Hey #GSB2026! Want to hear about soil protists? Want to learn more about long-read sequencing and assembling protist genomes? My talk tomorrow morning in the "Technological, Methodological, and Omics Advances - II" session will highlight some recent advancements in these realms 🦠🧬

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...

We tested the efficacy of semi-permeable capsules to capture protists from cultures and environmental samples using the Onyx from @atrandi.bsky.social. Tremendous effort from everyone in the lab and led by Marco Fantini and Nik Brask - check out the videos here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

#ProtistsOnSky #FungiFriends
in soil, it's not just fungi entrapping worms for dinner with their hyphae, it's also the protists that feast on fungal hyphae. after all, it's a jungle...

thx to kenneth @dumack.bsky.social for this highly interesting 🧵

Two scientists with big smiles are standing by a scientific poster that is colored bright pink.

Undergraduate researcher extraordinaire @melpaige05.bsky.social presented some of her recent findings on the role of temperature for the three life stages of a Heterolobosean protist (Fumarolamoeba sp.) today! Melanie's passion for pink posters and characterizing this amoeba is inspiring 💓🦠

The ecology of horizontal gene transfer Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) generates genetic variation in populations across all domains of life; however, most studies focus on individual transf…

I have a new review out in TiG titled, “The ecology of horizontal gene transfer”! I’ve been thinking about these ideas for years and this field is growing so fast it’s becoming impossible to review it. I hope this paper sparks discussion on different ways we can look at DNA transfer!

Contrasting effects of glutamate and branched-chain amino acid metabolism on acid tolerance in a Castellaniella isolate from acidic groundwater | Applied and Environmental Microbiology Nitrate pollution in groundwater is a major threat to both environmental and human health. This nitrate pollution can come from a variety of sources, including farm fertilizers, sewage, animal waste, ...

journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

We have a new paper out that looks at metabolic adaptations to mildly acidic conditions in a denitrifier isolated from acidic, nitrate-contaminated groundwater. 🧵

Thank you Christoph for the great blog post and bringing some new insights to the work - especially the feeding behavior!

We are accepting applications for up to 3 Peggy Cotter Travel Awards ($1,650 each) to support early-career professionals attending ASM Microbe 2026. Apply by Feb 16, 2026 by emailing a 1-page letter to jegoff@esf.edu. ASM membership required; branch membership may be completed once that is live.

Excited to announce the re-establishment of the Central New York Branch of the American Society for Microbiology (CNY ASM)! Founded in 1921, revived in 2025 to support collaboration, inclusive programming, and microbiologists at all career stages! This is our official BlueSky account!

Thank you for having us, had a great time chatting!!

Introducing the Fire Amoeba

🚨 Surprise podcast episode alert! 🚨
This week on Tiny Living Beings, I interviewed @oliverio.bsky.social and @hbrappap.bsky.social who led the discovery of the ‘fire amoeba’, that can reproduce at the highest temperature ever recorded for a eukaryote! 🌋 #protistsonsky

so cool!

fair point, i agree! just compared to the extremely stunning nature of other park features :)

Just on time for the holidays! Happy to share the published version of the discovery of leptophytes, a new deep-branching and widespread group of microalgae based on plastid MAGs (ptMAGs). Now with additional support from a mitochondrial MAG (mtMAG) of leptophytes.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

"A newly identified amoeba can survive at the temperature of a medium-well done steak" lol @scifri.bsky.social an apt comparison a hadn't previously considered...

A pleasure chatting about our research led by @hbrappap.bsky.social & with a wonderful team of colleagues.

Announcing our next #NSFfunded workshop on "Telling Stories Through Data", co-lead by myself + @vgwschutte.bsky.social! It’s half bioinformatics data viz & half #SciComm - this year’s focus is host-associated microbiome datasets. Apply here to join us (form closes 1/10) bit.ly/TSTD2026 #symbiosky

Yes! I think some were similar to trimyema minutum thermophilium

looking forward to reading this! we sometimes see Plagiopylea in geothermal samples as well and I've always been curious!

A meta-analysis of environmental sequencing data reveals the global distribution and hidden diversity of marine anaerobic ciliates Anaerobic protists are diverse, ecologically important members of anoxic microbial communities, acting as grazers, nutrient cyclers, and partners in multi-domain associations, yet remain understudied ...

New preprint led by @annaschreck.bsky.social that capitalized on the wealth of publicly available 18S rRNA datasets to explore the oceanic distribution and diversity of understudied anaerobic ciliates. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Boxing up the NSF at Eisenhower Av for the forced relocation. Boxes have “Details Matter” signage.

NSF

- Forced reorg

- POs down ~ 40% (DRP, most rotators not renewed, retirements)

- Forced move (and we have to pack and clean) to a building with no furniture, little to no conference space for panels, inadequate 🛜, …)

I personally love the boxes they gave us for packing.
“Details matter” 🙃

I think you might have a knack for relating bacterial species to pasta types....

Delighted to share some coverage of our new preprint (doi.org/10.1101/2025...) from Scientific American

and thank you @sciam.bsky.social @andreatweather.bsky.social for taking the time to chat with @hbrappap.bsky.social and I about why we are so excited about the geothermal 𝘐𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘢𝘮𝘰𝘦𝘣𝘢

sounds good!

that would be great!

and thanks @couchmicroscopy.bsky.social for your comments and insight on our findings!

Thanks nature news for featuring our recent preprint on 𝘐𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘢𝘮𝘰𝘦𝘣𝘢 led by @hbrappap.bsky.social

(check out preprint here: doi.org/10.1101/2025...) #protistsonsky

Wouldn't have been possible without you! (And so appreciative of your mentorship and kind and collaborative approach to science)

Thanks!! :)

Our attempt to give multinucleate cells the spotlight they deserve (seriously, they’re everywhere), led by the fearless @mrosjac.bsky.social and with @Markus Ganter

doi.org/10.32942/X2M...

We’d love your feedback while this goes through the peer review process!

#MicroEvoSky
#ProtistsonSky 🧪🌏