NVG Annual Meeting 2026
18–20 November 2026
Venue: Hotel Zuiderduin, Egmond aan Zee
Speakers
Dobberke Lecture
Martin Stevens (University of Exeter)
Martin Stevens’ work covers sensory ecology and evolution, especially vision and adaptive coloration. Much of his current research focusses on coloration, behaviour, and human impacts in marine invertebrates. A major area of research is camouflage in marine species and the mechanisms and function of colour change, but Martin Stevens works on a wide range of taxonomic groups, including birds, reptiles, crabs, insects, primates, and even humans. His work combines empirical and theoretical work in the lab and field, incorporating theories and methods from several areas of biology, experimental psychology, and computer science.
Baerents Lecture
Sylvia Cremer (Institute of Science and Technology Austria)
Sylvia Cremer studies colony-wide disease protection by cooperative immune defences in social insects, using ants as experimental study system. To prevent epidemics in their colonies despite a highly social lifestyle, ants evolved sophisticated collective hygiene and infection treatment, including nest disinfection and sanitary caregiving. Sylvia Cremer is particularly interested how the unconditional cooperation caused by reproductive specialization of colony members into the egg-laying queen and her sterile workerforce shapes colony-wide disease defence.
Keynote Speakers
Thomas Lameris (University of Groningen)
Thomas Lameris is a migration ecologist and assistant professor at the Groningen University. He studies Arctic migratory waterbirds, following these birds from wintering grounds around the Wadden Sea to breeding sites in the Eurasian Arctic. His main interest is the behavioural flexibility of birds to adjust to a warming and changing environment. He combines observational studies, tracking technologies and experiments to test the limits of behavioural flexibility in migratory birds.
Emmanuel Marquez Legorreta (Utrecht University)
Emmanuel Marquez Legorreta is a neuroscientist and Assistant Professor at Utrecht University. His research focuses on the neural basis of innate behaviors, currently focusing on predator avoidance behaviors. Using larval zebrafish as a model system, he combines whole-brain volumetric calcium imaging, behavioral assays, spatial transcriptomics, and neuroanatomical methods to link brain activity, circuit architecture, and molecular identity, with a broader aim of understanding how neural circuits drive behavior.
Kat Bebbington (Wageningen University)
As an evolutionary ecologist, Kat Bebbington is interested in understanding the physiological drivers of sociality, cooperation and conflict in animal families and groups. She combines behavioural data with information about intrinsic condition and fitness measures to test how selection might act on collective behaviour in different contexts. Her main current project explores how social immunity, or the sharing of immune function between animal partners, influences the link between group living and parasitic infections in birds.
Daniel Redhead (University of Groningen)
Daniel Redhead is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and the Interuniversity Center for Social Science Theory and Methodology (ICS) at the University of Groningen, and a Guest Researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. His work aims at understanding social structure and how that impacts inequality across social systems. To facilitate empirical research in this area, Daniel has developed methods for social network analysis.
Registration Fees
| Registration option | Early bird (until 28 August 2026) | Regular (deadline 23 October 2026) |
|---|---|---|
| Conference attendance, no accommodation | €225 | €300 |
| Conference attendance, single room, one night | €350 | €425 |
| Conference attendance, single room, two nights | €475 | €550 |
| Conference attendance, double room, one night | €325 | €400 |
| Conference attendance, double room, two nights | €400 | €475 |
| MSc workshop (18 November 2026) | €50 | €50 |
| PhD workshop (18 November 2026) | €75 | €75 |
| Discount conference attendance MSc students | €-125 | €-125 |
Important Deadlines
- Early bird discount: until 28 August 2026 you will get a €75,- discount on the conference fee
- Final deadline for registration and abstract submission: 23 October 2026
Please note that abstracts must be submitted at the time of conference registration.
To qualify for the early-bird registration discount, abstracts must therefore be submitted by 28 August 2026.
PhD Workshop – 18 November
Workshop topic: The role of peers in academic life
The workshop will cover topics related to the role of peers in publishing (peer-reviewing process), collaborations, as well as in funding and job applications.
The workshop will include a morning of (informal) presentations by the plenary speakers to introduce their experience on the topic, and a more practical (and fun!) afternoon where students will be divided in groups and discuss with each speaker about a sub-topic, rotating between the speakers.
MSc Grants
MSc students can apply for funding received from the Lucy Burger Stichting. A maximum of 10 grants is available this year, which will cover the conference registration fees. If more eligible applications are received than can be funded, priority will be given to students presenting their work (and the scientific quality of abstracts).