one of the greatest human triumphs of my lifetime is the relentless, unceasing, heroic effort by DECADES' worth of doctors and scientists to find a cure for a disease much of the world didn't take seriously for years because it predominantly affected a community they thought kinda deserved it

Solvitur ambulando is my favourite Latin phrase. It means "it is solved by walking".

#ProtistsOnSky no 'swimming' by 𝘝𝘢𝘮𝘱𝘺𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘢, definitively no 'staying still'. just a relaxed walk towards the lunch...

SMBE is calling for nominations for Best Graduate Student Papers of 2025, recognizing outstanding papers in @molbioevol.bsky.social and @genomebiolevol.bsky.social 🗓️ Deadline Feb 27 Articles published in 2025 are eligible. The nominated student must be first author; anyone can nominate authors.

New paper out in PNAS!!! 🎉 Do more plasmid copies mean faster evolution? 🧵 Dive into the story www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Registration now open for @embo.org workshop on the evolution of biological interactions on April 24 - 27, 2026! Come join us in Taipei, Taiwan to see how interactions shaped the genomes of various organisms and meeting people from across the globe. Info: meetings.embo.org/event/26-bio...

This is one of the most beautiful things I have witnessed, the craft here is impeccable.

A real treat to watch a male Lyrebird perform at the Healesville Sanctuary yesterday. Truly magnificent.

@laasya2.bsky.social @deepaagashe.bsky.social et al. quantified the growth cost of mistranslation rates and exposure to antibiotics in E. coli, finding that altered translation accuracy can shape adaptive outcomes. 🔗 doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msaf312 🖌️ Nishant Asawadekar #evobio #molbio

How do bacteria deal with double costs? And how costly are unusual levels of mistranslation anyway? In short - antibiotics are more of an issue than less/more mistranslation, but the latter changes how populations deal with antibiotics. For the long story, check out our new paper!

We have an early New Year present for you: 🎁The new #MVIF program is out🎁 Highlights: 🇳🇵 Bishwash Thapa 🇮🇷 Zahra Nezamivand Chegini Keynote: 🇨🇭 @saramitri.bsky.social Talks: 🇺🇸 @liliancaesar.bsky.social 🇮🇹 Haseeb Manzoor 🇦🇹 Laurenz Holcik Free registration: cassyni.com/s/mvif-45 See you in January!

The Congress Attendance Aid (CAA) Grant is offered by ESEB to promote equal participation, diversity, and accessibility @empseb31.bsky.social June 2025, Oberwiesenthal, Germany For more information and to apply click here: eseb.org/prizes-fundi...

A great piece below about science and art. And a great anecdote in the comments by @annfinkbeiner.bsky.social. Both ring pretty true to me.

ARTISTS! I need your help! In collab. w/the Society for Integrative & Comparative Biology, I'm organizing a group of artists to come to our Jan. meeting! We're looking for artists to create based on what they learn at the conference. $1000 stipend. Application is V short! forms.gle/ah1i8KwNJinZ...

Did you publish part of your PhD work in @journal-evo.bsky.social or @evolletters.bsky.social this year? Submit your paper for the SSE Presidents’ Award! Up to two recipients will each present an award talk during the virtual portion of #Evol2026 in May. Deadline: January 30. shorturl.at/CnVo6

Today is my birthday! 🎂 If you like my work and want to make my day, I only ask that you share my art and stories with someone who might enjoy them :) Or trick your gullible friend for a minute. That's also a good one.

Please apply for this, and/or encourage your mentees and peers to do so!

WE FOUND IT! We trekked day and night through tiger-patrolled Sumatran rainforests accessible only under permit for this: Rafflesia hasseltii. Few people have ever seen this flower, and we watched it open by night. Magic.

APPLICATIONS welcomed for the ESEB #Outreach Initiative Fund for educational initiatives that promote #evolution, public outreach seminars, public exhibitions, workshops, etc. Up to €4K available per project. eseb.org/prizes-fundi...

For a while (many years!) back, @eseb.bsky.social gave us €€€ to form a Special Topic Network. Formally, the network no longer exists, but informally for sure AND we can now pick the fruits of our labours! Here is one and the next post shows another... Thank you ESEB! 🙏

Deep in the Sumatran jungle today we found the extraordinary flowers of Rhizanthes pushing their fangs through the forest floor. A sap-sucking, leafless parasite, this is one of the world's weirdest plants.

I was thrilled to be interviewed by Matt Candeias for his cool podcast In Defense of Plants! Check it out if you want to hear about sagebrush, pitcher plants and leaf microbiomes! www.indefenseofplants.com/podcast/2025...

📣CALL FOR APPLICATIONS!! The next deadline for the #GodfreyHewitt mobility award is 31st January 2026. Open to ECRS in support of research trips or lab visits. For more information, eligibility and how to apply: eseb.org/prizes-fundi...

Excited to share our latest paper led by Ph.D. Candidate, Owen Hale, titled Elevated rates and Biased Spectra of Mutations in Anaerobically Cultured Lactic Acid Bacteria out now in mBio! journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

I wrapped up field work in Siang & Dibang Valleys, Arunachal Pradesh, India, two days ago. At my last rest stop, a stunning visitor landed on the dining table, as if saying, 'don't leave!'. It was Banded Redeye (Gangara lebadea; www.ifoundbutterflies.org/gangara-leba...). I'll be back next year!

