José Cerca

I did not know Switzerland did this!

Instead, we should allow young people with new ideas to do their science (there is research showing that spreading resources is benefitial for everyone). 🧨

I'm sorry to everyone who got their MSCA rejected. I'm on 0/5 on MSCAs (times I've applied + having people applying with me)!

My hot take here: The EU does not prioritize research enough, and all increases to the budget are too small. The choice of opening new calls for massive ERCs, with a strategy of 'winner-takes-it-all' is wrong.

Funding rates are consistently low since 2022, and for the first time below 10%. In my view, any proposal evaluated with >90-85% will be excellent and it will come down to details that the candidates do not control: If the reviewer had a good day, a good breakfast, etc. Pure and arbitrary luck.

Let's look at some numbers

2022: 7 044 applications submitted. 17.9 % success rate
2023: 8 039 applications submitted. 15.8 % success rate
2024: 10 360 applications submitted. 16.6 % success rate
2025: 17 058 applications submitted (record high). 9.7% success rate (preliminary numbers).

Look where we are, EU. 💀

We constantly talk about promoting science, increasing the investment in science, having a technology-driven economy, surpassing the US and China with modern tools. The image below is the evaluation report from a friend, who did not get a #MSCA grant despite scoring 94.4%.

"It's so crazy we have already sampled 4 D. gorgadensis populations and they not only differ between each other but also within them. You pick one plant with thin leaves and the other one right next to it has succulent leaves."
3/3

🌱 Diplotaxis seems like a really good system to understand how plants will adapt to a changing climate. From Florian's correspondence with me:
2/3

Florian Schimdt, PhD student in the group, is in Cabo Verde collecting Diplotaxis sp. .

🇨🇻 Cabo Verde is my favourite country on earth because of its people, culture and biodiversity.
1/3

There is a sheet coming out every year, but it is announced :)

What were the first animals? The fierce sponge–jelly battle that just won’t end For almost two decades, scientists have debated whether sponges or comb jellies are the first animal lineage. Now some are calling for a more harmonious approach.

So weird we're still here. To me, this shows how arbitrary it is to get space in Nature (in this case in its blog).

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Plus ... Predatory publishing fees.

If you work with genomics, bioinformatics or evol biol, when was the last time you read a paper from Nature EcoEvo?

People in our field seem obsessed about publishing there but I barely read their papers. Very ecological, macroevolutionary - which are fine subjects, but out of sync with what we do.

Excited to share our new paper on Arabidopsis adaptation in the Cape Verde Islands!! 🌱🌋
We developed a new multiparent intercross population to uncover genetic variants that were previously difficult to map. Here’s a quick overview 👇🧵
@GeneticsGSA academic.oup.com/genetics/adv...

DDLS Research School Postdoc call 2026 Call for Academic and Industrial Postdoctoral Fellowships in Data-Driven Life Science 2026 Generic Description of the DDLS Postdoc Program The SciLifeLab and Wallenberg National Program for Data-Drive...

Hit me up if you'd like to apply to a Data-driven postdoc fellowship with me in Sweden. 2 year salary, excellent community. Deadline March 31. I have a project idea on reference bias vs pangenome, but keen on hearing ideas. Please share broadly.

www.scilifelab.se/data-driven/...

The green lacewing venom system and the complex mechanisms underlying its evolution Abstract. Venom has independently evolved across many lineages, yet relatively few have been studied in detail, particularly among insects. Of these, Neuro

Awesome to see the first chapter of my PhD out in MBE!
We used a suite of methods to describe the venom system of the green lacewing. Take a look if you're interested in everything from venom system morphology to the molecular evolution of novel traits

doi.org/10.1093/molb...

A must read for conservation geneticists on the utility (or not??) of using molecular diversity to predict adaptive potential 👇🏻

SciLifeLab Voices: Caroline Gallant and Isolde Palombo of Alpha Cell Alpha Cell is a new strategic research program at SciLifeLab. This time in our SciLifeLab Voices series, we spoke with Caroline Gallant, Scientific Program Manager for Alpha Cell, and Isolde Palombo, ...

Alpha Cell is a new strategic research program at SciLifeLab dedicated to uncovering the molecular structure and function of #SingleCells in time and space 🧪

We spoke with Caroline Gallant, Scientific Program Manager for Alpha Cell, and Isolde Palombo, Project Coordinator of the program. ↓

The first conference was held in 2014 at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. I still remember the plenary talk given by Drs. Peter and Rosemary Grant.
#IB2026

Scalesia gordilloi, part of a large adaptive radiation of Asteraceae in the Galápagos.

Check out this new #AJB On the Nature of Things essay!

#Pangenomes as a framework for adaptive radiation, speciation & adaptation

By @nicolo-tellini.bsky.social , Ole Tørresen, David Edwards, Loren Rieseberg, Kjetill Jakobsen & José Cerca

doi.org/10.1002/ajb2... #botany #plantscience #evolution

💥 We highlight the problem (elephant in the room) of using a single reference genome.

➡️ We put forth a set of hypotheses on how variable genomes contribute to adaptation and diversification

📰 Starting this friday with some positive news:

Our publication "Pangenomes as a framework for adaptive radiation, speciation, and adaptation" came out today in the American Journal of Botany!

bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/1537...

Go work with Julian - it's a fantastic lab!

Why do queens bees live so much longer than workers? Apply for a postdoc position in my lab to figure it out! Please get in touch if you want to know more.

link to job:
www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...

lab website:
www.websterlab.net

My 11-year-old sitting with her pile of Halloween candy, sorting it into a bar graph

We have progressed from data collection to data analysis.

Hybrids

Postdoctoral researcher in molecular ecology - Uppsala University Postdoctoral researcher in molecular ecology, Department of Ecology and Genetics, Uppsala University

📢 We have an open position for a postdoc to join my lab. It's a great position @animecol-uu.bsky.social, fully salaried for 2.5 years with all benefits.

www.uu.se/en/about-uu/...

The project is about transmission patterns of bacteria and antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in aquatic insects. 🧬🦠 (1/3)

Reference genome bias in light of species-specific chromosomal reorganization and translocations - Genome Biology Background Whole-genome sequencing efforts, have during the past decade, unveiled the central role of genomic rearrangements—such as chromosomal inversions—in evolutionary processes, including local a...

📌 New publication out:

Reference genome bias in light of species-specific chromosomal reorganization and translocations

TL;DR - We show that the choice of reference genome biases the detection of structural variants and popgen stats. Navigate carefully - 🛳️ 😬

link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Thank you! :)

A very nice paper! @naturalselection.bsky.social Congrats!!!👍💪

Reference genome bias in light of species-specific chromosomal reorganization and translocations