Past Courses / Events

Blackcap migration - adaptation in time and space

Institute Seminar by Miriam Liedvogel
  • Date: Jun 17, 2025
  • Time: 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Miriam Liedvogel
  • Miriam Liedvogel is Director of the Institute of Avian Research “Vogelwarte Helgoland” and Professor of Ornithology at Carl-von-Ossietzky University Oldenburg. She is fascinated by the phenomenon of bird migration and with her research asks, how this fascinating behaviour is controlled, coordinated and regulated on the molecular level? To address this question, she links careful behavioural observation and state-of-the-art tracking migration in the wild to carefully characterise migratory behaviour under controlled conditions as well as free flying birds, with whole genome sequencing and gene expression approaches to match genotype to phenotype. Her work is funded through the European Commission (Marie Curie Fellowship), the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Feodor Lynen Fellowship), the German Research Foundation (DFG) and the Max Planck Society (MPG). Miriam has been awarded various prices and fellowships, e.g. an award for outstanding supervision by the Universitätsgesellschaft Oldenburg (UGO), the JED Williams Medal for her committee work. Besides regularly talking at both national and international scientific conferences, Miriam enjoys to communicate science to children and the general public.
  • Location: Bückle St. 5a, 78467 Konstanz
  • Room: Seminar room MPI-AB Bücklestrasse + Online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior
  • Contact: aflack@ab.mpg.de
Understanding the genetics of bird migration is a long-standing goal in evolutionary biology. Blackcaps Sylvia atricapilla are ideal for this work as different populations exhibit enormous difference in migratory behaviour and little else. We characterize (i) phenotype, population structure and ... [more]

Bat migration and Flight Dynamics

Rado Seminar by Edward Hurme
  • Date: Jun 13, 2025
  • Time: 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Edward Hurme
  • Location: MPI-AB Möggingen
  • Room: Seminar room MPI-AB Möggingen + Online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior
  • Contact: ddechmann@ab.mpg.de
[more]

The shrew as a model for brain shrinkage without neurodegeneration" - Practice talk for a conference presentation

Rado Seminar by Cecilia Baldoni
  • Date: Jun 6, 2025
  • Time: 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Cecilia Baldoni
  • Location: MPI-AB Möggingen
  • Room: Seminar room MPI-AB Möggingen + Online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior
  • Contact: ddechmann@ab.mpg.de
I'm preparing a 10-minute talk for the upcoming EMBO Workshop on unconventional vertebrate models in biomedicine. The workshop is targeted at researchers working with non-model species and those in biomedical fields (e.g. tissue regeneration, aging, stem cell biology). I’ll present how the common ... [more]

Sisters, mothers, and others: how kin shape the life-history of an asocial squirrel

Institute Seminar by Caitlin Wells
  • Date: Jun 3, 2025
  • Time: 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Caitlin Wells
  • Dr. Caitlin Wells, Assistant Professor in the Dept. of Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology at Colorado State University. Caitlin is a conservation ecologist whose work integrates evolutionary ecology, animal behavior, and conservation genomics to predict the responses of wild vertebrates to environmental change. Caitlin works with birds (primarily waterfowl) and mammals (rodents, elephants, and primates) of conservation concern, primarily in the mountains and the tropics, with long-term work in Hawaii, the Rocky Mountains, and Uganda. She is currently the PI of the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory’s long-term ground squirrel project studying social and reproductive behavior, accelerated aging, life histories, and phenological mismatch under climatic change.
  • Location: Bückle St. 5a, 78467 Konstanz
  • Room: Seminar room MPI-AB Bücklestrasse + Online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior
  • Contact: bbarrett@ab.mpg.de
Among mammals, the formation of matrilines – multigenerational female kin groups – is thought to be a key transition toward complex social living in primates, carnivores, and ground-dwelling squirrels. The costs and benefits of interactions with female kin have been well-identified for social ... [more]

Working in Germany – Labour Market and Job Search Strategies for International and German STEM Researchers

