Mike Barker

@barkerms.bsky.social

4625 Followers 4781 Following

Professor & Assoc Dept Head UofA EEB (@uofa-eeb.bsky.social) in Tucson studying plant evolution, botany, polyploidy, chromosomes, and biodiversity. Views are my own. He/Him https://www.barkerlab.net

Sonoran Desert landscape looking west across Avra Valley from Tucson Mountain Park. In the foreground, a desert trail winds through cholla cacti, saguaros, ocotillo, and native shrubs. The valley stretches to distant mountain ranges on the horizon under a dramatic sky of blue patches and white cumulus clouds with rays of light breaking through.
Sonoran Desert landscape at Tucson Mountain Park with saguaro cacti, palo verde trees, and desert scrub dotting a sandy trail. Rugged brown mountains rise in the background under a bright blue sky with scattered white clouds. The photographer's shadow stretches across the rocky ground in the foreground.
A tall columnar cactus with multiple ribbed stems blooming with cream and peach-colored flowers at night in Tucson. The cactus stands in a desert garden with purple flowering plants, gravel pathways, and a palm tree visible against a dark blue night sky.
A round 'I Voted' sticker with red text at the top and a blue desert landscape design in the lower half. Text includes 'I Voted' in English, 'A:ñi 'ant wodalt' in Tohono O'odham, 'Yo Voté' in Spanish, and 'Pima County AZ' at the bottom. Saguaro cacti silhouettes decorate the desert scene.
Flyer for CAMBIUM (Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Through Biodiversity Informatics Education and Mentoring) Graduate Research Traineeship program. Right side shows a scenic photograph of tall saguaro cacti against desert mountains. Program highlights listed in a blue box include: professional development training in communication, teamwork, and professionalism; interdisciplinary research rotations; career and professional development; $34,000 stipend with paid tuition, fees, and health insurance coverage for 2 years; and a Certificate in Biodiversity Informatics. A red box announces an informational webinar on November 18th at 2:30 PM MST with link to the CAMBIUM program website at https://cambium.arizona.edu/. Eligibility requirements include U.S. citizenship or permanent residency, incoming graduate student status for Fall 2026, and acceptance contingent on graduate program admission. Bottom features a 'Register here!' button with registration link at https://events.trellis.arizona.edu/en/f44lNu67/cambium-informational-webinar-4a3UKgGu6U/overview, along with NSF, University of Arizona, and CAMBIUM NRT logos.
A logo for the CAMBIUM NRT featuring stylized rings.
The allotetraploid lycophyte Selaginella rupincola growing among the boulders at Cochise Stronghold in the Dragoon Mountains southeast of Tucson, Arizona.
A vermilion flycatcher, a bird with a bright red chest and fuzzy head with black wings and back, sits on a branch of a desert willow tree with green leaves and pink-purple flowers blooming around it.
Red flowers of Fouquieria macdougalii hang in the center of the image with an organ pipe cactus in the background. Branches of the Fouquieria macdougalii are visible above with more flowers.
Bright red flowers of an ocotillo on the end of a spiky branch with small green leaves against the dark night sky.
A flyer for the next Polyploidy Webinar on Wednesday, April 2, at 11 AM PDT. Featuring Raymond Castillo from Washington University presenting "Phylogenetic methods for modeling chromosome size and count" and Eric Hagen from the University of Toronto on "Using -SSE models to study diversification after neopolyploidy and paleopolyploidy"
A bright yellow sunflower inflorescence of Tithonia diversifolia blooming in Tucson against a clear blue sky.
Flyer for the March 5, 2025, Polyploidy Webinar that will take place at 11 AM PST. This webinar feature's Maya Wilson Brown from Michigan State University presenting "Genetic variation of allotetraploid Capsella bursa-pastoris in introduced range" and Nomar Waminal of the Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research presenting "The Crocus panrepeatome: duplication, dynamics, and dysploidy".
A bright yellow sunflower inflorescence of Encelia farinosa is in the center of the image with other inflorescences around the photo. In the background are the orange flowers of desert globe mallow (Sphaeralcea ambigua).
A flyer announcing the next polyploidy webinar on February 5, 2025, at 11 AM PST. Links to sign up for the zoom at barkerlab.net/polyweb. Featuring Charity Goeckeritz from the HudsonAlpha Institute on Genomics of triploid apples narrow the search for the genetic basis of apomixis in Malus, and Christoph Rosche from the University of Halle on Herbarium specimens reveal a cryptic invasion of polyploid Centuarea stoebe in Europe.
Two men stand in a wooden cage with a two target boards at the far end. They are throwing axes at the target with one axe flying in the air towards the board. The sign of above the targets reads "St Hubert's Hatchet House."
A copy of Frank Herbert's Dune bound in a speckled tan paper from Cave Paper in Tucson.
A sign on the back wall says "Cave Paper: high quality handmade paper since 1994" with a table in foreground that has a could of pieces of their handmade paper with flax plants and fibers.
A large desert broom plant (Baccharis sarothroides) covered in white inflorescences and fluffy white seeds is centered in the photo with a pond and trees in the background.
A group of four Gambel's quails, small brown and white birds with a feather arched over their heads, flutter in the dust beneath a tree stump.
A small broad billed hummingbird with bright turquoise feathers on chest, green in the back of the head, and bright orange red beak sitting on a mesquite tree branch surrounded by green leaves. Head is tilted to the side as it looks around.
A coyote stands on a sidewalk at night with vegetation close around the sidewalk in Tucson.
A photo of a mountain road covered in snow with a rock wall on the right side and tall conifer trees on both side of the road. A bright orange sunset is in the background of the photo. Taken on Mt. Lemmon in the Santa Catalina Mountains above the city of Tucson, Arizona.
