Work with us! Join the team in Bristol studying the functional morphology of trilobite eyes 👀 ✍️ 30 months, @hfspo.bsky.social-funded, start by early 2027 🫵 looking for someone interested in developing new methods to analyse eyes in 3D and simulate vision 📆 Deadline 27. Aug ☎️ @laurensr.bsky.social

Lauren Sumner-Rooney@laurensr.bsky.social · last wk.

📢 JOB ALERT! 📢 I am recruiting a 30-month postdoc to work on modelling the vision of trilobites @hfspo.bsky.social ! If you like 3D data, fossils, and functional morphology, this is the one for you! 📆Deadline 27. Aug Pls contact me with any Qs and share widely! www.bristol.ac.uk/jobs/find/de...

Excellent way to start the week #ICN2026 with a fascinating and entertaining talk by @samjakeengland.bsky.social ⚡️🐛

Get excited :) PhyloSpec is coming! A shared standard + modelling language for phylogenetic models. Write a model once, run it across engines like BEAST X, BEAST 2.8 & RevBayes. Easy and reproducible. Built by @tochsner.bsky.social & collaborators (ETH Zürich, Auckland, LMU). phylospec.com

Incredibly honoured (and nervous) to have been awarded the Young Investigator Award from @neuroethology.org at this year's ICN in Vancouver - thank you so much to Daniel Robert and @laurensr.bsky.social for supporting my application, the society for the award and grant, and the lovely audience! 🥳

Having my photograph on the cover of Current Biology is definitely a bucket list item ticked off ✅🙏 all thanks to @atal-pande.bsky.social @multipleye-lab.bsky.social and their super cool study that I was lucky enough to make a small contribution to

Current Biology@currentbiology.bsky.social · 2w ago

Arachnophobes, avert your eyes! NEW issue just dropped🕷️👇 www.cell.com/current-biol... As usual, casting a wide net, across all of biology!🧬 🕸️

Stunning new cover from our research fellow @samjakeengland.bsky.social! Congrats, Sam! 🥰

Current Biology@currentbiology.bsky.social · 2w ago

Arachnophobes, avert your eyes! NEW issue just dropped🕷️👇 www.cell.com/current-biol... As usual, casting a wide net, across all of biology!🧬 🕸️

Keep your (schizochroal) eyes peeled for an opportunity to work with us! We'll soon be recruiting a 30-month postdoc to work on the functional morphology of trilobite eyes, using X-ray imaging 💥and developing optical models to reconstruct how they may have seen the ancient oceans... 🌊 Coming soon!

Lauren Sumner-Rooney@laurensr.bsky.social · 3w ago

📢 Heads-up: I'm currently finalising the job description for a 30-month postdoc modelling visual abilities in these very gorgeous and very dead creatures! If you're interested, please get in touch - anticipated start is late 2026/early 2027 and the project combines great colleagues in UK + S Korea!

The formatted paper is now out in MBE - describing OPTICS software to predict color sensitivy based on opsin sequence alone: academic.oup.com/mbe/article/...

Todd Oakley@ostratodd.bsky.social · 2mo ago

🧵 New paper! We’re excited to release OPTICS: software that immediately predicts color sensitivity from any opsin protein sequence. In other words: give OPTICS any opsin sequence, and it predicts the wavelength of light the pigment is most sensitive to 🌈👁️ academic.oup.com/mbe/advance-...

The group's *first* PhD student @atal-pande.bsky.social has published his *first* chapter - time to celebrate spiders and their forward-facing eyes everywhere 🥹 Congratulations Atal, other stellar group members @lucillejmrose.bsky.social and @samjakeengland.bsky.social, and all our co-authors 💛

Atal Pande@atal-pande.bsky.social · last mo.

Really excited to share that my first PhD chapter is now out in @currentbiology.bsky.social! 🕷️👀 We show that visually hunting spiders have repeatedly evolved forward-facing eyes, highlighting the remarkable evolutionary flexibility of their modular visual system. doi.org/10.1016/j.cu...

Out today in @royalsocietypublishing.org - we show that crab spiders (the ones you usually see ambushing pollinators on flowers 🕷️🌸) get worse at hunting if their eyes are covered!🫣 Sounds obvious? It's actually quite surprising, here's why... 👀 (1/8) royalsocietypublishing.org/rsos/article...

I am hiring a postdoc for scRNA-seq research in Lund, Sweden on the visual systems of non-model inverts as part of an ERC project on the evolution and ecology of advanced color and polarization vision. Apply here or share the link with someone who may be interested! 🧪 lu.varbi.com/en/what:job/...

📢 New pre-print alert! Most spiders have eight eyes, but not all - PhD researcher Antonio Galán Sánchez and Dr Andres Rivera Quiroz @naturalis.bsky.social led an exciting new analysis of the evolution of eye number and losses in spiders on a truly incredible scale! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

If you'd be interested in a postdoc with us using CT scans of trilobite eyes to model their visual abilities, watch this space...!

Lauren Sumner-Rooney@laurensr.bsky.social · 4mo ago

So excited to have received an #HFSPResearchGrant to study trilobite eyes with Luke Parry @oxuniearthsci.bsky.social and Gil Ju Lee (Pusan National University)!🥳 I'll be recruiting a postdoc @bristolbiosci.bsky.social - if 3D data, optical modelling, and fossils tickle your interest, stay tuned!

From our new paper out now in @currentbiology.bsky.social: www.cell.com/current-biol... w/ @neurofishh.bsky.social @gkafetzis.bsky.social @denilsson.bsky.social Looking across animals, the vertebrate eye is an obvious outlier. Why is it so different that other highly visual animals?

Are you finishing your undergraduate degree next year? Are you interested in animal eyes, and would you like to gain some paid research experience this summer @bristolbiosci.bsky.social? If so, get in touch! @rankprize.bsky.social funds 8-week studentships 👇 www.rankprize.org/grants/under...

Rank Prize

Stimulating and celebrating the brightest minds in nutrition and optoelectronics

rankprize.org

Amazing, 3-yr postdoc working on bioluminescence and visual ecology in comb jellies with Anders Garm in Copenhagen! candidate.hr-manager.net/ApplicationI...

Postdoc in Marine Bioluminescence

A 3-year postdoc position is open, shared between the sensory biology group lead by Assoc. Prof. Anders Garm at the Marine Biological Section, University of Cop

candidate.hr-manager.net

Congratulations @rochellemeah.bsky.social @ecologyofvision.bsky.social (and all our wonderful coauthors!) on her first PhD publication in @currentbiology.bsky.social 🤩 Light pollution suppresses natural peaks in activity AND natural celestial polarization patterns at key times in arthropods 🕷️🦋✨

Rochelle Meah@rochellemeah.bsky.social · 8mo ago

Multiple anthropogenic stressors can negatively impact species but can a single stressor also have multiple, concurrent impacts? Here we show that light pollution creates several simultaneous impacts to the nocturnal movement ecology of a moth and a spider: tinyurl.com/5eku5bff (1/5)

Download our large database of postdoc fellowships in all fields of research. Database freely available to all; 281 fellowships. Download here: research.jhu.edu/rdt/funding-...

Join us for your PhD! Apply by 15th Dec ⏰ to come to @bristolbiosci.bsky.social and study spider eyes, development and visual ecology under light pollution! Open to all nationalities, funded incl. stipend, set in a beautiful city, and with amazing collaborators ✨ www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Funded PhD - The impacts of light pollution on plasticity and evolution in spider visual systems at University of Bristol on FindAPhD.com

PhD Project - Funded PhD - The impacts of light pollution on plasticity and evolution in spider visual systems at University of Bristol, listed on FindAPhD.com

findaphd.com

Lauren Sumner-Rooney@laurensr.bsky.social · 8mo ago

Just TWO DAYS until the application deadline for our funded PhD disentangling the impacts of light pollution on spider eyes and visual ecology! 👀🕷️🌃 The project will combine development, morphology, behaviour, and genetics, and can be shaped by the student👩🏽‍🔬 Interested? Apply! Questions? Message me!

Just TWO DAYS until the application deadline for our funded PhD disentangling the impacts of light pollution on spider eyes and visual ecology! 👀🕷️🌃 The project will combine development, morphology, behaviour, and genetics, and can be shaped by the student👩🏽‍🔬 Interested? Apply! Questions? Message me!

Lauren Sumner-Rooney@laurensr.bsky.social · 10mo ago

Exciting times ahead - I'm beyond delighted to be joining @bristolbiosci.bsky.social in 2026! 🎉🕷️🎉🐌🎉 I'm also looking for a PhD student to join @multipleye-lab.bsky.social in our new home! Come and study the effects of light pollution on the evolution and development of spider eyes with us 🌃🕷️👀 👇

The Royal Society's Newton International Fellowship scheme opens to applications Jan 15 with a March 11 deadline. It provides £280K (salary and research expenses) over 2 years to outstanding ECRs from outside the UK. Why not come and work with me (or anyone else) @bristolpalaeo.bsky.social?

