Check out the draft program for the Comparative Genomics of Unicellular Eukaryotes meeting! Want to attend? Are you a speaker? Don't wait! Registration is closes on May 4. comparativegenomics2026.com/program/ w/ @cstairs.bsky.social

1/25 New paper out in PNAS! We show that the fitness costs of reproductive specialization, where somatic cells give up reproduction, scale inversely with organism size. Larger organisms can afford far more soma, removing a key barrier to multicellular complexity.

We have just published a short note on archaeal phylogeny: complex mixture models support a deep placement of Methanonatronarchaeia within Euryarchaea and indicate that three recently described groups (Halorutilales, Afararchaeaceae, and Ordosarchaeia) are actually the same. shorturl.at/5GMpU

So you are using IQ-TREE to estimate a tree for "deep time" phylogenetics using amino acid alignments. There is a lot of confusion about how to test model fit. Here are some suggestions.

Today we published a Correction on our 2023 @nature.com paper reporting the heimdallarchaeial ancestry of eukaryotes: www.nature.com/articles/s41... Corrected paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41... Importantly, the re-analyses of the corrected dataset are consistent with the original findings.

Comparative Genomics of Unicellular Eukaryotes (San Feliu, Spain): Abstract submission is open, with a short deadline! comparativegenomics2026.com Join us as we explore the most diverse, surprising, and still largely uncharted branches of the eukaryotic tree.

Microbial eukaryotes keep challenging assumptions about eukaryotic cell and genome biology. Our upcoming workshop explores the frontier of protist genomics and how it shapes cell biology, ecology and evolution. Please save the date! Talks, posters and ECR events Websites and details coming soon

Divergent Plastid Genomes in the Deepest-Branching Apicomplexan Parasites #protists #protistsonsky academic.oup.com/gbe/article/...

Beautiful work!

Happy to see our work published and glad to have contributed together with @maxraas.bsky.social ! Looking forward to all the projects that will come out of this work!

Excited to share our new paper in @cellreports.bsky.social that reshapes our understanding of chromosome organization's deep evolutionary roots! Our work dives into the origins of the machinery that structures our very genomes. 🔗: doi.org/10.1016/j.ce... #Genomics #Evolution #CellBiology #LECA

🎉 Now out “Phylogenomic analyses indicate the archaeal superphylum DPANN originated from free‑living euryarchaeal‑like ancestors” www.nature.com/articles/s41...

New vacancy in my team! PhD student position on microbial genome evolution, focusing on the evolutionary principles underlying bacterial genome architecture. Please repost and share with talented MSc students in #evobio, bioinformatics or related :) www.uu.nl/en/organisat... #MEvoSky #MicroSky

Check out exciting protist research in JEM! Holly Moeller et al. explore the feeding habits of Mesodinium rubrum and provide a tool for studying its cell biology and photophysiology in their open access paper in our March/April issue! doi.org/10.1111/jeu.... #protistsonsky

We must have been super lucky that contamination was all from different lineages to each Njord MAG and yet all from the same clade of unknown Asgard so that Njord form monophyletic groups within Asgards in individual gene trees.

I'm pleased to introduce our new paper rooting the eukaryote Tree of Life (eToL) that resulted from a collaboration led by PhD student Kelsey Williamson and a large group of collaborators doi.org/10.1038/s415...htt

🚨 New paper alert! 🚨 A robustly rooted tree of eukaryotes sheds light on their deep evolutionary ancestry—suggesting that the Last Eukaryotic Common Ancestor (LECA) may have had an excavate-like cell architecture. 🧵🔬 (1/) www.nature.com/articles/s41...

🧬🧪🦠🧫 @science.org www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... @rkoszul.bsky.social @leameneu.bsky.social @christophechapard.bsky.social @chromozz.bsky.social @pasteur.fr @sorbonne-universite.fr @institutcurie.bsky.social + PS www.science.org/doi/epdf/10.... @gfudenberg.bsky.social @vram142.bsky.social

Would you expect that Bacteria use an archaellum for swimming? We didn't, but we found that some Chloroflexota do! Find the story here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... A little thread below 1/n

Dear US scientists, We've been hearing a lot of questions of the form "Why aren't universities doing anything!? They need to speak out!" We can explain. It's bad news. We're on our own. But understanding why can help us all figure out our plan. Read along in thread 1/x 🧪

Fun little Q&A! Thank you for the opportunity Current Biology @currentbiology.bsky.social www.cell.com/current-biol...

