Two announcements regarding AccuSNV, which calls high precision SNVs across microbial genomes: Version 1.1 is now incredibly easy to install, run, and perform downstream analyses with (see image of typical output!). The manuscript was also published this summer in Genome Research! Links next...

📣 📣 📣 UPDATE: The 2026-2027 list of faculty and postdoc positions in ecology and evolutionary biology is out! Be sure to check out this active and helpful community run resource! docs.google.com/spreadsheets...

ecoevojobs.net 2026-27

docs.google.com

🧬 Ancient DNA → ancient proteins? We now have the computational toolkit to make this possible: CarpeDeam + AdDeam + AlphaFold + Foldseek. In our new preprint, we reconstruct an archaeal ATP synthase from ~2M-yo aeDNA from Greenland and predict its 3D structure. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Ancient Reconstructed Proteins: A Framework for Resurrecting Protein Structures from Million-Year-Old Metagenomes

DNA sequences derived from ancient samples provide insights into human history, paleoenvironments, and evolutionary biology. Advances in laboratory techniques and computational tools have established ...

biorxiv.org

A fully-funded opportunity to join an amazing group of UCL colleagues to work on a super-interesting PhD project.

Max Reuter@maxreuter.bsky.social · 3mo ago

We are advertising a PhD studentship to study the effects of mitochondrial function on cell motility in flies. The project is supervised by myself, Nick Lane and @fcamus.bsky.social, in collaboration with Anna Franz at UCL, @stramerlab.bsky.social at KCL and Michael Sixt at ISTA. Please repost!

Thx Tom. Expectations are high 😅. With plenty of faunal aDNA generated the initial bottleneck is that often no one looks into the pathogen signature. But I hope more and more people appreciate the unseen bycatch they may have. Our lab is happy to team up on the pathogen hunt if expertise is wanted.

Tom Booth@boothicus.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Good article on the potential and challenges of looking for pathogen DNA on ancient faunal remains, and really how without them we are only seeing a small part of the story of human disease through time. Possible it will change everything we think we know about infectious disease in the past.

Wrote a short piece about the opportunities and challenges of pushing ancient pathogen genomics into a new frontier: the zooarchaeological record. Pretty excited about what is going to come. www.science.org/eprint/MSG3Z...

Tracking the roots of zoonoses

Ancient pathogen DNA from animals elucidates the origin and evolution of infectious diseases

science.org

What a life! www.nytimes.com/2026/04/30/s...

J. Craig Venter, Scientist Who Decoded the Human Genome, Dies at 79

nytimes.com

Can we reconstruct ancient pathogen genomes from animal remains? Can paleopathology help prioritize promising specimens? Our new paper demonstrates this by screening more than 300 specimens from across Eurasia over the past 6,000 years. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Probing the zooarchaeological record across time and space for ancient pathogen DNA - Nature Communications

Authors investigate ancient DNA from animal remains and identify multiple signatures of ancient zoonotic pathogens. They find ancient pathogen genomics from archaeological animal remains may inform zo...

nature.com

Enjoyed reading this balanced piece on whether we are able to link the Neolithic 'decline' explicitly to pathogens (plague). Short answer: Probably not. It's complicated.

Tom Booth@boothicus.bsky.social · 6mo ago

I was pleased to be invited to comment on this new paper on the genetic analysis of people buried in the Bury megalithic gallery grave in the Paris Basin as it saves me making a thread of my thoughts on here! rdcu.be/fbyll

Thx for the invitation and organization of this exciting event about current frontiers in microbiome research. It makes me look forward to the Xmas season already.

Typas Lab@typaslab.bsky.social · 6mo ago

How can we tap into the enormous functional diversity of microbes on this planet? Join us at EMBL Heidelberg (8–10 Dec 2026) to learn about ongoing efforts to decode gene function and organisation in human gut microbes, and present your science.

Very much looking forward to visiting and meeting those working @mpiib-berlin.mpg.de next week, and the chance to speak about my postdoc work on within-patient AMR evolution, thanks to @keyfm.bsky.social and @mfenk.bsky.social for the kind invitation.

Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology@mpiib-berlin.mpg.de · 6mo ago

📢 Voices in Infection Biology Join us next week for a talk by Matthew J. Shepherd from @manchester.ac.uk, kindly hosted by @keyfm.bsky.social. 🗓️ March 25 🕓 4 pm 📍 on-site seminar (Berlin) Event info: www.mpiib-berlin.mpg.de/events/45077...

Pls re-post: My department @oxfordbiochemistry.bsky.social are recruiting for several new faculty positions (links below). Broad search in molecular biology/biochemistry, across prokaryotes and eukaryotes. Interested in understanding life at the molecular level, this job might be for you! 1/n

Leipzig U and the MPI for Evolutionary Anthropology (MPI-EVA) have an open faculty position (W2) in evolutionary population genetics! This position is tenured and comes with generous core funding. We are eager to welcome a new colleague! Deadline March 11. www.uni-leipzig.de/en/newsdetai...

The @scilifelab.se Ancient DNA Unit is recruiting a (permanent) Research Engineer for planning user projects and generating #aDNA 🧬 data: Application deadline: March 25th 🧪🏺 www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...

