I’m petrified about today’s science news. Genetically modifying crabs to have cheetah genes? This could go sideways fast.

let me share a little story about a remarkable wasp that I encountered yesterday in our local deserts I stumbled across her, and scrambled to get a few crappy photos .... but then realized that she had a burrow, perhaps a better photo op was possible ?? here she is at her burrow entrance.

A new study in ants from @danielkronauer.bsky.social reveals a previously unknown mechanism that ensures that each olfactory neuron expresses only one odorant receptor, with broad implications for the study of gene regulation. #RockefellerScience https://bit.ly/4pwPFLY

The final version of our paper on how ants and possibly other insects use a crazy mechanism involving extensive transcriptional interference to regulate odorant receptor expression is now open access in my favorite journal, @currentbiology.bsky.social authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S...

Ant reproduction is getting weirder and weirder. Here’s the latest: queens of a Mediterranean harvester ant mate with males from a different species and then lay eggs that clonally inherit those males’ genome. I.e., they lay eggs that develop into a different species. 🤯

Finally, an ant photo from my recent Kenya trip. On Mount Kenya, you pass through a zone of pristine rainforest, which is where I’ve previously worked on army ants. There are other cool ants though, and here’s an example. The dark sphere in this tree is a carton nest of Crematogaster acrobat ants.

If you’re interested in ants, olfaction, gene regulation, or all of the above, here’s a new preprint from the lab for you. It describes an unorthodox mechanism of transcriptional interference by which ant olfactory sensory neurons produce a single functional receptor. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Applications for faculty positions at Rockefeller are now open! We are seeking exceptional, creative scientists to join our faculty. Learn more below:

What a loss!

A black panther! Melanistic leopards are extremely rare in Africa, and seeing one on our recent trip to Kenya was a dream come true. We were able to spend an hour right before sunset around this marvelous creature while staying at Mpala Research Centre in Laikipia.

Sleeping hippos look like they’re smiling. Here, a group is resting on a river bank at Mpala Research Centre while being attended to by red-billed oxpeckers. These birds eat ticks off of large mammals, but also drink blood directly from wounds. 🦛 🇰🇪

The Grévy's zebra (Equus grevyi) is the largest and, sadly, rarest of the three zebra species. Luckily, Mpala Research Centre is home to a decent number of Grévy's zebras, which are studied as part of a long-term monitoring program: www.mpalalive.org/field_guide/... mpala.org/princeton-ze...

A hyrax with its little one. These cutie pies were living right outside our cottage at Mpala Research Centre. 🇰🇪 Apparently it is World Elephant Day. So why hyraxes? Unlikely as it may seem, hyraxes are elephants’ closest living relatives.

Some of the animals at Mpala Research Centre 🇰🇪 participate in ongoing projects. Here are vulturine guinea fowl studied by @[email protected] at the MPI for Animal Behaviour. They are individually marked and some are wearing solar-powered GPS tags. More info is here: mpala.org/vulturine-gu...

New research from @danielkronauer.bsky.social's lab in @pnas.org sheds light on how a young ant’s future is determined by genetics and the environment, finding that genes not only influence size, they change what a given size means for the colony. #RockefellerScience

The disapproving looks of a barred owl… Woodstock, NY

Check out our latest issue where we interview @danielkronauer.bsky.social, who studies the evolution and function of insect societies at Rockefeller University. www.cell.com/current-biol...

@danielkronauer.bsky.social talks about alloparental care in clonal raider 🐜 & how the ants' nutritional state affect this behavior. His lab also develops transgenic 🐜 used for Ca-imaging in the brain. www.cell.com/cell/fulltex... www.cell.com/current-biol...

Current Biology just published a Q&A with me where I talk about my journey as a scientist and why I enjoy interacting with artists. OA link: urldefense.com/v3/__https:/...

Congratulations to this year’s Hamilton Award winner, Kip Lacy, and Honorable Mentions Meagan Clark and Jeremy Summers! www.evolutionsociety.org/news/display... Watch their outstanding talks from virtual #Evol2025: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mzh3...

Massive congrats to @mendelslols.bsky.social for this very well deserved honor! 🍾🎈

Ant fathers are vastly under appreciated. OK, they die right after mating and don’t contribute much to colony life beyond their role as “flying sperm vessels”, but still, a single male can father thousands of daughters. Let’s wish this Camponotus americanus carpenter ant male a Happy Father’s Day.

Happy Father’s Day everyone! This tree swallow (Tachycineta bicolor) is being a good parent by literally stuffing its chick with yummy insects. Woodstock, NY.

Just saw this. This couldn’t have happened to a nicer and more accomplished evolutionary biologist. Congratulations Naomi! 🍾

And the prize for best hairdo goes to…drumroll…this bumblebee-mimicking robber fly (Laphria spec.). This dude is such a close mimic it almost fooled me last weekend. These flies are fierce predators of other insects including, well, bees. Thorn Preserve, Woodstock, NY.

The spiny caterpillar of the Baltimore Checkerspot (Euphydryas phaeton). Named after Lord Baltimore, this species is the official insect of Maryland. Thorn Preserve, Woodstock, NY.

