Skip to content
TrackPodcasts
healthOct 16, 202510:43pending

Standard Deviation S1 EP2: Domino Effect

Get every episode summarized

Each time Out of Patients with Matthew Zachary publishes, we email you a written briefing from the transcript — the topics, who appeared, and any specific claims, with the ad reads skipped.

Email me new episodes

Free for 3 shows. No card needed.

About this episode

Dr. Nikki Maphis didn’t just lose a grant. She lost a lifeline. An early-career Alzheimer’s researcher driven by her grandmother’s diagnosis, Nikki poured years into her work—only to watch it vanish when the NIH’s MOSAIC program got axed overnight. Her application wasn’t rejected. It was deleted. No feedback. No score. Just gone.

In this episode, Oliver Bogler pulls back the curtain on what happens when politics and science collide and promising scientists get crushed in the crossfire. Nikki shares how she’s fighting to stay in the field, teaching the next generation, and rewriting her grant for a world where even the word “diversity” can get you blacklisted. The conversation is raw, human, and maddening—a reminder that the real “war on science” doesn’t happen in labs. It happens in inboxes.


RELATED LINKS:

• Dr. Nikki Maphis LinkedIn page

• Dr. Nikki Maphis’ page at the University of New Mexico

• Vanguard News Group coverage

• Nature article

• PNAS: Contribution of NIH funding to new drug approvals 2010–2016


FEEDBACK:

Like this episode? Rate and review Out of Patients on your favorite podcast platform. For guest suggestions or sponsorship inquiries, visit outofpatients.com.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hosts & guests

No transcript yet

This episode has not been transcribed. Request it and it moves to the front of the queue.

Standard Deviation S1 EP2: Domino Effect

Out of Patients with Matthew Zachary

0:00
10:43

More episodes

More from Out of Patients with Matthew Zachary

View all episodes →