We are delighted to welcome our new Postdoctoral Fellow Anne Le Maitre to the KLI! Anne received her doctoral degree from the Université de Poitiers for her dissertation on the adaptation and phylogeny of the inner ear in extant and fossil primates. For her postdoc, she joined the department of theoretical biology at the University of Vienna in 2017 where she studied the evolutionary mechanisms (developmental canalisation, evolvability) underlying morphological variation from an empirical perspective. Here at the KLI, Anne's project... (continued)

We are delighted to have KLI alumna Barbara Fischer join the KLI again, this time as Group Leader, Evolutionary Biology! Barbara is an evolutionary biologist and data scientist with a background in mathematics and theoretical biology. She studies phenotypic evolution using theoretical and empirical approaches. Her work centers on the classical problem of adaptation vs. constraint in evolution: Why are some traits easily adapted by evolution, while others are not, with particular focus on the evolution of birth in humans. Currently, Barbara is an Elise Richter fellow at the Unit of Theoretical Biology, Department of Evolutionary Biology of the University of Vienna, Austria. (Click on title to continue....)

We are very happy to welcome our new Writing-Up Fellow Ben Kawam to the KLI. Ben is a PhD student in behavioural ecology at the German Primate Center, Göttingen, Germany, in the research group of Julia Ostner and Oliver Schülke. He is also an external researcher in the Department of Human Behavior, Ecology and Culture, at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany. His research interest lies in building bridges between theory and data to explain variation in animal behaviour. Ben will be a Writing-Up Fellow at the KLI from 15 May to 14 November 2025. (Click on title to read more.)

Hallgrimsson's project "Development and Evolvability: The Conceptual Foundations of Evo-Devo" aims to clarify key-concepts in the field.

We are happy to welcome our new Visiting Fellow, Carrie Figdor, to the KLI. Carrie is a professor of philosophy at the University of Iowa and an honorary professor of philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. Her KLI project is titled “Biological Modality and the Mind/Body Problem.”

We are delighted to have KLI alumna Cristina Villegas join the KLI again, this time as 'Group Leader, Philosophy of the Life Sciences'. Cristina is a philosopher of biology specializing in causal explanations, probabilities and chance in evolutionary biology, with a special focus on evo-devo and evolvability research. She is particularly interested in the intersection between evolutionary developmental biology and evolutionary quantitative genetics, and her work revolves around the epistemological, ontological, and historical aspects of this intersection. We wish Cristina a wonderful new beginning at the KLI! (Click on title to continue...)

Stadtmauer’s project “The Developmental Evolutionary Basis of Tissue Type” aims to develop a theory for the developmental-evolutionary concept of "tissue type".

We are very happy to welcome Dean Falk back to the KLI. Dean is the Hale G. Smith Professor of Anthropology and a Distinguished Research Professor at Florida State University in Tallahassee, where she teaches and does research. She is trained as a physical anthropologist, and is interested in the evolution of the brain and the emergence of human cognitive abilities that led to language, music, analytical thinking, and warfare. She is a Visiting Fellow at the KLI from 8 May to 21 June 2025. Here’s wishing Dean a wonderful time at the KLI. (Click on title to continue.) 

We are very happy to welcome our new Post-Doctoral Fellow Elis Jones here at the KLI. Elis had earlier come to the KLI as a Visitor Fellow in 2022. Since then, he has been awarded a PhD degree in Sociology from Exeter University’s Egenis Centre in October 2023 for his thesis, “Understanding the role of value in coral reef science”. Here at the KLI, Elis’s post-doc project, “Theorising the Blue Economy: Connecting Economic, Ecological and Epistemic Value in Coral Reef Research”, aims to integrate the scientific and ecological significance of reef ecosystems into the emerging concept of 'blue economics’. (Click on title to continue.)

We are happy to welcome Elisabeth Zimmermann to the KLI. Elisabeth joined the KLI in July 2025 as Managing Editor of the journal Biological Theory as well as KLI Communication Officer. She has a background in human biology and cognitive science, and received a MSc degree from the University of Vienna in 2008. Since 2006, Elisabeth has been the Program Coordinator for the Middle European Interdisciplinary Master's Programme in Cognitive Science based at the University of Vienna.

