My first scientific illustration featured in a publication! Congrats to Jack on the new paper, it was a pleasure working with you to reconstruct this impressive fish.

Jack Stack@jackstack.bsky.social · 4d ago

New paper on some very large ray-finned fish fossils! Thank you to Elizabeth Furman this awesome illustration. TLDR: Large early ray-finned fishes are rare, but show very different morphologies to the point that big body size is associated with distinct ecomorphologies. mapress.com/zt/article/v...

#FossilFriday 🦂 UMMNH has a new exhibit on eurypterids! I’m providing some work-in-progress research on eurypterid feeding behavior.

Exciting news! We here at the LSU Museum of Natural Science @lsumns.bsky.social and Dept. of Biological Sciences are looking for Curator and Assistant Professor of Vertebrate Paleobiology! Come work with us! We are fun, supportive and active! lsu.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/LSU/jo...

Assistant Professor

All Job Postings will close at 12:01a.m. CST (1:01a.m. EST) on the specified Closing Date (if designated). If you close the browser or exit your application prior to submitting, the application progre...

lsu.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com

New paper! Brandon Kilbourne conducted a huge data collection effort for the limb muscle architecture (masses, fascicle lengths, pennation angles; thereby PCSAs) of mustelid mammals. We found conspicuous relationships with morphology and locomotor mode. link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Muscle architecture in mustelid mammals: anatomical proxies for muscle function and their relation to locomotor habit - BMC Ecology and Evolution

Background Though skeletal adaptations for locomotion in mammals are well documented, possible limb adaptations in terms of muscle architecture have received far less study. Examining mustelid mammals...

link.springer.com

Ice cream cones!! Haha but seriously cool paper

Jack Stack@jackstack.bsky.social · 2w ago

Really cool and important paper, as an enormous part of the fossil record of fishes is isolated teeth. @elizabethsibert.bsky.social academic.oup.com/iob/advance-...

Really excited to share our latest paper with you! We examine patterns of skull shape evolution in an awesome group of fishes and show that they rapidly innovated following the mass extinction event that wiped out the dinosaurs. urldefense.com/v3/__https:/...

Selection, constraints, and contingency drive mosaic patterns of evolution during the carangarian adaptive radiation

Adaptive radiations generate remarkable morphological diversity, yet traits often diversify at different rates and modes, producing mosaic patterns of evolution. Modularity, the semiautonomous organization of traits, can shape how selection and ...

urldefense.com

#SundayFishSketch This is a mene. They’ve looked pretty much the same for most of the Cenozoic. Some might call that morphologically boring. Others might find the stasis interesting. I usually carve a paleo and modern version of each fish. In this case, I think one linocut will suffice.

#FossilFriday Barbie has had a lot of careers over the years, including Paleontologist Barbie in 1996! USPS has Barbie career stamps, and of course the paleontologist made the cut 🦴💕

I can’t explain how grateful I am to have been a part of building this case! Chasing down stories and learning more about the people, scientists, and history of UMMP was so much fun.

Matt Friedman@friedmanlab.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Something a little different on #FossilFriday: new temporary exhibit at UMMNH highlighting the history of paleontological collections at U-M. Timed to recognize UMMP's centennial (although the collection itself is approaching its bicentennial). 📸 Elliot Zirulnik/UMMNH

Unbelievably! excited that the first chapter of my dissertation is PUBLISHED in EVOLUTION!! I am incredibly proud of the work and my amazing coauthors! Special shoutout to my undergrad mentee and collaborator Ryan Isdonas! He’s fantastic, and it’s such a privilege to get to publish alongside him!

Mark Westneat 🐟@mwestneat.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Surgeonfishes are cool! Our Evolution paper now out in final form, the amazing patterns of change in fish shape and covariance (new method!) elegantly revealed by @linnealungstrom.bsky.social 🐟🐠🦑🌿 academic.oup.com/evolut/artic...

How many #sharks should there be on a coral #reef? Our new publication in Science tackles this question using thousands of fossil shark dermal denticles—tiny, tooth-like scales that are shed and preserve in sediments—from Panama's two oceans. Check it out here: doi.org/10.1126/scie...

