I do a hybrid approach with interactive lectures using the white board and slides. Then I’ll assign primary lit reading and have them breakout into small groups for discussion questions on the other day of the week. Walk around and engage with each group. I love it 📚

Details and application info:
🔗 smu.edu/dedman/academics/departments/earth-sciences/graduate

Funding + microbes = happiness.

DM or email if you’re ready to dive in.

We study how microbial lineages evolve and assemble linking genomes, metabolites, and ecological roles. Fieldwork, mass specs, metagenomes, and a bit of chaos.

🧬 PhDs are fully funded (tuition, stipend, the works). Additional competitive fellowships are available through SMU’s grad school.

I somewhat agree with what you’re saying. But our point was that these terms are used interchangeably all. The. Time. And no one defines them (or at least consistently), especially when considering evolution in microbiomes. Personally, I like using biology to define, but this is a frame of ref 🤷🏻‍♂️

If you want something very simple but does a great job visualizing. Just need input genbank files:

github.com/gamcil/clinker

and another recent one giving some ecological context to RiPPs in the human gut: five AIPs effectively inhibit the biofilm formation of disease-associated pathogens
www.nature.com/articles/s41...