Pirbright begins essential animal trials for new COVID-19 #vaccines developed by University of Oxford to help combat the #pandemic ow.ly/F8Sr50yWc8f @PHE_uk Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research #COVID19

And ending the press conference by coughing into his hand...

Out now: New tools for gene drive. We identified two eye pigmentation genes in the diamondback moth and used CRISPR to characterise their knockout phenotypes. Xuejiao Xu bmcmolcellbiol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.11…

Our new publication "Considerations for Human Blood-Feeding and Arthropod Exposure in Vector Biology Research: An Essential Tool for Investigations and Disease Control" is out. I hope this will be a useful resource for our VBD research community! liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/vb…

Ah, the ‘miracle of science’! And I always thought it was the hard work and dedication of scientists.

I know viruses aren’t most people’s favourite topic at the moment - but these are delicious!

Out today, our paper reviewing the role of Culex quinquefasciatus as an invasive threat to island bird communities and options for its genetic control: cabiagbio.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.11…

What a fun project this was to work on.

Christine Reitmayer @CourtneyMurdoc3 @MossieCator Laura_Harrington explore mating strategy and immune response in the yellow fever mosquito, finding that harmonic convergence predicts offspring immune responses, and to a stronger degree in males than females. nature.com/articles/s4200…

Diamondback moths are highly invasive pests of brassicas, costing upwards of US $5 billion a year in damage and control measures. Resistant to most classes of insecticides, this genetic control method could hold the key to reducing their impact doi.org/10.1002/ps.6353 Alphey Lab

We have a highly active Cas9 expressing diamondback moth (Plutella xylostella) line which shows 100% mosaicism and some germline activity. We would be happy to share this with the research community. Please message us ASAP if you are interested. Happy Friday!

Interested in mosquito research? We’re looking for a motivated person to join us at this exciting, final stage of the project when years of work all come together.

*NEW PAPER* We've just published a field study paper providing the first field evidence that diesel exhaust has direct impacts on honey bees reducing colony fitness Natural Environment Research Council Tracey A Newman Christine Reitmayer Uni of Reading University of Southampton SAPD at Reading Uni sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

🚨Hi everyone, there is an #arbovirus meeting on next week featuring some fantastic science and good presenters, organised by Andres Merits. It's a hybrid meeting that is on location 🇪🇪, or accessed by zoom. Highly recommended!🚨

Today marks exactly two months to go before I’ll start my alp crossing. So from now on, I’m not only packing an apple but also some diving weights in my ‘up and down the hills hike after work’ backpack.

Out in PNAS today! Our paper showing how the female sex-determination system in diamondback moth (PxyFem) evolved through retrotransposition of an existing male-determining gene (PxyMasc). pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pn…

Engineered death upon infection! Check out this pre-print describing a ZIKV responsive sensor coupled to a lethal effector in Aedes aegypti. Arthropod Genetics's Christine Reitmayer, Emily Levitt, Alphey Lab, Rennos Fragkoudis biorxiv.org/content/10.110…

Grateful to everybody involved, for their hard work, excitement and dedication. Here’s to interesting science and some great friendships as an output.

I am immensely grateful for this opportunity and very much looking forward to start working on this project. Thank you to everybody who helped me making this possible.