Lauren Hennelly

An Evolving View of Species Tree Inference Abstract. Nearly all modern studies that address evolutionary questions require consideration of the phylogenetic relationships among species. But what, ex

An Evolving View of Species Tree Inference
academic.oup.com/sysbio/advan...

Researchers in the US might be having feelings about writing grants atm-I know I am!

We still need to write them. In this Evolution Exchange, I again chat with Sam Scheiner, who summarizes how to write a competitive proposal.

His advice is gold, and helpful regardless of funder. Pls RT!

So I pleased to announce the conceptual spawn of FigTree: PearTree (acronym still to be finalised). If you want to dive right in it is hosted as a web app here: artic-network.github.io/peartree (click the “Example...” button for immediate candy and then click every button you can find).

An experimental test for ecologically dependent reproductive isolation across an avian migratory divide Abstract. Divergent adaptation can promote ecological speciation if hybrids have reduced fitness because they are poorly adapted to either parental niche.

An experimental test for ecologically dependent reproductive isolation across an avian migratory divide

Blain et al. 2025: doi.org/10.1093/jeb/...

Reconsidering cytonuclear discordance in the genomic age Abstract. Historically, phylogenetic datasets had relatively few loci but were over-represented for cytoplasmic sequences (mitochondria and chloroplast) be

17) Larson et al. 2025. Reconsidering cytonuclear discordance in the genomic age. Evolution (doi.org/10.1093/evol...)

Our new Ecosphere paper shows Gulf Coast canids are a wetland coyote ecotype shaped by red wolf introgression - tall, lanky, small‑headed, and big eared coyotes that eat lots of nutria and have high survival which helps preserve red wolf genetics.

esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Davis Summer Population Genomics Program Want to learn population genetics? Please fill out this form to indicate your potential interest in a 2-week intensive online summer population genetics course taught by Jeffrey Ross-Ibarra and Graham...

Fun news! @gcbias.bsky.social and I are teaching a 2-week online population genetics workshop this summer to raise money for the Center for Population Biology at UC Davis. We're trying to gauge interest -- please fill this out if you might be interested! And please share broadly!

Developing this course from scratch, incorporating several new recent developments from my lab, including tests of ghost introgression, model development and testing, and inference from Ks histograms. Do sign up! Feel free to DM me with queries.

Bumping this to the science feed 🧪

Interesting science to ponder the interplay between seasonality and circadian rhythms.

Just discovered the wonderful covers of 'Genes to Cells', the journal of the Molecular Biology Society of Japan @mbsj-official.bsky.social – absolutely beautiful!

here some examples inspired by mitosis, CRISPR, the DNA helix, and plant pigments

SLiM 5: Eco-evolutionary Simulations Across Multiple Chromosomes and Full Genomes Abstract. Evolutionary simulations of multiple chromosomes, even up to the scale of full-genome simulations, are becoming increasingly important in populat

Slim 5 can now simulate genomes with multiple chromosomes like autosomes, sex chromosomes, mitochondria and chloroplast dna academic.oup.com/mbe/article/...

🚨Final call for papers🚨

Joint Special Issue with Molecular Ecology!

Theme: Evolutionary Genomics & Climate Change 🌍🧬

📅 Submit by February 28🏃‍♂️

Reach out to us and @marenwellenreuther.bsky.social
if you wanna know more! And please help us spread the word 🦧

Advice from Pat Izar: "First, trust your own perspective. Your experiences, your landscape, your languages: these are forms of knowledge. Science needs them. Second, seek community. [..] And finally, remember that building a more equitable science is a collective effort. We advance together."
WORD!

🧬 Museums + zoos = a rapid ID pipeline.
Using a local network in Ecuador, we genetically identified trafficked olingos (Bassaricyon), revealed a likely new country record, and shared a recipe for accessing high-quality samples from the wild. url: academic.oup.com/biolinnean/a...

Not Just Ne Ne-More: New Applications for SMC from Ecology to Phylogenies Abstract. Genomes contain the mutational footprint of an organism’s evolutionary history, shaped by diverse forces including ecological factors, selective

Davide Peede & colleagues* (with input from me) have written a review paper on applications of the SMC model academic.oup.com/gbe/article/...

We discuss what is the SMC approximation and why it is important, and then discuss many methods that use its machinery to infer various aspects of biology.

