The VEO Group has a position open for a PhD student to investigate Fungi-bacteria interactions in complex communities! Check out this position and many more at the JSMC website 👇👇

www.jsmc-phd.de/admission/va...

The Fungi Sessions, Vol. 2

There is a new volume in The Fungi Sessions!! I loved the first album by Hannah Read that she performed at Fungal Genetics two years ago.

So excited for a part 2 and there are microscope videos of hyphae accompanying the songs in spotify 😍. 🍄🎶
open.spotify.com/album/5uGh16...

"Ozone hole" in grant descriptions by year, with two regression lines over a scatter plot

Bergogram plot: line plot of money awarded by year by NSF. 2025 and 2026 trail other years

Table of grants by US academic semester by state. In Spring 2026, New York has received 37 grants in total, Florida only 24

Word cloud of words in "formicidae" grants at NSF. "Ants" is most promient, also "species," "specimens," "project," and "collections."

Inspired by @jeremymberg.bsky.social & grant-witness.us, I've updated my rnsf #rstats package to include:

• Cache of public data on every #NSF grant (>500K)
• Info on every #GRFP

Tools for viz, examples of use, etc.

Blog post: brianomeara.info/posts/rnsf/

Pkg: bomeara.github.io/rnsf/index.h...

Designing life science assessments in the era of generative artificial intelligence Generative artificial intelligence (GAI) algorithms have the potential to reshape education. Though GAI may help democratize access to education, it also presents many challenges for educators. Alread...

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I am excited to share a new paper from the education side of the lab.

There is a lot of anxiety that genAI tools will jeopardize learning gains from homework assignments. Using Bloom's Taxonomy, we analyzed where genAI succeeds and where it struggles.

journals.plos.org/plosone/arti...

I'm hiring! I have 2 open positions:

🔬 Postdoc
🧪 Research associate

We study how animal multicellularity evolved by exploring the molecular logic of cell adhesion using cell biology, 'omics, and tool-building in non-model organisms.

Come join us!

Details and application links 👇

Please repost

Transposable elements hitchhike on Starships across fungal genomes - Nature Communications Large mobile genetic elements known as Starships act as vehicles for transferring transposable elements (TEs) between fungi. Here, Griem-Krey et al. show that these ‘hitchhiking’ TEs can drive rapid e...

Now out!
We show that TEs can be horizontally transferred between fungal species via Starships. Once transferred, these TEs can become active, changing the genome organization and affecting the lifestyle of the recipient fungus.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
@oggenfussursula.bsky.social #TEsky

Hi all. I am very excited that after 6 years I finally got my phylogenetic comparative methods book and online exercises online. Feel free to use and share. The book is here: nhcooper123.github.io/pcm-primer/. Note that it is not finished, we had to abandon it before the sunk costs fallacy broke us

Postdoctoral scholarship (2 years) in mycorrhizal biogeography and species distribution modelling

Postdoc (2 years) in mycorrhizal fungal biogeography & species distribution modelling @umeaplantsciencecentre.se
Work with large-scale metabarcoding data and modelling.

Deadline is 30th April
www.umu.se/en/work-with...

NIH grant terminations affected women scientists more than men, study finds A new paper shows that women, particularly those early in their careers, have been disproportionately affected by NIH grant terminations

A new paper suggests that grant terminations from the NIH over the past year may have further punctured the so-called "leaky pipeline" because women were more impacted by grant terminations than men

www.statnews.com/2026/03/23/n...

FINDING THE BIG PICTURE FOR GENETIC DIVERSITY! We are offering a 2-year POSTDOC JOB to work on genetic diversity synthesis & metrics across species, as part of a larger @bexplo.bsky.social project on multi-species genetic diversity.

@gfoesoc.bsky.social @eseb.bsky.social @sse-evolution.bsky.social

#Fungal26 need something to read on the flight home? Now obsessed with tRNAs? New Preprints!

