Richard Benton
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bentonlab.bsky.social
Richard Benton
@bentonlab.bsky.social
Professor at the University of Lausanne interested in genetics, neuroscience and evolution
Pinned
Deadline for this post-doc position in my lab extended to Jan 11th!
I'm looking to recruit a post-doc to help push forward our growing interests in insect ecotoxicology.
Apply here by Nov 30th!
(thanks for reposting)

career5.successfactors.eu/sfcareer/job...
Career Opportunities: Posdoctoral researcher in toxin susceptibility and evolution of resistance in insects (22517)
career5.successfactors.eu
Reposted by Richard Benton
JOB ALERT: Operations Director (DCI–Lausanne).
The DCI, a joint initiative of EPFL, UNIL, UNIGE and UNIBE, is recruiting an Operations Director to lead the cryo-EM facility in Lausanne.
📩 Questions: CEO of the DCI: @chgenoud.bsky.social
🔗 Apply here: careers.epfl.ch/job/Lausanne...
December 17, 2025 at 12:00 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Scientists around former IMP group leader David Keays (@lmumuenchen.bsky.social show that #pigeons detect magnetic fields through their inner ear. Their discovery was now published in the journal @science.org: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
More: www.imp.ac.at/news/article...
A global screen for magnetically induced neuronal activity in the pigeon brain
How animals detect the Earth’s magnetic field remains a mystery in sensory biology. Despite extensive behavioral evidence, the neural circuitry and molecular mechanisms responsible for magnetic sensin...
www.science.org
November 20, 2025 at 7:17 PM
You could read my Dispatch, but only as a teaser for two brilliant papers from Bogdan Sieriebriennikov (Desplan lab) and Giacomo Glotzer (Kronauer lab), which you *must* read.

Olfactory receptors: Making sense (and antisense) of monogenic expression: Current Biology www.cell.com/current-biol...
Olfactory receptors: Making sense (and antisense) of monogenic expression
Monogenic expression of odorant receptors (ORs) in individual sensory neurons is a hallmark of olfactory systems in insects and vertebrates. New studies highlight how transcriptional interference and ...
www.cell.com
December 15, 2025 at 3:47 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Hofstra Biology is hiring (again!): a tenure-track position in microbiology. Come join our collegial and rapidly growing dept. Small class sizes, hands on learning and research, manageable teaching loads and real startup. Please reach out for more info!
December 13, 2025 at 1:38 PM
Deadline for this post-doc position in my lab extended to Jan 11th!
I'm looking to recruit a post-doc to help push forward our growing interests in insect ecotoxicology.
Apply here by Nov 30th!
(thanks for reposting)

career5.successfactors.eu/sfcareer/job...
Career Opportunities: Posdoctoral researcher in toxin susceptibility and evolution of resistance in insects (22517)
career5.successfactors.eu
December 12, 2025 at 3:01 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Have you ever wondered what you would find if you could keep your eyes on a bee for more than a few meters? Us, too!

preprint (with videos!) + thread 🧵

Precise, individualized foraging flights in honey #bees 🐝 revealed by multicopter drone-based tracking

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

1/9
December 6, 2025 at 2:01 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Congrats Enrico!!!! 🎉 🥳
November 27, 2025 at 11:34 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Excited to share the latest work from the lab:
rdcu.be/eRWuD

Great team effort, led by @enriberti.bsky.social first at @unil.bsky.social and now @unifr.bsky.social; with fantastic collaborators @ribeirocarlitos.bsky.social and @dahaniel.muench.bio.
Evolution of taste processing shifts dietary preference
Nature - Calcium imaging of taste neurons and the ventral brain provides insight into evolutionary divergence of food choice in Drosophila species, supporting a role of sensorimotor processing in...
rdcu.be
November 27, 2025 at 8:36 AM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Our preprint doi.org/10.1101/2025... getting media coverage (!)
November 24, 2025 at 11:16 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Our preprint is out! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Peter Skovorodnikov and I are excited to present FERAL: a new video-understanding toolkit that maps raw video directly to behavior, no pose estimation required.
It works across species, from lab to field, and even in collective systems. (🧵1/n)
FERAL: A Video-Understanding System for Direct Video-to-Behavior Mapping
Animal behavior unfolds continuously in time, yet quantitative analyses often require segmenting it into discrete, interpretable states. Although manual annotation can achieve this, it remains slow, s...
www.biorxiv.org
November 19, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
@rorycoleman.bsky.social and I wrote an opinion piece called

'From neurons to novelty: Circuit mechanisms shaping courtship evolution'

We argue that now is a great time for neuro-evo research

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
From neurons to novelty: Circuit mechanisms shaping courtship evolution
The vast diversity of animal behaviors has long inspired ethologists and neuroscientists, but circuit mechanisms driving this variation remain elusive…
www.sciencedirect.com
November 17, 2025 at 8:57 AM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Job Alert! The Institute for Neuro- and Behavioural Biology at the Faculty of Biology @uni-muenster.de invites applications for a Full Professorship (W3) in “Systems Neuroscience” - Highly attractive research environment at the Multiscale Imaging Center. Apply by January 5th. See shorturl.at/VczFp
November 12, 2025 at 5:42 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
🌍Open call: Junior Group Leader positions!

