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Tony Gamble

@tonygamble.eurosky.social

Evolutionary biologist. Gaga for geckos. (he/him)

346 Posts2349 Follower2198 Folgt
Tony Gamble@tonygamble.eurosky.social · last wk.

Really disappointing to see obvious ai sludge in this venom evolution paper. No acknowledgement that ai was used to make the figures. It makes me question whether ai was also used to generate/edit text and whether I should trust any of it. Don't do this folks! 🧪🐍🦎 www.mdpi.com/4098448

AI generated mage from a paper on venom evolution. Original legend reads,"Figure 4. Within-lineage hypotheses for Anguimorpha and Serpentes. Grey denotes an ordinary oral secretory substrate or nonvenomous condition, purple denotes a precursor or functionally uncertain secretion, and orange-red denotes demonstrated functional venom. Solid paths represent observed features or published inferences, whereas dashed paths represent biological hypotheses requiring further testing. Question marks indicate unresolved states, downward arrows indicate reduction and fading, or crossed branches indicate documented or hypothesised loss. (A) In Anguimorpha, the published reconstruction supports a shared precursor. Mixed seromucous glands in Anguoidea, including the bridge taxa Abronia, Celestus, and Gerrhonotus, are shown alongside possible reduction or loss in Shinisaurus. Independent gland elaborations in Heloderma and the Lanthanotus–Varanus lineage are represented as strongly supported anatomical transitions. An early origin of functional venom is shown only as a dashed alternative hypothesis and not as the published reconstruction. (B) Scolecophidia are represented as two early-diverging but highly specialised branches whose nonvenomous coding cannot presently distinguish primitive absence from derived reduction. Early Alethinophidia are shown with a distributed maxillary–mandibular–rictal secretory system, with extensive serous or seromucous anatomy retained in Cylindrophis. Boas and pythons exhibit derived mucus dominance and possible reduction, whereas Caenophidia show maxillary concentration and elaboration. The solid orange-red transition near Colubroidea represents the published functional inference; the dashed earlier low-output functional state is an alternative requiring new analysis, not an established evolutionary history. Taxon illustrations and phylogenies are schematic and not to scale. Reference to published data refers to Wüster, Modahl, and Arbuckle’s [14]."AI generated figure from research paper about venom evolution. The snake skull on the far right is an abomination. The original figure legend reads, "Figure 1. What counts as an origin? Conceptual separation of four stages in venom evolution: an ancestral physiological molecular substrate, recruitment and secretion through oral tissues, the emergence of functional venom, and subsequent elaboration of the delivery system. Candidate proteins and regulatory networks may therefore pre-date oral secretion, while oral expression alone does not demonstrate venom function. The functional threshold is crossed when a wound-delivered secretion produces a biologically and fitness-relevant toxic effect in another organism, but this does not require specialised glands or intricate delivery architecture. Specialised glands, storage compartments, ducts, musculature, dental grooves, or fangs may evolve later and consequently are not signatures of the earliest functional venom. Reverse pathways indicate that secretion, function, or delivery architecture may subsequently be reduced, lost, or repurposed. The stages are conceptual distinctions rather than an obligatory invariant sequence, and the illustrations are schematic and not to scale."
Taniel@taniel.bsky.social · last wk.

Lula has been reelected president, Brazilian media has now called. An extraordinary comeback for the left-wing politician who trailed by 2 points in round 1 but managed to hold off Flávio Bolsonaro, the former president's son.

https://www.folha.uol.com.br/ announces Lula wins
Senator Tammy Baldwin@baldwin.senate.gov · last wk.

Wisconsin is a leader in biotechnology and personalized medicine. That’s why I worked to bring a Tech Hub to our state. It was great to be in Madison with so many incredible leaders who are working to grow our biotech sector and improve health care for patients.

