2025 Events

International Symposium: Geoanthropology, Planetary Health, and the Anthropocene Biosphere

  • Start: Dec 10, 2025 12:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • End: Dec 12, 2025 03:00 PM
  • Speaker: Various
  • Location: Villa Rosenthal
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology
  • Contact: winkelmann-office@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Critical Zones Africa: Towards an African Science and Politics of Habitability

Guest Lecture
  • Date: Nov 21, 2025
  • Time: 11:00 AM - 12:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Lesley Green (Environmental Humanities South, University of Cape Town, South Africa)
  • Location: MPI GEA and Zoom
  • Room: Villa V14 and Zoom
  • Host: Department Structural Changes of the Technosphere
  • Topic: Discussion and debate formats, lectures
  • Contact: rossee@gea.mpg.de
[more]
Graphic announcing Palaeosystems in Focus Seminar by Lucy van Dorp on 18 Nov 2025 at 2pm CET

Uncovering the Drivers of Pathogen Evolution from Ancient DNA to Modern Disease

  • Date: Nov 18, 2025
  • Time: 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Lucy van Dorp
  • University College London, Genetics Institute
  • Location: Zoom
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Topic: Discussion and debate formats, lectures
  • Contact: kutowsky@gea.mpg.de
Linking ancient DNA with modern genomic data provides a powerful framework for examining the evolution of pathogens and their hosts over centuries. Applied to microorganisms, ancient DNA approaches can recover lineages absent from contemporary sampling, expanding our view of past diversity. Temporal calibration points refine estimates of lineage ages and mutation rates, and increasingly enable the reconstruction of gene gain and loss chronologies. In this talk, I will discuss how time‐resolved approaches applied to pathogens can illuminate the processes that have shaped their diversity and adaptation, offering deeper insight into the forces influencing major disease challenges from the past to the present. [more]

Mining Conversations. The Futurepasts of ... Iron

  • Date: Nov 17, 2025
  • Time: 08:00 PM - 09:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Shanai Matteson, arts and culture collective Talon Mine Tours and Wildflower Group media collective/ Júlia Medeiros, MPI GEA/ Karin Reisinger, University of Applied Arts Vienna
  • Location: online
  • Host: Max-Planck-Institut für Geoanthropologie und Anthropocene Commons
  • Contact: rossee@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Water Management in Decision Theater - Learning from Others

  • Date: Nov 8, 2025
  • Time: 10:00 AM - 11:55 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Various
  • Location: Cafe Moskau Karl-Marx-Allee 34, Mitte, 10178 Berlin, Deutschland
  • Host: Falling Walls Foundation/ organised by Department Structural Changes of the Technosphere MPI-GEA
  • Topic: Discussion and debate formats, lectures
  • Contact: schwab@gea.mpg.de
This presentation explores three global Decision Theater cases: Arizona's water scarcity, Israel's tech-driven solutions, and China's Yellow River management. It highlights how these diverse approaches offer valuable insights for German water policy. Through comparative analysis, we examine transferable strategies and innovations, emphasising the importance of learning from others to shape adaptive, sustainable water management practices. [more]
Multiple monitors show images in a dark room. Text reads: Decision Theater Ideathon - Apply by 4 October 2025

Decision TheaterTM Ideathon

Berlin Science Week
  • Start: Nov 6, 2025 09:00 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • End: Nov 7, 2025 02:00 PM
  • Location: Säälchen, Holzmarktstraße 25, 10243 Berlin
  • Host: Jürgen Renn
  • Contact: rennoffice@gea.mpg.de
Arizona State University and the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology invite you to an immersive ideathon on 6–7 November in Berlin. Fifty professionals from politics, urban development, AI, art, culture, and creative tech will collaborate in interdisciplinary teams to explore new applications for the Decision Theater™ decision-making tool. [more]

WE-Heraeus Symposium: Revisiting the History of Quantum Physics

  • Start: Nov 5, 2025 10:00 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • End: Nov 7, 2025 01:00 PM
  • Speaker: Various
  • Location: WissenschaftsForum Berlin
  • Host: MPI GEA, Wilhelm und Else Heraeus-Stiftung
  • Contact: rennoffice@gea.mpg.de
On the occasion of the centenary of quantum theory, this international workshop brings together world-leading experts to synthesize recent scholarship on the history of quantum physics. The workshop explores key themes including the genesis of quantum mechanics, its social, cultural, and institutional contexts, interpretation debates, the role of women in the field, and the postwar expansion of quantum theory into areas like quantum field theory, condensed matter physics, and quantum information. The event offers an opportunity to reassess the past century and shape a future research agenda for the history of quantum physics. [more]

