Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Aug 27

Really happy to present my work at @behaviour2025.bsky.social yesterday! Taking our puzzle solving bees on tour, all the way to India. So far a lovely and productive conference! 🐝

Image shows a speaker on stage looking at their presentation slides.

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Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Aug 22

A new preprint by our group 🧪🪰 and the culmination of many years of work! Learn how houseflies see the world clearly even while they’re dodging our swats…

Small Brain Cognition Lab @minibraincognition.bsky.social · Aug 22

Flies keep their vision razor-sharp even at top speed: we found their synapses “jump” into higher frequencies during saccades, wiping out delays and boosting acuity. This self-sharpening trick shows how brains sync perception with rapid behaviour.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Synaptic high-frequency jumping synchronises vision to high-speed behaviour

During high-speed behaviour, animals must predict, detect, process, and respond synchronously to rapid environmental changes, including those caused by their own movements. How neural systems achieve ...

www.biorxiv.org

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Alastair Meeks @alastairmeeks.bsky.social · Aug 13

The aim is to be someone else’s nemesis.

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Small Brain Cognition Lab @minibraincognition.bsky.social · Jul 1

Exciting paper from our lab out today:

New insights into how bees use flight movements—such as body, head, and eye wiggles—to actively support their brain’s pattern learning and recognition with remarkable accuracy could inspire advances in next-generation AI.

elifesciences.org/articles/89929

A neuromorphic model of active vision shows how spatiotemporal encoding in lobula neurons can aid pattern recognition in bees

Active vision dynamically refines spatiotemporal neural representations, optimising visual processing through scanning behaviour and non-associative learning, providing insights into efficient sensory...

elifesciences.org

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

HaDi MaBouDi @maboudi.bsky.social · Jul 1

Our latest paper reveals how active vision via scanning dynamically refines spatiotemporal neural representations, enabling efficient pattern recognition in minimal systems.

A step forward in understanding embedded cognition & AI
www.sheffield.ac.uk/news/new-stu... #bee #ActiveVision #Neuromorphic

New study revealing bees' secret to super-efficient learning could revolutionise AI and robotics

A new discovery of how bees use their flight movements to facilitate remarkably accurate learning & recognition of complex visual patterns could mark a major change in how next-generation AI is develo...

www.sheffield.ac.uk

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Calli McMurray @callimcflurry.bsky.social · Jun 4

FlyBase, a crucial resource for drosophila research, has lost its funding because its grant is awarded to Harvard. The team is scrambling to find other sources of funds, including donations from labs. Read more: www.thetransmitter.org/community/fl... @flybase.bsky.social

FlyBase funding squashed amid Harvard grant terminations

The team behind the Drosophila genetics database is now requesting donations from labs to keep the resource afloat.

www.thetransmitter.org

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

FlyBase @flybase.bsky.social · Jun 3

We currently have a call for support that has gone out to European labs, to support FlyBase-UK. We are asking our colleagues from labs in the US and other countries to wait for a similar call to them that will go out in the near future, to support the US sites. We thank you for your patience.

Mark A. Hanson @hansonmark.bsky.social · Jun 3

URGENT: FlyBase has lost practically all its funding overnight; even user fees are tied up in denied grant funding. 🤬🤯

Any lab using @flybase.bsky.social please donate using the link in post below.

This incredible community, on whose backs our #Drosophila labs depend, can't be left out to dry.

Marc Dionne @marcsdionne.bsky.social · Jun 3

My lab studies bacterial infections. We spend a lot of time looking at (or for) species-specific genetic and genomic databases for hosts and microbes. FlyBase is the best of all—there is literally no comparison. Its existence is under threat. Please donate.
www.philanthropy.cam.ac.uk/give-to-camb...

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Sussex Sustainability Research Programme (SSRP) @sussexsrp.bsky.social · May 20

It's #WorldBeeDay 🐝

But how can you help bees to flourish in your own garden, balcony, or outside space?

An initiative led by our @davegoulson.bsky.social encouraged people to build 'solitary bee hotels', providing practical tips on how to do so. Why not give it a go?

The guidance is below 👇

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

The University of Sheffield @sheffielduni.bsky.social · May 20

Again for #worldbeeday, we wanted to reshare this incredible breakthrough last year about how cognitively sophisticated bees are 🐝

www.sheffield.ac.uk/news/bees-ma...

Bees master complex tasks through social interaction

In a groundbreaking discovery, bumblebees have been shown to possess a previously unseen level of cognitive sophistication.

www.sheffield.ac.uk

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Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · May 18

Yesterday’s walk in the woods 🐝

Honeybee on tiny blue and purple flowers

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Ryan Katz-Rosene, PhD @ryankatzrosene.bsky.social · May 11

Wild! “Researchers have concluded that too many older fish have been removed from these waters, preventing the knowledge of the best spawning grounds being passed to younger, less experienced fish.”

