Independent Research Groups

The Carl Zeiss Foundation Independent Research Group on Coevolutionary Human-Earth System Modelling aims to develop novel approaches for integrated human-Earth system modelling and its methodological and theoretical foundations. These tools are applied to study the intertwined interactions between biophysical processes, such as climate and ecosystem change, and socio-economic and socio-cultural structures and dynamics, such as institutions, norms, social groups and individual behaviours that are shaping planet Earth in the Anthropocene. [more]

In studying the origins of domestication and the causes of evolution in the past, we hope to better understand the future of domestication and anthropogenic evolution [more]

The world is currently facing a dual crisis involving biodiversity and climate, posing the greatest challenge to the continuation of human life on Earth. Confronting this crisis demands public support, political will, and scientific solutions across social, technological, and predictive realms. Our team contributes to this critical theme by exploring deep-time human-environment relationships to derive lessons for the present. [more]

The Language and the Anthropocene research group is the successor to the former Eurasia3angle Group, headed by Martine Robbeets at the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology. The group works on late human prehistory, integrating archaeological, genetic and linguistic evidence to reconstruct various aspects of human evolution and culture. Special focus is on the languages of North and East Asia, the Transeurasian languages in particular.  [more]