Reminder, registration for the Viral EcoGenomics & Applications (VEGA) 26 symposium is open ! See jgi.doe.gov/work-with-us... for more information

VEGA Symposium | Joint Genome Institute

Berkeley, CA

jgi.doe.gov

Simon Roux@simrouxvirus.bsky.social · 2mo ago

🚨 Registration for VEGA26 is 👏 officially open 👏 🚨 The 5th edition of our Viral EcoGenomics and Applications symposium will be held November 18-19, 2026, on the UC Berkeley campus 🧬 🦠 🔬 🧫 Event website ➡️ jgi.doe.gov/work-with-us... Registration link ➡️ cvent.me/e0RnA0

Out @cp-cellhostmicrobe.bsky.social, natural products meet bacterial immunity! We used genomics to identify lanthivirins: a family of >2,000 lanthipeptide BGCs that protect Actinobacteria against phages. Led by @hshomar.bsky.social & @mariegllm.bsky.social www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

A family of lanthipeptides with anti-phage function

Bacteria produce natural products to adapt to their environments, with phage interactions as major ecological and evolutionary drivers. While some nat…

sciencedirect.com

PhD opening in my lab @jagiellonskiuni.bsky.social: using AI to predict how phage enzymes break down bacterial capsules — joint work with ML group GMUM and Zuzanna Drulis-Kawa's phage lab (Wrocław), spanning genomics, AI & evolution. mostowylab.com/job-phd-ai-d... Deadline: 15 August 2026

New paper from the group - a tool for RNA virus discovery 🥳

Dimitris Karapliafis@dkarap.bsky.social · 4w ago

Very excited to share our paper (and first for my PhD) on RdRpCATCH in NAR Genomics and Bioinformatics! doi.org/10.1093/narg... Co-authors: @urineri.bsky.social, @ingrida.bsky.social, Justine Charon, @sho1.bsky.social, @xinhou.bsky.social, Dick de Ridder, Mark P. Zwart, and @annecmg.bsky.social

Happy to share our new paper in Gut Microbes 🧬 Samer Alban and I developed EcoGS, a genome-scale metabolic modelling tool for predicting ecological interactions between microbes. As first author, I thank Samer, @kaletalab.bsky.social, and all co-authors for the teamwork! doi.org/10.1080/1949...

Genome-scale metabolic models predict diet- and lifestyle-driven shifts of ecological interactions in the gut microbiome

Microbiomes and their host environments form complex, interconnected ecosystems. The microbial species within a microbiome, on the one hand, compete for resources, while on the other hand, they exc...

doi.org

Synteny-aware microbial pangenome graphs reveal blueprints of genomic variation https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.07.03.736256v1

We’re happy to introduce phageFACTor (Functional Annotation and Curation Tool) 👩‍💻Developed by Tanaïs Moreau, our most recent PhD candidate, and building on Phold, we were able to improve annotation of prophage genes by as much as 50% 🧬 You should check it out github.com/TMs-code/pha...

How good is MiniBWA, the successor to BWA? To test it, I ran MiniBWA on sequencing from 76 different species, comparing mapping speed, rate and accuracy with BWA MEM. In short, it's really good. If you map short reads, it's well worth your time. andrewcarroll.github.io/2026/06/30/t...

Interactive schedule for SMBE2026. Enjoy the conference! #SMBE2026 github.com/MoiColl/SMBE...

GitHub - MoiColl/SMBE2026_schedule: Interactive SMBE2026 schedule

Interactive SMBE2026 schedule. Contribute to MoiColl/SMBE2026_schedule development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

Out today in Nature Microbiology: a paper that started in 2021 with an email from @sullivan-lab.bsky.social. Subject line: "Crazy ideas". www.nature.com/articles/s41... 1/23

If you're going to #SMBE2026 @official-smbe.bsky.social Copenhagen by train, share your plans and experience on #NoFlySMBE. Let's make #NoFlyAcademics normal and visible! I'm going Lausanne-Basel, night train 😴 Basel-Hamburg, and finally Hamburg-Copenhagen. Easy! (I hope 🤞)

Marc Robinson-Rechavi@marcrr.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Are you going to #SMBE2026 Copenhagen by train, or are you hesitating? Let's share experiences and give ideas to those who think to fly from Western or Central Europe with the hashtag #NoFlySMBE. If you're coming from 🇨🇭, there are night trains from Zürich or Basel to Hamburg. ✅🚆 ❌✈️

I’ve been maintaining a list of shotgun #metagenomics tools and resources which I got Claude to turn into a GitHub repo. It has 300+ entries. Please share and tell me if I’ve missed anything! github.com/feargalr/Met... #microbiota #bioinformatics #microbiome #genomics

GitHub - feargalr/Metagenomics-tools-atlas: An inventory of tools and resources for short-read shotgun metagenomics.

An inventory of tools and resources for short-read shotgun metagenomics. - feargalr/Metagenomics-tools-atlas

github.com

We are looking for a PhD candidate who will study the biogeography of above- and belowground fungi associated with several Scalesia species. We aim to develop an integrated view of diversity and distribution of three components of the fungal microbiome. Apply by 26 June: nioo.knaw.nl/en/vacancies...