Genes near tRNAs are enriched in translational machinery:
tinyurl.com/zshnf835

Hidden Diversity in Yeast tRNAs: Comparative Genomics and Modification Mapping in a Eukaryotic Subphylum
tinyurl.com/3j6f3up2

Man in a psychedelic jacket with colorful fungi

Woman in dress with mushroom pattern

Another mushroom dress

Man in Mushroom shirt

Fungal fashion #fungal26

What a way to end #fungal26

We laughed and we cried and we learned so much

A great reminder to look back and reflect on the past

It can light the way to the future

Thank you Nancy Keller for being a light 🕯️ in the field

Image from Claude ai

Shout out to the myco-skeeters 🦋 at #fungal26

It's been fun live posting with you!

@germhuntermd.bsky.social @talbotlabtsl.bsky.social @audreykward.bsky.social @angusb.bsky.social @hyphaltip.bsky.social @uehlinglab.bsky.social

Title slide

Jorge Lobo's Disease (or lobomycosis) • A neglected chronic mycosis of the skin caused by Paracoccidioides lobogeorgi (Lacazia loboi) • Endemic to the Amazon Basin and other humid tropical regions of Latin America, • Infection occurs through traumatic inoculation of fungal cells into the skin • Transmission occurs primarily in rural populations exposed to forest environments

Our last talk is Marcus Teixeira on lobomycosis #fungal26

Cryo-electron tomography of appressoria of Magnaporthe introduced by @delaconcepcionjc.bsky.social #Fungal26

Environmental genomes of Coccidioides hold potential for tracing human infections Lisa Couper, Molly Radosevich, Kaylee Christensen, Mark Bitter, Katharine Walter, John Taylor, Justin Remais, Rachel Brem Berkeley

Next talk in our #fungal26 session on emerging fungal pathogens is Dr Lisa Couper on genomes of environmental isolates of Coccidioides for tracing human infections

Nate Johnson asks if small RNAs are the other stuff in the genome

We know sRNAs are important, but how do we find them 🔎, figure out what they do ⚙️, and classify them 📑

Small-RNA seq data may already exist to answer this question

#fungal26

Benny Kleinerman asks how does the ancient evolution and modern variation of Ssd1 RNA binding leads to phenotypic diversity across diverse homologs

#fungal26

Nawaraj Dulal @nawaraj-dulal.bsky.social reveals the role of tRNA modification and codon usage in Magnaporthe that infect 🥀 rice 🌾

Modifications impact pathogenicity in a codon specific manner

#fungal26

Nava R Poudyal asks how (no really, how?) do long non-coding RNAs mediate temperature 🌡️ and antifungal ☠️ responses

#fungal26

Travis Seamons invites us to 👂 listen into some microbial conversations using RNA Addressable Modification 🧬 and barcoding. (Read more here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...) #fungal26

Pikobodies - a revolutionary technology to engineer immunity into plants introduced by @JiorgosKourelis from his work in @kamounlab.bsky.social @thesainsburylab.bsky.social and now @imperialcollegeldn.bsky.social #Fungal26

Communication continues! Baoye He shares how cross-kingdom 🍄🌱 communication happens with extracellular vesicles 🫧 and RNA trafficking 🚛🧬 #fungal26

Flavia Rogerio discusses what the genome of Bipolaris can tell us about it's transition from grass🌾 pathogen to hemp pathogen

#fungal26

Césarée Morier-Gxoyiya @cesaree-mg.bsky.social asks what is causing the rise of wheat 🌾 stem rust?

Is the rising temperature 🥵 in the UK to blame for this increase?

Unlikes the rusts, Césarée will end this cycle (aka her PhD) looking for a postdoc

#fungal26

No RNAi, big problems 🧬➡️🛑 Mycoviruses 🦠 interfering with RNAi can make fungal pathogen Cryptococcus neoformans more virulent in mouse models. 🐁😷 Fascinating talk from Jun Huang. #fungal26

Megan McDonald speaking at the Fungal26 conference.

The one and only @mcdonaldmeganc.bsky.social at #Fungal26 talking about ToxA’s journey throughout the stars in different Starships!

Phylogenetic analysis

Dr Barber describes how genomic epidemiology was used to establish clonal spread of azole resistant C parapsilosis through hospitals in Berlin