biosyst.EU

biosyst.EU: a joint conference of the European systematics societies

Uppsala University in collaboration with the Swedish Systematics are happy to announce the 4th BioSyst EU meeting: 17-19th of August 2026, in Uppsala Sweden.

The three-day meeting will include talks and workshops on systematics and aims to strengthen the collaboration and networks of systematists in Europe – and all of this in the city where Carl von Linné laid the foundations to our discipline!

Registration to the conference is now open.

Please note that the deadline for early bird and for abstract submission is May 31, 2026.

The Swiss Systematics Society is organizing a symposium at the conference:

Evolution in Deep Time: Fossils, Phylogenies, and Reconstructing the History of Life

Organizers: Daniele Silvestro and Seraina Klopfstein, Swiss Systematics Society

Symposium abstract: From the discovery and interpretation of new fossils to broad evolutionary inference across vast geological timescales, this symposium explores how diverse lines of evidence are integrated to reconstruct the history of life. Particular emphasis is placed on approaches that combine fossil and extant organismal data to illuminate patterns and processes unfolding across deep time. Topics include methodological advances in total-evidence phylogenetics, diversification dynamics, and modeling long-term evolutionary change using Bayesian inference and emerging deep learning approaches. The symposium highlights the continuum from empirical data generation to integrative reconstructions of life’s deep past.

How to contribute: If you would like to contribute to this symposium, please choose it during the registration process via the webpage. Let us know if you need financial support for attending this meeting – students should apply via the society’s travel grant, established researchers can send an email to Seraina.klopfstein@bs.ch.

Confirmed speakers:

Sandra Alvarez-Carretero, University College London, UK: Dating deep divergences: challenges and emerging strategies in Bayesian phylogenomic dating

Jules Ferreira, Institut Botànic de Barcelona, ES: How Old Are Bark Beetles (Coleoptera: Curculionidae: Scolytinae)?

Seraina Klopfstein, Natural History Museum Basel, CH: Morphology is dead – long live morphology!

Alfredo L. Porfirio-Sousa, Texas Tech University, U.S.A.: tba

Alexandra Viertler, Natural History Museum Basel, CH: tba

Daniele Silvestro, ETHZ Basel, CH: tba

More information on the symposium will be added shortly.