Zamin Iqbal
@zaminiqbal.bsky.social
Professor of Algorithmic and Microbial Genomics at the University of Bath (UK). Pangenomes, drug resistance (esp TB), data structures for DNA search, plasmid evolution, global microbial surveillance. Open Data, reproducibility
Pinned
Zamin Iqbal
@zaminiqbal.bsky.social
· Nov 14
Congratulations to @zaminiqbal.bsky.social from @milnerevolution.bsky.social on being awarded the 2026 Mary Lyon Medal!
Honoured and quite blown-over to receive this award. I have been, and continue to be, very lucky - first with great mentors, and then really prodigious students, postdocs and collaborators. Working with them has been a joy.
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
The BBC should be "impartial", but that doesn't mean refusing to make judgments.
A jury or a football referee should be "impartial": they should not be "partial", or prejudiced, to one side or other.
But that doesn't excuse them from making decisions. It's why we trust them to do so.
A jury or a football referee should be "impartial": they should not be "partial", or prejudiced, to one side or other.
But that doesn't excuse them from making decisions. It's why we trust them to do so.
January 8, 2026 at 8:38 AM
The BBC should be "impartial", but that doesn't mean refusing to make judgments.
A jury or a football referee should be "impartial": they should not be "partial", or prejudiced, to one side or other.
But that doesn't excuse them from making decisions. It's why we trust them to do so.
A jury or a football referee should be "impartial": they should not be "partial", or prejudiced, to one side or other.
But that doesn't excuse them from making decisions. It's why we trust them to do so.
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
I understand the pressures on the BBC, but Radio 4's coverage of the Minneapolis shooting is an example of "bad balance".
It's all "the Trump regime says she was a terrorist, but Democrats say it was murder".
The BBC has the footage. It doesn't have to treat truth and falsehood as equally valid.
It's all "the Trump regime says she was a terrorist, but Democrats say it was murder".
The BBC has the footage. It doesn't have to treat truth and falsehood as equally valid.
January 8, 2026 at 8:38 AM
I understand the pressures on the BBC, but Radio 4's coverage of the Minneapolis shooting is an example of "bad balance".
It's all "the Trump regime says she was a terrorist, but Democrats say it was murder".
The BBC has the footage. It doesn't have to treat truth and falsehood as equally valid.
It's all "the Trump regime says she was a terrorist, but Democrats say it was murder".
The BBC has the footage. It doesn't have to treat truth and falsehood as equally valid.
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
Creating bacterial genomic diversity through large-scale reconfigurations reveals phenotype robustness to organizational genome change
doi.org/10.64898/202...
doi.org/10.64898/202...
January 8, 2026 at 7:36 AM
Creating bacterial genomic diversity through large-scale reconfigurations reveals phenotype robustness to organizational genome change
doi.org/10.64898/202...
doi.org/10.64898/202...
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
ICE shot and killed someone in south Minneapolis
Live updates: Officials confirm ICE-involved shooting in south Minneapolis
Witnesses reported a person was shot in south Minneapolis on Wednesday morning, amid a large presence of federal law enforcement officers. It was not immediately clear who may have been shot, or who m...
www.mprnews.org
January 7, 2026 at 5:19 PM
ICE shot and killed someone in south Minneapolis
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
Non-British ECR interested in working with me on #bioarchaeology, the @britishacademy.bsky.social International Fellowship scheme will shortly open. V keen on Egyptian bioarchaeology, human evo or #disAbility research 🏺https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/funding/schemes/international-fellowships/
January 7, 2026 at 3:28 PM
Non-British ECR interested in working with me on #bioarchaeology, the @britishacademy.bsky.social International Fellowship scheme will shortly open. V keen on Egyptian bioarchaeology, human evo or #disAbility research 🏺https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/funding/schemes/international-fellowships/
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
Subtweet:
You do not feel safer in London *despite* it being more diverse than other towns.
You feel safer in London because it is generally safe, and there being a lot of brown people here has LITERALLY NOTHING to do with how safe you are.
You do not feel safer in London *despite* it being more diverse than other towns.
