taylor cooper
@iamtaylornotyou.bsky.social
As an Evolutionary Biologist, I can confirm lizards are cool.
PhD Student | Stroud Lab | Georgia Tech
PhD Student | Stroud Lab | Georgia Tech
Reposted by taylor cooper
While stories of singular DNA changes that drove evolution of human brain/behaviour remain seductive, advances across multiple fields of biology cast doubt on such simplistic narratives of our origins. A new paper from my lab shows how biobanks may speak to this fundamental question.🧪
Explainer🧵👇1/n
Explainer🧵👇1/n
Evaluating the effects of archaic protein-altering variants in living human adults
Promise and pitfalls of using large biobanks to study impacts of archaic protein-coding variants in living humans.
www.science.org
December 18, 2025 at 1:51 PM
While stories of singular DNA changes that drove evolution of human brain/behaviour remain seductive, advances across multiple fields of biology cast doubt on such simplistic narratives of our origins. A new paper from my lab shows how biobanks may speak to this fundamental question.🧪
Explainer🧵👇1/n
Explainer🧵👇1/n
Reposted by taylor cooper
Or just don’t use acronyms.
Acronyms are almost always bad for readers because of the cognitive and memory load.
Acronyms are nice for typing when you’re in a hurry and don’t want to keep repeating lots of words.
So just use find and replace to clean up your manuscript before submitting.
Acronyms are almost always bad for readers because of the cognitive and memory load.
Acronyms are nice for typing when you’re in a hurry and don’t want to keep repeating lots of words.
So just use find and replace to clean up your manuscript before submitting.
Acronyms in academic papers should have clickable pop-ups that describe what they are.
Sometimes I just want to read the method/results and not have to dig through the intro for all the initial instances of the acronym.
Sometimes I just want to read the method/results and not have to dig through the intro for all the initial instances of the acronym.
December 13, 2025 at 6:14 PM
Or just don’t use acronyms.
Acronyms are almost always bad for readers because of the cognitive and memory load.
Acronyms are nice for typing when you’re in a hurry and don’t want to keep repeating lots of words.
So just use find and replace to clean up your manuscript before submitting.
Acronyms are almost always bad for readers because of the cognitive and memory load.
Acronyms are nice for typing when you’re in a hurry and don’t want to keep repeating lots of words.
So just use find and replace to clean up your manuscript before submitting.
Reposted by taylor cooper
Took me a year (😱), but I finally published a blog post about our article on the #quantgen variance partition of phenitypic plasticity with @lmchev.bsky.social, published in @peercomjournal.bsky.social.
🇬🇧 devillemereuil.legtux.org/quantitative...
🇫🇷 devillemereuil.legtux.org/fr/genetique...
🇬🇧 devillemereuil.legtux.org/quantitative...
🇫🇷 devillemereuil.legtux.org/fr/genetique...
Quantitative genetics of reaction norms: an onion partitionning – Pierre de Villemereuil
devillemereuil.legtux.org
December 10, 2025 at 10:48 AM
Took me a year (😱), but I finally published a blog post about our article on the #quantgen variance partition of phenitypic plasticity with @lmchev.bsky.social, published in @peercomjournal.bsky.social.
🇬🇧 devillemereuil.legtux.org/quantitative...
🇫🇷 devillemereuil.legtux.org/fr/genetique...
🇬🇧 devillemereuil.legtux.org/quantitative...
🇫🇷 devillemereuil.legtux.org/fr/genetique...
Reposted by taylor cooper
One of my neighbors has been putting up these fish facts posters. All kinds of different fish, marine, freshwater, deep, shallow, all kinds. This is a good one. “Stg this real fish” took me out. Good work, neighbor.
December 7, 2025 at 3:39 PM
One of my neighbors has been putting up these fish facts posters. All kinds of different fish, marine, freshwater, deep, shallow, all kinds. This is a good one. “Stg this real fish” took me out. Good work, neighbor.
