The Storm Glass says rain. Its chemicals crystallize differently with weather shifts. There was one aboard the Beagle when anchored in Ascension in 1836, no crystals then. The eco-climatic shift would take, at least, 50 more years. @nastassiakn.bsky.social @ricardsole.bsky.social @pflis.bsky.social
In 1836, Darwin visited this crater in Ascension Island and wrote:
“These saucer-shaped layers crop out on the margin, forming perfect rings of many different colours, giving to the summit a most fantastic appearance... hence the hill has been called the Devil’s Riding School.”
Can we terraform our own ecosystems, perhaps to rescue them from degradation and collapse? There is a Victorian story about this: Ascension Island, Darwin's synthetic ecosystem. Now in a film: www.europesays.com/uk/813985/ @vmaull.bsky.social @ftmaestre.bsky.social @vdlorenzo.bsky.social
Very proud that our research was featured in @natbiotech.nature.com. Congratulations to all my co-authors and colleagues!
A view of Green Mountain on Ascension Island, often described as the world’s first and only human-made cloud forest. More here: cadenaser.com/nacional/202... @avivirser.bsky.social @ricardsole.bsky.social
Hoy hablaré en el programa “A vivir que son dos días” en la cadena SER sobre la terraformación de la Isla de Ascensión. cadenaser.com/cadena-ser/a...
Today I’ll board a plane to the remote island of Ascension. During the 19th century, it was the setting of an unprecedented experiment in ecosystem engineering that remains, to date, largely unexplored.
Yesterday I defended my PhD thesis at the CSL, a unique library of questions and ideas. Thanks to @ricardsole.bsky.social I feel incredibly lucky to walk this path with you. To @vdlorenzo.bsky.social, @jgojalvo.bsky.social, Sonia Kéfi: amazing committee. To my family and friends, for lifting me up.
Can we engineer cognition in aneural systems? What are the challenges and implications? Can synthetic biology be used to interrogate basal cognition? Our new paper with @jordiplam.bsky.social explores these questions using models of minimal gene circuits. Available here pubs.acs.org/doi/pdf/10.1...
Excited to share a new PhD thesis from my student and soon Dr @vmaull.bsky.social on synthetic ecosystems, preventing tipping points, and a new concept: emergent bioengineering. Very proud of this achievement, and thankful to @sfiscience.bsky.social, where many of these ideas came to life.
This has been the greatest of journeys!
Thank you so much for guiding me through it. Let’s see what’s next!
Cooperation is a universal feature of complex systems, from the origins of life and microbiomes to societies. What universal patterns can be found in these systems? Here's our new @pnas.org paper. @jordipinero.bsky.social @artemyte.bsky.social @sfiscience.bsky.social www.pnas.org/doi/epdf/10....
Today I will be giving a talk in the BioClub Tokio on synthetic ecosystems. Happy to share and discuss with this community again! You can follow on zoom if you are interested: bioclub.tokyo/en/events/sy...
Off to Madrid from an amazing #ALIFE2025 conference in beautiful Kyoto. Kudos to the organisers.
Honored to receive the 2024 Outstanding Publication Award from the Intl Soc for Artificial Life @alife2025.bsky.social for our @royalsocietypublishing.org ublishing.org paper “Fundamental Constraints to the Logic of Living Systems” @sfiscience.bsky.social
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10....
Si trobem vida en un altre planeta, serà diferent de la que coneixem? Crear vida al laboratori seguirà les mateixes regles? Pot existir vida sense aigua o ADN? I les IAs del futur, poden aparèixer sense assemblar-se al cervell humà? Vine al @iec.cat i t’ho explico! @melisupf.bsky.social @prbb.org
UMass Boston seeks a tenure-track Assistant Professor in microbial ecology, starting September 1, 2026. Apply by December 1, 2025. Details: http://www.umb.edu/academics/csm/biology #job
Una exposició per pensar el Temps des de la ciència, la cultura i la condició humana museuciencies.cat/exposicio_te...
#MISB (@csic.es-UIMP )
Design meets evolution: Theory and practice
Víctor de Lorenzo (@vdlorenzo.bsky.social), @cnb-csic.bsky.social
📅Oct 3
⏰11am
The seminar will take place at CIB and additionally streamed online 🔗rediris.zoom.us/meeting/register/ZmrXKHm...
Can synthetic biology help save endangered ecosystems?
Our new paper with @vmaull.bsky.social explores how engineered genes can spread through soil microbes.
We model how synthetic gene transfer can support biodiversity. @vdlorenzo.bsky.social @guimaguade.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Can we leverage the mechanics of horizontal gene transfer to percolate genes of interest through bacterial communities? This paper takes the initial theoretical steps to explore its potential and implications, and to derive design principles.
Inspiration:
spj.science.org/doi/10.34133...
Can a single cell learn? Even without a brain, some microbes show simple forms of cognition. Can this basal cognition be engineered? Check our new paper with @jordiplam.bsky.social on the minimal synthetic circuits & their cognitive limits. @drmichaellevin.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
In Pan de Azúcar National Park in Chile’s Atacama Desert are pebbles known locally as “maicillo” and in English as “grit.” Rich colonies of hidden microbial life dwell in their crevices and bind them together into thin crusts. quantamagazine.org/in-a-fierce-...
A new theme issue of #PhilTransB focuses on the evolution of Earth’s biosphere: royalsocietypublishing.org/toc/rstb/202...
Beautiful patterns at the opposite side
A yellow bloom spreads in the southeast. Mud collected from the rivers that frame Barcelona, Besòs and Llobregat. Month 7.
#Biocrusts are vital to dryland health—but can they recover after being disturbed? 🤔A new review in @botsocamerica.bsky.social #AmJBot by @michalaphillips.bsky.social & al explores biocrust recovery timelines, climate impacts & restoration potential bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...
This paper on massive genomic rearrangements at the basis of a major evolutionary event reminds me of Cortazar's novel Rayuela, in which the order you read the same text originate very different stories www.nature.com/articles/s41...
How can we build a general theory of mutualistic communities? After five years, we finally completed a new Neutral Theory of Cooperation that is fully solved analytically and displays remarkable properties @jordipinero.bsky.social @artemyte.bsky.social @manlius.bsky.social arxiv.org/abs/2506.09737
