Edward Marcotte

I’m curious if anyone has heard anything about the status of the NIGMS R35 MIRA, currently there is no next submission deadline for established investigators and we have now passed the forecasted new announcement date

Amos Bairoch, Swiss pioneer of bioinformatics, passes away We are deeply saddened to announce the passing of our co-founder and Group Leader Amos Bairoch. Emeritus professor at the University of Geneva, he shaped the development of bioinformatics over more th...

We are deeply saddened to share the passing of Amos Bairoch, pioneer of bioinformatics and co-founder of SIB. His lifelong commitment for high-quality, open data transformed global research. We honour his legacy by continuing to build the future of bioinformatics.

Anthony A. Hyman will become EMBL’s next Director General.

He joins EMBL from @mpi-cbg.de in Dresden. He is also Professor of Molecular Biology @tudresden.bsky.social, and was a group leader at EMBL Heidelberg from 1993 to 1999.

www.embl.org/news/people-...

YouTube video by Schmidt Ocean The Origins of Complex Life | Searching for the Asgards

youtu.be/Jy_boPdY0zo?...

Definitely!

That's one for the quote wall

OK, this jumped straight to the front of my podcast queue

& here's the sub itself. The robot arms are controlled by two little robot arm-shaped joysticks in a control room with a wall of monitors showing feeds from the cameras on the front of the sub.

Here's the R/V Falkor (too) and the bay inside with the amazing robot sub (SuBastian), suspended from a giant A frame for deploying it through an even larger door. The two workbenches in front give you a sense of scale. You can also just make out @archaeal.bsky.social in front of the Falkor

This is a nice explainer of the search for Asgards happening right now off the coast of Uruguay. I was lucky enough to visit the R/V Falkor (too) [named for The NeverEnding Story!] while it was docked in Montevideo... (pics below)

bsky.app/profile/c0nc...

Today's dive site, to ~2,200m. We will be streaming 9am-3pm Central. At www.youtube.com/@SchmidtOcean

#AsgardArchaea
@schmidtocean.bsky.social
@moorefound.bsky.social
@texasscience.bsky.social
@utmsi.bsky.social

This team are searching for new "Asgard archaea" to sequence.

Let's talk about why these bacteria-like organisms are so fascinating, why they're named for Norse mythology, and why looking at them is unlocking a better understanding of our own genomes.

Once considered a type of oddball bacteria🦠...

Terrifying. Without a watermark, these would be hard to catch. I wonder what the Western blot or Hela cell image equivalent is for six-fingered hands in early AI portraits?

Congratulations to the newly minted Dr. Brittney Voigt! After defending a fantastic thesis spanning work in my lab and the @edwardmarcotte.bsky.social lab.

Integrative Biology at UT is hiring an Evolutionary Biologist! Happy to answer any questions about the position/dept/UT. Come join us!

integrativebio.utexas.edu
cns.utexas.edu
apply.interfolio.com/177547

I think they had to go with propane--ethane was proving to be hard to track down

Really enjoying watching science happen in real time, with @archaeal.bsky.social, @valdeanda.bsky.social, and colleagues live streaming their robot sub data collection from the R/V Falkor off of the coast of Uruguay

Schmidt Ocean Our Purpose: to excite interest and inform the wise stewardship of our planet. Our Mission: Catalyze the discoveries needed to understand our ocean, sustain life, and ensure the health of our planet ...

Starting at 7pm Central I will be streaming from the bottom of the ocean off the coast of Uruguay!

Feel free to join and ask questions.

www.youtube.com/@SchmidtOcean

Asgard collaborative expedition begins… Falkor (too) has left Montevideo

My department at UT Austin is looking to hire an Assistant Professor in Evolutionary Biology, broadly defined. Feel free to reach out to me with any questions you may have.
apply.interfolio.com/177547

Fantastic to see the lab filling up!

Bon voyage!

Plastic degradation by enzymes from uncultured deep sea microorganisms Abstract. Polyethylene terephthalate (PET)-hydrolyzing enzymes (PETases) are a recently discovered enzyme class capable of plastic degradation. PETases are

A wonderful collaboration between my lab and Andy Ellington and Edward Marcotte here at UT.

We obtained lots of thermal stable plastic degrading enzymes from the deep sea (Guaymas Basin, Gulf of California)

🌍Open call: Junior Group Leader positions!

Join a world-class biomedical research institute at the heart of the Vienna BioCenter, where curiosity drives discovery.

Lead your own lab, pursue bold ideas, and shape the future of science at the IMP: www.imp.ac.at/career/open-...

Baker Lab 2025

The container is our field gear for the research expedition for Uruguay.

sites.utexas.edu/baker-lab/sp...

We have wondered what a complex archaeal cell might look like ever since 2014. It’s been a long road (and the journey is far from over), but it’s a good time to pause for breath and look. These Asgard archaeal cells are a surprise! And that is the joy of being a cell biologist.

An Asgard archaeon with internal membrane compartments

Brilliant study led by @fmacleod.bsky.social and Andriko von Kügelgen. Tight collaboration with @buzzbaum.bsky.social and lab. Congrats to all authors!

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Love it! (My kids are also total Silksong addicts)

How scientists are pushing back against Trump’s funding ‘deal’ for universities Six institutions have so far rejected the administration’s list of demands over academic freedom concerns.

New: Researchers are broadly rejecting the Trump administration's compact. In faculty votes and student protests, they have mobilized to pressure their universities—to some effect: 6 of the original 9 universities have rejected the compact

With @alexwitze.bsky.social and @jennaahart.bsky.social: