Josep Mercadal

Richard Lewontin is turning in his grave.

Is this a joke?

It looks very much like Posidonia oceanica, a very common seagrass in the Mediterranean. The brown balls are fibers from the dead leaves, which are carried to the shoreline by the waves!

Really happy to see my PhD work out. Big thanks to @tonnigrubeandersen.bsky.social and everyone involved. I hope you enjoy reading it :)

MYB68 regulates radial endodermal differentiation and suberin patterning In this study, Kraska et al. identify MYB68 as a novel regulator of endodermal suberization, linked to the formation of distinct identities in the xylem-pole-associated endodermis. The research uncove...

Time for another paper from our lab!
This time it’s about passage cells. This work originated from a collaboration with @lauraragni.bsky.social and was spearheaded by the super-talented @leoniekraska.bsky.social Below you will find a thread that explains our findings.
www.cell.com/cell-reports...

Experimental embryology postdoc available in my lab at the @biology.ox.ac.uk @ox.ac.uk working on the evolution of vertebral counts. Reach out if you’re passionate about EvoDevo, enjoy lab work and microscopy and are into or could get into cichlid fishes. Deadline on the 16th June. Please share!

The four days of "Theory and concepts in biology" finish with a round table discussion on biology's biggest challenges. Some common themes emerged: how to deal with biological complexity? How to understand levels of organization? Which features make life unique? #EESTCBio @events.embl.org

You’re only human: a six-step strategy to surviving your PhD Graduate students are not machines. Behaving like one during your programme will leave you frustrated and unfulfilled, says Gauthier Weissbart.

During my PhD, I realized the hardest moments weren’t the work itself, but the psychological challenges. We see lots of productivity tips, but PhD students aren’t machines - they're complex human beings. 🫂 Glad to see well-being in @nature.com 'career column 🍀
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Kseniia Petrova, a Russian scientist at Harvard Medical School, was detained at Logan Airport after returning from France and sent to an ICE detention in Louisiana, The Insider reports.

A big critic of Putin and the war in Ukraine, she may now be deported to Russia.

Gestapo kidnapping students off the streets. Fascism is here.