Add enough environmental noise to a mosquito-borne disease model and epidemics that R0 says should happen simply don't. But at intermediate noise, you get the biggest outbreaks. New paper in PLOS Comp Biol with Kyle Dahlin, Karin Ebey, and John Vinson. doi.org/10.1371/jour...

🐟🦐 Come work with us! We’re offering a PhD position in marine life-history modeling as part of the Arctic Ocean 2050 program. The position is based at the Theoretical Ecology Group at the University of Bergen in Norway. www.jobbnorge.no/nn-no/ledige...

Timeline cleanse: Baby tapir getting scritches for their itches. If you want to scritch your very own tapir & you live outside of Central or South America or SE Asia, you'll need to visit a zoo. But these little guys are (evolutionarily) from around here, in North America. Let's talk about it.

Re-upping this @uio.no starter pack. Let me know if you want to be added! go.bsky.app/EMD9mq2

Five years after the rollout of Covid-19 vaccines started, it seems the mystery of why the Astra-Zeneca and J&J vaccines led to a rare but deadly side effect of unusual blood clots and bleeding has finally been solved. 
 It's a fascinating case of molecular mimicry that may help make vaccine safer.🧪

No joke: I got angry hate mail today for writing an obituary of a Black woman scientist—because the person felt she did didn’t deserve the recognition. Which just makes me want to share it again: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Really interesting and confounding trend reported in Dynamic Ecology - ecology citations peaked in 2021 and have been declining since. Continued impact from the pandemic? 🧪🌐🌾 dynamicecology.wordpress.com/2026/01/14/s...

We seek a highly motivated, enthusiastic candidate who has completed a #PhD in #ecotoxicology or related fields. Candidates with experience in experiments with soil invertebrates, especially #springtails, and publishing papers in leading journals are highly encouraged to apply! #SoilStress

📖 Big news! We just released the first five chapters of our new book, Hello Data Science. It is a fully open-access resource written for beginners. Please help us spread the word! A few points about the book are below 👇 🔗 www.hellodata.science #rstats #datascience #tidyverse

Can't pass ACA extensions but don't worry. We're going to probe whether Lyme disease is a US bioweapon instead.

Animals with misleading names. I'm seeing this go around as part of a viral tumblr thread so I thought I'd reshare it.

To “my students and to anyone who might listen, I say: Don’t surrender to AI your ability to read, write and think when others once risked their lives and died for the freedom to do so.” www.huffpost.com/entry/histor...

Dette er en stor dag for meg! Min spalte nummer hundre som spaltist for @dagsavisen.bsky.social! Jeg skriver om KI-boomen sett gjennom svindelens briller. Har vi egentlig råd til å være det mest lettlurte offeret for amerikanske tek-sjarlataner? Del gjerne, så flest mulig LLMer skraper teksten!

Yet again, we can't afford to let LLMs become a source of epistemic grounding for society.

NEW: @CDCgov hit hard by massive firings that several staff describe to me as a “bloodbath.” Among those RIFd: —leadership of the center for immunization and respiratory diseases; —leadership of global health center —leadership of the measles outbreak response; 1/4

“It actually doesn’t take much to be considered a difficult woman. That’s why there are so many of us.” ― Jane Goodall 💙 RIP to a real one. My childhood hero

Some personal news: I've been fired from the Washington Post in the aftermath of the Charlie Kirk shooting. Thread incoming. substack.com/@karenattiah...

A common type of ant in Europe breaks a fundamental rule in biology: its queens can produce male offspring that are a whole different species go.nature.com/4mOb5T9

Just a heads up to anyone using Firefox:

An ambitious new report, commissioned by #TheLancet, seeks to reframe #OneHealth to be an even more encompassing framework. I spoke with co-chairs Andrea Winkler and John Amuasi about their process. The report: www.thelancet.com/journals/lan... My interview: www.forbes.com/sites/johndr...

“The study authors asked GPT 4o-mini to evaluate the quality of 217 papers. The tool didn’t mention in any of the reports that the papers being analyzed had been retracted or had validity issues. In 190 cases, GPT described the papers as world leading, internationally excellent, or close to that”

Associate Professor position in animal physiology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (to replace me basically). An amazing permanent position at a great university! Please spread widely 🙏 www.jobbnorge.no/en/available...

Vaccines are our greatest scientific achievement. This is criminal.

WTF? I was quoted in this story but I have never spoken to the reporter nor would I have said those things. Is everything just generated by LLMs these days? cosmosmagazine.com/earth/oceans...

