Anna Bazzicalupo

New research in #GENETICS suggests accessory chromosomes in #fungi #fusarium might be maintained because of Spok genes and not because of their beneficial effects on virulence.

Learn more about this work from @fungage-lab.bsky.social and colleagues: buff.ly/R2CRa3O

Such a pleasure to be involved with this short film, filmed and scripted by the amazingly talented @amykingwild.bsky.social.

Woods Mill is my local woodland managed by @sussexwildlife.bsky.social. Amy has captured it wonderfully - makes me want to go for an autumnal woodland scamper right now!

Reductive evolution of the DNA replication machinery in endosymbiotic fungi The molecular machinery for replicating and repairing DNA accurately is critically important for life and highly conserved across the Tree of Life. Here we show that two major lineages of fungi, Glome...

I’m super happy to present the first discoveries of the RIKEN-Cambridge Joint Crop Symbiosis Research Team, based in Japan 🇯🇵

doi.org/10.1101/2025...

A thread 👇

Population structure in a fungal human pathogen is potentially linked to pathogenicity Nature Communications - Genetic diversity between clinical and environmental fungal isolates of Aspergillus flavus is poorly studied. Here, the authors analysed genomic data from a global set of...

Thrilled to share that the final chapter of my PhD with @rokaslab.bsky.social is now out in @natcomms.nature.com 🎉
Read it to find out how population structure impacts pathogenicity in Aspergillus flavus, a fungus that infects humans 🧪
rdcu.be/eAToj

Our Fungal Conservation column is out in Field Mycology 26 (2).

www.fieldmycology.org/index.php/jo...

🍄 Fungi and the Planning and Infrastructure Bill
🍄 British fungi on the Global Red List
🍄 An audit of nationally important fungal assemblages in Welsh SSSIs

#fungi #fungalconservation #PIB

Fig. 1 DALL·E OpenAI generated image of a mycorrhizal interaction. The image was created using the prompt: ‘Generate a photo of a plant root system interacting with fungal mycelium in a mycorrhizal interaction’. The resulting image clearly contains inaccuracies and unrealistic elements, making it appear surreal and scientifically unacceptable as an illustration of mycorrhizal interactions.

The increasingly powerful term #mycorrhiza warrants attention

#Editorial by Bonfante & Genre.

📖 nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Inaccurate AI-generated image generated using: ‘Generate a photo of a plant root system interacting with fungal mycelium in a mycorrhizal interaction’.

Cover of the book European Boletes by Michal Mikšík, Matteo Gelardi, and Giampaolo Simonini, showing large, brown-capped boletes growing in a mossy forest floor.

This #FungiFriday we're celebrating the monumental achievement of Kew Mycologist & Taxonomist Matteo Gelardi!

Last week Matteo and his collaborators Michal Mikšík & Giampaolo Simonini released their book 'European Boletes Volume 1' 🎉

Find out more here: www.fungipress.eu/en/

YouTube video by SMTPB Robert D. Holt interview

Sally Otto @sarperotto.bsky.social
and I are back with the next installment of “Reflections on the history of modeling and theory”, supported by @smtpb.bsky.social. Bob Holt shares his personal history and stories of his life in science: www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8hX...

Black and white portrait of Charles Darwin seated and looking off to the left. He has a long, white beard, and is wearing a suit.

Photo from Darwin's notebook, with a sketch of an evolutionary tree and the words "I think" above it.

#OnThisDay in 1856, Charles Darwin noted in his journal, "began...writing species sketch." This "sketch" would form the base of his book On the Origin of Species. 🏺 🧪

Prepare for ‘Sex, Drugs and Zombies’—Brood XIV Cicadas Are Coming As 17-year cicadas emerge this spring, a zombifying fungus is waiting for them

www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-...

Virtual #Conference: 5th Annual CanFunNet #Fungal #Biology

August 6-8 "From Local to Global"

canfunnet.conferences.uwo.ca

Abstract submissions, early registration open until May30

Topics include: Evolutionary Pathways of Fungal Pathogens, Fungal Genomics, Host Interactions, Fungal Resilience

World class training - International dual award PhDs in Plant & Soil Science now open These new studentships offer a unique opportunity to join a vibrant and collaborative research community spanning two world-class institutions in Sheffield, UK and Sydney, Australia.

Check out these exciting opportunities for a dual award PhD in plant and soil sciences 🤩 at @sheffieldpps.bsky.social and @westsyduhie.bsky.social: www.sheffield.ac.uk/biosciences/... each PhD project will involve at least 1 year spent at each institution - pls repost 🙏

This is fantastic

Yearling female bighorn sheep at Ram Mountain, Alberta, Canada.

Thought-provoking commentary by @amyforsythe.bsky.social just dropped on our recent study of individual heterogeneity in life-history trajectories! Always exciting to see the conversation evolve.
@marcofesta.bsky.social

📄 Read it here:
www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1...

Such an impressive feat!!

Congratulations!!!

Adaptation and gene flow are insufficient to rescue a montane plant under climate change Climate change increasingly drives local population dynamics, shifts geographic distributions, and threatens persistence. Gene flow and rapid adaptation could rescue declining populations yet are seld...

Brilliant new paper by Jill Anderson and colleagues using 9 years of transplant experiments and integral projection models to predict the capacity of populations for adaptation and persistence under new climates in Boechera stricta. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Swiss Alps seen from Neuchatel

Excited to do a postdoc in beautiful Neuchatel / Switzerland🇨🇭?

