Amanda Melin (she/her)

Was a real pleasure working on this project - see our prospective article on the sensory ecology of collective behavior, co-led by an outstanding team! elifesciences.org/articles/88028

Why do capuchins eat pith? The topic of the second paper out from @AMelinLab and my special issue of @AmJournalPrimat on #Primatology in #Canada. This time from @an_depasquale, @alice_poirier, and authors from @AMelinLab! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.10…

Tomorrow in Cairns, come see our symposium in rooms M5-6. Big thanks to our symposium sponsors, @AnatRecord and @AnatomyOrg

We are hiring! 3 year NSF-funded postdoc working on understanding the weird bright coloration of the infants of some nonhuman primate species. Starting salary $62.5k plus benefits. In collaboration with @wl_allen. Apply! (Img Menotlost WikimediaCommons) apply.interfolio.com/129167

Dr. Natalie Sanchez has been selected as Costa Rica's nominee for the Young Scientist Research Award: Women for Science, by the Academia Nacional de Ciencias. Congratulations @Nati_SanchezU! We're so proud of your nomination! 🐦🇨🇷🍾 Story: uwindsor.ca/dailynews/2023…

This research intersects with our other research - also out this week @RSocPublishing at dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.2… led by @SwellanPinto and @mareikecora on the genetic basis of ethanol metabolism in mammals with different diets.

We (innovated by coauthor Matthew Carrigan) adapted a handheld police-grade breathalyzer to measure ethanol vapours in wild fruits on site. This tech is enabling a large collaborative world wide survey of fruit ethanol (keep 👀 for more on this in future)

New paper & blog on research 1st-authored by @UCalgaryArts undergrad Julia Casorso, w key roles by @an_depasquale, @suhe94 & team on ethanol content of wild fruits in Costa Rica. Mammal-dispersed fruits are more ethanolic than bird dispersed fruits. doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2… 🧵👇

High-sensitivity low-cost spectrometer that runs from a smartphone. Build your own from 3D printed parts and off-the-shelf components. My paper is out in JEB today. doi.org/10.1242/jeb.24…

Really excited to be a part of the “Ask-a-scientist” event at @calgarylibrary (Country Hills) along with two other volunteers from @HPI_network ! 🪱 I love science outreach and am looking forward to talking about parasites with children at the library! calgarylibrary.ca/events-and-pro…

Lovely work by @eohomo and colleagues, beuatifully demonstrating how sensory specialisation shapes brain evolution. Like in primates, visual specialisation is associated with expansion of neural pathways including integrative brain regions nature.com/articles/s4146…

We have a new preprint to share. Hint: guenon evolution is a mess! biorxiv.org/content/10.110… In my PhD project with @kguschan, we study guenon genomics to learn about speciation processes. In part 1, we focus on ancient hybridization, and found a lot of it. From the top: 1/15

We further found that Ugandan populations have higher nucleotide diversity, which is likely a product of different demographic histories. Overall, our results highlight the importance of culture, subsistence economy, and drift in human chemosensory perception 7/7

However, we identify signatures of local adaptation on chemosensory genes within each geographic region. We identified significant trait associations for 35 SNPs, including those linked to potentially relevant traits such as intake of meat, coffee and fresh fruit 6/7

Thrilled that our new paper - asking whether subsistence exerts selection on the genes involved in smell & taste - is now out @CommsBio . A brief thread 🧵👇 1/7: nature.com/articles/s4200…

Obituary: Masatoshi Nei (1931–2023) Evolutionary geneticist whose powerful statistical methods facilitated the molecular revolution of evolutionary biology. nature.com/articles/s4155…