Sometimes you just get that shot. Anna's hummingbird with a little friend, in my yard. Davis, CA. #birds #ants

❄️🧬 Can we generate high-quality reference genomes without the cold chain? A new study suggests the answer is yes. DNA preserved at room temperature for up to one week produced chromosome-scale reference genomes. 📖 tinyurl.com/3zwtj9ka #Genomes @gigascience.bsky.social @sangerinstitute.bsky.social

Can highly recommend joining Emília's awesome group in Cambridge.

🚨 Exciting news! The Swiss Ornithological Institute is starting a collaborative program that offers multi-sensor geolocators and analytical support for bird migration research, focusing on underrepresented species & regions. Interested? geopressure.org/GeoCollabForm/ Please share!

The @smbe-idea.bsky.social symposium at #SMBE2026 was packed with inspiring talks and thought-provoking discussion. Thank you for the opportunity to share how @projectpsyche.bsky.social & @10klepgenomes.bsky.social is making biodiversity genomics more inclusive!

Enjoying an excellent Entomology Congress #ECE2026 in Tours, France. Jean-Michel Drezen and I hosted a genomics symposium. Lots of @projectpsyche.bsky.social members here. @pedrogribeiro.bsky.social gave an excellent talk on the @10klepgenomes.bsky.social COST Action.

Here at the @ece2026tours.bsky.social to talk about the amazing @10klepgenomes.bsky.social COST Action and how we are collaborating with @projectpsyche.bsky.social and #LepEU to obtain reference genomes of all European moths and butterflies!

I’m excited to be at #SMBE2026! I’m keen to talk to people about chromosome evolution/centromeres in the polycentric sedges and rushes (see poster or www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...) … … or about population genomics of soil arthropods!

Tens of thousands celebrated Budapest Pride, the first since Viktor Orbán’s ousting.

Congratulations to Prof Richard Durbin, winner of the 2026 Genetics Society Medal! His pioneering work in computational genomics has transformed how we analyse and understand genome sequences.

Bit late posting this... MicroFinder is now published in GigaScience: academic.oup.com/gigascience/....

Finally some good climate news!

So excited to announce our search for 4 postdocs (funded by the Simons Foundation) who will use genomics to "test how ecological interactions, natural selection, natural enemies, hybridization & environmental gradients shape...tropical tree communities" in Panama: stri.si.edu/story/bci-ev... ...1

So I'm finally thoroughly parsing through this preprint from @bjesseshapiro.bsky.social & Patrick Lypaczewski where they homebrewed targeted ONT library prep, and it's even more brilliant than at first glance. Plus they've been so generous in answering my questions. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Kicking off @10klepgenomes.bsky.social field workshop in Vlahi 🇧🇬 Butterfly & moth afficinados from all over Europe start deploying their beautiful light traps to capture undersampled #biodiversityhotspots for #referencegenome sequencing. Stay tuned for more! @projectpsyche.bsky.social

A world-class education is now completely free — MIT has opened its entire vault of more than 2,500 courses to the public online. source: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. (2026). About Us: MIT OpenCourseWare. MIT Open Learning. 😊

🚨 Why can’t mammals regenerate limbs like frog tadpoles or salamanders? In our new paper in @science.org , we show that species-specific oxygen sensing acts as a gatekeeper for initiating limb regeneration 🐭🐸 🔗 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... #EvoDevo

On my way back after 2 inspiring and thoughtprovoking days in Edinburgh where we hosted a @royalsociety.org meeting on Pangenomics. Many thanks to co-organisers @charlottewright.bsky.social, @henrylnorth.bsky.social, to Ash Carver for handling the logistics, the excellent speakers and all attendees.

Jialin Wei: very nice results on convergence of genome evolution with terrestrialisation in animal evolution #eed2026 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025-09722-4

Delighted to announce that this year’s Schering Young Investigator Award has been awarded to Can Aztekin, Max-Planck-Research Group Leader. Congratulations Can! Read the full article: www.bio.mpg.de/524116/can-a...

Congrats to Nik Cunniffe and colleagues! Truly ambitious and impactful science

These days, you may have seen many Painted Ladies (Vanessa cardui) 👀🦋 But did you know they make an extraordinary journey of more than 10,000 km between Africa and Europe, across successive generations? 🌍 🔗 Download the poster here: catalanbms.org/en/recursos/

Adorable young kestrels surprised by a butterfly.

There are few researchers for whom an entire field is so clearly distinct before and after their work. The gap between evolutionary biology "before Joe" and "after Joe" is just awesome. It is a measurably different enterprise, and the reach of his influence doesn't end at the phylogeny. Hats off!

A big preprint from my group! Muller Elements are considered to be conserved in flies. We tested it by reconstructing the ancestral dipteran karyotype using 340 chromosomal genomes and suprise suprise, they're not... Led by @juliagries.bsky.social and Sam Ebdon. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... 🧵👇

📢Job alert: #Curator (m/f/d) for the #Ornithology collection at @leibnizlib.bsky.social in Hamburg. 🐦🦉🦅🪶🥚 Application deadline: July 1, 2026. For more details and application see: 8101202752.karriereportal.cloud/job/2026-18-.... Please share.