CONNECTING URBANISM ACROSS TIME AND SPACE

  • Start: Oct 27, 2025 09:00 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • End: Oct 29, 2025 08:00 PM
  • Speaker: Various
  • Location: Normannenhaus Jena, Forstweg 12, 07745 Jena
  • Host: Department Coevolution of Land Use and Urbanization
  • Contact: carleton@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Weimarer Kontroversen in Berlin | Sag, wie hast du´s mit dem Weltuntergang?

  • Date: Oct 22, 2025
  • Time: 06:00 PM - 07:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Eva Geulen und Jürgen Renn im Gespräch mit Helmut Heit
  • Location: Gemäldegalerie, Matthäikirchplatz, 10785 Berlin
  • Room: Cafébereich
  • Host: Klassik Stiftung Weimar
  • Topic: Discussion and debate formats, lectures
[more]

Cutting Edge: Quantifying Complexity in Stone Tools

  • Date: Oct 21, 2025
  • Speaker: Charles Perreault (Keynote)
  • School of Human Evolution and Social Change at Arizona State University
  • Location: Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry and Zoom
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Contact: cuttingedge@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Perspectives on the Regimes of Extraction and the Green Energy Transition

  • Date: Oct 20, 2025
  • Time: 02:00 PM - 03:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Samuel Akande, Department of Geology and Mineral Sciences, University of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria
  • Location: Hybrid Format - Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, Mezzanine and Zoom
  • Room: Mezzanine and Zoom
  • Host: Department Structural Changes of the Technosphere
  • Contact: kaye@gea.mpg.de
[more]

The evolution of human niche size in East Asia across the Pleistocene

  • Date: Oct 15, 2025
  • Time: 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Miikka Tallavaara
  • Assistant Professor, University of Helsinki
  • Location: Zoom
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Contact: kutowsky@gea.mpg.de
Humans can thrive in nearly all terrestrial environments, exhibiting exceptional ecological flexibility among primates. However, it remains unclear how and when this flexibility first emerged in the human lineage. In this talk, I present a study addressing this question in the East Asian context. [more]

Forget-me-not: Japanese historical linguistics in memory of Prof. Dr. Elisabeth De Boer

  • Start: Oct 8, 2025 09:00 AM (Local Time Germany)
  • End: Oct 9, 2025 04:00 PM
  • Speaker: Various
  • Location: Hybrid Format - Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, V.14 + Online
  • Room: Villa V14 and Zoom
  • Host: Language and the Anthropocene Research Group - Martine Robbeets
  • Topic: Discussion and debate formats, lectures
  • Contact: robbeets@gea.mpg.de
On 22th August 2023, our dear colleague Elisabeth de Boer sadly died at the age of 57, cutting short a promising career in Japanese Historical Linguistics. Elisabeth was a respected teacher of Japanese and linguistics at the Universities of Leiden and Bochum. Her researched challenged several so-called teisetsu or ‘accepted opinions’ encountered in the field. Among others, Elisabeth showed that Japanese is better described as a restricted tone language than as a pitch-accent language; that Kyōto-type dialects have been less conservative than dialects to their east and west and that the commonly accepted binary tree structure of Japonic is in need of revision. Moreover, Elisabeth did not shy away from interdisciplinary approaches, integrating linguistic evidence with archaeological and genetic findings to illuminate ancient population movements across the Japanese Islands. [more]

Mining Conversations. The Futurepasts of ... Shale Oil and Gas

  • Date: Sep 22, 2025
  • Time: 08:00 PM - 09:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Benjamin Steininger, MPI-GEA/ Silas Grant, University of New Mexico/ Monika Halkort, School for Transformation at the University of Applied Arts, Vienna/ J. T. Jack, University of Groningen
  • Location: online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology and Anthropocene Commons
  • Contact: rossee@gea.mpg.de
[more]

The Ecology-Language Relationship Through Time in Microcosms of the World’s Ecologies: the Andes and the Altai-Amur-Japan