Screenshot of https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-01433-0

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Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Apr 28

Bluebell season 🪻

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Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Apr 7

Article in the New Scientist out recently, feat. a few quotes from yours truly :) 🐝

www.newscientist.com/article/mg26...

The animals revealing why human culture isn't as special as we thought

Even animals with very small brains turn out to have cultural traditions, which poses a puzzler for biologists wondering what makes human culture unique

www.newscientist.com

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Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Mar 18

Oh to be a tiny honeybee in a sea of fluffy blossom flowers 🐝

Canon 600d, 75-300 mm lens 📷
From last year? I think.
Roll on more days like this, please.

A honeybee pollinating white blossom flowers.

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Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Mar 10

Our new preprint is live! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... 🐝🧪 “Bumblebee string pulling skill spreads between colonies under open diffusion conditions”! @procenko.bsky.social @minibraincognition.bsky.social @larschittka.bsky.social

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Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Jan 3

@minibraincognition.bsky.social 🎉

Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Jan 3

Our lab’s latest review is finally out! 🧪🧠
It’s been a long time coming, so please enjoy it 😎
Learn how structural changes and tiny neural movements can help enhance the sensing & behaviour of animals beyond what we might expect is possible…
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Theory of morphodynamic information processing: Linking sensing to behaviour

The traditional understanding of brain function has predominantly focused on chemical and electrical processes. However, new research in fruit fly (Dr…

www.sciencedirect.com

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

John Tuthill @tuthill.bsky.social · Nov 18

Check out this fly boxing away a parasitic wasp who is trying to lay eggs in its abdomen.
I've watched a lot of fly behavior, but never seen anything like this. Makes you wonder how much we miss by studying lab organisms in isolation from their natural threats.
Vid from: doi.org/10.1038/s415...

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Altmetric @altmetric.com · Dec 3

There are already many articles for which there is more attention on Bluesky than on other comparable micro-blogging sites, meaning the academic community and the general public have clearly adopted Bluesky as one of its core places to disseminate and discuss new research.

A Place of Joy.

‘A place of joy’: why scientists are joining the rush to Bluesky
Researchers say the social-media platform — an alternative to X — offers more control over the content they see and the people they engage with.: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-03784-6

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Eoghan Daltun 🌍 @irishrainforest.bsky.social · Nov 29

"Bumblebee population increases 116 times over in 'remarkable' Scotland rewilding project."

Read that again: **116** times.

Why are we STILL having to argue the case for rewilding??
www.scotsman.com/hays-way/bum...

Bumblebee population increases 116 times over in 'remarkable' Scotland project

‘The sound of traffic and a uniform sea of barley have been replaced by the most beautiful meadows, full of wildflowers, young saplings and the buzz of bees’

www.scotsman.com

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Small Brain Cognition Lab @minibraincognition.bsky.social · Nov 28

Hello!
We are a group of scientists from the University of Sheffield excited about how the brain works, using flies & other insects as our models. 🧪🪰 Looking forward to sharing some of our work in the coming days!

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Harriet Lambert @hcslambert.bsky.social · Nov 20

Love Bumble bees? 🐝 Dive into pollination, microbiomes, foraging secrets, and ecosystem resilience. A starter pack for buzzing discoveries! 🌼💛 Explore here: go.bsky.app/Gq3vvkj

🐝 Bumble Bee Research Starter Pack 🐝

Join the conversation

go.bsky.app

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Reposted by Dr Alice Bridges

Mackenzie Weygandt Mathis @trackingactions.bsky.social · Nov 12

Woo hoo! 1K new followers, welcome to 💙🦋!

For science-minded folks, there are some very cool tricks 🚀…

If you use any of these emojis: 👩‍🔬|👩🏻‍🔬|👩🏼‍🔬|👩🏽‍🔬|👩🏾‍🔬|👩🏿‍🔬 your post will index on a Women in STEM feed

If you use 🧪 a Science feed

If you use 🧠 a Neuroscience feed

Go get it 🚀🧪🧠👩‍🔬💙🎊

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Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Nov 13

For anyone who’s around, I’ll be speaking at #entsoc2024 at 15:45 today! ☺️🐝 presenting some of my PhD work with puzzle solving bumblebees!

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Dr Alice Bridges @adbridges.bsky.social · Nov 12

Made a detour to the desert botanical garden in Phoenix before #entsoc2024 : just a couple of my favourite shots.

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