Ana Santacruz
@anasaruz.bsky.social
📤 104
📥 93
📝 12
Scientist, fish - parasite fan |
#cavefish
| 🏳️🌈 Postdoc at the Rohner lab at
@uni-muenster.de
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Ana Santacruz
Daniel Bolnick
5 days ago
Second new preprint of the week: Postdocs Arshad Padhiar and Maria Rodgers and collaborators describe the morphology, cell content (scRNAseq), gene expression, histology of the stickleback intestine. We present a method for building
#stickleback
gut organoids
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
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Ana Santacruz
MadScientist
21 days ago
Look, people. We have superb keynotes, we are giving prizes, we are giving postdocs a megaphone to tell everyone why they should be hired. This is the meeting to be at. Sign up, join us, and have the time of your life while discussing science with people that know where the cleithrum is🐟🧪
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Ana Santacruz
Biozentrum, University of Basel
22 days ago
In a new study, Prof. Anissa Kempf's team demonstrates in fruit flies that gut function is linked to feeding, sleep, and survival. Their work adds to growing evidence that the gut communicates with the brain and can influence behavior. 🧪@unibas.ch
#ScienceAdvances
@snsf.ch
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Sleeping instead of eating: How the gut influences behavior
Before newly hatched fruit flies feed for the first time, they need to empty their gut. But that’s not all: researchers led by Prof. Anissa Kempf at the Biozentrum have now discovered a surprising lin...
https://www.biozentrum.unibas.ch/news/detail/sleeping-instead-of-eating-how-the-gut-influences-behavior
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Ana Santacruz
Robert Kozol
27 days ago
I am happy to announce that my penultimate post-doc paper (Erik Duboue lab/X) is finally out in Science Advances. This work stems from my first cavefish experiments, examining how dark-adapted cavefish larvae respond to changes in illumination.
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
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Evolution of a central dopamine circuit underlies adaptation of a light-evoked sensorimotor response in the blind cavefish
Evolution shifts dopamine neuron responses in cavefish, reversing how light drives their behavior.
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adv3770
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Ana Santacruz
MadScientist
about 1 month ago
PRIZES for Posters PRIZES for Talks PRIZES for the best 'Postdoc to PI' Talk (register, folks. This is a great opportunity to tell us why fish are awesome and why you would be a great colleague and also show pretty pictures)🧪🐟
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Ana Santacruz
Julia MI Barth
about 1 month ago
Not every
#cichlid
fish needs two parents! A Cyphotilapia frontosa female produced offspring in the absence of a male, with
#genome-wide
heterozygosity patterns consistent with self-fertilization. Amazing work by M. Efe Uysal with W. Salzburger and A. Marks Preprint:
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
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Ana Santacruz
Cichlid Science 2026
about 1 month ago
Register here:
www.uantwerpen.be/en/conferenc...
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Participate in Cichlid Science 2026 | Cichlid Science 2026 | University of Antwerp
https://www.uantwerpen.be/en/conferences/cichlid-science-2026/registration/
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Ana Santacruz
Britt Koskella
about 1 month ago
Please share widely! Abstract submissions open for the 2026 Jacques Monod conference: Ecology and evolution of host-parasite interactions in a changing world! Held in beautiful Roscoff France from November 2- 6, 2026. Abstracts submission deadline : June 6
cjm.sb-roscoff.fr/en/conferenc...
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Ecology and evolution of host-parasite interactions in a changing world | CNRS - Conférences Jacques Monod (CJM)
https://cjm.sb-roscoff.fr/en/conference/ecology-and-evolution-host-parasite-interactions-changing-world
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Ana Santacruz
International Society of Fish and Shellfish Immunology
about 1 month ago
The
#ISFSI
in collaboration with
#IUIS
is delighted to announce the upcoming webinar by John F. Rawls: “The use of zebrafish as a powerful model for host microbiota interaction research and translational immunology” Free registration!! Just follow this link:
immunohub.iuis.org/iuis/2026/we...
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Zebrafish as a high-throughput screening model with strong... by Faculty / Presenters
; Presenters F. May 21 2026; 4205690;
https://immunohub.iuis.org/iuis/2026/webinars/4205690/
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Ana Santacruz
Tschopp Lab
about 2 months ago
One of my dream projects, ever since joining here in Basel, out now in
@nature.com
: single-cells 🤝 eco-morphological proxies
rdcu.be/fiyso
How cells and tissues adapt to dietary niches... Thanks and congrats to Antoine, Walter, and all the other co-authors for this great collaboration!! 🙏🥳
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Adaptive cellular evolution in the intestine of hyperdiverse cichlid fishes
Nature - Single-cell transcriptomics combined with morphological and ecological data show that the rapid evolutionary radiation of cichlid fishes in Lake Tanganyika was accompanied by dietary...
https://rdcu.be/fiyso
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Ana Santacruz
MadScientist
about 2 months ago
I'm very happy to announce that the "From Postdoc to PI Session" will be sponsored by the
@biologists.bsky.social
and we will be offering a $$ Prize to the best talk, so now a twofer reason to apply!
www.germanfishmeeting.org/from-postoc-...
Let me know if you have any question/s! 🐟
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From Postoc to PI Session | German Fish Meeting
https://www.germanfishmeeting.org/from-postoc-to-pi
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Ana Santacruz
Global Immunotalks
about 2 months ago
Looking forward to our next
#globalimmuno
talk this Wednesday, May 13th, at 9am PST, noon EST, 4pm GMT by Dr. Lucy Ochola. Title: “Unmasking the duality of Schistosoma in host immune modulation” ZOOM LINK:
us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...
LIVE ON YOUTUBE:
www.youtube.com/@GLOBALIMMUNOTALKS
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Ana Santacruz
Prosanta Chakrabarty
about 2 months ago
Smithsonian Fish Curator position announcement! Note the application dates of May 12 – June 2, 2026. Should be posted here tomorrow:
trustcareers.si.edu#js-careers-j...
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Excited to receive support from
@sse-evolution.bsky.social
to support our outreach work in Mexican communities and teach evolution through the Mexican cavefish! 🐟✨
about 2 months ago
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Ana Santacruz
Dr. Lauren E. Fuess
3 months ago
Hi folks, there is a high likelihood I will be recruiting 1-2 PhD students to start in Spring 2027. Trying to get the word out early; please share broadly with your networks and encourage your students to reach out early. Info can be found on my webpage.
fuesslab.wp.txstate.edu/opportunities/
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opportunities – Symbiommunity Lab
https://fuesslab.wp.txstate.edu/opportunities/
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Ana Santacruz
Dan 🐟 C
7 months ago
Exciting new
#Zebrafish
research from the
#WeinsteinLab
, led by Jong Park! “Specialized gas-exchange endothelium of the zebrafish gill” —
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Amazing to see red blood cells moving through the gills! Don’t forget to check out the supplemental movies ;-)
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Mucosal Immunology
7 months ago
Tissue resident colonic macrophages persist through acute inflammation and adapt to aid tissue repair in this work from
@lizihegarty.bsky.social
,
@bainlab.bsky.social
, and colleagues:
www.mucosalimmunology.org/article/S193...
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Ana Santacruz
Arica Beisaw
7 months ago
Come join us in Heidelberg for the first German fish meeting 👩🔬👨🔬🧬🔬🐟🐠
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Ana Santacruz
Zebrafish Rock!
8 months ago
Fluorescent micrograph of the enteric nervous system of a Pachon/surface hybrid cavefish. Credit to
@pavaniperera.bsky.social
.
#ZebrafishZunday
🧪
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apnews.com/article/nobe...
Nobel Prize in medicine goes to 3 scientists for key immune system discoveries
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The Nobel Prize in medicine goes to 3 scientists for key immune system discoveries
They won for their work on peripheral immune tolerance, which is one way the body helps keep the immune system from getting out of whack and attacking your own tissues..
https://apnews.com/article/nobel-prize-medicine-a68cf8a3b930570630168a949d277cde?utm_source=bluesky&utm_medium=share <br>The
9 months ago
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Ana Santacruz
Global Immunotalks
9 months ago
Looking forward to our next
#globalimmuno
talk this Wednesday, October 8th, at 9am PST, noon EST, 4pm GMT by Dr. Mauro Gaya. Title: “B cell memory in barrier tissues” ZOOM LINK:
us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...
LIVE ON YOUTUBE:
www.youtube.com/@GLOBALIMMUNOTALKS
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Ana Santacruz
Robert Kozol
9 months ago
I am happy to report that the lab has its first preprint! We looked at odor perception in cavefish and found a strong attraction to ancestrally negative odors, including appetitive behavior and brain activity when smelling death!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
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The evolution of cavefish odor perception shifts fish response from avoidance to approach when exposed to alarm and death odors.
An animals survival is dependent on activating the correct behavioral circuit in response to a sensory stimulus. These stimuli include environmental odorants that evoke positive approach behavior and ...
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.10.01.679817v1
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Ana Santacruz
Tilly Mommersteeg
9 months ago
More new work from the lab!
