Tomos Potter
@tomospotter.bsky.social
Evolutionary ecologist in the Kokko lab, JGU Mainz. Recovering guppy-botherer, interested in eco-evolutionary processes that generate and maintain diversity. Models, stats, long-term studies. 🏴 in 🇩🇪 Also likes: food, landscapes, guitars
I did a thing :D First chapter of my PhD out now! 🌱 (first paper ever 🥳) Traits are historically hypothesized to age synchronously, but it is no longer the case. We quantified asynchronous ageing in Seychelles warblers and reviewed potential reasons for why this may be.
Evolution Letters@evolletters.bsky.social · last wk.Do all traits age together? A long-term study of wild Seychelles warblers shows ageing is surprisingly asynchronous, with some traits senescing while others remain unchanged. doi.org/10.1093/evle...
Check out this really interesting preprint by @shikharabhat.bsky.social and @kokkonut.bsky.social on models of senescence and their connection to models of multilevel selection. It seems like these fun jump processes, PDEs, and SPDEs arise in a variety of biological contexts.
Shikhara Bhat@shikharabhat.bsky.social · last mo.If you like multi-level selection, you may enjoy (models of) ageing. @kokkonut.bsky.social and I show that the mortality patterns generated by dem. senescence are formally equivalent to a multi-level selection process! arxiv.org/abs/2607.00262 Confused? So were we! A short explainer thread below
What are the conferences/meetings that plant evolutionary ecologists in the UK attend? It seems silly for us to be siloed by taxonomy, so I’m keen to explore how we can encourage greater discourse. Please RT.
It's been incredibly fun to work with @gauravathreya.bsky.social @yagmurerten.bsky.social @arvidagren.bsky.social @tom-is-kean.bsky.social on internal evolutionary conflicts (also called intragenomic/intraorganismal conflict) and how to model them! See below for Gaurav's great explainer on the paper
Gaurav Athreya@gauravathreya.bsky.social · last wk.wanna read the latest overview of “internal evolutionary conflicts” — scenarios where genes spread despite being organism-deleterious? and wanna learn how to model them? look at our new preprint! we introduce unifying ideas, and try hard to write accessibly. small 🧵 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
wanna read the latest overview of “internal evolutionary conflicts” — scenarios where genes spread despite being organism-deleterious? and wanna learn how to model them? look at our new preprint! we introduce unifying ideas, and try hard to write accessibly. small 🧵 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
⚔️ A fight between two wild lesser #Anteaters is something few people ever witness. Rare footage from #Brazil captured an unusual display of aggressive #Behaviour between two free-ranging adults, grappling with their forelimbs and prehensile tails. 1/3
Really remarkable plant sex allocation study here: hermaphroditic avocado plants alternate sex roles twice daily and hence generate balanced sex allocation- controlled by ancient trans-species polymorphism. Heard a bit about this jaw-dropping work at UC Davis last year - great to see it out!
Jeff Groh@jeffgroh.bsky.social · last wk.Avocados come in 2 varieties - A-types start each day female and switch to male midday. B-types do the reverse. In work just published from the last chapter of my PhD, we show this system evolved 40+million yrs ago and is regulated by alleles of 1 transcription factor www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
📣 Spread the news to any recent graduates who dare to dream big: Only 10 days left to apply to join #Mast-EER, a cohort of MbyRes students based at the @uniexecec.bsky.social in #Cornwall funded by @aria-research.bsky.social. Places are limited, so apply now!
Erik Postma@erikpostma.bsky.social · last mo.Spread the word! 📢 Funded by @aria-research.bsky.social, @uniexecec.bsky.social in beautiful #Cornwall is creating a cohort of 20 (!) MbyRes students that will tackle some of the biggest questions in order to bring about a step-change for ecosystem resilience. For more information, see 👇!