Finally out! We studied the retinas of the longest-living vertebrate, the Greenland shark, and found that the retinas remain remarkably healthy in animals around 150 years old. What is the mechanism? It may be a highly efficient DNA repair system. Enjoy!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The past and future of known biodiversity: Rates, patterns, and projections of new species over time The number of known species on Earth is increasing rapidly, suggesting unexpectedly large numbers of many groups.

“The rate at which new species are formally described is an essential but relatively understudied aspect of biodiversity.”

The past and future of known biodiversity: Rates, patterns, and projections of new species over time | Science Advances www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Pangenomes: new tools for ecological and evolutionary genomics Genomic structural variation is an important component of genetic variation in natural populations. By assembling and analyzing multiple high-quality genomes within a species or clade, pangenomes capt...

www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...

I've slowly been reformatting notes from my population and conservation genetics course at Montana State University into a web book—a rough draft is now live here: elinck.org/popgen_conge...

Demonstrating how phylogenetic trees can rotate around their nodes and still tell the same story! #BI111 #SciArt (ping @bbolker.bsky.social)

Multispecies pangenomes reveal a pervasive influence of population size on structural variation Structural variants (SVs) are widespread in vertebrate genomes, yet their evolutionary dynamics remain poorly understood. Using 45 long-read de novo genome assemblies and pangenome tools, we analyze S...

Population-scale long-read datasets, involving sequencing and de novo assembly of multiple individuals within a species, are better at capturing the full spectrum of structural variants, but such datasets are rare outside of humans www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... #biodiversity #genomics

I am still actively looking for postdoc positions — please lmk if you (or your friends and colleagues) need a hardworking postdoc with field, lab, and bioinformatic skills!

I am broadly interested in evolution in the ocean, conservation and population genetics, and rapid evolution.

Imputation of ancient canid genomes reveals inbreeding history over the past 10,000 years | PNAS The multi-millennia-long history between dogs and humans has placed them at the forefront of archaeological and genomic research. Despite ongoing e...

Our paper in the PNAS Special Feature on 🐕 is out!
We demonstrated the accuracy of imputing ancient canid genomes, looked at inbreeding levels over the past 10,000 years and found genomic regions resistant to ROH which were enriched for immunity and chemosensory genes.
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Still time to register for the our next AaRCademy workshop on demographic history! Deadline is December 5th! #aDNA

Early Career Scientist Awards 2026 Application to the UW-Madison Evolution Seminar Series - Early Career Scientist Awards.

Wisconsin Evolution is accepting applications for our Seminar Series' Early Career Scientist Award. Come share your evolution research and visit UW-Madison's evolution community. Open to grad students and postdocs (<5 yrs post PhD) from outside UW-Madison.

Apply by Dec 15th here: shorturl.at/4a4O6

An ancient recombination desert is a speciation supergene in placental mammals - Nature Deep learning methods identified a large and evolutionarily conserved X-linked low recombination region in placental mammals that serves as both a barrier to gene flow in hybridizing lineages and an accurate phylogenomic marker.

Nature research paper: An ancient recombination desert is a speciation supergene in placental mammals

go.nature.com/47UiBWa

Genetic offset and vulnerability modeling under climate change scenarios: common misinterpretations and violations of evolutionary principles Abstract. Genetic offset models have become a popular component of the landscape genetics toolbox, with over 600 peer-reviewed publications applying these

Genetic offset and vulnerability modeling under climate change scenarios: common misinterpretations and violations of evolutionary principles
academic.oup.com/evolut/advan...

Our new study just came out taking a look at how drought influences human-wildlife conflict reports in California! Check it out here: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Hi Bluesky community - I'm teaching computational genomics again in the Spring term; always happy to have auditors or folks Zoom in. Just have your students email me for deets.

Seasonal vs opportunistic breeders, a seasonal morphological and endocrine comparative study of the gonadal cycle in birds Avian reproduction is usually seasonal and strongly influenced by environmental factors, primarily photoperiod, which is mainly perceived by deep brai…

Seasonal vs opportunistic breeders, a seasonal morphological and endocrine comparative study of the gonadal cycle in birds | www.sciencedirect.co... | General and Comparative Endocrinology | #ornithology 🪶