📣New paper! How does the sleeping brain help us to integrate new experiences while managing memories from the past? For his PhD work, @sabbaspoor.bsky.social recorded hippocampal ensembles in freely moving monkeys and found something unexpected. 🧵1/n www.nature.com/articles/s41... 🧪🧠📈👩‍🔬#OpenAccess

Experience reorganizes content-specific memory traces in macaques - Nature Neuroscience

In macaques, old memories, relative to new ones, are supported by more stable and interconnected cell assemblies. New-biased and old-biased assemblies reactivate during overnight sleep and can sometim...

nature.com

1/ The world's songbirds sing in just 8 basic sounds. And where a bird lives decides which ones it uses. My first PhD paper is out now in @science.org (www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aee6239) Here is what we found:

The ARC has released their new set of grant schemes ▶️ www.arc.gov.au/news-and-pub... Before implementing them, they’re now going to “consult with the sector”. Hopefully genuinely, not just with a few disengaged DVCRs. In the meantime, there’ll be another round of Discovery Projects (DP28).

jungle bat, Panama

New @cp-trendsecolevo.bsky.social paper out today. Interested in how animal groups pre-emptively adjust their behaviour to a landscape of intergroup conflict? The culmination of almost daily chats with @andyradford.bsky.social throughout my postdoc. doi.org/10.1016/j.tr...

Biological sex is binary, except when it’s not (isogamy). It’s defined by gamete size, except in large-spermed males. It’s binary, but one can be both at once (hermaphrodites), neither (sterile) or switch (clownfish), and it might depend on temperature (crocodiles) or parasites (Wolbachia). (1/3)

Ben Allen@evodynamics.bsky.social · 4w ago

Defining sex based on gamete size is a choice. Perhaps it's the most parsimonious of all binary single-criterion sex definitions. But to claim that gamete size is the "ultimate defining criterion of biological sex" (whatever that means) falls into the naturalistic fallacy the authors warn of.

Do you have a background in behavioural ecology and are you interested in doing a PhD in Australia? I’m looking for new grad students so check out our website (BobWongLab.org) or come find me in Torino at #ISBE2026. 🐟🐠

I’m looking to recruit a postdoc to join my research group at University of Iowa to work on disturbance ecology and biodiversity! Start date flexible, lots of opportunity for skill development, collaboration, and mentorship. Will review applicants in mid-August! Link: gavinmjones.com/opportunities/

Opportunities

BIG NEWS! The Jones Lab will be relocating to the School of Earth, Environment, and Sustainability (SEES) at the University of Iowa in Fall 2026. Our work on disturbance ecology and conservation sc…

gavinmjones.com

My 1st first-author paper is out now in Journal of Wildlife Management! 🎉 Using GPS collar data, we investigated how black bears 🐻respond to recreation and development in #YosemiteNationalPark 🧗‍♀️🥾🏕️🏠 Huge thanks to my #UBC and #NPS co-authors! wildlife.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

TWS Journals

Using GPS collar data from black bears in Yosemite National Park, we examined how bear spatiotemporal activity in relation to human development shifted during the COVID-19 park closure in 2020. In th...

wildlife.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Dwarf mongooses change their pre-emptive behaviour relative to the size of their neighbouring rivals🐻🥊 We leveraged 10 years of behaviour and GPS data to investigate the pre-emptive behavioural changes mongooses make to navigate a landscape of intergroup conflict: doi.org/10.1038/s415...

👏Our new paper uses #long-term data... 📚Over 1,600 daily movement tracks, 16,000 sentinel observations & 2,000 sleeping burrow returns 🙏HUGE thanks to the 83 research assistants, 12 field managers, 13 MSc students & 5 PhD students who contributed to the datasets. #awesome doi.org/10.1038/s415...

New mechanism for magnetic sensing in pigeons 🧭 Homing pigeons use magnetically responsive immune cells in their livers to sense Earth’s magnetic field, helping them navigate without visual cues like the sun. Published in Science: doi.org/10.1126/scie... @unibonn.bsky.social @unidue.bsky.social

✨REGISTRATIONS ARE NOW OPEN!✨ Join us in December for 🧬𝗘𝘃𝗼𝗹𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗚𝗼𝗻𝗴🧬- A joint conference by Australasian Evolution Society (AES) and The Society of Australian Systematic Biologists (SASB)🤝. Register at this link: aes.corsizio.com/portal/aes Follow the thread for Key Rego Dates (1/1)

If you’re getting shitty about arxiv penalising obvious AI slop that the authors have not checked then maybe you should rethink academia as being a place for you. As an EIC of a journal I can tell you that this stuff is ridiculously pervasive and takes time away from reviewing actual human work.

wow — the preprint host, arxiv, is banning authors for a year if they submit papers with hallucinated citations 🤖

Helen Branswell 🇨🇦@helenbranswell.bsky.social · 3mo ago

I find this unsettling: A new study in #Lancet shows that the number of faux citations in scientific articles is on the rise, and #AI is likely to blame. @aniloza.bsky.social reports. www.statnews.com/2026/05/07/l...

May issue of TREE out online now! www.cell.com/ecology-evol... Cover article from Eamonn Wooster et al. Featured articles from Kou et al, Morente et al and Noble et al Articles from Chan et al, Chen & Siemann, Lee et al, Oestreich et al, Perrier et al.

Our paper about how resource variability shapes the ecology of social information is out in this issue of TREE! This eco-evolutionary lens helps explain why collective sensing has evolved across such a wide range of lifeforms, from microbes to blue whales. www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...

Trends in Ecology & Evolution@cp-trendsecolevo.bsky.social · 3mo ago

May issue of TREE out online now! www.cell.com/ecology-evol... Cover article from Eamonn Wooster et al. Featured articles from Kou et al, Morente et al and Noble et al Articles from Chan et al, Chen & Siemann, Lee et al, Oestreich et al, Perrier et al.

