Mission Statement

The Department of Functional and Evolutionary Ecology within the Faculty of Life Sciences aims at a mechanistic understanding of ecological and evolutionary patterns and processes from organismic to ecosystem scale. Specifically, we study and teach biodiversity, symbioses, metabolic pathways, ecophysiology and ecosystem functioning in light of environmental change.

Units

Archaea Biology and Ecogenomics

Christa Schleper - Archaea Ecology and Evolution
Silvia Bulgheresi - Environmental Cell Biology
Simon Rittmann - Archaea Physiology & Biotechnology
Filipa Sousa - Genome Evolution and Ecology

 

Limnology

Christian Griebler - Groundwater Ecology
Katrin Attermeyer - Carbocrobe
Hubert Keckeis - Fish Ecology
Michael Schagerl - Phycology

 

 

Molecular Systems Biology

Wolfram Weckwerth - Systems Theory in Ecology and Biology
Palak Chaturvedi - Crops in a Changing Climate Environment
Ingeborg Lang - Structural and functional plant cell biology
Markus Teige - Plant signalling
Steffen Waldherr - Computational methods for systems biology
Stefanie Wienkoop - Plant-Microsymbiont Interaction


Bio-Oceanography and Marine Biology

Monika Bright - Marine Benthic Ecology
Gerhard Herndl - Microbial Oceanography
Thomas Reinthaler - Marine Microbial Biogeochemistry

News

11.02.2026
 

"Function and Localization of ParA ATPase-like MinD in Methanogenic Archaea"

23.01.2026
 

"STAUNEN in der Wissenschaft" mit Christa Schleper

13.01.2026
 

Major contribution of particle-associated microbes to deep-sea organic carbon degradation

22.12.2025
 

We are happy to welcome Guanzhe as a PhD Student to the group! His research focuses on characterizing the diversity and community structure of active,...

11.12.2025
 

"Localisation and function of the centromeric protein ParB in Multicellular Longitudinally Dividing Neisseriaceae"

11.12.2025
 

"Tracing Biliverdin Metabolism in Bacteria and Archaea"