Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 3d

It’s band-tober, which means that marching band is our entire life right now. Tonight was a small show (4 HS bands and 1 college band), but the closer had them all playing Sweet Caroline together.

Music brings such joy in a timeline where it is tough to find.

300 high school and college students from 5 marching bands standing at attention on a football field

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 5d

My comparative anatomy students had a blast learning with these @3danatomystudios.com shark skull models this week!

Large 3D printed model of a dogfish skull with jaws and arches

Several students in a classroom working with large 3D printed shark skull models

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Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

Matt Friedman @friedmanlab.bsky.social · 5d

Check out this rare faculty-curator position at OU:

Dr. Davey F. Wright ⛏️🦕🧬 @daveyfwright.bsky.social · 6d

🚨We're hiring! The Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History is seeking a tenure-track split position as Assistant Curator of Ichthyology and Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences. Please retweet & share with colleagues! 🐟🐠🧪

Apply here: apply.interfolio.com/174674

A job ad with multiple images, including the exterior of the museum, a view of collections (jars on shelves), and pictures of some cool, tropical fish but I don't know enough about fish to describe them other than to say they're pretty colors of yellow and blue/green

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Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

NPR @npr.org · 7d

Today marks the first day in public media’s history without federal funding. And we’re not going anywhere.

Listeners like you keep our mission alive. Protect one of the last places where America comes together to hear itself.

Stand with us today. Donate at this link: n.pr/46wamAj

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Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

Brian O'Meara @omearabrian.bsky.social · 6d

Webpage on the hidden curriculum of applying to ecology and evolution grad programs in the US (a lot of the info applies to other fields too, but perhaps less well): applyingtoeeb.info

#AcademicSky 🧪

Applying to US Graduate School in Ecology, Evolution, and Related Fields

applyingtoeeb.info

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Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

Kory Evans Ph.D @sternarchella.bsky.social · 8d

New paper alert!!!🚨 in our new study we find that Antarctic icefishes added a new module in their skulls during their adaptive radiation special shout out to @mayaranevesbio.bsky.social who led this project!

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

PNAS

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...

www.pnas.org

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 10d

I do still have it!!

Postcard depicting a woman standing next to a Dunkleosteus skull, with a banner that says “Dunkleosteous hinged jaws of death” at the top of the postcard and a circle that says “mysterious underwater creatures” in the lower right corner

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Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

Brooke Fitzwater, PhD (she/her) 🐟🪱🏳️‍🌈♾️ @oceanfilly.bsky.social · 13d

Happy to share that @taorminalepore.bsky.social and I are featured in @cp-trendsecolevo.bsky.social's continuing series sharing disabled scientists in ecology and evolution spaces! www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...

Disability in ecology and evolution

In this TrendsTalk series, ‘Disability in ecology and evolution,’ in Trends in Ecology and Evolution, we will be hearing from people about their experiences being disabled in ecology and evolution. We...

www.cell.com

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 13d

One more cephalopod video for your enjoyment: clumsy Nautilus

<donk>

Jean-François Cudennec @jfcudennec.bsky.social · 14d

major traffic incident

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 13d

Doomscroll safety stop! 🛑

Watch this wickedly awesome video of a sperm whale eating a giant squid!

AND if you read the thread, you’ll see it’s been fact checked.

🤯

Ok, carry on

Rebecca R Helm @rebeccarhelm.bsky.social · 13d

I get that the news cycle is packed right now, but I just heard from a colleague at the Smithsonian that this is fully a GIANT SQUID BEING EATEN BY A SPERM WHALE and it’s possibly the first ever confirmed video according to a friend at NOAA

10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 13d

Do it. It's the only way I can make sure I have any time to write/read for researchy things and I recommend this to all of my new faculty. I forgot to block out one of my times this week, and I have all of the meetings now.

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 13d

I need more papers like this in my life

Nicolas Mouquet @nmouquet.bsky.social · 14d

Very proud of this paper in BioScience :

« Too cute to be wild: what teddy bears reveal about our disconnection from nature »

🧸 are more than toys, they shape among our first emotional connections to nature. But their design may also distort how we see wildlife !

👉 doi.org/10.1093/bios...

