The Casino building of the Goethe University

Almost 300 researchers from many nations were convened last week at the beautiful Campus Westend of the Goethe–University in Frankfurt for the 8th International Crustacean Congress (ICC-8). Many interesting talks and high quality posters were presented over six days. A special workshop on DNA-identification and barcoding filled the auditorium to the the edge and left many attendants standing through the session. EW gave a 15 minutes talk on results from our barcoding of decapods and stomatopods. He particularly emphasized how barcoding can reveal discordant species identifications among different labs and research environments and pinpoint the need for reidentification and / or taxonomic revision of species.

Kenneth Meland (BIO, UiB) presented results from phylogenetic analyses of the ancient group Lophogastrida.  Separate analyses of morphological characters and DNA from four genes show surprisingly congruent results and have given us a new understanding of relations among  the  families of the group. Meland cooperates with EW and Stefan Richter (Univ. Rostock) in this  project.