Michael Seidl

In case you missed it: our review titled "Spatial structure: shaping the ecology and evolution of microbial communities" is out! 🚨

Let me hit you with some highlights on why spatial structure matters. (and why you should care!)

Sharing is appreciated 🙏 🧵👇

doi.org/10.1093/fems...

📣 Our latest story just dropped on bioRxiv:: A structurally unique effector shared between Verticillium dahliae and Fusarium oxysporum is involved in cotton defoliation and virulence on other hosts www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... 🧵

A permanent position as a research scientist is opened in our team! We look for a plant physiologist with expertise in plant / microorganism interactions to identify plant susceptibility factors to fungal disease. Please forward!

Parasex generates highly recombinant progeny in Candida albicans with increased virulence - Nature Microbiology An alternative mating system, termed parasex, produces progeny with high levels of genotypic diversity and is able to fulfil the roles of meiosis when it is absent in the fungal pathobiont Candida alb...

OUT NOW! Parasex generates highly recombinant progeny in Candida albicans with increased virulence

By Robert Fillinger, Scott Filler, Anna Selmecki, Richard Bennett,
Matthew Anderson & colleagues.
#microsky @annaselmecki.bsky.social

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Directors

Expressions of interest: Director at MPI EvolBio (f/m/d) — We invite expressions of interest from distinguished scientists in evolutionary biology with a bold, long-term research vision that complements our Institute. More information: www.evolbio.mpg.de/3856225/Dire...

In remembrance of Peer Bork  | EMBL EMBL and its community are deeply saddened by the death of Peer Bork, the organisation’s Interim Director General.

very sad news. Peer Bork was one of the leaders of our field, a wonderful scientist, and he's much too young to be gone. www.embl.org/news/embl-an...

This position is still open. The Weisberg lab is recruiting a postdoc or Ph.D. student to study horizontal gene transfer in plant-associated microbial communities. Please see the job ad for more information and feel free to contact me if you have any questions!

Effector biology and immunometabolic (re)programming: microbial strategies for compatibility Root immunometabolism: balancing defense and accommodationPlant health depends on balanced immune defense and microbial accommodation. As constant contact zones, roots must exclude pathogens while fos...

Now online: Effector biology and immunometabolic (re)programming: microbial strategies for compatibility: Molecular Plant www.cell.com/molecular-pl...

PhD position open in my team @uuplants.bsky.social !
Join us to investigate how sorghum roots interact with recently discovered Suberin-Inducing Microbes! More details: www.uu.nl/en/organisat...
Please share!

Black field with a macro image of a bright orange lichen Xanthoria in one of the corner. Little diagrams showing a structure of a lichen thallus with different layers in grey and green, a phylogenetic tree, and an alphafold generated structure of a protein. White text says "PhD position in Stockholm University / SciLifeLab. Lichen Biology, Symbiosis, Microbial Ecology & Evolution,Meta-omics Fully funded for 4 years. Start Apr-Sep 2026. Deadline for application: Feb 1st."

⚡️Fully funded #PhD position in my lab at Stockholm University / SciLifeLab! If you’re interested in #lichens, #symbiosis, fungal biology, or meta-omics, please apply. Deadline Feb 1. Read more here: su.varbi.com/en/what:job/...

We’re delighted to welcome Prof. Saskia Hogenhout as the new BSPP President, whose pioneering research on plant-microbe-insect interactions is transforming our understanding of pathogen transmission and plant health.

More about her work @johninnescentre.bsky.social www.jic.ac.uk/people/saski...

A conserved fungal transcription factor domain drives protein-protein interactions and necrotrophic effector-mediated virulence in Parastagonospora nodorum The fungal pathogen Parastagonospora nodorum utilises necrotrophic effectors (NEs) to cause chlorosis and necrosis on wheat. NE expression is mediated by an assortment of transcription factors (TF), t...

Our @theccdm.bsky.social preprint on the domain function and interactors of the effector-regulating transcription factor PnPf2 in Parastagonospora nodorum is live! 😁

Led by Shota Morikawa @callumverdonk.bsky.social

Collabs 👉 @danielcroll.bsky.social @evan-john.bsky.social

Why Ambrosia Beetles Keep Only One Fungus: Competitive Asymmetry, Bottleneck Drift, and Eco-Evolutionary Fixation https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2025.12.18.694882v1

Thrilled to finally see this work published in @narjournal.bsky.social! 🙌🏻 🥳 Huge thanks to @slavi-jan.bsky.social and everyone who collaborated on this project 🫶👏🏻

🧵 Just out in Cell after more than 10 years in the making!

