The guidelines

These guidelines offer the first standardized framework for Data and Code Quality Control led by SORTEE members and data editors across journals in ecology and evolution. The article introduces what data editors do, why quality control matters and provides a transparent, step-by-step process for checking archived data and code alongside manuscripts. Aimed at journal editors, reviewers, and authors, it outlines expected benefits and costs and gives practical advice for adoption. As a complement to peer review, it helps ensure that shared data and code adhere to the FAIR principles—Findable · Accessible · Interoperable · Reusable—at publication.

Check the preprint (DOI: 10.32942/X24P8S)

SORTEE in a nutshell

SORTEE—the Society for Open, Reliable, and Transparent Ecology and Evolutionary Biology—is an international, volunteer-driven community working to improve research reliability and transparency through cultural and institutional change. Activities include producing open-science resources (e.g., the above-mentioned guidelines), hosting webinars and annual unconferences/hackathons, and running the field-specific preprint server EcoEvoRxiv.

Want a quick tour of SORTEE’s mission and outputs?

• About SORTEE
• SORTEE outputs (guidelines, papers, resources)
• EcoEvoRxiv preprint server

Want to know more about SORTEE?

Check the SORTEE website for news, events, and ways to get involved. You can also follow announcements on social media and in the newsletter.

The YEG in a nutshell

Together with Sophie M Dupont, we are proud to participate in the coordination of the Young Ecotoxicologist Group (YEG) from the ECOTOX network. The group aims to create a dynamic and inclusive environment for young researchers in ecotoxicology, promoting interactions and collaboration, and enhancing professional development.

The YEG is a key network for sharing experiences and spreading information about events, job offers, and funding opportunities. It also focuses on promoting the exchange of scientific knowledge through monthly webinars and active discussion channels.

Are you a Master’s student, PhD candidate, research engineer, or post-doctoral researcher? Join us and be part of a dynamic community to improve our understanding of how contaminants affect organisms.

For a quick overview about the role of the YEG, check the poster we have presented to the SEFA meeting 2024 below:

Want to know more about the YEG?

Check the “Groupe jeunes” section of the ECOTOX network’s website.

The ECOTOX Thematic Sheet N°48 in a nutshell

Together with Raphaël Royauté, we have crafted a Thematic Sheet (N°48) for the French ECOTOX network. The aim of this article is to offer a non-exhaustive yet insightful overview of the current landscape in behavioral ecotoxicology.

Our short review leverages open-source technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) to tackle the complexities of behavioral data analysis, representing a significant step forward in our collective understanding of contaminants’ impacts on animals.

Although this thematic sheet offers a snapshot that may quickly become outdated due to the rapid evolution of methods and tools, especially those referring to AI, it is intended as a valuable resource for researchers eager to explore the fascinating field of behavioral ecotoxicology more deeply.

The full article is available (in French language only) here.

MoveR in a nutshell

The MoveR is a lightweight R package (mostly coded with base R) representing a full workflow for importing, filtering, visualizing, and analyzing data from common video-tracking solutions.

Accordingly, MoveR includes flexible tools for polishing data, removing tracking artifacts, subsetting and plotting individual paths, and computing different movement and behavior metrics.

Also, MoveR is very versatile and is intended to ease the management and analysis of video-tracking data for both beginners and advanced R users.

For a quick overview of the MoveR functionalities with a short illustrative example, check the poster I have presented to the 43èmes journées des Entomophagistes. below:

Want to know more about MoveR?

Check the MoveR documentation website and the associated GitHub repository.

Check also the MoveR preprint article hosted in bioRxiv or the edited version of the article published in SoftwareX.

Also, note that MoveR is still under active development, documentation and GitHub repository content may hence regularly be updated. Accordingly, if you find any issues, please report them using the GitHub issue section!.

Undark Magazine

Undark is a non-profit and editorially independent online magazine co-founded in 2016, which explores the intersection of science and society (More about it).

A bit of context

Back in 2020, my P.h.D focusing on the effects of multiple stressors on fish health just ended, with exciting results, particularly about the variability of behavioral responses to contaminants exposure among fish populations (check out here for further information).

Briefly, in an article from 2021, we found that when exposed to a metal mixture in the laboratory, some fish populations (particularly those originating from historically contaminated sites) displayed increased activity patterns compared to populations from study sites with low levels of contaminants. We hypothesized that these differences in behavior may have an adaptive value and stressed the need to verify this hypothesis.

Indeed, because behavior and cognitive abilities are very sensitive to exposure to stressors and may drastically alter ecosystem functioning, such changes may have highly detrimental consequences in the wild. Hence, These preliminary results may be of great importance to help mitigate the effects of pollutants and improve conservation strategies in the wild.

Accordingly, We had many ideas and perspectives about how stressors could affect behavior and, by extension, cognitive abilities in wild fish. Meanwhile, increasing our understanding of the relationships between cognitive ability and fitness in wild animals became a highly topical issue. Accordingly, with my PhD supervisor, Lisa Jacquin we gathered and wrote down our ideas in a perspective article about the effects of pollutants, and more broadly stressors, on fish cognition and behavior.

The resulting article was then published in a special issue of Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, focusing on the underlying mechanisms and constraints linking cognition and fitness in the wild (check out the special issue editorial article).

The feature

Recently, I was pleased to be interviewed by Doug Johnson to talk about our article published in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. Following our talk, our paper has been covered in the Undark Magazine. The full free article can be read on the Undark Magazine webpage

See also my twitter thread about this feature :

Read the accompanying thread on Twitter.