Miraculously, all three of us managed to get our visas on time, and I’m now celebrating by reading the revised version of our MS (soon-to-be a preprint + @gauravathreya.bsky.social will be talking about it in our mini-symposium), accompanied by some Irish beer at a local pub 🤩
I will be presenting some of the first results from a massive behavioural phenotyping effort. We are hoping this work might shed some light on how among-individual variation differs among populations. Come see my talk on Thursday 23rd in the Room Parigi @ 12:45 CET. @isbe2026.bsky.social #ISBE2026
Hey @isbe2026.bsky.social - I’ll be in Turin from tomorrow, and looking to recruit PhD student and postdoc to my lab in Stockholm soon… anyone interested in parasites, sexual selection, transgen effects, fish (guppy) tracking - let’s meet up!
Great paper and interview with Luisa here!
Luisa Jaimes@jaimesnino.bsky.social · 3w ago@jexpbiol.bsky.social / @biologists.bsky.social published our paper on Rescue behaviour in desert ants 🐜🤝🐜! Check it out here journals.biologists.com/jeb/article-... and the ERC spotlight 💡https://journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/229/14/jeb253034/372247/ECR-Spotlight-Luisa-Maria-Jaimes-Nino
Individual repeatability in dietary specialisation across years and competitive regimes in wild birds doi.org/10.32942/X27...
Stumbled on this spreadsheet I made way back documenting all the deaths described in Sun Kil Moon's 2014 album Benji... Would like to make a #dataviz, but I'm lacking quantitative resolution!
Preprint alert! 🧪 🐟 If you are interested in #LongTermStudies #BalancingSelection #KinCompetition check out our new MS. Mini thread below 🧵:
bioRxiv Evolutionary Biology@biorxiv-evobio.bsky.social · 3w agoCompetition among kin generates balancing selection in a wild population https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.07.11.737918v1
Preprint alert! 🧪 🐟 If you are interested in #LongTermStudies #BalancingSelection #KinCompetition check out our new MS. Mini thread below 🧵:
bioRxiv Evolutionary Biology@biorxiv-evobio.bsky.social · 3w agoCompetition among kin generates balancing selection in a wild population https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.07.11.737918v1
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. 🐟🐠
A new group dedicated to evolutionary ecology! This is an opportunity to have a permanent community space for the field, as well as ensure regular conferences like #ExE2026. But it needs your help 👇
BES Evolutionary Ecology Group@bes-evolecol.bsky.social · last mo.We’re now looking for evolutionary ecologists to join our committee to build #ExE2026 into the start of something great, not just a one-off. Details here: www.britishecologicalsociety.org/content/evol...
We started @abcmicrogrants.bsky.social to make a small but real change to barriers students face. Since then, we disbursed >£26,000 in microgrants & matched >120 mentees w. mentors! In our new paper, in #AnimalBehaviourJournal's SI on Biases in Animal Behaviour, we share what we did, why, and how 🐝
Animal Behaviour Collective@abcmicrogrants.bsky.social · 4w agoOur paper is out now! 🎉📝 We describe how we work to address barriers faced by students and early-career researchs in the animal behaviour field, through our mentorships and microgrants. We hope that this can inspire and provide practical resources for others hoping to do the same!
Interested in a postdoc position? Olfaction in poison frog tadpoles! Based in Germany with some field work in Costa Rica (bilateral funding, 3 years). Please share with your froggie and neuro/behavior contacts 🐸 www.uni-giessen.de/de/ueber-uns...
Back to Switzerland after the blast that was #ExE2026! Fantastic talks and posters, lovely people, biggest gulls I’ve seen in my life! Very pleased to present our cool time-machine eyes to this lovely crowd 🧿 See you all in Edinburgh 🍺
Special weekend. We installed a commemorative bench my dad made for my mum, at her favourite view point on her favourite local walk, looking over the Welsh hills she loved the best. On a clear day you can see Yr Wyddfa /Snowdon and others from Eryri in the distance. A lovely spot to sit and reflect.
When you are pretty sure that reviewer 2 from your last submission is the lead author of the MS you are currently reviewing
Moby Dick@mobydickatsea.bsky.social · last mo.I now prophesy that I will dismember my dismemberer.
Excited to join #ExE2026 conference in Penryn! The walk to the campus was impressive, like huge botanical garden! Excellent program and #WAME #microbiome workshop tomorrow
