iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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Philip Donoghue @phil-donoghue.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Latest from the Lab: @philvixseboxse.bsky.social tests Jerzy Dzik's @ipaleopan.bsky.social hypothesis that the evolution of exoenzymes like collagenases explain the heterogeneity of the fossil record. Thanks for including the rest of us as hangers-on, Phil! @bristolpalaeo.bsky.social

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Hoyaboya @hoyaboya1.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

Losso et al. (2026-10 preprint, bioRxiv) 「三葉虫類の神経系および大顎類の中心複合体の初期進化」 The trilobite nervous system and the early evolution of the mandibulate central complex doi.org/10.64898/202... 三葉虫類がステム大顎類であることを支持！！ Supports that trilobites are stem mandibulates!

Sarah R. Losso et al., CC BY 4.0, https://doi.org/10.64898/2026.10.05.756825

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Sam Burgess @oceanterra.org · 02/10/2026

Europe didnt just experience an exceptionally hot summer in 2026. It experienced a summer where multiple climate extremes reinforced each other. First - temperature records were broken at daily, monthly and seasonal scales across Europe Read more: climate.copernicus.eu/summer-revie...

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Stelios Katsanevakis @skatsanevakis.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

🌍 A super El Niño is becoming a global stress test — from fisheries and food security to wildfire risk and coral reefs. Three recent Nature pieces trace the same story: impacts are accelerating, preparedness matters, and ecosystems need every bit of resilience we can build. #ElNino #ClimateChange 🌐🧪

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Dr. Jack Cooper @cooperpalaeo.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

🚨Big News🚨 I wrote a book! It's out on February 9th & it’s available to pre-order now! 🦈 Published by UniPress Books & @princetonupress.bsky.social & featuring incredible art by the amazing Gabriel Ugueto @serpenillus.bsky.social, you can pre-order here: www.amazon.co.uk/Megalodon-Ot... 🦈 (1/4)

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Journal of Systematic Palaeontology @journalsystpal.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

A bird’s eye view of the fossil record: perspectives on avian systematics by Benito & Steell. Read here: buff.ly/fJattSx This is the latest article in our collection of agenda-setting reviews in the systematics of major fossil groups - with many more articles coming soon! #FossilFriday

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Colin Carlson @colincarlson.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

If you missed it last week, we published the largest ever study on emerging infectious diseases. Not really in vogue right now, but the next pandemic will come sooner than you think. Key lessons: nature-based solutions where you can, health system strengthening always. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The anthropogenic fingerprint on emerging infectious diseases

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Anthony (Tony) J. Martin @ichnologist.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Very excited to see this new review article, 'The Fossil Record of Bioerosion,' by Mark Wilson, @nhmbryozoa.bsky.social, & others! Published online in Journal of Paleontology (@paleosoc.bsky.social) & #OpenAccess. Looking forward to diving in & reading it later.

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franz @franzanth.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I'm actually impressed the review process seemed swift enough for this name to still reference the current arc

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Iñaki Ruiz-Trillo @multicellgenome.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

#Evolution can innovate without inventing. Cell type families can retain ancient regulatory “vocabularies”, while individual cell types evolve by reshuffling how those motifs are combined. @natecoevo.nature.com New cell types from old regulatory words. We like this! doi.org/10.1038/s415...

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PARADIVE UW @paleoparadive.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

🦠 We're hiring a 2-year postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Evolutionary Biology, University of Warsaw, to join the PARADIVE lab: euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/469223

euraxess.ec.europa.eu

Assistant Professor (post-doc) - Faculty of Biology, University of Warsaw (WB-KG-15/2026)

The position of Assistant Professor in the programme/project/undertaking The impact of mass extinctions on parasite diversity and evolution.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Reassessment of #Miocene putative #coprolites from Poland suggests a biogenic origin and probable #squamate (reptilian) producers: peerj.com/articles/217... @peerj.bsky.social supported by size/morphology, surface striations, hair-like inclusions and associated putative reptile remains #paleobiology

Six Miocene coprolite fossils (A–F) shown alongside modern reptile faeces (G–L) for comparison. The fossils are irregular, flattened, dark-brown masses; specimen C has a distinctive striated surface texture. The modern samples come from an iguana, a Madagascar boa, a boa snake, and a tortoise, appearing as similar brownish, segmented or lumpy droppings. Panels M and N are microscope photos of hair-like structures inside specimen A, each marked with a yellow line showing the thin-section cut. Scale bars: 1 cm for the specimens, 100 µm for the microscope views. See: https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.21755/fig-2

