School of Biological Sciences, Monash @MonashBiol

A recent study by Steven de Soir and colleagues has identified both bacterial and viral populations in human breast milk. They discuss the role of bacteriophages in the development of a healthy microbiome in newborns. www.nature.com/articles/s44... @jeremyjbarr.bsky.social

What is the role of cell-wall-modifying enzymes in hypocotyl elongation? A recent study by Yue Liu and colleagues with #Arabidopsis has linked environmental signalling to the cell wall biosynthetic machinery required for hypocotyl elongation nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

What do we know about Australian native bees? Not enough according to Scarlett Howard and Kit Prendegast. A recent review article highlights the importance of studying an island continent with a rich diversity of endemic bees. @thebeesearcher.bsky.social pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...

Massive congratulations to @shiho-ozeki.bsky.social on her award for best platform presentation at the @setac.bsky.social Asia-Pacific conference in Tsukuba, Japan, this week 👏. @monashbiol.bsky.social @monashscience.bsky.social #BobWongLab

Kyle Lyon, Samuel MAnning nad Richard Burke have found that the Hippo signalling pathway is important in determing the timing of epithelial cell replacement in the fruit fly #Drosophila journals.biologists.com/jcs/article/...

What happens to pharmaceuticals discharged via wastewater to Port Phillip Bay? Raiko Rafeeq and colleagues detected a total of 15 pharmaceuticals, with highest concentrations in plants and algae and closest to the Western Treatment Plant. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... @bbmwong.bsky.social

How do cells 'walk the line' between too much copper and too little? Lauren Kirn adn Richard Burke have reviewed what we know link.springer.com/article/10.1...

C.auris modulates its virulence potential and controls proportional immune responses. This metabolic flexibility enables it to optimize a critical trade-off: expressing virulence traits while minimizing immune recognition to colonize host tissues. @mikejmcd.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...

How does incorporating new lower elevation records of the mountain skink affect our predictions of suitable habitat for this species? @julesfarquhar.bsky.social @chapplelab.bsky.social and Thomas Parkin found substantial differences. connectsci.au/pc/article/3...

Over 80% of insect species live in the tropics, yet these are often the species we know least about. Our new BioScience paper asks why and how we can change this. We cannot conserve insects if tropical species remain invisible to science and policy. doi.org/10.1093/bios... @monashbiol.bsky.social

Nice editorial from @natecoevo.nature.com featuring several papers recently published on the fate of 🦋 under climate change, including our 🦋 paper. doi.org/10.1038/s415... @monashbiol.bsky.social @monashscience.bsky.social

Why is the take-up of Other effective area-based conservation measures (OECMs) as a conservation tool so slow? Alanna Marsh and @carly-n-cook.bsky.social have investigated! link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Congratulations to Prof Kathryn Hodgins for her recognition as a Monash 70th Anniversary Fellow www.monash.edu/science/news...

Our paper is out in @conphysjournal.bsky.social! We tested how the androgenic agricultural pollutant 17β-trenbolone affects immunity and reproductive allocation in eastern mosquitofish. A thread below (1/6): doi.org/10.1093/conp... @ceb-uwa.bsky.social @monashbiol.bsky.social

Australia’s lizards and snakes are in far more trouble than we thought. It’s time to act theconversation.com/australias-l...

Adolfo Aguilar-Cruz and colleagues sought to understand the function and evolution of microRNAs using Marchantia polymorpha, a model bryophyte that allows comparative approaches to infer characteristics of the ancestral land plant. Read more here nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirec...

Are you a potential Lecturer / Senior Lecturer in Ecology or Evolutionary Biology? The School of Biological Sciences at Monash University is recruiting careers.pageuppeople.com/513/cw/en/jo...

Our new Nature Eco Evo paper documents range shifts in 1,758 butterfly species across 105 countries, primarily due to climate change. 🦋80% expanded 🦋27% contracted 🦋22% shifted elevation 🦋342 showed multiple shift types. doi.org/10.1038/s415... @monashbiol.bsky.social @monashscience.bsky.social

How did snakes get to be so long? Recent work by Ammresh and colleagues on three species of elapids has found that most of the elongation happened in the thoracic region and a repatterning of this region gave rise to three modules. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1... @drteethal.bsky.social

Can intermittent fasting affect our genes? Xiangru Cheng and co-authors found that yes, it alters transposable elements that correlate with genes involved in lipid metabolism and muscle contraction. academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...

Are there downstream impacts from coal mining on adult frogs? Shannon Kaiser and co-authors looked at 25 unexposed sites and 22 exposed sites in the Royal National Park NSW and found that wastewater exposure increased amphibian disease risk. @bbmwong.bsky.social

How can one hormone control when and where development takes place? Laura Boulan and Christen Mirth review the multifaceted role of ecdysone in insect development and patterning. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Measuring executive function in guppies; is it impacted by anti-depressant pollution? Eleanor Moore and co-authors looked at working memory and cognitive flexibility 2 facets of executive function. @bbmwong.bsky.social @jack-brand.bsky.social @jackmanera.bsky.social link.springer.com/article/10.1...

How do species interactions and temperature interact to shape egg-to-adult viability in sub-tropical and tropical #Drosophila species? Vanessa Kellerman Carla Sgro and co-authors found the presence of other species tended to negatively impact egg-to-adult viability. doi.org/10.1002/ecy....