PhD: Biogeography of plant-associated fungi on the Galapagos islands

In this project, you will investigate the biogeography of above- and belowground fungi associated with several Scalesia species. We aim to develop an integrated view of diversity and distribution of t...

nioo.knaw.nl

🌎 🧬 🖥️ logan-search.org the tool to query all SRA sequences (Dec 2023 snapshot) — just got major updates. Here's what's new. 🧵 1/12

Thrilled that our paper "Eco-evolutionary dynamics of massive, parallel bacteriophage outbreaks in compost communities" is out! 🎉🦠🧬 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... w/ @paulbrainey.bsky.social, Petros Skiadas, Paulien Hogeweg, @bedutilh.bsky.social

Eco-evolutionary dynamics of massive, parallel bacteriophage outbreaks in compost communities

A single bacteriophage can dominate microbial communities yet only evolves when migration changes its ecological context.

science.org

@lakhanp01.bsky.social @annecmg.bsky.social et al. characterized the genomic diversity of a tailocin and discovered that diversity is maintained through exchange of the tail fiber locus DNA across Pectobacterium, a pathogen causing soft rot. 🔗 doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evag106 #genome #evolution

This is awful to hear, describing how Sean Eddy (HMMER, infernal, pfam, rfam) has been defunded. The letter said his work "had been determined to be of absolutely no value to the US taxpayer, and therefore it was being specifically terminated," www.npr.org/2026/05/21/n...

Researchers say the Trump administration is finding new ways to punish science

Even with federal grants largely restored, scientists say the Trump administration is still preventing those funds from reaching them. The consequences, they say, are already becoming clear.

npr.org

I'm looking for an enthusiastic student to join my team as a PhD candidate on archaeal genome evolution 🦠💻 Work in beautiful Utrecht, at @binfutrecht.bsky.social, an international group full of caring, amazing scientists, and with frequent cake breaks! www.uu.nl/en/organisat... Please share! 🙏

Hi #microbiomesky and #mevosky and also #phagesky maybe? Some of us want a microbiome journal club to catch up on microbiology/evolution related microbiome research. Monthly@15:00 CET/09:00 EST/18:30 IST or so Please text my LMU email address if you're interested (not typing it here to avoid spam)

Lavisha Parab@lavishaparab.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Does anyone know of an online microbiome journal club? I'm interested in joining one. More along the lines of evolution and microbiology than immunology or human effects #mevosky #microbiomesky

When is an antiphage mechanism an evolved defence adaptation? This question has been on my mind for so long, because despite the field’s rapid progress there is currently no widely agreed framework in place to answer it. So @brownlab.bsky.social and I wrote this, and I'm happy to share the preprint!

Does anyone know of an online microbiome journal club? I'm interested in joining one. More along the lines of evolution and microbiology than immunology or human effects #mevosky #microbiomesky

The deadline for the @meehubs.bsky.social Microbial Ecology and Evolution distributed-network conference is Sunday April 17.😅 Great folks organizing and presenting, details here: meehubs2026.oa-event.com

Will Smith@willpjsmith.bsky.social · 4mo ago

🚨 Calling all microbiologists! 🚨 The MEEHubs abstract submission deadline (19/04) is fast approaching. Come showcase your science!! Submission portal is here: app.oxfordabstracts.com/auth?redirec...

1/8 🔥 New preprint dropped: Dynamic co-existence of bacteriophages and their hosts 🦠 in the Arabidopsis thaliana 🌱 phyllosphere Work led by the indomitable @sheilaroitman.bsky.social‬ #plantscience #microbiome #holobiont www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

The Social Lives of Viruses is coming to Vancouver, Canada, from 4th-8th August 2026! This is a free meeting dedicated to all aspects of virus-virus interactions & evolution. To apply: socialviruses.zoology.ubc.ca @sociovirology.bsky.social #socialviruses #evosky #lovevirology #virosky

Deadline is April 20th! Let’s get those viruses

Ella Sieradzki@sieravirus.bsky.social · 5mo ago

I'm hiring my first postdoc! Apply by 20/4/26, position #20443. Seeking an environmental microbiologist with experience in metagenomics (preferably viromics) and molecular biology. Experience with targeted metabolomics is a plus. international.au.dk/about/profil...

Have you developed a new #bioinformatics tool to understand #phage or #virus? Make sure you add it to #awesome-virome github.com/shandley/awe...

I'm reviewing Sapiens, one page at a time! It's a little bit fact-checking and a little-bit soul-searching combined into a lot of feelings... ecodevoevo.blogspot.com/2026/03/sapi...

"Sapiens": One page at a time

I've been co-teaching a course for several years in which we read Sapiens . I think I've read it eight times, now. That explains the gumband...

ecodevoevo.blogspot.com

Want to annotate a bacterial genome with structures? @oschwengers.bsky.social bakta and @gbouras13.bsky.social phold got together, and the result is Baktfold: protein annotation across the microbial tree of life using structures www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... #phagesky #microsky #microbiomesky

Funding for new Leibniz ScienceCampus on AMR evolution at FZB Borstel and Kiel, with several open PhD positions! Incl @daganlab.bsky.social @bramkamplab.bsky.social @fzborstel.bsky.social @uni-kiel.de www.uni-kiel.de/de/detailans...

Neuer Leibniz-WissenschaftsCampus zur Erforschung von Antibiotikaresistenzen

 FZB und CAU erforschen im  WissenschaftsCampus „AMR-PLAS“ gemeinsam die AMR-Plastizität bei bakteriellen Krankheitserregern 

uni-kiel.de

Are you going to #SMBE2026 Copenhagen by train, or are you hesitating? Let's share experiences and give ideas to those who think to fly from Western or Central Europe with the hashtag #NoFlySMBE. If you're coming from 🇨🇭, there are night trains from Zürich or Basel to Hamburg. ✅🚆 ❌✈️