@idrm.ox.ac.uk
@oxforddpag.bsky.social
Do all zebrafish regenerate their hearts equally? Also featuring the Mexican cavefish☺️ Thanks to all co-authors and especially the incredibly talented DPhil student Kostas Lekkos who drove the project.
#zebrafish
#heartregeneration
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Ana Santacruz
Journal of Evolutionary Biology
9 months ago
Ribeiro et al. studied
#MHC
class II variation and infection by a sexually transmitted bacterium (C34) in black-legged
#kittiwakes
. They found sex-specific links between MHC supertypes, bacterial load and reproduction, suggesting STIs may influence immune gene evolution:
doi.org/10.1093/jeb/...
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An MHC class II supertype confers resistance to a sexually transmitted bacterium in females but not in males in a genetically monogamous seabird
Abstract. The major histocompatibility complex (MHC) is a gene cluster essential for pathogen recognition in jawed vertebrates. It encompasses the MHC clas
https://doi.org/10.1093/jeb/voaf097
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Ana Santacruz
The New Yorker
9 months ago
The naturalist Jane Goodall died today at 91. Hope, she argued, is not merely “passive wishful thinking” but a “crucial survival trait.” Revisit a conversation with Goodall, from 2021:
nyer.cm/F55JtsS
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“We (humans) have been so jolly arrogant to think we’re so special.”
www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2...
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Jane Goodall, primatologist and friend to chimpanzees, dies at 91
She used her global fame to draw attention to the plight of dwindling chimpanzee populations and, more broadly, to the perils of environmental destruction.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2025/10/01/jane-goodall-dead/
9 months ago
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Just Me - Yarn Sniffer
9 months ago
This gorgeous being is thwaitesia argentiopunctata. Also known as the sequinned spider, mirror spider and is found in Australia. Absolutely beautiful! I am at a loss for words.
#nature
#arachnid
#insect
#mirrorspider
#Australia
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Excited to start being part of the Postdoc Network Münster
#PNM
!
@uni-muenster.de
as a board member! A chance to give back to the community, and to the sometimes ‘grey’, neglected minority we postdocs are 💪✨
9 months ago
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Shefali
9 months ago
#Behindthepaper
stories:
@accorsi-alice.bsky.social
&
@planaria1.bsky.social
share how curiosity & passion driven research revealed that apple snails can regenerate full camera type eyes.
@the-node.bsky.social
@ucdavis.bsky.social
@stowersinstitute.bsky.social
#regeneration
#applesnails
#devbio
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In the apple eye of evolution: Camera-type eye regeneration - the Node
Behind the paper stories from "A genetically tractable non-vertebrate system to study complete camera-type eye regeneration" We are all stepping into a
https://thenode.biologists.com/apple-eye-of-evolution/interview/
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Ana Santacruz
PLOS Biology
10 months ago
How do your
#linguistic
,
#economic
&
#gender
backgrounds impact your
#scientific
productivity?
@tatsuya-amano.bsky.social
& co reveal that being a woman, a non-native English speaker, and from a low-income country is associated with a 70% reduction in productivity
@plosbiology.org
🧪
plos.io/4n3RLRQ
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Neil Shubin
10 months ago
Congrats to Aurelie Hinterman
aurhin.bsky.social
, Chase Bolt
chasebolt.bsky.social
, and Brent Hawkins
@homeobox.bsky.social
! Coverage in NYTimes by
@carlzimmer.com
:
www.nytimes.com/2025/09/17/s...
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Amazing work, my friend!
@aurhin.bsky.social
, always thinking outside the box!
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10 months ago
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Back from the Cavefish Retreat — amazing people, gorgeous location, great science, and a strong community! 🐟✨ The future looks bright for the
#cavefish
field!
10 months ago
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Ana Santacruz
Global Immunotalks
11 months ago
🧬2nd Semester 2025 lineup is here! Join us for a new round of cutting-edge immunology seminars from top researchers around the world! Mark your calendar & share! For more info:
linktr.ee/globalimmuno...
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These days at
@naturalsciences-be.bsky.social
I had the chance to visit the world’s largest otolith collection! Mostly marine specimens from a project started more than 100 years ago! Amazing to be a scientist and get the chance to go behind the scenes!
#fish
#otolith
10 months ago
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Back from my first
#FishBase
conference! It felt like a journey through the history of key databases and the exciting ones still to come! Times are changing, and so is how we understand
#fish
. Truly honored to have been invited to speak at this one!
