Postdoc Opportunity! 4-year @royalsociety.org funded post @uniexecec.bsky.social: “Understanding the role of individual cognitive variation in reintroduction biology”. Closes: 5 June 2026. More info & to apply: careers.exeter.ac.uk/vacancies/78... Wt: @paradiseparkhayle.bsky.social & Wildwood Trust

Got a #microbiome event coming up? If you are organising a seminar, workshop, conference session or public talk on the microbiome, you can submit it to World Microbiome Day for promotion. worldmicrobiomeday.com We help amplify microbiome research and engagement around the world. #worldmicrobiomeday

🚨🚨 Good news alert! 🚨🚨 We've rounded up five inspiring science stories – including the discovery of a new species, and a promising medical treatment for a fatal mitochondria disease. go.nature.com/4d0b1vG

Are you looking to sequence a bunch of samples from a wild population in low-coverage but don't have a reference panel? You might be surprised how well it can work. See for yourself in our new benchmark study: doi.org/10.1093/molb...

ABSTRACTS OPEN! We have an incredible line up for our Avian Disease Ecology conference next year. This is such an exciting field right now - if you’re working on avian pathogens, parasites, AMR, immunity, or non-infectious disease (pollutants, etc) then consider submitting an abstract!

🚨Deadline 30/04! PhD opportunity: 🐾 Mapping the Manor: How are the lives of meerkats shaped by their sleeping & breeding burrows? 🐾 💡 Big ecological Qs 📡 Geophysics tech + data 🌍 Fieldwork with me, @geophysics-adam.bsky.social & @aldinafranco.bsky.social APPLY NOW: www.uea.ac.uk/course/phd-d...

Seeking a motivated postdoc (2+3 yrs) to study links between cognition, behavior, and fitness in lemurs at our long-term field site in Kirindy Forest, Madagascar. Join an interdisciplinary team working on wild populations. @primatenzentrum.bsky.social. Apply here: www.dpz.eu

A Seychelles warbler genomic toolkit https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.04.16.719046v1

📃New paper in Ecology letters 🐦 I’m delighted to share the publication of the first paper from my #postdoc with @samanthacpatrick.bsky.social looking at life-history trade-offs and #senescence in black-browed #albatrosses from Kerguelen and Bird Island doi.org/10.1111/ele.70384

Exciting work from our lab! @amberhall.bsky.social and Matthew Shackleton-Chavez validated the first 7SK Pol III promoter in a Tephritid fly, Ceratitis capitata. A new tool for gRNA expression in #CRISPR editing of this major agricultural pest. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... #SynBio #Entomology

New paper out: Artificial selection for increased reproductive effort accelerates actuarial senescence and reduces lifespan in a precocial bird url: royalsocietypublishing.org/rspb/article... @uniexecec.bsky.social @erikpostma.bsky.social @joelpick.bsky.social y.social @oscarvedder.bsky.social

Remember this? Today in class something fascinating happened... We discussed this as an example of bad visual design because it distorts the impression of the height difference between countries. Then I set the task of making their own public engagement visuals on fresh data...

“The idea behind code review is not to judge people, but to check for errors and explain coding best practices.” Happy to be part of a recent piece that amongst other things, discusses code review: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Are you an ECR and working on wild microbiomes and wish to attend the microbiome workshop during the ExE conference? Funding to support attendance deets here:

🚨 Please share: PhD opportunity 🐾 Mapping the Manor: How are the lives of meerkats shaped by their sleeping & breeding burrows? 🐾 💡 Big ecological Qs 📡 Geophysical scanning 🌍 Field ecology & behaviour 📊 Big data & code with me & @geophysics-adam.bsky.social APPLY www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

How your housemates could be changing your gut bacteria The gut microbiome – which consists of bacteria, viruses and fungi – is shaped by our surroundings, including who we live with

How your housemates could be changing your gut bacteria: Scientists at the University of East Anglia (UEA) have found that living with housemates, partners, or family can lead to the exchange of gut bacteria through daily interactions like hugging, kissing, and sharin… https://ranked.news/609591?u=b

Could your housemates be changing your #gut #bacteria? ... | #microbes | #birds | #microbiomes | #microbiota | By @uniofeastanglia.bsky.social via @eurekalert.bsky.social

Attention ECRs! WAME is offering support to attend the ExE conference in Falmouth (sites.exeter.ac.uk/exe/) & associated WAME microbiome workshop. For more information and the application form, see below! We hope to see you there! 🦠 docs.google.com/document/d/1...

The only time I answer the door

The answer might be 42, but what’s the question? I’ll be giving a talk at @pintofscience.uk in Norwich on May 20: “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Life in the Universe”. Come along if you’re around! #PintOfScience #Astrobiology pintofscience.co.uk/event/from-t...

Research on a colony of tiny island birds reveals they share more of their gut bacteria with the birds they spend the most time with. And the team say the same principle almost certainly applies to humans too.

Dr Chuen Zhang Lee, from @biouea.bsky.social, has carried out a new study that has found that living with friends may be altering your gut bacteria. Read more: https://bit.ly/4dAxUbb #ResearchMatters

New paper! 🐦🦠 Social Structure and Interactions Differentially Shape Aerotolerant and Anaerobic Gut Microbiomes in a Cooperative Breeding Species doi.org/10.1111/mec.... A 🧵

JOB ALERT: Two 4.5 year postdoctoral positions to work on my Wellcome-funded project 'Conserving Global Health: Biodiversity Protection and the Prehistory of Planetary Health'. Please share widely! CLOSING DATE: 23 April (the date on Jobs.ac.uk is apparently incorrect)

Deadline is April 20th! Let’s get those viruses

#5MinuteMerlin at home in Norwich: Great Tit, Common Wood Pigeon, Collared Dove, Wren, Goldfinch, Dunnock, Blue Tit, Robin and Siskin (probably wrong). Pretty good!

