At a number of town halls, the VC has spoken about “excellence.” Someone asked her how she defined it. Her answer, and I paraphrase: “I know it when I see it.”

Hope you also have your "book map" with you too 😉

‪
🌳 Do you want to contribute to research on how humans perceive forests? Take this quick, anonymous 10-min survey 🌲

👉 www.biodiful.org#/forest

This will help us explore how people experience forest biodiversity!

Please share on 🦋 & tag @biodiful.bsky.social to reach more participants 🙏💚

🌐🌍🦤🦑🪴🍁🧪

Very large snail, held in hand, looking at camera. Man in blue t-shirt behind

Very large snail in hand

Baby snail, less than a month old

Field work in one of the smallest countries, Sao Tome, looking for one of the largest snails, unfortunately also endangered. Success! Giant Obo snail 🐌, bigger than your regular Giant African land snail - and sinistral coiling. Just born baby = garden snail size 😮 #snails #saotome #chirality

Very large snail, held in hand, looking at camera. Man in blue t-shirt behind

Field work in one of the smallest countries, Sao Tome, looking for one of the largest snails, unfortunately also endangered. Success! Giant Obo snail, bigger than your regular Giant African land snail - and sinistral coiling. #snails #saotome #chirality

‘Don’t go to the US – not with Trump in charge’: the UK tourist with a valid visa detained by ICE for six weeks Karen Newton was in America on the trip of a lifetime when she was shackled, transported and held for weeks on end. With tourism to the US under increasing strain, she says, ‘If it can happen to me, i...

A retired British primary school administrator with a British passport and a valid visa was shackled, chained and detained for six weeks by ICE

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

El Yunque mountain viewed from Baracoa, Eastern Cuba

Cuba is heading for a humanitarian disaster, because the US is using starvation to promote regime change. Read more here: www.theguardian.com/news/ng-inte....
Help here: www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding...
#Cuba #BloqueoACuba #CubaEmbargo #USCuba #JustGiving

Image of two snails on leaf matter. Euglandina tenella (Strebel, 1875) and Helicina sp., with kind permission to MSL to use image from Tadeo De Jesús Esquivel Blanco and Luis Armando Navarro Zarco

🙏Please share🙏
🐌Applications are open for MSL travel grants!🐌
⭐Deadline = 1st March (for travel between 1st June and 30th November)
⭐£500 available for members
⭐£300 available for non-members
malacsoc.org.uk/awards-and-g...

I need to insure a snail shell - the remains of "Jeremy the shellebrity snail" - for international travel. It is going to be the centrepoint of Netherlands museum exhibit! But what value do I put on a one in million snail?! #snail #snaillove

"With free bar stocked with local beer" I think I meant 🍺

I've been sitting on this for over a month...but given how cross I am with @royalsociety.org at their ongoing inaction over #Elon #Musk I thought I'd share this.

They invited me to serve on their Public Engagement Committee; I could have been more eloquent, but I had to give a firm "no"...

And if you want a list of the reasons that have been given for keeping Musk as FRS, there's this piece deevybee.blogspot.com/2025/02/seve...

Reporting back from the frontline of the 59th iteration of PopGroup conference in Lille, only the 2nd ever outside the UK. With a free bar stocked with local bar, excellent frites for the poster session and top quality food, why would we ever hold it anywhere again?! 😁 #pgg59 #popgroup59 #conference

Shades of blue and red in a slice through an immuno stained brain showing some deliciously lovely looking mushroom body lobes - ripe for investigation during a funded PhD - and the central complex. Image credit: Dr Max Farnworth

🚨RA/PhD position available in evolutionary neurobiology 🚨

Working on a deep dive into circuit changes during mushroom body expansion in Heliconius butterflies @camzoology.bsky.social

- employment benefits
- 4 years funding
- 1000% fun

Deadline: 14/1/2026

Details:
www.cam.ac.uk/jobs/researc...

Accurate Runs of Homozygosity Estimation From Low Coverage Genome Sequences in Non‐Model Species Runs of homozygosity (ROH) are increasingly being analysed using whole genome sequences in non-model species as a measure of inbreeding and to assess demographic history, thus providing useful inform...

Accurate Runs of Homozygosity Estimation From Low Coverage Genome Sequences in Non-Model Species
#popgen #consgen
doi.org/10.1111/1755...

🚨Two funded PhDs on the evolutionary ecology of antipredator colouration 🦋 with myself and Iliana Medina.