Here’s a large Dorylus molestus army ant worker guarding the trail of its colony at Mount Kenya.

Congratulations to our graduates! 🥳

Here’s a series of pictures from a Dorylus molestus army ant swarm raid at Mount Kenya. At a height of about 1.7 meters up the vegetation, the ants encountered a large slug. The slug initially responded to the ant attack by secreting and encapsulating itself in a thick layer of mucus. 1/3

The dogbane leaf beetle (Chrysochus auratus) is an absolute gem. As the name suggests, these beetles eat dogbane, and have adapted to tolerate the plant’s toxins. Thanks to Caroline Chaboo for confirming the ID. Woodstock, NY.

Immigrant pavement ants (Tetramorium immigrans) originally hail from Europe but are now common in North America. In the spring, they fight intense territorial battles with neighboring colonies. The first image is a portrait, and the second shows them butchering a caterpillar. Woodstock, NY.

Here are a few more portraits of the myrmecophilous clown beetle Haeterius brunneipennis, a guest of Formica wood ants. Thanks to Alexey Tishechkin for the species ID. Woodstock, NY.

Crematogaster acrobat ants have heart-shaped butts, undoubtedly the cutest in the ant world. As the name suggests, they are also very flexible, bending their derrière forward and over the head when upset. Here, they are taking care of their larvae. Woodstock, NY.

Here’s a massive rove beetle, the golden-brown Platydracus maculosus, up to ca. 3 cm in length. An actively hunting predator of other arthropods, this dude looked like an insect version of a Komodo dragon or a honey badger to me. Woodstock, NY.

The myrmecophilous clown beetle Haeterius lives inside the nests of Formica wood ants. I found this specimen in a mixed colony of Formica sanguinea-group slave-making ants and their Formica fusca-group hosts in my garden. The beetle is just under 2mm long. Woodstock, NY.

This time of year you’re likely to observe clumps of foam like the one shown here on all kinds of plants. This photo is from last weekend in Woodstock, NY. Ever wonder what these things are? (1/3)

Carpenter ant mating flights are imminent in New York. Here are two gynes (young, virgin queens) collected from their natal nests in Woodstock: The American carpenter ant (Camponotus americanus) and the ferruginous carpenter ant (Camponotus chromaiodes).

I’ve got this rock in my garden with both a carpenter ant (Camponotus americanus) and a wood ant (Formica fusca group) colony under it. Every time I flip it over all hell breaks loose and the ants start killing each other. Ants aren’t exactly the best example of love thy neighbor… Woodstock, NY.

A highlight from today’s walk at Onteora Lake in the Catskills with @pbrand.bsky.social and @tomaskay.bsky.social was this Eastern Copperhead (Agkistrodon contortrix), one of the few venomous snakes in New York. They are very well camouflaged and tend not to move, so are hard to spot.

Would you like to organise a Workshop? Send us your idea for our 2027 #BiologistsWorkshops programme. We cover all costs so you can simply focus on the science. Apply by 30 May 2025. www.biologists.com/workshops/pr... #Collaboration #Science #Biology #Workshop

Here’s another spectacle of New York spring entomology: Eastern tent caterpillars (Malacosoma americanum) are among the most social lepidopterans. In May, you can find their silken tents, in which they aggregate (and defecate).

An old photo I took during my first field season with a macro lens - checks notes - ahem, 20 years ago, in May 2005. I hadn’t discovered flash diffusion yet. But it’s a rarely witnessed scene: Eciton burchellii army ant workers collective carry a massive male larva. Henri Pittier NP, 🇻🇪.

While “Berührungsangst” (the fear of contact) is generally the exception at @rockefelleruniv.bsky.social, here is an example of crown shyness on our beautiful spring campus.

Army ant colonies bring in a lot of prey and discard the leftovers in refuse piles. The refuse is a welcome resource for many other organisms, including various beetles. Here is an Ecitopora rove beetle scavenging among the prey remains of an Eciton burchellii colony in Costa Rica.

A nest of the northern paper wasp, Polistes fuscatus. The wasps like to build their nests under overhangs, especially of wooden houses. They masticate the wood they collect from the environment into a pulp, which they then use to construct their paper combs. Woodstock, NY.

Not that the internet needs more photos of monarch butterflies, but they’re just so pretty. Here’s my favorite stage, the chrysalis, with its golden ornamentations. The other image shows the fully grown caterpillar as it enters pupation. Woodstock, NY.

Here’s a very hungry little monarch caterpillar eating its way through a milkweed leaf. If you want to learn more about this relationship, @[email protected] wrote a nice book about the coevolution of monarchs and their host plants: press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...

I usually associate phasmids with the tropics, but it turns out there are two species native to New York. Here is the common walkingstick, Diapheromera femorata, which enjoys the oak trees in my garden. Small nymphs appear in May, and adults, like this one, in late summer. Woodstock, NY.

I had to make a voiceover of this post.

A bald-faced hornet fly (Spilomyia fusca; a syrphid, or hoverfly) and an actual bald-faced hornet (Dolichovespula maculata). The former is supposed to be a mimic of the latter, and I can believe that one might be fooled upon a cursory look. Woodstock, NY.