PhD opportunity! Join us in St Andrews to study the consequences of defence against conjugative plasmids (preprint coming soon on this!). Funded by EASTBIO, co-supervised by @mfwhite2.bsky.social. Please share & pass on to anyone interested! 🦠🧫 Deadline 16th November www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Eastbio: Mechanism and consequences of lethal zygosis in bacteria restricting AMR plasmids. at University of St Andrews on FindAPhD.com

PhD Project - Eastbio: Mechanism and consequences of lethal zygosis in bacteria restricting AMR plasmids. at University of St Andrews, listed on FindAPhD.com

findaphd.com

Postdoc position available in my group to work on ERC funded project on evolutionary biology of antibiotic resistance. Looking for someone with expertise in bacterial genetics, AMR, and evolutionary biology. www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DSZ416/p...

Postdoctoral Research Associate at University of Oxford

Explore an exciting academic career as a Postdoctoral Research Associate. Don't miss out on other academic jobs. Click to apply and explore more opportunities.

jobs.ac.uk

Please share! We are looking for a PhD student excited about gene transfer, and tackling Antimicrobial Resistance in Klebsiella pneumoniae. 🧬 More details & applications on funder website by 21st Oct 👇🏻 gw4biomed.ac.uk/developing-c...

Does an AMR gene on a plasmid diversify differently to an AMR gene on a chromosome? We are looking for a PhD student to work on this question in Bath!

Our special issue on the social lives of bacteria is out today 🎉 it was a pleasure to edit this collection over the last year with @friendlymicrobe.bsky.social. Read our editorial here: portlandpress.com/essaysbioche...

🧵 New paper out in Nature Communications! 🐜🦠 How can an ancient nutritional symbiosis persist for millions of years, yet still be lost without killing its host? In Cardiocondyla ants, the answer appears to be remarkable metabolic flexibility. Paper: doi.org/10.1038/s414... 1/6

This may help explain how ancient nutritional symbioses can remain evolutionarily flexible. A fun collaboration led by Phoebe Cunningham, with @chemamd.bsky.social, Jan Oettler, Eva Schultner, Rayko Halitschke, @tcsengl.bsky.social & @kaltenpoth-lab.bsky.social Happy to finally see it out! 🐜🦠

My new book, Phylogenetic Biology, is now published. Available online for free at dunnlab.org/phylogenetic... . Physical copies can be purchased at shop.lightningsource.com/b/085?params... or your favorite bookstore.

⭐Postdoc position available⭐ How do symbionts evolve new beneficial functions? Join the Henry Lab to investigate how horizontal gene transfer drives host–microbe symbioses. 🦠 Apply below Enquiries: l.henry@qmul.ac.uk Please share! #Postdoc #EvolutionaryBiology #Symbiosis henry-lab.co.uk

🚨 New preprint with @annadewar.bsky.social 🚨 Do plasmids “ameliorate” towards their hosts? Maybe… We show that the classic plasmid-host GC correlation is confounded by population structure, and argue that plasmid mobility shapes the opportunity for host-associated compositional evolution.

Mobility shapes plasmid GC content evolution

Plasmids are frequently AT-rich relative to their bacterial hosts. Despite this tendency towards lower GC content, plasmid and host chromosome GC content are positively correlated across diverse collections of plasmid-host pairs. However, the evolutionary processes underlying this pattern remain unclear. The classic model of amelioration predicts that horizontally acquired DNA gradually converges on host nucleotide composition. However, because plasmids can repeatedly transfer between bacterial hosts, the opportunity for such host-associated evolution may depend on their transmission dynamics. Using 50,936 plasmid-host pairs from a public sequence database, we found that the apparent global correlation between plasmid and host chromosome GC content was largely driven by differences between bacterial species rather than within species. We therefore accounted for plasmid and host population structure when testing how plasmid mobility shaped host-associated compositional evolution. We compared two contrasting regimes: a population of 3,682 Enterobacterales plasmids distributed across diverse host backgrounds, and six long-term host-associated plasmids from a Rhizobium leguminosarum lineage with INSeq-determined gene essentiality data. In the Enterobacterales population, GC content variation was overwhelmingly explained by plasmid lineage rather than host phylogeny, and conjugative plasmids showed greater similarity to their host chromosomes than mobilisable or non-mobilisable plasmids. In the Rhizobium leguminosarum plasmids, synonymous-site composition was more similar to the host chromosome among genes required across multiple host life stages. Together, these results support a model in which plasmid mobility influences the opportunity for host-associated evolutionary processes to alter nucleotide composition. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. Wellcome Trust, 319534/Z/24/Z St. John's College, University of Oxford, UK

doi.org

Had a great time working on this with @wtmatlock.bsky.social! 🧬

Will Matlock@wtmatlock.bsky.social · 3mo ago

🚨 New preprint with @annadewar.bsky.social 🚨 Do plasmids “ameliorate” towards their hosts? Maybe… We show that the classic plasmid-host GC correlation is confounded by population structure, and argue that plasmid mobility shapes the opportunity for host-associated compositional evolution.

