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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

闵娅(Min Ya; Minya) PhD @minyaaa.bsky.social · 1d

Excited to participate and talk about how quantitative imaging analyses using #MorphographX helped see things that I didn’t know! #MGX 🌱🧪

Mingyuan Zhu @mingyuanzhu.bsky.social · 1d

🌱 Join us for our upcoming workshop Quantifying Plant Morphogenesis: 4D Insights with MorphoGraphX!
Learn how to quantitatively analyze plant confocal imaging data using MorphoGraphX.

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Anajú Sagasti @anajusagasti.bsky.social · 11d

It's #FossilFriday! Great time to check out our new paper if you haven't yet.

#Palaeobotany #JurassicPlants

Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 17d

Excited to share our recent paper @newphyt.bsky.social where we describe evidence of a Jurassic nurse log from Scotland! Great work led by @anajusagasti.bsky.social Sophie Burne and @jeremywyman.bsky.social @instmolplantsci.bsky.social
🧵 👇 1/6
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Decay stages of Jurassic wood debris from Scotland: evidence for the coevolution of fungal rot, arthropods and the nurse log strategy

A key feature of extant conifer forests is the high percentage of seeds that germinate and establish on dead wood; in some forests, this can exceed 90%. This deadwood can act as an ideal nursery for...

nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Oxford Biology @biology.ox.ac.uk · 23d

Oxford Biology is growing 📢

We’re appointing 3 Associate Professors in:
🌱 Plant Sciences
🦉 Animal Behaviour
🔬 Molecular Cell Biology

3 fields. 3 opportunities. One new home for Oxford Biology.

Learn more 👉 bit.ly/41S2Tc7
Apply now 👉 bit.ly/488CNW3

Photo showing the inside atrium of the new Life and Mind Building

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Facundo Romani @fromani.bsky.social · 16d

Very important paper and resource. Bryophyte genomes expanded by one order of magnitude. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Bryophytes hold a larger gene family space than vascular plants - Nature Genetics

A super-pangenome analysis incorporating 123 newly sequenced bryophyte genomes reveals that bryophytes exhibit a larger number of unique and lineage-specific gene families than vascular plants.

www.nature.com

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Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 17d

Our recent paper @newphyt.bsky.social @anajusagasti.bsky.social @instmolplantsci.bsky.social is featured today in the Sunday Post!
Thanks Sally McDonald for your piece helping to promote and communicate Scotland’s rich fossil heritage
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Page 11 of the Sunday Post. With story 'Fossil find is modern-day Jurassic spark'. The title image is of dinosaurs and below is an image of fossil wood, and a photograph of Anajú Sagasti and Sandy Hetherington

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Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 17d

This wouldn’t have been possible without support from the @ukri.org @hfspo.bsky.social @leverhulme.ac.uk – and the nurse log specimen is now accessioned into @ntlmuseumsscot.bsky.social 6/6

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Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 17d

Our findings extend the fossil evidence for this key ecological strategy and importantly demonstrate the close evolutionary links between fungi, plants and animals for forest regeneration 5/6

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Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 17d

This decaying conifer wood preserves evidence of white pocket rot; two types of arthropod boring, likely by beetles and mites; and colonisation by small roots. It therefore preserved evidence of a rich ecosystem occurring on the floor of a Jurassic forest 4/6

Microscope image of fossil wood under the microscope with fossil rootlets and decaying wood evident

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Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 17d

To investigate the prevalence of this strategy we searched for new fossil nurse logs and reviewed existing literature. We discovered the first nurse log from Scotland, and only the second known from the Jurassic Period 3/6

Rocky coastline on sunny day with blue skye

Anajú Sagasti looking at fossil nurse log on the microscope

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Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 17d

Seedling establishment on the forest floor is a challenging process. Plants have therefore adapted to make use of dead wood as a seed bed. This decaying wood can act as a nursery for seedlings and is termed a nurse log.
In conifer forests today nurse logs support >90% of germinating seedlings 2/6

