Interested in creating baselines for monitoring genetic change? Check how many "populations" qualify based on already digitized herbarium specimens. Grateful to have been part of this side project! Led by amazing grad students and friends at @biomcgill.bsky.social

Lucas Eckert@lucaseckert.bsky.social · 4mo ago

How useful can #herbarium collections be for genetic monitoring? 🌿 We show that Earth’s currently digitized herbarium specimens can be clustered into HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of historical “populations” suitable for population genetic studies 🔗 doi.org/10.1093/bios... 🧵

How useful can #herbarium collections be for genetic monitoring? 🌿 We show that Earth’s currently digitized herbarium specimens can be clustered into HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of historical “populations” suitable for population genetic studies 🔗 doi.org/10.1093/bios... 🧵

The utility of herbarium collections for genetic monitoring

Abstract. Despite growing evidence of widespread genetic responses to anthropogenic activity, data shortfalls constrain genetic monitoring efforts and prec

doi.org

McGill Biology is hosting a panel to showcase non-academic careers in Biology. Come listen to former PhDs and MScs now working in non-profits, industry, and government. biologygraduatestudent.association.mcgill.ca/events/career-panel Come out on Tues, March 24 from 2-4:30pm @biomcgill.bsky.social

What can #herbarium collections tell us about genetic responses to global change? A lot!! 🌿 Check out our viewpoint, out now in @newphyt.bsky.social - genetic monitoring, extinctions, adaptation, GEAs, and more! ⬇️ doi.org/10.1111/nph....

Using herbarium collections to study genetic responses to global change

Earth's c. 406 million herbarium specimens represent a largely untapped resource of genetic data that could transform our understanding of global plant populations. Advances in DNA sequencing have ma...

doi.org

Today will be the last time I survey lupines at Indiana Dunes National Park. I'm feeling a little at loss that I won't be returning to the field sites that I've been visiting for 4 years!! Wondering how other people feel when they leave a field site for the last time. 🥲 #fieldwork #indianadunes

I have no clue how a month and a half passed since I set out for fieldwork, but here we are. Today I dismantled my transplant site in Ohi, wrapping up a 3 year experiment. Check out the length of these lupine roots! Really had to dig deep. #fieldwork #lupines Now I gotta prep for CSEE 🫠🫠

Fieldwork update 5! The lupines are approaching their peak bloom at Kitty Todd Nature Reserve near Toledo, Ohio (@nature.org), creating purple hues across the landscape. Counting plants is so much easier now 🤠

Fieldwork update 3! Earlier last week I visited the Karner Blue Sanctuary managed by Lambton Wildlife. The @ncccnc.bsky.social applied a much needed prescribed burn, removing some of the successional growth that isn't conducive for lupines. We'll see how the burn did when I return in June! 🔥🔥

fieldwork update 2/n After surveying the NH lupines by a lake (and visiting a kind local), Simon and I visited a private airport housing the National Guard. There were lupines right beside the runway. Not quite the field site I expected! Thanks to Dan from the NH Fish & Game for giving us a hand!

A little late on the fieldwork posts but here's update 1 of many to come! On April 27, I crossed into the US to survey lupines in New Hampshire. Was unexpectedly met with snow!! After passing through the white mountains, Simon (MSc labmate) found some just beside a lake.

A week from today I will be driving around southern Ontario and the US Midwest for my *last* extensive field season. I'm visiting oak savannahs, prairies, dunes, and pine barrens to survey Sundial lupine. Fieldwork photos to come soon! Field season 4 here we go! 🌱🪻⛺🚙

It's not a dire wolf. It's a gray wolf clone with 20 dire-wolf gene edits, and with some dire wolf traits. And here's my story! Gift link: www.nytimes.com/2025/04/07/s...

My lab (Anna Hargreaves) is hiring ~3 undergrad field assistants for this summer! Work in 1 of 3 study systems : White trillium (ON & QC), Sundial lupine (ON, QC, USA) and Yellow rattle (AB). Job ads available at annahargreaves.wixsite.com/home @biomcgill.bsky.social @mcgillscience.bsky.social 1/2

Anna Hargreaves, evolutionary ecologist

Anna Hargreaves conducts research on the ecology and evolution of plant-animal interactions and the limits to species' geographic distributions

annahargreaves.wixsite.com

For grad students and practitioners in conservation, check out this amazing list for potential funding/grants! Thanks @aerinj.bsky.social !! If your conservation research involves genomics, also check the American Genetics Association. They offer up to $6000 USD and funded my sequencing project!

Aerin Jacob, PhD@aerinj.bsky.social · 2y ago

Happy New Year! I updated my webpage of envirionment-related scholarships, grants, & awards: www.aerinjacob.ca/funding--awa... It includes: * science * action & policy * communication * travel awards * international tho' emphasis on N Am, Africa, & women Please share. #ConservationFunding

Finally finished the revisions for an old MSc manuscript... onto the next!! ⌨️🧑‍🔬😀

Reviewing some photos from this past year and found a quick reminder that fieldwork is just around the corner! Take a look at these flowering Sundial lupines, taken at Norfolk County on @ncccnc.bsky.social lands! #lupines #speciesatrisk @biomcgill.bsky.social @mcgillscience.bsky.social 1/2

Congratulations to Matt Osmond on publication of the final version of "Estimating dispersal rates and locating genetic ancestors with genome-wide genealogies" elifesciences.org/articles/72177

Estimating dispersal rates and locating genetic ancestors with genome-wide genealogies

A new method to infer the spatial history of genetic ancestors from a sequence of trees along a recombining genome.

elifesciences.org

Reflecting on this past year (3rd + 4th year PhD), I've noticed that grad school can be really fun when people gather at school. For journal club, for lunch, for lab meetings, for seminars, after work beers, etc. I've also learned a lot of science just by conversing organically. (1/n)

Hey there! 👋🏻 I'm a PhD student at McGill University in Montréal, Canada. I study the genetics of range-edge populations of the at-risk plant Sundial lupine. If you like pretty flowers, prairies, and sand dunes, stay tuned until I return to fieldwork in 2025. 🏕️🪻⛱️

Happy to announce the 3rd and final chapter of my PhD is now published in the October 2024 issue of Molecular Ecology! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... Largest publication PDF of my career so far at 123.6 MB 😱

Testing concordance and conflict in spatial replication of landscape genetics inferences

The degree to which landscape genetics findings can be extrapolated to different areas of a species range is poorly understood. Here, we used a broadly distributed ectothermic lizard (Sceloporus occi...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com