No consistent support from theory or bird data for the hypothesis that cooperation can be favoured to reduce variation in fitness (altruistic bet-hedging) www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Larger colony sizes favoured the evolution of more worker castes in ants www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Using data from 794 ant species, the authors test alternative causal models to explain the evolution of complexity in ant colonies. They find evidence that larger colony sizes favoured the evolution o...
🦠 Lifestyle plays a key role in shaping bacterial pangenomes 🦠 New research from @annadewar.bsky.social@stuwest.bsky.socialbit.ly/3wC8M0w
Bacteria with more variable lifestyles have more fluid pangenomes www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...@annadewar.bsky.social@lauriebelch.bsky.social
Why do pangenomes vary so much across bacteria? 🦠🧬 We show that bacterial lifestyle is the key factor shaping variation in pangenome fluidity. Read more in our paper out now in PNAS: doi.org/10.1073/pnas...@lauriebelch.bsky.social@stuwest.bsky.social
What is cooperation, and how is studied in bacteria? A super short primer: www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/jour...@digglelab.bsky.social !
Want to do a PhD in Biology, but not thinking about applying to Oxford? Come to this 2 day all expenses paid workshop to have your mind changed. envres.web.ox.ac.uk/2-day-applic...
Our new paper on plasmids and cooperation has been published today in Proceedings B! "Genes for cooperation are not more likely to be carried by plasmids." doi.org/10.1098/rspb...@lauriebelch.bsky.social@stuwest.bsky.social. Summary thread below... 🧵
It is great to see this story out in Nature Microbiol from Lingchong You with @stuwest.bsky.socialwww.nature.com/articles/s41...
