This is a small painting I made several years ago after visiting Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario
Algonquin Sunset
12x12 acrylic on canvas

At the university of Melbourne with my @leverhulme.ac.uk personal fellowship award. I will be giving a research seminar here on Thursday at noon if you are about and/or want to hear more!:)

Phylogeny showing the classifications of cooperative breeding (outer circle) and female song (inner circle) for 1,041 Oscine species.

Female birds more likely to sing when extended family help

Territoriality modulates the coevolution of cooperative breeding and female song in songbirds🧪
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Cooperative breeding shapes the evolution of vocal communication differently based on territorial context and sex

MicroRNA evolution and the genetic basis of placental phenotypic diversity across mammals at The University of Manchester on FindAPhD.com PhD Project - MicroRNA evolution and the genetic basis of placental phenotypic diversity across mammals at The University of Manchester, listed on FindAPhD.com

We are recruiting ! ... the second PhD position available with us at University of Manchester: www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Defining the landscape of stop codon readthrough across vertebrate genomes at The University of Manchester on FindAPhD.com PhD Project - Defining the landscape of stop codon readthrough across vertebrate genomes at The University of Manchester, listed on FindAPhD.com

Come join us for a PhD at the University of Manchester :

Application deadline this Monday!

Offering a few free commissions to improve my sci comm skills & portfolio. I can do hand-painted illustrations for figures, design infographics, and even sound design and music for research promotion or podcasts. jenisidwell.com

#sciencecommunication #marinemammals #lifesciences #datavisualization

If you are looking for activities to do for the #BritishScienceWeek, take a look at our “How are proteins made?” from RiboCode sLoLa project. Designed for schools in the UK and Ireland, ages 7-11 (~KS2/Second to Fifth Class/P4-7). Download the free resources and enjoy:) ribocode.org/resources/

Pseudogenes document protracted parallel regression of oral anatomy in myrmecophagous mammals Abstract. Adaptation to ant and/or termite consumption (myrmecophagy) in mammals constitutes a textbook example of convergent evolution, being independentl

Emerling, @freddelsuc.bsky.social et al. investigated candidate genes related to dentition, gustation, and mastication in nine convergent myrmecophagous mammalian lineages, finding that convergent evolution of myrmecophagy was a protracted process.

🔗 doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msag009

#evobio #molbio

Reflecting on what has been a thought provoking and enjoyable experience at my first SBS research away day today at UoManchester. First up was a fantastic talk from @whelanfj.bsky.social and the day just kept on giving! Feeling hugely excited for what is to come in my new academic home :)

A hands-on course in Bayesian modelling and evolutionary analysis using RevBayes 21-24 April 2026

Join the online course "A Hands-on Course in Bayesian Modelling and Evolutionary Analysis using RevBayes" from April 21-24. More details at www.physalia-courses.org/courses-workshops/bayesi... #course

Degrees of opportunity? Working-class women’s lives beyond the elite university Employing innovatively creative methods, Katherine Davey’s research interrogates the nuanced relationship between social class and gender, offering the first national picture of how inequalities emerg...

Leverhulme Early Career Fellow, Dr Katherine Davey, conducts new research @manmetuni.bsky.social offering the first national picture of how inequalities emerge for academically successful working-class women. media.leverhulme.ac.uk/feature/kdavey

InspectorORF: a tool for visualising Ribo-Seq and additional genomic or transcriptomic data AbstractMotivation. The advent of ribosome profiling (an adaptation of RNA sequencing) to determine the translatome, has led to a huge improvement in our u

Congratulations to Eilidh Ward (first author and PhD student co-supervised by co-authors Julie Aspden, David Westhead and yours truly) on this lovely contribution - a method to visually inspect reads from novel open reading frames: doi.org/10.1093/bioa...

Uppsala in late autumn

Join us at the Evolutionary Biology Centre at Uppsala University. We’re searching for an Assistant Professor in Biology. www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...

Upcoming training courses The SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics is an academic not-for-profit organization whose mission is to lead and coordinate the field of bioinformatics in Switzerland.

Pre-announcement ... keep an eye out for news of our upcoming #Biodiversity #Bioinformatics Summer School 21-26 June in Germany co-organised by @sib.swiss & @denbi.bsky.social ... sign up to the mailing list to be sure not to miss it! www.sib.swiss/training/upc...

Marram grass leaf. Light micrograph of a cross section through a closed (unravelled) leaf of Marram grass, Ammophila arenaria. The deeply grooved leaf is thrown into folds. The folds conserve water and withstand salt, and prevent excessive evaporation. Round vascular bundles are visible inside each fold, serving to transport food and water through the leaf. They look like smiley faces. The large "eyes" are the xylem, which transport water. The bright blue "mouths" are the phloem, which transport sugars produced during photosynthesis. The spiky, curved structure is a natural adaptation to drought conditions, helping the leaf to roll up and conserve water. Spines on the surface discourage animals from eating the leaf. Marram grass is important in coastal ecology, since it is one of the commonest grass species in Britain to stabilize sand dunes.