We have several postdoc positions open at the moment!

Check our website for the full ads here: pathogen-genomics.org/jobs

Happy to answer any question and please spread the word to anyone who might be interested!

0. Vought, Vance, Rufo, and those attacking academia see scientists as bureaucrats—in the most pejorative sense of the term—who they can "put into trauma" and drive to quit.

They don't understand that science is not just a job. It's a vocation, literally, in the original sense of *a calling*.

Illustrations of various fungi species by Julius Vincenz Krombholz, 1831-1846. 🐡

Only 60 years ago we still thought fungi to be weird types of plants 🍄🤔🌱

With shared characteristics such as immobility, having a cell wall and growing out of substrates like soil, it was easy for early natural historians to group these two hugely diverse groups together. So how were they split? 🧵👇

If you have experienced direct harm to your work/lab/job due to recent changes at US NSF, & are willing to share this on behalf of the Am. Society of Naturalists and NSF, please DM/ email me ASAP (this is time-sensitive) or submit story here sites.google.com/view/scienti...
Please share widely

A curated soil fungal dataset to advance fungal ecology and conservation research in Australia and Antarctica Scientific Data - A curated soil fungal dataset to advance fungal ecology and conservation research in Australia and Antarctica

How do you study invisible organisms, such as fungi, from the environment?

We provide a benchmarked meta-barcoding dataset for soil fungi in Australia and Antarctica, combined with +100 predictor variables to fast-track data exploration, research and conservation.

rdcu.be/ebCeu

Silene uniflora in flower, showing its white petals against a black backdrop

Exciting News! New research has found a plant’s past adaptations can help it survive pollution 🌿

Kew's Mike Fay & partners at Bangor University found Silene uniflora’s salt tolerance helped it adapt to toxic mine waste, giving hope for nature’s recovery!

👉 www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Evolution of cross-tolerance to metals in yeast Organisms often face multiple selective pressures simultaneously (e.g., mine tailings with multiple heavy metal contaminants), yet we know little about when adaptation to one stressor provides cross-t...

Here is our preprint on metal cross-tolerance evolution in yeast! @sarperotto.bsky.social Penny Kahn, Eully Ao, and Joel Campbell www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Mind the lag: understanding genetic extinction debt for conservation The delay between disturbance events and genetic responses within populations is a common but surprisingly overlooked phenomenon in ecology and evolut…

✨Excited to share our new article on time lags/genetic extinction debts, online now in Trends in Ecology & Evolution
#KewScience

🧬🧬🧬/1
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Estimating dispersal rates and locating genetic ancestors with genome-wide genealogies A new method to infer the spatial history of genetic ancestors from a sequence of trees along a recombining genome.

Congratulations to Matt Osmond on publication of the final version of "Estimating dispersal rates and locating genetic ancestors with genome-wide genealogies"
elifesciences.org/articles/72177

The Forest Soils and Biogeochemistry research unit, conducting integrative research on various aspect of the soil, from biogeochemical processes to soil biodiversity and its functions. The Rhizosphere Processes group is offering a position starting in April 2025, initially limited to a duration of 2 years, as a PostDoc in Microbial Ecology 80-100% (f/m/d) This position offers an exciting opportunity to participate in an international research project on “Microbial biodiversity and Carbon Use Efficiency as Nature-based solution for soil carbon stabilization (BIOCUE)”. The BIOCUE project will investigate how Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) affect soil carbon (C) balance by studying their impact on microbial diversity, function, and Carbon Use Efficiency (CUE). The BIOCUE project is part of a European Biodiversa+ initiative. In collaboration with the international project partners, your role will involve planning and conducting fieldwork, designing, and executing laboratory experiments, processing and analysing samples, analysing datasets, preparing manuscripts, and publishing them in peer-reviewed scientific journals. You will also present the research outputs at local and international conferences and engage with stakeholders. You hold a PhD in biology or environmental sciences, with a strong background in microbiology and ecology. Ability to conduct field- and labwork independently and solid knowledge of environmental science and molecular biology methods is required, along with extended skills in DNA/RNA sequencing techniques and bioinformatics. Fluency in English (both oral and writing), ability to supervise junior team members, excellent communication skills and a collaborative mindset are key to success in this role.

#Sciencejob Alert! #PhD in #biology or #environmental sciences with a background in #microbiology and #ecology as well as skills in DNA/RNA sequencing? Our #Forest Soils and #Biogeochemistry research unit is looking for a #PostDoc! 🔬🧬https://apply.refline.ch/273855/1690/pub/1/index.html

Toadstool with teeth and ghostly palm among plant and fungus finds of 2024 Scientists race to discover new species before destruction of natural world drives them to extinction

🌍🌎🧪🌎🌱🌾🌴🌳🌼🌻🌺🍄‍🟫🍄Lovely new plants and fungi from around the world. Found in biodiversity hot spots like Indonesia but also intensively recorded places like UK. Seen this year, maybe not again, as land use is changed. So sad. #BUC2025
www.theguardian.com/environment/...

A blue felt information board features a sign saying "Fungi Walk" and below that a photo montage of a churchyard and it's grassland fungi. At bottom right there's a photo of someone in a blue jacket addressing a small group of people. Reader, it is me.

I'm on an informative board!!!

Congratulations Henfield on absolutely bossing your "Year of Biodiversity".