Join a world-class biomedical research institute at the heart of the Vienna BioCenter, where curiosity drives discovery.

Lead your own lab, pursue bold ideas, and shape the future of science at the IMP: www.imp.ac.at/career/open-...
November 10, 2025 at 1:26 PM
Jérôme Mermet's developmental snRNA-seq atlas of living and dying neuronal lineages in the olfactory system (and much functional follow-up) reveal this "highly stereotyped" sensory system is not quite as precise as we assumed, and what it might mean for how olfactory pathways evolve:
rdcu.be/eM8fP
Multilayer regulation underlies the functional precision and evolutionary potential of the olfactory system
Nature Communications - How sensory neurons generate both functional precision and evolutionary flexibility remains unresolved. Here authors generate snRNA-seq atlas of Drosophila’s olfactory...
rdcu.be
October 28, 2025 at 5:15 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
📢 Applications open for a 𝗧𝗲𝗻𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝗰𝗸 𝗔𝘀𝘀𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝘁 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗳𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗼𝗿 𝘁𝗼𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗱𝘀 𝗔𝘀𝘀𝗼𝗰𝗶𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗳𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗼𝗿 in #plant-organism #interactions
at the Department of Plant Molecular Biology
❗ Deadline: November 30th

More info 👉 career5.successfactors.eu/career?caree...

#joboffer @unil.bsky.social @nikogeldner.bsky.social
Opportunités de carrière : DBMV: Professeur-e assist. en PTC à PAS en interactions plantes-organismes (22484)
career5.successfactors.eu
October 23, 2025 at 8:00 AM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Structure-informed phylogenetic inference with FoldTree outperforms sequence-only trees on divergent proteins, and untangles RRNPPA quorum-sensing receptors across Gram-positive bacteria & phages. Work led by David Moi (www.linkedin.com/in/david-moi) Paper: doi.org/10.1038/s415...
October 23, 2025 at 6:13 AM
Reposted by Richard Benton
TT faculty job opening in #Neuroscience!
We are looking for a colleague to join us in our fantastic Biology Department and Neuroscience Program at Brandeis. We are a group of *very* collaborative, supportive, and productive scientists (& humans!) so please apply
academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/30961
Brandeis University, Biology Department
Job #AJO30961, Assistant Professor in Biology and Neuroscience Program, Biology Department, Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts, US
academicjobsonline.org
October 22, 2025 at 11:28 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
🧠🌟🐭 Excited to share some of my postdoc work on the evolution of dexterity!

We compared deer mice evolved in forest vs prairie habitats. We found that forest mice have:
(1) more corticospinal neurons (CSNs)
(2) better hand dexterity
(3) more dexterous climbing, which is linked to CSN number🧵
October 22, 2025 at 8:41 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
There is still “an urgent need for donations from the community,” says Eric Lai, president of the Fly Board.

By @callimcflurry.bsky.social

#neuroskyence

www.thetransmitter.org/community/fl...
FlyBase secures funding for year, but future still uncertain
The FlyBase team’s fundraising efforts have proven successful in the short term, but restoration of its federal grant remains uncertain.
www.thetransmitter.org
October 21, 2025 at 6:23 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Despite the mess, we are grateful to be funded, have exciting science happening, and have an opening for a postdoc!

If you are interested in sensory biology and esp in cilia, thermosensation, or interoception, and would like to join an interactive & supportive group - please email.

Please RT 🙏
October 16, 2025 at 5:29 PM
I'm looking to recruit a post-doc to help push forward our growing interests in insect ecotoxicology.
Apply here by Nov 30th!
(thanks for reposting)

career5.successfactors.eu/sfcareer/job...
Career Opportunities: Posdoctoral researcher in toxin susceptibility and evolution of resistance in insects (22517)
career5.successfactors.eu
October 16, 2025 at 12:18 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
We're now recruiting early career group leaders at the Crick to lead ambitious research programmes and explore bold scientific questions.

Hear our Director, Edith Heard, explain why the Crick is a unique place for curiosity-driven research.

Apply now ➡️ www.crick.ac.uk/careers-stud...
October 9, 2025 at 2:06 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
We are recruiting PhD students! If you are interested in evolutionary neuroscience, consider applying: www.crick.ac.uk/careers-stud...
Prieto Godino Lab | Cellular and molecular bases of neural circuit and behavioural evolution
www.crick.ac.uk
October 8, 2025 at 8:51 PM
Reposted by Richard Benton
Please spread the word! 10 days left to apply for this #sciencejobs as Assistant Professor Tenure Track in Quantitative Cell Biology 👩‍🔬
@izb-unibern.bsky.social @unibe.ch! ohws.prospective.ch/public/v1/jo...
#QueerInSTEM #DisabledInSTEM #BlackInSTEM #WomenInSTEM #CarersInSTEM #AcademicSky #HigherED
Uni Bern: Assistant Professor with tenure-track for Quantitative Cell Biology
Start date of employment: anticipated for August 2027
ohws.prospective.ch
October 7, 2025 at 11:17 AM