iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Stephen Montgomery

Simon Evans @sevans.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Evolution and adaptation are frequently used interchangeably when describing trait change. Does it really matter? Our new paper in PLOS Biology shows that yes, it really does. journals.plos.org/plosbiology/... Buckle up, we're going for a ride...

journals.plos.org

Gene flow drives periods of both evolutionary stasis and change in a wild bird population

Why do we not see evolutionary change in heritable, fitness-related traits of free-living populations? This multi-decade study of the evolution of clutch size in populations of great tits before, duri...

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 03/10/2026

Congrats Simon and team, sounds very cool! Looking forward to reading it properly

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Thanks Jake! It will be great to catch up soon, I’ll shoot you an email…

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Not quite sure how I ended up with an office with this view 🤯

A green lawn with a gothic chapel to the left, an ornate fountain in the middle and blue skies above

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Monika Scholz @monikakscholz.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Come be our colleague @mpinb.mpg.de ! jobs.b-ite.com/jobposting/4... Bonn has a great community of neuroscientists and it's been a great place to start a group! #neuroethology @neuroethology.org

jobs.b-ite.com

Max Planck Research Group Leader (W2) in Neuroethology (m/f/div)

limited contract

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Congrats Jolyon, George and team, very cool!

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Jolyon Troscianko @jtroscianko.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

🦋 Butterfly wing patterns create motion illusions that protect them from predators! Our new study (8 years in the making) is out in Nature today doi.org/10.1038/s415... @grahancock.bsky.social @esbriolat.bsky.social @scienceanna.bsky.social @lauraakelley.bsky.social @uniexecec.bsky.social

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

O, that way madness lies; let me shun that; No fucking more of that.

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Daniela Rößler @roesslerdaniela.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

🚨New paper🚨 Garden #spiders are everywhere right now—big, beautiful ladies, still in the hub of their 🕸️ But they are not just waiting, at night they also 💤! We found behavioral signatures of sleep in the wild. Out in #AnimalBehaviour w/ @mherberstein.bsky.social tinyurl.com/uznvv58y 🧵1/5

Adult female garden spider (Araneus diadematus) sitting at the center of her orb web, with orange‑brown legs and a patterned abdomen. The web’s radial and spiral threads are sharply visible, catching the light. The background is blurred green foliage with soft circular highlights, making the spider and web stand out in clear focus.

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Are you a #NewPI in Ecology & Evolution? Would you like to meet with peers to chat about work, the future and life as a new PI? 🍪☕️ Then I have the form for you! 📋 Help us gauge interest in a new network/event by filling in this short survey: forms.cloud.microsoft/e/K4wUiuLuFn Please RT! 🙏

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FishEvo Zuzana Musilova @fishevo.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Hot off the preprint: visual adaptations in crater-lake #cichlids revealed by single-cell RNA-seq of the retina. Deep-water species have mainly green cones that however differ from both green and red cones of the shallow-water species. Quite unexpected in such young adaptive radiation!😍

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Giorgio Gilestro @giorgio.gilest.ro · 20/09/2026

Academia has seen inflation in the past 30 years but it is now entering Republic of Weimar territory, with value of knowledge moving from "paper to land". In all this, Open hardware is an act of armed resistance to Technofeudalism. giorgio.gilest.ro/the-weimar-o...

giorgio.gilest.ro

The Weimar of knowledge – la bottega

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Jon Simons @jonsimons.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

The School of Biological Sciences at @cam.ac.uk is seeking a new Director for our Microscopy Bioscience Platform, which brings researchers together through open access to advanced imaging expertise and technology. Please share! www.cam.ac.uk/jobs/directo...

cam.ac.uk

Director of the School of the Biological Sciences Microscopy Bioscience Platform (Associate Research Professor (G10)/Research Professor (G11))

We are seeking a new Director for the Microscopy Bioscience Platform (https://www.bio.cam.ac.uk/microscopy-platform), based within the School of the Biological Sciences city centre campus. This strate...

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Reposted by Stephen Montgomery

Anil Seth @anilseth.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

1/6 An extraordinary @nature.com paper has just landed from the lab of @sergiuppasca.bsky.social. They found a way to create "xenocortical mice" which have ~92% of their cortex occupied by a cortical organoid derived from human stem cells.

