Rósa S. Gísladóttir
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rosagisladottir.bsky.social
Rósa S. Gísladóttir
@rosagisladottir.bsky.social
Linguist, cognitive neuroscientist and wannabe geneticist. Associate Professor at University of Iceland. Views are my own. https://uni.hi.is/rosas and https://english.hi.is/staff/rosas
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Look at that cool cover of @cp-trendsgenetics.bsky.social featuring my forum article on genetics of human communication 🎯 The article is short and accessible, see link in 🧵
📣 Our August issue is live!

In addition to human communication (see cover), topics include newborn screening, genomic recording, CASTs, sex differences in the aging brain, insect chemoreception, potato polyploidy, epigenome-epitranscriptome interactions, and more! 🧬

▶️ www.cell.com/trends/genet...
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Sometimes, a family company splits in two, each part getting its own specialisation.

That’s what happened to ‘owe’ and ‘ought’, once the present and past tense of one and the same verb. Its original meaning was “to possess”.

They’re also related to ‘own’.

Zoom in on my graphic to learn more:
October 31, 2025 at 8:03 PM
I don't know who needs to hear this, but Iceland now has a female President, Prime Minister, Bishop, Rectors of all major universities, Head of Police, Director of Health, Speaker of Parliament, and Mayor of Reykjavík. You do not mess with Icelandic women.
www.inspiredbyiceland.com/society/gend...
Iceland Gender Equality | History, Progress & Challenges
Dive into Iceland gender equality. See the nation’s historic milestones, current leadership, pay equity efforts, and ongoing challenges toward full equality.
www.inspiredbyiceland.com
October 26, 2025 at 7:35 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Our new paper is now in BioRxiv ☺️
See how the auditory cortex encodes vocalizations before the bat produces them 📣🦇🧠

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

with @talking-bat.bsky.social and Dennis Röhrig!
Neurons in the bat auditory cortex encode class and complexity of future vocalizations
Vocal production is a complex behavior across the animal kingdom that relies on coordinated motor and auditory networks. However, the contribution of sensory areas in vocal control remains poorly unde...
www.biorxiv.org
October 25, 2025 at 12:23 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Come join us for a 4-year PhD on effects of rare gene disruptions involved in speech disorder, investigated in human neuronal models (via gene-editing, tissue culture, brain organoids, high-res microscopy, transcriptomics, epigenomics).
More info: www.mpi.nl/imprs-phd-fe...
#AcademicJobs #PhDJobs
🧬🧪
October 22, 2025 at 3:43 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Unique opportunity to direct your own innovative long-term research programme on the psychology of language at @mpi-nl.bsky.social, a leading interdisciplinary Max Planck Institute in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. Nominate yourself or a colleague by 19 December 2025. Please help us spread the word. 👇🧪
We're seeking the next Director of the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics! Lead cutting-edge research in language & cognition. Nominations (incl. self) due 19 Dec 2025.
mpi.nl/career-education/vacancies/vacancy/nominations-and-self-nominations-sought-position-director-max
October 3, 2025 at 8:18 AM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Recalling sequences from memory can explain the distribution of recursive structures in natural languages. New paper by Fenna H. Poletiek, Peter Hagoort & Bruno R. Bocanegra
doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106244
paper: tinyurl.com/mvy4jkb5
October 2, 2025 at 8:26 AM
So native speakers of English are basically Icelandic at heart...#ð
The most common English consonants in dictionary words (gray chart) vs. in actual speech (colored chart)

