Max Telford

Inaugural Lecture: Professor Richard Mann, School of Mathematics Join us on 24 March for the upcoming Inaugural Lecture of Richard Mann, Professor of Mathematical Ecology and Evolution in the School of Mathematics.

Inviting anyone who is interested to come to my inaugural lecture, 'Why the Cambrian Explosion happened', on March 24 at the University of Leeds eps.leeds.ac.uk/faculty-engi...

Considering my book "The Tree of Life" for introductory evolution class? I have a few complimentary copies to evaluate. Please DM me. And please repost.

Review in Science described it as "..a fantastic informal introduction to a course on evolution.. recommended it to my first-year students".

Congratulations Matthew!!!

Cover image of paperback edition of the Tree of Life book by Max Telford.

On world book day might you be tempted to preorder the paperback edition of The Tree of Life?

Out in pb on April 23rd.

www.amazon.co.uk/Tree-Life-So...

Happy #WorldBookDay. For those who like to dress up for it, here's Daisy Edgar-Jones rocking The Jewel Box look a few years back...

I’m beyond excited to see our work published in Science Advances! 🎉

Deeply grateful to everyone involved — and especially to @pawelburkhardt.bsky.social for the great mentorship ✨

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

rambaut/figtree Automatically exported from code.google.com/p/figtree - rambaut/figtree

The first version of FigTree was released nearly 20 years ago and it is still widely used (including by me). But there are currently 85 issues on the GitHub repo (github.com/rambaut/figt...) and some of them I don’t really like the look of.

This is so important. BHL is absolutely brilliant.

YES!

Meanwhile somewhere there is a rival group organising a Poriferapalooza.

Entomology technician post in my lab in London (position is for 11 months starting August 2026). The work is about sentience and cognition in a variety of insect species. Thank you for sharing (and applying)! qmul-jobs.tal.net/vx/mobile-0/...

Happy 38th birthday to the #LTEE!
#BOTD in 1988.
Keep on evolving!

#science #evolution #microbiology

Ils sont fous ces Québecois!

Fabulous!

Blimey!

Author Adrian Wolfson Warns Of ‘Second Genesis’ In New Book 'On The Future Of Species' YouTube video by NDTV

It was a great pleasure to be interviewed by #NDTV on the #Tech360 show by the brilliant host #AayushAilawadi where I discussed my new book #OnTheFutureOfSpecies

www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWHv...

Eponges ou cténophores ? Duel au plus profond du vivant pour le titre de premier animal La controverse secoue les spécialistes de l’arbre de la vie. Deux camps s’affrontent, avec chacun sa lignée marine favorite. D’un côté, la créature la plus sommaire du règne animal ; de l’autre, des p...

The sponge / ctenophores debate reaches Le Monde. www.lemonde.fr/sciences/art...

No evidence that haplodiploidy favors the evolution of eusociality | PNAS The potential role of haplodiploid sex determination in promoting the evolution of altruism and eusociality has been the subject of intense debate ...

📄 No evidence that haplodiploidy favors the evolution of eusociality 🐝🐜

⬇️
www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1...

The billionaires' eugenics project: how Epstein infiltrated Harvard, muzzled the humanities and preached master-race science Edge - Jeffrey Epstein's favourite intellectual salon - was sold to me as a gathering of the world's finest minds, writes Virginia Heffernan. The files reveal it was something far darker: a decades-lo...

Shudder… www.thenerve.news/p/epstein-bi...

With a nice shout-out for our Genomic Code paper proposing that the genome instantiates a generative model of the organism www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Congratulations to @arnausebe.bsky.social, Premi Ciutat de Barcelona 2025 in the category of Life Sciences and Medicine. The award ceremony will take place today at the historic Saló de Cent and was presided over by the Mayor of Barcelona. Full story: www.crg.eu/en/news/arna...

Today, UCL turns 200. 🎉 For two centuries, our community has opened doors, challenged convention and pushed the boundaries of knowledge across every discipline. Thank you to everyone who’s been part of the UCL story, here’s to the next century. ✨

#UCL200 #LoveUCL

Phylogenetic Accuracy Under Non-Stationary and Non-Homogeneous Conditions: A Simulation Study Abstract. Phylogenetic inference typically assumes that the data has evolved under Stationary, Reversible and Homogeneous (SRH) conditions. Many empirical

Naser-Khdour et al. (2026-02, Systematic Biology) (open access)
Phylogenetic Accuracy Under Non-Stationary and Non-Homogeneous Conditions: A Simulation Study
doi.org/10.1093/sysb...

THE WONDER OF LIFE ON EARTH - published today www.panmacmillan.com/authors/henr...

Generous praise (in passing) for The Tree of Life in the TLS.

CHSTM Research Seminar, 3 February 2026 Prof Matthew Cobb The life and times of Francis Crick, or why it sometimes matters who does science

If you're in Manchester this afternoon and fancy listening to me chuntering about Francis Crick and why it sometimes matters who does science, come along! Details here:

<i>Veneriserva pygoclava</i> There are many ways to become a parasite , and there are parasites with vastly different ancestries that end up joining the same path on th...

Wormception:
Veneriserva pygoclava is a worm with a name that translates into "Venus' servant" - but the truth is quite the opposite.
It is a polychaete worm that has evolved to live as a parasite inside the body of other polychaete worms.
#Invertebrate 🧪
dailyparasite.blogspot.com/2024/03/vene...

New paper on @biorxiv-evobio.bsky.social: Are interphylum spiralian relationships resolvable? doi.org/10.64898/202...

@maxjtelford.bsky.social and I tried answering this question with two independent phylogenomic datasets.

(1/7) 🧪

My book 'The Tree of Life' is currently only £3.99 on Kindle!

www.amazon.co.uk/Tree-Life-So...

The bar for Valentine's day gestures has been raised very high by one Ealing local.