Small tree growing on rotting wood - termed a nurse log

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Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 17d

Excited to share our recent paper @newphyt.bsky.social where we describe evidence of a Jurassic nurse log from Scotland! Great work led by @anajusagasti.bsky.social Sophie Burne and @jeremywyman.bsky.social @instmolplantsci.bsky.social
🧵 👇 1/6
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Decay stages of Jurassic wood debris from Scotland: evidence for the coevolution of fungal rot, arthropods and the nurse log strategy

A key feature of extant conifer forests is the high percentage of seeds that germinate and establish on dead wood; in some forests, this can exceed 90%. This deadwood can act as an ideal nursery for...

nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 22d

Really excited to be kicking off this series of Palaeobotany evening lectures at the Oxford University Botanic Garden. All are online and free to attend 👇👇

Mark Walters @mark-walters.bsky.social · 23d

There’s an interesting series of 5 free online paleobotany lectures via the Oxford University Botanic Garden this autumn. You can book all 5 lectures here (scroll down webpage to ‘Get your tickets now’ button) www.obga.ox.ac.uk/event/dr-san... #paleobotany

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Matt Friedman @friedmanlab.bsky.social · 25d

UMMP 57588: specimen showing the Late Devonian genera Archaeopteris (fronds) and Callixylon (trunks, branches) belonged to the same plant. This critical discovery by UMMP curator Charles Beck illuminated the structure of trees contributing to some of the planet's most ancient forests. #FossilFriday

Slab of gray rock with black-to-orange impressions of branches and leaves.

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Sandy Hetherington @sandyheth.bsky.social · 25d

So great having @isabelmonte.bsky.social visiting Edinburgh. Thanks for a wonderful seminar and some great discussions. Really pleased the rain held off for a lovely walk round the Botanics - including the obligatory stop to see the Lycopodium clavatum 🪴 🌿 🍄 🦠

Group of 9 people standing on a red bridge in Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh

7 people standing in royal botanic gardens Edinburgh looking down at a small green plant - lycopodium clavatum

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Rafaela Missagia @rmissagia.bsky.social · Sep 4

Our paper on rodent thumbnails is out! Big team effort, powered by museum collections. Turns out, nails can reveal a lot about rodent evolution. Shoutout to Dr. Gordon Shepherd for the wild idea to study rodents thumbs!

Science Magazine @science.org · Sep 4

New findings in Science suggest that rodents owe much of their evolutionary success to their thumb-nail (the first digit, D1), an adaptation that gave them dexterous hands for cracking seeds and nuts.

Learn more in this week's issue: https://scim.ag/46caVho

This red squirrel’s hands display tiny nail-bearing thumbs, alongside large claw-bearing digits.

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Dolf Weijers @dolfweijers.bsky.social · Sep 5

Recently, both our team and the Richardson/Estelle/Strader teams showed that ARF transcription factors are actively degraded. In this new preprint, Martijn de Roij explores the requirements and relevance of ARF degradation (1/7)

bioRxiv Plant Bio @biorxiv-plants.bsky.social · Sep 5

Diversification of functional requirements for proteolysis of Auxin Response Factors https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.09.03.673984v1

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

闵娅(Min Ya; Minya) PhD @minyaaa.bsky.social · Sep 4

My department is hiring a Plant-Fungal Assist Prof!! As the newest #NewPI here, don't get me started on how wonderful my colleagues, how smooth my onboarding has been, how supportive the school and the department are, how nice my brand new lab is, and how convenient living in Champaign Urbana is!

Steven Burgess @sjb287.bsky.social · Sep 4

We are hiring! The #PlantBio department at UIUC is looking to recruit an Assistant Professor in Plant-Fungal interactions. Application deadline is October 31st @dallingjim.bsky.social see the link below for more details:
illinois.csod.com/ux/ats/caree...

