Young children who attend nursery get sick more often than those who don’t, but will have fewer illnesses during early school years, finds a new review of evidence by parent-scientists including Dr @lucyvandorp.bsky.social @ucllifesciences.bsky.social and Dr Leo Swadling @uclmedsci.bsky.social

Even working in infectious disease genomics, it came as a bit of a shock how often toddlers get sick. So myself and a set of colleagues, expertly led by @virologyhouldcroft.bsky.social, set out to review the evidence. How much infection is expected, does it increase with nursery attendance and why?

Have you ever wondered why children starting nursery/daycare pick up so many germs? I certainly did, and with a crack team of parent-scientists/clinicians, we set out to answer that question. Is childcare a germ factory or an immune bootcamp? journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

Come join us! We are looking for a Professor or Associate Professor of Computational Genomics in Health and Disease at University College London. Details 👉 www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/... Post funded by UCL Health Strategy.

There's still a few days left to apply for our AI-Intervene PhD project mapping the drivers of avian influenza using viral genomics, bird migration data and AI-powered phylodynamics. Come join us! Details below. #FindaPhD #LondonPhD #genomics

"These viruses have been co-evolving with human populations for well over 2,000 years, underscoring a deep, ongoing shared history between virus and host”: Dr @lucyvandorp.bsky.social on her ancient DNA analysis of human herpes viruses @ugiatucl.bsky.social @ucllifesciences.bsky.social

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... It's finally out! Meriam Guellil expertly led this project from the first HHV6 detection to the final paper. We found both human herpesviruses 6A and 6B in ancient remains going back 2500 years.

New paper out in Science Advances: Tracing 2500 years of human betaherpesvirus 6A and 6B diversity through ancient DNA 👉 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Reconstructing the histories of ancient pathogens with @poojaswali.bsky.social of @ugiatucl.bsky.social at the @lien-london.bsky.social meeting. Makes me want to learn every one of these stories!

We’re recruiting a PhD student as part of the AI-Intervene DTP to join FlightPath, an exciting project combining viral genomics, bird migration data, and AI-powered phylodynamics to forecast how avian influenza evolves and spreads. Project Details 🦠🧬🦅🦆🌎: tinyurl.com/2v4xaxmx.

PhD candidate Cedric Tan from @ucl.ac.uk @ugiatucl.bsky.social is exploring how pathogens and antimicrobial resistance jump between species, supported by a scholarship from A*STAR Singapore and @astar-gis.bsky.social. #UCLSingapore #UCLHealth www.ucl.ac.uk/global/case-...

We are recruiting! If you like evolutionary biology, microbial genomics, and host-pathogen interactions we have a PhD opening at @ugiatucl.bsky.social using population-scale metagenomics to map global phage diversity and uncover evolutionary signatures that could point to new antimicrobials.

The 2026 EMBL symposium 'Reconstructing the human past using ancient and modern genomics' is live with a fantastic invited speaker lineup! Abstract deadline 9 June. If work is ongoing, plan for Heidelberg in September😉. Organised by Maanasa Raghavan, @matejahajdi.bsky.social, Choongwon Jeong & me.

A fantastic day of talks and discussions. Thanks to the organisers and @gensocuk.bsky.social

Great to have Dr Hrushikesh Loya give a fantastic talk on his tool Ghostbusters: A Genome-Wide Genealogical Approach to Uncovering Hidden Admixture Events in Human Evolution 👻

I am fascinated by how viruses evolve - and not just since #SARSCoV2 has shown us at the global stage how consequential virus evolution can be for us. In my new story in @science.org I got to explore how researchers are probing deeper into the past with old RNA virus genome. So a 🧪 thread…

Pooja Swali @poojaswali.bsky.social presenting her very interesting work on ancient pathogens. @ugiatucl.bsky.social

Excited to say we’re hiring 😊. We’re looking for a post-doc in ancient pathogen genomics to join our friendly supportive team in London at @ugiatucl.bsky.social. Start date January 2026. www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/...

New preprint from UGI PhD student @cednotsed.bsky.social , @proffballoux.bsky.social and @lucyvandorp.bsky.social, exploring the microbial and antimicrobial resistance signatures of hospital-acquired pneumonia using nanopore metagenomic sequencing (www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...).

Not long left to submit your abstract! Deadline is 31 July. Join us in November for the Ancient Genomes meeting and hear from amazing speakers including: @mathiesoniain.bsky.social, @lquintanamurci.bsky.social & @lucyvandorp.bsky.social! genetics.org.uk/events/ancie...

@cednotsed.bsky.social presenting at #SMEB2025 on his work on predicting the fitness of mutations in SARS-CoV-2. Preprint here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

And UGI PhD student Cedric Tan presenting in symposium 21 @official-smbe.bsky.social #SMBE2025 on his work "Intrahost dynamics, together with genetic and phenotypic effects predict the success of viral mutations".

✨🧬 Sharing our UCL Genetics Institute starter pack of researchers, friends and alumni past and present 🧬 ✨ #UGISKY (DM us to be added) go.bsky.app/Gw1NqRa

We’ve got some good news! The deadline to submit abstracts for our “Ancient #Genomes: Perspectives on Human Biology and Medicine” meeting has been extended to 31 July 2025. So if you were thinking about submitting, there’s still plenty of time! genetics.org.uk/events/ancie...

Thrilled to share our latest preprint! 🎉🔥 We analysed >23k mtDNA genomes & found 18 variants shaped by climate—linked to thermogenesis, metabolism & disease. Led by PhD student Finley Grover-Thomas, and in collab with: @aidaandres.bsky.social @lucyvandorp.bsky.social @proffballoux.bsky.social

Our @ucl.ac.uk @crick.ac.uk work, out this week in @science.org, traces a genetic time series of bacterial infections to reveal when and how Borrelia recurrentis jumped from ticks to humans—via our body lice. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...