The objective of this project is to investigate the high diversity of morphologies and sizes among fossil and modern sperm whale lineages in order to reconstruct the evolution of their predation modes, prey types and habitats - and to define the potential triggers of the main ecological shifts.

Doctoral thesis by Katrien Van de Vijver at the Faculty of Sciences KU Leuven on the human skeletons found in the St.Romboutscemetery in Mechelen, dated between the 11th and 18th centuries AD.

Through archaeozoological analyses the project aims at demonstrating that possible pathways to food production, resulting in the rise of complex societies and probably the most important development in human history, are very diverse and that the models from Eurasia are not valid in Africa. The role of the natural environment is thereby tested.

The study of the paleoenvironment of the Strud quarry beds (Late Famennian) is primordial because their formation took place during the earliest phase of tetrapod evolution (i.e. after their emergence around 400 million year ago and before their terrestrialisation at the beginning of the Carboniferous 40 m.y. later).

Paleobotany Collections of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences are among the largest and richest in Europe. They are unique in the world for the Paleozoic (542-299 Ma) as they contain many type specimens from internationally defined historical and actual stratotypes from existing sites in Belgium

In this research, outcrops of hypersiliceous rocks, ranging form Cambrium to Tertiary in age, are being mapped. The inter- and intravariability within one outcrop and between different outcrops is being studied by a multidisciplinary approach (petrography, spectrometry and diffractometry).

Tijdens het laat Paleoceen – vroeg Eoceen (60-50 Ma) onderging de aarde de warmste omstandigheden van het Cenozoïcum. Vooral op hoge en gematigde breedten waren de temperaturen veel hoger dan vandaag. Bovenop deze warme basissituatie beïnvloedde een felle en kortstondige opwarming (“hyperthermaal”) van de aarde, bekend als het Paleoceen-Eoceen...

Doctoral thesis by Els Thieren at the Faculty of Sciences KU Leuven on the identification of the sturgeon species occurring in the North Sea during prehistoric and historic times. The study material includes both modern and archaeological specimens.