Matt Johnson, PhD
LightNews LightNews
banner
mossmatters.bsky.social
Matt Johnson, PhD
@mossmatters.bsky.social
1.3K followers 330 following 200 posts
Associate Professor, Texas Tech University
Director, E.L. Reed Herbarium
bryophyte evolution, plant phylogenomics
mossmatters.com
ORCID: 0000-0002-1958-6334
he/his
Posts Replies Media Videos
mossmatters.bsky.social
Look, I get being a fan. This is me at the 2010 National Championship game. Despite winning on a weeknight, Duke did not cancel classes. I know because I had get someone to fill in as a TA because I was in Indianapolis. Nobody asked the faculty to pretty please let academics take a back seat.
Man in a Duke t-shirt with face painted blue and white, arm outstretched at the 2010 National Championship game
November 18, 2025 at 2:21 AM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Because the Big XII championship game is during final exams, our Provost suggests faculty choose from ideas including "exempt students from the exam" and "change your whole method of assessment" with 1 week notice

More than usual I'm feeling I work for a football team with a school on the side.
Exempt the final exam for students who have maintained a high average in the course. Give students a choice to adjust grading by weighting another exam more heavily or revising the grading schema. Contact [email redacted] for assistance with changes in RaiderCanvas. Replace the final exam with an alternative assignment that meets the course’s learning goals. Move the final exam online and consider a broader testing window. Continue with your scheduled exam time on Saturday, Dec. 6.
November 18, 2025 at 2:16 AM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Update - it's actually a video the smoke MOVES what
September 1, 2025 at 9:57 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Yes thank you very much for the design idea, Powerpoint, that is exactly the right vibe for this lecture.
Generated slide idea for "Introduction to Plant Taxonomy, BIOL4302: Field Botany and Natural History Collections" featuring a large industrial plant with several stacks billowing smoke. Might actually be a nuclear power plant? Still, wtf Powerpoint
September 1, 2025 at 9:51 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Got one in a place of honor on our fridge!
Steel fridge with magnets and stickers, including We Are All Beautiful, Palo Duro Canyon, I <3 Lemurs, Roswell, and Pluto: Revolve in Peace
August 5, 2025 at 1:33 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
When in New Mexico… #botany2025
Me hugging a flowering yucca at White Sands National Park
August 1, 2025 at 3:54 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
When in Arizona…
#botany2025
Me hugging a saguaro
August 1, 2025 at 12:37 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Hey #Botany2025 was so fun we’re ready for #Botany2026 … maybe we’ll wait for y’all here in Tuscon!
Selfie of the lab in front of the entrance to Starr Resort in Tuscon, the location of Botany 2026. Saguaros in the background!
August 1, 2025 at 1:44 AM
mossmatters.bsky.social
When in California… #botany2025
Me in a tie dye shirt hugging a tall pine tree
July 31, 2025 at 11:46 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Opening night of #botany2025 means matching lab t-shirts!

Check out the alt text to read all of our "plant band" names!
Nine botanists in bright green E.L. Reed Herbarium t-shirts at Botany2025 Botany July 27-31, 2025 Palm Springs CA Monday: Panicum! At the Disco Hall & Sideoats • Kate Subshrub • OK Glomus Tupackera Shakur • Postoak Malone • My Chemical Bromeliad Bryum Adams • Imagine Snapdragons • Moss Def • Green Day  RUBISCO Speedwagon • Blue Bonnet Jovi • Arctic Monkeyflowers Tuesday: Chapparal Roan Philadelphus Collins • Fleet Phloxes • Van Xanthisma Durian Durian • Guns ‘N’ Rosaceae • The Notorious G.D.C. • AsteraceDC Ceratodonovan • Scurfy • Dexy’s Midnight Stolons • Violet Femmes The Mammas and The Chaetopappas • Buddy Ilex • Smashing Curcurbita    Up All Night Wednesday Featuring PEAT Lab @ TTU: CorgiOne • JellyJam • Mycelial Network • Youthful Eyes Junior Ranger • Plant? • Tequilia Greg • Babagooya • Flora 
July 28, 2025 at 2:31 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Our lab is out in force at #Botany2025 - come check out our talks and posters this week in Palm Springs!
Peat Lab at Botany - Department of Biological Sciences, Texas Tech University. Featuring seven talks and three posters by: Matt Johnson (PI) Assessing BCEENET CUREs Monday • 8:45 AM • SmoketreeC Madison Bullock (PhD Candidate) Conservation Genomics: Gettin SNPpy with it Monday • 10:15 AM • Ventura Nan Hu (Post-doc) IDing plants in Mixed DNA with A353 Monday • 11:15 AM • MesquiteC Anna DesHotels (MA Student) The Comanche Plant Footprint Monday • 2:00 PM • SmoketreeDE Jazlyn Salazar (Post-bac) 100 years of Stomatal Change in GUMO Tuesday• 8:30 AM • SmoketreeAB Mara Hosaka (MS Student) AMF Diversity from Herbarium Specimens Tuesday • 10:30 AM • Santa Rosa Oluwaseun Shodipo (PhD Student) Phylogenetic Systematics of Xanthisma Tuesday• 2:45 PM • Sierra Undergraduate Posters Monday 5:30 - 7 PM • Oasis 2 Rylee Creek • P206 Fun-sized Library Prep Bowen Forman • P209 Phylogeny of Texas Flora Charles Huff • P11 GPU-Accelerated HybPiper PLANTS: Everything About Them!
July 27, 2025 at 3:50 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
We ♥️ National Parks!