Asst Professor - Plant or Fungal Genomics // University of Wyoming jobs.chronicle.com/job/37995586... The Department of Botany and the School of Computing invites applications for a tenure-track position in Plant or Fungal Genomics at the rank of Assistant Professor. #BotanyJobs

postdoc alert 🚨! NIH-funded postdoc in my lab to work on Ancestral Recombination Graphs in space. Please spread the word widely in your networks, and please reach out if you're interested! (2-3yr position, start date flexible, pay/benefits good!). details here: careers.umich.edu/job_detail/2...

If you are interested in collecting specimens for chromosomal genomes and/or generating chromosomal reference genomes from specimens that were not cold-chain preserved, please read on and share this thread.

How do we get ahead of the 1000 cuts to science? How do position leaders to implement the changes we desired before Tmonkey happened? Who’s working on that blueprint, that vision, that future? How do I help that plan? I gotta be working towards something I believe in … 🧬🧪

Here's one for you: our paper has been sent to three journals over the course of nine months... without a full review. The first journal found ONE person. The last journal tried 15 times and no dice. What on earth. Anyone want to read a paper about emperor penguins? 🦉🦑🌍🧪

This needs to be emphasized

No clue what a springtail is? Never fret. We've interviewed the UK's national springtail biological recorder and PhD student @jamesimcc.bsky.social . Head to our blog to learn more ⤵️ https://sangerinstitute.blog/2026/03/26/studying-soils-unsung-heroes/ 📸 Tim Jonas #NameItToSaveIt

Today is taxonomy appreciation day. Researchers like @jamesimcc.bsky.social , @joanameier.bsky.social and @charlottewright.bsky.social have taught me the importance of taxonomy for their genomics research. Now, I understand full-well how these specialisms coexist and work together. ☯️ #NameItToSaveIt

Hi Genetics/Comp-Bio community 👋 Interested in mentoring a comp-bio research student in East Africa over the summer? Do you have any experience in bioinformatics, biostats, genome/RNA-seq analyses, ML, or metagenomics? We'd love to have you as a mentor in our new program! 🧵 (1/n)

Join us for another @speciation-network.bsky.social seminar, this time on the ecological and geographical axes of speciation by Ingrid Olivares and Alexandre Siqueira on 2 June, at 10 am CEST. More details and Zoom link here: speciation-network.pages.ist.ac.at/seminar-seri...

"A career in pursuit of the origin of species: celebrating Roger Butlin’s contributions to the advancement of knowledge and growth of our scientific community" A very nicely written piece on Roger's impressive work and philosophy. He inspired countless people. academic.oup.com/jeb/article/...

🚨Job claxon🚨 4-year #Postdoc available in our lab in @camzoology.bsky.social developing molecular and anatomical approaches to mapping evolutionary changes in the brain, using #Heliconiini butterflies. Come join us, we are nice. 🧪 www.cam.ac.uk/jobs/researc...

Generalovic et al. studied the genetics of the black soldier fly, finding two highly divergent genetic clusters and signatures of domestication bottlenecks in this key species for the global industry of insects food and feed. 🔗 doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evag097 #genome #evolution

VOTE NOW for Britain's Favourite Butterfly! 🦋 Flashy, adventurous or fantastically freaky. The UK is home to 60 species of butterfly, each with their own unique story. But who will be crowned the nation's favourite? 👑 Vote for your favourite 👉 britainsfavouritebutterfly.co.uk?utm_source=S...

Interested in comparing speciation across taxonomic groups? Join the @speciation-network.bsky.social in Glasgow, 7-11 December, to work together populating our speciation database and analysing the results. More infos and application links: speciation-network.pages.ist.ac.at/workshops/

🧬 Gain expert-led training in using k-mers and sequence graphs for pangenomes! #ScalableGenomics26 Join us on for hands-on training in how to design scalable genomics programmes, tailored to multi-genome and population studies. 📅 11–16 October ⏰ Applications close 22 June 🔗 bit.ly/4dcg8ur

Our warmest and wildest 100th birthday wishes to Sir David Attenborough, vice-patron of our Society. Today, we are celebrating Priam's Birdwing, which he said he would include in his "ark" to protect from extinction. This illustration is from E Donovan's "An Epitome of...Insects of India" (1800).

Oh my. This is spectacular. sinceyouarrived.world/taken

Congratulations, Roger!

🔔This Wednesday we are excited to have three amazing ECR talks at #FragileNucleosome by Ujani, @ewholling.bsky.social & @germainekaram.bsky.social ! Don't forget to subscribe to our series! us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

New PLOS Biology paper arising from a collaboration between us at the Sanger/U Cambridge and the U York and Sheffield, and many more collaborators across the Americas and Europe. Regulatory changes in the same genes (optix, ivory) led to the same colour patterns in mimetic butterflies and moths.

A team led by @anthropocenebio.bsky.social and @sangerinstitute.bsky.social with researchers from South America has found that some butterfly and moth species reuse the same two genes to evolve near identical colour patterns 🦋 Open access paper in @plosbiology.org doi.org/10.1371/jour... 🔓 📄

Read ‘Genetic parallelism underpins convergent mimicry coloration in Lepidoptera across 120 million years of evolution' from @york.ac.uk @sangerinstitute.bsky.social @joanameier.bsky.social, et al., in @plosbiology.org ⤵️ journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...