Note how the ⟨th⟩ sound /ð/ is one of the most common sounds in speech, but one of the least common sounds in terms of how many words it appears in.
September 28, 2025 at 6:49 PM
If you're in Barcelona, check out this open MusicGens event happening tomorrow! A roundtable about the musical genome with @musiccognition.bsky.social and more inspiring speakers! 🎵 🎹
The Musical Genome - Roundtable- Do we carry music in our genes?
Do we carry music in our genes? 17th September 2025.
www.palaumusica.cat
September 16, 2025 at 6:08 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
The Manhattanplot of every GWAS is evolving. the top cluster/horizontal band is proteins, the second protein ratio's the third all kinds of microbiome GWAS (which have smaller N and less power, hence the almost empty third horizondal band). I might make this into an interactive shiny website...
September 16, 2025 at 12:17 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
We know GLP-1 drugs reduce brain inflammation. But I didn't anticipate bipolar disorder as a possible indication in the future
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Glucagon-like Peptide-1 receptor agonists as emerging therapeutics in bipolar disorder: a narrative review of preclinical and clinical evidence - Molecular Psychiatry
Molecular Psychiatry - Glucagon-like Peptide-1 receptor agonists as emerging therapeutics in bipolar disorder: a narrative review of preclinical and clinical evidence
www.nature.com
September 13, 2025 at 7:20 PM
"Tell me you're a linguist without telling me you're a linguist"😃
Danny Hieber, Ph.D. (@linguisticdiscovery) on Threads
New linguistics experiment just dropped
www.threads.com
September 8, 2025 at 11:18 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Breaking News: In a win for Harvard University, a judge said that the government broke the law by freezing billions of dollars in research funds.
Judge Issues Ruling Helpful to Harvard in Case Against Trump
Harvard had sued the Trump administration in an effort to restore billions in research funds that the government canceled this spring.
nyti.ms
September 3, 2025 at 8:42 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Interested in doing a PhD with me and lacns.github.io? Or with any of the incredible fellows in the IMPRS School of Cognition www.maxplanckschools.org/cognition-en - apply before Dec 1st at cognition.maxplanckschools.org/en/application
Language and Computation in Neural Systems
We are an international group of scientists consisting of linguists, cognitive scientists, cognitive neuroscientists, computational neuroscientists, computational modellers, computational scientists, ...
lacns.github.io
September 3, 2025 at 3:15 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Important reading as you prepare for your semester
August 31, 2025 at 12:10 AM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
The full story on "stem-cell-based, tissue engineered trachea replacements" by @pmurray65.bsky.social and Peter Wilmshurst. Whistelblowers met with a wall of silence from the establishment drpeterwilmshurst.wordpress.com/2025/08/19/s...
Stem cell scandal: prison for one surgeon, pay bonus for another
This is a joint blog by Professor Patricia Murray and Peter Wilmshurst. Summary We question the contrasting responses of legal and regulatory bodies in Sweden and the UK to deaths of patients that …
drpeterwilmshurst.wordpress.com
August 24, 2025 at 8:47 AM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Latest processing of UK Biobank brain imaging data - now with 82,000 usable first-scan datasets. Correlating brain IDPs with 13,000 non-imaging variables gives a rich manhattan-stye plot. 324,000 Bonferroni-significant associations.
August 22, 2025 at 11:35 AM
👌
August 21, 2025 at 10:28 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Developmental stuttering involves speech disfluencies (blocks, prolongations, repetitions). We sequenced all protein-coding genes of 85 parent-child trios in which the child stuttered, & found (likely) pathogenic DNA variants in 4 genes also implicated in neurodevelopmental disorders. New paper:👇🗣️🧬🧪
De novo protein-coding gene variants in developmental stuttering - Molecular Psychiatry
Molecular Psychiatry - De novo protein-coding gene variants in developmental stuttering
www.nature.com
August 20, 2025 at 5:36 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Delighted to see work led by Hayley Mountford @hayleymountford.bsky.social published today. rdcu.be/eA8G0 We used MTAG to increase gene discovery for dyslexia: 36 new regions; ~30 new genes from gene-based tests; several sig biological pathways @profsimonfisher.bsky.social @schoolofppls.bsky.social
Multivariate genome-wide association analysis of dyslexia and quantitative reading skill improves gene discovery
Translational Psychiatry - Multivariate genome-wide association analysis of dyslexia and quantitative reading skill improves gene discovery
rdcu.be
August 18, 2025 at 5:47 AM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
This isn’t an impoverished regional school – this is the University of Chicago. Devastating.
August 13, 2025 at 5:30 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Hello it is possible to have a background in both the humanities and STEM (👋) and I'd argue that being interdisciplinary leads to a more broad-ranging set of ideas. The STEM/Hums boundaries are imposed top-down and we need all of us to advance human knowledge.
August 13, 2025 at 9:11 PM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Third: forum piece on the genetics of human communication, by @rosagisladottir.bsky.social
📣 Our August issue is live!

In addition to human communication (see cover), topics include newborn screening, genomic recording, CASTs, sex differences in the aging brain, insect chemoreception, potato polyploidy, epigenome-epitranscriptome interactions, and more! 🧬

▶️ www.cell.com/trends/genet...
August 10, 2025 at 8:15 AM
Reposted by Rósa S. Gísladóttir
Some August highlights from Trends on music, communication, and genetics.

First up: the review on music reward sensitivity as a model for understanding reward processing, by Mas-Herrero, Zatorre & Marco-Pallarés.

www.cell.com/trends/cogni...
August 10, 2025 at 8:15 AM