High light can damage the photosynthetic apparatus in plants through an over-reduction of the photosynthetic electron transport #PET chain, production of #ROS and damage to proteins and membranes. Marten Moore @mariaermakova.bsky.social at al have investigated a work-around doi.org/10.1016/j.mo....

Can developmental plasticity mitigate the physiological consequences of genomic discordance? Stefano Bettinazzi @dk-dowling.bsky.social et al. found early-life mitochondrial stress induced by dietary modulation promotes mitochondrial homeostasis and longevity. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/42412929/

Can habitats disturbed by humans, prime species for successful invasion of similar habitats elsewhere? The Anthropgenically Induced Adaptation to Invade hypothesis #AIAI is hard to test. Arnaud Estoup Kathryn Hodgins and co-authors provide insights to this problem doi.org/10.1016/j.tr...

How does the probability of survival and fertility change with age and early-life experience? In a rare field test Will Morgan Hayley Cameron and @djmmeeg.bsky.social found that adult bryozoans that experienced greater early-life stress had lower fitness overall academic.oup.com/evlett/advan...

Can we change the way rice use CO2 to increase photosynthetic efficiency and yield? Kuenzang Om @mariaermakova.bsky.social and colleagues think they can. A recent study investigates how C4-PEPC from maize (ZmPEPC) functions biochemically when expressed in rice. academic.oup.com/plphys/advan...

Fresh from fieldwork in remote Western Australia, @monashbiol.bsky.social PhD student Jing-Chia Guo (co-supervised with @annempeters.bsky.social) talking about his research on heat stress in purple crowned fairy wrens @animbehav.bsky.social #assab2026 #Bobwonglab

Native and invasive fish differ in their response to pharmaceutical pollution with consequences for species interactions. Raiko Rafeeq presents the results of her @monashbiol.bsky.social PhD work at #ISBE2026. #BobWongLab

Resolving data deficiency in a cryptic skink: distribution, threats and an Endangered conservation status for the Bungle Bungle robust slider (Lerista bunglebungle) connectsci.au/pc/article/d...

Can we improve translocation management for conservation? Xenia Münger, Carly Cook & Carlo Pacioni ran simulations and showed an increase in genetic diversity from translocations; introduced variation may outweigh the loss of local variation. besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdfdirec...

Second thoughts about first principles in biology: Trends in Ecology & Evolution www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...

How important is mitochondrial DNA in conservation? Jack Brand, @dk-dowling.bsky.social and co-authors argue that ignoring mtDNA risks unintended maladaptation and that mitochondrial and nuclear genetics should be considered jointly in conservation planning. www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...

Rhiannon Eastment @bbmwong.bsky.social and colleagues found no difference in growth and reproduction of weedfish exposed to a pervasive oestrogenic pollutant found in female contraceptive pills. watermark02.silverchair.com/xaag062.pdf?...

Tiny, depigmented, blind, slender isopods called Microcerberidae have finally had confirmation that they belong in the order Asellota. Christophe Douady, Kelly Merrin and co-authors have used sequence data for 8 slow evolving nuclear genes to confirm this onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1...

A case study of a 22-year-old patient with cystic fibrosis and identified for phage therapy, found pre-existing phage antibodies. These antibodies may have contributed to clinical failure by effectively neutralizing the phage. www.nature.com/articles/s41... @jeremyjbarr.bsky.social

Does it matter if single celled organisms are getting smaller as the world gets hotter? @djmmeeg.bsky.social and colleagues found that size-function relationships have been mis-estimated with worrying consequences for global carbon pumps. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/42087558/

Annual lab group photo tradition initiated - here’s the Evolutionary & Conservation Genomics Group, May 2026. I am so lucky to work with these fabulous folks! @monashbiol.bsky.social @monashscience.bsky.social

How does having a large neighbour affect resource acquisition in sand gobies? Topi Lehtonen @bbmwong.bsky.social and Natarsha Babic found that males were able to adjust their resource-holding strategies in response to environmental and social conditions. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

What can muscles tell us about prey capture and locomotion? Riya Bidaye Alistair Evans and colleagues took advantage of roadkill of 3 species of dasyurids. The results support the known trend of conserved forelimb musculature in marsupials. anatomypubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10....

Congratulations to Sean Layh, artist and @monashbiol.bsky.social @monashscience.bsky.social @monashuniversity.bsky.social graduate, on winning the Packing Room prize at this year’s Archibald at the Art Gallery of NSW! 🎨

How do we manage data deficient species? Luke Bonifacio and colleagues have found lots of gaps in the management of these taxa but after receiving some data practitioners were more likely to specifically manage these species. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Facundo Romani and co-authors have investigated the role of transcription factors in order to uncover the ancestral roles that they played in early stages of land plant evolution. academic.oup.com/plphys/advan...

Storme De Scally et al describe how genomic and biological characterisation of bacteriophages help us better understand bacteria-phage ecological and evolutionary dynamics in natural and synthetic communities. @mikejmcd.bsky.social @jeremyjbarr.bsky.social www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Luciano Beheregaray and colleagues have put together a special issue on genetic rescue. The articles identify opportunities and limitations and underscore its potential to improve resilience, adaptive capacity, and the long- term persistence of biodiversity. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1...

can we disentangle the effects of clonality and hybridity and quantify the relative degree to which these characteristics contribute to differences in mitochondrial function, organismal performance and fitness? Randy Klabacka and co. suggest some strategies royalsocietypublishing.org/rstb/article...