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Andrew Lin @andrewclin.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

We're hiring! Join us as a postdoc to study how the brain is optimised for sensory coding and memory Please spread the word! Apply at jobsite.sheffield.ac.uk/job/Research... Deadline: 5 October 2026 Learn more at: www.aclinlab.org

jobsite.sheffield.ac.uk

Research Associate: Neuroscience (2 Posts)

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

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Tomás Ryan @tjryan.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

"MIT wants to rebuild education around the things AI can't replace. That means oral exams, semester portfolios, in-person project work, and a required social component in every subject. The report even floats the idea of rethinking grades entirely..." This is the way forward @tcddublin.bsky.social

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Richard Merrill @dickmerrill.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Very excited to see this multi-faceted* study, led by Shane Wright and representing years of work on visual evolution and perception in Heliconius as part of our ERC Starting Grant, released into the world! 🦋*pun very much intended www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

biorxiv.org

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

True, but Unis should be capable of meeting GDPR requirements. It makes me very uncomfortable that UKRI won’t see a large part of the review process yet claims to keep a “keen eye” on EDI.

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Interesting ideas! RE “Universities are not set up to do demand management… funders like UKRI are the experts” - after today’s announcement personally i would like to see UKRI issue instructions for how to do demand management, and what (required [EDI]) data to collect and report

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Harry Siviter @harrysiviter.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Come and join us! 🐝

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Dr. Or M. Bialik |📚|🔬|🌊|⚒️ @obialik.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

Fish with electrical senses have unique brain cells specifically to process that information. The real trick they pull is separating the electricity they emit from the ones they sense. 🧪 Link: www.nature.com/articles/s41586-026-…

a, Schematic of the interference problem facing the passive electrosensory system of weakly electric fish. Responses of EAFs to prey are masked by responses to the EOD of the fish, which vary depending on factors such as water conductivity. b, Schematic of prediction and cancellation of responses to the EOD. Predictions are based on electric organ corollary discharge signals conveyed by GCs (granule cell basis) and require specific patterns of synaptic connectivity. c, Summary diagram of the synaptic connectivity patterns revealed in the present study. Only connections comprising >10% of the total synapses to a given cell type are shown in the diagram. d, Two example Output cells (blue and red) are shown along with EAF (pink) and GC (magenta) inputs overlaid on a cutout of the EM volume (424 × 427 × 45 µm; all EM connectomic data are from a single biological specimen). The dorsal–ventral and anterior–posterior dimensions of the skin surface are mapped onto the x- and z-dimensions of the volume, respectively. The top inset shows example excitatory GC synapses (magenta fill and star) onto apical dendritic spines of the ON cell (red fill). The magenta fill marks the example GC axon visualized in the volume; the magenta star marks another GC axon. The white star marks an inhibitory molecular layer interneuron synapse onto the dendritic shaft of the same ON cell. The bottom inset shows an example excitatory EAF synapse (pink fill) onto the ON cell basal dendrite (red fill). mol, molecular layer; ggl, ganglion layer; plex, plexiform layer; gran, granular layer. e–h, Example reconstructions of major ELL cell types. Axons are shown in black. ON/OFF, Output (h); MG+/MG−, medium ganglion (f); SG+/SG−, small ganglion (g); Gr+, granular; SP−, small plexiform (h). The inset in f shows an example inhibitory synapse between an MG+ cell (orange) and an OFF cell soma (blue).

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Includes a nice article covering of @borreroja.bsky.social and @dickmerrill.bsky.social’s work in #Heliconius!

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Andrew Straw @andrewstraw.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

We are hiring! Come join us in the Straw Lab at the @biologyunifreiburg.bsky.social . Seeking a scientist to work on the neural and computational mechanisms of visual navigation in honey bees. uni-freiburg.de/en/job/00005...

Bee trajectories in agricultural landscape and two photon microscope for in-vivo calcium activity imaging.