Mother nature is a raver.

The abstract submission deadline (Jan 31st) for the 2026 Mathematical and Computational Evolutionary Biology Meeting on Crete mceb2026.sciencesconf.org is this Saturday!

From Genomic Context to Sensor Design: Computational Identification of AMR Biomarkers in Agriculture (project at Queen's University Belfast) at University of Reading on FindAPhD.com PhD Project - From Genomic Context to Sensor Design: Computational Identification of AMR Biomarkers in Agriculture (project at Queen's University Belfast) at University of Reading, listed on FindAPhD....

Last chance to apply for our funded PhD opportunity. w. Prof. Fredric Coulon @ Cranfield University. This will investigate expansion of ML models for AMR phenotype detection to agriculture settings to create a sensor-ready hit list.
Detail here:
www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

📣 Please spread: we’re hiring a Lab Manager! It is a critical position in our new lab. As our lab moves to Barcelona and joins the @crg.eu, we’re looking for a Lab Manager to help build the lab and set the lab atmosphere.
🔗 Apply here 👉 recruitment.crg.eu/content/jobs...

A new study by Philip Leverhulme Prize Winner Harrison Steel, @gabriel-abrahams.bsky.social and others has proved for the first time that it is possible to deliberately engineer quantum mechanical processes occurring inside a protein, and use these to create new sensing technologies.

The submission deadline (Jan 31st) for the 2026 Mathematical and Computational Evolutionary Biology Meeting in Crete mceb2026.sciencesconf.org is getting closer!

NYU's Rocha Lab seeks a Postdoctoral Associate in Evolutionary Biology. Ideal candidates hold a PhD, with expertise in genetic diversity, bioinformatics, and mentoring. Apply by Feb 26, 2026. More info: https://apply.interfolio.com/180051 #postdoc

PanForest: predicting genes in genomes using random forests AbstractMotivation. The presence or absence of some genes in a genome can influence whether other genes are likely to be present or absent. Understanding t

Interested in pangenomics ? This paper just out from Alan Beavan (not on socials), @blackpassiflora.bsky.social and @jomcinerney.bsky.social is a must: doi.org/10.1093/bioi...

Sharon introducing herself and her research.

So excited to have @szytynska.bsky.social kicking off our Evolution & Ecology day at @manchester.ac.uk today! #UoM_EEday

Independent origins of spicules reconcile paleontological and molecular evidence of sponge evolutionary history Sponges have a cryptic Ediacaran history because ancestral sponges were soft-bodied and had low fossilization potential.

Our latest: Independent origins of spicules reconcile paleontological and molecular evidence of sponge evolutionary history, led by @meleonora-rossi.bsky.social with help from friends @bristolpalaeo.bsky.social including @anariesgo.bsky.social @evopalaeo.bsky.social Davide Pisani and many others

300,000 Wondrous Nature Illustrations Put Online by The Biodiversity Heritage Library Are we truly in the midst of a human-caused sixth mass extinction, an era of “biological annihilation”?

300,000 Wondrous Nature Illustrations Put Online by The Biodiversity Heritage Library | Open Culture

On the robustness of Bayesian inference of gene flow to intragenic recombination and natural selection Abstract. The multispecies coalescent (MSC) model provides a framework for detecting gene flow using genomic data, including between sister species. Howeve

Thawornwattana, Rannala & @zihengyang.bsky.social use simulation to study the false positive rate of a Bayesian test of gene flow under the MSC with multiple influencing factors.

🔗 doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msaf327

#evobio #molbio #compbio

Arctic endured year of record heat as climate scientists warn of ‘winter being redefined’ Region known as ‘world’s refrigerator’ is heating up as much as four times as quickly as global average, Noaa experts say

Arctic endured year of record heat as climate scientists warn of ‘winter being redefined’

🚨 What if evolution is the ”law”… and networks are the machines that do the work?

In this paper (just published) I try to formalize how living systems are non-equilibrium, information-processing, adaptive matter. With a great biological flavor! 🧪🌐🌍🧬🦠

👉 iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...

🧵 1/

Harnessing comparative biology to understand climate change induced heat stress impacts on maternal and offspring health at University of Edinburgh on FindAPhD.com PhD Project - Harnessing comparative biology to understand climate change induced heat stress impacts on maternal and offspring health at University of Edinburgh, listed on FindAPhD.com

We have a PhD studentship available starting in October 2026. Investigating climate change heat stress impacts on maternal and child health. Get in touch if you have questions! www.findaphd.com/phds/project...