You, Me & HIFMB - Stories of Science and the Sea

In this episode, Jan welcomes Daniela Portella Sampaio for a conversation about her scientific journey through Antarctica and current research on Antarctic governance. We particularly focus on Antarctic intersectionality research. Daniela also shares memorable moments from the field (like finding a historic shoe) and tips on how to successfully score grants - she scored 2 (!!) Marie Skłodowska-Cur...

Today in another European Commission Edition episode, I talked to Sahar Stevenson-Jones. She is working at SERE (The Society for Ecological Restoration Europe) and there she is the Project Officer for the Marine Restoration Project. The Marine Restoration Working Group was established at the SERE2024 Conference in Tartu, Estonia, and currently meets 4 times a year, with the 5 task forces, which ar...

HIFMB's Transfer Office was attending the  Knowledge Exchange Network for Marine Biodiversity Cluster Event  at the European Research Executive Agency (REA) of the European Commission (EC).  Here in Brussels, I interviewed participants of the event - one of them being Paris Vasilakopoulos - today's guest. Paris works at the EC, specifically the Joint Research Centre (JRC) and, among many topics, w...

Episode overview This episode covers the essentials of social science research in terms of practical concerns and ethical considerations. It firstly spends some time, thinking about time! How researchers can plan projects within specific timeframes, budgetary constraints, possible travel restrictions, and how to also think on vital matters of risk, health and safety in doing social research. The p...

Episode overview This episode shifts our focus to how we might start to think about social worlds in our research. It outlines that how we look at the world – the assumptions we hold about it (what exists, how we know what exists) – is crucial to our start points in research, and drives the kind of questions we might ask about the world. This podcast explores the role of theory (and how it is some...

Episode overview This episode tackles the fundamental question: What is social science, and why does it matter for marine research? We first (try to) define social science, discussing the various disciplines which constitute it, and briefly introduce the methods and approaches that will be discussed further, later in the series. We next discuss marine social science, its special and important plac...

Episode overview This episode welcomes listeners to the podcast "Social Science Matters," which is dedicated to exploring the important world of social science research in the marine environment. In this episode we outline the purpose of the series, which aims to demystify social science methods and make them accessible to marine researchers, practitioners, and anyone interested in the human dimen...

In the new year, Kim Peters surprises podcast host Jan and turns the tables on him. She Interviews him on: what got him to HIFMB, a quick look into Jan's work on marine biodiversity at the science-policy interface, the wonderful people he got to learn from and work with, and even the Olympics 2028!!  Happy 2024 everyone, enjoy!

Kristin (or Tine) Tietje has not only got a super Northern-German sounding name but also recently got a full-time position as the science coordinator of the Marine Governance Group here at HIFMB. She talks about the long winding road that she took to get here and tells us what it means to coordinate science and, more importantly, scientists - which is why she enjoys her job so much. 

Today, we hear from Merdeka, a PhD-student in the former Marine Political Ecology Group that is now part of the Marine Governance Group. He reports on his recent manuscript about tin mining by Indonesian divers and how he switches the perspectives in his writing to highlight topics that are otherwise forgotten about. Merdeka also reflects on what it is like to have children as a PhD student and ho...

In a thunderous summer episode, we hear from Anna Roik - postdoc at HIFMB. Her work is centered around harnessing the microbiome (the collection of bacteria, viruses, fungi and their genes) on corals. She transplants the microbiome of more heat resistant corals onto that of heat susceptible ones to boost their resilience in the face of climate change. 

Jasmin Groß and Elena Schall - both representatives of the Postdoc-Team a the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research - bring a hot topic to the podcast: the recently proposed law reforms surrounding the "Wissenschaftszeitvertragsgesetz". This is a "Law on Fixed-Term Contracts in Higher Education and Research" and it is due for a change. Jasmin and Elena will present to us what is i...

