Jesse Shapiro

Ok, I can’t not cheer for Vlad Jr.

Sorry Toronto, but Montreal will be cheering for the Dodgers tonight!

A black-and-white photo of Jackie Robinson wearing a Montreal uniform, holding a bat over his shoulder. He is dressed in a light jersey with "Montreal" written across the chest, a matching cap with an "M" logo, and pants with a belt. The background shows a crowd of spectators in a stadium.

On Oct. 23, 1945, the news broke that Jackie Robinson had been signed to play with the Montreal Royals.
He would spend a season with the team before being promoted to the Brooklyn Dodgers on his way to the Hall of Fame.
This is his story.

🧵 1/12

🦠📢If, like us, you lie awake at night wondering how cyanobacteria can be so good at adapting to any conditions, or if you just think they're cool and need an excuse to visit #Montreal, please consider submitting an abstract to our session by November 25th #ASLOSIL2026 www.aslo.org/aslo-sil-2026/

Non-conjugative plasmids limit their mobility to persist in nature Sabnis et al. explain why non-conjugative plasmids move at a low rate in nature. While increased mobility can easily evolve by incorporating phage DNA into plasmids, this is disadvantageous because it...

New paper with my (amazing) friend and mentor @jrpenades.bsky.social
Really looking forward to see what plasmid aficionados think of this one!!
With @asantoslopez.bsky.social @wfigueroac3.bsky.social Akshay Sabins and others
www.cell.com/cell-reports...

I’m very happy this is finally out! Here, we showcase the combination of BONCAT and SIP metaproteomics to uncover rare and active microbes driving anaerobic acetate turnover. We are excited to see what other microbial metabolisms and ecosystems this approach can help to illuminate! 🦠

Please share this with anyone who may be interested in a post-doc in Germany:

jobs.awi.de/Vacancies/20...

This is quite an exciting opportunity to push the boundaries of what is known regarding the molecular basis of the formation and demise of photosymbiotic relationships in marine habitats.

Why can’t I have more content like this?

A supermarket aisle displaying various dairy products, including bags of milk and cartons of cream, with brands such as "Sealtest" and "Lactantia" prominently featured. The products are arranged on shelves, with some bags of milk in blue and red packaging in the foreground and various milk and cream cartons in the background.

Outside of Canada, many assume that the entire country uses bagged milk.
The truth is, only part of Canada have bagged milk in the fridge.
But why? Well, it comes down when Canada made the transition to the metric system.
This is the story!

🧵 1/9

Very cool! Look forward to reading it :)

Habitat-specificity in SAR11 is associated with a few genes under high selection Abstract. The order Pelagibacterales (SAR11) is the most abundant group of heterotrophic bacteria in the global surface ocean, where individual sublineages

I'm delighted our paper is out: doi.org/10.1093/isme...
With new SAR11 isolate genomes and time-series metagenomes, we reveal coastal and offshore SAR11 ecotypes, identify associated metabolic traits, and pinpoint selective gene sweeps as a likely evolutionary driver to niche partitioning. 🌊🦠

And now NextStrain as well.

Next up, will GISAID start charging open-source community tools to have access?

That would completely shaft users who contributed to GISAID, where we never agreed to that and assumed GISAID would be good custodians of the data we contributed. They're not.

Isolation, engineering and ecology of temperate phages from the human gut - Nature Human host-associated cellular products may act as induction agents for bacteriophages.

Very cool phage study from @jeremyjbarr.bsky.social's lab.

Isolation, engineering and ecology of temperate phages from the human gut
#microbiomesky #phagesky

We are recruiting new faculty in IMES at MIT!

IMES (Institute for Medical Engineering and Science) is the MIT home of the famous HST program. As faculty are also appointed in a department at MIT, we have diverse research programs, all focused on human health.

faculty-searches.mit.edu/imes-search/

Ecological constraints foster both extreme viral-host lineage stability and mobile element diversity in a marine community Phages are typically viewed as very rapidly evolving biological entities. Little is known, however, about whether and how phages can establish long-term genetic stability. We addressed this eco-evolut...