Beyond hero and villain narratives in ecology and conservation science 🌎 @aibsbiology.bsky.social academic.oup.com/bioscience/a...

Beyond hero and villain narratives in ecology and conservation science

Abstract. Storytelling is an essential part of science writing. To craft compelling stories, scientists are taught to think of their variables as character

academic.oup.com

Postdoc Opportunity! 4-year @royalsociety.org funded post @uniexecec.bsky.social: “Understanding the role of individual cognitive variation in reintroduction biology”. Closes: 5 June 2026. More info & to apply: careers.exeter.ac.uk/vacancies/78... Wt: @paradiseparkhayle.bsky.social & Wildwood Trust

Exciting to see our new paper exploring how human activities reshape predator–prey interactions featured on this month's cover of TREE! A big thanks to @predator-smarts.bsky.social and the team, and to Angus Emmott for the fantastic cover photo! Open-Access paper 👉 www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...

Our recent paper on human-induced trait shifts and predator–prey interactions is on the cover of the May issue of Trends in Ecology & Evolution 😭😵‍💫 The paper is available open access here -> www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...

New paper from @julia-penndorf.bsky.social and the clever cockie research team! A wild experiment shows that cockies adopt novel foods via social learning, with info. transmitted across social networks & over space This works gives insight into how social learning enables niche expansion in cities

PLOS Biology@plosbiology.org · 3mo ago

What is the role of social learning in adopting novel food? Study of urban #cockatoos by @julia-penndorf.bsky.social @clevercockierp.bsky.social &co shows that they rapidly adopt novel food via #SocialLearning, with juveniles showing conformist preferences @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/4uq6NVq

New paper out! doi.org/10.1073/pnas... We examined how historical legacies of evolution history, environmental dynamics, and past species losses have shaped today's mammal food webs 🐅🐆🦁 🦌🦓🐗across the globe. #MammalFoodweb #DietaryNiche #Extinction #MacroEcoEvo #EcologicalNetwork

Giants that vanished 10,000 years ago triggered ripple effects that are still felt today, and here’s where

Between 50,000 and 10,000 years ago, many of the world’s largest mammals disappeared. Picture creatures like saber-toothed cats with 7-inch fangs and elephant-sized sloths. A new study reveals h...

eurekalert.org

For millions of years the traits of predators and prey have dictated their interactions. In the Anthropocene, humans are altering these traits. In @cp-trendsecolevo.bsky.social, we explore how human-induced traits shifts reshape predator-prey interactions. tinyurl.com/TREEshifts

I do not use AI for writing. I like writing. Why would I farm out my favorite part of my job to a gdamn robot who takes no joy from it? I only use AI for my wow-I'm-a-professional-scientist-and-I-still-don't-know-how-a-science-thing questions like "What are magnets and how do they work?"

Laura Keating@lorekeating.bsky.social · 4mo ago

I keep seeing "all authors use AI, the real issue is they're being forced to be sneaky about it" headlines. Full stop No. This is a lie peddled for normalization. It's schoolyard-level pressure tactics "C'mon, all the cool kids are already doing it. We won't tell. It's fine. We're on your side."

Congrats to @jackmanera.bsky.social on his PhD paper investigating impacts of neuroactive pollution on cognition in fish. Open access here: pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

Neuroactive Pollution Disrupts Cognition in Fish by Causing Sex-Specific Effects on Spatial Learning

Cognition underpins how animals perceive, navigate, and respond to their environment, yet these fundamental processes are increasingly threatened by environmental pollutants. Neuroactive pharmaceuticals are now routinely detected in aquatic ecosystems, raising concern about their potential to disrupt key cognitive functions in wildlife. Here, we tested whether exposure to the antidepressant amitriptyline, a widespread pharmaceutical pollutant, impairs spatial learning in wild-caught guppies (Poecilia reticulata). Using a repeated-trial maze assay, we quantified learning performance across 12 trials following an 11-d exposure to either a freshwater control (0 ng/L) or ecologically relevant low (52 ng/L) or high (496 ng/L) concentrations of amitriptyline. We found strong evidence of spatial learning across all treatment groups, with maze solve times and navigational errors declining over trials. However, males exposed to low and high concentrations of amitriptyline made 26% and 34% more errors, respectively, compared to control males. Female learning, by contrast, was unaffected by amitriptyline exposure, revealing sex-specific cognitive effects. Control males were more accurate than females, yet this advantage was lost under exposure and ultimately reversed at high concentrations, where males performed worse than females. These results emphasize the need to consider sex differences in cognitive responses when assessing the ecological impacts of environmental contaminants.

pubs.acs.org

Hard to put in to words how uninteresting this all is www.nature.com/articles/d41...

How to build an AI scientist: first peer-reviewed paper spills the secrets

AI Scientist, an autonomous research tool, first released in 2024, has now undergone peer review, highlighting its strengths and limitations.

nature.com

Excited to share our new paper @royalsocietypublishing.org This one took what felt like endless maze trials. We found that even modest warming (~1°C) changed an ectotherm's behaviour such that it affected cognitive performance. Speeding them up and reducing decision accuracy.

Increasing temperature reduces decision accuracy by shifting speed–accuracy trade-offs in slower individuals

Abstract. Cognitive responses are linked to consistent individual behavioural variation, but the potential impact of warming on this relationship remains u

tiny.cc

For millions of years the traits of predators and prey have dictated their interactions. In the Anthropocene, humans are altering these traits. In @cp-trendsecolevo.bsky.social, we explore how human-induced traits shifts reshape predator-prey interactions. tinyurl.com/TREEshifts

Perfect