The 2025-26 Eco-Evo job list is out. Good luck to those applying!

docs.google.com/spreadsheets...

Great new paper just dropped! A really comprehensive look at how mammals and their ancestors moved from sprawling to upright stances... but not in the straightforward way you might think! Congratulations to all the authors! 🎉

My coauthor, Mags Mercado, is a very talented artist (and scientist!) 🎨🔬

This work would not be possible without a long list of collaborators, collection staff and colleagues. Extremely grateful to my coauthors (including a former student who made vital contributions).

You can see a lovely write-up of the paper here news.harvard.edu/gazette/stor...

Contrary to older ideas that posture evolved in a stepwise manner, we found that the ancestors of mammals navigated a complex evolutionary adaptive landscape, evolving, radiating and diversifying in their own unique ways.

We compiled a huge dataset of limb bones from living and extinct animals (>200 species) and analysed what they look like, how they functioned and how this all changed through 300 million years of evolutionary time.

I'm so excited to share my latest paper out now! How did the ancestors of mammals make the switch from sprawling to upright, taking over the world in the process? Spoiler alert; it's complicated! journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

How did our mammalian #posture arise from our sprawling #synapsid ancestors? @docrobbrock.bsky.social &co reveal #parasagittal postures in stem therians, implying that synapsids evolved & radiated with distinct forelimb trait combinations for most of their history @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/4loAHoy

Oh look! Me and @nhcooper123.bsky.social have done a podcast!

For each episode we scour the @nhm-london.bsky.social's collections for weird and fun specimens that fit the theme, and then ramble to each other about them.

So if that's your bag, give it a listen! 🎉

New publication day! 🥳 Read all about arm joints in mammals and lizards - what they look like and how they move - with me, @l-fahn-lai.bsky.social and our co-authors. Out today in @jexpbiol.bsky.social

journals.biologists.com/jeb/article-...

Announcing The first found, and most complete, #dinosaur skeleton from the Middle #Jurassic of Scotland! 📢🦖 So delighted to finally be able to share this great new fossil, published today! It was actually the first dinosaur found in #Scotland... thread 🧵 #OpenAccess #fossils doi.org/10.1017/S175...

The Elgol Dinosaur is out!

This is the first and most complete dinosaur skeleton from the Jurassic of Isle of Skye, Scotland. I got to work with the amazing @elsa-panciroli.bsky.social on bringing this early ornithischian back to life. #Sciart

Link to paper: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Just out of the oven! Today @migueldlm.bsky.social just published his first paper related to his PhD thesis! BFEX is a new Blender tool for making FEA more accessible for biologists and paleontologists! All using open and free software 😱

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

New research led by Spencer Hellert tests the idea that major radiations within synapsids are begun by small faunivores.

Paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Press release: www.eurekalert.org/news-release...

Exciting pair of muscle evolution companion papers just out! Bishop & Pierce describe the fossil record of appendicular muscle evolution in Synapsida on the line to mammals in forelimb & hindlimb
anatomypubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...
anatomypubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...