iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Gwênlyn Glusman (she/her) ☸️ @gwenlyn.bsky.social · 12h

• The tool now offers downloading the actual COA form in XLSX format, no need to copy/paste into it anymore. • You can also drop in your old COA XLSX, and it will update it! So the minimal workflow for uncomplicated cases is: drop old form, click submit, download updated version. Enjoy!! 🧪

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

A few recent ant photos from Aroostook county, Maine. Ok and one of me, too.

Camponotus novaboracensis, New York Carpenter Ant, red and black, sitting in a clover.

Lasius americanus, brown with hairless scape, vertical, climbing against a tawny background.

Jane pointing aspirator at the camera, hair blowing in the wind

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

Grateful for an accepting, welcoming, and trans-supportive community at #iussi26 #iussi2026. Thanks, all! 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🏳️‍🌈

Jane, in a blue dress and purple converse platforms sharing her poster at the IUSSI conference in Freiburg.

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Why Pogonomyrmex would make the worst desk clerks at motel 6… the lights will not be left on for you!! Christina Kwapich (UCF) shared the coolest mix of natural history and division of labor theory in an absolutely heart-wrenching story about nest door-closing. @pogonokwap.bsky.social #IUSSI26

Motel 6: We’ll leave the light on for you

Christina showing examples of door-closing in ants

Illustration of ants filling in a nest entrance by Turid Hölldobler-Forsyth

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

As a native New Yorker, I see what you did here, and love it. From a stellar discussion of evolutionary (ecological?) dynamics in mixed-lineage clonal raider ant colony groups by Tomas Kay (Rockefeller). @tomaskay.bsky.social #IUSSI26

A slide from Tomas’ talk with the clonal raider ant populations identified by letters designed to look like the lines of the NYC subway!

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Libby Tseng (Rockefeller) uses clonal raider ants as a model to study collective decision making: do they retrieve distant prey or transport larvae to the prey? Colonies are sensing and integrating many parameters w/ respect to the supply and demand for work! #IUSSI26 @danielkronauer.bsky.social

Libby Tseng speaking on the main stage at the social insect conference; photo of a colony of Ooceraea biroi on the screen

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Anna Dornhaus making the case that *evolution shapes variation*, even among individuals within a colony at the same time. Absolutely stunning examples of diligent tracking of variation in ant walking speeds vs. activity, corpulence, and even antenna sensilla density! @dornhaus.bsky.social #IUSSI26

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Jen Fewell (ASU) came out swinging! “Emergence of division of labor is not the same as *adaptive* DOL.” That, and that males should handle removal of trash (or at least the fecal packs). #IUSSI26

Jennifer Fewell at the podium (lecturn?!?) with title slide showing a photo of a Pogonomyrmex californicus colony with sun shining through (which I took on an iPhone in her lab 16 years ago!!)

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Disheartening morning at #iussi26. Seeing a known abuser show up on multiple co-author and acknowledgement slides. Seeing that someone updated the name of the species on their slides, but left the anachronistic and harmful metaphors. We need decolonization, now. And pronouns on badges, please!

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Chelsea Cook @phdbee.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

@nstroeymeyt.bsky.social is hiring! Collective behavior, disease, and social organization - if you’re looking for a PhD or postdoc! #IUSSI26

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Alex Wild @alexwild.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Achtung, tigermucke!

Street poster, in German, warning about the Asian Tiger Mosquito. The poster is stylized red and white, with a silhouette of a mosquito.

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Extant natural history makes inference from fossils possible. Dr. Phil Barden (NJIT) @haidomyrmex.bsky.social at #IUSSI26 - morphological signatures of div of labor - evidence of coll. behavior & cooperation - dating origin of eusociality But… anteaters!!

Phil Barden, standing at podium, large screen showing an ant in amber, about to start speaking at IUSSI!

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Rangelands are important for ecosystem services but 50% are degraded! What role do seed-harvesting Pogos play? 🐜🐜🐜 They’re generally not stealing restoration seeds! Dr. Joanie King @joanieking.bsky.social (New Mexico) at #IUSSI26

Dr. Joanie presenting at the IUSSI conference, title slide showing a large Pogonomyrmex rugosus ant carrying a grass seed

Lots of pitfall trap ants, pinned and ready to ID!