Very proud of this little contribution we have made to the field. Check out our latest @pnas.org paper on mitonuclear ageing

Stefano Bettinazzi@stefanobettinazzi.bsky.social · 4mo ago

How far do intergenomic compatibility shape ageing trajectories? 🦠🧬🪰 Our latest study in PNAS @pnas.org, explores this. Check it out! doi.org/10.1073/pnas... Thanks to an amazing team: @fcamus.bsky.social, @dk-dowling.bsky.social, Avi & Finley. #mitochondria #mitonuclear #ageing #diet #hormesis

🔥 Published today, and just in time for summer conferences, here are your guidelines for presenting badly www.nature.com/articles/s41... rdcu.be/fqa92

How to give a bad talk? Short and precise points by @itaiyanai.bsky.social on how to give a talk and present your ideas. Highly recommend saving this and reading it before your next presentation. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

PhD on greenbeards! www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Why does altruism exist? at University College London on FindAPhD.com

PhD Project - Why does altruism exist? at University College London, listed on FindAPhD.com

findaphd.com

Made it onto bluesky at long last! And with a new review to boot with Solomon Garland, @vickiorr.bsky.social and @jpjhall.bsky.social. Invasive plasmids as ecosystem engineers—from mechanism to application portlandpress.com/essaysbioche... #plasmids

The new OrthoFinder paper is out now! In this new work, we introduce major advances in accuracy and scalability, allowing analysis on much larger datasets www.nature.com/articles/s41... github.com/OrthoFinder/...

OrthoFinder: improved phylogenetic orthology inference with enhanced accuracy and scalability - Nature Methods

The updated OrthoFinder v3 software boosts accuracy and scalability in phylogenetic orthology inference with massive and diverse datasets.

nature.com

Social insects tackle pathogens with behaviours like grooming and the removal of infected individuals. These behaviours facilitate the evolution of larger more complex societies. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... @mingpapilio.bsky.social @georgeshillcock.bsky.social @tomwscott.bsky.social

Social immunity can be a consequence and cause of social evolution | PNAS

Many social insects respond to pathogens in ways that reduce pathogen transmission within their social groups, with behaviors such as grooming or r...

pnas.org

Huge congratulations to @stuwest.bsky.social on his election as a Fellow of the Royal Society! From fig wasps to Pseudomonas, he’s shown just how powerful behavioural ecology can be. I couldn't think of anyone more deserving. www.biology.ox.ac.uk/article/prof...

Professors Tim Coulson, Stuart West, and Kathy Willis elected as Fellows of the Royal Society

biology.ox.ac.uk

We’re hiring for OrthoFinder! Great role for someone who enjoys scientific software development: Python, data analysis, workflows, Git, scalability, and making tools nicer to use. Comparative genomics or open-source bioinformatics experience would be a lovely bonus. my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecru...

What determines who wins in bacterial competition? We review how the environment can influence bacterial warfare! Hopefully interesting for anyone who likes Bacteriocins (my favorite), T6SS, or CDIs! portlandpress.com/essaysbioche...

How social is social resistance? Check out our new mini-review, co-authored by Rosie Randall. Her first paper! 👏🏽 portlandpress.com/essaysbioche... Thanks to @friendlymicrobe.bsky.social and @rachelmwheatley.bsky.social for the invitation. @biology.ox.ac.uk @ilesla.bsky.social

We're recruiting! We're looking for two graduate students to join us at UBC in Vancouver. Fully funded and open to global applicants, with flexible start-date. Topics include theory, bioinformatics, and microbiology. More details: asherleeks.com/apply #socialviruses #evosky #virosky 🧪

Interested in predicting the dynamics of antibiotic resistance? Come work with us! We're looking for two postdocs to develop predictive models of resistance. We're interested in a range of approaches (mathematical & statistical modelling, causal inference, machine learning). tinyurl.com/6c4y3jke

Final version just published of our review on the ecological and evolutionary consequences of cooperation www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/... @ryosukeiritani.bsky.social @annadewar.bsky.social @asgriffin.bsky.social @lauriebelch.bsky.social @asn-amnat.bsky.social

Out now in @plosbiology.org : our big joint effort on the role of #CRISPR in plasmid competition. Read on for a really fun (I’m biased ok) analysis of how a defence system has new selective pressures when it’s mobile journals.plos.org/plosbiology/... 1/6

🚨 New preprint 🚨 How promiscuous really are conjugative plasmids, and what does that mean for plasmid co-occurrence? A pleasure to collaborate with @craigmaclean.bsky.social on the first paper of my fellowship! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Comparative analysis across 5,678 insect species shows that, when you control for phylogenetic bias, eusociality has not evolved at a faster rate in haplodiploid species. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

We understand a great deal about how and why cooperation evolves, but what about its long-term consequences? Great to see our new review on this out now in @asn-amnat.bsky.social!

Stu West@stuwest.bsky.social · 9mo ago

Huge thanks to @asn-amnat.bsky.social for inviting our review on the evolutionary and ecological consequences of cooperation. @annadewar.bsky.social @asgriffin.bsky.social @lauriebelch.bsky.social www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...

GLADE takes a fully phylogenetic approach. It uses orthogroups, gene trees, and the species tree to infer gains, losses, and duplications, and to map each event onto the phylogeny. (4/10)