Saudat Alishayeva

Conference title: Dialectical Biology Today: Legacies of Richard Lewontin, and image of Lewontin in Black and White with intense expression in front of a chalkboard holding up a fist, When and Where Friday, October 10, 2025 11:30 am to Sunday, October 12, 2025 2:00 pm Music Room (218) Goldring Student Centre 150 Charles St W, Toronto, ON M5S 1K5 | and online via Zoom

I'm excited to share with you all a conference I'm planning Oct. 10-12: Dialectical Biology Today: Legacies of Richard Lewontin.

It will be hybrid in Toronto and on zoom, so please join us however you can! Register for zoom link here: ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/diale...

Hybridization and introgression are major evolutionary processes. Since the 1940s, the prevailing view has been that they shape plants far more than animals. In our new study (www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
), we find the opposite: animals exchange genes more, and for longer, than plants

‘Almost unimaginable’: these ants are different species but share a mother Ant queens of one species clone ants of another to create hybrid workers that do their bidding.

woah this is genuinely, utterly WILD

Ant queens of one species produce males of another species, so she can then mate with them and produce hybrid workers!

This is so gloriously weird I can't quite compute it 🤯🧪🐜
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

MEME alumni (www.evobio.eu) at #ESEB2025! We span so many generations now, from the first cohort (graduated in 2012) to those who are still studying, with master students, PhD students, postdocs, and PIs among us! So happy to get together in every ESEB 🤩

Music to my ears. This is brilliant. Either 90% of us can claim to be better musicians than Beethoven or… maybe just maybe polygenic scores aren’t perfect?

Identification of multivariate phenotypes most influenced by mutation: Drosophila serrata wings as a case study
#Drosophila

Predicting the direction of phenotypic difference Nature Communications - Here authors reveal a method to predict key information on phenotypes - their direction. This is achievable even for phenotypes with incomplete genotype-to-phenotype...

Given two genomes, can you tell who’s taller or more prone to a disease? How confident can you be? A fresh take on phenotypic inference, now out:
rdcu.be/exW4f
See thread🧵👇:

Electroreception in treehoppers: How extreme morphologies can increase electrical sensitivity | PNAS The link between form and function of an organism’s morphology is usually apparent or intuitive. However, some clades of organisms show remarkable ...

Why do treehoppers look so weird?! Our latest paper, out this week in @pnas.org, suggests a perhaps unexpected reason - static electricity ⚡ We show that treehoppers can detect the electrostatic cues of predators and that their crazy shapes may boost their electrosensitivity! doi.org/10.1073/pnas...

Possible Horizontal Transfer of Drosophila Genes by the Mite Proctolaelaps regalis There is strong inferential evidence for recent horizontal gene transfer of the P (mobile) element to Drosophila melanogaster from a species of the Drosophila willistoni group. One potential vector of...

I need you, and I can't stress this enough, to read this paper by Margaret Kidwell et al. on horizontal transfer of P elements from mites to flies and back...from *1991*: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Artwork by Gabriel Ugueto

I am proud and grateful to present a dream project today in @nature.com www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Meet #Mirasaura grauvogeli, a #wonderreptilewith skin appendages that rival feathers and hairs, challenging our view of reptile #evolution🪶🦎

#FlyCROSS mentee surveys are open for #earlycareer #Drosophila scientists. If you're a #gradstudent #postdoc or pretenure faculty or equivalent - fill up the survey by Sept 1 to participate & be matched by #mentor of your preferences to gain guidance to your unique needs. @flybase.bsky.social

Experimental evolution in an era of molecular manipulation - Nature Reviews Genetics In this Review, Ascensao and Desai discuss how methodological advances in genotype and phenotype manipulation are transforming experimental evolution approaches and providing new insights into the und...

Experimental evolution in an era of molecular manipulation www.nature.com/articles/s41... #jcampubs

Context-dependent effects of developmental and adult diet on life-history traits in Drosophila melanogaster
#Drosophila

Bates’ many contributions - Nature Ecology & Evolution Henry Walter Bates gave the first known scientific account of mimicry in biological systems. To mark the bicentenary of his birth, we present a collection of content that reflects on his life and lega...

