Outreach
December 2022
Barbara Wallner is featured in a series of Ö1 radio broadcasts from 12-16 December (Vom Leben der Natur, 8:55): "Wie das Pferd zum Menschen kam".
October 2022
The Austrian Broadcasting Corporation (ORF) published an article about the unusually high number of fruit flies currently appearing in Vienna. While Drosophila populations indeed thrive every year during wine harvest season, the mild October temperatures caused by the climate crisis increase the fly's growth rates as explained by Christian Schlötterer: ORF News
November 2021
Elif Bozlak, Lara Radovic and Barbara Wallner won the 1st prize at this year's VetIdeas Challenge at Vetmeduni Vienna for translating their research to a possible applicable business idea. The team developed the project "Horse paternal ancestree" to bridge the gap between the scientific and public horse community. The project aims to enable the interested public to explore the paternal ancestry of horses which may be particularly interesting for horse owners. For the poster and pitch presentation of the idea, special attention was given to the implementation of economical aspects that were earlier developed at different workshops. Congratulations!
July 2021
PhD students Dagny Runarsdottir and Lara Radovic reach out to young researchers at Children's University to explain how populations evolve.
August 2020
The 2020 edition of "Kinderuni" (Children's University) could unfortunately not run "live" due to the Covid-19 crisis. Nevertheless, three of our students joined the efforts of Kinderuni to provide a fun, safe virtual contribution. Christina, Burcin and Elif prepared posters about evolution of horses in three languages for curious young researchers. "We were disappointed that we couldn't interact with the kids, and show them evolution under the microscope. It was a challenge to come up with a concept but it turned out to be fun to collaborate for the poster from our individual home offices."
October 2019
In October 2019, we started to record some of our international guest talks. Schedule and links to YouTube talks are available here
Click here for the PopGen Vienna YouTube channel
May 2019: Open University Day
Members of PopGen Vienna participated at Vetmeduni's Open University Day.
March 2019: Science Day
Members of PopGen Vienna participated at the Science Day of the University of Vienna.
Summer 2017: Internship for high school student
Welcome to this year's high school intern Petra who joins our PhD students for 4 weeks to assist in hands-on fly evolution projects.
More about the "Talente entdecken" program of the FFG here
June 2017: PopGen Vienna participates at Open University Day
For this year's Open University Day, our students participated at the Science Cafe and prepared a fruit fly themed microscopy table. Both adult and young visitors were equally fascinated by fruit fly populations from around the world, evolved flies, bizarre mutants and blue larva next to close-up shots of electron microscope images. Kids were also invited to extract DNA from some of fruit fly's favorite foods: strawberries.
April 2017: March for Science
PopGen Vienna students, postdocs and faculty joined the March for Science on April 22 in Vienna, one of 600 marches that took place around the globe. We demonstrated our support for science and the fundamental role it plays in serving and improving our society through informed policy. #marchforscience #vienna
July 2016: Evolution explained to kids
Two of our students joined the "Kinderuni" as teachers in July 2016 to bring the complex topic of evolution into the spotlight during a workshop with 25 school kids aged 10-12. The kids actively engaged in a lecture about the principles of DNA, organisms and evolution. In the following practical session they were fascinated to see DNA being extracted from Strawberries, and to observe fruit flies and mutants under the microscope.
May 2015: PopGen Vienna participates at Open University Day
For the 250 year anniversary of the Vetmeduni Vienna, our students thought of an additional attraction for visitors at the booth of the Vienna Graduate School of Population Genetics: participants were instructed how to extract DNA from Strawberries using everyday materials. The feedback of the visitors of all ages was very positive. One pupil was so impressed that he will repeat the experiment at school with all his class mates!
As usual, the audience was also fascinated by our temperature-adapted fruit flies, bizarre mutants and close-up shots of electron microscope images of Drosophila.
Summer 2014: Internships for high school students
During Summer 2014, four high school students will be hosted at PopGen Vienna.
Bernadette, Thomas, Julia and Clemens were selected from a number of interested high school students to spend one month during Summer at PopGen Vienna, collaborating with our PhD students to gain an insight into hands-on science.
More about the "Talente entdecken" program of the FFG here
July 2014: Evolution explained to 10-12 year-olds
How to explain to kids what Evolution is? Three of our students managed to bring this complex topic into the spotlight during a "Kinderuni" (Kid's University) workshop in front and in midst of 25 curious and active school kids. The children asked surprisingly clever questions, and agreed that fruit flies are ideal to observe evolution in the lab.
June 2014: PopGen Vienna PhD student at Falling Walls Lab
Daniel Fabian (PIs Thomas Flatt/Christian Schlötterer) contended for participation to the Falling Walls Lab, a non-profit series of scientific conferences that aims at building and fostering interdisciplinary connections between young bright minds. This new and interdisciplinary format offers the opportunity to excellent young academics and professionals from all disciplines to present their outstanding ideas, research projects and entrepreneurial or social initiatives. Each participant is asked to present his/her work in 3 minutes, and a prestigious jury from science and business awards the best participants.
Read more about Falling Walls here
May 2014: PopGen Vienna participates at Open University Day
Also at this year's Open University Day at Vetmeduni Vienna, some of our students represented the Vienna Graduate School of Population Genetics to visitors of all ages. The audience was quite fascinated by temperature-adapted fruit flies and different bizarre mutants.
Summer 2012: internship for high school student
Also this year one high school student will be hosted at PopGen Vienna:
Pia Hager, a high school student from Vienna with a growing interest for biology, will assist PhD students in September 2012 with life history evolution projects.
June 2012: PopGen Vienna participates at Open University Day
PopGen Vienna students explained to visitors of all ages how fruit flies develop and how they're cultivated in the lab. Big and small were equally amazed by comparing wild type flies and natural mutants (e.g. white eyes, curly wings, different body colors) under the microscope.
Winter 2011: Bioinformatics Internship at Popgen Vienna
The Vienna Graduate School of Population Genetics hosted Michael Würdemann (Berlin) during November 2011 for a one-month internship. Michael attends an advanced training module at Consulting & Qualification Haberhauffe Centre for Further Education to become a bioinformatics assistant. During his stay he will handled and analysed Next Generation Sequencing data in collaboration with our PhD students (on the picture, Michi is on the right).
Summer 2011: Summer internship for high school students
Two high school interns gained insight into experimental evolution:
We hosted Pia and Janine, two high school students, during July and August 2011 to assist PhD students of the Schlötterer and Flatt groups in projects dealing with temperature adaptation and life history evolution. Pia and Janine found the new experience rewarding, and it was a pleasure for us to work with them!