Mita Mahato is an artist who uses art to communicate environmental issues - especially via the use of comix - yes with an X! As our artist in residence in collaboration with the Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg Institute for Advanced Study, Mita reflects on the work she has done during her time with us.

HIFMB postdoc Dorothee Hodapp is working on biodiversity change and is giving us insights into her recently published study in Global Change Biology. Here, she shows how climate change disrupts core habitats of marine species and predicts their ranges up to the year 2100. She further shares her recipe for successfully blending family life with two kids with a gapless CV in academia and her recent...

Today we have Meren on the show. He is the leader of our institute's Ecosystem Data Science Group and considers himself and his group to be placed at the intersection between microbiology and computer science. Mentorship is an imporant topic to him - we talk through his survey  Mentorship in life sciences: voices of mentees , where he asked early career researchers how the mentorship that they rec...

Back from our winter break, we have Jana Massing on the podcast. Jana is a PhD-student in the Biodiversity Theory group and introduces us to her work on marine bacteria. Amongst her many interests, including food webs, modelling, governance and science communication, we chat about her recent paper. There she applies a manifold learning technique, called “diffusion maps” that allows her to gain ins...

Gema Martínez Méndez reads her Scientific Fairytale "The Bremen Town Musicians set sail" from "Once Upon a Time – A Scientific Fairytale Vol. 1" that we introduced in Episode 11. Happy Holidays everyone! 

In this Episode, postdoc Andrea Franke showcases her latest paper from People and Nature on real-world labs. She also shares with us how she expanded her research from specialised experimental work on herring larvae to transdisciplinary work on the UN Ocean Decade. A great example on how to build interdisciplinary recognition!

Lucie Kuczynski is a community ecologist working on global change and what it implies for biodiversity. One of her recent studies shows why the biodiversity crisis is too nuanced to be tackled in the same way as global warming. She also enlightens us why French wine is the best, why La Rochelle is the best city and why Academia is not the only career path for Academics. A lot of wisdom in this epi...

Today, it’s all about science communication! And for the first time, we have two guests: Gema Martínez Méndez, marine scientist, and Rebecca Borges, marine ecologist. Both are involved in a sci-comm project called “Once upon a time… a scientific fairy tale” where scientific studies are communicated via the use of fairy tales. Definitely give this one a listen! Read the scientific fairytales here:...

Lukas Meysick is a postdoc for seafloor ecology of the Wadden Sea. He also works on a recent project partnering with stakeholders from Tanzania and South Africa looking at how seagrass can assist in clearing polluted water. We further talk about his scientific career – in his PhD, seagrass also took centre stage. Enjoy this seagrass-themed episode with Lukas!

In this episode, Soli Levi tells us about a very new and unexplored study field: emotions in marine governance. Soli is developing a theoretical framework to bring emotion into management decisions and talks about her plan with case studies in Ireland. We also talk about Soli’s multifaceted past as a turtle conservationist and working with NGOs in Greece, remote work as a business development coor...

Solomon Sebuliba considers himself a conservation biologist turned political ecologist who, in his PhD at HIFMB, looks at biodiversity as a concept. Specifically, he considers the inherent power that terms like “biodiversity” or “biological diversity” have. Through this, he came up with his own concept, the “Bio Ocean”. We also talk about Solomon’s deep and varied CV, working on the ICUN Red List,...

Master’s student and our very own podcast editor Nina Tombers chats about her experience of the Master’s career stage. We chat about her Thesis work on population genetics at the Centre for Marine Tropical Ecology (ZMT) in Bremen and her student assistant job here at HIFMB. She gives us a look into the behind the scenes of podcasting, Switzerland, tropical population genetics, her training to beco...

In this Episode, Sharlene Fechter talks about being a Master’s student at HIFMB. She covers her thesis work on stakeholders of the Weddel Sea in Antarctica and how she built a diverse skillset to jumpstart an interdisciplinary career in science. We also talk about how becoming a young mother early in her career motivated her even further and how she is currently searching for a PhD-position in Aus...