Assistant Professor- Department of Plant Biology

Duties & Responsibilities

illinois.csod.com

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Tommaso Jucker @tommaso-jucker.bsky.social · Aug 14

We have a #Tansley review out today @newphyt.bsky.social led by Becky Banbury Morgan in which we put forward a new framework that aims to explain how and why edge effects on forest structure vary across ecosystems and through time

📜 doi.org/10.1111/nph....

Graphical illustration of the four key stages of edge evolution following edge creation.

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Brandy A Freitas @brandy-syglass.bsky.social · Sep 4

Pollen diversity #3DThursday!🌼🌾 Thanks to Nat Prunet's careful microscopy, we see ridges, spikes & pores that reveal how plants spread & survive.
🔬: @zeiss-microscopy.bsky.social LSM 980, Airyscan 2
🥼: @nat-prunet.bsky.social
🏛️: UNC Biological Microscopy Core
🎬: syGlass.io v2.4.0 #syGlass

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Pingtao Ding (he/him) @dinglab.bsky.social · Sep 4

Huge congratulations to #early-career scientists working with plants awarded with ERC-2025-StG @ecologybasel.bsky.social @clemmar.bsky.social @izzysaurlab.bsky.social @pfeilmeier.bsky.social @jiorgoskourelis.bsky.social @vinayshukla.bsky.social

European Research Council (ERC) @erc.europa.eu · Sep 4

📣 The ERC Starting Grant call results are out!

Find out which early-career researchers will receive funding this year, what they will be investigating, where they will be based... plus lots of other #ERCStG facts & figures for 2025!

➡️ buff.ly/IsafuFh

#FrontierResearch 🇪🇺#EUfunded #HorizonEurope

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Vinay Shukla @vinayshukla.bsky.social · Sep 4

Honoured & excited that ‘Breathing Underground’ has been funded by the ERC!
This will let me explore one of the most fundamental questions of plant life: how roots breathe underground? @erc.europa.eu

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Tanja Slotte @tanjaslotte.bsky.social · Sep 2

*Postdoc in Evolutionary genomics at Stockholm University*
We are recruiting a postdoc for a large interdisciplinary project to investigate evolutionary drivers and genomic consequences of pollen evolution in response to pollination mode shifts in flowering plants. 1/5

su.varbi.com/what:job/job...

Purple pollen visible in a dissected flower of Linum grandiflorum, flowering flax, an insect-pollinated species.

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Ferwen @ferwen.bsky.social · Sep 1

Macroevolutionary role reversals in the earliest radiation of bony fishes
www.cell.com/current-biol...

Macroevolutionary role reversals in the earliest radiation of bony fishes

Troyer et al. examine lower jaw evolution in Silurian-Devonian bony fishes and find substantial differences in patterns of morphological disparity, rates of shape evolution, and functional diversity b...

www.cell.com

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

The Pallavi Singh Lab @thepallavisinghlab.bsky.social · Jul 25

🌱 Big news! @thepallavisingh.bsky.social has been awarded by @aria-research.bsky.social to develop PlantPlug! 🎉🧬

By turning mistletoe into a programmable bio-interface, we aim to boost crop resilience & yields 🌿

Stay tuned for more updates and job opportunities!
#SyntheticBiology #PlantScience

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Reposted by Sandy Hetherington

Journal of Experimental Botany @jxbotany.bsky.social · Aug 29

🔎 DARWIN REVIEW 🔎

Mody et al. review the study of the cellular basis of plant morphogenesis with 3D digital organs 🔬🌱

🔗 doi.org/10.1093/jxb/...

#PlantScience 🧪 @kschneitz.bsky.social

Fig. 1 (shortened, full legend in paper): Pipeline to generate 3D digital organs demonstrated using a stage 3-V Cardamine hirsuta ovule. (A) The generation of a 3D digital organ starts with 3D imaging of the organ of interest stained with a cell wall stain such as SR2200. The 3D rendering of a confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) z-stack of ovule with SR2200-stained cell walls is shown. The bounding box shows the xyz imaging directions of the ovule in the 3D view (top panel).

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