Excited to have been a small part of this amazing project lead by @marialopopolo.bsky.social and headed by @nrascovan.bsky.social My part was #ancientDNA labwork for one ancestor that had M. lepromatosis - a form of leprosy present in the US before European contact. Out in #Science -link in thread
Back into the ancient DNA lab this morning 🦴🧬
This is an amazing resource for ECR, please consider adding your grant apps!
One highlight of this semester was getting to go-develop ancient DNA methodologies with @twinanthro.bsky.social
Using hair found in the teeth of the infamous lions named the "Tsavo Man-Eater's," scientists uncover their diet consisted of humans, giraffes, and more. @currentbiology.bsky.social
www.cell.com/current-biol...
Would love to be added to this starter pack!
Out this week! We review recent developments in landscape ecology computational methods! topics=spatial patterns, connectivity, landscape genetics, sampling, simulations and modeling, and spatial planning: doi.org/10.1007/s408...
@adeflamingh.bsky.social and I just made a new releas of Numt Parser: github.com/adeflamingh/.... The main software hasn't changed--alignments to MT and NUMT refs are used to find NUMT contamination. We mostly added some behind-the-scene checks when processing CIGAR strings and improved logs!
A piece I wrote yesterday on the antiquity of the Blackfoot Confederacy and how scholars are praising Indigenous-led research. 🏺🧪
Cool article by @killgrove.bsky.social covering a recent research partnership that I was part of: www.livescience.com/archaeology/...
Read more about our recent Cape lion paper here: Cape Lion was genetically diverse prior to extinction, researchers find www.igb.illinois.edu/article/cape...
It’s kind of weirdly sad walking around right now and knowing that there used to be lions here. First pub out this year!
I legit just found myself googling "fancy word for when cats lick themselves" 🤣 working on a lion manuscript and jet lag got me like 🫠
9km hike through a magical forest enjoying nature and looking for fresh elephant poop 🐘 good to be back in this piece of the pretty-world for a while 💚 And I feasted on waterblommetjiebredie (yes that's one word) at dinner made by a family friend ♥️
Yay! Correct answer is Dugong! Am I the only one weirded out (in a good way) by the Paenungulata phylogeny? 🤯
Some close guesses but no correct answers so far. I’ll give it another day and then post the answer 😉
Here’s a Friday challenge for you… can you guess the species? (Hint: Mammal phylogenetic relationships are sometimes just plain weird)…
When you know that only your eyes are going by to be visible for most of the day, you make it count 😝 ancient DNA lab “problems”
Picture posted with permission :)
One of my favorite things about my job is mentorship and training the next generation of molecular biology scientists. This month has been very rewarding working in the ancient lab with undergrad Lauren Moy who has such impressive lab skills. Lauren drilled samples today like a pro💪🧬🦴very proud!
This is amazing! Such a cool idea!
Blows my mind how rapidly biotech advances 🤯 on the right is a NovaSeq 6000 S4 flowcell, on the left is the new 10B NovaSeq X plus flowcell
I led some recent elephant genomics papers that are out if those might be of interest? Also have an ancient elephant paper that used DNA from shipwreck ivory, not sure if that’s of interest :)
Non-science Sunday post: feast your eyes on this pretty pink cosmos in my small pollinator garden 💗
My entry into Bluesky with proof of my "accurate" profile description - it's been a week y'all. Are things on here more serious or more casual than previous places (aka should I post professional, fun, or ridiculous stuff - or a combination of all 😋)...?