Ageing in Social Insects

Registration Fees

Due to the current situation, we like to encourage your participation with our special offer.

on site:

  • Students, PhD: EUR 80,-
  • Postdocs and Technicians: EUR 100,-
  • Professors and Principal Investigators: EUR 120,-

online: free

Posted on

Registration

Registration for active participation:

  • If your application is successful, you will get an email with information on registration

Registration for Livestream only:

  • You will be able to follow the workshop online via livestream link
  • Participation is limited to chat option
  • Registration open Aug 18 – Sep 24, 2021
Posted on

Participation

This workshop will be held as a hybrid format – with a limited number of participants on site and the possibility of a remote online participation.

Our venue - the scenic Monastery Wasem in Ingelheim - and the adjacent hotel worked out a hygiene concept that complies with the current laws and regulations pertaining to the COVID-19 pandemic. For our safety the spaces to participate on site are limited. This way, all hygiene regulations can be followed and the workshop can still take place with the planned program.

If you do not feel comfortable on site or travel restrictions do not allow being there face to face, there is the possibility to follow the workshop remotely on an online livestream and you can apply to give a talk online.

Temnothorax ©Romain Libbrecht
Posted on

Application for active participation

Please first submit an abstract by Aug 25, 2021 and choose from the following options:

  • participate on site with a talk or a poster
  • participate online with a talk
  • no preference for on site or online (organizer will assign you)

If your application is successful, we will send you a link to register. The decision who will get which spot will be made by Sep 3, 2021.

In case your application was not successful, there is still the possibility to register for the livestream only.

Posted on

Apply and Register

This workshop will be held as a hybrid format – with a limited number of participants on site and the possibility of a remote online participation.

Our venue - the scenic Monastery Wasem in Ingelheim - and the adjacent hotel worked out a hygiene concept that complies with the current laws and regulations pertaining to the COVID-19 pandemic. For our safety the spaces to participate on site are limited. This way, all hygiene regulations can be followed and the workshop can still take place with the planned program.

If you do not feel comfortable on site or travel restrictions do not allow being there face to face, there is the possibility to follow the workshop remotely on an online livestream.

If you want to apply for participation, the following possibilities are available:

Active participation on site:

  • You are actively taking part in the workshop on site (choice between talk, short talk or poster presentation)
  • Please first submit an abstract to apply for a space by Oct 15, 2020
  • Unfortunately we are only able to host a limited number of people on site. In case your application was not successful, there is still the possibility to register for the online participation or the livestream only.
  • Registration open Oct 20th - Nov 1st 2020
  • Registration fee: EUR 250

Online participation:

  • You are actively taking part in the workshop online (choice between talk and short talk)
  • Please first submit an abstract to apply for a slot by Oct 15, 2020
  • In case your application was not successful, there is still the possibility to register for the livestream only.
  • Registration open Oct 20th - Nov 1st 2020
  • Registration fee: EUR 20

Livestream only:

  • You will be able to follow the workshop online via livestream link
  • Participation is limited to chat option
  • Registration open until 22 Nov, 2020
  • Registration fee: free

To apply please click here and fill out the form. If there are any questions regarding the application, feel free to send us an e-mail anytime.

Posted on

Workshop Program | Aging in Social Insects

Please notice that the time refers to CEST.

 

Wednesday 29th September

18:00 Peter Baumann and Susanne Foitzik - Welcome address
18:15 Laurent Keller - Social life, phenotypic plasticity and ageing
18:55 Judith Korb - How and why can social insect queens live so long? Insights from experimental studies in termites
19:35 Dinner and Leisure time / Get together

