The horrors [complimentary] persist

Our new paper on squid and cuttlefish evolution is out in @natecoevo.nature.com : www.nature.com/articles/s41... /1

Thurs @ the Willimantic Library, @jillianlewis.bsky.social & artist Ezra Blanchard will be hosting a community meeting about our biodiversity mural! Folks can come learn more about the project & vote on which animals to include in the mural! We'll have free postcards for attendees feat. Ezra's art!

this post has destroyed my brain. every time I am pouring a Guinness I am like ah yes, for the bug, he has been waiting a long time at the bar

I'll never forget visiting Kewalo Marine Lab decades ago to give a seminar, after which Prof. Mike Hadfield showed me a room full of fridges full of endangered land snails-for some species I think the only ones left were in that room. So I loved this #EarthOptimism www.nytimes.com/2026/03/11/s...

People usually go to Sipadan for huge schools of fish, but this pygmy squid (idiosepius) was my favourite find! The size of a thumbnail, you can make out individual chromoatphores on its skin. Adorable. They have a glue gland in their mantle that helps them stick to surfaces. #scuba #marinelife

NIH leadership wants to strip worker's rights from the majority of scientists on its campuses. But, the NIH does not get to say whether we are a union or not. We do, and we are no strangers to having to fight for our union. Time for a short history lesson. 1/n Disclaimer: all views are my own.

Genomic and chemical analyses of 713 marine biofilm-derived bacterial strains journals.asm.org/doi/full/10.... #jcampubs

How a tiny bacterium turns itself into a “tunneling machine” http://dlvr.it/TRGZ7c http://dlvr.it/TRGZ7k

DEADLINE APPROACHING! Apply to Molecular and Cell Biology of Symbiosis by March 4. This immersive four-week course is designed to teach basic concepts and and facilitate state-of-the-art experimental approaches in symbiosis research. 🔗More info here: go.mbl.edu/symbiosis

Wrapping up a productive week: very glad to have contributed to this review on how spatial structure shapes microbial ecology and evolution, led by @marcelbaecker.bsky.social, @bedutilh.bsky.social, @bramvandijk.bsky.social and many others. doi.org/10.1093/fems...

Hawaiian bobtail squid maintain distinct microbiota in different organs, including bioluminescent bacteria in their light organs, by deploying immune factors with tailored expressions in each niche. In PNAS: https://ow.ly/QxLo50XPnyS

Happy to have contributed a small part to this really fun story: journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/... ‘catch and kill’ interplay between marine organisms congrats Qihao and Dave!

BY THE WAY the CT application is open until the end of the year. We'll be co-creating a biodiversity mural with the community. You get help from experienced assistants throughout the project! Easy-to-paint location, no scaffolds or ladders. docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

the year i’m having

Grad student in the lab (Dom Pham), in her first semester, already out here writing those op-eds: www.ctpost.com/opinion/arti... 💪✨

For this #FluorescenceFriday I wanted to share this spooky eye from a squid embryo! 👁️🦑

Excited to share our new paper out in @isme-microbes.bsky.social. We asked if environmental microbial communities can be adaptively modulated by host species that transiently acquire their symbionts from the environment #SymbioSky #MicrobiomeSky doi.org/10.1093/isme...

I wrote an opinion piece about parental/family leave at UConn. I’m only ~75% happy with it but … something needed to be said. Many things actually. Loudly. Repeatedly. And with as many voices as possible. “This is UConn: Zero paid family leave for professors” ctmirror.org/2025/10/21/t...

When marine biologist Cherisse Du Preez sent an underwater drone to explore a methane seep on the ocean floor, she expected to find tubeworms. Instead, she stumbled upon an army of octo-moms. 🐙

🪱🍄 The secret to predatory escape lies in collagen. A new study how a single nematode gene nhr-66 resist fungal traps thanks to Velcro-like abilities, but the trade-off is their weakened cuticles making them vulnerable to rainfall. For more: s.gwdg.de/VJySw4 #Nematodes #FungalBiology #MaxPlanck

Congratulations to Avery Imes and all of our collaborators on this cover & editor's spotlight article in #AEM! More details on the study in the preprint thread linked below. @asm.org bsky.app/profile/mark...