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Meredith @leafhopper.bsky.social speaking about aphid predation by Crematogaster at #IUSSI26… they’re (maybe) not chomping them for the reason you think!

Meredith speaking at the IUSSI conference, to a packed room!

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Two tales of mutual aid: Rachelle Adams (OSU) described how fungus garden ant interloper Megalomyrmex helps protect its host fungus and Melina Kienitz (Würzburg) studies Vachellia plants and their tenant Pseudomyrmex responses to plant wounds! #iussi26

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Joe Brennan @biologyjoe87.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Looking for sci comm opportunities? Join us as a writer for American Naturalist press releases! These write-ups are primarily written by graduate students and other early-career scientists. No experience required; we have editors to help along the way. Apps due Sept 1. Please share widely :D

forms.gle

Looking for Press Release Writers & Editors for The American Naturalist

Sign up for the opportunity to write and/or edit for The American Naturalist! We are seeking authors to write press releases for new journal articles. See examples of recent press releases here. We a...

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

In the thermal ecology symposium at #IUSSI26, Maria Eduarda presented terrific data on CTmax and metabolic rate in DINOPONERA! What a dreamy ant to do respirometry with! And strikingly high thermal limits and metrate q10s too! 👀

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Lots of love for the clonal raider ant, Ooceraea biroi! Thanks @yukoulrich.bsky.social for an amazing talk at #iussi26

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

In Freiburg and for #IUSSI26 participants, there is a service to help folks get home safe at night. Haven’t tried it yet, but sharing a link in case anyone needs. Feel free to find an ally with a pink heart on badge if you need anything else! www-vag--freiburg-de.translate.goog/fahrplan/nac...

www-vag--freiburg-de.translate.goog

Nachtverkehr

safer traffic – nachts unterwegs mit der VAG

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

“Females contain multitudes, even into adulthood.” RJ Milena (Rochester) speaking at #IUSSI26, sharing longterm vs short-term Polistes host neurotranscriptomics; their hitchhiking Xenos riding the endocrine wave to differentiation & development. @entomolrj.bsky.social @avispatica.bsky.social

RJ on a platform stage at the conference, title slide showing two beautiful Polistes wasps

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Many folks interested in ants recently credit AntsCanada and YouTube as inspiration… but decades ago for me and so many others it was Alex Wild and his website cataloging gorgeous insect ecology & behavior through macrophotography. Roberto Keller thanked @alexwild.bsky.social and I do too! #iussi26

Website screenshot for Alex Wild’s beautiful insect macrophotography (showing a gorgeous Cephalotes turtle ant)

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Alex Wild @alexwild.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Everyone at #iussi26 who wants to learn about honey wasps (yes! They are real!) should attend @joholley.bsky.social ‘s talk at 4:15 this afternoon in hall 4.

A dozen or so fuzzy black wasps with tasteful yellow war stripes standing about on mottled grey wasp nest paper, though awaiting a scientific seminar on their own biology at IUSSI.

Honey of different colors in hexagonal cells BUT WAIT THATS NOT WAX ITS PAPER

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

The intake target as a mystical aspect of collective regulatory behavior in social insect colonies: Jon Shik (Copenhagen) compares IT to CTs in thermal ecology, and methods are similarly sensitive; so his group pulls food from the jaws of foraging ants to test hypotheses in the field! #iussi26

Geometric framework plots for two ant species

Jon in the field, on his belly, pulling food from ants as they carry it back to their nests

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

The language we use matters: It can convey precision about nature, but too-often, when muddled with metaphor, it causes harm. As a community of social insect scientists, we need to do better, and we can by speaking with more diverse communities of academics and the public. -J. Herbers #iussi26

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Terry McGlynn (CSU DH) at #iussi26: Ants outside their nests How brightly they are shining It’s not what you expect 👀 @hormiga.bsky.social

Myrmecologist Terry, presenting his results at the IUSSI conference

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Clint Penick (Auburn) sharing the secret traits of urban ant success, specifically in NYC: soil-dwelling, polydomous, generalist dietary feeders, and mass-recruiting (e.g. to dropped hot-dogs) ants make up the urban core! #iussi26 @clintpenick.bsky.social

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Thrilled to walk into the #iussi26 conference and be greeted by so many queens, literally and figuratively!

