That was quite the board meeting…

Some thoughts on where AI in genomics stands right now, building on a symposium we recently hosted at UChicago. Seven points, ranging from why scaling DNA models hasn't delivered, to why metadata is the real bottleneck, to the weird backlash against AI in academia open.substack.com/pub/blekhman...

Amazing to finally get all of my lab group together in one place! I think this is the first time that this has happened since before the pandemic.

It’s been great to be part of this awesome institute for the past decade. I feel immensely grateful.

Without question, this is hysteria. www.ipm.org/news/2026-04...

Penn State Biology is hiring! We have an opening for a tenure-line faculty position in plant biology - if you'd like to pursue awesome science in a supportive and interdisciplinary community of researchers, consider applying! psu.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/PSU_Ac...

I've just spent the last year on the administrative side of things and here are some of the lessons I've learned (or not learned). #academicsky 🧪

Haven’t watched the Derby for years. Choose a good one to tune into for so many reasons.

Simons Graduate Fellowship Applications are open! If you're applying to Ph.D. programs in ecology and/or evolution this year, or if you're an incoming Ph.D. student who won't start your degree program until Fall 2026 or later, apply! www.simonsfoundation.org/grant/simons...

I'm looking to hire a postdoc. Please share if you can!

Always was wondering what else happens in the building where I teach Evolution… statenews.com/article/2026...

Congratulations to @jrossibarra.bsky.social on being elected to the National Academy of Sciences! We'll be popping some corn in his honor www.ucdavis.edu/news/nationa...

Big, big congratulations to our lab's PhD student, Madison Plunkert (@madisonplunkert.bsky.social), who is a recipient of this year's Donald R. Kaplan Dissertation Award in Comparative Morphology!!!!

What a nice day: Great people that I know getting tenure, getting into the national academy, or wrapping up their last PhD Committee meeting as they think about future postdoc positions. Science is awesome and the people that make it happen are awesome. Keep pushing forward everyone.

Lovely day in Saugatauk, MI.

Woah www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Just finished this book. I highly recommend. Learned a lot I did not know before about Linnaeus, Buffon, and how we ended up with modern day taxonomy and nomenclature, with all of its strangeness.

Mid-Michigan Spring Phenology Watch 2006 Day 1.

My trout lilies finally bloomed in East Lansing.

This was almost a month ago. Has anyone received an NIH grant since then? www.science.org/content/arti...

I'm a data scientist @ourworldindata.org and I need help from a botanist or someone local to Kyoto, Japan! 🌸 We present one of the world’s longest climate records: 1,200 years of peak cherry blossom dates in Kyoto. The researcher who maintained it, Prof. Yasuyuki Aono, sadly passed away last year.

@haorancai.bsky.social and Des Marais investigated gene expression variability in duplicate genes, suggesting a mechanism facilitating gene expression divergence, functional gains, and duplicate retention following small-scale duplications. 🔗 doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evag077 #genome #evolution

✨ Paper spotlight ✨ (🧵 1/7) Silene, a versatile model system: from sex and genome evolution to ecology and speciation nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Murray et al. show that the fast-slow continuum of life history variation emerges as a contour of highest fitness in the face of catastrophic demographic disturbances, which rivals some classic hypotheses. Read now ahead of print! www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...

For more than 15 years, botanist Naomi Fraga has been trying to collect seeds from the rare Death Valley sage, for safekeeping in a vault of native California seeds. n.pr/4ttOsq4

Great to meet up with Rich Shefferson, who is now a Full Professor and a Department Head at the University of Tokyo. Rich and I overlapped in Ellen Simms’ lab at UC Berkeley, when I was and an undergraduate there. It’s been over two decades since we had a chance to meet up.

Despite the great extent of coastlines of the world (>million miles depending on how you measure it), very few scientists currently work on understanding how plants adapt to this important habitat. This week, I was able to meet with one of these few scientists, Matsuo Itoh, in Kyoto, Japan.