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Molecular Biology and Evolution@molbioevol.bsky.social · 2w ago

Tallon, Maladesky, Jabbour-Zahab, @aline-muyle.bsky.social & @thomaslenormand.bsky.social propose to use the proportion of allele topologies as the primary signal for identifying and delimiting sex chromosome strata 🔗 academic.oup.com/mbe/article/... #societyjournal #evobio #molbio

Using gene topologies to partition sex chromosomes into regions with distinct histories

Abstract. Sex chromosomes often evolve through successive recombination arrests, forming evolutionary strata. Accurately describing these strata, their bou

academic.oup.com

The American Genetic Association@theaga.bsky.social · 2w ago

Recently accepted research describes how innovative, minimally invasive sequencing of scale-clip DNA in timber rattlesnakes (Crotalus horridus) enables simultaneous insights into population structure, phenotype, and pathogen load. 📸: the authors 1/2

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Jhan C. Salazar, PhD@jhancsalazar.bsky.social · 4w ago

Happy to share that the last chapter of my dissertation is finally out in Evolution! 🦎⛰️ I'll share a longer thread soon about what we did and found. Huge thanks to all my coauthors: @jblosos.bsky.social, @juvelas.bsky.social, Steven Poe and Adam Algar doi.org/10.1093/evol...

Repeated evolution of high-elevation occupation in tropical lizards

Abstract. Since Darwin and Humboldt, researchers have sought to understand how species adapt to elevation. Although tropical reptiles are typically most di

doi.org

@jakobheinz.bsky.social · last mo.

I’m excited to share our new preprint introducing HipHap, a tool for assigning long reads to haplotype-resolved diploid reference assemblies! With Max Marin, Matthew Meyerson, and @lh3lh3.bsky.social Preprint: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... 🧵 1/6

HipHap: Haplotype Assignment and Confidence Scoring for Diploid Reference Genomes

Diploid genome assemblies are now routinely available, but most read aligners were designed for haploid references, which have long been the gold standard. When reads are aligned to a diploid assembly...

biorxiv.org

Dr Mark D. Scherz@markscherz.bsky.social · last mo.

🚨We're hiring a new Curator of Mammals!!🚨 🦍🐕🦝🐅🦓🦌🐃🐖🐏🐫🐘🦏🦛🐿️🦔🦇🦥🦦🦨🦘🦡🐋🦭🦒🧸 Come join the Vertebrate Unit at @nhmdk.bsky.social—a fantastic team in the heart of Denmark's beautiful capital! Amazing collections, incredible history. Please share widely! 🧪🏛️ candidate.hr-manager.net/ApplicationI...

Tenure Track Assistant Professor or Associate Professor and Curator of Mammals

Tenure Track Assistant Professor / Associate Professor, and Curator of Mammals at Natural History Museum Denmark The Natural History Museum Denmark wishes to ap

candidate.hr-manager.net

Dr. Sarah Carey@scarey.bsky.social · last mo.

I am thrilled to share our pre-print for CBS-tools: a k-mer based analysis that utilizes whole-genome sequencing of a few sex-identified isolates to guide users from the discovery of the heterogametic sex through identifying the sex-determination region www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Identifying, phasing, and structurally annotating sex chromosomes for genome assemblies using CBS-tools

A complete reference genome for species with chromosomally-determined separate sexes should contain scaffolds for all sex chromosome homologs. However, sex chromosomes present distinct computational c...

biorxiv.org

Judith Mank@judithmank.bsky.social · last mo.

So very, very happy to see this out @plosbiology.org : Ancient inversion polymorphisms associate with sexually selected traits across natural guppy populations. Beautiful work by two very clever and talented coauthors, Yuying Lin and @vdbijl.bsky.social . journals.plos.org/plosbiology/... 1/

Ancient inversion polymorphisms associate with sexually selected traits across natural guppy populations

Genomic inversions spanning many genes can persist for millions of years. This study of Trinidadian guppy populations reveals how both ecological conditions and mate choice help maintain this hidden l...

journals.plos.org

Rich Meisel@richmeisel.bsky.social · last mo.

We're hiring an Assistant or Associate Professor in Evolutionary Biology in my department at the university of Houston @uh-ecoevo.bsky.social Come be my colleague careers.uh.edu/jobs/assista...

Assistant or Associate Professor - Evolutionary Biology - Houston, Texas, United States

Department: Biology and Biochemistry Salary: Commensurate with experience Description: The Department of Biology and Biochemistry at the University of Houston seeks to hire an evolutionary biolog...

careers.uh.edu