A grid of small vertebrate fossils from Bełchatów, Poland (scale bars 1 mm). Highlighted putative reptile finds: A, a possible reptile tooth crown shown from two sides; B, a crocodile tooth, slender and pointed; G, a rounded osteoderm (bony skin plate) in dorsal and ventral view; and N, a putative squamate bone fragment shown in three orientations. The remaining panels show mammal and amphibian remains: bat and hedgehog teeth, a possible frog bone, rodent incisors, and numerous mole and shrew-like insectivore teeth (Desmanella, Plesiosorex, Talpinae, Plesiodimylinae), plus a lagomorph tooth and a desman molar. Scale bars: 1 mm. 10.7717/peerj.21755/fig-3

Thin-section and electron microscope images of probable coprolites from Bełchatów, Poland. A and B show entire thin sections of two coprolites — pale, elongate slices with darker internal material. C and D are optical microscope views of the coprolite matrix; E and F are backscattered electron images of the same, showing scattered pale inclusions in a darker groundmass. G, H, and I are SEM close-ups revealing clusters of siderite and iron oxides/hydroxides — granular, bright mineral aggregates labelled "Sd" and "FeO(OH)" — in the coprolite matrix. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.21755/fig-5

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UNITED24 @u24.gov.ua · 28/09/2026

russia struck the National Academy of Sciences in Kyiv. Employees of the academy attempted to jump from the windows, as flames engulfed the building. russia rejoices in killing people who make this world a better place, while its war criminals turn cities to ruins.

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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

My former colleagues, Mark Cane and Stephen Zebiak, were the first to successfully predict El Niño more than a year in advance in the late 1980s. Now we’re really good at it, and know the consequences. It’d be irresponsible for governments not to take action. Read this from my buddy Jeff Shaman.

nytimes.com

Opinion | The Super El Niño Comes Bearing One Gift: Time to Prepare (Gift Article)

There’s still time to prepare.

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Andrej Spiridonov @andrejpaleo.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

J. Alroy's (johnalroy.bsky.social) article on the unreliability of the coverage-based rarefaction; also known in paleontology as the SQS subsampling, in estimating species richness. Use other techniques folks... nsojournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirec...

Violin plots (Adler et al. 2025) showing diversity estimates yielded by seven estimators when applied to data simulated under three distributions.

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Christoph Bautz @christophbautz.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Am 9. Oktober passiert ein Schulterschluss, auf den wir lange hingearbeitet haben. Die Erneuerbaren-Branche geht zusammen mit der Zivilgesellschaft auf der Straße. Die Botschaft ist klar: Wir wollen Planungssicherheit & Tempo beim Ausbau der Erneuerbaren – keine neuen fossilen Abhängigkeiten.

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Richard Dearden @euphanerops.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Fan of weird end-Permian-surviving fossil sharks? Check out our preprint describing the first endoskeletal fossils of Carnian jalodontiform Keuperodus brodiei. #FossilFriday doi.org/10.64898/202... Led by Ryan Tokeley (no bsky), based on his great masters project work @nitroshutter.bsky.social

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Russell Garwood @russellgarwood.co.uk · 15/09/2026

Interested in how species diversity is split between major animal groups? Here is the infographic for you! 🧪⚒️🦀🦑 #evosky

An infographic showing the number of described and estimated species for major animal groups. There are more insects than anything else. Of the remaining groups, arachnids and nematodes are the most diverse.

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Harriet B. Drage @harriedrage.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Interested in fossil arthropods, palaeoecology, dispersal, and interesting methods? 🦀 🌎 I'm hiring a 4-year, fully funded PhD student at the University of Geneva as part of my European Research Council (ERC) grant. Deadline: 16th October. Reach out if any questions! www.unige.ch/sciences/ter...