Today, join #MVIF 43! We will discuss the new bioinformatics approaches, latest findings in drug development, cancer studies and more! There's still time to register: cassyni.com/s/mvif-43

Now accepting nominations for the Gould Prize, which recognizes an individual who has advanced public understanding of evolutionary science and its importance. The awardee will present a public lecture at #Evol2026 in Cleveland. Nominations due January 15! shorturl.at/jornc

We are excited to welcome our three new SMBE Fellows! Ioanna Kotari, Shady Kuster, and Haoran Cai will join @molbioevol.bsky.social and @genomebiolevol.bsky.social as writing fellows. Keep an eye on our next Highlight articles in MBE and GBE! #society #scicomm #evobio #molbio #genome #evolution

Out now at @plosbiology.org we evaluate the potential for antibiotic efflux and cell wall biogenesis as targets for reversing drug resistance and preventing its de novo evolution in Escherichia coli. Link below: journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

I'm the incoming SSE president and am behind this idea -- if you're interested in putting together an app and have questions, pls reach out!

I wrote a commentary about the recent paper by @deepaagashe.bsky.social and @vrindarvkm.bsky.social Also go have a look at the original paper if you haven't ! The timeframe of prediction for eco-evolutionary dynamics | PNAS www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

The MBE Best Student Paper award of 2024 goes to Julien Joseph (winner) and William S. Henriques (runner-up). 👏 Congratulations Julien and William for this recognition of your amazing work! Check below for details on their research ⬇️

Many sea stars begin life as young fairy-like creature (called a brachiolaria) that float through the open ocean. Eventually, a small star forms within them (here in yellow). The fairy-like brachiolaria sinks under the star’s weight, and the star pops out! 🎥@the_story_of_a_biologist (on Insta)

Due to the aforementioned school project, I've been inundated with dragon content in recent weeks. Yup, it's the school mascot. So I was transported back to my first Ecuador trip (2006), where we traveled deep into the Amazon, The highlight was... this Amazon Forest Dragon (yes, it was slow).

📢🦋 Our paper ‘Global selection on insect antipredator coloration’ is out and featured on the cover of @science.org We ran a huge experiment to find out how ecological context favours camouflage and warning colouration as antipredator strategies. 1/6 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Delighted to see our paper studying the evolution of plasmids over the last 100 years, now out! Years of work by Adrian Cazares, also Nick Thomson @sangerinstitute.bsky.social - this version much improved over the preprint. Final version should be open access, apols. Thread 1/n

The buff-tip moth (Phalera bucephala) has mastered a very particular kind of camouflage. When they close their wings up, they resemble a broken twig. Native to large parts of Europe, there's regional pattern variation that reflects the local tree species. This one best resembles birch twigs?

Sofya is a fantastic scientist and a super nice person. Definitely recommend finding a way to work with her!

About 10 years ago, we set up lots of experimental beetle populations, censused monthly. Expecting extinction, I said the workload would drop soon. But they all rescued themselves! 😱 So Vrinda & co kept counting. Many hundreds of thousands of beetles later, we have some neat outcomes. Enjoy!

NEW PAPER! Some kinds of genetic mutations are more likely to arise than others. Such "biases" in mutation vary between species. Analyzing data from 14 species, we show that this variation explains species differences in the genetics of adaptation! (1/3) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

*Congratulations* to former Darwin Trust-funded PhD student Arun Prakash for being awarded the Alfred Russel Wallace award from @royentsoc.bsky.social for his PhD on #immune regulation of disease #tolerance and immune #priming in #Drosophila! @edinburghbiology.bsky.social @uoe-eid.bsky.social

Sometimes we’re unsatisfied with a thing we made because when it only existed in our head, we saw all the things it could have been and when it’s done we know all the things that it isn’t, but we can’t see the way it expands into a million new things when someone else unpacks it in their head. 🖊️🦑

Season 5 is going to start 🔜 Check out the program and feel free to join the keynotes by presenting your work–abstract submission is open www.microbiome-vif.org/en-US/-/info... @kathlemon.bsky.social ‬ @saramitri.bsky.social @simrouxvirus.bsky.social @halllab.bsky.social @deepaagashe.bsky.social

Aurelien Tellier presenting the details of #eseb2027 which will be a hub meeting, with connected and local sessions in 4 hubs (Gothenburg, Munich, London, Istanbul) eseb2027.org #eseb2025

✨ Day 5 of #ESEB2025 wrapped! Thanks for an inspiring week: safe travels home, and see some of you tonight 🎉

So excited to share this new paper by @sulheim.bsky.social and others! It's rare that you find a pattern, propose a hypothesis and the more you look, the more data you find that fits! Snorre's intuition, hard work and rigour to put it all together have been inspiring! Let us know what you think...

New paper out @molbioevol.bsky.social on antimutator Ecoli, mutational spectra and the distribution of fitness effects of antibiotic resistance with @knightjar.bsky.social @rokkrasovec.bsky.social and others @mermanchester.bsky.social doi.org/pzfm Read🧵for highlights and fun stats (1/13)

Very cool work, showing how to increase adaptation rates with very specific tuning of local mutation rates!