[RDV 16h !] #LUCA, le dernier ancêtre commun à tous les êtres vivants. De quelle nature est-il ? A quand peut-on le dater et comment ? Quel a été son impact sur son environnement ? tinyurl.com/25jhs4pa avec Guillaume Lecointre et Purificacion Lopez Garcia

NEW preprint!🥳 Orthogroups are a prerequisite for comparative genomics and Tree of Life inquiries Introducing #OrthoHMM, software that improves the inference of orthogroups (blue in fig) OrthoHMM may refine our understanding of genome evolution and the Tree of Life 🔗 tinyurl.com/4s9mwxz6 🧵 1/8

📢Call for Papers!📢 Applied and Environmental Microbiology is actively seeking submissions on the topic Anaerobic Microbiology. We welcome reviews and new research insights into strict and facultative anaerobes (archaea, bacteria, eukarya, viruses). Learn more: journals.asm.org/journal/aem/...

Please share! Applications due Dec 15th for a starting date in Sep 2025.

Understanding the origin of eukaryotic cells is one of the biggest puzzles in biology 🧩 As genomic data expand, painting a clear picture of LECA requires analytical resources and a commitment to data sharing. This paper led by T. R. emphasizes a community-driven approach to tackle this complexity.

This really is an excellent paper. It shows that plastid protein import machinery can be inherited through serial transfer, and that we should not expect additional membranes in tertiary plastids. In other words, serial transfers got easier to explain www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Here’s the updated Computational Biology Starter Pack! Let me know if you'd like to be included. go.bsky.app/QVPoZXp

Greetings to new followers! For those with only a sketchy, starter-pack sense of me, here's a quick run-down. I write about life for the New York Times. Today is the 20th anniversary of my 1st story there! I write on evolution, genomes, pandemics, brains, etc. www.nytimes.com/by/carl-zimmer 1/8

#Pfam #hmmer #LLMs #ProteinDomains www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Want to learn about the evolution of brown algae as derived from 60 new genomes? Exciting results of the Phaeoexplorer project: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

If you... like me... have found a lot of cool/relevant starter packs only to lose them again, here is a really useful tool - search starter packs: blueskydirectory.com/starter-pack... 🧪

I've imported all my posts from X using blueark.app, which seems to have worked well! (except it doesn't import any of the comments and reactions, so it makes you look a little bit like you're talking to yourself 😅)

Genomics, evolution, and more starter pack! Help build community with this starter pack. This list is currently incomplete. Want to be included? Reply and I will remedy that! go.bsky.app/JjvzkWU

We are searching for a postdoc to join our team, focused on anaerobic ciliate-methanogen symbiosis. Please share widely!

Readvertising this for the new protist lovers out there. Use #protistsonsky

Fully Funded PhD Opportunity in Evolutionary Biology at the U of Rhode Island. Join us to explore the origin and early evolution of eukaryotes using cutting-edge comparative (meta)genomics and molecular evolution approaches. Applications are due December 15th. Contact me ASAP at [email protected]

Puri presenting the investigations of the limits of life in the beautiful diverse extreme environments of Dallol #gdrarchaea

Highly recommend reading the Dispatch by @freejakoba and @Ryan_Gawryluk. It's a thorough and well-written perspective on the relevance of our findings! https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0960982224008510?via%3Dihub

Happy to present the outcome of a fun project carried out hand in hand with David Moreira. Did you know there's mitochondrial genome out there just as gene-rich as those of of jakobids? Why do we care, one might ask? Say no more! A thread...

👋 We're hiring! We're looking for a PhD student to work on the phylogeny and evolution of Archaea. Please get in touch and/or apply directly here: https://emploi.cnrs.fr/Offres/Doctorant/UMR8079-PURLOP-003/Default.aspx?lang=EN

Here we go ! Go, Brittany @britbaker11 !

Online: our evolutionary interrogation of eukaryotic Structural Maintenance of Chromosomes (SMC) complexes @maxraas.bsky.social @eelcotromer.bsky.social @lauraeme.bsky.social #SMCcomplexes #eukaryogenesis #LECA #condensin #cohesin #evolutionarycellbiology #chromatin 🧵(1/6) doi.org/10.1101/2024...

First paper out of Jazmin Blaz's PhD! In this collaborative effort, we're presenting two new sp. of Mantamonas and the first complete genome for a representative of CRuMs. Their phylogenetic position makes them key to understanding the early evolution of eukaryotes. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

And it’s out! https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-023-02488-2

Scientist? New to BlueSky? Trying to figure out what the hell a "feed" is and why hashtags aren't working the same as on Twitter? Check out this quick start guide by @steveharoz.com and me 👇

Monday morning surprise from my colleague 😂 This might have to become my new avatar.