I love Letters to a Pre-Scientist week! This round, my pre-scientist pen pal (whose stem interest was "not at all") asked me about cool lizards. I doubt they've ever seen this buff worm! (Mexican worm lizard, Bipes biporus)
December 3, 2025 at 4:49 PM
I love Letters to a Pre-Scientist week! This round, my pre-scientist pen pal (whose stem interest was "not at all") asked me about cool lizards. I doubt they've ever seen this buff worm! (Mexican worm lizard, Bipes biporus)
Reposted by taylor cooper
Somehow these peas also require 10x the normal amount of water to boil.
![[Scene is a kitchen - a middle aged woman called JANET is boiling peas at the stove. A younger more colourfully dressed woman named LIZ approached her.]
JANET:
Ugh...
LIZ:
What's up?
JANET:
I am so bored of cooking peas!
LIZ:
Have you tried...
AI peas?
JANET:
AI peas?
LIZ:
They're peas with AI!
[Liz holds up to us a packet of peas labelled: Pea-i AI - Peas with AI].
LIZ:
Al-powered peas harness the potential of your peas
JANET:
What
LIZ [Now a voiceover as we cut to a whizzy technology diagram of peas all connected by meaningless dotted lines]
Why not take your peas to the next level with Al Peas' new Al tools to power your peas?
[Show a techno diagram of a pea with a label reading 'AI' pointing to a random zone in it]
LIZ:
Each pea has Al in a way we haven't quite worked out yet but it's fine
[Show Janet and Liz now in a Matrix-style world of peas]
LIZ:
With Al peas you can supercharge productivity and make AI work for your peas!
JANET:
What
LIZ:
Shut up
LIZ:
Our game-changing Pea-Al gives you the freedom to unlock the potential of the power of the future of your peas workflow
From opening the bag of peas
to boiling the peas
to eating the peas
To spending millions on adding Al to the peas and then having to work out what that even means.
JANET:
Is it really necessary to-
LIZ [Grabbing Janet by the collar]:
THE PEAS HAVE GOT AI, JANET
[Cut to an advert ending screen, with the bag of peas and the slogan:
AI PEAS: Just 'Peas' for god's sake buy the AI peas.
[Ends]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:4m3we4apbjayclzcnhwe3pfp/bafkreiayqa37f7kik7l7s7fbtfp2sir5ckb662ry2lylinyjrfa2rkvvka@jpeg)
November 13, 2025 at 6:50 PM
Somehow these peas also require 10x the normal amount of water to boil.
Curly-taileds are some of my favorite lizards, but unfortunately we don’t have them in Georgia… or do we?? One of the best things I’ve found in a cracker barrel parking lot! Check it out now in Reptiles & Amphibians journals.ku.edu/reptilesanda...
November 13, 2025 at 7:24 PM
Curly-taileds are some of my favorite lizards, but unfortunately we don’t have them in Georgia… or do we?? One of the best things I’ve found in a cracker barrel parking lot! Check it out now in Reptiles & Amphibians journals.ku.edu/reptilesanda...
Reposted by taylor cooper
Warning. ⚠️ If you are writing an NSF GRFP, new this year, you need official transcripts to apply. Beware. They will not review applications without official transcripts. ‼️
November 4, 2025 at 8:50 PM
Warning. ⚠️ If you are writing an NSF GRFP, new this year, you need official transcripts to apply. Beware. They will not review applications without official transcripts. ‼️
lizard rage (n): a feeling that results from a lizard evading you multiple times, slipping the loop, or otherwise getting the better of you. May result in yelling obscenities, throwing and/or breaking your pole, and a foul mood.
November 2, 2025 at 9:16 PM
lizard rage (n): a feeling that results from a lizard evading you multiple times, slipping the loop, or otherwise getting the better of you. May result in yelling obscenities, throwing and/or breaking your pole, and a foul mood.