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Pável Matos @pavelmatosm.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Please share: Only 10 days left to apply for a PhD position on comparative and population genomics in our lab 🦋

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Reposted by Stephen Montgomery

Max Farnworth @maxfarnworth.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

🚨 I AM HIRING a 3-year postdoc & 4-year PhD student 🚨 [PLEASE SHARE WIDELY] My Emmy Noether @dfg.de funded Neural Circuit & Systems Evolution lab (🌟) at the @unimainz.bsky.socialÍ wants to start existing. So..., what do we need? WELL... we need you! APPLY UNTIL 21 SEPTEMBER.

static.klipy.com

ALT:

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

Thanks Carolina and Clara for a fun conversation!

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Neuroverse @neuroversepod.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

New episode out today! We were joined by Prof. Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social to learn about how evolution contributes to the generation of new behaviours and cognitive solutions🍃🧠, using neotropical butterflies🦋 as a fascinating case study🔬. Listen here: open.spotify.com/episode/4d7T...

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Molecular Biology and Evolution @molbioevol.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

Pinheiro de Castro et al. trace the evolution of cyanogenic glucosides biosynthesis in Heliconiini butterflies, providing evidence for the genetic basis of this phenotype and empirical evidence for plasticity-first evolution. 🔗 academic.oup.com/mbe/article/... #societyjournal #evobio #molbio

MBE | Plasticity-first evolution via CYP405 loss shaped chemical defenses in butterflies

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Andy Brown @andybrown1951.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

If much of the methane trapped beneath permafrost gets released into the atmosphere then this summer's heat waves will look like a very minor early stage of chaos. Humanity is taking huge risks in order to line the pockets of fossil fuel companies. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

theguardian.com

The threatening thaw: climate professor on heatwave risks to tipping point of permafrost

Prof Gustaf Hugelius warns wildfires could accelerate release of methane and carbon as vast regions approach irreversible thresholds

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Emilie Ellis @e-ellis1.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

🦋 I’m recruiting a fully funded PhD student at the University of Helsinki: understanding how butterflies respond to climate change across Europe. Apply by 30 Sept: Full details: jobs.helsinki.fi/job-invite/5... Please share! #ecology #job #phd

jobs.helsinki.fi

Doctoral Researcher (PhD student) in Butterfly Ecology and Climate Change across Europe

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Totally agree. But the response has to be fair and in proportion, and what just passed hasn’t been, in large part due to the press, but I think we can also hold ourselves to higher standards in this context too.

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Yeah and there would’ve been a process for handling that, which may well have reached that conclusion, if not for the media intensity ending as it did. I read the post more as a critique of the specific framing by the press, lazy journalism, and online pile ons.

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Stephen Montgomery @ebablab.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Clear, succinct, balanced and evidence based; apparently too much to ask from many journalists

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Jess O'Thomson @jessothomson.co.uk · 15/08/2026

We are writing to the Prime Minister, and the Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy, calling for an immediate public inquiry into the British press, following the tragic death of Jason Arday. Sign here 👇

goodlaw.social

Jason Arday Letter | Good Law Project

Commission an immediate public inquiry into how to ensure a responsible press given its contribution to Dr Arday’s tragic death.

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Jose Pina-Sánchez 🇪🇺 @jpinasanchez.eurosky.social · 14/08/2026

"Recent analysis shows that the decline in international students means the UK has lost out on a net economic benefit of nearly £3bn." Best part, this is all completely deliberate.

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Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior @mpi-animalbehav.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

How did cognition evolve? 🧠 On the sandy bottom of Lake Tanganyika, scientists asked wild fish how they make decisions, revealing how two closely related species diverge in surprising ways. Paper ▶️ www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... Story ▶️ www.ab.mpg.de/1452608/news...

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Alex von Tunzelmann @alexvont.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

Stop considering it. Just ban them. Do it now. Disposable barbecues are (a) useless as BBQs, take ages, food often still raw in middle, (b) environmentally horrible, (c) incredibly good at starting massive fires. There is no good argument for them. Bin them off www.theguardian.com/society/2026...

theguardian.com

Burnham to consider ban on disposable barbecues as wildfires rage in UK

PM to look at imposing restriction in public spaces, though campaigners fear it does not go far enough

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