Susana Wadgymar🌿🔬
@smwadgymar.bsky.social
Evolutionary ecologist, Botanist, Associate Professor at Davidson College (PUI 💪🏼), she/her 🔗smwadgymar.weebly.com
Does finding triple maple samaras convey the same luck as finding a four-leaf clover?
Evolution 2027 meeting logo contest! The winner will receive free conference registration and t-shirt! www.evolutionmeetings.org/2027-logo-co...
2027 Logo Contest
2027 Evolution Logo Contest! San Juan, Puerto Rico Please submit your original images to be considered. The winner will receive free meeting registration and t-shirt! Due October 1 Submit to...
evolutionmeetings.org
Early career faculty in Evolution? I would love to chat with you!
Society for the Study of Evolution@sse-evolution.bsky.social · last wk.Want to be featured in an upcoming Evolution Exchange interview? We are seeking two to four new faculty members to talk with host Dr. Gina Baucom about their careers and current positions. Nominate yourself or someone else by September 30! forms.gle/tnpK6NYwJZGG...
Our new paper on bird vocal amplitude is out in @sse-evolution.bsky.social ! Across 123 species, we found two new contenders for world’s loudest bird: bare-throated bellbird and seriema Along with the white bellbird, both can reach jackhammer-level amplitudes! doi.org/10.1093/evolut/qpag153
Look at this little B. rapa seedling with a flower bud. Slow down, enjoy life. Geez.
United States President Donald Trump issues executive order instructing federal government agencies to "use the terms 'Super Intelligence' and 'SI' in place of 'Artificial Intelligence' and 'AI' and will not acknowledge the usage of 'Artificial Intelligence' and 'AI' in any applicable setting."
Inaugurating The Era Of Super Intelligence
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered: Section 1. Every child deserves a safe and nurturing home where they ...
whitehouse.gov
In the September 2026 @ijpsjournal.bsky.social 🚨Undergraduate research🚨 The flower economic spectrum based on hermaphroditic herbaceous temperate species @sofialarag.bsky.social, Lucian Kaack, Kenneth Monge, Steven Jansen www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.... #PlantScience
“I believe that science derives its authority from…interactions within a community of people trained to interrogate evidence and answer for the conclusions they draw from it. And it is time to formalize what this means, and which sorts of human judgment cannot (or should not) be offloaded to AI.”
C. Brandon Ogbunu@cbo.bsky.social · last wk.In my latest for @undark.org, I compare AI adoption in science to the Ship of Theseus: "If you swap out every wooden plank on a ship over time, is it still the same vessel?" I argue that science derives authority from something more than data generation + publication. undark.org/2026/09/25/o...
In my latest for @undark.org, I compare AI adoption in science to the Ship of Theseus: "If you swap out every wooden plank on a ship over time, is it still the same vessel?" I argue that science derives authority from something more than data generation + publication. undark.org/2026/09/25/o...
AI Presents Science with a ‘Ship of Theseus’ Problem
Opinion | AI can replace each part of the scientific process, leaving the enterprise recognizable but devoid of human judgment.
undark.org
With fieldwork, I didn't get to advertise our (not so now) new paper on the quantitative genetics of growth in the 🦎 in @journal-evo.bsky.social: dx.doi.org/10.1093/evol... It's an exciting paper paper in which we disentangle what it means to treat the whole growth curve as a function-valued trait!
Quantitative genetics of lifetime growth curves in a lizard
Abstract. Body size is an iconic trait in quantitative genetics. For species with indeterminate growth however, growth curve, a function-valued trait, is t
dx.doi.org
♻️ Maternal sex influences seed dormancy in a gynodioecious species by Brooklyn Richards and co-authors. Full #openaccess 👉 doi.org/10.1093/aobp... #PlantScience
Maternal sex influences seed dormancy in a gynodioecious species
We tested whether female and hermaphrodite Sidalcea campestris plants produce seeds that differ in quality or germination behaviour. Seed viability and mas
doi.org
The assault on US universities didn't start in 2025. Our new paper traces the decades of corporate capture that made it possible, and why climate research is a primary target. Open access: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Four days ago, a scientist was surprised by the news that Anthropic discovered new virus genes for making DNA. He says he’s been studying them for years—and feeding his data to Anthropic’s AI as part of his own research. Coincidence? Here’s my story. nyti.ms/3VSWayc
Did Anthropic’s A.I. Really Make a Scientific Discovery on Its Own? (Gift Article)
An expert at the University of Copenhagen said his team had been sharing its research with the company’s A.I. model, Claude, and that its new finding matched their work.
nyti.ms
David Quammen's essay in The New York Times today closes with this paragraph. It's both a scientific falsehood, and an incredibly dangerous narrative. If you're willing to give me five minutes of your time, I'd like to explain why.