🚨 New pre-print! 🚨 In the largest study of its kind to-date, we investigate the ecological and evolutionary mechanisms driving within-patient evolution of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Read here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... , and follow along with this thread, discussing our findings (1/21)

Are you interested in human DNA from ancient sediments? Do you want to do a PhD in Vienna? We have two open positions in our group! You can learn more and apply here (scroll down to the very bottom, ours are the last two listings): careers.univie.ac.at/en/praedoc/s...

Institut Pasteur (@pasteur.fr) is recruiting new young PIs to open new groups in the Institute. Deadline is February 9th! Don't miss the opportunity!

📢 We're hiring a postdoc (33 months) in human evolutionary genomics / paleogenomics / statistical genetics, Paris 🇫🇷 Project on selection on disease-associated variants, integrating ancient genomes, GWAS, and Ancestral Rec. Graphs. Start May 2026 (flexible). Apply here: emploi.cnrs.fr/Offres/CDD/U...

Please share: We are hosting the 2026 DZG evolutionary biology graduate meeting at Uni Hamburg on March 25-27: "Interactions and Coevolution: from Molecules to Species". #PhD students, early postdocs and advanced Master students in evolutionary biology are welcome to register! t1p.de/dzg2026evolbio

🔊 Job Opportunity: Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Bacterial Evolution. Looking to recruit a postdoc to join a UKRI FLF-funded project on antibiotic resistance evolution in the microbiome 🦠 3 years funding, deadline 26th Jan, please share! hrwebapp.qub.ac.uk/tlive_webrec...

A new year brings new opportunities: we are looking to fill a permanent professorship position with a Microbiologist preferably with expertise on archaeal biology, RNA biology or imaging techniques to unravel cell biology in prokaryotes! Please share and/or apply :)! www.nature.com/naturecareer...

Professurship (W2) in Microbiology - Regensburg (Stadt), Bayern (DE) job with Universität Regensburg | 12851113

UNIVERSITY OF REGENSBURG   The Faculty of Biology and Pre-Clinical Medicine invites applications for a   Professurship (W2) in Microbiology   To be...

nature.com

We’re hiring 2 Postdocs (f/m/d) in Drug–Microbiome–Host Interactions 🦠💊 Focus: how non-antibiotic drugs shape the gut microbiome, drug efficacy & side effects. #PostdocJobs #Microbiome #AcademicJobs Full job ad: lisamaierlab.com/wp-content/u...

We are recruiting! If you like evolutionary biology, microbial genomics, and host-pathogen interactions we have a PhD opening at @ugiatucl.bsky.social using population-scale metagenomics to map global phage diversity and uncover evolutionary signatures that could point to new antimicrobials.

A PhD project in human genomics with me is open for applications through the @nrpdtp.bsky.social. Use biobank-scale genomics datasets to answer long-standing questions about the evolution of our species: biodtp.norwichresearchpark.ac.uk/projects/the...

The genomics of modern human biological uniqueness (BERGSTROM_U26DTP) | Doctoral Training Partnership

Modern humans are unique as a species, having spread widely and transformed the world with technology and large-scale societies. But until relatively recently (~50,000 years ago)…

biodtp.norwichresearchpark.ac.uk

Our new preprint, led by Martin (@mfenk.bsky.social), is online. We address the microbiome’s role as a source and incubator of acute infections by combining prospective collection of native samples with population-wide, culture-based sequencing. Please check out Martin’s wonderful thread. ⬇️🧵🎉

Martin Fenk@mfenk.bsky.social · 11mo ago

Is the human microbiome a source for hospital-associated infections (HAI) and are any genetic changes associated with HAI? In our new preprint, we longitudinally reconstruct the evolutionary processes within the human microbiome leading up to HAI: doi.org/10.1101/2025...

📣 Open call for life science #interns Our International Summer #Internship 2026 is now open for applications. Three-months fully funded internships at the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology. 👉 Information on the internship projects and how to apply: www.mpiib-berlin.mpg.de/mpiib-isi

Two group leader positions available in the broader areas of RNA science, RNA technologies, and RNA medicine. Attractive packages and a great environment. Come and join us at Helmholtz RNA Würzburg, Bavaria.

Two new positions are available at the MPI for Evolutionary Biology to support development of our genomics facility. Both stand to become permanent. Both offer a ton of opportunity to engage in a wide range of creative science. Pls repost 🙏 www.evolbio.mpg.de/3838377/job_...

Two full-time positions | Bioinformatician (m/f/d) + Applications Specialist (m/f/d) - Molecular Biology

The Genome Facility at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology in Plön is seeking to fill two positions (full time) to support and expand our core facility services.

evolbio.mpg.de

🔊 Fully-funded 4yr PhD studentship with the NWB DTP, working on novel regulators of bacterial nitrogen metabolism 🦠 Primary supervisor: @ariannebabina.bsky.social (University of Glasgow) Co-supervisors: myself (Queen’s Belfast)+ Dónal Wall (Glasgow) 🌟 please share 🌟 www.gla.ac.uk/postgraduate...

Great to see the preprint & code out. Large scale within host evolution analysis made easy. Happy that we could contribute to the development. Kudos to all involved including @i-light-maka.bsky.social & @mfenk.bsky.social from the Key lab.

Tami Lieberman@contaminatedsci.bsky.social · 12mo ago

Precisely calling mutations across hundreds of bacterial isolates has been hard, requiring manual filtering and expertise. Until now, using AccuSNV. Herui Liao trained an ML model based on our previous meticulously called SNVs. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...