Phages evolve fast, or do they?
In oysters, some stay identical for years.
With >1,200 phages & 600 Vibrio genomes, we reveal long-term stability and new mobile elements.
Proud of this collaborative work across our teams (Roscoff-UdeM and @epcrocha.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

A mural of road cycling racers and the inclined tower of the Olympic stadium are illuminated by the golden light of the setting sun. In the foreground, orange cones casually delimit an intersection under construction.

Montreal scene

Three Bicentenary research fellowships on offer at @officialuom.bsky.social @fbmh-uom.bsky.social for exceptional ECRs with <3y postdoc experience

3yrs salary + £30k pa research expenses

Do you have a great idea & want to join @mermanchester.bsky.social?

www.bmh.manchester.ac.uk/research/sup...

a man in a blue jacket is crying and says " are you crying " ALT: a man in a blue jacket is crying and says " are you crying "

Reading the acknowledgments section of my student's PhD thesis...

Measles, Canada... 1,923 cases total https://www.alberta.ca/measles

Meanwhile in Canada, there have been more reported measles cases in Alberta (cases: 1,923; population: ~5M) than reported in all of the US this year (cases: 1,563, population: ~340M).

Consequence: "The Americas region is at risk of losing its measles-free status..."

globalnews.ca/news/1146683...

Trade-offs between phage resistance and conjugative ability shape the ecological and evolutionary response of a multidrug resistance plasmid to plasmid-dependent phage Phage therapy is a promising alternative to antibiotics to treat multidrug resistant infections. Plasmid dependent phages (PDPs) are particularly attractive as therapeutics because they can both kill ...

New pre-print www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Plasmid-dependent phage (PDPs) are ubiquitous, but the selective pressures that they impose on plasmids are not well understood. Project led by Daniel Cazares in collaboration with @brockhurstlab.bsky.social!
#phagesky#microsky

Bon conseil ;)

Would love to. Let’s keep in touch.

Experimental evolution of a mammalian holobiont: bank voles selected for herbivorous capability evolved distinct and robust gut bacterial communities Abstract. According to the “hologenome” theory of evolution natural selection and evolution can act through a conglomerate biological unit, the “holobiont”

Pleased to share new work tinkering with and testing the concept of the holobiont
@isme-microbes.bsky.social

"Experimental evolution of a mammalian holobiont: bank voles selected for herbivorous capability evolved distinct and robust gut bacterial communities"
🌾🐭🦠

academic.oup.com/ismecommun/a...

Around Montpellier! Exact location TBA, depends on the quality of local bike routes ;)

Fall 2026 to summer 2027! Want to come visit? Will you be nearby?

A photo of a cycling map of France on a table beside a glass of beer on a table in a bar.

Sabbatical planning: step 1.

Disability in ecology and evolution In this TrendsTalk series 'Disability in ecology and evolution' in Trends in Ecology and Evolution, we will be hearing from people about their experiences being disabled in ecology and evolution. We a...

www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...

New entry into the Disability in Ecology and Evolution series in TREE featuring me :)

Glass buildings with a paved path in between (gray, with blue lines)

My department @geographieudem.bsky.social is looking for a professor in human geography specializing in the study of social-ecological transformations, political ecology, climate change, environmental justice and/or the geography of risks and infrastructures. Deadline November 10, share widely!

Genomic correlates of tailocin sensitivity in Pseudomonas syringae Abstract. Phage-derived bacteriocins, also referred to as tailocins, are structures encoded by bacterial genomes and deployed into the extracellular enviro

Here’s published version of our manuscript using GWAS to investigate tailocin sensitivity in Pseudomonas syringae. TL:DR pretty clear LPS is tailocin receptor but also that P.syringae often completely swaps out its entire O antigen biosynth pathway w/ recombination

academic.oup.com/g3journal/ad...

Resistance mutation supply modulates the benefit of CRISPR immunity against virulent phages Only a fraction of bacterial genomes encode CRISPR-Cas systems but the selective causes of this variation are unexplained. How naturally virulent bacteriophages (phages) select for CRISPR immunity has...

New preprint!

Ever wondered why only a fraction of genomes encode CRISPR immunity? 🧬 🦠

Turns out CRISPR is rarely beneficial against virulent phages, being most beneficial against those for which resistance mutations are rare!

An epic effort by Rosanna Wright

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