You feel safer in London because it is generally safe, and there being a lot of brown people here has LITERALLY NOTHING to do with how safe you are.
January 7, 2026 at 2:17 PM
Subtweet:
You do not feel safer in London *despite* it being more diverse than other towns.
You feel safer in London because it is generally safe, and there being a lot of brown people here has LITERALLY NOTHING to do with how safe you are.
You do not feel safer in London *despite* it being more diverse than other towns.
You feel safer in London because it is generally safe, and there being a lot of brown people here has LITERALLY NOTHING to do with how safe you are.
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
It has been a long road, but our paper on Klebsiella plasmids is finally out in Lancet Microbe. Thanks to all co authors but especially Marjorie Gibbon and Natacha Couto www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Convergence and global molecular epidemiology of Klebsiella pneumoniae plasmids harbouring the iuc3 virulence locus: a population genomic analysis
Klebsiella pneumoniae is an important pathogen of humans and animals. In the past five years, increasing reports of convergent strains that carry both…
www.sciencedirect.com
January 7, 2026 at 2:13 PM
It has been a long road, but our paper on Klebsiella plasmids is finally out in Lancet Microbe. Thanks to all co authors but especially Marjorie Gibbon and Natacha Couto www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
Now published in Algorithms for Molecular Biology: link.springer.com/article/10.1.... Key message: a tiny CNN model with 7k parameters can capture main splice signals across vertebrates+insect and halves the minimap2 & miniprot junction error rate. I always use this new feature now.
Preprint on "Improving spliced alignment by modeling splice sites with deep learning". It describes minisplice for modeling splice signals. Minimap2 and miniprot now optionally use the predicted scores to improve spliced alignment.
arxiv.org/abs/2506.12986
arxiv.org/abs/2506.12986
January 6, 2026 at 11:02 PM
Now published in Algorithms for Molecular Biology: link.springer.com/article/10.1.... Key message: a tiny CNN model with 7k parameters can capture main splice signals across vertebrates+insect and halves the minimap2 & miniprot junction error rate. I always use this new feature now.
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
Now published in Nature Biotechnology:
go.nature.com/44P7nSm
If you missed it, the TL;DR is in my April thread below
go.nature.com/44P7nSm
If you missed it, the TL;DR is in my April thread below
January 6, 2026 at 9:38 AM
Now published in Nature Biotechnology:
go.nature.com/44P7nSm
If you missed it, the TL;DR is in my April thread below
go.nature.com/44P7nSm
If you missed it, the TL;DR is in my April thread below
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
How delightful to start the year with a neat overview of the sequencing field from the most capable watcher of the space.
Sequencing Instrumrnt Outlook 2026
My observations & predictions on sequencing instrument companies
🧬🖥️
omicsomics.blogspot.com/2026/01/sequ...
My observations & predictions on sequencing instrument companies
🧬🖥️
omicsomics.blogspot.com/2026/01/sequ...
Sequencing Instrument Outlook 2026
A computational biologist's personal views on new technologies & publications on genomics & proteomics and their impact on drug discovery
omicsomics.blogspot.com
January 7, 2026 at 8:54 AM
How delightful to start the year with a neat overview of the sequencing field from the most capable watcher of the space.
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
“I want a progressive movement that is aggressively pro raising wages at the bottom and aggressively pro immigration. These are completely coherent goals.” Great piece by @polphilpod.bsky.social
www.liberalcurrents.com/we-need-to-g...
www.liberalcurrents.com/we-need-to-g...
We Need to Get Off The Defensive About Immigration
Free movement is a fantastic thing, and we should say it.
www.liberalcurrents.com
January 7, 2026 at 10:29 AM
“I want a progressive movement that is aggressively pro raising wages at the bottom and aggressively pro immigration. These are completely coherent goals.” Great piece by @polphilpod.bsky.social
www.liberalcurrents.com/we-need-to-g...
www.liberalcurrents.com/we-need-to-g...
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
New paper up - inspired by the periodic table of the elements, we attempted to organize bacterial diversity in genome-inferred trait space academic.oup.com/ismej/advanc...
