Ashlee Mikkelsen

Florent Murat Fish Evolution, Genomes, and Reproduction

Our lab is hiring a postdoctoral researcher with expertise in bioinformatics, evolutionary genomics and single-cell data analyses, to explore the evolution of reproductive organs across fishes. We are located in Rennes, France (INRAE-LPGP). For more details: florentmuratwebpage.wordpress.com

A systems modelling approach to predict biological responses to extreme heat Anthropogenic climate change is leading to more frequent and extreme heat waves. These large-scale events are radically reshaping interactions among organisms—impacting biodiversity, community composition, and ecosystem services crucial to natural systems and food security. Predicting heat wave impacts on interacting species requires an understanding of the processes driving differential exposure and sensitivity of organisms to extreme heat events in a life cycle context. To achieve this predictive capacity, we need to integrate models across scales while capturing species-specific responses at the individual level. We review and demonstrate how existing models in disparate fields can be linked to achieve an increased understanding of how individuals and communities will respond to extreme heat, now and into the future.

Online now: A systems modelling approach to predict biological responses to extreme heat

I am extremely grateful to receive a Research Leadership Award from the Leverhulme Trust to study the epigenetic mechanisms underlying environmental stress memory in crops @dundee.ac.uk and @hutton.ac.uk 🍓🍅🌱

I’ll be advertising positions in our group soon - stay tuned!

buff.ly/pI5Bqoo

The power of Bayesian reasoning | The Royal Society YouTube video by The Royal Society

What is Bayesian reasoning and why is it so powerful? Sir David Spiegelhalter, Emeritus Professor of Statistics at the University of Cambridge, explains all.

Made in partnership with #BBCIdeas.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pnlExzbNqE

Published📖

Validating a low-cost alternative to body surface area estimation: Implications for energy budgets and scaling relationships of ectotherms 🦎 🐍

🔎 Read more:

Associate Lecturer in Plant Ecology PRIMARY DETAIL - Salary package: $123,435 FTE (Level B.1) plus 17% employer's superannuation contribution and annual leave loading. - Full-time- 35 hours per week, fixed term for 36 months - Based at ...

Exciting position at The School of Natural Sciences at Macquarie University.

We are looking for an Associate Lecturer in Plant Ecology.

A great opportunity to teach, mentor students and contribute to plant ecology research on the Wallumattagal Campus in Sydney.

Human Technopole is hiring:
Postdoctoral Researcher in Molecular Biology

#postdoc

University of California, Riverside is hiring:
Assistant Professor in Computational and Analytical Metabolomics

#assistantprofessor

Many heat-stressed tropical insects are reaching their limits Vast study in Peru and Kenya confirms limited defenses against rising temperatures, redoubling climate concerns

🧪🌎🔬🌡️Many heat-stressed tropical insects are reaching their limits www.science.org/content/arti...

My department is hiring a Teaching Professor in Marine Biology!
northeastern.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/careers/job/...
Application review will begin on March 31, 2026 #EcoEvoJobs #EvolJobs #PhDjobs @ecoevo.social.ecoevo.social.ap.brid.gy

A digital CAPTCHA verification window titled "Select all squares with PIPES" against a plain white background. The window contains a 3×3 grid of numbered squares, mixing literal hardware, smoking pipes, and programming syntax.

These captchas just keep getting harder #rstats

Job ID: 184386
Extract: Applications are invited for the post of Associate Professor of Statistics in the Department of Statistics. The successful candidate will have a doctorate in Statistics or a related discipline and an outstanding research record.

Wondering where to start? All seem a bit overwhelming?
Start with the first step. Once you do that you've started and it doesn't feel so bad.
Open the document.
Make the first change.
Analyse that first bit of data.
Make a start.

A group of four students in white lab coats studying plants

Job Alert! Come join us at The School of Biological Sciences as a Professional Teaching Fellow. Relevant subject areas are: molecular biology, cellular biology, genetics, molecular ecology, biochemistry. Closing 31st March.
jobs.smartrecruiters.com/TheUniversit...

NEW FISH WHO DIS

A flyer advertising an open PhD position titled "Evolutionary Ecology of Avian Energetics" at the Institute of Vertebrate Biology, Czech Academy of Sciences in Brno. It is funded by the Czech Science Foundation (GACR). The text outlines a project investigating avian energy metabolites using fieldwork, macroevolutionary analyses, metabolomics, and advanced statistics. It lists essential qualifications including an MSc degree, and offers a fully funded position with guaranteed income and student housing. Applications require a CV, a max 400-word motivation letter, and references, submitted via a provided link. Review begins March 16, 2026. The flyer features photos of field researchers, a bird being measured with a blood glucose meter, and a research team working together around a table.