Reposted by taylor cooper
Thank you Python Software Foundation:
“Ultimately, however, the value of the work and the size of the grant were not more important than practicing our values and retaining the freedom to support every part of our community.”
pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-...
“Ultimately, however, the value of the work and the size of the grant were not more important than practicing our values and retaining the freedom to support every part of our community.”
pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-...
The PSF has withdrawn a $1.5 million proposal to US government grant program
In January 2025, the PSF submitted a proposal to the US government National Science Foundation under the Safety, Security, and Privacy of Op...
pyfound.blogspot.com
October 31, 2025 at 1:15 PM
Thank you Python Software Foundation:
“Ultimately, however, the value of the work and the size of the grant were not more important than practicing our values and retaining the freedom to support every part of our community.”
pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-...
“Ultimately, however, the value of the work and the size of the grant were not more important than practicing our values and retaining the freedom to support every part of our community.”
pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-...
Very exciting, but the real question is does Arghap36 explain why my orange boy ACTS like an orange boy. iykyk
Last year, two teams have independently found the long-awaited mutation and discovered a protein that influences hair color in a way never seen before in any animal.
Learn more on #NationalCatDay: https://scim.ag/3LdWP8b
Learn more on #NationalCatDay: https://scim.ag/3LdWP8b
October 29, 2025 at 5:29 PM
Very exciting, but the real question is does Arghap36 explain why my orange boy ACTS like an orange boy. iykyk
Reposted by taylor cooper
I wrote about an absolute diva
defector.com/fat-and-sass...
defector.com/fat-and-sass...
Fat AND Sassy? A Three-Legged Lizard Really Can Have It All | Defector
Decades ago, the evolutionary biologist Jonathan Losos found himself chasing a lizard around an island in the Bahamas. The island was little more than mound of craggy limestone the size of a baseball ...
defector.com
October 29, 2025 at 4:26 PM
I wrote about an absolute diva
defector.com/fat-and-sass...
defector.com/fat-and-sass...
Always love working down in Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden.
Catching some great lizards all day every day and teaching high school students how we use them to study ecology and evolution.
Can’t imagine a better gig!
Catching some great lizards all day every day and teaching high school students how we use them to study ecology and evolution.
Can’t imagine a better gig!
October 27, 2025 at 7:25 PM
Always love working down in Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden.
Catching some great lizards all day every day and teaching high school students how we use them to study ecology and evolution.
Can’t imagine a better gig!
Catching some great lizards all day every day and teaching high school students how we use them to study ecology and evolution.
Can’t imagine a better gig!
Amazing symposium on Sex and Gender at #Evol2025 So grateful to all the speakers for bringing us together to think about how to teach and communicate these complex topics @jacanamama.bsky.social Thomas Sanger @bio-eddy.bsky.social @cissyballen.bsky.social
June 24, 2025 at 4:27 PM
Amazing symposium on Sex and Gender at #Evol2025 So grateful to all the speakers for bringing us together to think about how to teach and communicate these complex topics @jacanamama.bsky.social Thomas Sanger @bio-eddy.bsky.social @cissyballen.bsky.social
Do proportional changes in neurons underlie behavioral divergence in Lake Malawi cichlids? Come to my talk at 4:15 in Olympia 1 to find out! #Evol2025
June 21, 2025 at 12:42 PM
Do proportional changes in neurons underlie behavioral divergence in Lake Malawi cichlids? Come to my talk at 4:15 in Olympia 1 to find out! #Evol2025
Had such an amazing time at the 2025 Evolutionary and Quantitative Genetics Workshop! Thanks so much to the amazing organizers and participants @pseudacris.bsky.social @lauraalencar.bsky.social @joelmcglothlin.bsky.social Patrick Carter, Jacqueline Sztepanacz, & Joe Felsendtein
June 20, 2025 at 12:11 PM
Had such an amazing time at the 2025 Evolutionary and Quantitative Genetics Workshop! Thanks so much to the amazing organizers and participants @pseudacris.bsky.social @lauraalencar.bsky.social @joelmcglothlin.bsky.social Patrick Carter, Jacqueline Sztepanacz, & Joe Felsendtein
Reposted by taylor cooper
Please share! JOIN THE LAB! We are looking to recruit a motivated reserach technician to assist with field research on restoration and lidar data collection in #longleaf pine at the beautiful @thejonesctr.bsky.social Apps due July 6 jonesctr.org/wp-content/u...