10 months ago
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Ana Santacruz
PLOS Biology
10 months ago
What determines the human gut fungal community?
@emilyvansyoc.bsky.social
@erdavenport.bsky.social
@symbionticism.bsky.social
&co present the first
#GWAS
of human genetic loci that influence the abundance of gut
#fungi
, linking these to disease risk
#mycobiome
@plosbiology.org
🧪
plos.io/42bCKou
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Gustavo Monasterio Ocares
10 months ago
Back from one of the best conferences I’ve attended!The
@embo.org
Workshop on Barrier Immunity,brilliantly organized by
@maurogaya.bsky.social
&
@immunologyking.bsky.social
! Outstanding science from many, including
@mucosalimmunology.bsky.social
,
@danmucida.bsky.social
&
@martinaparigi.bsky.social
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Martin Genner
10 months ago
In crater Lake Masoko one fish species is splitting into shallow and deep-living ecotypes occupying different light environments. New research shows their visual systems are diverging, and how colours of male eggspots have changed to maximise their visibility.
doi.org/10.1093/molb...
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Maxwell Shafer
10 months ago
Now published
@natecoevo.nature.com
with
@annika-nichols.bsky.social
, our latest on the evolution of 𝘴𝘭𝘦𝘦𝘱 across 𝟲𝟬 𝘀𝗽𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗲𝘀 of cichlid fishes!
doi.org/10.1038/s415...
with members of the
@schierlab.bsky.social
and Salzburger labs, as well as the burgeoning Shafer lab
@uoftcellsysbiol.bsky.social
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Diana E Matei
10 months ago
Amazing fantastic great talks so far
@embo.org
Barrier ImmuniTy 🤩 what better place to learn all about B/T cells in the gut/lung/liver/bladder/brain - eeeeeverywhere!!
#EMBOBarrierTissues
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An extremely engaging talk on a sometimes overlooked tissue, the bladder, by Molly A. Ingersoll at
#EMBO
. Not only that, the study showed that 'sex matters,' and it matters a lot during infection, with strong differential responses between sexes!!! Learning so much!!
#EMBOBarrierTissues
10 months ago
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Eduardo Villablanca
10 months ago
Great analogy to illustrate the question
@carlanowosad.bsky.social
is pursuing on her lab: how GC are form and how GC cells find their way to their specific locations
#embo
workshop Basel
#immunalogy
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Petter Brodin
12 months ago
Weight loss improves health but What happens to cells in the fat during weight loss? Intriguingly, immune cell numbers decrease but their activated states persist w chronic inflammatory potential. Beautiful work from neighbors
@mrc-lms.bsky.social
Will Scott et al
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
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Selective remodelling of the adipose niche in obesity and weight loss - Nature
An atlas study of adipose tissue in people with obesity undergoing weight loss and their lean counterparts reveals that weight loss reduces cell senescence but cannot reverse all the metabolic problem...
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09233-2
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medicalxpress.com/news/2025-08...
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How subtle bacterial shifts keep gut inflammation at bay
One of the most captivating mysteries about the immune system is how it manages to keep its healthy equilibrium—staying on high alert and ready to react to harmful invaders or damaged cells, while rem...
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-08-subtle-bacterial-shifts-gut-inflammation.html
10 months ago
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Emily Troyer
12 months ago
Check out our new paper! We find cavefish colonized caves 3x and global cooling events may have influenced these events.
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
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Ana Santacruz
Daniel Bolnick
11 months ago
When populations evolve different strategies to defend against a recently acquired parasite (e.g., tolerance, resistance), what sets of gene expression responses are conserved, or diverge? Using a vaccination experiment with
#stickleback
@laurenfuess.bsky.social
reports some fun results...
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Ana Santacruz
Tim Vernimmen
11 months ago
Mexican tetras living on the surface (left) look dramatically different from populations that were washed into caves generations ago (right) – and not just on the outside. Featuring
@rohner.bsky.social
and others.
knowablemagazine.org/content/arti...
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How the cavefish lost its eyes — again and again
Mexican tetras that got swept into pitch-black caverns had no use for the energetically costly organs. They lost their eyes in multiple ways — and gained some nifty traits too.
https://knowablemagazine.org/content/article/living-world/2025/how-the-cavefish-lost-its-eyes
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My brilliant friend, Dr. María Recuerda, presenting her work on bird pangenomes at
#ESEB2025
!
11 months ago
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For a parasite fan like me, this was one of the best talks I’ve ever attended, a whole lifetime of science across scales, delivered by none other than Prof. Dieter Ebert!
#ESEB2025
11 months ago
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