  • Start: Sep 16, 2025 05:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • End: Sep 18, 2025 08:00 PM
  • Speaker: Various
  • Location: Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology
  • Host: Martine Robbeets, Paul Heggarty and Rebecca Sequeira
  • Contact: sequeira@gea.mpg.de
[more]

MINT-FESTIVAL JENA 2025

  • Start: Sep 16, 2025
  • End: Sep 18, 2025
  • Speaker: Various
  • Location: Campus Ernst-Abbe-Platz der Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena
  • Host: Friedrich-Schiller-Universität
  • Contact: mint@uni-jena.de
[more]

Deep-time, large-scale perspectives on biodiversity and ecosystems - implications for biosphere stewardship in the Anthropocene

Human Palaeosystems in Focus
  • Date: Aug 27, 2025
  • Time: 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Jens-Christian Svenning
  • Department of Biology at Aarhus University, Denmark; Director of DNRF Center for Ecological Dynamics in a Novel Biosphere
  • Location: Zoom
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Contact: kutowsky@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Mining Conversations. The Futurepasts of ... Petroleum

  • Date: Jul 29, 2025
  • Time: 08:00 PM - 09:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Nellys Koyoo, Kenyatta University/ Ana Luiza Nicolae, Harvard University - Department History of Science/ Monique Verdin, Another Gulf Is Possible Collaborative, The Land Memory Bank & Seed Exchange
  • Location: online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology and Anthropocene Commons
  • Contact: rossee@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Mining Conversations. The Futurepasts of ... Lithium

  • Date: Jun 26, 2025
  • Time: 08:00 PM - 09:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Karolína Žižková, Czech Academy of Sciences & Masaryk University/ Verónica Zuccarelli Freire, Alexander von Humboldt Postdoctoral Fellow, MPI GEA/ Kassandra Lisenbee, Earthworks/ Berenika Boberska, Feral Office, Los Angeles
  • Location: online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology and Anthropocene Commons
  • Contact: rossee@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Workshop: Human-Environment Interactions in Eurasian Uplands

  • Start: Jun 18, 2025 02:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • End: Jun 20, 2025 02:00 PM
  • Location: Hybrid Event hosted at the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology
  • Host: Domestication and Anthropogenic Evolution Independent Research Group, FEDD: Fruits of Eurasia Research Group
  • Contact: filipovic@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Geoanthropologie: Kann sich die Wissenschaft auf die Herausforderungen des Anthropozäns einstellen?

Ringvorlesung Nachhaltigkeit: Ringvorlesung Nachhaltigkeit - Vortrag von Prof. Dr. Jürgen Renn
  • Date: Jun 12, 2025
  • Time: 04:00 PM - 06:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Prof. Dr. Jürgen Renn
  • Location: Ernst-Abbe-Platz 8, Jena
  • Host: FSU Jena
  • Topic: Discussion and debate formats, lectures
The lecture discusses the Anthropocene as a new geological era in which humans have become the decisive influencing factor for the Earth system. In response to this fundamental transformation, geoanthropology is presented as a transdisciplinary research approach that examines the interactions between global society and the Earth system. Using the example of the energy transition, the lecture highlights the discrepancy between scientific knowledge and social action and argues for a systemic understanding of complex transformation processes. The central thesis is that the challenges of the Anthropocene can only be overcome through integrative approaches that take into account the co-evolution of technosphere and planetary processes. [more]

Using Palaeoecology to uncover colonization processes in Western Mediterranean islands

Human Palaeosystems in Focus
  • Date: Jun 11, 2025
  • Time: 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Dr. Gabriel Servera-Vives
  • Location: Zoom
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Contact: kutowsky@gea.mpg.de
[more]

African history – inferences from modern and ancient DNA

Human Palaeosystems in Focus
  • Date: May 13, 2025
  • Time: 03:00 PM - 04:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Prof. Carina M. Schlebusch, Human Evolution, Department of Organismal Biology, Uppsala University, Sweden
  • Location: Online
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Contact: kutowsky@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Mining Conversations. The Futurepasts of ... Forests

  • Date: May 8, 2025
  • Time: 08:00 PM - 09:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: P. Charoenpacharaporn, Chulalongkorn University, Thailand/ N. Gándara, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, Chile/ M. José Iturralde, Fundación Pachaysana & Humans for Abundance, Ecuador/ M. C. Rocha, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brasil
  • Location: online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology and Anthropocene Commons
  • Contact: rossee@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Mining Conversations. The Futurepasts of ... Copper

