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Ilias Foskolos

@theclickitclick.bsky.social
208 followers 166 following 6 posts

Greco, MSCA postdoc fellow at ‪‪@stanfordhopkins.bsky.social of @stanford.edu‬ / also at @bioacousticsau.bsky.social of @au.dk Interested in #zoology #bioacoustics #biologging #cetaceans #bats #echolocation #biosonar #foraging

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Reposted by Ilias Foskolos
Bat1K Genome Project @bat1kgenomes.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Where did bats come from?🦇🌍 After decades of debate, the biggest bat genome + fossil study ever done has an answer - and it’s not where anyone expected! 🤩OUR PHASE 1 FLAGSHIP is out today in nature! doi.org/10.1038/s415... A thread 🧵
doi.org
Reference genomes and fossils revise bat family phylogeny and biogeography - Nature
An updated phylogeny of bats is presented, based on new genome assemblies and many ancient fossils and including all known bat families.
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Stavros Malichudis @malichudis.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
— Πώς φτιάχνεται ένα μπεστ σέλερ — Ένα βιβλίο διαφημίζεται για μήνες στις στάσεις λεωφορείων της Αθήνας και γίνεται μπεστ σέλερ. Βοηθάει που η εταιρεία που ελέγχει τα ίδια διαφημιστικά πάνελ ανήκει στον συγγραφέα του βιβλίου; www.stavrosmalichudis.com/pws-ftiaxnet...
stavrosmalichudis.com
Πώς φτιάχνεται ένα μπεστ σέλερ
Ένα βιβλίο αυτοβοήθειας διαφημίζεται για μήνες, στις στάσεις λεωφορείων της Αθήνας, και γίνεται μπεστ σέλερ. Ποιος είναι ο συγγραφέας του;
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Journal of Experimental Biology @jexpbiol.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
Sperm whales rest in an unusual position, sleeping vertically underwater. In their recent paper, Freymond & co show that the whales blow bubbles in their sleep to keep themselves from shooting to the surface, letting them sleep soundly beneath the waves doi.org/10.1242/jeb....
Two resting sperm whales blowing bubbles. Photo credit: Stéphane Granzotto www.stephanegranzotto.com
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Luke Rendell @lrendell.bsky.social · 26/07/2026
Exceot they are not vowels or even "vowel-like". In any way. At all. The entire myth is built on fundamental misunderstanding or misrepresentation of sperm whale sound production - which is why the word 'vowel' appears only in the PR and not the actual peer-reviewed paper 🙄
Screenshot of an article in the Guardian about claims regarding vowel sounds im sperm whales highlighting dubious linguistic gymnastics by the study's defenders
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Miguel Clavero @chikichanka.bsky.social · 30/06/2026
Natural history on canvas: Brueghel knew about bird-eating noctule bats Just published in @pnas.org, OA for all eyes Led by the one-and-only @romero-vidal.bsky.social, with the amazing @elena-tena.bsky.social and Sonia Sánchez-Navarro @ebdonana.bsky.social LINK: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
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Sensory Ecology Lab @sensoryecology.bsky.social · 24/06/2026
“Between the eastern and western communities of sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus) that call the region home, scientists have discerned distinct differences in communication style.” #scicomm #sensoryecology #bioacoustics #animalcommunication www.sciencealert.com/whales-appea... 🧪 🐋 🎶 🦊 🦑
sciencealert.com
Whales Appear to Be Evolving a New Dialect in The Mediterranean Sea
In the sparkling blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea, a cultural divide may be underway.
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Nature Portfolio @natureportfolio.nature.com · 18/06/2026
Plastic pollution is pervasive across ecosystems. A Review in Nature Reviews Biodiversity summarizes current evidence on plastic exposure pathways, organismal responses and potential effects at higher levels of biological organization. go.nature.com/3QsA6rS 🌎🧪
This is figure 1, which shows the interactions of plastic with biodiversity.
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Nature Portfolio @natureportfolio.nature.com · 10/06/2026
A vast whale graveyard found on the bed of the Indian Ocean may represent the deepest and most extensive known accumulation of whale fossils, carcasses, and communities supported by the whale falls, according to a paper in Nature. go.nature.com/4fx8BYt #Paleosky 🌎🧪
This is figure 2, which shows whale falls in the sulfophilic stage in the Diamantina Zone.