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Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences @pnas.org · 03/09/2026

Soundscapes of ancient forests are made possible through reconstructions of the sound-producing structures of insects from the Jurassic period. These ancient relatives of today’s katydids lived in what is now Inner Mongolia, China. In PNAS: ow.ly/xee550ZISxP

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Dr. Or M. Bialik |📚|🔬|🌊|⚒️ @obialik.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

We also get to have some cool stuff from time to time - anyone wants to know how Jurassic insects sounded like? Because now we know. 🧪 Link: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.26151…

Reconstruction of main vibration of the stridulatory wing cells based on FEA models of nine fossil wing geometries. Deflection maps indicate relative minimum (blue) and maximum (red) deflection of the involved wing cells (see color scale). The quality factor Q (peak width at −3 dB) is measured from the fundamental frequency (dashed red line).

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Andrej Spiridonov @andrejpaleo.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Wonderful world of cephalopod evolution in deep time... " Here we provide an overview of some exciting fields in cephalopod research, where (in our biased opinion) the most impressive advances have been made." 🧪⚒️ #Geology #Paleobio #EvoBio www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Morphological changes during the evolution from bactritids (top) to the first and slightly derived Devonian ammonoids and changes in ecology.

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John Alroy @johnalroy.bsky.social · 30/07/2025

Phylogenetic relatedness predicts spatial co-occurrence in Neotropical bats and birds. A new paper by Anikó Tóth with Kate Lyons, Drew Allen, and me. Includes Drew's great new method of inferring interaction processes based on co-occurrence data. royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

royalsocietypublishing.org

Effects of phylogenetic distance, niche overlap and habitat alteration on spatial co-occurrence patterns in Neotropical bats and birds | Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

Ecological interactions influence which species can coexist locally, but assessing the effects of interactions on species distributions at landscape to regional scales has proven challenging. Here, we...

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Thanks. Of course. May be easiest to sent me an e-mail: ibe.biol.uw.edu.pl/en/people/dr...

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

If you are interested in this work, please surf to the listed doi number. If i understand correctly, if the page receives sufficient visits, it may become available in #openaccess

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Thanks to Christian Klug for inviting us and leading this work. Great collaboration with René Hoffmann, Isabelle Rouget, @apohle.ecoevo.social.ap.brid.gy, Alison Rowe, Dirk Fuchs, David Peterman, Yasuhiro Iba, Martina Aubrechtová, Björn Kröger, Amane Tajika, Isabelle Kruta and Peg Yacobucci

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

It was great to be able to contribute to this. We were brought together by a workshop funded by @paleosynth.bsky.social

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Led by @thefairestfowl.bsky.social Aleksandra Skawina @devapriya-chat.bsky.social with @taphonomist.bsky.social Paula Dentzien-Dias @realhuntley.bsky.social Ádám Kocsis - Conrad Labandeira @lhliow.bsky.social Elizabeth Petsios - Alexis Rojas - Jansen Smith - Karina Vanadzina

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

The fossil record is indispensable for understanding how interactions evolve, collapse, or persist across environmental crises, providing the foundation for linking organismal observations to evolutionary insights on how life has shaped—and been shaped by—biotic interactions.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

This review traces the process of knowledge creation from specimen-level evidence to inferred interactions, highlights insights gained from different fBI types, and advocates for standardized nomenclature and reporting.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

We review the contributions of the fossil record to studies of biotic interactions, propose a unified framework for reporting fBI data, and outline the interpretative challenges unique to fossils, including taphonomy and the inability to directly observe behavior.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Unlike modern ecological data, the fossil record captures the long-term consequences of short-term and local interactions, offering insights into biodiversity, extinction, adaptation, and ecosystem function.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Fossil biotic interactions (fBIs) provide a critical but underutilized window into the ecological and evolutionary dynamics of life through time.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Furthermore, we highlight some fields that require research focus and discuss #threats and #problems impacting #research on #fossil #cephalopods.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

#coleoid diversity in the #Cretaceous (“digital fossil mining,” i.e., a system that excavates all fossils embedded in rocks through a combination of automated grinding tomography and artificial intelligence); food-web positions of various cephalopods (as prey or predator); and nautiloid evolution.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

early #coleoid #evolution (multispectral imaging, RTI); new coleoid systematics; coleoid #anatomy ( #synchrotron, #UV);

Figure showing PPC-SR-μCT scans and 3D rendering of fossil cephalopods from La Voulte-sur-Rhône. Panels: (1) Binned dataset of Vampyrofugiens atramentum (MNHN.F.A32491), voxel size 25.28 μm; (2) Close-up of the cephalic region of Vampyrofugiens atramentum, binned dataset, voxel size 7 μm; (3) 3D rendering of the arms of Proteroctopus ribeti. PPC-SR-μCT scan data available at http://paleo.esrf.fr/. References: Rowe et al. (2023), Fischer and Riou (1982), Kruta et al. (2016).