In this month's issue of Nature Ecology & Evolution, we celebrate 200 years since the birth of Henry Walter Bates, who gave the first scientific account of mimicry in butterflies [thread] 🦋

Editorial: Bates’ many contributions www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Butterflies- not just beautiful, but essential! 🦋

Sadly, they are declining in many areas of the world...🌍

Protecting pollinators safeguards #biodiversity.

Learn more: @ipbes.net #PollinationAssessment

www.ipbes.net/assessment-r...

Design by Eleanor Lutz🧪

If you (like me) are pulling together a reading pile to lose yourself in this summer, let me remind you of this terrific starter pack.

go.bsky.app/2LmKSDN

Official accounts for SMBE and affiliated journals are now on Bluesky:

▫️ Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution @official-smbe.bsky.social
▫️ Molecular Biology and Evolution @molbioevol.bsky.social
▫️ Genome Biology and Evolution @genomebiolevol.bsky.social

Starter Pack: go.bsky.app/2xnyMrS

New publication from @jiachengmiao.bsky.social and Qiongshi Lu lab

github.com/qlu-lab/PIGEON

In this just published paper we reconstructed the almost 400 million of leaf venation evolution!!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

We had a fantastic time delving into the regulation of biological noise at the SMBE satellite meeting! Here's a starter pack with the participants who are already on Bluesky. We'll continue adding more researchers interested in this topic—follow them for inspiring science! 🧬🎲🧠🌀📊
go.bsky.app/4AQyofh

Please share widely! We have been running this course for 3 years now, and this is our fourth iteration! We also offer a mini grant program and mentorship opportunities! Check it out and sign up here: evobiocrashcourse.github.io

The evolution of local adaptation in long-lived species Abstract. Many species experience heterogeneous environments and adapt genetically to local conditions. The extent of such local adaptation depends on a ba

My paper with @schmidmax.bsky.social and @charlesmullon.bsky.social is out in @journal-evo.bsky.social 🌟 doi.org/10.1093/evol... 🌟 We show how the effect of longevity on local adaptation, rather than being unidirectional, depends on the life cycle and how frequent selection is relative to dispersal

More information about the course at the Consortium webpage: evobiocrashcourse.github.io

+ Other initiatives such as:

Mentorship programme 🧑🏽‍🔬
Mini-grants 🌻

Registrations are open for the Evolutionary Biology Crash Course 2025! This is our fourth year of organizing this open-access course for anyone who is interested in evolution! 🧬

Our SMBE Satellite Meeting on Biological Noise is only couple of days away! We will be streaming the talks on Zoom, in case you couldn't join us in person - Info about the zoom link and the program is here: pallareslab.github.io/bionoise2025...

MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2025 MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships enhance the creative and innovative potential of researchers holding a PhD and who wish to acquire new skills through advanced training, international, interdisciplinary ...

I am very happy to host a Marie Curie Fellow in my lab. Please email me in case you are interested in experimental evolution, evolution of cooperation, bacterial multicellularity, metabolic cross-feeding, or related topics.

marie-sklodowska-curie-actions.ec.europa.eu/calls/msca-p...

Variation in temperature but not diet determines the stability of latitudinal clines in tolerance traits and their plasticity https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.05.20.655196v1

A previously reported bottleneck in human ancestry 900 kya is likely a statistical artifact Hu et al. (Science, 2023) recently inferred a severe ancient bottleneck around 900 thousand years (kya) ago in African ancestry but found no similar eviden

Interesting model, but the bottleneck claim is very controversial:
academic.oup.com/genetics/art...

“Remember that all through history, there have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they seem invincible. But in the end, they always fall. Always.”

—Mahatma Gandhi

Elegant new theory on polygenic adaptation by Will Milligan, Laura Heyward, and Guy Sella.