  • Date: Apr 29, 2025
  • Time: 08:00 PM - 09:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Gustave Lester, Centre for Anthropocene History, KTH Stockholm/ Victor Hugo Salinas Silva, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, Chile/ Jennifer Scappettone, University of Chicago
  • Location: online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology and Anthropocene Commons
  • Contact: rossee@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Online Discussion Series: Mining Conversations. The Futurepasts of …

  • Date: Apr 29, 2025
  • Time: 08:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Various
  • Location: online
  • Host: Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology and Anthropocene Commons
  • Contact: rossee@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Industrial waste and multi-contaminated megasites as cultural heritage?

  • Date: Apr 29, 2025
  • Time: 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Oliver Schlaudt
  • Host: Department of Structural Changes of the Technosphere
  • Contact: schaefer@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Drivers of vegetation change in tropical Africa

  • Date: Apr 9, 2025
  • Time: 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Prof. William D. Gosling, Department of Ecosystem & Landscape Dynamics University of Amsterdam
  • Location: Online
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Contact: kutowsky@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Public Lecture Noble Gespräche:"Biodiversität und Mensch im Anthropozän"

  • Date: Apr 3, 2025
  • Time: 05:30 PM - 06:30 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Prof. Dr. Katrin Böhning-Gaese, Wissenschaftliche Geschäftsführerin Helmholtz Zentrum für Umweltforschung, Professorin Goethe-Universität Frankfurt
  • Location: Beutenberg Campus, Hans-Knöll-Str. 1, 07745 Jena
  • Room: Hörsaal Abbe-Zentrum Beutenberg
  • Host: Beutenberg Campus e.V.
  • Topic: Discussion and debate formats, lectures
[more]

Epistemic Infrastructures in the Social Metabolism with Nature – Towards an Ecological Genealogy of Artificial Intelligence

  • Date: Apr 1, 2025
  • Time: 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Prof. Simon Schaupp, Technische Universität Berlin
  • Location: Hybrid Format - Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, V.14 + Online
  • Host: Department of Structural Changes of the Technosphere
  • Contact: steudle@gea.mpg.de
[more]

An archaeologist’s perspective on the miombo woodlands of south-central Africa

  • Date: Mar 24, 2025
  • Time: 01:00 PM - 02:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Professor Larry Barham, University of Liverpool, Department of Archaeology, Classics, and Egyptology
  • Location: Online
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Contact: kutowsky@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Hands-on Workshop on Archaeobotany and Environmental Archaeology in Central Asia

  • Start: Mar 24, 2025
  • End: Mar 28, 2025
  • Location: Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology
  • Host: FEDD: Fruits of Eurasia: Domestication and Dispersal; Basira Mir Makhamad and Dr. Robert Spengler
  • Contact: mirmakhamad@gea.mpg.de
[more]

From Mechanics to Gestures: Understanding Knapping Actions Through Controlled Lithic Experiments

  • Date: Mar 12, 2025
  • Time: 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Dr. rer. nat. Li Li, The Interdisciplinary Center for Archaeology and the Evolution of Human Behaviour (ICArEHB), University of Algarve, Portugal
  • Location: Online
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Contact: kutowsky@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Scientific Council Meeting - Earth Among the Exoplanets – A Long-Term Perspective on Sustainability

  • Date: Feb 26, 2025
  • Time: 05:00 PM - 08:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Location: Hybrid event at the Harnack-Haus of the Max Planck Society, Ihnestr. 16–20, 14195 Berlin
  • Host: Jürgen Renn, Lina Schwab
  • Contact: rennoffice@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Micromorphology as a Tool for Integrative and Contextual Research in Archaeology

  • Date: Feb 21, 2025
  • Time: 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Prof. Dr. Christopher Miller
  • Location: Hybrid
  • Room: Villa V14
  • Host: International Max Planck Research School for Modelling the Anthropocene, Department Coevolution of Land Use and Urbanisation
  • Contact: gjha@gea.mpg.de
[more]

Millennial evolution of the Mediterranean sea-level: a story of mud, archeology and geophysical modelling.

  • Date: Jan 15, 2025
  • Time: 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Matteo Vacchi, University of Pisa
  • Location: Online
  • Host: Human Palaeosystems Research Group
  • Contact: kutowsky@gea.mpg.de
[more]
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