Team

Michael Matschiner

After a brief excursion into microbiology, Michael found his interest in evolutionary biology during his diploma (equivalent to MSc) studies. He familiarized himself with phylogenetics and population genetics during his PhD thesis work on the adaptive radiation of Antarctic icefishes, and gained expertise in Bayesian inference and genomics during his first postdoctoral research at the Universities of Canterbury and Oslo. He highly appreciates how his international network of collaborators manages to keeps him well-supplied with massive and exciting genomic datasets, allowing him to train his bioinformatics skills and make interesting discoveries along the way.

Employment

University of Oslo, Norway | Since 2021
Associate Professor in Vertebrate Zoology and curator of the fish collection at the Natural History Museum

University of Zurich, Switzerland | 2018-2021
Postdoctoral fellow at the Palaeontological Institute and Museum

University of Basel, Switzerland | 2017-2018
Postdoctoral fellow at the Zoological Institute, Department of Environmental Sciences

University of Oslo, Norway | 2013-2017
Researcher at the Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences

University of Canterbury, New Zealand | 2012-2013
Swiss National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellow

Education

University of Basel, Switzerland | 2008-2011
PhD thesis in the group of Walter Salzburger, Zoological Institute, Department of Environmental Sciences

University of Konstanz, Germany | 2002-2008
Diploma studies of Biological Sciences

Fabrizia Ronco

Fabrizia is a zoologist and evolutionary biologist with a strong interest in how species arise, adapt and persist. In particular, she is keen to understand what factors trigger adaptive radiations and how morphological and ecological diversification unfold over their course. During her masters, PhD and first PostDoc projects – all at the University of Basel, Switzerland – she focused on the adaptive radiation of cichlid fishes from Lake Tanganyika. She studied trait evolution of a wide set of characters across the radiation and got acquainted with several eco-morphological analyses, phylogenetic comparative methods, and bioinformatic tools. More recently she started to dive into phylogenetic inference and gene flow analyses, which is what brought her to the Evoinformatics Group where she studies Antarctic notothenioid fishes.

Employment

University of Oslo, Norway | Since 2022
Postdoctoral fellow (SNSF mobility program) at the Natural History Museum

University of Basel, Switzerland | 2020-2021
Postdoctoral researcher at the Zoological Institute, Department of Environmental Sciences

Education

University of Basel, Switzerland | 2014-2019
PhD thesis in the group of Walter Salzburger, Zoological Institute, Department of Environmental Sciences

University of Basel, Switzerland | 2012-2014
Master studies in Animal Biology

University of Basel, Switzerland | 2008-2012
Bachelor studies in Animal & Plant Biology

Thore Koppetsch

A strong interest in zoology and passion for organismic research motivate Thore to study how diversification is emerging, developing, and changing in different organisms. During his bachelor and master studies at the Universities of Kiel and Bonn and the Zoological Research Museum Alexander Koenig he was working with the morphology, taxonomy, and phylogeny of reptiles. He occupied himself intensively with molecular, phylogenetic, and bioinformatic methods and techniques during several research stays in other herpetological laboratories in the context of several completed and ongoing projects dealing with systematics, phylogenetics, and functional morphology of herpetofaunal diversity. However, Thore has a wide-ranging and broad interest in evolutionary biology, organismic zoology, and biodiversity, and is excited to study the role of hybridization in a broader context across several vertebrates.

Education

University of Oslo, Norway | Since 2021
PhD thesis in the Evoinformatics Group at the Natural History Museum

University of Bonn, Germany | 2018-2020
Master studies in Organismic Biology, Evolutionary Biology and Palaeobiology

University of Kiel, Germany | 2015-2018
Bachelor studies in Biology

Alberto Valero Gracia

Passionate since his childhood about the sea and the origin of life, Alberto found these interests widely fulfilled in the field of Evolutionary Developmental Biology. This discipline, while modifying his mechanistic view about how processes occur, allows him to explore different biological phenomena (e.g. the development of echinoderm larvae and its photosensory capabilities associated with the dial vertical migration, the biggest biomass movement on Earth); and to learn a variety of techniques that range from experimental molecular biology or functional behavioral assays, to the in-silico study of gene and protein interactions by means of bioinformatical approaches. Currently, this experience is being used and further extended: (i) to do de novo sequencing, assembly, and annotation of whole nuclear genomes at the chromosome level in a variety of marine invertebrates; and (ii) to employ this data as resource to investigate the genome dynamics and phylogenomic relationships within the Spiralia clade. Furthermore, Alberto reads and contributes to theoretical works related to the Philosophy of Science and the origin of life cycle complexity.

Employment

Lund University, Sweden | 2016-2017
Visiting researcher at the Lund Vision Group

Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn, Italy | 2013-2016
Marie Curie Early Stage Researcher at the BEOM Department

Education

University of Oslo, Norway | Since 2021
PhD thesis at the Natural History Museum

Open University of London, United Kingdom | 2013-2019
MPhil thesis in Sensory Biology at the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn

Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain | 2007-2013
Licenciatura en Biología (long cycle degree equivalent to a Bachelor plus MSc)

Benedicte Garmann-Aarhus

Benedicte is an evolutionary biologist with a great interest in genomics. After finishing her master's, where she made the first chromosome level whole-genome assemblies of the species pair the European river lamprey (Lampetra fluviatilis) and brook lamprey (Lampetra planeri), she went on to work for the Norwegian branch of one of the world's largest reference genome initiatives, the Earth Biogenome Project. Here, she worked as a bioinformatician, and in addition to creating whole-genome assemblies for a range of different species, she held workshops about the assembly and curation process. Benedicte is also passionate about science communication. She is the course coordinator for the largest science communication course at the University of Oslo (MNKOM3000/4000), where she teaches bachelor and master students from all STEM-fields how to communicate their work to a broad audience, through popular science articles, podcasts, debates, infographics, and stage shows. In addition to this, she has also written a childrens book, "Verdens rareste dyr" ("The worlds strangest animals"), about how the strangest animals are sometimes the ones with the most exciting evolutionary secrets. As a PhD student in the Evoinformatics group, she is currently working on the ICEFISH project, where she will explore the role of gene flow in the adaptive radiation of Antarctic icefishes.

Employment

University of Oslo, Norway | Since 2023
Course coordinator for MNKOM3000/4000 at the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences

Kagge Publishing, Norway | Since 2022
Author

University of Oslo, Norway | 2022-2023
Department engineer at the Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, for Earth Biogenome Project Norway

Education

University of Oslo, Norway | Since 2023
PhD thesis at the Natural History Museum

University of Oslo, Norway | 2020-2022
Master studies in Bioscience, Ecology and Evolution

University of Oslo, Norway | 2018-2020
Bachelor studies in Bioscience

Alessia Prestanti

Alessia is a master's degree student whose interests are focused on the fields of the biodiversity conservation and evolutionary dynamics. After attending her Bachelor degree in Biological Science in Siena, she moved to Padova due to her attraction for the Evolutionary Biology course that the Veneto's University was offering. In order to achieve both transversal and DNA-laboratory competences she decided to spend the spring semester in Oslo, joining the evoinformatics team as an Erasmus Traineeship student. During this period she is going to work on her Master thesis, that is supposed to concern the phylogenetic relationships among the Malagasy cichlids which belong to the genus Paratilapia.

Education

University of Padova, Italy | 2021-2023
Master studies in Evolutionary Biology

University of Siena, Italy | 2018-2021
Bachelor studies in Biological Science

Send us a message

Other ways to reach us