Joanna Bagniewska

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Joanna Bagniewska

@joannabagniewska.com

Zoologist, science communicator, 🇵🇱 in 🇬🇧.
Departmental Lecturer in Environmental Science at Oxford University
Senior lecturer at Brunel University London

I wrote a somewhat inappropriate book and you should buy it.
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A book from my (much-too-long) 'to get hold of'-list has finally materialised in the museum dungeon: 'The modern bestiary' by @joannabagniewska.com, here being inspected by one of the office cuddlebugs (I think it heard that it features in the book...) -- looking much forward to reading it!🤓💚
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It's graduation day at Brunel University - a great opportunity to celebrate the success of our students, put on gowns, and take a few novelty photos. It's my favourite day of the academic year - well done to all 🎓 🧪 #academicsky
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My first time being addressed as #AUTHOR - and by the V&A, too! Inside the envelope sits an invite to the Illustration Awards gala, to celebrate the incredible talents of Jenny Smith, the illustrator of The Modern Bestiary. #Art #SciArt
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A (not so) fun fact for today: hedgehogs suffer from subcutaneous emphysema, or "balloon syndrome", where gas is trapped under their skin due to an infection or injury (e.g., a kick or blow). Untreated, this condition is lethal, and balloon hedgehogs need to be deflated by a surgeon to survive. 🧪🦊🦔🌏
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A new, lovely book appeared recently - "Infinite Life" by @juleshoward.bsky.social. It's about eggs and the evolution of life, and if you liked "Otherlands", you'll enjoy this one as well. I reviewed it for the Times Literary Supplement, if you need more tempting. www.the-tls.co.uk/science-tech... 🧪
Why life on Earth is so diversewww.the-tls.co.uk To people who normally encounter them in culinary form, the structure of eggs may seem basic: yolk, white, shell, plus the bits of membrane that make
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Happy World Oceans Day 🌊 & Happy Pride Month! 🌈 Want to support queer ocean art & science? 🧪🦑🐙🐡 I’m a Salish Sea natural historian photographing gelatinous marine inverts & trying to 3D scan them this summer. I’m selling my art & fundraising research costs. linktr.ee/noncompliantcyborg
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There's a lot of bad news in the world, but this is nice*: researchers found the skull of a 500-pound bird species and realized it's part of the waterfowl family and named it a Giga-Goose 🧪 www.scientificamerican.com/article/500-... *only it went extinct shortly after humans arrived in Australia
500-Pound Prehistoric Bird Was a ‘Giga-Goose,’ Fossils Revealwww.scientificamerican.com Scientists reveal the face of Australia’s massive, extinct “giga-goose”
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A really cool sighting (for anyone who enjoys huge, jet-black insects): Xylocopa violacea, the violet carpenter bee. About 2.5 cm long, happily buzzing around a garden in Crete. 🧪 🌍 🐝
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Depressingly familiar indeed. While I understand the pressures on students, there are fewer things more disheartening than turning up to class you've painstakingly prepared to teach only to find that nobody else did. 🧪 #academicsky
It’s a depressingly familiar story: students are missing lectures and tutorials due to paid work, poor mental health, and lack of motivation. Their grades suffer, perpetuating the cycle. How as educators can we do better? #HigherEducation #academia www.theguardian.com/education/ar...
‘I see little point’: UK university students on why attendance has plummetedwww.theguardian.com About half the students who got in touch skip lectures, with many ‘disappointed’ with the experience and others forced to prioritise paid work
‘I see little point’: UK university students on why attendance has plummetedwww.theguardian.com About half the students who got in touch skip lectures, with many ‘disappointed’ with the experience and others forced to prioritise paid work
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It's #WorldTurtleDay - the ideal opportunity to remind everyone about the bum-breathing (cloacal respiration), punk-haired (algal growths), endangered (mainly due to habitat loss) Mary River turtle from Australia. 🧪 🐢 🌍 🇦🇺 www.edgeofexistence.org/species/mary...
