Brian O'Meara
@omearabrian.bsky.social
5.4K followers 7.9K following 21 posts
I study diversification, species delimitation, trait evolution & similar questions, often using new methods. Also random coding projects. College prof living in Oak Ridge, TN, USA. Opinions my own. He/Him
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Reposted by Brian O'Meara
danielbolnick.bsky.social
@sse-evolution.bsky.social just announced the following:

Call for Proposals: Research Synthesis Working Groups
The Society for the Study of Evolution (SSE) invites proposals for sponsored Research Synthesis Working Groups at the 2026 Evolution meeting (up to two in-person and one virtual). ...
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
shellygaynor.bsky.social
Just a reminder - if you run/recruit or have anything to do with an ecology & evolutionary biology PhD program, check out our database and update your departments salary here: rhettrautsaw.app/shiny/Biolog...
omearabrian.bsky.social
Each clear one has an opposite partner. So do two of the purple. The remaining three purple are 120 degrees apart from each other.
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
botana-bedoya.bsky.social
One week to apply before reviews start for the postdoc I am offering investigating the tempo and pattern of river connections with the closure of the isthmus of Panama and its impact on river plant (Podostemaceae) migration. Genomic+fossil+geological data + fieldwork 👇
botana-bedoya.bsky.social
I am recruiting a postdoc to work for 2-3 yrs on our NSF-funded project aiming to investigate plant migration and river connectivity with the closure of the Isthmus of Panama. Leading publications, fieldwork in CR & Panama, applying and expanding phylo. & pop.gen tools👇

www.nybg.org/about/work-w...
Employment | New York Botanical Garden
Find out what employment opportunities are available at The New York Botanical Garden.
www.nybg.org
omearabrian.bsky.social
Just a reminder that AFAIK there is no* evidence that giant sauropods *didn't* create bowers

[* ok, maybe parsimony since only a few extant dinos make bowers]

Alt text for image: a trail of pebbles and other gray and white detritus, including a gear, leading to a tunnel made of thatch
lauraakelley.bsky.social
Back in the land of bowers this week! Investigating how male courtship signals are affected by urbanisation #greatbowerbirds @uniexecec.bsky.social
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
cpuentelelievre.bsky.social
Save the date! the SMBE Australasian Protein Structural Phylogenetics Meeting #APSPM will take place on 15 - 18 February, 2026 at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia. More details coming up soon. Registration will be free thanks to the generous support of @official-smbe.bsky.social
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
cathyhernandez.bsky.social
Very happy to share that I will be starting as an Assistant Professor in the department of Biological Sciences at the University of South Carolina in January! My group will be working on environmental phage ecology and evolution, and I am recruiting for the upcoming year (more info below).
A graphic advertising phage ecology and evolution research at the University of South Carolina, showing a central image of a tide pool flanked by a photo of an agar plate containing diverse microbes and a TEM image of a virus particle.
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
sarahmackattack.bsky.social
I love shitting on social media as much as the next guy, but Skype a Scientist was built directly from social media connections.

We've matched over 60,000 classrooms with scientists from it...

That's pretty great.
conradhackett.bsky.social
Has anything great happened in your life because of social media?
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
lovetheants.bsky.social
Tenure track assistant professor of biology position in my department just posted!

www.schooljobs.com/careers/prov...
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
shastingssimon.bsky.social
My number one tip for researchers that do a significant amount of non peer reviewed paper publication/outreach:

Create an excel table, every time you give an interview, talk, write an oped or white paper, etc. take 5 seconds to immediately note it in the excel.
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
jebyrnes.bsky.social
That's right, folk! THREE TENURE TRACK JOBS IN BIOLOGY AT UMASS BOSTON! You might even be a good fit for more than one! Check 'em out! We'd love to have you!
omearabrian.bsky.social
I've now seen a few conferences for 2026 with no mentions of any sort of code of conduct, let alone an actionable, concrete one. We know with all the power dynamics in academia bad things can and do happen. Shun conferences that officially don't take steps to address this.
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
andrew-ecoathome.bsky.social
Introducing BIRDBASE, which aims to be the world's most comprehensive avian trait ecology database. Article links to open access paper, & data in Excel spreadsheet. phys.org/news/2025-09... #science #environment #ecology #eco #biology #bird #birds #birding #birdwatching #openaccess #datascience
BIRDBASE dataset tracks ecological traits for 11,589 species of birds
Çağan Şekercioğlu was an ambitious, but perhaps naive graduate student when, 26 years ago, he embarked on a simple data-compilation project that would soon evolve into a massive career-defining achiev...
phys.org
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
3rdreviewer.bsky.social
The most important paper in evolutionary biology I'd never heard of:

1/

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
daveyfwright.bsky.social
"AI is the asbestos we are shoveling into the walls of our society and our descendants will be digging it out for generations"
jbau.bsky.social
This whole section really.
Finally: AI cannot do your job, but an AI salesman can 100% convince your boss to fire you and replace you with an AI that can't do your job, and when the bubble bursts, the money-hemorrhaging "foundation models" will be shut off and we'll lose the AI that can't do your job, and you will be long gone, retrained or retired or "discouraged" and out of the labor market, and no one will do your job.
AI is the asbestos we are shoveling into the walls of our society and our descendants will be digging it out for generations:
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
anaserrasilva.bsky.social
Please register or get your students to register!

I do not want to unleash nagging mode!
systassn.bsky.social
The Young Systematists' Forum is nearly upon us!

If you are a student (or postdoc) working on phylogenetics, taxonomy or systematics, join us Nov 14th for this free and friendly online conference!

Abstract submission closes Saturday, October 25th at 11:59PM GMT+1

REGISTER: tinyurl.com/2w5n3e8
YSF2025 Registration Form
Welcome to the YSF2025 Registration and Abstract Submission form. This year the conference will be held online on Friday, November 14th 2025. We look forward to seeing old and new faces from across t...
tinyurl.com
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
martinebotany.bsky.social
Please share! Psyched to bring in a new member of the team. Starting salary $62K.

#postdoc #sciencejobs #plantpeopleFTW
martinebotany.bsky.social
Excited to begin the search for the next (6th) Burpee Post-Doctoral Fellow in Botany here in my lab at Bucknell! Funded research and teacher-scholar training embedded in the primarily undergraduate institution (#PUI) environment.

#iamabotanist

Details (+ application portal) here:

lnkd.in/eVsbe7K5
Photos of past Burpee postdocs with some of our great students at Bucknell.
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
shankothari.bsky.social
The nomination deadline for 2026 @ecologicalsociety.bsky.social awards is coming up on November 13, 2025! This year we're accepting nominations for the inaugural Bazzaz-Pickett Award for inclusive mentorship in ecology. We'd love to see as many nominations as possible! esa.org/about/awards/
esa.org
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
adapalmer.bsky.social
Puffins return to Maine after half a century of absence. Eastern Egg Rock now hosts the only puffin colony in the United States, restored through decades of painstaking work after the birds were hunted out a century ago. buff.ly/RB0Ibz0
#ShareGoodNewsToo
How researchers restored a thriving habitat for Atlantic puffins in Maine
Atlantic puffins face an increasingly precarious foothold due in part to a loss of habitat and to troubles tied to warming ocean waters and climate change. But an effort off the coast of Maine…
buff.ly
omearabrian.bsky.social
Claims it uses papers from various publishers. It’d be very easy for it to be biased towards papers from Springer-Nature when suggesting references (even non-deliberately: the corpus could just be enriched for the papers they can most easily access).
omearabrian.bsky.social
Note for folks using US IPEDS data for colleges: the case of some of the columns in the data dictionary raw files has apparently changed (varname to varName, for example)
Reposted by Brian O'Meara
drugmonkey.bsky.social
Another pause in graduate school admissions for 2026.
UCSD dept of math this time.

www.math.ucsd.edu/students/gra...
UCSD’s Department of Mathematics has paused PhD admissions -- we will not be able to admit new PhD students in Fall 2026.
omearabrian.bsky.social
But yeah, I do worry about focusing on single individuals. I try not to make Darwin a hero but rather relatable (he was a failed pre-med, after all) and show as an example of how science actually works.