For benthic invertebrates, the ability to disperse is usually limited to the short time period when they are larvae. A common way is to produce huge masses of tiny planktonic larvae that float and feed among the plankton, until they reach a big enough size to metamorphose to […]

It was just a week ago, while waiting to embark on a plane, that I received a very unexpected news: a Mediterranean monk seal (Monachus monachus) has been sighted near my hometown, in the North-western Adriatic Sea. As I first approached the world of pinnipeds through this species, […]

If you look at the world today, it is impossible to ignore how deeply humans have reshaped it. We have turned forests into deserts and deserts into parks. We have warmed the atmosphere, melted ice sheets, and yet many still insist climate change is just a myth. Part […]

In 2018, Lewin et al proposed the ambitious goal to sequence a reference genome of each eukaryotic species on Earth within 10 years called the moonshot of biology. This proposal let to the establishment of the Earth Biogenome Project (EBP) and gained a lot of traction and momentum […]

I 2018 foreslo Lewin et al det ambisiøse målet å sekvensere et referansegenom for hver eukaryotisk art på jorden innen 10 år, kalt «moonshot of biology». Dette forslaget førte til etableringen av Earth Biogenome Project (EBP), som fikk stor oppmerksomhet og fart i etterkant. Dette førte til etableringen […]

Earlier this year in January I reported in a CEG blog contribution about tree (or tree-like) ferns, a holiday discovery during a visit to the Adelaide Botanic Garden located in the capital of South Australia. The visit had inspired me to learn more about the biology of this […]

In this blog post, I wish to write about species delimitation. What it is and methods we have to delimit species from each other. Species delimitation — what it is and why it matters Species delimitation is the set of methods and conceptual approaches used to determine where […]

Winter in Scandinavia is not considered an insect collecting season. Snow and ice are good for skiing and skateboarding, not for butterfly hunting. At winter, northern entomologists may enjoy a break, free of collecting work, finally with plenty of time to sort, look at and identify what was […]

In the end of September, the CEG research group had its annual retreat. This year, we aimed for Røros, a small mining town in the east of Norway. On the way to the destination we noticed that we would pass the Jutulhogget, a spectacular geological formation a bit […]

For this December Sunday, I want to tell you about my favourite bird that also happens to be the national bird of Norway – the white-throated dipper (Cinclus cinclus, fossekall på norsk). These lovely little dippers can be found in Olso as well, and I had a pleasure […]