Fossil specimen of Dorateuthis syriaca (Woodward, 1883), cataloged as MNHN.F. 88589, from Hjoula, Lebanon, dating to the Cenomanian period. The image consists of two panels: (1) an overview of the fossil, and (2) a μXRF scan showing the distribution of titanium (red), yttrium (green), and iron (blue) using a Bruker M6 Jetstream XRF at the MNHN. For further discussion, see Rowe et al. (2024, 2025).

Fossil specimen of Phragmoteuthis conocauda (Quenstedt, 1846–1849), cataloged as SMNS 61129, from the Toarcian period in Holzmaden. The image shows a well-preserved specimen with visible gills. Computed tomography enhances the visualization of these soft tissues. The top panel displays the fossil with surrounding sediment, while the bottom panel isolates only the soft parts.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

stable isotope #geochemistry of Mesozoic–Cenozoic cephalopods; ammonoid #reproduction (based on exceptionally preserved fossils and substantive fecundity estimates); #ammonoid morphological #evolution and biodiversity dynamics;

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

These are, in roughly stratigraphical order: the #phylogeny of early #cephalopods (using Bayesian approaches); the #origin of #ammonoids; functional morphology of ammonoids (using ammonoid #robots, grinding #tomography, #finite #element #analyses);

Diagram illustrating the morphological evolution from bactritids (top) to early and slightly derived Devonian ammonoids, highlighting associated changes in ecology. Modified after Klug and Korn (2004).

Figure showcasing virtual and physical biomechanical models of ammonoids. Panels include: (1) Virtual hydrostatic model for analyzing buoyancy, orientation, and stability; (2) Schematic of a physical model matching the properties in (1); (3) Physical model weighted to replicate living ammonoid hydrostatics (1–3 modified from Peterman and Ritterbush, 2022b); (4) Schematic of an ammonoid robot; (5) Self-propelling, untethered ammonoid robot (4, 5 modified from Peterman and Ritterbush, 2022a); (6) Fundamental physical tradeoffs in planispiral ammonoids (modified from Peterman and Ritterbush, 2022b); (7) Theoretical morphologies illustrating increased ornamentation coarseness and rocking attenuation (modified from Peterman et al., 2025).

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Here we provide an overview of some exciting fields in cephalopod research, where (in our biased opinion) the most impressive advances have been made.

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Kenneth De Baets @djbirddanerd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

In times when science, including paleontology, is being questioned by some, the rising interest in the paleontology and paleobiology of the most intelligent invertebrates, namely cephalopods, may raise the hope for a brighter future.

Diagram illustrating ammonoid suture patterns (1–3), septa (4–6), and conch anatomy (7). Panels show: (1, 4) Goniatitic suture and septum of Manticoceras sp.; (2, 5) Ceratitic suture and septum of Xenaspis sp.; (3, 6) Ammonitic suture and septum of Menuites oralensis; (7) Reconstruction of Manticoceras sp. with half the shell removed to reveal internal soft body and goniatitic septa. Suture patterns modified from Arkell et al. (1957) and Peterman et al. (2021)."

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Sarah McAnulty, Ph.D. @sarahmackattack.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

Attention Philadelphia! We're hosting a rally to demand that Drexel University maintain The Academy of Natural Sciences Museum open to the public. Join us on Tuesday morning at 10am in front of the academy. Please spread the word, we need all hands on deck! RSVP here: luma.com/1qwnrqz2

A dinosaur on a white background with the text SAve the academy of Natural sciences museum rally Tuesday Sept 8 10am in front of the academy 1900 ben Franklin Parkway. "Tell Drexel University "Keep the museum open!" with the logos for Philly Science Action, Skype a Scientist, and Green Philly

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Rachel Warnock @rachelwarnock.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Elegant study on experimental taphonomy, links to broader discussions about phylogeny and molecular dating led by @taphonomist.bsky.social - onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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