A red bag full of red envelopes in the top right corner of the image, a brown clay teapot sits in the top left, and an opened red envelope with a silver package of tea and a small card is in the lower center of the image. The tea package reads gyokuro chat musume Japan, and the card contains instructions for brewing the tea. It also reads "Shaded leaves rolled like pine, gyokuro makes the season divine".
A flyer for the December 4, 2024, Polyploidy Webinar that will be at 11 AM PST on zoom. This month features Pam & Doug Soltis from the University of Florida presenting details on their new Polyploidy Integration and Innovation Institute and Trevor Faske from the US Geological Survey presenting Variance dissimilarities in mixed-ploidy genomic data cause irregular patterns in PCA and other clustering analyses. Sign up for the zoom link at https://www.barkerlab.net/polyweb
A brown, dense ball of leafy material attached to a creosote stem. The ball is a creosote gall made by a gall inducing fly in Asphondylia.
A photo of the Sonoran Desert at night with a saguaro cactus in the foreground with the top glowing from the moonlight. A field of stars is visible in the sky behind the cactus.
A photo of a large yellow book on a black table. The title of the book is "Foundational papers in complexity science, volume one, 1922-1962, David C. Krakauer, editor."
Red cliffs above blue waters and below a clear blue sky at Cape Peron, Francois Peron National Park, on Shark Bay in Western Australia.
A scene from Parks and Recreation with a character stating "Leslie, I tried to make ramen in the coffee pot"
A white rain lily flower with yellow pollen is in focus in the center of the image against a background of rocks and dirt.
An open air metal structure reminiscent of a small chapel made of white bike parts with colorful stained glass images of bikes with the sun setting behind it.
A bright green grass smiley face grows against a background of dying grass of another species. This happens every year at this time in our park.
A bright green tree fern fills the picture with green pinnate fronds and a large, relaxed crozier of a new grind growing up in the center of the photo.
A flyer for the next Polyploidy Webinar on November 6, 2024, at 11AM Pacific Time. It includes photos of the two presenters and their presentation titles. Sylvia Kinosian from the University of Arizona will speak on "Genomics is modifying our concepts of evolution in homosporous pteridophytes" and Tamsen Dunn from San Diego State University will present "Deciphering the Polyploid Ks Histogram with Forward Time Simulations."
Dr. Culber of Star Trek Discovery standing and wearing a gray jacket in a dark scene saying "But I suspect he's a polyploid."
A green tropical forest with palms, tree ferns, and other tropical trees rolls down mountain slopes towards the sea in the distance. White clouds hang low in the sky.
People riding bicycles down the city streets of Tucson with booths open serving food and promoting different causes and organizations. A man in the foreground waves from an extra tall bike
An "I Voted" sticker from Pima County, Arizona, with a silhouette of saguaros and other cacti in blue against a white sky. The sticker reads “I voted” in English, “A:ñi 'ant wodalt” in Tohono O'odham and “Yo Voté” in Spanish.
A collection of cupcakes with cat heads wearing birthday party hats on top.
Two people standing in a restaurant with green lighting. Brittany Sutherland on the left and Mike Barker on the right.
A half smoke from Ben's Chili Bowl. It is a sausage in bun covered with chili, mustard, and onions.
The Lincoln Memorial with an orange sunset behind and the branches of a tree in the foreground.
A flyer for a webinar on getting into grad school. The event will be on October 30, 2024, at 9AM PST. Sponsored by the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona. Register here: http://bit.ly/eebgradwebinar Why choose UA EEB for your MS or PhD? UA fellowships and training grants What prospective advisors look for How to apply and what happens next Advice from current students Q&A
A circular phylogeny of the ferns with WGDs indicated as circles on branches of the tree. Outlines of different fern species surround the phylogeny to indicate different clades.
Two plots of the number of rounds of WGD in angiosperms, ferns, gymnosperms, and lycophytes. On the left is a plot of absolute number of rounds, whereas the plot on the right is WGD per MY). Angiosperms have the highest number of rounds of WGD per lineage and most WGD per MY. Gymnosperms and lycophytes are among the lowest in each plot.
A bright yellow sunflower of Tithonia diversifolia stands among green leaves with blue sky and clouds behind.
A comet with a white point and long, whispy tail pointing upwards in the sky at dusk to the right of a telephone pole.
A brown javelina standing in mud at the edge of a pond in the Chiricahuas surrounded by grass stares into the camera.
A tan roadrunner with a blue and yellow tail standing on the road in front of a red curb. Behind the roadrunner are some plants with a second roadrunner on the sidewalk behind the plants in shadow.
A flyer for the Polyploidy Webinar that will be at 11 AM Pacific Time on October 2, 2024. Shelly Gaynor from the University of Michigan will present "Computationally intensive methods and models to understand mixed-cytotype populations" and Michael McKibben from the University of Arizona will discuss "Species‐tree topology impacts the inference of ancient whole‐genome duplications across the angiosperm phylogeny".
Venus and a waxing crescent moon above the Tucson Mountains with an orange sky fading to a night time blue above on the horizon.
A white beach with turquoise water and blue sky above. Shell Beach at Shark Bay in Western Australia.
A gray and white desert spiny lizard sitting among Opuntia pads with spines from the cactus surrounding it.
A little, tan poodle Chihuahua mix dog sleeping half on a dog bed and half on the floor.
Wordcloud of paper titles from google scholar. Largest words are plants, genome, evolution, duplications, and gene.
A chicken and chiltepin huarache with green lettuce, red and white sauces, and cheese on a white plate.
Bright green fronds of Notholaena standleyi growing with other desert plants, mostly dried out, among rocks.
Bright red vermilion flycatcher sitting on a tree branch.
A trickle of water at Bridal Wreath Falls in Saguaro National Park