Taming the BEAST 2020

Taming the Beast 2020

May 31 - June 5, 2020, Oberägeri, Switzerland

Phylogenetics and phylodynamics are central topics in modern biology. Phylogenetic inferences reconstruct the evolutionary relationships between organisms, whereas phylodynamic inferences reveal the dynamics that lead to the observed relationships. These two fields have many practical applications in disciplines such as epidemiology, developmental biology, paleontology, ecology and even linguistics. However phylogenetics and phylodynamics are complex and fast-​evolving fields. As such, inference tools are not easily accessible to researchers who are not from a computational background.

Taming the BEAST is a one-​week summer school in the Swiss Alps organized by a team from the Computational Evolution group at ETH Zürich. The summer school will focus on the BEAST2 software and consists of a mix of invited talks by experts in the field (including several of the core developers of BEAST2), lectures and hands-​on tutorial sessions. The aim of the summer school is to equip participants with the skills necessary to confidently perform their own inferences, while providing them with a firm grasp of the theory behind those inferences. Participants are also highly encouraged to bring along their own datasets and to engage with the organizers and speakers to address any problems that they may be experiencing.

The summer school is geared towards graduate students and early-​career scientists in the life sciences. Preference will be given to applicants who are not from a computational background and applicants who have already collected/assembled a dataset that they need to analyze.

Invited speakers:

Alexei Drummond (University of Auckland)

Tanja Stadler (ETH Zurich)

Remco Bouckaert (University of Auckland)

Denise Kuehnert (Max Planck Institute)

The academic registration fee is 900CHF, which includes accommodation and meals. 
Registration is now open.
Please do not hesitate to contact us via tamingthebeast@bsse.ethz.ch with any questions about the workshop.

We hope to see you there,
the Taming the BEAST organizing team

Analytical Paleobiology Workshop Materials available now online!

The organizers of the Analytical Paleobiology Workshop are pleased to announce that the course materials for the 2018 edition of the workshop are now freely accessible online at www.analytical.paleobiology.de. Please click on ‘course materials’ tab to access the materials.

The 2018 Analytical Paleobiology Workshop, dedicated to analytical training of graduate students in paleobiology, was motivated by the success of the Fossilworks Intensive Workshop in Analytical Palaeobiology (http://fossilworks.org/?page=workshop) developed and coordinated by John Alroy (Macquarie University).

The 2018 workshop, hosted by the Florida Museum of Natural History (University of Florida), was made possible thanks to generous support of the Paleontological Society, NSF Sedimentary Geology & Paleobiology Program, NSF-Funded Research Coordination Network (Earth Rates), and the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.

The materials posted at www.analytical.paleobiology.de, provided by 2018 instructors and other contributors, offer diverse materials: lectures, R-tutorials, and exercises. These materials introduce common analytical methods used in paleontological research. Instructors have posted by now most of the course materials. However, not all instructors uploaded all their files. Additional materials will be forthcoming in the near future.

The course materials for the 2019 edition (June - July 2019, UC Riverside) will be posted on the same website in the next several months.

Thanks to the teachers and organizers for making these materials available!

Organizers: Shanan Peters, Seth Finnegan (chairs, 2019), Wolfgang Kiessling,  Rowan Lockwood, Charles Marshall, Alycia Stigall, & Michal Kowalewski. 

Teachers: Gene Hunt, Jessica Blois, Katrina Jones, David Polly, April Wright, Phil Novack-Gottshall, Steve Holland

2019 Analytical Paleobiology Summer Workshop - following NAPC

The 2019 edition of the Analytical Paleobiology Summer Workshop will be hosted at the University of California, Riverside (USA) immediately following the 11th North American Paleontological Convention (NAPC: https://napc2019.ucr.edu): FRIDAY JUNE 28 thru TUESDAY JULY 23, 2019.

To submit your application, please visit www.analytical.palaeobiology.de. Applications and recommendation letters are due on March 15, 2019. Admission decisions will be made in early April 2019.
The workshop is free for admitted applicants and lodging will be provided at little or no cost to all participants. Financial aid to assist participants with travel costs may be available, but we encourage applicants to pursue additional funding at their home institution or other sources, particularly in association with NAPC.

This 4-week workshop, with major support from NSF, aims to introduce graduate students to a range of analytical methods that are foundational to or at the cutting edge of paleobiological research. Topics, taught by rotating expert instructors, will include probability theory, maximum likelihood and Bayesian methods, resampling techniques, correlation and regression, multivariate statistics, methods of measuring biodiversity, morphometrics, phylogenetic methods, spatial and time-series analyses and other related topics. The workshop will also provide practical hands-on training in statistical programming and data analysis and visualization in R.

PhD students from any degree-granting institution worldwide are eligible for admission. Applications from junior scientists who completed their PhD recently and from future PhD students (i.e., advanced undergraduate students and MS students interested in research-oriented careers in paleontology) will also be considered. Maximum enrollment is 15 students. Admission decisions will be based on student applications and recommendation letters. Special consideration will be given to students who plan on attending NAPC prior to the workshop.

To learn more about the workshop, please visit the website at www.analytical.palaeobiology.de. If you have questions about the workshop or the application process, please email Shanan Peters (peters@geologywisc.edu) or Seth Finnegan (seth.finnegan@gmail.com).

Sincerely,
The Initial Organizing Committee of the Analytical Paleobiology Short Workshop
Shanan Peters, Seth Finnegan (chairs, 2019)
Wolfgang Kiessling
Rowan Lockwood
Charles Marshall
Alycia Stigall
Michal Kowalewski

2019 Geobiology Course

The International Geobiology Course is now accepting applications!

For additional course information and requirements, please visit our website: http://web.gps.caltech.edu/GBcourse/

Applications must be submitted by February 8, 2019. http://web.gps.caltech.edu/GBcourse/application.html

2018 Analytical Paleobiology Summer Course

Interested in analytical Paleobiology? Check out the summer workshop below!

We are now accepting applications for the 2018 Analytical Paleobiology Summer Course.  To apply for course admission and also to learn more about the course and application process, please visit our website at http://www.analytical.palaeobiology.de/.The 2018 edition of the course will be hosted at the University of Florida (Gainesville, FL, USA) from THURSDAY JULY 19 thru WEDNESDAY AUGUST 15, 2018.

This 4-week course, sponsored by the NSF, the Paleontological Society, and the EarthRates RCN NSF initiative is designed to introduce graduate students to a range of analytical methods that are foundational to or at the cutting edge of paleobiological research. The topics, taught sequentially by rotating expert instructors, will include probability theory, maximum likelihood and Bayesian methods, resampling techniques, correlation and regression, multivariate ordinations and tests, methods of measuring biodiversity, morphometrics, phylogenetic methods, spatial and time-series analyses and other related topics. The course will also provide practical hands-on training in statistical programming and data visualization in R.

PhD students from any degree-granting institution worldwide are eligible for admission. Applications from junior scientists who completed their PhD recently and from future PhD students (i.e., advanced undergraduate students and MS students interested in research-oriented careers in paleontology) will also be considered. The maximum course enrollment is 15 students. Admission decisions will be based on student applications and recommendation letters.

The course is free for admitted applicants. Also, we are pleased to inform you that lodging will be provided free of charge to all participants. Financial aid to assist participants with travel costs may be available, but we encourage applicants to pursue additional funding at their home institution or other sources.

To submit your application, please visit http://www.analytical.palaeobiology.de/.  Applications and recommendation letters are due on April 1, 2018. Admission decisions will be made before the end of April 2018.

If you have questions about the course or the application process, please email Michal Kowalewski at kowalewski@ufl.edu.