  • Date: May 27, 2025
  • Time: 12:00 PM - 01:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Eva Maisel, Career Service University of Konstanz
  • Location: University of Konstanz
  • Room: R511
  • Host: KoRS-CB and IMPRS
  • Contact: imprs@uni-konstanz.de
[more]

Collective Behaviours in Wild Indian Wolves & Conservation of Indian Savannahs

Institute Seminar by Adwait Deshpande
  • Moved to Bücklestrasse!
  • Date: May 27, 2025
  • Time: 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Adwait Deshpande
  • Location: Bückle St. 5a, 78467 Konstanz
  • Room: Seminar room MPI-AB Bücklestrasse + Online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior
  • Contact: vsridhar@ab.mpg.de
Social carnivores have garnered the attention of behavioural biologists because of their complex social structures and remarkable collective behaviours, such as coordinated hunting. However, quantitative understanding of these social and collective behaviours in social carnivores is significantly ... [more]

Documenting animal experiments - legal requirements and MaxCare as a new tool

Rado Seminar by Inge Müller
  • Date: May 23, 2025
  • Time: 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Inge Müller
  • Location: MPI-AB Möggingen
  • Room: Seminar room MPI-AB Möggingen + Online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior
  • Contact: ddechmann@ab.mpg.de
The seminar will cover the legal requirements for documenting animal experiments, both in a general context and with a specific focus on German and EU legislation. We will introduce MaxCare, a customized database designed to help you document animal experiments consistently and thoroughly, ensuring ... [more]

Neuroethology of African Cichlids: Environmental and Social Influences on Neuroanatomical Variation

Doctoral defense by Bin Ma, supervised by Alex Jordan
  • Date: May 23, 2025
  • Time: 10:00 AM - 01:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Bin Ma
  • Location: University of Konstanz
  • Room: A702 + online
[more]

Knowledge and culture in savannah elephants: What do we know, and what should we do next?

Institute Seminar by Lucy Bates
  • Date: May 20, 2025
  • Time: 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Lucy Bates
  • My research considers the evolution of social skills and cognition in mammals, particularly elephants. My current work concerns the acquisition of information and the role of ‘knowledgeable’ individuals in elephant society. This has implications for elephant conservation and management policy, which is an important part of my interest, and I endeavour to use my research to contribute to and enable sustainable, fair and effective conservation practices. My passion for studying elephant cognition began with my first post-doctoral research position, conducted between 2005 and 2008 at the University of St Andrews. Working with Professor Dick Byrne, I conducted some of the first field studies exploring social cognition in savannah elephants, working in collaboration with the Amboseli Trust for Elephants. Before that I completed my PhD on chimpanzee behavioural ecology, also at St Andrews. After the post-doc I took a break from academia, working as a consultant for various conservation projects in southern Africa between 2009 and 2015 before returning to research with a part-time Daphne Jackson Trust Fellowship held at the University of Sussex, working alongside Professor Karen McComb. I then worked as an Associate Lecturer at the Open University, before joining the University of Portsmouth as a (part-time) lecturer in 2022.
  • Location: Bückle St. 5a, 78467 Konstanz
  • Room: Seminar room MPI-AB Bücklestrasse + Online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior
  • Contact: rthillaikumar@ab.mpg.de
In this talk, I will explore what we know about the acquisition of information and the role of knowledgeable individuals in elephant society. It is something of a mantra for elephant biologists that older elephants are ‘repositories of knowledge’, but I will question what this means in two ways ... [more]

Understanding Roost Fidelity in Cave-Dwelling Bats: Insights from PIT-Tag Monitoring of Rhinolophus euryale

Rado Seminar by Lander Olasagasti
  • Date: May 16, 2025
  • Time: 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Lander Olasagasti
  • Location: MPI-AB Möggingen
  • Room: Seminar room MPI-AB Möggingen + Online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior
  • Contact: ddechmann@ab.mpg.de
Roosts are vital for bats, offering protection and a place to rest, breed, and socialise. Among roost types, caves are the most stable but also the least available, leading cave-dwelling bats to form larger colonies and switch roosts less often than tree-rosting species. Conservation and monitoring ... [more]
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