Myrmica ant queen being held by her wings

Jane, Rebecca, Jennifer (the queen!), and Terry

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

Biological sex is not binary… because biologically, sex is many things.

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

Clonal raider ants, Ooceraea biroi (photographed with a pride flag in the background, because 🏳️‍🌈❤️‍🩹🏳️‍🌈)

A small golden yellow ant with stubby antennae on top of a white brood item; pride flag blurry in the background

A small golden yellow ant with stubby antennae flipped upside down; pride flag blurry in the background

A small golden yellow ant with stubby antennae in lateral view; pride flag blurry in the background

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Would love to update this list of myrmecologists to include new folks on here doing ant research... lmk if I can add you! go.bsky.app/zo95qR

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Scenes from our week-long ant course at the Eagle Hill Institute in Downeast Maine, it was such a great opportunity to teach and learn from all the participants! www.youtube.com/shorts/7c323...

youtube.com

Ant Camp 2026: Ant Biodiversity, Natural History, and Collective Behavior (Eagle Hill Institute)

YouTube video by AntLabPVD with Dr. Jane Waters

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Paige Jarreau @fromthelabbench.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

The mysterious vibe check of the Needle ant, in action! youtube.com/shorts/qWm1K... @lovetheants.bsky.social #ants #insects #animalbehavior

youtube.com

The mysterious vibe check of the Needle ant

YouTube video by Facetime With Scientists

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Paige Jarreau @fromthelabbench.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

Meet not-so-scary needle ants, kidnapper ants, acorn ants, and more in Dr Jane Waters' Ant Lab! youtu.be/XILvi8Vx_zk?... #ants #scicomm #sciart @lovetheants.bsky.social

youtu.be

Meet not-so-scary needle ants, kidnapper ants, and more in Waters' Ant Lab

YouTube video by Facetime With Scientists

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

There is still time to sign up and join us for for a week of ANT CAMP in Downeast coastal Maine at the beautiful Eagle Hill Institute!

Ant Biodiversity, Natural History, and Collective Behavior
July 26-August 1, 2026

In this summer field seminar, we will gather for an in-depth and transdisciplinary study of our local ants and their complex behaviors and societies both in the field and in lab settings. Participants will be trained to find and collect ants using a range of methods (hand-collecting using aspirators, traps, baits, and UV-blacklighting), identify specimens to species using microscopy and morphological keys, to image them using macrophotography, culturing colonies within formicaria and artificial enclosures, to listen to them with sensors, and to track their movements and behaviors.

Jane S. Waters is a myrmecologist and a professor in the Department of Biology at Providence College.

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

Happy trans day of visibility #tdov Photos by Rose De Guzman where I was part of the faculty collection modeling at the Science Ball 🩵🩷🐜🩷🩵

Jane on the runway in a custom labcoat black dress ant aspirator white boots smiling and making her ant antennae hand pose

Jane on the runway with an ant bedazzled and UV-glowing lab coat

Jane exiting the runway smiling in her ant bedazzled purple fringed labcoat

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Madeline G. Eppley, PhD @madeline-eppley.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

ICYMI: in our new paper, we contend there is "no current consensus on a definition of sex that is free of assumptions and limitations... and most importantly,...no biological definition of sex should be used to dictate human rights" #evolsky #LGBTQSTEM #ecology #evolution #biologicalsex

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 05/03/2026

Grateful for the statement by @iuscientist.bsky.social! Science is an inherently political activity and we must speak out and fight to promote its peaceful applications and continued existence!

