Global Evolutionary Biology Initiative

Recent years have seen the rise of research interest in evol­u­tion­ary bio­logy in regions out­side of the tra­di­tion­al strong­holds of the dis­cip­line (i.e., West­ern and North­ern Europe, USA, Canada, Aus­tralia, New Zea­l­and and Japan). In some non-tra­di­tion­al regions the fund­ing situ­ation for research in evol­u­tion­ary bio­logy has also been improv­ing, lead­ing to a nas­cent and grow­ing com­munity of research­ers. ESEB aims to foster the devel­op­ment and integ­ra­tion of loc­al evol­u­tion­ary research com­munit­ies and their links with the evol­u­tion­ary bio­logy com­munity in Europe. To help address these goals, the Glob­al Evol­u­tion­ary Bio­logy Ini­ti­at­ive (GEBI) provides fin­an­cial, organ­isa­tion­al and stra­tegic sup­port to foster the growth of loc­al evol­u­tion­ary bio­logy com­munit­ies in vari­ous parts of the world. In addi­tion the GEBI can also:

  • sup­port region­al train­ing activ­it­ies focused on evol­u­tion­ary biology
  • con­trib­ute to the organ­isa­tion of loc­al con­gresses, through e.g. the trans­fer of organ­iz­a­tion­al exper­i­ence, and help with acquir­ing invited speakers
  • facil­it­ate increased vis­ib­il­ity and glob­al con­nec­tions for region­al soci­et­ies, by provid­ing sup­port to hold sym­po­sia hos­ted in the spe­cif­ic region, includ­ing par­ti­cipants from the region as well as oth­er ESEB mem­ber countries
  • facil­it­ate net­work­ing oppor­tun­it­ies to strengthen inter­ac­tions across loc­al evol­u­tion societies
  • con­trib­ute to the organ­isa­tion of loc­al Uni­ver­sity edu­ca­tion cur­ricula, through e.g. the trans­fer of organ­isa­tion­al exper­i­ence, teach­ing con­tri­bu­tion, resource shar­ing (books, exper­i­ment­al kits and videos, etc)
  • sup­port oth­er requests from loc­al com­munit­ies com­pat­ible with this ini­ti­at­ive and its goals

GEBI wel­comes applic­a­tions to sup­port new pro­jects in line with its aims (examples include meet­ings to estab­lish or strengthen loc­al research­er net­works, con­duct­ing hands-on work­shops to dis­sem­in­ate new tools or meth­ods, or devel­op­ing cur­ricula for teach­ing). The cur­rent call will close on Septem­ber 1st, 2024.

Call for proposals for GEBI Support 2024–2025

The next call is now open and will close on Septem­ber 1st, 2024. Details are avail­able at https://eseb.org/prizes-funding/global-evolutionary-biology-initiative/gebi-call-for-proposals/

Events supported by GEBI

Please see sum­mar­ies and fur­ther details of GEBI-sup­por­ted events at https://eseb.org/prizes-funding/global-evolutionary-biology-initiative/events-supported-by-gebi/, con­sider organ­iz­ing an event in 2024–2025, and apply for GEBI sup­port in the next call (details here: https://eseb.org/prizes-funding/global-evolutionary-biology-initiative/gebi-call-for-proposals/).

To facil­it­ate sup­port of loc­al meet­ings and teach­ing, the GEBI Com­mit­tee plans to build a data­base of ESEB mem­bers who are inter­ested in volun­teer­ing as speak­ers or tutors, pro bono. If you would con­sider join­ing GEBI-sup­por­ted activ­it­ies from time to time, we kindly ask you to fill in this short form. We will later be shar­ing this inform­a­tion (i.e., your insti­tu­tion­al email, research top­ics, and pre­ferred type of par­ti­cip­a­tion) with col­leagues that are organ­ising GEBI activ­it­ies, when needed. The inform­a­tion related to pop­u­lar sci­ence meet­ings will be passed on to ESE­B’s Out­reach Com­mit­tee, which coordin­ates this kind of activity.

https://forms.gle/wvbZ7ArD6gbr4Gib6

Access to ESEB membership and Society-run Journals

We encour­age organ­izers of GEBI-sup­por­ted events to share inform­a­tion about free or low-cost ESEB mem­ber­ship with par­ti­cipants of their events. ESEB mem­ber­ship includes access to the Journ­al of Evol­u­tion­ary Bio­logy, ESEB’s flag­ship journ­al. The co-owned soci­ety-journ­al Evol­u­tion Let­ters is online only and entirely open access.

Details for the mem­ber­ship sub­scrip­tion types can be found at https://eseb.org/society/eseb-membership/.

The Glob­al Evol­u­tion­ary Bio­logy Ini­ti­at­ive is man­aged by a com­mit­tee con­sist­ing of Deepa Agashe (Nation­al Centre for Bio­lo­gic­al Sci­ences, Ban­galore, India; co-chair), Leonardo Baci­ga­lupe (Uni­ver­sid­ad Aus­tral, Chile), Simone Immler (Uni­ver­sity of East Anglia, Nor­wich, UK), Tadeusz Kawecki (Uni­ver­sity of Lausanne, Switzer­land), Yan­nis Michala­kis (CNRS, Mont­pel­li­er, France), Nina Slet­vold (Uppsala Uni­ver­sity, Sweden; co-chair), Mehmet Somel (Middle East Tech­nic­al Uni­ver­sity, Ank­ara, Tur­key), and Elio Sucena (Insti­tuto Gul­ben­ki­an de Ciência/Faculdade de Ciên­cias da Uni­ver­sid­ade de Lis­boa, Portugal).

Con­tact: ESEB Office – office@eseb.org