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Peter Cook @pfcook.bsky.social · 18/05/2026
Great work from Simone Videsen. We found sperm whale slow clicks maintain extreme isochrony with inter-click intervals up to ~10s. That's beyond any known neural system for precise interval timing. May be a long-distance communication system. nyaspubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
nyaspubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
NYAS Publications
In this study, we show that male sperm whales produce low-frequency slow clicks at low repetition rates with extreme source levels > 200 dB re 1 µPa (pp), making them the loudest mammalian communicat...
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Natural History Museum, London @nhm-london.bsky.social · 07/05/2026
It’s thought that up to 90% of all species living in the deep Pacific could be unknown to science 🤯 Exactly how mining might affect these animals is still largely unknown. But a new study has tried to assess all studies to date, giving a mixed picture. Find out why 👇🏻 www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/new...
nhm.ac.uk
Most comprehensive review of how deep-sea mining might affect unique sea life | Natural History Museum
There’s increasing interest in deep-sea mining, but the impacts that this will have on the animals that live in the depths isn’t fully understood.
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Asher HELLbein @asherelbein.bsky.social · 23/04/2026
This is wild: the authors find evidence for giant, macro-predatory octopuses in Late Cretaceous oceans that might max out at *62 feet long,* comfortably large enough to attack, kill and eat mosasaurs
science.org
Earliest octopuses were giant top predators in Cretaceous oceans
Top predators drive changes in ecosystem structure. For the last ~370 million years, large-sized vertebrates have dominated the apex of the marine food chain, while invertebrates have served as smalle...
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AU Bioacoustics @bioacousticsau.bsky.social · 18/03/2026
#PHD #summerschool in #bioacoustics 🦇🐬🐦🐘🔉- Application open NOW If your PhD studies 🧑‍🎓👩‍🎓involve #acousticcommunication in terrestrial or marine animals, we highly recommend participating in this biennial international 14-days intensive graduate course by @sdu.dk www.sdu.dk/en/forskning...
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Schmidt Ocean Institute @schmidtocean.bsky.social · 09/03/2026
The first in situ sighting of the Ram’s Horn Squid (Spirula spirula) was collected during our 2020-2021 time in Australian waters, led by Dr. Robin Beaman of James Cook University. www.mdpi.com/1424-2818/12...
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Nature @nature.com · 23/01/2026
Nature research paper: Oxygen-free metabolism in the bird inner retina supported by the pecten go.nature.com/3Lol4Be
go.nature.com
Oxygen-free metabolism in the bird inner retina supported by the pecten - Nature
While the photoreceptor outer segments in the bird outer retina have access to oxygen, the inner retina operates under chronic anoxia, supported by anaerobic glycolysis in the retinal neurons.
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Daphne Papadopoulou @daphnenews.bsky.social · 20/01/2026
The brown bear population in Greece has nearly doubled in recent years without a rise in damage to livestock, beekeeping or agriculture, according to a study by the environmental organization Arcturos. www.ekathimerini.com/news/environ...
ekathimerini.com
Brown bear population nearly doubles without added damage, study finds | eKathimerini.com
The brown bear population in Greece has nearly doubled in recent years without a rise in damage to livestock, beekeeping or agriculture, according to a study by the environmental organization Arcturos...
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Darren Naish @tetzoo.bsky.social · 19/01/2026
Journalists report tool use in a non-human and say that it overturns everything. It doesn't, because scientists already know that tool use is widespread. Aaaaaand repeat...
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David Shiffman, Ph.D. 🦈 @whysharksmatter.bsky.social · 14/01/2026
The red dot is a baby North Atlantic right whale trying to migrate up the east coast of the United states. The blue streaks are fast moving shipping vessels entering and leaving New York City harbor. One collision and the whale is dead. We need *mandatory* speed limits for these vessels! 🧪🦑🌍
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Eva Stewart @evastewart.bsky.social · 05/12/2025
After 5 years of sample collection and analysis our paper examining the impacts of an industrial #DeepSea mining trial on seafloor #biodiversity is published! Read here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
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Thejasvi Beleyur @beleyurthejasvi.bsky.social · 25/11/2025
Thur can't be said enough 🤣 it's a choice that they're brushing past you, and very rarely an accident
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Marie Louis @mariels.bsky.social · 20/11/2025
Do tusk anomalies impact the foraging ecology of narwhals ? To find out, we used stable isotope analyses of museum specimens 🐋🦷 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.... photo: Natural History Museum Denmark
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Luke Rendell @lrendell.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
No, they really haven't. Calling spectral peaks vowels is as inane as saying that because my washing up gloves are also yellow, they have the same nutritional content as a banana. Zero evidence of vowel-like function. It's pure clickbait, and a new low in irresponsible claims from this group 🙄🐳🦑🧪
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Nature Portfolio @natureportfolio.nature.com · 29/10/2025
The remarkably long lifespan of bowhead whales could be due to an increased ability to repair DNA mutations, according to research in Nature. go.nature.com/4hzvDN7 🌏 🧪
This is figure 5, which shows CIRBP overexpression extends lifespan and enhances DNA damage resistance in Drosophila.
