Line of this talk so far: “What I’m telling you is I’m decently good at pipetting”

I will commit to using CoPilot to the best of my ability every day, as soon as that $52k raise comes through

I am having lunch at a sports bar (grilled cheese with tomato and bacon). The radio just played a tenor cover of Into the Unknown from Frozen 2. I am beginning to wonder if I have slipped into a parallel dimension.

Observation 1: many blood feeding parasites have serious problems with their diet lacking specific nutrients, such as B vitamins Observation 2: microbial symbionts can provision these vitamins to their hosts. Idea: naturalist trying to identify and culture symbionts from vampires.

I would be a little less unnerved by a talk about botflies if I weren’t living in a reality where my country has decided to abandon a historic win in screwfly control.

Tonight’s Super Social for the Evolution conference will be in the Great Lakes Science Center. 12 years ago today, it was at the Natural History Museum in Raleigh, which led to:

It has never been more affordable to trap Cu Chulainn between his competing geasa.

This is the one where they prisoner had a 5th Cir. decision *in his hand* that said prison officials could not cut off his locs, and they threw it in the trash along with his locs. Today SCOTUS holds he cannot sue to be compensated for this clear and obvious violation of his constitutional rights.

I’m recruiting a PhD student to join our lab in the fall of 2027. If you’re excited about phylogenetics, comp bio, paleobiology, stats theory, macroevolution, etc. please get in touch! Folks at #Evol2026, you can talk to @brpetrucci.bsky.social & @sigournie.bsky.social to learn more about our lab

It remains strange to me how many people speak perfectly understandably and yet PowerPoint either doesn’t try to give them captions, or gives comically bad ones. You’d think by now the software would have been trained on enough different accents and/or speech conditions.

Long term field monitoring continues to suggest that evolutionary biologists preferentially predate on bananas when presented with a range of hand-sizes fruit.

I actually do have sympathy for the difficulties involved in teaching giant classes where an increasing number of students are entering them not at the expected level of preparation in cognate subjects. But that's way better addressed by prerequisite courses than by testing requirements.

For reasons I am not sure I can really justify, I feel less guilty cranking the AC in a hotel room than I do at home. And thus I am enjoyed chilled air despite currently being in a climate/weather situation that doesn't actually need it. Woo!

@jrossibarra.bsky.social Alerting you to the taxonomic diversity of ornaments available for sale by a vendor at Evolution. There is both Corn and Not Corn.

Turtles Some Portion Of The Way Down

Geothermal vents at an octopus garden off the California coast can reduce egg hatching time by 4 years. The mere idea of an egg taking multiple years to hatch…

Red squirrels apparently carry less than 3% body fat before winter. That is wild.

“So, basically everything we’ve learned about behavioral genetics is a lie. Genes don’t do anything”

The Amazon molly is an asexual parthenogenesic fish that’s a hybrid of two different sexually reproducing molly species. Yet another reminder that my goodness is it hard to precisely define species in ways the apply to everything.

“After I cut off the head, I can poke the tail all I want and it doesn’t do anything. It’s incapable of any coordinated behavior until it regrows a brain. It suggests the brain is doing something”

At the Evolution confrrence, I’ll typically prioritize my research interests (for me, experimental evolution, adaptation, and things on the mutualism/parasitism/coevolution spectrum), education research, and awards symposia. But I’ll also spend a good amount of time in Behavior sessions.

I had not previously heard that a weed is “Any plant that interferes with man’s plan of conquering the Earth” (actual old timey definition; not one we use much now)

Very much appreciating that this morning’s rain is actually more of a mist. Especially given that I didn’t pack an umbrella and picked a hotel a mile away from the conference center.

The obvious but still somehow unanticipated downside of having quality pillows at home is being disappointed by hotel pillows. #FirstWorldProblems

“Loser effects” is such a weird term. It apparently just means the impact on an individual from having previously had another individual be aggressive to them. Regardless of the outcome of that aggression.

Reminder for the #Evol2026 folks. At the Princeton Uni Press booth, if you give them your contact info, you can reserve a book to take home free at the end of the conference. (Limit 1 per person)

Alex Badyaev: You don’t have to name ALL your population genetics software finches, but it certainly helps.

Field studies on animals who can make choices seem so complicated. Renee Duckworth finds that in her birds, most years there’s selective pressure for breeding early. But when there’s a late cold snap, there’s a big advantage to nests where the eggs haven’t hatched yet.

This is turned up to the max when considering species definitions: imgs.xkcd.com/comics/stand...

Perennially appropriate.

Becky Fuller at the ASN presidential talk beating the drum for the benefits of publishing in society journals. I have to agree

The hotel self serve waffle machine: because sometimes cake for breakfast sounds like a great idea.

'Dungeon Crawler Carl' TV Series Greenlit by Peacock

Having both a) attended Michigan State University and b) watched many Disney films, I am unclear whether this church is attempting to light the signal for Sparty or currently host to evil magic.

As I am a giant nerd (hopefully you know that already), I’m at a lecture from Neil Shubin. Likely best known as the author of Your Inner Fish, and the discoverer of tiktaalik, an important fossil fish.

I walked by and it didn’t even heckle me about my variety show act.

Every so often, as I quietly use various programs in the ways they were clearly intended, I just have to stop and wonder what the hell is wrong with a number of people who feel compelled to very obviously abuse the intention.

@gianttourtiere.bsky.social Important consideration for your dread skellington army.

I have successfully invaded the land of Cleves.

Today I Columbused ("discovering" something many, many other people already knew about) the podcast The Rest Is Science. Hannah Fry (mathematician, also YouTuber) and Michael Stevens (guy who does the Vsauce sci comm YouTube channel) pick a topic and both research stuff related to it and discuss.

Potential postdoc opportunity! We're looking for someone to do Good Work Fast at the interface between zoonotic disease ecology and global climate and land-use projections. Strong skills in statistics and geospatial modeling are the non-negotiable here. In-person in New Haven. More essential info 👉

Since I'm seeing a lot of postdoc recruitment posts recently, just resharing this as an explanation of why I'm only reposting a fraction of them.

Because @rahaeli.bsky.social is once again engaged in “explaining something important to people who do not want to believe what repeated studies and expertise have shown because it is contrary to their assumptions”, I am engaging in compensatory #Potato posting. Feel free to join.

The existence of the Off Campus series amuses me to no end. Some executive, presumably being paid more money than I ever will be, looked at the success of Heated Rivalry and concluded that it was because viewers want more hockey content.

Since I did do my PhD in cyanobacteria growth and treatment optimization modeling AND work in the water treatment industry, I’m gonna share my theory as to what’s happening here and how to fix it. People are focusing on the painted bottom of the pool increasing residual heat, and while that 1/19

Confession: even after playing Connections for years, I am terrible at guessing which category will be yellow and which green.

New episode of #MattersMicrobial! This time, Dr. Jeff Barrick joins the #QualityQuorum to discuss the LTEE and microbial evolution. I had such fun and learned so much. Please spread the #GoodMicrobialWord? @asmicrobiology @univpugetsound @microbe.tv @relenski.bsky.social youtu.be/z1tysDEzJLA?...

The key takeaway, of course, is that once we *do* routinely produce excess antimatter, we should develop a way to use it to create better aurorae. www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFhr...

This. If you shelve the books with other books that likely appeal to the same readers, you get more people who want to read the book finding it, and fewer people feeling deceived that they were looking for A and got B in A packaging.

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings. Join my Substack for weekly articles about how to live your best kingly life. And check out these affiliate marketing links for supplements and protein powder that will make the mighty look on ye and despair.