Sam Wuest

Finished just at sunset

Extremely excited me on the sowing machine, for our collaborative project on wheat variety mixtures PreDiMix. With ETH, UZH, IPK Gatersleben and Agroscope.

Shade avoidance restricts soybean breeding progress and increases herbivore susceptibility High planting densities expose field crops to competition for light, which typically induces shade avoidance responses such as stem elongation. While adaptive in natural environments, these responses ...

Our latest preprint is out www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... . Fantastic work by @lukecoevo.bsky.social, with Emanuel Kopp, Simon Jäggi and Pascal Niklaus. #DarwinianAgriculture #soybean #breeding

‘People just lie’: How Riverford’s Guy Singh-Watson became the most brutally honest farmer in Britain The organic veg pioneer talks to the Guardian about being unemployable, his unconventional father and his recent autism diagnosis

The most honest #farmer in Britain: “I spent a lot of time looking at the evidence on the impact of #meat & it was overwhelming. 10 billion people can’t live sustainably on this planet if we’re eating anything like the level of meat consumed in a western diet… www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Weak evidence for heritable changes in response to selection by aphids in Arabidopsis accessions Strong selection by aphids only weakly affects epigenetic and phenotypic variation within three Arabidopsis thaliana accessions, demonstrating limited potential for adaptation by epigenetic differenti...

doi.org/10.7554/eLif...

New genomic techniques in organic production: Considerations for science-based, effective, and acceptable EU regulation The EU has a goal of 25% organic farmland by 2030, but lower yields in organic farming versus non-organic farming puts strain on sustainable food production. Utilizing new genomic techniques (NGTs) in...

“Utilizing new genomic techniques #NGT in #organic production could improve yields …. and will help achieve the #EU ’s sustainable #agriculture goals” several authors together with our president @apmweber.bsky.social advocate in Cell Reports Sustainability www.cell.com/cell-reports...

Post-doc position: Genome Editing Sustainable and Innovative Potatoes - Agroscope Agroscope is looking for Post-doc position: Genome Editing Sustainable and Innovative Potatoes

❗ We have an open post-doc position in our group! 🌱🥔🧬
Are you interested in novel crop breeding techniques and potatoes? If yes, the CRISPS project (in collaboration with Wageningen University and SLU Sweden) may be something for you! You can apply here:
jobs.admin.ch/job-vacancie...
#NBTs

📣 Latest from the lab: Performance of deep-learning-based approaches to improve polygenic scores www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Its thought deep learning will substantially improve PGS but the reality is MANY have tried but no/little gain has been seen so far. Here we report our negative results.

How can biological systems anticipate future events? In our new paper with @jordiplam.bsky.social, we show how a simple genetic circuit can predict future trends through a simple (and perhaps widespread) mechanism @drmichaellevin.bsky.social @koseskalab.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

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!

So cool! Huge congratulations!!

2025 WIT Award Winner Laura Mathieu Laura Mathieu, from France, a postdoctoral researcher at the French National Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAE), based at the Plant Health Institute of Montpellier (PHIM).

I am deeply honored to receive the 2025 Women in Triticum Early Career Award from the BGRI (Cornell Univ. & CIMMYT) ! This award is not only a recognition of my work, but also an opportunity to encourage women to pursue their aspirations.

#WomeninScience #Wheat

bgri.cornell.edu/awards/wit-e...

The Blue Origin flight showcased the utter defeat of American feminism | Moira Donegan The trip leaned on a vision of women’s empowerment that is light on substance and heavy on a childlike, girlish silliness

Well written and sobering take-down of the blue origin flight. Worth a read. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Leiterin/Leiter Agroscope - Bundesamt für Landwirtschaft BLW Bundesamt für Landwirtschaft BLW sucht Leiterin/Leiter Agroscope

#Agroscope 🇨🇭🚜 is looking for a new leader. Please share!
jobs.admin.ch/offene-stell...

I grew up in Bangladesh and studied about the Sub1 gene as an undergrad!

