Matt Hufford

@mbhufford.bsky.social

Evolutionary Genomicist, EEOB Dept., Iowa State University, evolution of maize and its wild relatives

Our paper is out in MBE! doi.org/10.1093/molb... We tracked TF binding site evolution across 589 grass species, and found that while binding preferences are pretty stable over 80 million years of evolution, individual binding sites have turned over a lot. Thread here: bsky.app/profile/char...

Grasses share a conserved set of cis-regulatory motifs, but individual motif instances have turned over repeatedly across 80 million years of evolution.
Charlie Hale@charleshale.bsky.social · last yr.

New preprint from my PhD! How cis-regulatory evolution shaped grass diversification worldwide www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... We looked across 589 (!) grass species to ask: — What regulatory changes enabled grasses to adapt? — How can this inform crop breeding for resilience? Here’s what we found:

Exciting news from NSF today! Our proposal to host an EPSCoR Graduate Training Program at ISU in the biological sciences has been funded. Students receiving an honorable mention in the GRFP competition are eligible. We have a diverse set of faculty participating across the breadth of biology.

According to the posted lists for this year, only 1,000 applicants received the GRFP and ~ 3,000 were named honorable mentions. The solicitation stated there would be 2,300 awards, so this is a massive cut. 🧪🔭

First day of class at ISU! As the campus bustles with activity, I'm reminded that a college education is a dream come true and something that students and their families have worked and saved for for years. Hoping to live up to their expectations as I teach this semester!

My group is recruiting a bioinformatician for genomic studies in maize. The position includes work on diverse projects and collaborations with the Maize Genetics and Genomics Database, the CERCA project, and others in the Hufford Lab. isu.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/IowaStateJob...

Research Scientist II

Position Title: Research Scientist II Job Group: Professional & Scientific Required Minimum Qualifications: Bachelor’s degree and 2 years of related experience Preferred Qualifications: PhD in Bio...

isu.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com

The Zeavolution webinar on maize evolution will have it's first 2024 meeting tomorrow at 10am CST. Mohamed El Walid (Buckler Lab at Cornell) will get us started! DM me if you need to be added to the Zeavolution Slack, need connection details, or would like to speak in the series!

I've been searching for the breakpoints of this adaptive chromosomal inversion for 15 years. We have now finally found those breakpoints and have discovered that the inversion contains an even older large inversion. This and more in this new preprint. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

The role of breakpoint mutations, supergene effects, and ancient nested rearrangements in the evolut...

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