Congratulations to all of the new AAM Fellows! Many many friends & colleagues on the list, but especially excited for Patty Champion and JD Sauer! @sauerlab.bsky.social @uwmadisonmmi.bsky.social @uwmadisonmdtp.bsky.social bsky.app/profile/asm....

The American Academy of Microbiology proudly announces the election of 63 fellows to the Class of 2026. Over the past 50 years, the Academy has elected +2,700 distinguished scientists. This year, the new fellows hail from 14 countries. Read press release: asm.social/2OC

🚨🍄Nancy Keller Fungal Research Published in PNAS! “What we hope people take away from this paper is that scientists are actively studying this serious issue. We’re working hard to understand why it’s happening.” -Nancy Keller mmi.wisc.edu/nancy-keller... 📸: Dr. Anna Pringle

I am seeking a postdoc to join my group at UCLA -- ideally the candidate would have some experience in either population genetics or microbes/microbiome (computational background needed). We have a range of projects and are happy to tailer to your interests. Please dm/email me if interested.

All you want for christmas is.... transposon mutagenesis! Our new work at @cultivarium.bsky.social screening lots of transposon vectors in lots of bacteria, from @charliegilbert.bsky.social and team. Transposon and promoter modular parts available on Addgene (pooled library will be there soon too)

Our new paper in @natcomms.nature.com is now online-early! We describe independent evolution of bacterial genomes of only ~50–52 kb — the smallest known outside cellular organelles — revealing striking convergence toward minimal gene sets. 🔗 doi.org/10.1038/s414...

Postdoc position available in my lab! Project will focus on how the microbiome-derived metabolite butyrate shapes C. difficile fitness and pathogenesis & will build on our previous/ongoing work in this space. Apply here: hr.wisc.edu/postdoc-and-...

Seema Mattoo on Bordetella pertussis and whooping cough! Matters Microbial, @mattoolab.bsky.social @markowenmartin.bsky.social #MicroSky

Gladys Mae West obituary: mathematician who pioneered GPS technology www.nature.com/articles/d41...

[email protected]’s famous version of the Statue of Liberty—appearing to be semi-submerged in Lake Mendota—is now an annual fixture of the UW Winter Carnival, running through Feb 7. Learn about the sculpture’s origins in a classic 1979 student prank. onwisconsin.uwalumni.com/statue-of-li...

Please share: we're hiring a new tenure-track faculty member to our Department of Genetics at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. faculty-einstein.icims.com/jobs/17847/a...

Hey all, excited to share this collab w/ @shaunmckinnie.bsky.social TL;DR we combined our expertise to develop and validate a MALDI-tims platform for screening the production of isomeric small molecules (~212 Da) directly from E coli colonies in high throughput www.cell.com/cell-reports...

🎉Congratulations to Professor JD Sauer on Receiving the Vilas Associates Award! mmi.wisc.edu/professor-jd...

“What she told me is that (the grant) was terminated for violating guidelines that don’t exist...She told me she doesn’t even know if anyone’s working on developing the guidelines.” dailyillini.com/news-stories... #governmentefficiency

Why rename Pseudomonas putida KT2440 to P. alloputida🦠? This is an excellent example of why taxonomic changes require caution. We shouldn't blindly follow rules while ignoring decades of established practice. journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/... #microbiology @asm.org @microbiologysociety.org

Congratulations to the @uwmadison.bsky.social Badgers Women's Hockey athletes headed to the Olympics! Representing multiple countries, this is the best of the USA and of Wisconsin.

Excited to announce the upcoming 2026 Microbial Toxins and Pathogenicity GRC and GRS meeting taking place July 12 - 17, 2026 at Waterville Valley in New Hampshire. This meeting will be chaired by yours truly and co-chaired by @sunnyshinlab.bsky.social www.grc.org/microbial-to...

We just released #anvio v9, "eunice" 🎉 This version represents over 2,000 changes in the codebase since v8, increasing the total number of programs in the anvi'o ecosystem to 176. Read the release notes: github.com/merenlab/anv... Visit our up-to-date web page: anvio.org

Reminder for those applying for #NIH grants using the #ScienCV templates. You can format the text sections using html codes: <p> paragraph <br> break line <b>bold</b> <i>italics</i>

Save the date... The Symbiosis Gordon Conference is headed back to Tuscany June 20-25, 2027 with @ngerardo.bsky.social as Chair! www.grc.org/animal-micro...

very sad news. Peer Bork was one of the leaders of our field, a wonderful scientist, and he's much too young to be gone. www.embl.org/news/embl-an...