Mary River Turtle - EDGE of Existencewww.edgeofexistence.org The Mary River turtle is one of several species of cloaca-breathing turtles, which breathe underwater using specialised glands in their reproductive organs.
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Forget-me-nots have been a symbol of remembrance, memory and (perhaps unexpectedly), freemasonry. Since 2002, Poland has been celebrating Dzień Niezapominajki, the Forget-me-not Day, on May 15th. Happy Cute Little Flower Day to you all! 🌸 🌍
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Bumblebees learn to push Lego blocks as a team - and their cooperation isn't just an accumulation of individual efforts; there's active coordination involved. 🧪 🐝 royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
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Everyone, here's a book that's both beautifully written and thoroughly researched. If you've enjoyed "Otherlands", you'll love "Infinite Life". A word of warning though - there's not a single egg pun in the entire, otherwise eggselent, book. 🥚 🧪🌍 🪶 #academicsky
*drumroll* …Please welcome into the world ‘INFINITE LIFE’, which rolls out of its egg-tube today and finally hatches! It’s an egg’s eye view of evolution, spanning 1,000 million years of animals. It’s out now! (Also on Audible, in which I go full Brian Blessed). Bookshop.org: bit.ly/4aMVk9i
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#DYK it is rumored that the character design for Yoda was inspired by tarsiers? The resemblance is uncanny! ‌ Happy #StarWarsDay, and May the 4th (of nature) be with you.
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A marvelous observation: the first record of self-medication by a wild orangutan for a facial wound. 🧪🦊🌏
“in 21 years and 28,000 observation hours, we never observed any other orangutans at Suaq using Fibraurea tinctoria to treat their wounds” Isabelle Laumer and the Suaq Balimbing team report the first observed wild use of a medicinal plant. It’s not clear if it was a one-off, or learned activity🧪🦧🚑
Active self-treatment of a facial wound with a biologically active plant by a male Sumatran orangutan - Scientific Reportswww.nature.com Scientific Reports - Active self-treatment of a facial wound with a biologically active plant by a male Sumatran orangutan
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Springtime in the intertidal means finding lots of eggs and juveniles. This little urchin was one of many. 🦑 (Kachemak Bay, Alaska)
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I just learnt it's Hug An Australian Day today - but maybe don't hug these particular Aussies. 🌏 🇦🇺
Really cool study from Australia about the evolutionary arms race between snakes (venom) and lizards (resistance to it, or lack thereof, depending on size, habitat and lifestyle). Plus, "goanna" rhymes with my name. 🧪 🌍 🦎 🐍 www.abc.net.au/news/science...
Think snakes are scary? These lizards have evolved to make snakes the snackwww.abc.net.au Snakes and lizards in the Australian outback are locked in a battle of survival. Which is predator and which is prey comes down to strategies they've evolved to resist deadly venom, a study suggests.
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Get ready for the distinctive whistling, buzzing and chirping mating calls of cicadas. They’re about to emerge in 17 states, as two large broods emerge at the same time (the last time this happened was 1803) 🧪 🌳
Billions of cicadas are about to emerge from underground in a rare double-brood convergencetheconversation.com The last time that these two groups of cicadas emerged from underground together, Thomas Jefferson was president.
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It's dissertation time once more... #academicsky 🧪
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For the #InsertAnInvert2024 prompt “not long, not limbless” the truly ornate Elvis worm! 🧪🐡🪱 In 2020, scientists discovered 4 types of scale worms, with shimmering lavender, blue, & orange exoskeletons, which looked like they were wearing sequined jumpsuits like Elvis Presley! 🧵1/n
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It's National Mammal Week in the UK - the perfect time to join the Mammal Society or one of its local chapters (obviously Oxon Mammals are the best). Here are other ideas on how to get involved: www.mammalsociety.org.uk/national-mam... ... and a water shrew to grab your attention. 🦊 🌍
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