Constructing a “periodic table” of bacteria to map diversity in trait space
Abstract. Despite an ever-expanding number of bacterial taxa being discovered, many of these taxa remain uncharacterized with unknown traits and environmen
academic.oup.com
January 6, 2026 at 7:31 PM
New paper up - inspired by the periodic table of the elements, we attempted to organize bacterial diversity in genome-inferred trait space academic.oup.com/ismej/advanc...
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
“We are locked into a battle we did not seek and our timidity is keeping us on the defensive. It isn’t working. Our pessimism is self-fullfiling.” www.liberalcurrents.com/we-need-to-g...
We Need to Get Off The Defensive About Immigration
Free movement is a fantastic thing, and we should say it.
www.liberalcurrents.com
January 7, 2026 at 11:08 AM
“We are locked into a battle we did not seek and our timidity is keeping us on the defensive. It isn’t working. Our pessimism is self-fullfiling.” www.liberalcurrents.com/we-need-to-g...
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... It's finally out! Meriam Guellil expertly led this project from the first HHV6 detection to the final paper. We found both human herpesviruses 6A and 6B in ancient remains going back 2500 years.
January 2, 2026 at 7:53 PM
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... It's finally out! Meriam Guellil expertly led this project from the first HHV6 detection to the final paper. We found both human herpesviruses 6A and 6B in ancient remains going back 2500 years.
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
Our paper on the first ancient Human betaherpesvirus 6 A/B (HHV-6) genomes is published in Science Advances! 🥳
In collaboration with @virologyhouldcroft.bsky.social @lucyvandorp.bsky.social @lehtisaag.bsky.social @ktambets.bsky.social & other amazing researchers!
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
In collaboration with @virologyhouldcroft.bsky.social @lucyvandorp.bsky.social @lehtisaag.bsky.social @ktambets.bsky.social & other amazing researchers!
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Tracing 2500 years of human betaherpesvirus 6A and 6B diversity through ancient DNA
First ancient HHV-6 genomes reveal 2500 years of phylogenetic continuity and provide insights into the endogenization of HHV-6A.
www.science.org
January 5, 2026 at 3:14 PM
Our paper on the first ancient Human betaherpesvirus 6 A/B (HHV-6) genomes is published in Science Advances! 🥳
In collaboration with @virologyhouldcroft.bsky.social @lucyvandorp.bsky.social @lehtisaag.bsky.social @ktambets.bsky.social & other amazing researchers!
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
In collaboration with @virologyhouldcroft.bsky.social @lucyvandorp.bsky.social @lehtisaag.bsky.social @ktambets.bsky.social & other amazing researchers!
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
“[P]utting data into GISAID is like dropping it in a mail slot in an unmarked building,” says @colincarlson.bsky.social. “It’s wonderful that there’s so much cool stuff in that building. It would be great if we knew who owned it, or who paid for it, or what they plan to do with it.”
#IDsky 🧪
#IDsky 🧪
Fresh conflicts erupt around giant database for flu and COVID-19 sequences
Critics say “autocratic” behavior by GISAID could hamper response to a future pandemic
www.science.org
January 7, 2026 at 9:51 AM
“[P]utting data into GISAID is like dropping it in a mail slot in an unmarked building,” says @colincarlson.bsky.social. “It’s wonderful that there’s so much cool stuff in that building. It would be great if we knew who owned it, or who paid for it, or what they plan to do with it.”
#IDsky 🧪
#IDsky 🧪
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
Absolutely fucking tremendous from the FT.
Who’s who at X, the deepfake porn site formerly known as Twitter
A look inside Elon Musk’s big tent
www.ft.com
January 6, 2026 at 4:53 PM
Absolutely fucking tremendous from the FT.
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
US President Donald Trump has been discussing "a range of options" to acquire Greenland, including use of the military, the White House said.
Trump is completely unhinged
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Trump is completely unhinged
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
US discussing options to acquire Greenland, including use of military - White House
It came as European allies rallied behind Denmark, which is pushing back against Trump's ambitions for the Arctic island.
www.bbc.co.uk
January 7, 2026 at 6:30 AM
US President Donald Trump has been discussing "a range of options" to acquire Greenland, including use of the military, the White House said.