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Journal of Experimental Biology @jexpbiol.bsky.social · 29/10/2025
Bats use their echolocation abilities to find prey, but also to find each other and avoid obstacles. Iturralde-Pólit &co show that the warm, dry air that comes with climate change, alters these calls, potentially costing the bats more energy to make them journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/...
An elegant myotis bat. Photo credit: Juan Cruzado Cortés, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
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Ilias Foskolos @theclickitclick.bsky.social · 11/10/2025
Check out also the feature of our latest paper in @nytimes.com 🦇 #greaternoctulebats #bats #passerines #spain #zoology #ethology #biologging #bioacoustics #sciencejournal
nytimes.com
Bats Catch Migratory Birds and Eat Them in Midair
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Dave Levitan @davelevitan.bsky.social · 09/10/2025
EXTREMELY COOL BAT STUFF: A study out in Science today found that the greater noctule bat, Europe's largest, hunts and catches *migrating birds* while in flight. In at least one case, a bat climbed to more than 1200 feet, then chased a robin downward FAST until it caught it near the ground.
science.org
Greater noctule bats prey on and consume passerines in flight
Despite billions of passerines seasonally migrating during the night at high altitudes, only three bat species have been found to consistently tap into this rich prey resource. However, it remains unk...
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Ilias Foskolos @theclickitclick.bsky.social · 11/10/2025
Check out our new paper in @science.org on how greater noctule bats 🦇 hunt passerines 🐦 on the wing #greaternoctulebats #bats #passerines #spain #zoology #ethology #biologging #bioacoustics #sciencejournal
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Chris Mull @cgmull.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
New paper led by @seaprinceaaron.bsky.social in @currentbiology.bsky.social looking at the threats deep sea mining poses for sharks, rays, and chimaeras. We found 30 species are threatened via various pathways including collector impact and plumes at depth and pelagic discharge plumes.
Figure 1: highlighting various pathways through which mining can impact sharks, rays, and chimaeras including collector impact and plumes, and discharge plumes.Figure 2: The diversity of sharks, rays, and chimaeras impacted by deep sea mining operations. Nearly 2/3 of these species are already at an elevated risk of extinction.
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Danai Papageorgiou @danaipapageorgiou.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
This list can really assist peers in avoiding predatory publishers: www.predatoryjournals.org @predatoryjournals.org I have been receiving plenty of generic emails to join editorial boards in MDPI and Frontiers. At exactly the same time, friends receive the same generic emails..
lnkd.in
LinkedIn
This link will take you to a page that’s not on LinkedIn
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Nature @nature.com · 29/09/2025
Papers from research teams with a substantial number of beginners are highly disruptive and innovative go.nature.com/4nrEvqg
go.nature.com
Rookie scientists make research teams more innovative
Papers from research teams with a substantial number of beginners are highly disruptive and innovative, study shows.
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Ilias Foskolos @theclickitclick.bsky.social · 20/09/2025
Check out also the press-release of our latest paper in @consletters.bsky.social: #hector'sdolphins #toothedwhales #newzealand #aotearoa #zoology #biologging #bioacoustics #conservation
auckland.ac.nz
Hidden world of Hector's dolphin: watch, listen - The University of Auckland
Tracking devices enable scientists to reconstruct the underwater life of the Hector's dolphin.
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Ilias Foskolos @theclickitclick.bsky.social · 20/09/2025
Can Hector's dolphins 🐬 behave in ways that expose them in a higher bycatch risk? @consletters.bsky.social @rconstantine.bsky.social @aucklanduni.bsky.social @docgovtnz.bsky.social #hector'sdolphins #toothedwhales #newzealand #aotearoa #zoology #biologging #bioacoustics #conservation
conbio.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
Subsurface Behaviors of Hector's Dolphins Could Increase Their Risk of Bycatch
Hector's dolphins, endemic to New Zealand, suffer from bycatch in fishing gear. Fishing restrictions in inshore areas have reduced bycatch, although dolphins have been recorded outside these areas. W....