IUS Condemns US-Israeli Military Aggression Against Iran

[Photo of graves]

Graves are being prepared for over 165 young girls killed in a US–Israeli airstrike on an elementary school in Minab, Iran. (Image: X/ @aragchi)

We, in the International Union of Scientists (IUS), strongly and unequivocally condemn the wanton military attack on Iran by the USA and its Israeli accomplice, carried out under the pretext of a “preventive” strike, at a time when active negotiations were going on between Iran and the USA for a peaceful resolution of the nuclear dispute. The attack began with the assassination of the head of state and top government officials and has since caused the destruction of schools and hospitals and deaths of hundreds of Iranian civilians, including schoolchildren. It is nothing but an act of thuggery, violating all considerations of humanity, international law, and the sovereignty of a nation.

While the current Iranian government has faced longstanding allegations of human rights violations, the responsibility to address these issues rests solely with the Iranian people. No external imperialist power has the moral or legal authority to impose regime change through bombardment, coercion, and destruction. The right to self-determination must be upheld without exception.

The USA has a despicable record of having close ties with several tyrannical dictators, and President Trump's declared sympathy for freedom and democracy in Iran sounds hollow. History repeatedly demonstrates that wars waged in the name of democracy and security bring devastation, destabilization, and the destruction of societies built over centuries. Genuine freedom cannot be delivered through military aggression, nor can democracy arise from the killing of innocent people. It is evident that this attack by the US and Israel is not about defending democratic rights or peace, but about reasserting geopolitical dominance and enabling the exploitation and plunder of Iran’s and the Middle East’s natural and human resources—at the cost of human lives and widespread destruction.

We call upon people around the world, including members of the STEMM community, to raise their voices against the naked aggression of the imperialist USA, its Israeli accomplice, and their allies. We demand an immediate cessation of hostilities and a return to diplomacy, peace, and respect for the sovereignty and dignity of nations.

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Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 28/04/2025

MUST READ especially for climate change concerned folks who think they can choose silence on genocide: “War causes extensive, long-lasting environmental damage, affecting landscapes, ecosystems, biodiversity, and vital resources.” 🧪 @iuscientist.bsky.social www.iuscientists.org/militarism-a...

iuscientists.org

Militarism: A Leading Cause of Environmental and Climate Crises

By Manabendra Nath Bera. Synopsis - The climate and environmental impacts of war and military operations are often neglected in global climate negotiations. This article highlights how war, being the...

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Rosemary Mosco @rosemarymosco.com · 20/01/2026

How to get into nature.

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 03/01/2026

If your position is that regime change should be forced on countries where the president does not respect democratic norms and regularly kidnaps opponents using an officially sanctioned paramiliatary, have I got news for you about your position on the United States

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Alex Wild @alexwild.bsky.social · 03/01/2026

Imagining the Maduro trial’s jurors learning about nullification, and how that would play out.

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Reposted by Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸

Sophia Babai @swingingstorm.bsky.social · 03/01/2026

Three million people live in Caracas, five million in the metro area. It's one of the densest cities in South America. Remember this in the morning when they try to spin this as anything other than a cold-blooded attack on a major civilian center.

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 24/11/2025

I'm not very familiar with William Blake's work but came across this mention of ants (emmet) in a 1789 poem, "A Dream" from his Songs of Innocence

Once a dream did weave a shade,
O'er my Angel-guarded bed,
That an Emmet lost it's way
Where on grass methought I lay.

Troubled wilderd and forlorn
Dark benighted travel-worn,
Over many a tangled spray
All heart-broke I heard her say.

O my children! do they cry
Do they hear their father sigh.
Now they look abroad to see,
Now return and weep for me.

Pitying I dropp'd a tear:
But I saw a glow-worm near:
Who replied. What wailing wight
Calls the watchman of the night.

I am set to light the ground,
While the beetle goes his round:
Follow now the beetles hum,
Little wanderer hie thee home

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Jane Waters 🏳️‍⚧️🐜🇵🇸 @lovetheants.bsky.social · 07/11/2025

Proponent of Good Faith, by Sue Johnson (Premonition of a Natural History, 1991)

$Image of a page in Sue Johnson’s 1991 book, Premonition of a Natural History (Fireflies Burning). The page shows an artistic black and white illustration of a butterfly seen from the dorsal perspective; its right wing has been replaced with what appears to be a fractal branching circulatory system. The title on the previous page reads “Proponent of Good Faith” and you can almost see the next image’s title on the page below this one, “There’s a second tier. Do you want to go up?”$

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