Magda Garbowski

New York-ass staff never been to the damn desert

Attention folks in the weather, climate, disaster, wildfire, and Earth science communities: NSF has just published a new "Dear Colleague" letter inviting feedback (by Mar 13) on the proposal to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). www.nsf.gov/funding/...

Thanks for writing this! Hits spot on as I contemplate getting up to work for a few quiet hours before my 2yo wakes up.

The cure for misinformation is not more information or smarter news consumers Political scientist Samuel Bagg explains why social identity is at the root of the misinformation crisis -- which calls for something deeper than factchecking.

ICYMI: I sat down with political scientist @samuel-bagg.bsky.social to discuss the crisis in our information environment and its roots in social identity.

Thanks for the episode! Sent it to many ppl!

Learning with AI falls short compared to old-fashioned web search Doing the mental work of connecting the dots across multiple web queries appears to help people understand the material better compared to an AI summary.

· #AcademicSky · #EduSky · #AI ·
“When people rely on large language models to summarize information on a topic for them, they tend to develop shallower knowledge about it compared to learning through a standard Google search.”

The job Cooperating in the field of periglacial vegetation development with other Helmholtz centres, we offer a PhD position (f/m/x) to survey and analyse the development of vegetation and associated microbiomes in glacier forelands of the Alps. Your tasks • Collection of vegetation data in glacier forelands and surroundings • Collection of soil and root samples • Analyses of soil and root associated microbiomes through meta-barcoding • Analysis of the link between vegetation and microbiome development as a function of (successional) time • Scientific publications We offer A lot of things, but space does not permit. Please see the link for details. Your profile • Degree (Master, Diploma) in biology, ecology, geoecology or comparable courses of study • Experience in the field of vegetation methods (vegetation surveys) • Field work experience in soil and root sampling for microbiome analysis • Lab skills to analyse the microbiome like DNA extraction, PCR, and sequencing • Knowledge of the Northern Alpine flora • Experience in high mountains and the ability to hike several hours a day and 1000 metres in altitude with luggage and equipment • Orientation skills in the mountains • Ability to work independently and solve unexpected problems • Statistical skills (preferably in R), knowledge of data storage (databases) desirable • Very good knowledge of English (communication in the working group, reading technical literature, writing technical articles)

Interested in pursuing your PhD in Alpine Ecology? How do ecosystems emerge after glacial retreat? Come with us @ufz.de as a PhD researcher on the development of vegetation and microbiome in glacier forelands.

recruitingapp-5128.de.umantis.com/Vacancies/33...

#ecojobs #ecology #Alps #AlpineEcology

linocut by Jitka Klimesova

#Novelty isn’t a yes/no, but a #gradient from #replication to #innovation. We should be honest about where our work sits on that gradient, instead of overselling everything as #groundbreaking
More▶️ 1url.cz/sJXel
#GoBelowground #ExFuMo #linocut @ibotcz.bsky.social @czechacademy.bsky.social

Students collecting vegetation data in the Organ Mountains

Plants with soil and roots

Students collecting plants from forest understory

Hello! I’m recruiting three graduate students (MS or PhD) to start in summer or fall 2026 . Projects are broadly focused on the ecology, restoration, and management of rangelands, deserts, and forests. Please share!

Lab website: functionalrestoration.nmsu.edu

Today my @nytimes.com colleagues and I are launching a new series called Lost Science. We interview US scientists who can no longer discover something new about our world, thanks to this year‘s cuts. Here is my first interview with a scientist who studied bees and fires. Gift link: nyti.ms/3IWXbiE

An ad for a PhD position to start fall 2026 working with me at ETSU. For more info, please email at LeeBR1@etsu.edu.

A close-up picture of dimpled trout lilies active in early spring, still largely surrounded by the previous year's senesced tree leaves.

A beautiful vista of the Blue Ridge Mountains from on top of Carver's Gap on the border between North Carolina and Tennessee.

🚨 Please repost widely!🚨

I am recruiting a PhD student to join my lab next fall to work on forest and climate change ecology projects in southern Appalachia! Come join me in one of the most beautiful, biodiverse, and understudied parts of North America. Details below and happy to answer questions

Meeeee

Excited to share our paper on grassland establishment 7 yrs after native #AMF inoculation—showing AMF result in higher diversity + prairie spread into old fields—was selected Editor’s Choice by @femsjournals.bsky.social.🦠🌎
I’ll discuss next week at #SER2025 Denver ! academic.oup.com/femsle/artic...

