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Reposted by Jas Rees

Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution @official-smbe.bsky.social · 20/04/2026

The 2026 awardees of SMBE's Faculty Award are now known. We start by presenting the SMBE Early-Career Excellence Award winner - Leo Speidel - working at RIKEN, Japan. @leospeidel.bsky.social Visit our website to learn more about the SMBE Faculty Awards 🔗 smbe.org/faculty-awards #society

SMBE Early-Career Excellence Award - Leo Speidel

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Reposted by Jas Rees

Max Reuter @maxreuter.bsky.social · 21/01/2026

A new preprint from the lab, with postdoc @deboraycb.bsky.social and collaborators @aidaandres.bsky.social and Tim Connallon: “Characterising the detectable and invisible fractions of genomic loci under balancing selection” www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

biorxiv.org

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 13/10/2025

thank you! was definitely worth the time we spent

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

12/ TLDR: we identify widespread signatures of positive selection associated with 13 different micronutrients at different timepoints in human evolutionary history, suggesting that micronutrients have been a powerful selective force in modern humans 🧬🌎🍎

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

11/ Side bar: this work was done as part of my PhD, under two incredible supervisors (@aidaandres.bsky.social & Sergi Castellano) and I hope some of the joy of my time at @uclchildhealth.bsky.social & @ugiatucl.bsky.social translated into the paper

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

10/ If true, this has the potential to drive or exacerbate micronutrient-linked health disparities across populations - especially when over-farming and climate change continues to decrease soil quality. It is hard to ignore potential public/global health connotations🌎

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

9/ Why is this important? We suggest dietary micronutrients have shaped the recent evolution of humans and likely contributed to population differentiation in diet-related genes - possibly resulting in average differences in their micronutrient uptake, metabolism or regulation.

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

8/ In some cases, signatures of positive selection are identified in areas of the world with soil of known deficiencies or toxicities of micronutrients - potentially reflecting genetic adaptation to soil-driven micronutrient levels in the diet. Read our paper to see where 🤓

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

7/ Rather than isolated cases, we see evidence for monogenic and/or oligogenic adaptation for all micronutrients , across diverse geographic and temporal scales ⚠️

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

6/ We used methods informed by extensive simulations to identify signatures of positive selection in ~300 genes associated with 13 essential trace minerals in 40 diverse human populations, considering monogenic, oligogenic and polygenic selection 🧬

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

5/ We wanted to ask: have all micronutrients acted as selective pressures? Or only a few? And in which populations and timepoints? Is this likely to be driven by differing micronutrient levels in local soils? 🌎

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

4/ But soils can be extremely variable in their micronutrient content (even amongst really close-by environments!) - and have previously been suggested to drive some isolated examples of local adaptation to dietary micronutrients in human populations 🧬

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

3/ For much of human evolution, the amount of micronutrients in our diet have depended on the underlying soil content, since micronutrients are taken up by local plants and animals that then make up the human diet 🐔🍎🌽

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

2/ Micronutrients - including trace minerals and vitamins - are essential components in the human diet, needed in very small and precise quantities. Deficiencies can be super harmful, leading to stunted growth and increased risk of infectious, metabolic or respiratory diseases 🤒

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Jas Rees @jasminrees.bsky.social · 16/09/2025

1/ So pleased to share our paper on genetic adaptation to micronutrients in humans! Our biggest conclusion? Trace minerals in the diet have shaped human evolution far more than previously appreciated 🧬🌍👇 www.cell.com/ajhg/fulltex...

t.co

https://www.cell.com/ajhg/fulltext/S0002-9297(25)00315-5

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Reposted by Jas Rees

Aida Andres @aidaandres.bsky.social · 10/09/2025

Jasmin Rees PhD chapter as a paper just out at the AJHG @ajhgnews.bsky.social, with Sergi Castellano, who first envisioned the study. Jas investigated signatures of human local genetic adaptation in hundreds of micronutrient-associated genes.

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