Every time I see this time lapse of Sub1 by Pamela Ronald makes me happy 🌾🌾🌾

Thanks for your tremendous contributions to Bangladeshi farmers over the years.

@yoginho

“De-extinction” is the “carbon capture and storage” of ecology: a glitzy techy always-in-the-future promise meant to distract from having to do anything meaningful or disruptive today.

This is figure 1, which shows that latent parthenogenesis leads to haploid induction in sunflowers.

A paper in Nature presents a new method to increase the speed and efficiency of sunflower breeding. This new technique could increase the yield for this important oilseed crop while simplifying and shortening the breeding process. https://go.nature.com/41WCQAQ #horticulture 🧪

Things that could be happening outside

Butterflies on a blue sky

THREAD

The numbers are in. @bsky.app research sharing volumes vs X Formerly Twitter

In March 2024, on most days, Bluesky hosts more posts linked to research published in 2025 than X.

By quite a lot.

Release the Kraken...

#AcademicSky #HigherEd #Altmetrics
1/11

Wheat field trial with plots. Research together for the future.

I am super happy to see that our institution has also chosen to come over to Bluesky!!!
Welcome Agroscope!
Follow if you’re interested in Swiss 🇨🇭 governmental research for agriculture. 🌱🌾🧬🚜🐖🐄👩‍🌾🧑‍🌾
@agroscope.bsky.social
A quick presentation of Agroscope: m.youtube.com/watch?v=F8ue...

Something I would recommend to every plant biologist: attending a tree pruning course

Es geht um eine Modernisierung des über 30 Jahre alten Gentechnikrechts in Europa. Den nun auf dem Tisch liegenden Verhandlungsmandaten nach sollen gleiche Pflanzen ähnlich reguliert werden. Das ist sinnvoll und folgt weitgehend den Empfehlungen aus der Wissenschaft.

🧵 Thread on #SessilePlants:

Plant Scientists: "As sessile organisms, plants [𝘢𝘯𝘺 𝘷𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘢𝘯𝘵 𝘰𝘧 "𝘤𝘢𝘯'𝘵 𝘥𝘰 𝘢𝘯𝘺𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨" 𝘢𝘯𝘥/𝘰𝘳 "𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘭𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘩𝘦𝘭𝘱𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘴"].

David Attenborough: "👇"

Larry Ellison spent $500 million on his grand plan to feed the world by growing lettuce on his private island in Hawaii. Forget the world; the Oracle billionaire’s plan has been an utter failure, as h...

I think it was Jim Hightower who used to say "you can still make a small fortune in agriculture. Problem is, you got to start with a large one."

What a waste, all for lack of an agronomist or two. 🙂
luxurylaunches.com/other_stuff/...

I didn’t think I was still capable of being as angry as I am right now. Zelensky is an absolute hero, in an impossible situation. Слава Україні, always. 🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦

Zelensky not punching him right in the face is perhaps the greatest act of self-restraint I have ever witnessed.

Too much of a good thing: Lessons from compromised rootworm Bt maize in the US Corn Belt Widespread use of genetically engineered maize targeting the corn rootworm complex (Diabrotica species) has raised concerns about insect resistance. Twelve years of university field trial and farm sur...

(3/3) Misperceptions around optimal planting levels of Bt maize cause less effective resistance to corn rootworm.
Paper here: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
and associated Policy Forum here: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Happy reading!

Dear dept head,

My accomplishments last week are:

1. I have climbed highest mountains
2. I have run through the fields
Only to be with you (X2)

3. I have run, I have crawled
4. I have scaled these city walls
Only to be with you (X2)

But I still haven't found what I'm looking for (X2)

Sincerely,

@elonmusk: Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump's instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week. Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation.

This is the ultimate dick boss move from Musk - except he isn’t even the boss, he’s just a dick.

Registration is open for the
International Brachypodium Research Conference 2025 (IBRC2025) #Brachy2025
July 6 - 10, 2025 in Monte Verità, Switzerland

www.brachypodium2025.org/registration

Registration deadline is May 5

🌾 Join us if you love grass biology 🌾