Great to chat with @caordonezparra.bsky.social about the ordinary and extraordinary lives of plants for @botany.one

New review paper on bird #microbiome methods out! Bridging the gap: improving methodologies for future avian microbiome research 🐦🦠🧬 #OA @avianbiology.bsky.social @charlisdavies.bsky.social @kbodawatta.bsky.social nsojournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

In my latest #MeetingPlantScientists post, I interview @alexmcbowles.bsky.social, who is tackling one of the most fascinating questions in plant science: what drives the extraordinary diversity of plants and algae? @botany.one #Botany #PlantScience 🧪 www.botany.one/alex-bowles-...

Looking for MSc student(s) to be involved in some really cool germ-free experiments with house sparrows at @niooknaw.bsky.social @animalecol-nioo.bsky.social ! 🐣🦠Get in touch if you're interested and please share :) nioo.knaw.nl/en/vacancies...

Super excited for my first ever Instagram Live with Dr. Shivam Tiwari, a marine biologist and project scientist at CMLRE, India. Always happy to share my experiences ✨ Follow @aurkitnapadhoge on Instagram to attend such fantastic and informative sessions.

📻🎙️🔊 New podcast! Student paper prize winner Eléonore Lavanchy talks about: 1. Her work 2. European Barn Owls 3. Inbreeding 4. Deciding if she was being scammed, or if she'd really won the prize! 👂 shorturl.at/rcF2F @dee-unil.bsky.social @sib.swiss @fbm-unil.bsky.social @gensocuk.bsky.social

We now know that dog domestication happened more than 14,000 years ago, thanks to new research from the Crick, @uniofeastanglia.bsky.social and @mpi-eva-leipzig.bsky.social, shedding light on how the first farmers adopted hunter-gatherer dogs. www.crick.ac.uk/news/2026-03...

Congratulations to our very own @anders-bergstrom.bsky.social for this fantastic paper on the 'Genomic history of early dogs in Europe' highlighted on the cover of Nature. #UEAScience

Nature research paper: Genomic history of early dogs in Europe go.nature.com/40TcDSA

Out today is our paper 'Genomic history of early dogs in Europe', in which we uncover the identity of the dogs that lived in Europe before agriculture—during the Paleolithic & Mesolithic periods: doi.org/10.1038/s415.... A thread ⬇️ (10) @biouea.bsky.social @crick.ac.uk @mpi-eva-leipzig.bsky.social

Braaaains, er, genomes ... Researchers have resurrected ‘dead’ bacterial cells by replacing their defunct DNA with the working genome of another species. go.nature.com/40Tfrio

In #Microbiome 🚨MHC-I effects on the gut microbiome of wild Seychelles warbler 🔍Using shotgun metagenomics to explore how variation in MHC genes shapes the taxonomy & function of the gut microbiome 👉 doi.org/qwcp #OpenAccess

The findings from a new study show that immune genes shared by all vertebrates – including humans – interact closely with gut bacteria.

Next talk 👇🏼 🦠 Sharing microbes through social behaviour Chuen explores how social interactions in wild birds shape the transmission of gut microbiomes, with close contact increasing the sharing of key anaerobic microbes. 🔗 ecoevorxiv.org/repository/v... @chuenlee.bsky.social #CEECRebellion2026

By studying wild birds in the natural environment, researchers were able to show that variation in major histocompatibility complex (MHC) immune genes is closely associated with both the makeup and the function of gut bacteria 🦠

Fantastic talk by @jj255.bsky.social

Island birds reveal surprising link between immunity and gut bacteria https://www.vitaminrush.com/318974/island-birds-reveal-surprising-link-between-immunity-and-gut-bacteria/ image:  The Seychelles warbler has revealed a surprising link between immunity and gut bacteria view more  Credit: …

⏳2 days to go! #CEECRebellion2026 is almost there 🌿 @aldinafranco.bsky.social @drgdavidson.bsky.social @thiagobacouto.bsky.social @katiemillar.bsky.social @gargi93.bsky.social @chuenlee.bsky.social @nashalselection.bsky.social @marius-somveille.bsky.social @mattgenetics.bsky.social

🐦What can we learn about our own health from the Seychelles warbler? Dr Chuen Zhang Lee & his team @rug.nl @uniofeastanglia.bsky.social have uncovered a hidden link between gut health and the immune system, thanks to this small songbird.🎵 Curious? Read more👇 🔗 www.rug.nl/fse/news/cli... 🧪 #SciComm

I’m grateful to @microbiomej.bsky.social for publishing this work. Many thanks to the editors and reviewers for their thoughtful feedback.

Scientists @uniofeastanglia.bsky.social including Leverhulme Early Career Fellow @sarahfworsley.bsky.social have uncovered a hidden link between gut health and the immune system – all thanks to a tiny island bird. link.springer.com/article/10.1... @springernature.com @david-s-richardson.bsky.social

The researchers studied the Seychelles warbler and collected the birds' poo to analyse their gut bacteria and found that their immune genes influence which gut microbes thrive.

Prof David Richardson from @biouea.bsky.social has been the senior researcher on a study that has uncovered a hidden link between gut health and the immune system – all thanks to a tiny island bird. Read more: https://bit.ly/4cIV4vs #ResearchMatters #NewStudy #GutHealth