As part of our annual conference, we offer a variety of interactive workshops that provide space for exchange. Each workshop description can be found below to help you choose the sessions most relevant to your interests.
Workshop 1: Take your biodiversity research to the next level with metabarcoding From project design to data analysis across diverse taxa and sequencing technologies An introduction to iBarc tools, services and collaborative opportunities
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Date: Wednesday, 09 September 2026
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Time: 09:00 AM
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Location: Friedrich Schiller University,
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Presenter: María Mendez, Nadine Möbius
Description:
This workshop invites you to explore how metabarcoding can be used in your biodiversity research and provide new insights into biodiversity patterns and processes. It introduces the iBarc Support Unit and its services, spanning project planning, laboratory workflows, and bioinformatics across different taxonomic groups.
The first 45 minutes feature short talks, including an overview of iBarc and four research projects demonstrating how metabarcoding is applied across taxa using different sequencing technologies such as Illumina, Nanopore, and PacBio. These examples showcase current approaches within the iDiv network and iBarc and illustrate how molecular data can be translated into ecological insights.
The second half of the workshop focuses on interactive small-group discussions. You can bring your own questions or project ideas or simply join to listen and exchange. The aim is to foster discussion, explore potential collaborations, and, where relevant, dive into methodological and technical details.
Hands-on thinking, minds-on rounds (45 - 60 min)
Discuss your data, questions, and ideas in small groups.
Three thematic breakout groups will be offered, each led by members of the iBarc team:
o Working with your metabarcoding data: from data generation to analysis
o Quantifying biodiversity: making sense of metabarcoding data
o From field to lab: preparing your samples for metabarcoding
The workshop is open to all conference participants, particularly those interested in integrating metabarcoding into their research. It aims to encourage exchange, provide practical insights, and support the use of metabarcoding as a versatile tool in biodiversity and ecological research.
Workshop 2: Co-developing and evaluating scenarios for restoring landscape elements in agricultural regions across Europe
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Date: Wednesday, 09 September 2026
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Time: 09:00 AM
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Location: Friedrich Schiller University
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Presenters: Jennifer Hauck, Guy Pe`er, A. Cristina de la Vega-Leinert
Description:
Landscape Features (LF) – such as hedgerows, flower strips, ponds, tree patches, and terraces – are key elements of agricultural landscapes that mediate biodiversity, ecosystem functioning, and land-use intensity. As semi-natural structures in human-dominated systems, they contribute to habitat provision, ecosystem service delivery, and landscape connectivity. In the context of biodiversity loss, climate change, and competing land-use pressures, LF restoration is emerging as an important strategy for enhancing multifunctional and resilient agricultural regions.
The EU Horizon project LAFERIA (https://laferia-project.eu) investigates pathways for reintroducing landscape features across European agricultural regions, where one of seven case studies concentrates on agricultural areas around Leipzig. The project adopts a transdisciplinary approach involving farmers, landowners, municipalities, policymakers, civil society, and researchers in co-developing transformation pathways.
This workshop aims to advance and test methodological approaches for participatory scenario development in socio-ecological research, jointly with scientists interested in ecological and socio-ecological transformations in agricultural areas. The workshop conceptualizes landscape transformation as a multi-scalar process linking biodiversity patterns, ecosystem functions, and land-use governance, aiming to strengthen scenario-based analytical frameworks.
Participants will be invited to evaluate and refine draft LF restoration scenarios which are currently being developed based on seven European case study regions. After a short introduction, participants will divide into small groups to assess alternative scenarios using criteria related to biodiversity outcomes, ecosystem service provision, socio-economic feasibility, and governance constraints. We will thereby together explore alternative pathways and identify priorities for LF protection and restoration.
The workshop is tailored to iDiv researchers whose expertise in biodiversity, ecosystem functions and services, landscape ecology, and human dimensions of biodiversity are essential for strengthening socio-ecological assumptions underlying our scenarios and improving assessments of LF restoration potentials. In return, the workshop provides access to a multi-country European project, insights into European policies and an opportunity to participate in developing policy-relevant scenario framework linking biodiversity research with EU land-use transformation under the Common Agricultural Policy and the Nature Restoration Regulation.
Workshop 3: Citizen Science – How To?
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Date: Wednesday, 09 September 2026
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Time: 09:00 AM
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Location: Friedrich Schiller University
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Presenter: Gemma Burgazzi, Louisa-Marie von Plüskow, Aletta Bonn, Roland Bischof
Description:
This session will be a hand-on session how to do good citizen science. There will be lightning-talks of ongoing citizen science projects, followed by a world cafe to exchange hands-on tips & tricks how to design, conduct and evaluate a citizen science project. How to engage volunteers and make it an enriching experience from a scientific, social and political transformational perspective. This will be a fun interactive session and hopefully be the start of an iDiv citizen science platform, to link up, exchange experiences and learn from each other. Everyone welcome, also if you’re not (yet) engaged in citizen science!