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Rebecca Lowry Palmer

@bexlowrypalms.bsky.social

mum of two+microbiologist. Navigating career in science post kids 👩🏽‍🔬 Currently - PDRA Manchester uni, MERMan research group - bacterial mutation rates and DNA repair 🦠 Personal projects underway - Bdellovibrio: evolution, ecology and agriculture 🌱

53 Posts172 Follower140 Folgt
Rebecca Lowry Palmer@bexlowrypalms.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Great first seminar in the series, thank you @taylorlabgroup.bsky.social for joining us in Manchester and telling us about your fab science

MERMan Research Group (University of Manchester)@mermanchester.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Last week we kicked off the ecology & evolution seminar series with a fantastic talk by @taylorlabgroup.bsky.social 🧬 A great start to a diverse series of talks organised by @bexlowrypalms.bsky.social & @matthewjshepherd.bsky.social Come and join us for the next one on 25th June!

Rebecca Lowry Palmer@bexlowrypalms.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Wasn't selected to apply for a fellowship I was soooo hoping to apply to - went to the allotment to try and make myself feel better - a man starts talking to me about voting reform 🤢 - is there no safe space anymore? I just want to make a raised bed in peace and pretend the world isn't falling apart

Rebecca Lowry Palmer@bexlowrypalms.bsky.social · 3mo ago

This is so stressful - Manchester only able to put 3 candidates forward. I need to rethink my career - so far past my PhD but with my career break to have kids I'm so limited with what is available for me to apply. There isn't much hope currently

Kirsty Grainger @kirstygrainger.bsky.social · 3mo ago

If you have a BBSRC Early Independence Fellowship outline in, check your inbox. Please give professional services teams a few days to design demand management processes as we're finding out the same time as you. The outlines per institute data provided is super interesting; 15 awards available 👀👀👀👀

UKRI – Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council Annex A – Maximum Number of Applications to the 2026 round of the BBSRC Early Independence Fellowship scheme per HEI These figures have been calculated based on submissions to the 2021 Research Excellence Framework (REF) with the number of Early Independence BBSRC Fellowship applications permitted related to the FTE staff numbers included within each institutions REF submission as follows: Academic organisations who did not submit to the REF and are not identified within the grouping are permitted to submit one application to this opportunity. Table UKRI – Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council Annex A – Maximum Number of Applications to the 2026 round of the BBSRC Early Independence Fellowship scheme per HEI These figures have been calculated based on submissions to the 2021 Research Excellence Framework (REF) with the number of Early Independence BBSRC Fellowship applications permitted related to the FTE staff numbers included within each institutions REF submission as follows: Academic organisations who did not submit to the REF and are not identified within the grouping are permitted to submit one application to this opportunity. Table Higher Education Institution (HEI) Number of outline applications Maximum number of applications to this opportunity Aberystwyth University 8 1 Aston University 4 1 Babraham Institute 1 1 Brunel University London 1 1 Cardiff University 8 2 Cranfield University 4 1 Durham University 5 1 Earlham Institute 1 1 Edge Hill University 2 1 Harper Adams University 3 1 Heriot-Watt University 3 1 Imperial College London 27 2 Institute of Cancer Research 3 1 James Hutton Institute 1 1 John Innes Centre 3 1 King's College London 28 2 Lancaster University 3 1 Leeds Beckett University 1 1 London School of Hygiene…
Rebecca Lowry Palmer@bexlowrypalms.bsky.social · 3mo ago

So hard - worked evenings when the kids had gone to sleep to get this in. All to find it doesn't even count. Outline application was longgggg. Annoying it's only called an 'outline' 🤦🏻‍♀️

Daniel Padfield@padpadpadpad.bsky.social · 3mo ago

And it also feels a bit of a middle finger to all the ECRs who put all that work in to their Outline applications. Feels like such a brutal time to be a postdoc, ECR, and aspiring fellow. Find it hard to know how we can help and fix it.

Daniel Padfield@padpadpadpad.bsky.social · 3mo ago

BBSRC Early Independence Fellowships had an Outline stage this year to try help with amount of peer review. Turns out they received 586 applications, a 110% increase on 2025, and only typically fund 15 a year. They are cancelling this stage and going straight to full app with an institutional sift.

Rebecca Lowry Palmer@bexlowrypalms.bsky.social · 4mo ago

One week left to apply for a plant health vacation studentship 🌱✨ Based in Manchester, working on predatory bacteria and plant health 🦠🍅 Supervised by me!

Rebecca Lowry Palmer@bexlowrypalms.bsky.social · 4mo ago

📢 Excited to be offering a Plant Health vacation studentship this summer on plant disease biocontrol and predatory bacteria! Supervised by me at Manchester Uni! @manchester.ac.uk If interested—or know someone who might be—please share and apply! my.rsb.org.uk/services.php... 28th April deadline 🌿🍅🦠

The University of Manchester@manchester.ac.uk · 4mo ago

WINNERS 🏆💜 We couldn’t be prouder of our incredible team for winning University Challenge! This win marks a special milestone. With five victories, we’re the most successful university in the history of the competition, joint with Imperial College London. Well done team 👏🏆

Congrats University Challenge Winners!!
Fiona J Whelan@whelanfj.bsky.social · 4mo ago

📣 Still time to apply to this bioinformatics postdoc position with us! If you have any questions, please DM me here or send me an email. Deadline 3 April.

Fiona J Whelan@whelanfj.bsky.social · 5mo ago

📣 The Whelan lab is hiring a bioinformatics postdoc 📣 Together with @fabricejpierre.bsky.social, we are offering a 1-year bioinformatic PDRA position in comparative genomics of Pseudomonas aeruginosa. To find out more please visit whelanlab.co.uk/contact/. Applications close 3 April 2026!

Rebecca Lowry Palmer@bexlowrypalms.bsky.social · 6mo ago

All that time sat next to @matthewjshepherd.bsky.social watching him work away at this - absolutely buzzing it's finally out there!! Well done!

Matthew J Shepherd@matthewjshepherd.bsky.social · 6mo ago

🚨 New pre-print! 🚨 In the largest study of its kind to-date, we investigate the ecological and evolutionary mechanisms driving within-patient evolution of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Read here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... , and follow along with this thread, discussing our findings (1/21)

Michael Brockhurst@brockhurstlab.bsky.social · 6mo ago

New PDRA position with @knightjar.bsky.social @coytelab.bsky.social & me Community assembly processes in soil microbiomes with focus on bioinformatics and computational modelling of data from field and lab experiments www.jobs.manchester.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...

'Research Associate in Microbiome Ecology:Manchester

We wish to appoint a PostDoctoral Research Associate to an exciting project exploring the assembly, stability and function of microbial decomposer communities.

jobs.manchester.ac.uk

Michael Brockhurst@brockhurstlab.bsky.social · 10mo ago

New preprint! Ever wondered why only a fraction of genomes encode CRISPR immunity? 🧬 🦠 Turns out CRISPR is rarely beneficial against virulent phages, being most beneficial against those for which resistance mutations are rare! An epic effort by Rosanna Wright www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Resistance mutation supply modulates the benefit of CRISPR immunity against virulent phages

Only a fraction of bacterial genomes encode CRISPR-Cas systems but the selective causes of this variation are unexplained. How naturally virulent bacteriophages (phages) select for CRISPR immunity has...

biorxiv.org