Michael Giolai

Genomic traits associated with pathogenicity.

Lifestyles shape genome size and gene content in fungal pathogens.
buff.ly/tec1Tds

Postdoc position in my lab in Cologne starting early next year or latest in spring to get this exciting project started.

jobportal.uni-koeln.de/ausschreibun...

Dual recognition of structurally unrelated mildew effectors underlies the broad-spectrum resistance of Pm3e in wheat Broad-spectrum resistance genes are highly valuable for sustainable crop protection, yet the molecular basis of their activity is often unknown. The Pm3 allelic series in wheat encodes NLR receptors t...

A wheat NLR conferring broad-spectrum resistance against powdery mildew by recognizing two structurally diverse AVR effectors. Interested? Check out our newest preprint: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Farming Today - 30/10/25: An uncomfortable transition? The buzz about Asian hornets. Cosmic ray neutrons and soil moisture - BBC Sounds The boss of one of the UK's biggest farming companies says a painful transition is ahead.

Despite recent rain, soils in many areas remain drier than normal for the time of year. UKCEH uses cosmic ray neutrons to monitor soil moisture to depths of 20–30 cm at @cosmosuk.bsky.social sites across the UK.

📻 Hear Jonathan Evans on BBC R4’s Farming Today: www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

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Our MARTi @nanoporetech.com paper is now out in @genomeresearch.bsky.social after several years of development (particularly Ned Peel and Sam Martin). We'd love to hear from users about how you're using it, or suggestions for new features. @earlhaminst.bsky.social

genome.cshlp.org/content/earl...

Only few days left to apply for the full professorship in Functional Ecology at @unituebingen.bsky.social. We are looking for a female colleague to join our institute. Come and join us! Lots of opportunities for collaboration in a beautiful work place!

Drought intensity and duration interact to magnify losses in primary productivity As droughts become longer and more intense, impacts on terrestrial primary productivity are expected to increase progressively. Yet, some ecosystems appear to acclimate to multiyear drought, with cons...

Although many ecosystems can weather several years of moderate drought, consecutive years of extreme dryness push them past a tipping point, resulting in dramatic declines in plant growth, researchers report in Science. https://scim.ag/4ogN9I8

Massively parallel interrogation of the fitness of natural variants in ancient signaling pathways reveals pervasive local adaptation The nature of standing genetic variation remains a central debate in population genetics, with differing perspectives on whether common variants are almost always neutral as suggested by neutral and n...

One of the most exciting works of my career, years in the making. We used high-throughput precision genome editing to test the fitness effects of thousands of natural variants. Our findings challenge the long-held assumption that common variants are inconsequential.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Combatting wheat take-all disease with in-field and synthetic microbial communities

PhD studentship
Come help us understand the wheat rhizosphere at the Earlham Institute 🦠

Working at the interface of fungal antagonists & pathogens (@rowenahill.bsky.social @neilhall.bsky.social ), host genetic diversity (Simon Griffiths -JIC) and bacterial community diversity (Jacob Malone -JIC)

Arabidopsis arenosa influences its microbiome as a serpentine soil adaptation strategy There is growing evidence that microbes can facilitate plant growth in metal-rich soils. However, our current understanding of how plants recruit their microbiomes under abiotic stress remains incompl...

Very happy to share our newest preprint! We show that plant genotype drives microbiome recruitment under extreme abiotic stress (serpentines vs. non-serpentines) and identify key microbial taxa that explain how microbiomes can enable stress (serpentine) adaptation. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

🌍 Across 55 populations on 3 continents, new #PlantPopNet study finds that key size metrics capture growth, survival & reproduction very well. Big step for scaling large-scale comparative demography to plant population ecology!
🔗 doi.org/10.1111/1365...
Led by @drbaudraz.bsky.social

Was a pleasure to contribute a small part to this massive WGS effort of Kew's fungarium! @estergaya.bsky.social @rbgkew.bsky.social

Check out the paper @newphyt.bsky.social 👉 doi.org/10.1111/nph.70472

man rolling rock up hill how it started how its going

3 Post doc positions in biodiversity science, genetic indicator assessment and ecological statistics 3 Post doc positions in biodiversity science, genetic indicator assessment and ecological statistics

📢 Post doc! Want to join our team?

We are looking for 3 post docs in biodiversity science, genetic indicator assessment, and ecological statistics for a fixed term of 2 years!

Come unravel the drivers and consequences of global change on biodiversity with us!