Do ectotherms age more strongly in warm environments? And if so, does it mean reduced fitness and population viability in a warmer world? We investigated these questions in a recent study based on an experiment with Daphnia magna (1/7) @t-ergon.bsky.social @biovitenskap.bsky.social

Would you pay $169 for an introductory ebook on machine learning with citations that appear to be made up? Intern Rita Aksenfeld's first story for Retraction Watch

“Historically, no one lived past age 35” "I’ve heard *so* many versions of this claim, including recently from a menopause doctor (implying menopause is not “natural” because noone lived long enough to go through it). Every time someone states this “fact,” a demographer loses a piece of their soul"

I’ve warned that this was only a matter of time, but it’s still shocking to see in person. Here AI generated content is being used to create a fake news ecosystem, disparaging a professor who has been critical of unscientific bullshit in the form of deextinction hype.

Entire Fulbright board quits, citing Trump administration interference

Proposed cut to NSF Biology budget is 70%. 70%. Seventy. Call your senators & reps nonstop. Give them numbers on NSF impact for state/district. tableau.external.nsf.gov/views/NSFbyN... explain this will decimate the economy if their districts, especially if it has a major research univ. 🧪

🚨 URGENT RESPONSE CALL 🚨 Trump’s Fool’s Gold Science EO is a dangerous sham. It gives his appointees the power to dismiss entire bodies of research and punish researchers who fail to fall in line with his agenda. We’ve launched an open letter. SIGN & SHARE NOW: actionnetwork.org/petitions/op...

NSF grant terminations are disproportionately affecting underrepresented scientists. 58% of canceled grants have women PIs, despite making up only 34% of awards. 17% of canceled grants have Black PIs (versus 4% of the pool). Hispanic and disabled PIs are twice as likely to have NSF grants canceled.

I wrote about the widespread adoption of AI in education, and why there needs to be more resistance to it open.substack.com/pub/irinadum...

What scientists know as "mites" is almost certainly an artificial taxonomic group, according to recent phylogenetic analyses and studies using advanced microscopic techniques.

In only two years, ChatGPT has unraveled the entire academic project. James D. Walsh writes for @intelligencer.com: nymag.com/intelligence....

The Department of Natural History at NTNU is seeking an ambitious candidate for an open position as associate professor in vertebrate evolutionary genomics. Please see 👇 for details. Deadline for applications is May 25. www.jobbnorge.no/en/available...

The final question in the exam for one my online classes is "What is the most exciting or useful thing you learned in this class?"— this time around, it was shocking to see a bunch of LLM-generated answers (one even including "Certainly, I can help you think of something useful from your class…") 😢

Has anyone else caught on to this?

Even accepting the premise that AI produces useful writing (which no one should), using AI in education is like using a forklift at the gym. The weights do not actually need to be moved from place to place. That is not the work. The work is what happens within you.

Looking for a PhD? There is an opening for a PhD-student in evolutionary ecology on phenotypic plasticity in aquatic organisms at NTNU in Trondheim, Norway – with two super-good supervisors (Sigurd Einum and Tim Burton) - highly recommended! www.jobbnorge.no/en/available...

This is Wisdom, the oldest known wild bird in the world. Estimated at 74 years old, this Laysan albatross has outlived multiple partners and still lays eggs, with her last chick hatching on January 30, 2025. Since 1956, she has survived earthquakes, tsunamis, and had her tag changed six times.

I wrote about how population stratification in genetic analyses led to a decade of false findings and almost certainly continues to bias emerging results. But we are starting to have statistical tools to sniff it out. A 🧵:

For a long time we've known about the negative impacts of over-abundant deer in global forests. A sudden crash in their populations from Chronic Wasting Disease is not necessarily to be welcomed though. 1/12 🌏 🧪🌐

Trump, Musk, Vance, Vought, etc are systematically destroying: 1. Scientific research in the United States. 2. The talent pipeline for this research. 3. The university system itself. 4. The careers of thousands of people like Dr. Minor For what? Politics? Resentment? Thiel? Putin? Thread:

Lower survival rate among trainees in labs with highly productive mentors raises important concerns about what we value in academia. Many interesting things to stew over with this paper! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

“We are losing sight of the academic mission: to think, to enquire, to design and perform new research, to innovate, to teach and communicate our findings for the purpose of societal improvement” academic.oup.com/brain/articl...

Nothing will kill more children than the ongoing decimation of CDC, NIH, and USAID work to lift vaccine uptake in the US and world. Child survival rose 75% in the last 50 years. Vaccines account for 40% of that. Measles vax alone was 60% of the benefit. www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...

Registration to the 10th annual Evolutionary Demography Society is now open. See you all at @pembrokeoxford.bsky.social 22-24 Sept 2025. Early-bird ends April 15th: evodemo2025.weebly.com Please share @biology.ox.ac.uk @oxforddemsci.bsky.social @britishecologicalsociety.org @evoldir.bsky.social

In case RFK Jr convinced you that he is not anti-vax, but merely "skeptical" & concerned about vaccine safety...look here NIH is terminating awards to obtain reliable data on vaccine hesitancy & ways to improve uptake. This is an explicitly anti-vax policy. www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...