🧪🦤

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 13d

OMG, amazing.

Although, if they're having poultry for dinner, they're not wrong about it being dinosaur meat.

Susan Kaye Quinn is Writing Solarpunk 🌞🌱 @susankayequinn.bsky.social · 13d

They've lost the 9yos

JA Westenberg
@Daojoan@mastodon.social

My 9 year old and his classmates have started using “that’s AI” to mean “I don’t believe you.”

Me: we’re having dinosaur meat for dinner

Kiddo: that’s AI
Sep 24, 2025, 07:36 AM

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 14d

It wasn’t labeled, but @billryerson.bsky.social said it’s either that or an emerald tree boa. I know very few snake species…

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 14d

(Yes it’s half a snake. That’s how it came)

Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 14d

Wow, it’s been a while since an afternoon of lab work has made me this stinky.

But I did manage to finally prep out a freeze dried snake and a barracuda head . Both have been sitting in my work freezer for 8 years, and before then were in Tom Frazetta’s freezer probably for decades.

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 14d

Oh man, I might still have a postcard of one of these banners with Dunkleosteus on it. I think it’s on my office door!

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 19d

If you're using our textbook for a course you're teaching, can you please fill out this quick Google Form so that we know how many folks have adopted it?

forms.gle/47wJtmEMYMM8...

Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · Jul 31

Y’all!!! Our comparative anatomy textbook is out!!! Free, open access, and just in time for the fall semester!

Bill Ryerson @billryerson.bsky.social · Jul 30

New Comparative Anatomy Textbook! Completely free to read and open access!

doi.org/10.59319/YHF...

Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

Prof Susie Maidment @tweetisaurus.bsky.social · 20d

JOBS JOBS JOBS! Stony Brook are advertising two assistant professorships in vertebrate palaeo/evolution, one focused on (in the words of the SVP programme) NOT DINOSAURS and the other on evolutionary neurology:
apply.interfolio.com/172502
apply.interfolio.com/172517

Apply - Interfolio {{$ctrl.$state.data.pageTitle}} - Apply - Interfolio

apply.interfolio.com

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 20d

Can’t wait to bring this to my comparative anatomy class on Friday! I keep telling them that new stuff is discovered about vertebrate bodies constantly - and here’s more proof of that.

Carl Zimmer @carlzimmer.com · 20d

How Did Hands Evolve? The Answer Is Behind You. (My story of some surprising evo-devo!) nyti.ms/42Cg8xH

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Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

Todd Clardy @realfishdoc.bsky.social · 22d

Undergraduate and graduate students can get $1500 ($2000 for international students) to visit and study in our museum collections. Contact a curator to discuss plans first to make sure we have what you need (that would be @planet-of-fishes.bsky.social for the Ichthyology Department). Come to LA!

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Lisa Whitenack, PhD @whitenacklab.bsky.social · 24d

It’s nice to do something fun for a good cause among all of this <gestures at world>

Guest bartending at my local bar to raise $ for a local foundation that benefits our school district’s kids while also representing my kids’ marching band.

Our lights are 🎵 and our hats are music themed!

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Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

Minorities in Shark Sciences @misselasmo.bsky.social · 28d

Our paper on MISS programming effectiveness was recently published in Integrative & Comparative Biology! 📄

Read all about our journey (so far!), our mission, methods, and outreach programs at the link below! ⤵️

academic.oup.com/icb/advance-...

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Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

EvolDir @evoldir.bsky.social · Sep 7

UC Berkeley's Martin Fish Speciation Lab seeks a part-time lab manager for pupfish research. Requires a biology degree and some lab experience. Flexible hours, multi-year position. Apply: [email protected]. More info at https://ib.berkeley.edu/labs/martin/ #job

Martin Lab

ib.berkeley.edu

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Reposted by Lisa Whitenack, PhD

Peter Wagner (a Real Dr., not a surgeon-barber/body-tech/golfer) @peterjwagner3.bsky.social · Sep 7

If you know anyone interested in starting a Master's project working on ammonoid phylogenetics (or the phylogenetics of a mollusc group spanning the OAE2 event in the Late Cretaceous), then ask them to get in touch with me.

The situation is a little tricky, as it would be funded by the remainder…

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