DL 24.9.
#universityofhelsinki

Genomic constraints shape the evolution of alternative routes to drug resistance in prokaryotes Background Variation within the prokaryotic pangenome is not random, and natural selection that favours particular combinations of genes appears to dominate over random drift. What is less clear is wh...

New preprint reveals bacteria can't just collect all resistance genes like Pokemon cards.
We found mutually exclusive evolutionary pathways to multidrug resistance in E. coli & P. aeruginosa - some resistance mechanisms actively prevent others from coexisting www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

University Lecturer in Biostatistics University Lecturer in Biostatistics

We are recruiting‼️A permanent university lecturer position in BIOSTATISTICS is available at @helsinki.fi Faculty of Biological and Environmental Sciences. Great colleagues, excellent infrastructures and startup support 🙌🏻
DL 14 September

jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki...

Out after peer review, collaborative study from Nordborg & Weigel labs with help from many others. Not the largest collection of new Arabidopsis thaliana genomes, but we hopefully put forward some good ideas for how to think about pangenomes and their analysis!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Multiple Autopolyploid Arabidopsis lyrata Populations Stabilized by Long-Range Adaptive Introgression Across Eurasia Abstract. Abundance of established polyploid lineages varies across lineages, evolutionary time, and geography, suggesting both genetics and environment pl

@alisondawnscott.bsky.social et al. use genome data from >400 Arabidopsis lyrata sampled across Eurasia to show it as the most polyploid-rich species complex in Arabidopsis, with multiple origins of autotetraploidy.

🔗 doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msaf153

#evobio #molbio #PlantSky

1/3 New preprint led by Shanshan Wang, in collaboration with the Timmermans lab.

Several groups have presented sc/snRNA-seq analyses of Arabidopsis leaves after bacterial infection before. Is there anything left to discover? Turns out: Yes.

#plantscience
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

VACANCY

Optical Microscopy Specialist

Come work alongside the plant and microbial scientists at JIC and help us explore the biological frontier at the tissue, cell and subcellular scale!

Group Leader in Discovery Plant Sciences | John Innes Centre The John Innes Centre (JIC) seeks a visionary Group Leader to lead research on Discovery Plant Science.

GROUP LEADER VACANCY

JIC is recruiting a Group Leader in Discovery Plant Sciences.

If you think your research would synergise and thrive at JIC, please apply.

www.jic.ac.uk/vacancies/gr...

Aphid Saliva fans, happy news, this amazing story is now out in Science Advances www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... congrats @qunliu07.bsky.social @saskiahogenhout.bsky.social et al @johninnescentre.bsky.social 24h after a triumphant presentation at #ismpmi2025

Effector Innovation in Genome-Reduced Phytoplasmas and Other Host-Dependent Mollicutes Obligate host-associated bacteria with reduced genomes, such as phytoplasmas, face strong evolutionary constraints, including metabolic dependence on hosts, limited horizontal gene transfer (HGT), and...

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

New Postdoc position (2yrs) available in our #EvoMPMI lab @JohnInnesCentre. Come and work with on harnessing the diversity of immune mechanisms to protect plants. jobs.jic.ac.uk/Details.asp?va…

Plant microbiomes feel the heat Rising temperatures change the structure and function of plant microbial communities

‪In another Perspective article, @annaliisalaine.bsky.social and Sara Leino highlight the ways in which plant microbiomes respond to heat (3/8)
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Undermining the cry for help: The phytopathogenic fungus Verticillium dahliae secretes an antimicrobial effector protein to undermine host recruitment of antagonistic Pseudomonas bacteria https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.06.09.658588v1

Plant microbiomes feel the heat Rising temperatures change the structure and function of plant microbial communities

Our Perspective on
Plant Microbiomes Feel the Heat
with Sara Leino out now in @science.org 🥳

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

k-mer-based diversity scales with population size proxies more than nucleotide diversity in a meta-analysis of 98 plant species Abstract. A key prediction of neutral theory is that the level of genetic diversity in a population should scale with population size. However, as was note

Hey, Miles' @milesroberts.bsky.social beautiful paper showing that sequence diversity missed by standard methods contributes to Lewontin's paradox is officially published in @evolletters.bsky.social. academic.oup.com/evlett/advan...

Group Leader, Institute of Biotechnology Group Leader, Institute of Biotechnology

Group leader position at the University of Helsinki, Institute of Biotechnology. Plant biologists eligible as well. jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki...

ecoevorxiv.org/repository/v... Our new preprint on the biodiversity impacts of carbon farming practices is out now! @rececochange.bsky.social sky.social @bsag.fi