New paper out: Artificial selection for increased reproductive effort accelerates actuarial senescence and reduces lifespan in a precocial bird url: royalsocietypublishing.org/rspb/article... @uniexecec.bsky.social @erikpostma.bsky.social @joelpick.bsky.social y.social @oscarvedder.bsky.social

New preprint with Kosuke Hamazaki is out in bioRxiv. The beta version of its R package is available via GitHub at github.com/yassato/rNei...

😲

1. The thing about science that these jokers don't understand is that science cannot be vibe-coded.

Whatever its flaws, the point with vibe coding is that you're trying to quickly make something that sorta works, where you can immediately sorta see if it sorta works and then sorta use it.

New preprint from our group:

Phenotypic differentiation between highland and coastal quinoa under cold stress conditions

We use both field trials and lab experiments under controlled conditions to show that the two major quinoa ecotypes differ in adaptive traits.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Agroscope stellt sein Arbeitsprogramm 2026–2029 vor YouTube video by agroscopevideo

Research with a Focus on Impact and Practical Benefits:
Agroscope’s New Work Programme 2026-2029 Places a Greater Focus on Impact and Practical Benefits. Areas such as #PlantProtection, #PlantBreeding, #ClimateChange adaptation and economic efficiency will also be strengthened.

Europe’s farmers lost the Mercosur battle. They’re still ahead. Europe’s farmers are a minority. You wouldn’t know it from the political power they wield.

Excellent overview of the strength of Europe's farm lobby in this Politico article by Bartosz Brzezinski today www.politico.eu/article/euro...

Just wow!

Wenn aus Fülle ein Problem wird: Die Schweizer Landwirtschaft im Würgegriff der Überproduktion - bauernzeitung.ch 126 Millionen Kilo Milch zu viel, Schweineschlachtungen über Zielmarke, Weinlager randvoll: Die Schweizer Landwirtschaft kämpft mit massiver Überproduktion. Während die Politik mit Ertragsprämien noch...

Eine sehr lesenswerte Analyse in der BauernZeitung. Er zeigt fundiert die Zusammenhänge zwischen Überproduktion und Wachstumszwang auf. Gleichzeitig weist er auf die Widersprüchlichkeit aktueller politischer Forderungen hin.

Blinded by the lights? Re-examining the adaptive role of transposable elements in plants with population genomics Transposable elements (TEs) are ubiquitous components of the genome whose mobility can be triggered by environmental stress and influenced by genotype…

Have we been overstating the role of transposable elements in adaptation to local or rapidly changing environmental conditions? Happy to share my (somewhat unpopular?) opinion paper on this matter: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Thanks to those who already shared the link!

Fits with the narrative of "the idea factory", book by Jon Gertner, on the miraculous advances made in the Bell Labs - connecting basic research and applied engineering was a very inspiring place to be...

Imagine all cars were electric, and then one Volkswagen engineer comes up with another idea …

#EMobility

Beyond the buzz: analyzing actors promoting regenerative agriculture in Europe

Relevant new paper by Schreefel et al in npj Sustainable Agriculture
www.nature.com/articles/s44...

'Identifying the safe operating space for food systems'

Highly relevant new paper by Sofie te Wierik et al. in Nature Food www.nature.com/articles/s43...

The paper shows: i) food systems are the single-largest pressure across Earth system processes, ii) all food system boundaries are transgressed

Huge congratulations, very exciting news, and wishing you all the best on this new exciting scientific journey! 💪

@samwuest.bsky.social @samuelknapp.bsky.social @lauramathieu.bsky.social @lstefan.bsky.social

Finished just at sunset

Extremely excited me on the sowing machine, for our collaborative project on wheat variety mixtures PreDiMix. With ETH, UZH, IPK Gatersleben and Agroscope.

Shade avoidance restricts soybean breeding progress and increases herbivore susceptibility High planting densities expose field crops to competition for light, which typically induces shade avoidance responses such as stem elongation. While adaptive in natural environments, these responses ...

Our latest preprint is out www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... . Fantastic work by @lukecoevo.bsky.social, with Emanuel Kopp, Simon Jäggi and Pascal Niklaus. #DarwinianAgriculture #soybean #breeding

‘People just lie’: How Riverford’s Guy Singh-Watson became the most brutally honest farmer in Britain The organic veg pioneer talks to the Guardian about being unemployable, his unconventional father and his recent autism diagnosis

The most honest #farmer in Britain: “I spent a lot of time looking at the evidence on the impact of #meat & it was overwhelming. 10 billion people can’t live sustainably on this planet if we’re eating anything like the level of meat consumed in a western diet… www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Weak evidence for heritable changes in response to selection by aphids in Arabidopsis accessions Strong selection by aphids only weakly affects epigenetic and phenotypic variation within three Arabidopsis thaliana accessions, demonstrating limited potential for adaptation by epigenetic differenti...

doi.org/10.7554/eLif...

New genomic techniques in organic production: Considerations for science-based, effective, and acceptable EU regulation The EU has a goal of 25% organic farmland by 2030, but lower yields in organic farming versus non-organic farming puts strain on sustainable food production. Utilizing new genomic techniques (NGTs) in...

“Utilizing new genomic techniques #NGT in #organic production could improve yields …. and will help achieve the #EU ’s sustainable #agriculture goals” several authors together with our president @apmweber.bsky.social advocate in Cell Reports Sustainability www.cell.com/cell-reports...

Post-doc position: Genome Editing Sustainable and Innovative Potatoes - Agroscope Agroscope is looking for Post-doc position: Genome Editing Sustainable and Innovative Potatoes

❗ We have an open post-doc position in our group! 🌱🥔🧬
Are you interested in novel crop breeding techniques and potatoes? If yes, the CRISPS project (in collaboration with Wageningen University and SLU Sweden) may be something for you! You can apply here:
jobs.admin.ch/job-vacancie...
#NBTs

📣 Latest from the lab: Performance of deep-learning-based approaches to improve polygenic scores www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Its thought deep learning will substantially improve PGS but the reality is MANY have tried but no/little gain has been seen so far. Here we report our negative results.

How can biological systems anticipate future events? In our new paper with @jordiplam.bsky.social, we show how a simple genetic circuit can predict future trends through a simple (and perhaps widespread) mechanism @drmichaellevin.bsky.social @koseskalab.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Swiss Alps seen from Neuchatel

Excited to do a postdoc in beautiful Neuchatel / Switzerland🇨🇭?

We have several postdoc positions open at the moment!

Check our website for the full ads here: pathogen-genomics.org/jobs

Happy to answer any question and please spread the word to anyone who might be interested!

So cool! Huge congratulations!!

2025 WIT Award Winner Laura Mathieu Laura Mathieu, from France, a postdoctoral researcher at the French National Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAE), based at the Plant Health Institute of Montpellier (PHIM).

I am deeply honored to receive the 2025 Women in Triticum Early Career Award from the BGRI (Cornell Univ. & CIMMYT) ! This award is not only a recognition of my work, but also an opportunity to encourage women to pursue their aspirations.

#WomeninScience #Wheat

bgri.cornell.edu/awards/wit-e...

The Blue Origin flight showcased the utter defeat of American feminism | Moira Donegan The trip leaned on a vision of women’s empowerment that is light on substance and heavy on a childlike, girlish silliness

Well written and sobering take-down of the blue origin flight. Worth a read. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...