Thursday 30th September

09:00 Abel Bernadou - Macronutrient balance and the longevity/fecundity trade-off in the clonal ant, Platythyrea punctata
09:20 Charlotte de Vries - Modeling the evolution of senescence in eusocial species
09:40 Megha Majoe - Age shows stronger effects on the transcriptomic profiles of brains compared to the ovaries and fat body of leaf-cutting ant queens
10:00 Coffee break + Poster session
11:20 Adria Leboeuf - Rewiring the fecundity–longevity trade-off with the social circulatory system
12:00 Guy Bloch - Juvenile hormone regulates brain-reproduction tradeoff in bumble bees but not in honey bees
12:40 Lunch break
13:40 Olav Rüppell - Social stress resistance: Can it explain aging patterns of social insects?
14:20 Barbara Feldmeyer - Longevity/fecundity trade-off in social insects: insights from the ant T. rugatulus
15:00 Coffee break
15:30 Tobin Hammer - The gut microbiome of bumblebee workers does not senesce (online)
15:50 Jürgen Liebig - The neglected morph: Aging and plasticity in workers of the ant Harpegnathos saltator (online)
16:30 Gro Amdam - Lifespan or Healthspan? Reflections before the Wine Hike (online)
17:40 Wine Hike
19:00 Dinner and Leisure time / Get together

Friday 1st October

09:00 Luisa Jaimes - Late-life fitness gains explain the delay of the selection shadow in ants
09:20 Matteo Negroni - Autophagy, nutrient intake and the longevity-fecundity trade-off reversal in the ant Temnothorax rugatulus
09:40 Marina Choppin - Histone acetylation regulates the expression of genes involved in worker reproduction and lifespan in the ant Temnothorax rugatulus
10:00 Coffee break + Poster session
11:20 Susanne Foitzik - The molecular basis of an extreme lifespan extension in cestode-infected ants
11:40 Ido Pen - Eusociality and the evolution of aging in superorganisms
12:20 Lunch break
13:40 Romain Libbrecht - Queens are not queens unless they have workers: The social environment controls queen behavior in ants
14:20 Alexei Maklakov - Ageing as ‘early-life inertia’: Disentangling life-history trade-offs along a lifetime of an individual
15:00 Coffee break
15:30 Andrew Bourke - Sociality, ageing and costs of reproduction in eusocial insects (online)
16:10 Daniel Kronauer - Differentiation, communication, and collective behavior in the clonal raider ant (online)
16:50 Coffee break
17:20 Karen Meusemann - Aging and the fecundity-longevity trade-off in social insects: a comparative approach (online)
17:40 Kate Hunter - Life history trade-offs in the flexibly social Megalopta genalis (online)
18:00 Hongmei Li-Byarlay - The lifespan and levels of oxidative stress between feral and managed honey bee colonies (online)
18:20 Short walk
19:15 Thomas Flatt - Asymmetry, division of labor, and the evolution of aging
20:00 Dinner and Leisure time / Get together

Posted on

Gutenberg Workshop in the Life Sciences: Aging in Social Insects

September 29–October 01, 2021, Mainz 

A characteristic of social insects is division of labor between reproductive queens and non-reproductive workers. Such specialization on different tasks led to the evolution of disparate phenotypes or castes, which differ not only in behavior and reproductive potential, but also in lifespan. Indeed, social insect queens can typically live for many years (up to several decades), whereas their workers are much shorter lived, with average lifespans of a few weeks to a few years. In most social insects, female eggs are totipotent and can develop into either queens or workers through phenotypic plasticity, in response to the conditions experienced during larval development.

Recent advances in genomics and transcriptomics allow the field of social insect biology to investigate the genes, pathways and gene regulatory mechanisms that control differences between female castes. In particular, it is of great interest beyond social insect research to determine which molecular mechanisms allow social insect queens to live so long.

This workshop will bring together researchers investigating the evolution and molecular basis of lifespan in social insects with researchers working on longevity in other model organisms to understand how social evolution led to shifts in the molecular regulation of aging.

 

 

Scientific Organizer: Prof. Dr. Susanne Foitzik

Scientific Director: Prof. Dr. Peter Baumann

Event Manager: Dr. Sacha Heerschop

 

Posted on