Samuel Abalde

Totally unrelated, but I have very recently learned about Mexican chinampas and how they use them to protect endangered species such as the axolotl. I hope these efforts pay off 🤞 youtube.com/watch?v=86gyW0vU…

Finally, besides the comparison of acoelomorph genomes, we investigated the genes related to the excretory system. We observed that Osr (which participates in the early formation of kidneys and Malpighian tubules) is absent in Xenacoelomorpha.

Interestingly, through comparisons to other bilaterian and cnidarian genomes, we noticed that acoelomorphs are characterised by an important reduction of gene content. Many genes shared between cnidarians and bilaterians (or among nephrozoans) are missing in this phylum.

Nevertheless, beyond contiguity, we are very happy with the quality of the annotation as the gene models represent full proteins. We observe that the number of genes, number of exons per gene, and intron size are relatively conserved among acoelomorphs

The genome is similar in size to P. naikaiensis, twice as long as the insect genomes sequenced with this protocol to date (from 300 to 600 Mbps). Unfortunately, contiguity is still challenging. We are not sure why, but it might be due to low coverage.

Briefly, we managed to extract 20 ng from a single specimen of N. westbladi. The sequencing library was prepared following the @PacBio Ultra-Low Input DNA protocol and then sequenced in one SMRT cell using HiFi.

Apparently, no animals were studied.

I've been waiting for this since day one: chaetognaths! My phone camera just doesn't do justice to this beauty.

Slow day today. Maybe not as excited as with other animals, but we got some nice brachiopod skeletons from >200m deep

Sometimes it's tricky going from macro to micro. Today we got this nice sea cucumber... And this tiny rotifer

Sometimes it's tricky going from macro to micro. Today we got this beautiful sea cucumber... and this tiny rotifer

Today nudibranchs and tardigrades: the two most popular groups every year