Why are some species widespread while others are found only in small, isolated areas? A study in Nature Communications shows that species with narrow ranges, and thus higher extinction risk, are often island-restricted, poor dispersers, and have evolved relatively recently. #evosky 🧪

New short paper from our lab @currentbiology.bsky.social, in which we discover of a new mode of cell motility for choanoflagellates: flagellar gliding. www.cell.com/current-biol... - A 🧵

How many chromosomes can an animal have? In our paper out now in @currentbiology.bsky.social we show that the Atlas blue butterfly has 229 chromosome pairs- the highest in diploid Metazoa! These arose by rapid autosome fragmentation while sex chromosomes stayed intact. www.cell.com/current-biol...

🧪Discovery of calcarins in @elife.bsky.social, a protein family in the sponge Sycon ciliatum, clarifies spicule formation and suggests parallel evolution of carbonate biomineralization in sponges & corals—key for animals as ecosystem engineers of reefs. @lmumuenchen.bsky.social #molpalmuc

Congrats! Such a needed message, this debate has gone very quickly from "probably no macrosyntenic conservation in animals", to "holy molly, sponges to amphixous are the same!", to "look, new rearrangements must be adaptive". Neat to see such a clear link with rate of molecular evolution.

My dispatch on early echinoderms (www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...) is now out in @currentbiology.bsky.social www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

My first steps into paleontology!! 😀 Big thanks to @imranrahman.bsky.social for having me on this cool project to look at some fascinating echinoderm fossils ⭐

Delighted to share the peer-reviewed version of our study led by @tomlewin.bsky.social now out in Genome Biology @bmc.springernature.com! We analyzed 64 chromosome-level genomes across 15 animal phyla and found that extensive genome rearrangements are the norm in bilaterians. doi.org/10.1186/s130...

Delighted to share the peer-reviewed version of our study led by @tomlewin.bsky.social now out in Genome Biology @bmc.springernature.com! We analyzed 64 chromosome-level genomes across 15 animal phyla and found that extensive genome rearrangements are the norm in bilaterians. doi.org/10.1186/s130...

Chaetognaths have lost gene body methylation and shifted #5mC back to Transposable Elements. This reversion to the ancestral state is coupled with a simplification of DNMT3 architecture. We posit that trans-splicing might compensate. It is an honour to have contributed to this 20y struggle ⛰️.

#BiologyLetters A review of animal–chlorophyte photosymbioses explains how symbiosis drives adaptation and shapes animal life in diverse and dynamic environments. royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/... #ecology #evolution #developmentalbiology

A genome sequence and single-cell atlas of a marine worm species point towards bursts of gene emergence, duplication and loss as the drivers of lineage-specific body traits go.nature.com/4oAI2nf

After nearly twenty years in the making, our attempt at understanding what makes the chaetognath phylum so unique has finally been published! www.nature.com/articles/s41... with #LauraPiovani @dariagavr.bsky.social @alexdemendoza.bsky.social @chemamd.bsky.social and others /1

These genome structure papers on obscure animals keep getting wilder! 🧪🦑

A feature in Nature reports on how journals and funders are trying to boost the speed and effectiveness of the peer review processes that are under strain. #Academicsky 🧪

Very happy to share the peer-reviewed version of our work on the cis-regulatory determinants of #microexon #splicing regulation by SRRM3/4, published in @natsmb.nature.com! rdcu.be/ezGqT Work led by @sobonnal.bsky.social, with Simon Bajew & @rmartinezcorral.bsky.social. @crg.eu @upf.edu

Calling all scientists with an interest in photography! The @royalsocietypublishing.org Photography Competition closes this coming Friday 15 August, with categories including Astronomy, Behaviour, Earth Science & Climatology, Ecology and more: #RSPphotocomp royalsociety.org/journals/pub...

Happy to see our latest work out in @molbioevol.bsky.social. We revisit the evolution of 5-methylcytosine across neglected eukaryotic supergroups, establishing an ancestral repressive role silencing genome invaders, both transposons and viral elements👾: academic.oup.com/mbe/advance-... 🧵 1/7

We're recruiting a postdoc to study animal–algal symbiosis in green hydra at Academia Sinica, Taipei. If you're interested in symbiosis, genome biology, and sequencing technologies, get in touch! More at: sgel.biodiv.tw

Congratulations to Jana Ordon and all coauthors!!! Our new study is published in @natureplants.bsky.social "Conserved immunomodulation and variation in host association by Xanthomonadales commensals in Arabidopsis root microbiota" (0/n) rdcu.be/eauzt

Delighted to share our paper in @currentbiology.bsky.social iology.bsky.social‬ with a palaeo-evo-devo perspective on the evolution of symmetry in echinoderms. Led by Steffi Woodgate with Frankie Dunn, @echinerd.bsky.social, @laurentformery.bsky.social & Sam Zamora www.cell.com/current-biol...-5

Corey Allard and Amy Lee discuss curious "solar-powered" animals that steal and maintain foreign chloroplasts for photosynthesis and starvation resistance. @harvardcellbio.bsky.social, @danafarbernews.bsky.social. news.harvard.edu/gazette/stor...

90% of doing science is being open to new ideas.

