
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
"Institutions like Wikipedia are the last bastions of the dream of a free and open internet that betters humanity. Protecting the source code of reality is a matter of survival for a free and sane society, and we must act like it."
I wrote about how "Grokipedia" is a new front on the war against reality itself. It's an attempt by the oligarchic class to seize the means of knowledge production itself and create a weaponized unreality.
www.thedissident.news/grokipedia-a...
www.thedissident.news/grokipedia-a...
Grokipedia and the Coup Against Reality Itself
Grokipedia, the copycat of Wikipedia launched by Elon Musk isn’t just a string of AI generated slop, it is a weapon. The launch of "grokipedia" is a calculated, strategic escalation by the billionaire...
www.thedissident.news
October 28, 2025 at 8:38 PM
"Institutions like Wikipedia are the last bastions of the dream of a free and open internet that betters humanity. Protecting the source code of reality is a matter of survival for a free and sane society, and we must act like it."
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
Spread the word! There is a professor position opening at our University @upcite.bsky.social. There are several possible (great) labs to join, but if you are interested in DNA methylation and epigenetics in mammals, don't hesitate to contact me directly!
#JobOffer
💼 Un poste susceptible d’être vacant de Professeur en stabilité des génomes devrait s’ouvrir pour la rentrée 2026 au sein de l’Institut Jacques Monod
➡️ Informations concernant ce poste et la procédure de candidature 🔗 www.ijm.fr/poste-de-pro...
💼 Un poste susceptible d’être vacant de Professeur en stabilité des génomes devrait s’ouvrir pour la rentrée 2026 au sein de l’Institut Jacques Monod
➡️ Informations concernant ce poste et la procédure de candidature 🔗 www.ijm.fr/poste-de-pro...
October 28, 2025 at 1:51 PM
Spread the word! There is a professor position opening at our University @upcite.bsky.social. There are several possible (great) labs to join, but if you are interested in DNA methylation and epigenetics in mammals, don't hesitate to contact me directly!
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
🧪🌾Our Poplar Transgenic Facility supports research with transformations of hybrid aspen trees and maintains a diverse collection of lines for a wide range of different studies.
But how much do you think actually happens each year?
Take a guess in the poll below👇 and see if you can get it right!
But how much do you think actually happens each year?
Take a guess in the poll below👇 and see if you can get it right!
October 28, 2025 at 10:55 AM
🧪🌾Our Poplar Transgenic Facility supports research with transformations of hybrid aspen trees and maintains a diverse collection of lines for a wide range of different studies.
But how much do you think actually happens each year?
Take a guess in the poll below👇 and see if you can get it right!
But how much do you think actually happens each year?
Take a guess in the poll below👇 and see if you can get it right!
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.
June 19, 2025 at 11:21 AM
Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
Really fascinating article. Prior to 2019, there were no GM crops in Nigeria. Now there are success stories for drought and pest resistant maize and pest resistant cotton+ cowpea, with ongoing trials for low nitrogen rice and nutritionally improved cassava.
press.asimov.com/articles/nig...
press.asimov.com/articles/nig...
Why Nigeria Accepted GMOs
Genetically modified crops are finding a foothold in the Global South, producing some unlikely leaders in agritech.
press.asimov.com
October 27, 2025 at 1:50 PM
Really fascinating article. Prior to 2019, there were no GM crops in Nigeria. Now there are success stories for drought and pest resistant maize and pest resistant cotton+ cowpea, with ongoing trials for low nitrogen rice and nutritionally improved cassava.
press.asimov.com/articles/nig...
press.asimov.com/articles/nig...
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
If someone wanted to harm USA agriculture they'd do 5 things.
1. Deport labor, make work in USA inhospitable
2. Start tariff wars that end US commodity crop exports
3. Fire experts in transmissible livestock disease
4. Invite/subsidize foreign meat competition
5. Tell farmers how much I love them.
1. Deport labor, make work in USA inhospitable
2. Start tariff wars that end US commodity crop exports
3. Fire experts in transmissible livestock disease
4. Invite/subsidize foreign meat competition
5. Tell farmers how much I love them.
October 26, 2025 at 10:17 PM
If someone wanted to harm USA agriculture they'd do 5 things.
1. Deport labor, make work in USA inhospitable
2. Start tariff wars that end US commodity crop exports
3. Fire experts in transmissible livestock disease
4. Invite/subsidize foreign meat competition
5. Tell farmers how much I love them.
1. Deport labor, make work in USA inhospitable
2. Start tariff wars that end US commodity crop exports
3. Fire experts in transmissible livestock disease
4. Invite/subsidize foreign meat competition
5. Tell farmers how much I love them.
If a computer cannot write proper code, how can anyone expect it to be good in anything else?
EA's AI Game Development Tools Are Apparently So Bad That It's Costing More Money To Fix Their Mistakes
QUELLE. SURPRISE.
www.thegamer.com/ea-generativ...
QUELLE. SURPRISE.
www.thegamer.com/ea-generativ...
EA's AI Game Development Tools Are Apparently So Bad That It's Costing More Money To Fix Their Mistakes
A new report suggests that EA's pivot to AI is just causing costly mistakes, and the developers hate it.
www.thegamer.com
October 25, 2025 at 1:21 PM
If a computer cannot write proper code, how can anyone expect it to be good in anything else?
If you’re fed up with MacOS, here’s a really nice Linux version that runs on recent Macs. Super easy installation.
Run in terminal:
curl alx.sh | sh
Run in terminal:
curl alx.sh | sh
October 24, 2025 at 1:34 PM
If you’re fed up with MacOS, here’s a really nice Linux version that runs on recent Macs. Super easy installation.
Run in terminal:
curl alx.sh | sh
Run in terminal:
curl alx.sh | sh
Reposted by Etienne Bucher 🌾🧬🇪🇺
An article on Model Organisms, published in Science in 2005, lists the Models that together represent "the diversity of life".
Guess which model is missing from the list?
This view is one major reason why it's so difficult to obtain funding for basic plant research.
#PlantBlindness #PlantScience
Guess which model is missing from the list?
This view is one major reason why it's so difficult to obtain funding for basic plant research.
#PlantBlindness #PlantScience
October 24, 2025 at 8:10 AM
An article on Model Organisms, published in Science in 2005, lists the Models that together represent "the diversity of life".
Guess which model is missing from the list?
This view is one major reason why it's so difficult to obtain funding for basic plant research.
#PlantBlindness #PlantScience
Guess which model is missing from the list?
This view is one major reason why it's so difficult to obtain funding for basic plant research.
#PlantBlindness #PlantScience