The Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology is organising a 4 day
workshop to celebrate Darwin's Day on "Concepts of Evolutionary Biology"
from 10-13th February 2025.

The purpose of this workshop is to discuss some of the most pertinent
and exciting topics in modern evolutionary biology, from origins of life
to predicting evolution. We are particularly interested in bringing
together ideas from different disciplines to achieve a broad-scale
understanding. The full list of topics and invited speakers is detailed
below. The discussion for each topic will involve two speakers. The
first will provide a "concept talk". Ideally this will include an
introduction to the topic, but will then focus on concepts, perhaps
including historical development of ideas. In those instances where the
topic has proved controversial, then it would be important to provide a
balanced critique of conflicting views. The second speaker will deliver
an "empirical talk" based on current/on-going research. Lastly,
these talks will be complemented by poster sessions and group discussions.

Early replicators and Origin of life: 

-Nick Lane (University College London) 

Niche construction: 

-Kevin Laland (University of St. Andrews) 

-Blake Mathews (Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology) 

Adaptive radiations: 

-Dolph Schulter (University of British Columbia) 

-Christopher Martin (University of California, Berkeley) 

Fitness landscapes: 

-Justin R Meyer (University of California, San Diego) 

-Andreas Wagner (University of Zürich) 

Polygenic Adaptation: 

-Marcus Feldman (Standford University) 

-Neda Barghi (Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology) 

Evolutionary Developmental biology: 

-Natalie Feiner (Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology) 

-Emilia Santos (Oxford University) 

Multilevel selection: 

-Paul Rainey (Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology) 

-Katrin Hammerschmidt (Christian-Albrechts-University Kiel) 

Holobiont and HGT: 

-Ford Doolittle (Dalhousie University) 

-Honour McCann (Max Planck Institute for Biology) 

Predicting Evolution: 

-Meike Wortel (University of Amsterdam) 

-Peter Lind (Umeå University) 

We ask that everyone who wants to participate also submit a poster. 

Registration and abstract submission deadline: 15th of November 

Further details are available at the workshop website:
https://workshops.evolbio.mpg.de/event/119/

Best regards, 

Organizing team: 

Alejandro Bonive Boscán 
Alexander Jacobsen 
Beatriz Vieira Mourato 
Enea Franceschini 
Gisela T. Rodríguez-Sánchez 
Prof. Dr Paul B. Rainey (Supporting Principal Investigator) 

Concepts EvolBio <concepts-evolbio@evolbio.mpg.de>

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