Road trip to #botany2025 continues!
Selfie of 9 people at the grandest of canyons Slightly off kilter photo at Petrified Forest National Park
July 25, 2025 at 8:35 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
The flat bed Ford that slowed down to take a look at us E.L. Reed Herbarium sticker left its mark on the flat bed ford at Winslow Arizona
July 25, 2025 at 12:12 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Takin it easy while simultaneously gettin our kicks on our way to #botany2025

Such a fine sight to see!
Selfie of nine people at the Standin on a Corner tourist trap in Winslow, Arizona.
July 25, 2025 at 2:10 AM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Stopped for food in ABQ and reached the Continental Divide!
Eating Indian food in Albuquerque Selfie of 9 people at the Continental Divide, 7295 feet in New Mexico
July 24, 2025 at 10:59 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Y’all, big news, I found out where they’re keeping them all
Green road sign on the highway that says: Grants City Limit Elev 6470
July 24, 2025 at 9:58 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
The PEAT* Lab is on its way to #Botany2025! A mere 16 hours to Palm Springs, see y’all there!
A van of smiling botanists at the beginning of a very long road trip
July 24, 2025 at 3:36 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Well I've broken my second stress ball of 2025 which is not an omen or metaphor of any kind I'm sure
Hand squeezing a blue stress ball with liquid squeezing out of a small hole. A crushed multicolored stress ball and a cat ears stress ball look on with some concern.
June 20, 2025 at 6:22 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
New addition to the lab door courtesy of @sarahmackattack.bsky.social and squidfacts.bigcartel.com
Door with three posters, including Biology is Bigger than Binaries from SkypeAScientist, along with In this Lab we Believe (Science is real, love is love, black lives matter, feminism is for everyone, plants are cool, and immigrants are welcome) Also a lab inside joke about poorly drawn dinosaurs from the movie "Drasik Werl" with a QR code that leads to the screeching recorder version of the Jurassic Park theme song.
May 29, 2025 at 3:02 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
Field last week in Junction, TX - towards a new flora of Kimble County, TX including South Llano River State Park. Over 350 specimens collected from 200+ plant species!
Two students beneath a mesquite tree setting up a 1m box for plant abundance Four students sit on a rocky river bank with a plant press Matelea reticulata, pearl milkweed vine, in the South Llano River State Park Man in a red hat and sunglasses holding a specimen of a complex thalloid liverwort, complete with archagoniophores, collected on a beer can.
May 27, 2025 at 6:13 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
No better way to spend a whole day than attending two graduations @ttu.edu

Proud to celebrate two students Hannah and Jazlyn who did research in the herbarium and don our professorly wizard costumes!

Bonus “Matt Selfie” feat. @drbarnes.org
Hannah and I after TTU graduation in our wizard clothes Jazlyn and I smiling after she got her diploma at TTU graduation Several biology professors in our wizard outfits before our TTU graduation Two Matts in our wizard outfits at TTU graduation
May 16, 2025 at 10:39 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
How does avian influenza spread to cats? It’s a real mystery, the world may never know.
A mourning dove perched on a plastic container of cat food left outside a building on campus
May 10, 2025 at 4:15 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
The average American has three friends
Drawing of moss, liverwort, and hornwort, the three bryophyte friends. Image from https://tentativeplantscientist.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/moss-liverwort-hornwort.png
May 2, 2025 at 10:50 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
TTU English Professor TJ Geiger presented at Science By The Glass on Lula Pace and the teaching of evolution in 1920s Texas. TJ is writing a book on Pace’s life as an educator and defender of evolution at Baylor
TJ and a slide with a picture of a woman (Lula Pace) and a quote “If evolution can not be taught, the premedic course can not be given. I grant you a teacher may give it and not use the word evolution”
April 25, 2025 at 11:49 PM
mossmatters.bsky.social
They Thought They Were Free: The Germans 1933-1945

Chapter 13: But Then It Was Too Late
“In the university community, in your own community, you speak privately to your colleagues, some of whom certainly feel as you do; but what do they say? They say, ‘It’s not so bad’ or ‘You’re seeing things’ or ‘You’re an alarmist.’ (Or you’re a conspiracy theorist.) “And you are an alarmist. You are saying that this must lead to this, but you can’t prove it. These are the beginnings, yes; but how do you know for sure when you don’t know the end? On the one hand, your enemies, the law, the regime, the Party, intimidate you. On the other, your colleagues pooh-pooh you as pessimistic or even neurotic. You are left with your close friends. “But your friends are fewer now. Some have drifted off somewhere or submerged themselves in their work. You no longer see as many as you did at meetings or gatherings. Informal groups become smaller; attendance drops off and the organizations themselves wither. Now, in small gatherings of your oldest friends, you feel that you are talking to yourselves, that you are isolated from the reality of things. This weakens your confidence still further and serves as a further deterrent. It is clearer all the time that, if you are going to do anything, you must make an occasion to do it, and then you are obviously a troublemaker. So, you wait, and you wait. “But the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds or thousands will join with you, never comes.” Milton Mayer’s They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45 “How is this to be avoided, among ordinary men, even highly educated ordinary men? Frankly, I do not know. I do not see, even now. Many, many times since it all happened I have pondered that pair of great maxims, Principiis obsta and Finem respice—‘Resist the beginnings’ and ‘Consider the end.’ But one must foresee the end in order to resist, or even see, the beginnings. One must foresee the end clearly and certainly and how is this to be done, by ordinary men or even by extraordinary men? Things might have changed here before they went as far as they did; they didn’t, but they might have. And everyone counts on that might.
April 15, 2025 at 12:57 PM