ITALIAN SOCIETY FOR EVOLUTIONARY BIOLOGY Congress 6-10 September 2026, Firenze, Italy REGISTRATION OPEN Dear friends and colleagues, Registration is now open for the *SIBE Evoluzione 2026 Congress*, which will take place in *Firenze from 6 to 10 September*. The scientific program will be organized around the following symposia: Symposium 1 "Host-microbiome interactions" Symposium 2 "Evolutionary roots of behavioural diversity" Symposium 3 "Phylogeography and Conservation Genomics: understanding evolutionary history to sustain species resilience" Symposium 4 "Human evolution" Symposium 5 "The evolution of ecological diversification: mechanisms, interactions, and outcomes" Symposium 6 "Evolutionary biology without borders" Each symposium will open with a plenary lecture by an international invited speaker, including *Stephen Palumbi, Mihai Netea, David Caramelli, Martin Giurfa, Jacintha Ellers, Mirte Bosse, and Maurizio Mencuccini*. In addition to the scientific sessions, the congress will offer several events, including a *dedicated poster session*, a free *crash course* on wet-lab techniques in genomics, the meeting of the *Italian Group for Conservation Genetics and Genomics*, the original *outreach theatre event* "Botanica Queer", and a *social dinner at the Florence Botanical Garden*. The congress will take place across several venues in the city. All scientific sessions will be held in the Novoli district, at the University's Social Sciences Campus, while social events and the poster session will take place in the historic city centre. Participants may therefore choose to stay either in the city centre or in Novoli, two areas conveniently connected by the tram line. Please note that the last tram runs at around 00:30; after this time, public transportation options become more limited. September is a high season for tourism in Florence, and other conferences are scheduled in the Novoli area during the same period. We therefore strongly recommend booking accommodation well in advance. For further details about Evoluzione 2026, please visit the website: www.sibe-iseb.it/firenze2026 We look forward to welcoming many of you to Firenze, The Organizing and Scientific Committee Alessio Iannucci Tenure Track Researcher (RTT) Department of Biology University of Florence Via Madonna del Piano 6, I-50019 Sesto Fiorentino (FI), Italy email:alessio.iannucci@unifi.it Tel. +390554574741 "alessio.iannucci@unifi.it" (to subscribe/unsubscribe the EvolDir send mail to golding@mcmaster.ca)