A 130,000 to 115,000 years old polar bear jawbone fossil from Svalbard. Photo: Karsten Sund, Natural History Museum Oslo.

There is increasing societal discussions on and measures against climate change and biodiversity loss, topics that touch the self-conception and tasks of natural history museums. In 2015, the United Nations adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) for the 2030 Agenda. To what extent do the SDG affect scientific […]

Identification of African staphylinid beetles can be challenging. Many genera have never been revised, and descriptions of their species are scattered in different papers, published by different authors at different times, often without illustrations or comparison among related species. Staphylinid beetle genus Philonthus is represented in the Afrotropical […]

Academic teaching is a central task and a key element of the self-conception of universities. Yes, teaching is time consuming and needs commitment of the academic teacher. But it is also highly rewarding. All FEZ members are highly dedicated to providing excellent training to the next generation biologists. […]

By now, everyone knows that a lot of us in FEZ are working with marine invertebrates. But why? Aren’t these just weird worms that do nothing but crawl on the ocean floor? Not really, and I’ll try to explain why. From the 34 phyla of the Animal kingdom, […]

Most species of the hydraenid beetle genus Ochthebius are associated with fresh water habitats e.g. creek margins. One clade, the vandykei group, succeeded in a very different habitat, fissures and crevices of the supralittoral coastal rocks on both sides of the northern Pacific. One species of this group […]

Bowhead whales (scientific name Balaena mysticetus) are baleen whales that spend the entire life in the Arctic and subarctic waters. They are named after their characteristic triangular skull that allows them to break through ice for breathing. They are 15-20 meters long and may weigh up to 100 […]