🎓 www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

Plants and animals evolve radically different body plans.

Do they also operate under fundamentally different molecular evolutionary constraints during organ formation?

@cellpress.bsky.social

New opportunity to join our #EvoMPMI group @johninnescentre.bsky.social as a Postdoctoral Researcher working on the mechanistic basis of immunity in diverse plants. Please spread the word, reach out by email, and/or apply if interested! More details here: www.jic.ac.uk/vacancies/po...

Genomic Insights into Historical Adaptation of Three Key Fungal Plant Pathogens Abstract. Fungal culture collections hold a wealth of historical isolates that could be used to study fungal evolution over the past decades, an era that c

Alkemade, @timbarra.bsky.social et al. did temporal association analysis on three major fungal crop pathogens collected between 1956 and 2023, identifying genes linked to fungicide resistance and stress responses as frequent sites of adaptation.

🔗 doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evaf241

#genome #evolution

‘Borrowed time’: crop pests and food losses supercharged by climate crisis Heating means pests breeding and spreading faster, warn scientists, with simplified current food system already vulnerable

The key global crops, wheat, rice and maize, are expected to see the losses to pests increase by about 46%, 19% and 31% respectively when global heating reaches 2C 👇 www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

Transcriptional Response of Magnaporthe oryzae Towards Barley-Microbiome Derived Bacteria | Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions® The composition of the plant microbiome is shaped not only by the host plant and abiotic environmental factors, but also by inter-microbial cooperation and competition. Plant pathogens, therefore must...

CONGRATS to team @effectomics.bsky.social and @steidele.bsky.social . Transcriptional Response of Magnaporthe oryzae Towards Barley-Microbiome Derived Bacteria | Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions® apsjournals.apsnet.org/doi/10.1094/...

Read the Latest Issue of Interactions Now!

Members: Check your inbox for the last issue of #Interactions of 2025! Discover the latest research, meet the members leading our field, get society updates, and more. Read the December issue now! https://bit.ly/4hPkQgw

Microbial eukaryotes keep challenging assumptions about eukaryotic cell and genome biology.

Our upcoming workshop explores the frontier of protist genomics and how it shapes cell biology, ecology and evolution.

Please save the date! Talks, posters and ECR events

Websites and details coming soon

Evolution of evolvability — thought provoking essay from
@thanvisrikant.bsky.social and @hajkdrost.bsky.social!

Ecosystem health shapes viral ecology in peatland soils - Nature Microbiology Metagenomics shows that viral diversity and community structure are shaped by geography and ecosystem health status, positioning viruses as unexpected players in peatland restoration.

Soil viruses are important regulators of ecosystem function, but what are their roles in environments that face long-term degradation and restoration? In our paper published today in Nature Micro, we asked how soil viruses influence peatland recovery, and vice versa. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Thanks @danielcroll.bsky.social

Welcome to Bluesky, @pieterhart.bsky.social!

Pieter just joined my group as a PhD student studying bacterial genome evolution—exciting years ahead!

Here he is enjoying a chat about his MSc work (w/ @kassipan.bsky.social & @ettema.bsky.social) at Science4Life @utrechtuniversity.bsky.social 🧬🦠✨

MetaPointFinder:
A new approach for detecting mutation-driven antimicrobial resistance directly from metagenomic reads.
Fills a major gap in current resistome profiling by capturing chromosomal AMR mutations that metagenome tools miss.

github.com/aldertzomer/...

Now officially published in Current Biology 🥳🥳 @mfseidl.bsky.social @binfutrecht.bsky.social

www.cell.com/current-biol...

Extensive horizontal transfer of transposable elements shapes fungal mobilomes Romeijn et al. reveal that horizontal transposon transfer is widespread in fungi, contributing up to 70% of transposon content in some taxa. The authors uncover thousands of events across diverse line...

Extensive horizontal transfer of transposable elements shapes fungal mobilomes

@currentbiology.bsky.social by @jromeijn.bsky.social et al from @mfseidl.bsky.social

www.cell.com/current-biol...

A recent shift in centromere size and DNA content in Podospora pseudocomata co-occurs with the loss of a fungal genome defense system https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2025.12.02.690432v1