For the recent coral reef science arrivals, here are two starter packs so you can find your people! If you want to be added, please let me know. I have been adding people as they come through my feed. go.bsky.app/Qo5Gh2H go.bsky.app/QSafBeL 🌎🌊🧪🌐🐟🪸🐙🌿

Zancolli, @marcrr.bsky.social @agneeshbarua.bsky.social et al. show that venom glands in marine predatory snails evolved via functional divergence from digestive organs, involving gene expression shifts and enhanced secretory machinery. 🔗 doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msaf095 #evobio #venom #mollusca

We looked into details of the stem cell system of catenulids. Surprisingly, it was very different from the canonical neoblast-based systems of other flatworms. What does it tell about the evolution of stem cells and regeneration? Check in our latest paper in @naturecomms.bsky.social: bit.ly/3WK2ZzR

Our review "Predicting gene expression from DNA sequence using deep learning models" is finally out! 🤗

Finally out - our paper on shell field and spicule #EvoDevo in a variety of #mollusks such as #scaphopods, #cephalopods, #aplacophorans, and of course #polyplacophorans. Among others we show evolutionary highly conserved gene expression in aculiferan spicules onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Proud to present the peer-reviewed version of our Cell Type Allometry paper, out today in Science Advances! www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... Are animals of different sizes made of the same cell types? Here’s an update of the main points and revision items (with memes!) Thread 👇🧵

Hint: it’s less than 1% — a lot less https://go.nature.com/4jLPDwi

I’m incredibly proud of this - in January, we began a co-reviewing project to encourage established researchers to mentor early-career researchers in carrying out peer review. It adds to diversity of perspectives & helps with gender balance 🧪 @nature.com www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Sponges, ctenophores and the statistical significance of syntenies https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.05.07.652388v1

It's publication day of my first book: The Tree of Life. The tree of life is a time machine that can take us back 4 billion years to meet our most distant ancestor. It is the magic that lets us tell the origin stories, beginning with this ancient relative, of everything from mushrooms to man.

Check out our latest work on the evolution of animal genome regulation out today in @nature.com. Nicely summarized below by @ianakim.bsky.social. www.nature.com/articles/s41... This is a major output from our ERC-StG project Evocellmap @erc.europa.eu at @crg.eu

🚨We’re proud that The Genetics Society @gensocuk.bsky.social supports the upcoming UK EvoDevo meeting. Register for only £5 and submit your abstracts before June 1st! Link to register: eshop.qmul.ac.uk/conferences-...

🚨Registration for the UK #EvoDevo meeting is open! Join us on July 11th in London to enjoy an exciting day of talks, posters, friends, and superb science! -Registration (only £5!): shorturl.at/9cQGL -More info: londonevodevo.ac.uk

Also a blast from the past! Another preprint is now available from my first postdoc in the @arnonelab.bsky.social at @szndohrn.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

🥳Congratulations to the 104 pioneering scientists from 30 nations awarded 2025 #HFSPResearchGrants! 🎉Your frontier research is shaping the future of #LifeSciences! 🌍🔬🧪 🏆 Meet the awardees & their projects: www.hfsp.org/bookletRG202... #ScienceDiplomacy #HFSP #FrontierScience #sts

It's official! I'll be starting my lab at UF Department of Biology this January working on evolution of light-sensing systems and marine invertebrate biodiversity! 🪸🐙🦑🪱🐚🐌🦀

Bioluminescence evolved in ostracod crustaceans some 200 Million Years ago, first used to ward off predation, later as a courtship signal. How did this eco-system-altering trait originate? The final version of a paper led by Lisa Mesrop, just released, addresses this question. 🧪🦑 #evolution #evodevo

We offer 2 PhD Positions in Evolutionary Biology! 1️⃣ Evolutionary Developmental Biology – Craniofacial evolution. (March 31, 2025) 2️⃣ Evolution of Polygenic Traits – Genetic adaptation in Drosophila. (April 30, 2025) More here: www.evolbio.mpg.de/1639156/Job_... #PhD #EvoDevo #Genetics

Delighted to see our new paper out, led by PhD student Asia Hoile. We explored new genes that emerged during the early evolution of Lepidoptera 🦋 Many cool insights which we think open up new questions to explore. Get in touch if you have thoughts/want to discuss more! 🔗: tinyurl.com/48rx72es

We offer three new positions to join BCA Phase 0: 1. A full-stack developer to work on the BCA database with @ebi.embl.org 2. A senior research technician to develop sc methods 3. A bioinformatician to analyze new atlases with @sangerinstitute.bsky.social Details below. Please, share and repost.

Happy to present the peer-reviewed version of our Hydractinia Cell Atlas paper out today in Nature Communications! As I presented this back when we were in “that other” social network, let me recap the basic findings and revision items in this thread: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The utility of generative AI tools is expanding far beyond simple summarisation and grammar support towards more sophisticated, pedagogical applications https://go.nature.com/3DgtdDy

The Trump administration's efforts to slash research funding have US graduate students, postdocs and other early-career scientists fearing for their careers. Some might leave the country -- or abandon research altogether. https://go.nature.com/43ao2zq

Japan can be a science heavyweight once more — if it rethinks funding #OIST doi.org/10.1038/d415...

Here's a starter pack for early career researchers in evolutionary biology. I prioritized the most-junior folks, and this list quickly filled up with undergrads, grad students, and postdocs. Might do another list later, but I'm tired. Have fun everyone! 🐒 #evobio go.bsky.app/MzND7nX

An open letter to the President of the @royalsociety.org – time to stand up for your values. occamstypewriter.org/scurry/2025/...