‘The news devastated me’: Pennsylvania NPR station will be first in the US to go dark following Trump’s cuts A public media organization in a university town just a few hours northwest of Philadelphia is set to be the first in the country to go dark after the Trump administration stripped away federal funding for NPR and PBS. 

The first public media station to go dark thanks to Trump’s cutoff of federal funding to public media is a 70 year old station in Pennsylvania. https://loom.ly/IjOHdzI

NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP)

The GRFP lives!! (due end of October)
www.nsf.gov/funding/oppo...

Fully funded PhD in #Ecophysiology at UBC in Vancouver! 🍁 Possible topics include leaf physiology, thermal ecology, microclimates, scaling, tree physiology, forest ecology, and more. Start Sept 2026/Jan 2027. michaletzlab.org
Please share!
#PlantEcoPhys #Ecology #Botany #PhDposition #GradSchool

Integrating intraspecific trait variability in functional diversity: An overview of methods and a guide for ecologists Variability in traits within species (intraspecific trait variability; ITV) has attracted increased interest in functional ecology, as it can profoundly influence the detection of functional trait pa....

Hot off the press 🔥 New Ecological Monographs paper shows why, when and how to include intraspecific trait variability to enhance functional diversity research. Huge shout out to Facundo Palacio for his vision and leadership. Read here 👉 doi.org/10.1002/ecm....
#traits #functionaldiversity 📏🌐

Kayak trip with the lab in Deep Cove BC

🚨postdoc opportunity at UBC🚨 applications are now open for the Killam Postdoctoral Fellowship, due internally Oct. 15 - www.postdocs.ubc.ca/award/killam...

I can nominate 1 person and give feedback on that nominee's materials - if interested plz email me by Sept. 10 - join us!

SER in Denver?

Congrats!

Reconsidering space-for-time substitution in climate change ecology - Nature Climate Change Ecologists often leverage patterns observed across spatial climate gradients to predict the impacts of climate change (space-for-time substitution). We highlight evidence that this can be misleading n...

New paper out on the dangers of using patterns across spatial climate gradients to predict what will happen with changing climate. That includes species distribution modeling. Space-for-time substitution can be misleading in sign, not just the magnitude of effects.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Belowground persistence types relevant to severe disturbance Despite recent advances in plant trait ecology, we identified a knowledge gap in understanding how plants strategize to cope with severe and recurrent disturbances. Here, we propose a new classificati...

📢Klimešová et al. (2025) in Trends Plant Sci: Belowground persistence types relevant to severe disturbance - a new classification! ▶️ 1url.cz/FJExZ
#GoBelowground #ExFuMo #Clonality #BudBank #Resprouting #Disturbance #Storage

News from the NSF Division of Earth Sciences Informational Webinar: If US scientists want to support NSF EAR, they should continue to submit proposals. The number of proposals is an important metric for quantifying need and therefore influencing the budget

Congressionally mandated climate reports have disappeared from their federal websites | CNN The National Climate Assessments can no longer be found on their government-hosted websites.

Congressionally mandated climate reports disappeared from their federal websites. www.cnn.com/2025/07/02/c...

This is true for learning and knowledge retention in higher ed too.

Teaching individual units/topics/lectures is not as effective for learning as teaching systems of knowledge (how multiple concepts are related and help fully address a question). Brief and illustrative example in the article below.

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

People and Nature Call for Proposals: Taking stock of social-ecological restoration <em>People and Nature</em> is an international journal publishing interdisciplinary research with ecological relevance that explores the relationships between humans and nature.

Special Feature in *People and Nature*: “Halfway through the UN Decade:
taking stock of social-ecological restoration”

besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/page/journal...

We welcome proposals for papers – deadline to submit abstracts is *June 30,
2025*.

We’re seeing a lot of grasses, forbs and shrubs suffering (maybe dying?) all over southern NM - the last year of drought seems to have put many species over the edge. Hopefully some things are hanging on - it would be very interesting to know which ones and why.