June 20, 2025 at 11:49 AM
Please share! JOIN THE LAB! We are looking to recruit a motivated reserach technician to assist with field research on restoration and lidar data collection in #longleaf pine at the beautiful @thejonesctr.bsky.social Apps due July 6 jonesctr.org/wp-content/u...
Reposted by taylor cooper
Hot off the press 📣: one of the most surprising and unsettling findings of my PhD. A novel social tradition emerged in the tool-using white-faced capuchins of Jicarón island… abducting and carrying the infants of another species. Thread with gifs, videos, and all the bizarre details 👇
Humans have many unusual traditions. But did you know animals’ strange behaviors can become culture too? Out now in Current Biology (doi.org/10.1016/j.cu...) we show the rise and spread of a surprising tradition: interspecies infant abduction. Interactive timeline (www.ab.mpg.de/671374) 🧵 (1/12)
May 19, 2025 at 3:08 PM
Hot off the press 📣: one of the most surprising and unsettling findings of my PhD. A novel social tradition emerged in the tool-using white-faced capuchins of Jicarón island… abducting and carrying the infants of another species. Thread with gifs, videos, and all the bizarre details 👇
Reposted by taylor cooper
Convergent evolution of "smelling like rotting meat" is mediated by a 3 amino-acid chance in a conserved enzymes, just out @science.org 🔽
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Convergent acquisition of disulfide-forming enzymes in malodorous flowers
Identifying the metabolic and genetic changes that confer evolutionary novelty is essential for understanding the factors facilitating or constraining the occurrence of traits. We show that dimethyl d...
www.science.org
May 8, 2025 at 7:18 PM
Convergent evolution of "smelling like rotting meat" is mediated by a 3 amino-acid chance in a conserved enzymes, just out @science.org 🔽
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Reposted by taylor cooper
Green anole, originally from tropical Cuba, have evolved to live in this. Wut.
@iamtaylornotyou.bsky.social
🦎🦎🦎
@iamtaylornotyou.bsky.social
🦎🦎🦎
January 10, 2025 at 1:42 PM
Green anole, originally from tropical Cuba, have evolved to live in this. Wut.
@iamtaylornotyou.bsky.social
🦎🦎🦎
@iamtaylornotyou.bsky.social
🦎🦎🦎
Reposted by taylor cooper
Reposted by taylor cooper
Running away isn't always the best strategy, simply staying put and hoping the danger will pass can be better, & now Damián Oliva & co show that signals in the mudflat crab's MLG1 neurons trigger freezing when the crab is at risk from a distant threat
journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/...
journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/...
November 27, 2024 at 4:44 PM
Running away isn't always the best strategy, simply staying put and hoping the danger will pass can be better, & now Damián Oliva & co show that signals in the mudflat crab's MLG1 neurons trigger freezing when the crab is at risk from a distant threat
journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/...
journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/...
Reposted by taylor cooper
Our big collaboration on anglerfish diversity is out today in @natureecoevo.bsky.social. THREAD PART 1
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reduced evolutionary constraint accompanies ongoing radiation in deep-sea anglerfishes - Nature Ecology & Evolution
Based on phylogenomic and geometric morphometric analyses of 132 anglerfish species, the authors infer a Cretaceous origin of the clade and show that bathypelagic anglerfish are undergoing rapid pheno...
www.nature.com
November 27, 2024 at 6:20 PM
Our big collaboration on anglerfish diversity is out today in @natureecoevo.bsky.social. THREAD PART 1
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by taylor cooper
November 19, 2024 at 3:38 PM