Newton International Fellowships | Royal Society

This fellowship is for non-UK scientists who are at an early stage of their research career and wish to conduct research in the UK.

royalsociety.org

On the beautiful island of Hiddensee for a writing retreat with @evoimec.bsky.social @multipleye-lab.bsky.social ✍🏼👩🏼‍💻 enormous thanks to @wolffspider.bsky.social for the invitation (and his trusty suitcase full of snacks...) #outofoffice

Come and work with us in our new home @bristolbiosci.bsky.social ! This fully funded PhD opportunity is open to anyone interested in spiders/eyes/light pollution/evolution/development! 🕷️👀 ⏰Deadline 15th December, online info event TODAY @2pm! Link in the PhD advert👉 www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Funded PhD - The impacts of light pollution on plasticity and evolution in spider visual systems at University of Bristol on FindAPhD.com

PhD Project - Funded PhD - The impacts of light pollution on plasticity and evolution in spider visual systems at University of Bristol, listed on FindAPhD.com

findaphd.com

Lauren Sumner-Rooney@laurensr.bsky.social · 8mo ago

And last - but definitely not least! - for anyone interested in spider vision / light pollution / eye development / evolutionary morphology, come and work with us @multipleye-lab.bsky.social ! This funded PhD is open globally, incl. fees+stipend! ⏰Apply by 15 Dec! www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

🚨 Uh-oh!!! A suuuper hot #PhD opportunity just dropped! My friend and collaborator Massimo De Agrò is looking for someone to explore jumping spider vision and neurophysiology! #psychophysics #jumpingspiders #greatPI - apply!!!! (Deadline December 17th) 🚨

Happy to see this lovely study led by @sigwartae.bsky.social and Leonie Georg @oceanspecies.bsky.social out! 🎉Although chitons are a classic example of distributed visual systems, the shell eyes aren't uniform across the body - the lenses increase in volume as new eyes are added at the shell edge!

🐛📢🐛New paper alert! Lovely review of caterpillar sensory ecology led by @samjakeengland.bsky.social (@humboldt-foundation.de fellow) with friends and colleagues @rochellemeah.bsky.social @benitoexplains.bsky.social and Callum McLellan! 🐛⚡🐛👁️🐛🤝🐛👃🐛 link.springer.com/article/10.1...

The sensory ecology of caterpillars - Journal of Comparative Physiology A

Caterpillars (larval Lepidoptera) are one of the most ecologically and evolutionarily significant taxa on Earth. As both feeders and food, they shape the dynamics of enumerate ecosystems on land. Key ...

link.springer.com

Do you work (/want to work) with caterpillars? Or sensory systems? Or BOTH?! Well good golly do we have the paper for you! We explain the senses that caterpillars have, what they use them for, and how anthropogenic sensory pollution might be messing it all up 🐛 doi.org/10.1007/s003...

The sensory ecology of caterpillars - Journal of Comparative Physiology A

Caterpillars (larval Lepidoptera) are one of the most ecologically and evolutionarily significant taxa on Earth. As both feeders and food, they shape the dynamics of enumerate ecosystems on land. Key ...

doi.org

Reposting for the Monday morning scrollers! Funded PhD opportunity with me @multipleye-lab.bsky.social @bristolbiosci.bsky.social - spiders, their eyes, and their babies under long- and short-term light pollution!

Lauren Sumner-Rooney@laurensr.bsky.social · 10mo ago

Exciting times ahead - I'm beyond delighted to be joining @bristolbiosci.bsky.social in 2026! 🎉🕷️🎉🐌🎉 I'm also looking for a PhD student to join @multipleye-lab.bsky.social in our new home! Come and study the effects of light pollution on the evolution and development of spider eyes with us 🌃🕷️👀 👇

🎉 Big news! 🎉 We will be moving to @bristolbiosci.bsky.social @bristoluni.bsky.social in 2026!! We're so excited to be joining such a dynamic and thriving department, university, and city - thank you to everyone who has already been so welcoming! 📢 But that's not all - come and join us! 👇

🚨 PhD alert! IMPRS brain & behavior in Bonn just opened their calls for applications. Great PhD funding opportunities. Check it out! PS- I just joined their faculty, meaning you could do a rotation in my lab or even a PhD with me on spider sleep 🙃 Apply! 🚨

IMPRS for Brain and Behavior@imprsbb.bsky.social · 11mo ago

📢Apply now! Join our IMPRS for Brain&Behavior to pursue a #PhD in #neuroethology. Learn how brain circuits are linked to interesting animal behaviors! 📅 Deadline: October 31, 2025 🔗 imprs-brain-behavior.mpg.de #neuroscience #Neuroskyence #neurojobs #sciencejobs #PhDsky #PhDOffers #FundedPhD