07-09-2018

Group Retreat 2018

For this years’ retreat we travelled to the far east of Germany and spent three days in the remote location Klingemühle in the beautiful nature reserve Schlaubetal in Brandenburg. Together with the groups of Sophie Armitage and Claudia Fricke , we spent three days discussing science and trying to find wolves. Even with the help of rangers the real wolves kept hidden, but we found their tracks!

19-08-2018

Evomont2018 — © Evolution Montpellier 2018

Conference: Evolution Montpellier 2018

Nicolle Demandt, Nora Schulz, Caroline Zanchi, and Joachim Kurtz presented their research on the 2nd Joint Congress on Evolutionary Biology in Montpellier (France).

02-07-2018

New PhD student joins the Kurtz Lab

We want to welcome Reshma R as a new member of the IEB. Reshma joined the "Animal Evolutionary Ecology" group of Prof. Dr. Joachim Kurtz. Together with Lai Ka Lo and Özge Sahin, she will work within the CRC NC³ on the project "The role of niche construction and evolutionary capacitance for evolvability in the Red Flour Beetle, Tribolium castaneum”.

New paper by Demandt et al. & Interview with Dr. J. Scharsack in "dlf - Forschung Aktuell"

20.06.2018

The stickleback part of the "Animal Evolutionary Ecology" group just released a new paper on how infected sticklebacks shift the behaviour of uninfected sticklebacks towards a bolder behaviour. In connection with the new paper, Dr. Jörn Scharsack was interviewed by the Deutschlandfunk (dlf) for the "Forschung aktuell" broadcast about the findings of this study. The interview will be broadcasted today at 16:35 on the Deutschlandfunk and will be available here on the official "Forschung aktuell" webpage directly after the broadcast.

For the official WWU announcement of the paper click here. There are articles about the paper in "The Atlantic" and "United Press International". The German public international broadcast service "Deutsche Welle" (DW) also reported on this paper, see here.

Nicolle Demandt, Benedikt Saus, Ralf H. J. M. Kurvers, Jens Krause, Joachim Kurtz, Jörn Peter Scharsack: Parasite-infected sticklebacks increase the risk-taking behavior of uninfected group members. Proceedings of the Royal Society B; DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2018.0956

Two new PhD students join the Kurtz Lab

02.04.2018

We want to welcome Özge Şahin and Lai Ka Lo as new members of the IEB. Özge and Lai Ka joined the "Animal Evolutionary Ecology" group of Prof. Dr. Joachim Kurtz. Both are working on the NC³ project "The role of niche construction and evolutionary capacitance for evolvability in the Red Flour Beetle, Tribolium castaneum".

Parasiten - Global Player der Ökosysteme

09.01.2018

Joachim Kurtz and Jörn Scharsack contributed to a radio broadcast on the role of parasites as "global players" in ecosystems called "Parasiten - Global Player der Ökosysteme" by Rainer B. Langen. It will air Wednesday the 10.01.2018 at 8:30 am on SWR 2. For a recording of the show visit the SWR2 podcast.

Joachim Kurtz und Jörn Scharsack trugen zu einer Radiosendung über die Rolle von Parasiten als "global player" in Ökosystem names "Parasiten - Global Player der Ökosysteme" von Rainer B. Langen bei. Die Sendung wird am Mittwoch dem 10.01.2018 um 8:30 im SWR2 ausgestrahlt. Eine Aufnahme der Sendung wird es im SWR2 Podcast nach der Ausstrahlung geben.

Open Positions

08.01.2018

The newly funded SFB "NC³" is offering several interesting positions, including two PhD positions here in the Animal Evolutionary Ecology group.
For more information see the "Open Positions" section of the "NC³" home page or at the WWU (PhD1 and PhD2). The application deadline for both PhD positions is 14 January 2018.