We are happy to welcome our new Visiting Fellow Emilie Raymer to the KLI. Emilie is a faculty member in the Harvard College Writing Program. She holds a doctorate degree in the history of science and technology from Johns Hopkins University. Her research interests include the development of the life and human sciences, the philosophy of science, epistemology, evolutionary theory, and environmental history. Emilie will be a Visiting Fellow at the KLI from 23 June to 6 July 2025. Her KLI project is titled, ‘The Web of Life: Ecology, Culture, and Reciprocal Evolution.’

Enrico Petracca’s project “Embodied Rationality: Normative and Evolutionary Foundations” introduces a novel naturalistic perspective on rationality, called "embodied rationality".

We are excited to welcome our new Writing-Up Fellow, Erica Calabretta, to the KLI. Erica is an ecologist completing her PhD at the Konrad Lorenz Institute of Ethology, University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna, where she studies how non-breeding ecological conditions affect spring migration in wild birds along the Central Mediterranean corridor. She holds a Bachelor's in Natural Sciences and a Master's in Ecology and Biology from the University of Rome “La Sapienza”. (Click on title to read more.)

We are very happy to welcome our new Writing-Up Fellow Eva Zaffarini to the KLI! Eva is currently a PhD candidate in the Hallgrímsson Lab at the Cumming School of Medicine, University of Calgary, Canada. At the KLI, she will be working on her project, “Genotype to phenotype mapping of feto-maternal trait covariation: a multivariate approach to understanding Cephalo-Pelvic disproportion”, from 1st Feb to 31st July 2025. Here’s wishing Eva a hearty welcome and a fruitful time at the KLI. (Click on the title to know more about Eva!)

We warmly welcome our new Writing-up Fellow Franziska Reinhard to the KLI! Franziska is currently a PhD researcher at the Institute of Philosophy, University of Vienna. Her PhD project studies practices from origins-of-life research from a philosophy of science perspective, combining aspects of general philosophy science, philosophy of biology, and philosophy of the historical sciences. Franziska has completed a BA in Chemistry and Philosophy at the Ruhr-University Bochum, Germany, and an MA in Logic and Philosophy of Science at the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy, Ludwig-Maximilian University of Munich, Germany. (Click on title to continue...)

Brown's stay at the KLI is a joint visiting fellowship with Kevin Lala to work on their project 'Promoting a Progressive Vision of Evolutionary Science'.

We are pleased to welcome our new Writing-Up Fellow Henry Camarillo to the KLI. Henry is a PhD candidate in Martha Muñoz’s lab at Yale University. His research interests lie in understanding form-function evolution and investigating how biomechanical constraints may influence morphological evolution, especially focussing on the diversity of salamander cranial anatomy. During his fellowship at the KLI from 1 September 2025 to 26 February 2026, Henry will be working on the evolutionary anatomy of lungless salamanders. (Click on title to read more.)

We heartily welcome our new Visiting Fellow Ievgeniia Ivanova who will be with us till 28th June. Ievgeniia is a Visiting fellow at the University of Stirling, UK (2023-2024), and was an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Aberdeen, UK (2022-2023). From 2012 to 2022 she held positions of senior lecturer and associate professor at the Odesa National Polytechnic University (Ukraine), National Medical University (Ukraine), and National University "Odesa Maritime Academy" (Ukraine). Ievgeniia’s research interests cover interdisciplinary areas such as philosophy and methodology of knowledge, epistemology, and philosophy of science using a systems approach to research complex intellectual, value, and social objects. During her stay here at the KLI, Ievgeniia will also give a colloquium talk titled, "Parametric General Systems Theory and How to Apply It".

Project: Transdisciplinary research and its scientific impact: Insights and implications from health research and sustainability research on interconnected health-environmental challenges, collaborative approaches, and structural development in science

We are very happy to welcome Jules Macome as Visiting Fellow to the KLI. Jules is a PhD student at the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge. His research focuses on the origins of life, particularly the application of evolutionary theory as a framework for explaining abiogenesis and its potential limitations. Jules will be a Visiting Fellow at the KLI from 7th to 31st March 2025.