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Oxford Biology @biology.ox.ac.uk · 15/09/2025
Oxford Biology is growing 📢 We’re appointing 3 Associate Professors in: 🌱 Plant Sciences 🦉 Animal Behaviour 🔬 Molecular Cell Biology 3 fields. 3 opportunities. One new home for Oxford Biology. Learn more 👉 bit.ly/41S2Tc7 Apply now 👉 bit.ly/488CNW3
Photo showing the inside atrium of the new Life and Mind Building
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Marine Mammal Research at Aarhus University, Ecoscience @marinemammalsau.bsky.social · 08/09/2025
Our recent study in the #MarineEcologyProgressSeries highlights how body size, condition, and human impacts shape the survival of right whales & why they are so vulnerable to prey limitation and disturbance 🐋 🔗 in thread #Conservation #WhaleResearch #RightWhales #OceanHealth #MarineScience 🌐🌏🧪🌱
📸 Southern right whale: Fredrik Christiansen, Aarhus University
📸 North Atlantic right whale: Center for Coastal Studies, taken under NOAA permit #24359
👉 Link to paper: https://www.int-res.com/abstracts/meps/v768/meps14914
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Aliki Chapple @commonmugwort.bsky.social · 05/09/2025
“The scandal has also pulled back the curtain to reveal how power in Greece operates.” It’s not often an accurate description of Greece appears in the international media. Thank you, @alexclapp.bsky.social.
theguardian.com
It’s the big fat Greek farming scandal – devised by the political elite and paid for by ordinary people | Alexander Clapp
A massive EU subsidy scandal has pulled back the curtain to reveal how power operates in Greece, says journalist Alexander Clapp
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Nature @nature.com · 03/09/2025
A common type of ant in Europe breaks a fundamental rule in biology: its queens can produce male offspring that are a whole different species go.nature.com/4mOb5T9
go.nature.com
‘Almost unimaginable’: these ants are different species but share a mother
Ant queens of one species clone ants of another to create hybrid workers that do their bidding.
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Journal of Experimental Biology @jexpbiol.bsky.social · 01/09/2025
Issue 16 has closed & issue 17 is open journals.biologists.com/jeb/issue/22... The front cover by Kaloyana Koseva shows a bag hanging from its feet with forelimbs down. Laura Stidsholt reviews how bat-borne devices are revolutionising research into bat echolocation & behaviour
Front cover of Journal of Experimental Biology, Volume 228, issue 16, published in August 2025. The cover image (by Kaloyana Koseva) shows a bat hanging from its feet. The Company of Biologists 100 logo is in the bottom left corner of the cover.
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Giorgos Lialios @lialios.bsky.social · 20/08/2025
Μετά απο μια δεκαετή προσπάθεια, οι ψαράδες της Αμοργού επιτέλους πέτυχαν αυτό που ζητούσαν: να τεθούν χρονικοί και χωρικοί περιορισμοί στην αλιεία στο νησί. Η απόφαση μετατρέπει την Αμοργό σε παράδειγμα για το Αιγαίο και τη Μεσόγειο- αρκεί να εφαρμοστεί σωστά.
kathimerini.gr
Η Αμοργός βάζει φρένο στο ψάρεμα για πέντε χρόνια
Η πρωτοβουλία ανήκει στους αλιείς του νησιού, οι οποίοι επιθυμούν να τεθούν περιορισμοί για να ανακάμψουν οι πληθυσμοί των ψαριών – Κρίσιμη η περιφρούρηση.
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Colton the fish squeezer🐟🪴📚🏕️🐝 @fishsqueezer.bsky.social · 19/08/2025
Hahaha, I love this photo of a snake nerd researcher from the Phoenix Herpetological Society using a fake leg to step on rattlesnakes & see how likely they are to bite. He "stepped" on 175 of them, and was bitten by only SIX. Snakes desperately want to just get away! 🐍🧪 www.npr.org/2024/05/17/1...
A guy out in the desert scrub who looks like Napoleon Dynamite uses a jeans-wrapped pole with a hiking boot on the bottom to "step" on a rattlesnake.
