Congratulations to James

Congrats to James Burgon who has been awarded funding from the Systematics Research Fund  (Linnean Society of London and the Systematics Association) for his phylogenomics research on salamanders.

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NEW PAPER: landscape genomics reveal that oviparous and viviparous lizards have innately different population patterns

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In a neat mix of some spatial genetic autocorrelation analyses (which I got excited about during my PhD on leaf litter frogs ) and life history strategies, we have published a new paper on oviparous and viviparous lizards. We find that even in the same environment, ie at the same site, the different parity modes have different scales of dispersal and different population densities. See details below. To do this study we reanalysed population level data collected in the study Hans led on the genomic basis of parity mode phenotypes now looking only at pure ovi/vivi individuals. This is unusual because most often these lineages are found in very different environments, which is a confound if we wanted to explore contrasts in their life histories and demographies. Parity-specific differences in spatial genetics and dispersal in the common lizard Abstract: Dispersal is a key demographic parameter that plays an important role in determining spatial population dynamics and genetic structure....
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New paper: Review paper on epigenetics in colouration

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 New paper from final year PhD student Nic Strowbridge. Nic's PhD looks at epitranscriptomics in different skin colour of salamanders. Methylation is a top new topic spurred on by advances in sequencing technology (which Nic is also using!) Using that momentum and finding lots of literature gap, Nic led this excellent and topical review paper. Check it out here - Open access!  Nicholas Strowbridge, David R. Vieites, Michael G. Ritchie, Kathryn R. Elmer. 2025. Contributions of epigenomic and epitranscriptomic methylation to animal colouration. Trends in Genetics  Abstract Due to its high variation and its diversity of functional roles, animal colouration has long been a fascinating phenotype for geneticists. While the loci underpinning colour are relatively well known, there remain components of unexplained variation. The contribution of DNA and RNA methylation to these molecular mechanisms of colouration is only now being explored. Recent research has shown that DNA (m 5...
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NEW PAPER: Dollo's law and evolutionary reversals

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 Published this week is a new paper I wrote with Jean Clobert, asking 'how to study (putative) evolutionary reversals?' We look at the current state of agreement about what is needed, provide some history and context to the arguments about Dollo's law, and finally propose a roadmap for how to test evolutionary reversals now that we are in the so-called post-genomic era.  Open access paper available in Trends in Ecology and Evolution Thanks to TULIP for funding a research visit that let me work on this paper at SETE Abstract Dollo’s law of irreversibility argues that evolution cannot revert to earlier states. It has remained controversial ever since its inception in the 19th century. Enabled by advances in phylogenomics and functional genomics, recent studies show that there are very likely some cases of ‘breaking Dollo’s law’. As post-genomic research grows from showing patterns to revealing processes, new emphasis is needed on the molecular mechanisms by which Dollo’s law...
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