SSAR Live & Silent Auctions at JMIH 2026 (New Orleans, July 8–12). Accepting herp-related art, books, gifts, etc.
No live animals or herp products.
Donations support student travel.
Bring items or ship to local host.
Questions: gnicholson@tamu.edu or jmd240@lockhaven.edu.
Behrens et al. investigate the evolution of sex chromosomes in the ancestors of the lacustrine radiations of East African cichlids, showing slower sex chromosome turnover than in the rapidly diversifying haplochromines.
🔗 doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evaf191
#genome #evolution #cichlids
I’m holding the Senate floor tonight in protest of legislation that would allow a copper-nickel sulfide mine on the doorstep of the Boundary Waters.
Not this mine. Not this place.
A title slide of a talk, “exploring the evolution and development of complex tissues in reptiles: integrating classic and cutting-edge techniques”
Postdoc @aaronhgriffing.bsky.social showing off some cool new methods and data at the NYC Miltenyi lightsheet microscope users symposium
Yes, but Led Zeppelin II and Houses of the Holy would inevitably win the argument
1/ BRAKER4 hatched!
The Earth BioGenome Project is on track to sequence ~1.5M eukaryotic species. Every one needs a structural annotation. No Perl monolith was going to survive that. So we rewrote BRAKER from the ground up. github.com/Gaius-August...
My PhD student will be finishing soon and is looking for a postdoc position to start in the fall semester. If you have a postdoc ad or opening and are looking for someone experienced especially in population/evolutionary genomics with a knack for coding and bioinformatics, let me know.
Recording engineer Don Landee passed away earlier this week. He recorded albums by The Doors, Van Morrison, Doobie Brothers, Carly Simon, Montrose, and Van Halen. A huge loss for the music world.
www.vhnd.com/2026/04/05/d...
PREPRINT ALERT !!!
Excited to share our #reptile #embryo cryopreservation method optimised on peri-gastrulation veiled chameleon embryos! This lays the foundation for functional studies & reptile #conservation efforts!
#devbio #squamates #evodevo
www.biorxiv.org/content/bior...
Oh no. NSF Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) program shuttered.
This one leaves me winded. A good story from 2025 by @seattletimes-rss.bsky.social offers insight into what we are losing: www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news...
Happy to announce the alpha release of the SCINKD3!
SCINKD3 is an extension of SCINKD streamlines the use of WGS data from multiple individuals to identify sex chromosomes. In testing, its shown to be robust in many cases with as few as 4 individuals.
github.com/DrPintoThe2n...
A dark turtle with a yellow neck on a log. Text that says, "we're hiring," and, "go.illinois.edu/prijobs."
🐍 Seasonal Herpetological Technician – Join Illinois Natural History Survey! Assist with reptile and amphibian surveys throughout northern Illinois! Apps due Apr. 10, 2026
👉 Apply now: https://loom.ly/nyKlxKU
I am often asked what laws I would recommend blue states adopt. While there is no one-size-fits-all approach, there are seven changes every state could adopt right now, for virtually no cost or administrative burden. www.democracydocket.com/opinion/seve...
Photo of a Common Wall Gecko (Tarentola mauritanica) on a rock
Photo of a Mediterranean House Gecko (Hemidactylus turcicus) on a rock
There are several gecko species native to Crete and they have different sex-determining systems. The Common Wall Gecko (Tarentola mauritanica) has TSD. The Mediterranean House Gecko (Hemidactylus turcicus) has XX/XY sex chromosomes. We found both at the conference hotel! 🧪🦎 @biol-vsd.bsky.social
Presenting our latest turtle sex determination preprint at the @biol-vsd.bsky.social meeting in beautiful Crete 😊. Check it out! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
🏝️ In Crete island, enjoying the iconic Vertebrate Sex Determination Synposium @biol-vsd.bsky.social
Thanks to the organizers for the invitation and especially to @nitzan-gonen.bsky.social & Humphrey Yao for making this meeting a reality
🚨 IT'S DAY 2 of VSD26
After a successful start, we are continuing today with our second plenary speaker.
Susana M. Chuva de Sousa Lopes is presenting her amazing work on sex-specific features and reaggregation of human fetal gonads. 🧬
Enjoy day 2 ! ✨
#VSD26 #crete #day2
Cranial ossification in leopard geckos examined using Alizarin Red staining.
A chart illustrating ossification sequence in leopard gecko crania
New paper in @journalofanatomy.bsky.social with PAD Wise and AP Russell! We show that using morphological criteria to assign developmental stage provides more ossification sequence resolution than embryo size or developmental time (days).
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10....
#GeckoEvoDevo
Lateral view of a preserved croaking gecko (Aristelliger) embryo
I’m so excited to announce our new paper in @journal-evo.bsky.social showing how embryology can help us determine ancestral character states in temporal niche
academic.oup.com/evolut/advan...
Collab w/ A Bauer, A Wegerski, @tonygamble.bsky.social, & A Rasys
#GeckoEvoDevo #Aristelliger
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Dear 🪰folks, for a project I am looking for D. buzzati, D. gaucha, D. recens and Z. sepsoides. Please get in touch if you have them in your lab and willing to share.
Excited to share a new paper written by a AAAS Policy Fellow I mentor, Dr. Lisa Walsh.
“This review synthesizes literature on fieldwork safety across scientific disciplines, highlighting four facets of safety for leaders and researchers to address: physical, social, financial, and psychological.”
Much of Claude’s training data likely includes older sources that list him as President of Iran. 😬
www.wsj.com/livecoverage...
So I pleased to announce the conceptual spawn of FigTree: PearTree (acronym still to be finalised). If you want to dive right in it is hosted as a web app here: artic-network.github.io/peartree (click the “Example...” button for immediate candy and then click every button you can find).
#JMIH26 Joint Meeting of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists 2026
Annual meeting of: Amer. Soc. of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists 🐟, Amer. Elasmobranch Soc. 🦈, Herpetologists' League 🐍 & Soc. for Study of Amphibians & Reptiles 🐸
The abstract submission and meeting website is now open jmih.net
Very sad news just in from Neil Shubin that Hans-Dieter Sues has died: suddenly in his sleep this past weekend. Hans’ knowledge of vertebrate palaeontology was exceeded only by his good humour. 😞
An historic illustration of bees and other insects flying around a flowering bush.
All BHL staff have been secured! 🧪 As we enter our next chapter, the team who steward BHL’s collections & infrastructure remain in place, led by Colleen Funkhouser in her new role of Managing Director. Meet the team guiding BHL forward:
blog.biodiversitylibrary.org/2026/02/celebrating-bhl-team.html
A work colleague in neuro/ophthalmology was telling me about how chameleons have unique coiled optic nerves. Turns out this was learned largely from digitized specimens in oVert. I remember when oVert was a grant proposal. Such an amazing resource 💚 www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/science/scie...
