NW European section - Newsletters

IUSSI North-west European section

International Union for the Study of Social Insects

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The section produces two newsletters for its members annually. The format of these changed somewhat in 2014, with the spring newsletter consisting of announcements and information following the annual winter meeting, and the autumn newsletter containing updates on the research groups that make up the section and more general information.

The latest version of the Newsletter is available online on this page, and can also be downloaded/viewed as an Adobe Acrobat PDF file from the table below, together with all newsletters since March 2002

Year	*Spring Newsletter*	*Autumn Newsletter*
2002	March 2002	September 2002
2003	March 2003	September 2003
2004	March 2004	September 2004
2005	March 2005	September 2005
2006	March 2006	September 2006
2007	May 2007	November 2007
2008	April 2008	October 2008
2009	May 2009	November 2009
2010	April 2010	October 2010
2011	June 2011	November 2011
2012	May 2012	December 2012
2013	April 2013	September 2013
2014	February 2014	October 2014
2015	March 2015	October 2015
2016	February 2016	October 2016
2017	March 2017

Spring Newsletter 2017

Announcements

The IUSSI NW Europe section 2017 Winter Meeting will be a two-day meeting in December, hosted by Elva Robinson in York, with our treasurer Elizabeth Duncan from Leeds as a co- organiser. Further details will follow in the Autumn newsletter, but please also check the website for updates.

The XVI National meeting of the Italian IUSSI will take place at the Università degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza" from 14-15 September 2017. More details and the first circular (in Italian) can be found at the Italian Section web site: http://www.aisasp.it/?p51

The IUSSI Andean-Caribbean Section (formerly Bolivarian Section) will hold its Eleventh Biennial General Meeting in the city of Tarapoto, Peru, 7-11 August 2017. The meeting is hosted by URKU Estudios Amazónicos (www.urkuperu.org) y la Universidad Nacional de San Martín (http://www.unsm.edu.pe/). Tarapoto is located on the high-amazonian plateau at about 365 m, with ready access to the Upper Amazon Region. The meeting will include a field trip on the penultimate day. Those with an interest in neotropical social insects and general problems of social insects are cordially invited to join us. Colleagues from outside the Andean-Caribbean region will participate on the same basis as section members. As always, the languages will be Spanish, English and Portuguese. Wecond announcement will follow shortly. Interested colleagues can place themselves on the mailing list by contacting section president Marilena Marconi marilena.marconi@gmail.com.

A word from the treasurer

Our treasurer Elizabeth Duncan reminds all members to be active in recruiting new members, and especially all group leaders to make sure that their students and other junior colleagues join the society. The money we get from the International Unions depends on the membership, so this is very important. The membership form can be found here.

The finances of the section are reasonably healthy (£3,893.12 in our account). There will be no travel awards offered in 2017 to allow us to support as many students as possible to attend the IUSSI meeting in Brazil in 2018. In 2017, no travel grants will be awarded, as the demand for travel grants is expected to be high in the year 2018, due to the international IUSSI meeting in Brazil.

Upcoming meetings

European Ant Course 28 August - 2 September 2017, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
This 6-day PhD course is designed to give an appreciation of the evolutionary history and general ecology of the European ant fauna, and to provide a toolkit of skills and resources enabling the identification of any European ant species. The course will be run by the Centre for Social Evolution, and this years' external guest teachers will be Riitta Savolainen and Christos Georgiadis. The course is limited to 20 students, and while designed for PhD students, is also open to MSc students and Postdocs if seats are still available. Participation is free, but students must arrange their own travel and accommodation. For more information, and to enrol, see: https://phdcourses.ku.dk/DetailKursus.aspx?id2546&sitepath=NAT

The British Ecological Society
BES has two symposia that could be of interest to our membership: "Advances in Biodiversity & Ecosystem Services" 24th-26th April in Cardiff, and "Macroecology of Alien Species: Patterns, Drivers and Consequences of Global Biotic Exchange" 24th-26th July, in Durham. See http://www.britishecologicalsociety.org/ for details

The European Society for Evolutionary Biology
ESEB will have its bi-annual meeting in Groningen, Netherlands, 20-25th August. The abstract submission is closed already, but registration is open, and there are quite a few symposia with our members speaking, and otherwise of interest as well, including Major transitions in Evolution, Sociality and Disease, Evolution across the mutualist-parasite continuum, to name a few. See www.eseb2017.nl for details.

The 45th Apimondia Congress will be held in Istanbul, Turkey, 29th Sep – 4th Oct. The abstract submission deadline is 1st May. See http://www.apimondia2017.org/ for details.

More upcoming meetings are advertised on the section's webpage

2016 Winter meeting report

The winter meeting of 2016 was organised by our president, Prof. Paul Eggleton and his group at the Natural History Museum. I’m sure I’m not alone in thinking this was an excellent meeting both scientifically and socially – so our thanks go to Paul for a wonderful meeting at NHM, once again!

We had the pleasure of hearing an excellent plenary from Kate Parr, Univ. Liverpool on Risk- taking & Ecological Surprises, encouraging all of us to dare to think big in our research. As always, the talks were a nice mixture of topics and study taxa, ranging from ant genomics to pollination by bumblebees to reproductive conflicts in Polistes. From the several high- quality student talks, the jury concluded that the deserving winner was David Treanor, on Wolbachia in Myrmica scabrinodis.

The Business meeting of the section concluded the winter meeting. The most importantly, the location of the 2017 Winter Meeting was decided (University of York, see above). The business meeting also included the Treasurer’s report: The finances of the section are reasonably healthy. In 2016, we awarded 10 travel grants of £250 for students to attend the IUSSI meeting in Helsinki. However, the membership numbers dropped significantly from 2015 (178 members) to 2016 (127 members). Thus, especially all group leaders were asked to make sure that their students and other junior colleagues join the society. The money we get from the International Unions depends on the membership, so this is very important.