Giving the fish collection bulletin board a much needed update...

One of the most remarkable deep-sea fish groups now has a paleontological record. Ridolfi and colleagues report the first fossil stylephorid (tube-eye) from the middle Eocene of Iran. #OA in Papers in Palaeontology: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

UMMP/Michigan Earth past & present at CBEP 2026 at the National Museum of Natural History.

It's the UMMP show for CBEP 2026 at the National Museum of Natural History.

It was me 🥲. I spent an annoying amount of time flossing this fish #fossilfriday

Hadeel Saad@hadeelsaad.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Bless the person who has to clean this

New fossil fish dropped! Meet Jianghanichthys huachongensis sp. nov. Despite fragile, swampy origins, exceptional preservation of its head sensory canals is shedding new light on Cypriniformes evolution! cdnsciencepub.com/doi/full/10.... #Paleontology #Ichthyology #Fossil #NewSpecies #Evolution

With my upcoming departure from the University of Michigan, I've found myself deep in the job hunt process. Moving back to Canada from the U.S is certainly something I'm really looking forward too. If any 🇨🇦 labs (especially in Alberta) are searching for a µ-CT expert, please let me know!

On Saturday we said goodbye (for now) to Mateus de Fraga Rodarte, who has been working in my lab the last six months. What wonderful energy and knowledge of turtles he has shared with us! Sad to see him go, but I know he’s excited to return to São Paulo and complete his PhD. Boa viagem Mateus!

New paper from @jakeberv.bsky.social harnesses a massive skeletal measurement dataset for passerines to show nested bursts in phenotypic evolution, many of which appear coincident with intervals of climate instability. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Check out our new publication in Ecology and Evolution! This paper was led by @umich.edu PhD student, Cheyenne Graham, and focuses on the effects of hybridization on the immune response in animals. #gobluemammalogy onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Hybridization and Immunology in Animals: A Review

Hybridization can reshape immune function by introducing novel genetic variation and combining parental immune traits. Across animal taxa, this process may influence resistance, tolerance, and pathog...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Please join us tomorrow morning at 10 AM eastern for @sanaaelsayed.bsky.social's dissertation defense seminar "Teleost fish evolution in the Cenozoic: New insights from Paleogene ichthyofaunas from the Eastern Desert of Egypt." Message or email me for Zoom passcode: umich.zoom.us/j/98521134857

Huge congrats to Lindsey DeHaan on receiving the Stoye Award for best student presentation in ichthyology at #JMIH26 in New Orleans! Lindsey presented work on macroevolutionary shifts in spiny eels, representing one of her dissertation chapters. 📸: @leicurtis.bsky.social

Looking forward to #JMIH26. My lab is the biggest it has ever been (and will be for the foreseeable future after my first PhD student graduates). I'm bringing a postdoc, 2 grad students, and an undergrad, and together we'll be giving 6 presentations. Find us in the meeting program app!

Holy mola! Beautiful articulated Masturus from the Miocene of Korea: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

First report of fossil Masturus (sharptail mola) from the Miocene Hagjeon Formation, southeastern Korea

We report the first fossil occurrence of Masturus from the Middle Miocene Hagjeon Formation of the Pohang Basin, southeastern Korea. It is referable to Masturus cf. lanceolatus based on a distincti...

tandfonline.com

#Evol2026 I’m launching a new research group at UNC Charlotte in January 2027. Prospective students, postdocs, and collaborators are welcome to get in touch: jacob.berv@charlotte.edu More at jakeberv.com, lab website coming soon.

Made it to Montana! So close to dropping these fossils back home 💕

Happy #fossilfriday ! Today @hadeelsaad.bsky.social and I began the long-haul process of driving 600 specimens from Ann Arbor, Michigan, to Missoula, Montana. These specimens are from the famous Bear Gulch lagerstätte (located in Montana).

A new Science Advances study led by Sanaa El-Sayed reveals that many modern fish groups were already diversifying in Egypt less than 4Ma after the extinction of the dinosaurs, providing a rare glimpse into the recovery of ancient marine ecosystems. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aec8978

Bless the person who has to clean this

Matt Friedman@friedmanlab.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Coming to a display case near you . . .