One in Swansea tinyurl.com/4thtbph6 deadline Jan 12th @crocus-dla.bsky.social

The other in Melbourne - deadline Jan 1st

Please share among potential students!

Evolutionary dynamics of dietary specialisation – insights from Neotropical mistletoe‐dependent frugivores Mistletoes occur worldwide, with most relying on birds to disperse their sticky seeds to suitable hosts. There has been considerable ecological research on these interactions, emphasizing those birds....

In time for the festive season, my latest paper charts the 25 million year story of how mistletoe and songbirds somersaulted across the Americas, diversifying as they went.  Strap in for an epic ecological tale #MistletoeMunchersFromWayBack 1/12
nsojournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Charles et al. rediscover the presumed - extinct greater chestnut weevil (Curculio caryatrypes) in the eastern US via iNaturalist, and genomic data and field surveys confirm identity and active reproduction, revealing persistence despite American chestnut collapse and underscoring the power of digital platforms for biodiversity research and conservation

"Rediscovery of the greater chestnut #weevil highlights the power of digital platforms in biodiversity research and conservation" spkl.io/63326Ad07u

@Michael A. Charles & colleagues
@currentbiology.bsky.social

Apparently "Nottingham has evolved into one of the largest university estates in the country ..." Blame "evolution", not themselves, eh? No apologies, of course, but at least they are selling Castle Meadow, which has cost nearly £100m and is not fit for purpose. At a huge loss, of course. #UoN

UCU union demo outside university of Nottingham building. Lots of pink!

Two days of demos and inspirational speeches outside Trent building - while university council decide our future but without our consultation, or consideration of the local and East Midlands community. #UoN promotes #WeAreUoN hashtag but does not listen. #University #eastmidlands @ucu.org.uk

I wish I didn’t have to share this. But the BBC has decided to censor my first Reith Lecture.

They deleted the line in which I describe Donald Trump as “the most openly corrupt president in American history.” /1

Image shows planned course closures in the Faculty of Arts, including the whole of modern languages and music. This will inevitably lead to closure of the whole departments and multiple job losses

BREAKING The University of Nottingham has decided to lead the way in being the first 🥇 Russell group university to NOT do modern languages. Music is also gone! 🗡️ Apparently, neither are necessary for a world "top 100" university with charitable status. ENDS
#UoN #Russell @ucu.org.uk #UCU

Join us! 🧬🪰🎉🔬

We are currently advertising two #PhD projects to study the #evolution, #development and #genomics of sexual traits in stalk-eyed flies.

Deadline for applying is Wednesday, January 7, 2026. Get in touch for more info!

Right. Hitler's DNA. Brace yourselves for a deluge of misinformation and bad science.

I'm in Australia, so do get in touch if you want some expert debunking.

Beautifully patterned and colourful snail and shell

The world needs more Polymita 🐌 This one is Polymita sulpurosa, superb pic by Julio Larramendi. We now have a genome sequence! 🌝 #snails #polymita

The snail farmer of London, his mafia friends, and a £20m vendetta against the taxman Terry Ball runs elaborate mollusc-based tax avoidance schemes that are costing London councils millions of pounds. Yet when London Centric tracks him down, an even stranger story emerges.

Bizarre story, an elaborate mollusc based tax avoidance scheme! www.londoncentric.media/p/terry-ball...

#molluscs #snails/ #taxavoidance

Molluscan genome assemblies—problems and progress A reference genome assembly is a starting point for research (Davison & Neiman, 2021) in a wide variety of subdisciplines of biology, including mollusc

Problems and progress in getting molluscan 🐌 genome assemblies, new paper out. Although the publication was much delayed, we recently redid the analysis, finding that actually not much ahs improved 😔 academic.oup.com/mollus/artic...
🧬 & 🖥️ #genomics #snails #molluscs

How does a single cuckoo species evolve eggs that mimic those of many different hosts?

In a new Science study, researchers report genomic data that reveal a complex geographic mosaic of cuckoo-host coevolution.

Learn more in a new #SciencePerspective: https://scim.ag/4nEZIfY

We are still interested in any found twite feathers for a study on the relationships and genetic diversity between the British groups - particularly now for birds of Scottish origin in the NE of England or, birds on the Avon.
DM me for me more info.
#birdringing

Talk about an in-flight meal.

For the first time, researchers have captured rats hunting bats by grabbing them from the sky. Learn more: https://scim.ag/3Jqldmn