Trump is completely unhinged
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Trump is completely unhinged
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
I see some replies that this can't happen because Republicans control both houses. First, democrats can at least try. If the goal is to make sure everyone knows this is unacceptable, the effort is worth as much as the outcome. Second, we shouldn't let Republicans off the hook. They have agency.
January 6, 2026 at 9:33 PM
I see some replies that this can't happen because Republicans control both houses. First, democrats can at least try. If the goal is to make sure everyone knows this is unacceptable, the effort is worth as much as the outcome. Second, we shouldn't let Republicans off the hook. They have agency.
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
get him out of office so these fucking lunatics don't try to TAKE GREENLAND BY FORCE
impeach him. try to do it once a month, if necessary. build the case over and over to not just the American people but to the world that this isn’t the way things should be here, that this isn’t the way we should use our power abroad.
January 6, 2026 at 9:16 PM
get him out of office so these fucking lunatics don't try to TAKE GREENLAND BY FORCE
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
New preprint from my lab (with Arya Kaul, @fernpizza.bsky.social, and @brinda.eu), in which we explore new genes hitchhiking on the beneficial deletion that fused them together, and find them in the LTEE, M. Tb/bovis, and across the bacterial tree of life
Novel genes arise from genomic deletions across the bacterial tree of life https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.01.05.697752v1
January 6, 2026 at 4:12 PM
New preprint from my lab (with Arya Kaul, @fernpizza.bsky.social, and @brinda.eu), in which we explore new genes hitchhiking on the beneficial deletion that fused them together, and find them in the LTEE, M. Tb/bovis, and across the bacterial tree of life
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
🎉 New year, NEW PREPRINT!
Bacteria exhibit astonishing genetic diversity, but where do new genes come from?
My best friend Arya Kaul (/labmate in the @baym lab) investigates how advantageous deletions can spawn new genes - "deletion-born fusions." 🧵:
Bacteria exhibit astonishing genetic diversity, but where do new genes come from?
My best friend Arya Kaul (/labmate in the @baym lab) investigates how advantageous deletions can spawn new genes - "deletion-born fusions." 🧵:
Novel genes arise from genomic deletions across the bacterial tree of life https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.01.05.697752v1
January 6, 2026 at 4:09 PM
🎉 New year, NEW PREPRINT!
Bacteria exhibit astonishing genetic diversity, but where do new genes come from?
My best friend Arya Kaul (/labmate in the @baym lab) investigates how advantageous deletions can spawn new genes - "deletion-born fusions." 🧵:
Bacteria exhibit astonishing genetic diversity, but where do new genes come from?
My best friend Arya Kaul (/labmate in the @baym lab) investigates how advantageous deletions can spawn new genes - "deletion-born fusions." 🧵:
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
Applying the prefix-suffix approach to type strains from 5 commonly studied bacteria (E. coli, N. gonorr., M. tubercul., Strep. pneumo., C. jejuni) we find deletion-born fusions across the bacterial Tree of Life:
January 6, 2026 at 4:09 PM
Applying the prefix-suffix approach to type strains from 5 commonly studied bacteria (E. coli, N. gonorr., M. tubercul., Strep. pneumo., C. jejuni) we find deletion-born fusions across the bacterial Tree of Life:
Reposted by Zamin Iqbal
It's not just in the lab. During the M. tuberculosis–M. bovis split, we found 2 deletion-born fusions:
🔹 acrR-glcD
🔹 mlaE-htpX
These arose during speciation and persist in natural populations today.
🔹 acrR-glcD
🔹 mlaE-htpX
These arose during speciation and persist in natural populations today.
January 6, 2026 at 4:09 PM
It's not just in the lab. During the M. tuberculosis–M. bovis split, we found 2 deletion-born fusions:
🔹 acrR-glcD
🔹 mlaE-htpX
These arose during speciation and persist in natural populations today.
🔹 acrR-glcD
🔹 mlaE-htpX
These arose during speciation and persist in natural populations today.