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AU Bioacoustics @bioacousticsau.bsky.social · 13/08/2025
Breaking News 🚨: Our #bioacoustics 🔉🐬🦇lab seeks a permanent new colleague in a tenure-track assistant professor 🥷position. Excited? Then join our vibrant group of 15 researchers, postdocs and PhD students at AU who work with #marinemammal #acoustics, #conservation #physiology and #effectsofnoise!
au.dk
Tenure-track Assistant Professor in Bioacoustic Physiology - Ledig stilling på Aarhus Universitet
Ledig stilling ved Institut for Biologi - Zoofysiologi, Aarhus Universitet
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Mirjam Knörnschild @berlinbatlab.bsky.social · 10/08/2025
New paper out! We found that in pipistrelle bats, social vocalizations carry a stronger phylogenetic signal than echolocation calls, suggesting the former evolve more slowly, while the latter remains flexible and shaped by the environment. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
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Claudia Wascher @wascherclaudia.bsky.social · 17/06/2025
Originally posted on Twitter in 2023—reposting after a chat with a colleague about possibly publishing in an MDPI journal (whose review practices are similar to Frontiers). Not sure if either has since addressed the issues raised, but I feel process should be public knowledge.
Tweet from 2023 saying: 'I resigned as an Associate Editor for a Frontiers journal because of the way their automated system took away much of my editorial autonomy. some details that might also explain odd reviewer/author experiences:'
(1/7)
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Adam Markham @adammarkham.bsky.social · 15/06/2025
From the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center. Apart from the overwhelmingly largest cause of population declines - habitat loss and destruction - what are the other big killers of birds? A reason to consider keeping cats inside.🪶🌎
A chart showing that cats kill around 2.6 billion birds annually in North America, compared to 624 million killed hitting windows, 214m by cars and 64m by collisions with industrial installations (e.g. wind turbines, factories, lighthouses, communication towers, etc). Graphic from the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center.
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Ted Pavlic (he/him/his) @tedpavlic.bsky.social · 08/06/2025
Reminder: Nobel-prize winning PCR (1983), used in basically all genetic tech today, was only possible because of extremophile bacterium discovered in 1964 in Yellowstone funded by a small ~$80k NSF grant with no obvious application at the time. #science 🧪 www.richmondscientific.com/how-a-discov...
richmondscientific.com
How a discovery in Yellowstone National Park led to the development of PCR - Richmond Scientific
A discovery in Yellowstone National Park led to the development of PCR, the gold-standard COVID-19 tests used to fight the global pandemic.
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Dr Luis Huckstadt @luishuckstadt.bsky.social · 08/06/2025
We can do great things when we are working together... 🦭🐋🦈🐻‍❄️🐟🐧🦢*🐢* Global tracking of marine megafauna space use reveals how to achieve conservation targets | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
science.org
Global tracking of marine megafauna space use reveals how to achieve conservation targets
The recent Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) sets ambitious goals but no clear pathway for how zero loss of important biodiversity areas and halting human-induced extinction of thre...
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SMRU Consulting @smruc.bsky.social · 05/06/2025
New output from the ONR/LMR-funded #ACCURATE project by @popigk.bsky.social in @asa-news.bsky.social #passiveacoustics #densityestimation #beampattern #biosonar @uniofstandrews.bsky.social @seamammalresearch.bsky.social @au.dk #CREEM #JASA doi.org/10.1121/10.0...
doi.org
Sensitivity of density estimates to off-axis beam pattern assumptions in deep-diving odontocetes
Density estimation from passive acoustic monitoring requires knowledge of the sound production rates and signal characteristics of animal calls. This study expl
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The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 25/05/2025
Academic freedom in the United States has found itself periodically under siege, but the current attacks from the federal government raise a new level of alarm. nyer.cm/u405qvQ
 “I’ve studied McCarthyism’s impact on higher education for 50 years. What’s happening now is worse.” -Ellen Schrecker, historian
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Ecology of Animal Societies @livingingroups.bsky.social · 19/05/2025
Humans have many unusual traditions. But did you know animals’ strange behaviors can become culture too? Out now in Current Biology (doi.org/10.1016/j.cu...) we show the rise and spread of a surprising tradition: interspecies infant abduction. Interactive timeline (www.ab.mpg.de/671374) 🧵 (1/12)
An illustration of a white-faced capuchin monkey carrying a howler infant on their back while cracking nuts with a stone
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Danai Papageorgiou @danaipapageorgiou.bsky.social · 07/05/2025
This is very interesting... When I was starting my PhD in 2016, amidst the peak of the financial crisis in Greece and while abroad, I often heard that we (Greeks) are lazy, enjoy the sun, and that is why there was a crisis...
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Christina Belanger, Ph.D @belaforams.bsky.social · 06/05/2025
Data are everywhere… “Here, we examine an unusual source of information: classic Chinese poetry. From 724 ancient poems containing references to the Yangtze finless porpoise (N. asiaeorientalis), we infer that the range of this subspecies has contracted by at least 65% over the past 1400 years.”
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