LaBella Lab

This semester I ran a class where we read recent papers in phylogenetics / systematics. I'd prepare an intro for each with background, then we'd dig in. I'd write a blog post after each as well. All the papers, slides and posts are now available at brianomeara.info/posts/phylop...

🧪 #AcademicSky

Come celebrate 50 years of the GRC Cellular and Molecular Fungal Biology series!!

www.grc.org/cellular-and...

There’s the Dance Your PhD competition… but what about Drink Your PhD?
After Swapna Subramanian’s defense we went to Longview Ciderhouse and drank Kanavu, the brand of cider on tap that was brewed with a wild yeast Swapna found, sequenced, and artificially selected for brewing honeycrisp apples. YUM

JOB ALERT @ UNC Charlotte

Come be my newest colleague!

DM me if you have questions about the department, city, or University

jobs.charlotte.edu/postings/65031

Mini @rokaslab.bsky.social reunion with Dr. Abigail Lind @abigailllind.bsky.social

Amazing seminar... What is in our gut and what is it doing!?

I assume our students are flocking to try EukDetect!

The 5th of 6 faculty positions in UNC Biology is posted. We're working with the @ncbg.bsky.social to fill a joint position as Director of the UNC Herbarium at @ncbg.bsky.social and as Associate Professor within the Department of Biology (BIOL). Please share 1/n
unc.peopleadmin.com/postings/308...

codon usag About the Conference Codon usage bias—the preference for certain synonymous codons—is a key factor in genome regulation. Codon usage and synonymous codon mutations have been shown to influence gene ex...

Do the mysteries of synonymous codons keep you up at night?

Are you constantly correcting your colleagues when they say "SILENT MUTATION"

Then you need to be at The 3rd Codon Usage Conference:
Function, Mechanism & Evolution
Montreal Canada (May 31-June 3, 2026)

sites.google.com/view/codonus...

I often use the sponge 🧽

I have been trying to get this published as an op-ed, but I am going to post it here since I think it is timely in light of the "consent" extortion events.

Deafening Quiet from the Scientific Establishment

jeremymberg.github.io/jeremyberg.g...

1/14

Convergent evolution of aerobic fermentation through divergent mechanisms acting on key shared glycolytic genes As the tree of life becomes increasingly accessible to molecular investigations, describing mechanisms underlying evolutionary convergence and constraint will be crucial to understanding diversificati...

In a preprint with the @rokaslab.bsky.social , @linder-surprise.bsky.social developed a high-throughput extracellular acidification rate (ECAR) assay to evaluate glycolytic rate. We highlight how genetic traits, such as aerobic fermentation, can arise convergently with strong constraints. 🧬

a man sitting in front of a dell monitor ALT: a man sitting in front of a dell monitor

Some days I wish I had gotten a PhD in "Canvas Administration"

Nothing says professor like standing in a classroom full of students and not knowing how to unlock a module properly

GBE | From Trees to Traits: A Review of Advances in PhyloG2P Methods and Future Directions

In a new Review article in GBE, @scientific-arlie.bsky.social et al delve into the growing field of phylogenetic genotype to phenotype mapping (PhyloG2P), discussing advances and future directions for using phylogenomic data to map traits to genomes

🔗 doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evaf150

#genome #evolution

Dr. White @raw937.bsky.social discusses bats 🦇 and viruses at the Biomedical Symposium

Brad Bower of the NIH outlines the Strategic Plan for Data Science

Do you share your data in a usable way?

Where can AI take us next?

Excited for the Charlotte Biomedical Symposium today!

Intro to CIPHER by Dr. Jamie's featuring a @morgancarterphd.bsky.social Carter lab trainee

We are hiring! Oxford biology has three associate professorships available as we move to new state-of-the-art facilities

Three Associate Professor (or Professor) positions available at Oxford Biology. Come be my colleague! www.biology.ox.ac.uk/article/we-a...

✨ Are you a pre-tenure faculty or advanced postdoc with an academic offer in hand? 🎓 3 days left to apply for the SDB New Faculty Boot Camp! 🚀 Deadline: Aug 22, 2025 Apply here 👉 tinyurl.com/SDBFaculty

I'm hiring a postdoc to work in theoretical / computational phylogenomics! More info at tinyurl.com/63hb5ew8. Please share!

