Our students had two posters there on our current project and got interesting comments/questions (in part as comments on the poster page which was a simple but nifty solution).
The talks, and in particular the keynote talks, were (more than usual) brilliant I must say. It's nice to see micropaleontology finally starting to live up to its potential. Some random thoughts/comments on the talks:
- Mixotrophs are in, this year! Two of the keynote talks revolved more or less around mixotrophy (one by Samantha Gibbs on K/Pg nannofossils, one by Celli Hull on a more general point of consideration vis-à-vis questions around planktonic protists and carbon pump). More generally people really moved from considering microfossils as piece of rocks useful to date things to actually considering them for the complex eukaryots they were/are. It helps that molecular biologists started working hand in hand with micropaleontologists in the last decade.
- Radiolarian taxonomy is going through a massive transformation (which might end up with us having to throw away half of the Haeckelian genera namesgood riddance! in particular) and I for one cannot be happier.
- People really finally embrace databases and online taxonomical catalog, which is a win for everyone.
Screenshot of the meeting website.
Together with our colleagues at the GFZ in Potsdam, we are thinking about putting on a bid to host next year's meeting in Berlin (or, you know, online, if neededHat tip to all the people out there acting as if this was over and thanks to whom this nightmare is gonna last for the next 2 to 5 years! If it's OK with you I would like to be able to go see my family again.). We'll see how it goes!