Greg Hurst

Life imitating art. Douglas Adams

"I have a very special service for rich people ..."
"Oh yes?" said Ford, "And what's that?"
"I tell them it's OK to rich"....
"You what?" he said....
"It's my big number,... I have a Master's degree in Social Economics and can be very convincing. People love it."

Last chance to join us next month for the #Biodiversity25 conference.

A fantastic set of speakers, mix of talks & focused workshops, and the chance to meet others in the field of biodiversity genomics 🧬

In-person registration closes next Monday 29th September!

Registration 🔗: bit.ly/4j3vAZ9

Aww. The thought generates happy feelings in the Liverpool symbiont community!

Well it is different, but was inspired by Margaret's paper. Symbionts were always going to be easier, as they often have active mechanisms for infecting the germ line.

John Jaenike did follow up for mites moving spiroplasma symbionts, which made the same shift (will group-》mel). It worked and he did get heritable transmission in recipient mel at a low rate. Which was very cool.

As an editor, I found them occasionally counter productive- a reviewer would write a thing (e.g fine but iterative) but not write this in the review - so as an editor made decisions harder to justify. Save misconduct, if you want it part of the review process, write it direct to authors.

Two fully funded #PhD positions on insect #Symbiosis available in our lab: Spiroplasma in Neotropical Arthropods (tinyurl.com/spiroplasma) & Psyllid symbionts (tinyurl.com/psyllids).
Please contact me for any questions & share widely #symbiosky #academicjobs

HPRU Clinical Fellow at University of Liverpool Apply now for the HPRU Clinical Fellow role on jobs.ac.uk - the leading job board for higher education jobs. View details.

We are offering an exciting opportunity for a clinical trainee to undertake a PhD in an area relating to outbreak prone infectious disease of public health importance or zoonoses: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DNJ811/h...

Looking for a postdoc on bacterial-insect symbiosis, combining evolution and molecular mechanisms? I'll have one open in my lab starting Sept 2025. If interested contact me (or find me at the GRC on Animal-microbe symbiosis if you'll be there). #SymbioSky

Drosophila Genetic Database The Drosophila Genetic Database, FlyBase, is on the brink of collapse due to the sudden termination of the FlyBase NIH grant, which includes salaries for 5 literature curators based at the University ...

#drosophila @flybase.bsky.social request emergency funding:
"As it stands, by the end of July, 2025, there will be no future updates to FlyBase, and in the worst case scenario access to the website will also be lost" => please donate!

www.philanthropy.cam.ac.uk/give-to-camb...

Rickettsia in the form of Ca Tisiphia is in amoebae and inverts. More widely, rickettsiales are everywhere really (inverts and lots of microeuks).

The Rickettsia is about double 'normal' size. In the plot below, blue lines are insertion sequences locations. Over half the genome. I still find it remarkable this bacterium is able to grow and replicate!

Did the chicken pox vaccination privately when F1 was 10 and hadn't caught it. It is pretty unpleasant as a disease in adults.... (I got it at 17 yeuch)

Symbiont genomes are generally small, losing content. However, mobile element proliferation occasionally drives genome expansion. Is this a chance thing? Emily observed coinfecting symbionts with greatly enlarged genomes (via distinct mobile elements) implying an underlying driver of expansion. 2/2

Concerted genome expansion of heritable symbionts in an insect host Maternally transmitted symbionts represent important components of arthropod biology, acting as both beneficial partners and as reproductive parasites. Their strict vertical transmission greatly reduc...

New preprint ex @bolinabug.bsky.social (+ @daisukekageyama.bsky.social & @scottishwormboy.bsky.social) on the pronounced secondary expansion of Spiroplasma and Rickettsia genomes in lacewings doi.org/10.1101/2025... #symbiosky 1/2

Your salamanders (and their algae) featured in my year 1 intro to ecology lecture on symbiosis!

Rachel Drysdale and I prepared a biographical memoir for Michael Ashburner, now published at:
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

Our New Paper is out! Great work by Mashaneh Ahrar and the team - thank you all, especially @makaefer.bsky.social and Greg Hurst (is he on Bsky???)! TBC :)

Please spread the word - 2 new PhD positions, one fully funded and one self-funded, with us at Durham and @clarahowcroft.bsky.social at Northumbria Uni! We are looking for people with interdisciplinary experience (biology, computer vision, engineering) and interest to work across disciplines.

£9 million investment fuels groundbreaking bioscience research From unlocking the secrets of animal movement to tackling antimicrobial resistance, UK’s brightest bioscience minds are pushing the boundaries of innovation.

Delighted to have been awarded a BBSRC Fellowship to look at the genetics of how insects have adapted to living in freshwater habitats 🧬🦋🪰🪲🌊

Extremely grateful to all who have supported me over the years and excited to be at Liverpool with some great colleagues!

www.ukri.org/news/9-milli...

CPR Survey | International Sample Archive International Sample Archive

You could try the continuous plankton recording project, who have been archiving material for a long time. www.cprsurvey.org/services/int...

Many FTSE companies are UK registered but international in activity, so impacted well beyond just UK-US tariffs.

Evolution of Wolbachia male-killing mechanism within a host species Male-killing bacterial symbionts, prevalent in arthropods, skew population sex ratios by selectively killing male progeny, profoundly impacting ecolog…

@haraipapilio.bsky.social paper on evolution of Wolbachia MK mechanism through prophage acquisition in molina butterflies - avoiding suppression by the host. Now out! #symbiosky www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti.... With @daisukekageyama.bsky.social @bolinabug.bsky.social and others

#symbiosky

Hi Nancy, you can find symbiosis posts on the #Symbiosky feed/tag. Great to see you here!

Happy to contribute to this piece in recognition of #InternationalWomensDay

I once tried to order tea in Polish in Spain. I speak good enough Spanish, but brain went into last language spoken mode (despite my Polish being very tourist basic)

#symbiosky

A dual insect symbiont and plant pathogen improves insect host fitness under arginine limitation | mBio Unlike obligate symbionts that are permanently associated with their hosts, facultative symbionts rarely show direct nutritional contributions, especially under nutrient-limited conditions. This study...

New study from my lab and former grad Dr. Kwak shows Liberibacter psyllaurous, a dual insect symbiont and plant pathogen, boosts psyllid fitness by providing essential nutrients like arginine. A rare case of nutritional benefits from non-obligate symbionts #symbiosis journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

Pacific beetle-mimic cockroach and her newly born nymphs

Overview of project on Nutrition and immunity in pregnancy: picture of pregnant woman on one side, viviparous insects on the other; 3 boxes linking project components (evolutionary models, insect experiments and human cohorts)

View of cormorant drying its wings by the Bristol harbour: light reflecting off the water

Researchers at an insect outreach event, standing at the stall

Job! 2-year postdoc position in EVElab, Bristol UK on nutrition and infections in pregnancy (FLF-funded)
www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DLV631/r...

Apply if you are enthusiastic about:
- experiments on insects which get pregnant
- relevance of evolution to public health
- a vibrant city & research environment