I have
NIGMS R35, impact score 12
NIHGRI R21, 4th percentile
NHGRI R01, 7th percentile (co-I)
and it seems like none will be funded. 0/3.

PO (who has been very helpful) said "Unfortunately, I do not expect this application will be selected for funding in FY25."

😭

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐅𝐮𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐅𝐮𝐧𝐠𝐢 𝐀𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐢𝐬 𝐛𝐚𝐜𝐤—𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐛𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐰𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐟𝐮𝐧𝐠𝐢 𝐢𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐯𝐚𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐬! 🌍🍄

The awards mission is to 𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐚𝐥𝐲𝐳𝐞 𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐛𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐟𝐮𝐧𝐠𝐚𝐥 𝐢𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐯𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 that address some of humanity’s biggest environmental challenges—and to support the 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐩𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐬𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐞𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐮𝐫𝐬 pioneering these solutions

Ew... @theathletic.com

Do I "remember" the great Ilona Maher?!

I never forgot about her. She's been kicking ass this whole time!

Do better... not all your readers instantly forget about half of all athletes because of their gender

If interested in this or other ways that our lab uses Notion for recordkeeping and project management, I’ve now added a resource about it to our lab website.
#NewPI 🧪🦠
pages.charlotte.edu/carterlab/re...

Cannot stop laughing at this

Please help us spread the word! Please amplify!

We are searching for an associate or full professor (Canada Excellence Research Chair) in Biodiversity Genomics at the University of Guelph! 🐟🌿🦠🐜🐸🐝

Applications are due October 6 2025.

careers.uoguelph.ca/job/Guelph-C...

#AcademicJobs #EvoBio

Recruiting an NSF-funded Post-Doctoral Researcher in EEB The Budke Lab in the Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at the University of Tennessee (http://jmbudke.github.io/) is seeking a Post-Doctoral Research Associate to work on an NSF-funded project. This project is investigating morphological evolution in a phylogenetic context using moss plants as the experimental system. The research responsibilities will include (1) assembling morphological datasets using the literature and herbarium specimens, (2) compiling DNA sequence datasets from publicly available resources and laboratory-based methods using herbarium specimens, and (3) combining these data to analyze the evolution of morphological structures across a phylogeny. Opportunities will also be available to develop novel research questions focusing on the functional morphology, physiology, and evolution of the parent-offspring relationship in mosses. Supervising and mentoring undergraduate researchers in both the laboratory and herbarium will be required. An additional aim of this project is to build awareness of and appreciation for plants and botanical natural history collections. As part of the team, the postdoc will participate in hands-on outreach events, such as Darwin Day. The postdoc will also co-lead a May-term course for undergraduate students on collections-based research. Apply by 17 August 2025 for full consideration.

Looking for a #postdoc in evolutionary biology?
Come join the Budke Lab! Read more about the lab jmbudke.github.io & apply at this link fa-ewlq-saasfaprod1.fa.ocs.oraclecloud.com/hcmUI/Candid...
This is the last weekend to apply before applications will be evaluated and zoom interviews scheduled.

Just to give the TL;DR on this one:

*The* main purpose of the EO is to move funding priorities and decisions away from experts and career professionals over to political appointees. With the ultimate power held by Vought / OMB.

New executive order puts all grants under political control All new funding on hold until Trump administration can cancel any previously funded grants.

New ArsTechnica story about the new steaming pile of Executive Order...

arstechnica.com/science/2025...

Phyling: phylogenetic inference from annotated genomes Phyling is a fast, scalable, and user-friendly tool supporting phylogenomic reconstruction of species phylogenies directly from protein-encoded genomic data. It identifies orthologous genes by searchi...

New #preprint from talented graduate student for a workflow we have been using for a while into a formal usage www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Whole-genome sequencing of 490,640 UK Biobank participants - Nature A study reports whole-genome sequences for 490,640 participants from the UK Biobank and combines these data with phenotypic data to provide new insights into the relationship between human variation a...

✅ Published in @natureportfolio.nature.com today, the paper describing the initial whole-genome sequencing analysis of 500,000 UK Biobank participants.

Read here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...