Fully funded 4-year PhD in Avian Evolutionary Physiology in Czechia! 🇨🇿🇪🇺
Join IVB CAS to study the evolutionary ecology of avian energetics (glucose/fatty acids).
🐦 Fieldwork (Barn swallows, passerines)
🧪 Metabolomics
💻 Adv. stats in R
Apply by March 16! 👇
forms.gle/AFkpt4foeV5i...
#EcoEvo #PhD

#Perfectionism: “Better to do something imperfectly than do nothing perfectly.” Robert H. Schuller. Stop waiting for the perfect sentence, the perfect analysis, the perfect time to start. Jump in now, get it wrong, improve it and repeat. #PhDchat #ECRchat #postdoc

iDiv and @uni-jena.de are recruiting a Postdoctoral Researcher (f/m/d) in Trait-Based Community Ecology and Modelling.

Highlights:
🔺Full-time (100%, 40 h/week) with the option to reduce to 80%
🔺Fixed-term for 2 years
🔺Salary up to E13 TV‑L

📆 Apply by: 29 March 2026

www.idiv.de/career/job-o...

Scientists Finally Found Something Tardigrades Can’t Survive Tardigrades are practically invincible on Earth, so scientists looked to outer space in search of their kryptonite.

Important science: tardigrades are actually killed by something

gizmodo.com/scientists-f...

This week's EGI seminar will be given by Prof Hanna Kokko @kokkonut.bsky.social from Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz @unimainz.bsky.social on the role of time in avian trade-offs. All welcome in person in LT1 in LaMB @biology.ox.ac.uk 3.30pm on 6 March. Also live-streamed: details available ⬇️

Believe it or not, the owner of these MONSTROUS FANGS is a grass-eater, but they have a friendship with a meat-eating wolf.

Meet the gelada, (Theropithecus gelada), native to the Ethiopian highlands.

They're called 'bleeding-heart monkey' for the 'cleavage' that turns red in females in estrus.

Monkeys' cosy alliance with wolves looks like domestication Feeling right at home (Image: Jeff Kerby. Project funding: National Geographic) In the alpine grasslands of eastern Africa, Ethiopian wolves and gelada monkeys are giving peace a chance. T...

I like to think it worked out as some sort of "bro code" arrangement where an Ethiopian wolf caught two geladas in the back of a car at the drive-in, and in exchange for his silence, let him crash on the couch & have free use of the refrigerator.

Free movie idea, btw, Disney.

More here:

Cool paper alert. Was trying to model the thermal performance curves of several farmed seaweed species and ran across this awesome, theoretical unifying paper: “A universal thermal performance curve arises in biology and ecology” www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Path diagram of a structural equation model with three latent variables called ind60, dem60, and dem65. ind60 has three indicators, dem60 and dem65 each have four. dem65 is regressed on dem60 and ind60. dem60 is regressed on ind60.

So, a thread about how I have learned #SEM in #R as a #PhD student in #StatisticalGenetics.

I’ve heard SEM be described as a “system of regressions”, but in addition to observed variables, we also have latent/unobserved variables.

We can represent these variables in a path diagram (lavaan.org) :

Read the story behind the paper, "energetics link long-term environmental variations to breeding success in a wild penguin population", below 🐧
buff.ly/NO5dogw
@bendps.bsky.social

Botswana shows how smarter cattle herding can save lions, reopen ancient wildlife pathways The lions that roamed the plains of northern Botswana were dying. One by one, the big cats were succumbing to poisoned bait planted by exasperated villagers. The lions had been chipping away at their ...

Restoring traditional herding practices in northern #Botswana has led to a huge decrease in cattle predation + retaliatory lion poisonings.
More #lion cubs are now surviving, with the lion population in northern Botswana up 50% over the past 4 years.
#conservationoptimism

The cost of casting animals as heroes and villains in conservation science New research shows how these storytelling choices can distort science – and how to move beyond them.

Science writing often describes species like wild pigs and rats as villains destroying ecosystems. But two ecologists argue this storytelling choice misrepresents how nature actually works and can justify harmful treatment of animals.

buff.ly/GAhXUcO

I saw this when it was a preprint? They have a unique version of the estimand-estimator-estimates workflow, will be useful for may biologists, not just ecologists. We need more case studies for ecologists to emulate and for norms to shift so "regression and storytelling" becomes unpublishable.

The little-known photographer who documented a changing Okanogan, Washington - High Country News Beth Harrington’s 2025 documentary Our Mr. Matsura uses communally-held memory and traditional research to explore the little-known story of a Japanese photographer who documented the changing world o...

Timeline cleanse: a Japanese photographer beloved by northern WA Indigenous ppl.

“The story is not just about Frank and his charisma and his incredible body of work. It’s about the way people uphold his memory and still talk about him 112 years after his death.”

www.hcn.org/issues/58-2/...

🦋 The Blueprint of Life PhD Deadline is February 27th 🦋

Fully funded PhD at the UPR, Río Piedras as part of the NSF-funded Blueprint of Life project. Click on the link to learn more!

evol.mcmaster.ca/brian/evoldi...

📍 Puerto Rico | Genomics | Evolution |