New #symbiosky paper from Cory Bishop and collaborators (including me 😊) on the remarkable specificity of the symbiosis between spotted salamanders and the alga in their eggs. Cory organized colleagues to get egg fluid from NC USA to NS Canada. He found extremely low... tinyurl.com/2jmwce2s

everyone please look at the hummingbird enjoying my purple coneflower 🌼

Seeing between the lines: matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry imaging advances for microbial interactions -in Curr Opin Microbiol from @drlaurasanchez.bsky.social #Microbiota_thematic_issue www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

please enjoy a bunch of clams doing the wiggle www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DBS...

Artists of bluesky! @skypeascientist.bsky.social & Willimantic Public Art are collabing on a community mural in Willimantic, CT in spring. We're looking for Eastern CT artists who'd like to work on the project! The artist will be selected *by the community*. Apply here: forms.gle/2tjJmdXcF6wy...

So, here it is. Thanks to a new state law that was NEVER DEBATED, Indiana University has committed itself to abolishing majors in African-American/African Diaspora Studies: American Studies; Art History; French; Italian; Religious Studies etc. DOZENS of majors. www.ipm.org/news-section...

Thanks for the shoutout Dr. Kat! I make non-squid jewelry on request too, if folks have other favorite model systems :)

Protect Trans Scientists. cowritten with a lot of amazing people (I tagged those I could find but there are so many more incredible folks) www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... @thepunkscientist.bsky.social @jlw-ecoevo.bsky.social @bfrancescol.bsky.social @drsueishaq.bsky.social

Learning about science is always rad. But as the Animal-Microbe Symbiosis GRC wraps up, I'm most excited about whom I get to do that science with.

Our paper in @science.org 👉🏽 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... is accompanied by an especially thoughtful perspective by Carey Nadell and Chris Marx 👉🏽 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

🌈 This #PrideMonth, UConn was proud to host the 4th annual Queer Science Conference, which introduces Connecticut high schoolers to the wide rainbow of possible career paths in science. today.uconn.edu/2025/06/at-u...

I’m at the Uni of Michigan today! I’ll be doing a science comm. seminar + workshop later, but now I’m catching up on all the squid + bacteria symbiosis work with @spencernyholm.bsky.social & @balunaslab.bsky.social. These labs collaborate, understanding symbiosis with both biology & chemistry.

MY ART IN SCIENCE LABS!!!

Do you know a high school student who's queer and interested in STEM? Do they want to come to UConn for. *free* one day conference to meet and learn about queer scientists and engineers work. Join us for Queer Science June 8 in Storrs.

An absolutely mesmerizing slime mold found in Soberanía National Park, Panamá. It’s the kinda thing that makes you re-experience child-like wonder at the beauty of life followed by a devastating reminder that we are obliterating billions of years of biological innovation to cool chatbot servers

Exclusive: National Science Foundation staff were told today that the agency’s 37 divisions—across all eight directorates—are being abolished and the number of programs within those divisions will be drastically reduced.

I get sad every time I make new antibiotic stocks, because I can’t help but think of this album

If the retiring faculty agree to WHAT NOW

Spring in Connecticut is beautiful.

Very cool new work by @megbehri.bsky.social and William F. McLaughlin: Starvation drives co-existence in cross-feeding bacterial populations www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

This work is finally officially out! Check out our paper, where we use various advanced microscopy techniques to shed light on the structures of a complex symbiotic organ and the communities of bacteria that live inside it. journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

Happy to share our work on jellyfish microbiomes across space and life history stages @akerwin.bsky.social #Microsky #Symbiosky 🧪🌊https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0319944&?utm_id=plos111&utm_source=internal&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=author

do you need some Creatures today? I know I did

We offer a PhD project within our International Max Planck Research School "Chemical Communication in Ecological Systems" on "Metabolic exchanges, regulation and equilibrium of an ancient insect symbiosis" (Project 5). Please share, inform & apply here: www.ice.mpg.de/129183/imprs

March 12 is your last chance to apply for the MBL's 2025 Molecular and Cell Biology of Symbiosis course! 🗓️ This immersive, research-based course facilitates state-of-the-art experimental approaches in symbiosis research. Read more: bit.ly/4ig81fJ #ScienceStartsHere

Amazing! Congrats @ceilidhc.bsky.social and co!

Attention Scientists! Check this out! A thing you can do that's useful and likely in your wheelhouse!