Roxanne Armfield

MUSEUM JOB KLAXON!
Very excited about bringing this new post in to the team. If you've got good natural history collections management skills and solid leadership experience, we'd love to hear from you! #MuseumJobs

04.06.2025 12:33 — 👍 5    🔁 9    💬 0    📌 0

Graphical abstract for "The Diffusion Diaries: Diffusible Iodine-Based Contrast-Enhanced CT for Vertebrate Natural History Specimens", showing the number of scans : "252 scans of 205 specimens from 7 natural history collections" a plot showing how staining time increases with mass, log-transformed (bottom left), a pie chart showing the Tissue Condition scores (TCS) recorded for all specimens (bottom middle), and a screenshot of a lab protocol for diceCT'ing museum specimens (bottom right)

Cover image for Integrative Organismal Biology, showing cross sections through a fish, a tenrec, a frog, and a lizard at the bottom of the image, and a 3D rendering of each animal at the top of the image (colored in teal, grey, yellow, and pink, respectively)

🚨New publication alert!🚨 A big one! It might just be my *biggest* one: doi.org/10.1093/iob/... IMPORTANT THREAD! From the moment Dave Blackburn set me loose at the Florida Museum, I had a marvelous time using diffusible iodine-based contrast-enhanced CT (diceCT) to create anatomical datasets 🧪1/6

21.04.2025 19:42 — 👍 87    🔁 47    💬 7    📌 3

09.04.2025 15:01 — 👍 82    🔁 11    💬 2    📌 0

To sum up where we are
Colossal: We made a dire wolf.
Scientists: Ha ha, no, you really didn’t.
Public: If you did, it was a pretty bad idea all around.
MAGA: Great news! I guess we don’t need the Endangered Species Act anymore.

09.04.2025 06:00 — 👍 16    🔁 7    💬 1    📌 0

2 different angles of a bronze cast of an Edmontosaurus skull where an American robin has nested in its mouth.

This robin has excellent taste in real estate.

(That’s 'Monty,' the bronze cast of an Edmontosaurus on UTK's campus.)

📸 McClung Museum

07.04.2025 21:28 — 👍 451    🔁 154    💬 8    📌 8

A snake climbs the side of a tree. Its body looks like a graph showing a steep decline. Yellow axes are overlaid on the graph. The snake is better at the economy than the current administration.

OK so where are we on this snake-predicted stock market graph? 📉🐍

*yes, the snake was climbing the side of a tree like this!

05.04.2025 18:04 — 👍 263    🔁 46    💬 9    📌 6

Text that reads: The University of Texas High-Resolution X-ray CT Facility (UTCT) will host a short course on the fundamentals of acquisition, visualization, and analysis of high-resolution X-ray CT (HRXCT) data for biological and paleontological specimens June 2-4, 2025 in Austin, TX. This short course will present an overview of the acquisition, interpretation, 3D visualization and analysis of HRXCT data. This will be followed by hands-on training focused on 3D visualization, surface extraction, and segmentation (e.g., endocasts, digital dissection) including deep learning. Covered programs include ImageJ, Dragonfly, and 3D Slicer/SlicerMorph. This course is sponsored in part by NSF and funds are available to help cover the cost of travel, lodging, and meals. There is no charge to attend. Because we will not be able to accept all applicants, preference will be given to those who have/will have HRXCT data for the course and have a demonstrated need for immediate application of the skills learned. Students and early-career researchers receive priority. Participants are invited to bring their own HRXCT data, or to have specimens scanned (at a significant discount) at UTCT prior to the course.

Every year UTCT teaches NSF sponsored short courses on high-resolution X-ray CT, taught by UTCT staff (including me!). Applications for the 2025 courses are now open! See below for the biological/paleontological course info, & we also have a geological one. If you'd like to apply, send me a DM 🩻☢️🦴

04.04.2025 17:52 — 👍 15    🔁 25    💬 0    📌 0

Quoting Physics Nobel laureate Geoffrey Hinton: “I can repeat my own opinion, which is that if the [Royal Society] gives fellowships for promoting science they should take them away for demoting science,”
Precisely.

25.03.2025 22:51 — 👍 28    🔁 14    💬 2    📌 0

Department for Education confirms launch of natural history GCSE Campaigners have been calling for the qualification for years but plan stalled despite a curriculum being drawn up

Brilliant news! At last, confirmation that the Govt *will* go ahead with the #NaturalHistoryGCSE 🎉 We have to get to know our fellow travellers on this planet again. Young people who know & love nature are far more likely to protect & restore it - as well as enjoying better physical & mental health

21.03.2025 15:54 — 👍 2179    🔁 474    💬 58    📌 60

Very much this.

08.03.2025 02:34 — 👍 598    🔁 166    💬 7    📌 7

Reviving the woolly mammoth isn’t just unethical. It’s impossible | Adam Rutherford At a time when US scientists are under attack from their own government, the illiteracy around these elephantine fantasies is dangerous, says geneticist Adam Rutherford

My very sensible friend @adamrutherford.bsky.social on the absolute NONSENSE of trying to “de-extinct” mammoths.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

06.03.2025 14:31 — 👍 536    🔁 100    💬 28    📌 11

Exclusive: NIH to terminate hundreds of active research grants Studies that touch on LGBT+ health, gender identity and DEI in the biomedical workforce could be terminated, according to documents obtained by Nature.

NEW: The NIH has begun terminating grants for active projects studying gender identity, DEI, environmental justice, climate change, among other topics.

At least 16 termination letters have already been sent — and hundreds more are coming, people inside NIH tell me.
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

06.03.2025 02:17 — 👍 1318    🔁 901    💬 39    📌 119

SCIENCE IRL: Community SciComm mini-grant Skype a Scientist is offering $300-$1,000 mini-grants to support boots-on-the-ground science communication. The Science IRL mini-grants will support projects that put either 1) important science mess...

Apps are due FRIDAY for the Science IRL grant

We're funding projects that tackle humanity's big science-centric problems, while reaching people who are NOT engaging with science. Bring me your creative, unique projects that put science where there currently is none.

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

11.02.2025 04:24 — 👍 122    🔁 95    💬 3    📌 1

Roxanne Armfield holding a blue-tongued skink: a brown-grey elongate lizard with a white belly and tiny limbs.

Roxanne Armfield looking out on the french Alps in the summer. Roxanne is in the foreground with grass-covered hilltops behind her. Further back are dark green mountains lightly covered by clouds.

A cute tan coloured corn snake, with red and black stripes and a beady black eye, looks out from a bundle of sawdust.

Hello Bluesky! I'm a palaeontologist & evolutionary biologist with a love of big systems,
🧬➕🥚➕🌿🏞️ = 🦎
big questions,
🦎➖🐾= 🐍
and big to-do lists.
📝
Frequently distracted by #SciComm, #Snakes and Shiny Things💎

23.12.2024 16:36 — 👍 15    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0