Gonna be some rad science -- @mollyschumer.bsky.social keynote and a bunch of good talks and posters. And I'll personally pay the registration of anyone who wants to come (it's free).

Despite the great extent of coastlines of the world (>million miles depending on how you measure it), very few scientists currently work on understanding how plants adapt to this important habitat. This week, I was able to meet with one of these few scientists, Matsuo Itoh, in Kyoto, Japan.

There is nowhere else in the world (that I am aware of) where phenology has been recorded as regularly as in Kyoto, Japan. Records here of peak cherry blossom bloom go back to the year 812. Those blooms have been getting earlier in recent years due to climate change and urban heat island effects.

Review: What happens when it gets too hot – the vulnerability of plant reproduction in a warming world plantae.org/review-what-...

Short Kyoto phenology watch Day 1.

So cool reading this from Kyoto, Japan, where it is now a few days from peak.

Our new experimental evolution study across 30+ locations using the plant Arabidopsis thaliana —— we direct "see" adaptation and extinction to different climates at the genetic as it happens! Read it in Science dx.doi.org/10.1126/scie... @ucberkeleyofficial.bsky.social @hhmi-science.bsky.social

Phenology watch is big in Japan. #sakura

Wild rice is a perennial, creeping plant. The secret to its perennial growth habit lies in a developmental reversal directed by small RNAs. This image illustrates how combining perennial genes with prostrate growth genes allows cultivated rice to mimic wild rice. Learn more: https://scim.ag/40GOjDb

Modifying meiotic recombination by targeting chromatin regulators to crossover hotspots in Arabidopsis From: www.science.org/doi/full/10.... #PlantScience

We're hiring a postdoctoral researcher in plant genome engineering with expertise in synthetic biology, gene editing, and omics, with an interest in developing next-generation technologies for plants.🪴🧬 Available immediately. If interested, send your CV! Feel free to share with your networks.

BREAKING: @delauro.house.gov announces at a House Oversight hearing with NIH director Jay Bhattacharya that OMB approved the agency's apportionment last night. That means the agency should have access to its appropriated funds — 42 days after its spending bill passed.

Some insight into why Congressionally appropriated funds are still not flowing as they should from America’s science agencies. www.science.org/content/arti...

Paul Ehrlich has died. Most will remember him for "The Population Bomb." But for many of us, Ehrlich and Raven 1964 was a foundational read that influenced our careers. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

My speech last week for the #StandUpForScience National Day of Action rally at the Michigan State Capitol. When we protect science, we protect democracy too. #Lansing @standupforscience.bsky.social www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSMZ...

Does the time 1:59 have any particular significance on Pi Day? Just curious.

New preprint from Asia Hightower @puffballove.bsky.social showing that heat hurts reproduction + fruit development without affecting vegetative growth in Capsella bursa-pastoris www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Our new preprint reports an interesting analytical approach for RNA-seq based gene expression analysis of a ~500 plant diversity panel of switchgrass grown in the contrasting environments of Michigan and Texas. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Big congrats to former Lowry Lab postdoc Daniel Anstett, who's paper: "Rapid evolution predicts demographic recovery after extreme drought" is out in Science today. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Phytochrome B integrates jasmonic acid and warm temperature signaling pathways to regulate cotyledon chloroplast development www.nature.com/articles/s41...

I am SO THRILLED to share our first fully-lab lab paper!!!!!! Led by @hybridzones.bsky.social & @hagarsoliman.bsky.social, w/ a major assist from @pfschwarz.bsky.social!!!!!!!!!!!!! Read more below, if you're curious (you should be- it's AWESOME!!!!!!!) link: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

🌿 Postdoc opportunity in plant evolutionary ecology/genetics! My lab in the Dept. of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at the University of Michigan is recruiting a postdoctoral researcher to start Fall 2026. We study plant adaptation, using weeds as model systems. #Postdoc #EcoEvo Pls RT!