I’m so tired of US politics, I propose we abolish existing states and make new ones based on the ancient Cicada brood territories.
NIH funding doesn't belong to Donald Trump—it belongs to the patients and families waiting for the next medical breakthrough. We cannot let Trump politicize federal research grants and give right-wing extremists a veto over lifesaving work. SPEAK UP FOR SCIENCE.
Good news but... What's not being said here? Is this another example of the administration admitting defeat for an unpopular policy? Is this about midterms? Will this attack just pick back up again next year? What about NSF? Ugh it's hard to find joy these days, even in in apparent good news...
Politico@politico.com · 2w agoCollins: White House drops effort to politicize health research grants
Collins: White House drops effort to politicize health research grants
Collins: White House drops effort to politicize health research grants
The White House halted a planned executive order that would have put control over NIH research grants in the hands of political appointees
dlvr.it
We have to stop using "paper count" as a useful scientific metric. More writing output no longer means more knowledge gained www.washingtonpost.com/education/20...
One professor’s AI-assisted output: 200 papers and 14 books this year
An online platform removed 257 papers written or co-written by the University of Chicago’s Nicholas Polson after other academics raised questions.
washingtonpost.com
Really valuable thread puts lots of data points together into a powerful picture.
John Smillie@johnsmillie42.bsky.social · 2w agoThread on solar vs. farmland debate: 1/n Enviro writer Bill McKibben: "“If you care about the future of agriculture on this planet,” he added, “you should be focused on driving down carbon emissions so we will still be able to grow things.”" www.canarymedia.com/.../lowell-v....
🪸 Rapid loss, and slow recovery, of coral reef structural complexity resulting from a prolonged marine heatwave🪸 'These results illustrate how rapidly habitat complexity can be lost during climate change induced mass mortality events'🌍 📖 buff.ly/UEeAXwX
Okay this jogged loose something I've had half-written for a while now: Despite decades of effort, scientists have still not found a substitute for reading the paper denimandtweed.jbyoder.org/2026/09/desp...
Despite decades of effort, scientists have still not found a substitute for reading the paper
Science is difficult, but not for the reason you think. It’s not that conceiving a research program is difficult. It’s not that planning and performing an experiment or observational st…
denimandtweed.jbyoder.org
Jeremy Yoder says no war@jbyoder.org · 2w agoALMOST EVERY PEER REVIEWED PAPER HAS A SUMMARY OF KEY POINTS RIGHT BELOW ITS TITLE
Fake figs, fooled fig wasps & rewarded flies: this plant has one of the strangest #pollination systems yet found in #Apocynaceae. I’ve written about the new study and how it fits into our wider work on this extraordinary plant family. Read more here: jeffollerton.co.uk/2026/09/18/f... #Biodiversity
Fake figs, fooled wasps, and another extraordinary Apocynaceae pollination system
One of the things I love about working on the milkweed and dogbane family (Apocynaceae) is that it has an apparently inexhaustible capacity to produce strange and wonderful interactions with animal…
jeffollerton.co.uk
If you want a feel for just how diverse insects are - here's @ceiseman.bsky.social on the 5 different species of tiny moths he found feeding as leafminers in a single leaf. At least one (but probably two or more) is an undescribed species.
Charley Eiseman@ceiseman.bsky.social · 2w agoTo follow up on a question @colinpurrington.bsky.social asked me several years ago, here are five different leafminers in a single leaf! bugtracks.wordpress.com/2026/09/18/a...
Y'all I think it's safe to admit this website has The Sauce now
Stephanie 🍉@ageofoddish.bsky.social · 2w agommygod