Thrilled to share that my first-author paper is now published in Nature Communications! 🎉 Huge thanks to my PI, Dr. Drew Bridges (@bridgesbio.bsky.social), my collaborators, and all the incredible lab members for their support throughout this project www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Grinnell College has openings for two 1-year term positionsto teach microbiology and immunology. More information here: apply.interfolio.com/179939

We are hiring new faculty!! Come join our amazing community in the Department of Molecular Microbiology at Washington University School of Medicine! The deadline for applications is 2/21, but applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis. facultyopportunities.wustl.edu/Posting/Deta...

The final form of my 2nd postdoc paper with the Bassler Lab! Turns out our favorite quorum-sensing phage isn’t a one-off, but rather a member of a globally dispersed family of phages that sense a universal autoinducer. #phagesky #microsky journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

Registration is open for September’s Vibrio2026 conference in Berlin! event.fourwaves.com/vibrio2026/p...

Maintaining microbiota across diverse symbiotic organs in Euprymna scolopes: Insights into shared immune responses from @nidhivijayan.bsky.social John Briseño, Oleg Simakov, @spencernyholm.bsky.social in @pnas.org www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

It is an oversimplification to say that science is always changing. Although well-established theories may be overturned on rare occasion, scientific knowledge builds on prior knowledge. Scientific methods, fields and discoveries are predominantly cumulative, whereas pseudoscience fails to progress.

James Cook is the 2025 rushing champ

UW-Madison is looking for a new Chief Research Administration Officer: jobs.wisc.edu/jobs/chief-r... @uwmadison.bsky.social

Submit your abstracts for ASM Microbe 2026! As a member of the Scientific Program Committee, I can vouch for great science with something for everyone! @asm.org asm.org/events/asm-m...

Hey all, I reached out to the PO of my NIGMS MIRA to ask if the gov't shut down, and rescheduling of study sections, might allow for some accommodation to the standard rule that PIs cannot resubmit a MIRA while their MIRA (or other RPG) is under review (waiting in scores or summary statements) 🧪

Professor Ruth: Coming Fall 2026! I'm thrilled to announce that I have officially accepted a tenure-track faculty position in the Biology Department at @macalestercollege.bsky.social! #HeyMac #NewProfessor #WomanInSTEM

Live thread of the NSF biology virtual office hour: 🧵

I think some folks might be happy to see this. NIGMS MIRA R35 for EI/NI has been published. PAR-26-121 files.simpler.grants.gov/opportunitie...

The newest issue of Microcosm from @asm.org is now out! It's all about animal microbiology and I was excited to contribute the story about the fascinating vibrio-squid symbiosis (my story is available via member log-in, but others are free). asm.org/magazine/202... #MicroSky #Microbiology

Read @jtsangwrites.bsky.social's article about the squid-vibrio symbiosis in the latest @asm.org Microcosm magazine!

New from @paczkowskilab.bsky.social

It is rare as an editor to get to take on an article so uniquely in your wheelhouse. Sharing some wonderful work by Guarnaccia et al. from the Perez, Ng, and Neiditch labs. #structuralbiology of #pathogens @plos.org dx.plos.org/10.1371/jour...

The new Enabling Discovery through GEnomics (EDGE) Program page is posted. Please contact us at [email protected] if you have questions. www.nsf.gov/funding/oppo...

This is fascinating work: www.nature.com/articles/s41... #microbiomes

This Friday! @torreslab.bsky.social

Congratulations to Katie Barnes from the Knoll Lab on receiving Microbiology Society's 2026 Prize! mmi.wisc.edu/katie-barnes...

Brave genomes is finally out!😎 shop.elsevier.com/books/brave-... www.amazon.de/Brave-Genome...

CryoET of microbes inside an animal organ? Yes it’s possible! Check out our new preprint showing how we did it! What an amazing collaboration with amazing scientists who made this possible!

Three shots, three goals for McKayla Zilisch. The Appleton, Wisconsin native has tied the program record for goals in a period with three, becoming the first #Badgers player to do so in 14 years. Before today, the senior had scored just one collegiate goal during her rookie year in Bemidji.

I'm happy to share a perspective that @soniamodilevsky.bsky.social and I wrote about a new and exciting paper in @science.org with big implications for IBD. Check it out: A bacterial toxin disarms gut defenses against inflammation | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Today!

Through a project at the graduate school I had the good fortune to interact with Dean Scott. She was an incredible visionary, deeply dedicated to graduate education, and also so down to Earth. She will be deeply missed. bsky.app/profile/uwch...