I’m hiring two postdocs to join my group at UCL, both funded for 3 years, to investigate how commensal bacteria contribute to the evolution and spread of antimicrobial resistance in pathogens. Please share! Links below 👇 www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DSU266/r... www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DSU268/r...
"When you find yourself writing such a statement about a topic you’re not an expert in, there are only two possibilities: 1. You are not talking to the right people. 2. You are talking to the right people but you’re not listening" blog.genesmindsmachines.com/p/im-sorry-y...
I'm sorry, you're not going to die from an AI-engineered supervirus
God save us from economists who think they can competently talk about biology
blog.genesmindsmachines.com
A massive update: At least ~15 companies~ are selling scientists antibodies using faked validation data. We've documented 18,000+ manipulated images on 17,000+ products sold by leading laboratory suppliers including Thermo Fisher, Abcam, Santa Cruz Biotechnology, Millipore Sigma and Bio-Techne. 1/🧵
Enjoyed this! journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...
Species-specific barriers restrict virus spillover potential across the Caenorhabditis genus
Why do most cross-species virus jumps fail? Using Orsay virus across multiple Caenorhabditis species, this study reveals how mismatches in replication, genome balance, and transmission create layered ...
journals.plos.org
Very cool pair of papers demonstrating little link between amount of additive genetic variation and amount of nucleotide variation within species: journals.plos.org/plosbiology/... www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Levels of additive genetic variation vary substantially between species
Adaptive potential determines how populations respond to environmental change. This study compiles evolvability estimates from over 170 multicellular species, revealing substantial variation across th...
journals.plos.org
🪰 Managing Diptera Specimens Join us on 24th Nov and learn how to process, preserve, store and record fly specimens with David Brice & @dipteristsforum.bsky.social. Ideal for ecological surveyors, recorders and anyone building a reference collection 🌎 🧪 Book: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/1989367530...
1/4 In today's funding climate, every grant and fellowship matters. Based on feedback from our GSAC Community Check-In Survey, we're building a growing hub of graduate & postdoctoral funding opportunities and job boards to make them easier to find. 🧵
Here it is. My manifesto for the 2026 Clacton By-Election. It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Join me, clean up Clacton and let's make 13th August Bin Day! #VoteBinface #VoteyMcVoteface #YesWeTinCan
It's true, what could be better than being a fly, though? I mean, look at them
“I have discovered I am a fly, that we are all flies, that nothing matters. It's a great load off my life, for I don't mind being such a micro-organism-to me the honour is sufficient of belonging to the universe-such a great universe, so grand a scheme of things.”
Hi all, putting feelers out: folks looking for a job ASAP in the 🇬🇧 in Cornwall, or willing to move? Collaborating group hiring a couple roles with skills in any of: - insect injections (incl. gene edits) - machine learning for image analysis - experience with 🦋 a plus! Can email me at link below.
Discovery
experts.exeter.ac.uk
How do transposons jump when they’re released from host control? I babysat two chromosomes for 2 years, making sure they are ok without most piRNAs. Here’s what we found & excited to share my 1st postdoc paper: “piRNA loss unleashes episodic transposition bursts” www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
piRNA loss unleashes episodic transposition bursts
In Metazoa, transposon expression is suppressed by the piRNA pathway, and disruption of this pathway leads to rampant transposon expression. However, it remains unclear whether increased transposon ex...
biorxiv.org
Interested in a postdoc position? Olfaction in poison frog tadpoles! Based in Germany with some field work in Costa Rica (bilateral funding, 3 years). Please share with your froggie and neuro/behavior contacts 🐸 www.uni-giessen.de/de/ueber-uns...
Excited to read this! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Fly Viral Atlas: A single-nucleus transcriptomic atlas of RNA viruses and transposable elements (TEs) in Drosophila melanogaster
Drosophila RNA viruses often persist in wild and lab populations, yet their tissue and cellular tropism is poorly understood. In the Fly Cell Atlas (a comprehensive Drosophila single-nucleus transcrip...
biorxiv.org
Another outstanding plenary at #SMBE2026! 👏 Microbes in our gut can adapt incredibly fast… but sometimes they need a little help 💩😅 A truly thought-provoking talk! 🔬 Read one of the groundbreaking studies shared today here: doi.org/10.1038/s415...
📣 New preprint with @allyphillimore.bsky.social, out now! As climate change shifts seasonal timing across food-webs, we present an experiment testing the impact of phenological mismatch in *48* plant-caterpillar 🌳→🐛 trophic interactions. Read it here: doi.org/10.64898/202... ...or scroll 🧵👇 1/7
#SMBE2026 I thought maybe this table-layout of the programme might be handy for more of us: drive.google.com/file/d/1tYF3...
SMBE_2026_Tue_Wed_side_by_side_timeblocks_10pt_compact_consecutive.pdf
drive.google.com
Wild talk by @joannamasel.bsky.social on reconstructing the origin of the genetic code. Left us with the thought that perhaps there was no unitary LUCA but a messy approximate agreement on a code between archaea and bacteria + a bunch of HGT #SMBE2026
Deadline is this Friday, don't be shy to ask any of us about the opportunity at #SMBE2026
📣🧬 Postdoc Alert🧬📣 We are hiring a 2+ year NERC-funded postdoc at Edinburgh Uni investigating causes and consequences of sex differences in recombination in house sparrows in Norway. Informal enquiries welcome at Susan.Johnston@ed.ac.uk 🙂 Details here: elxw.fa.em3.oraclecloud.com/hcmUI/Candid...
340 dipteran genomes reveal the origin of Muller elements and sex chromosomes in Diptera https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.06.01.729285v1