- BERG - University of Stirling Mailing Lists

This week's BERG: Q&A with Dr Cynthia Moss
by Donna Kean 20 Nov '17

20 Nov '17

Dear BERGers, This week we are very excited to have Dr Cynthia Moss in conversation with BERG members - this will be a question and answer session. Cynthia is founder and director of the Amboseli Trust for Elephants and is involved in research & monitoring of elephants, training elephant researchers and promoting public awareness, to name a few. She has also written numerous influential books & articles, and created award-winning documentaries. Please find links below for further information on her work. Amboseli Trust for Elephants https://www.elephanttrust.org/ Interview with Cynthia & Vicki Fishlock https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSOPqacr2iQ Recent articles: African Elephant Play, Competence and Social Complexity http://dspace.stir.ac.uk/bitstream/1893/20549/1/05.Lee_Moss_Final.pdf Elephants can determine ethnicity, gender, and age from acoustic cues in human voices http://www.pnas.org/content/111/14/5433.full.pdf [cid:image001.jpg@01D361FA.201CC130] Drinks and nibbles from 5.30pm as usual. Looking forward to seeing everyone there! Best, Donna

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This week's BERG: Prof. Phyllis Lee discussing whether apes are special?
by Donna Kean 13 Nov '17

13 Nov '17

Dear BERGers, This week we will have Prof. Phyllis Lee presenting a talk entitled: “Are primates special????” The special “uniqueness” of primates as a taxonomic group will be compared with that of other mammals, some birds and a few fish. What can an ape do that a guppy can’t? [cid:image001.png@01D35C88.3809F280] Looking forward to seeing you all there, drinks and nibbles as usual! Best wishes, Donna

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No BERG meeting this week - Instead: Research Seminar Thursday 9th November 4pm - 3A94 - Prof Emma Flynn
by Donna Kean 07 Nov '17

07 Nov '17

Dear BERGers, Unfortunately there will be no BERG meeting this week. However, I would like to highlight Thursday's research seminar hosted by Prof Emma Flynn (email below) which is very relevant to BERG's area of interest. Below is a link to Emma's bio if anyone would like some more information on her work. https://www.dur.ac.uk/research/directory/staff/?id=5391 It would be great to see you all there! Best wishes, Donna ________________________________ From: Louise Lavery Sent: Monday, November 6, 2017 9:45 AM To: Psychology Staff; Psychology PhD Students Subject: Research Seminar - Thursday 9th November 4pm - 3A94 - Prof Emma Flynn Dear all, Just a reminder that Prof Christine Caldwell and Dr Elizabeth Renner are hosting the next Research Seminar of the Autumn semester this Thursday at 4pm in 3A94. Prof Emma Flynn will be leading the seminar titled Eureka! Innovation: Who, what, when and why (should we care.) All are welcome! Kind regards, Louise Lavery Administration Assistant Psychology, Faculty of Natural Sciences (01786) 467640

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This week's BERG: Laura Scullion-Hall discussing refinement of laboratory-housed dog care
by Donna Kean 30 Oct '17

30 Oct '17

Dear BERGers, This week we will have a talk from Laura Scullion-Hall entitled ‘Refining Dog Care: working with industry to improve the welfare of laboratory-housed dogs’. Below is a summary of what will be presented: Dogs are used worldwide in the development of new medicines, yet few evidence-based Refinements have been developed to improve their welfare. This talk will discuss research conducted in partnership with the UK pharmaceutical industry, and how improvements to training, welfare and data quality are being made. [cid:image001.png@01D35193.868AEBD0] Please also find the BERG schedule attached for this semester. We have one slot remaining, if you would like to present/host a discussion please do let me know. Drinks and nibbles provided as usual! Best, Donna

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No BERG This Week
by Donna Kean 24 Oct '17

24 Oct '17

Dear BERGers, There will be no BERG this week due to the mid-semester break. For those interested, Alex Weiss very kindly sent us more information regarding the topic of his talk last week. Below are links to one of the papers he discussed and a blog post: https://www.nature.com/articles/sdata2017146 http://blogs.nature.com/scientificdata/2017/10/24/authors-corner-revisiting… Additionally, for anyone who hasn't already, below is a link to the BERG Facebook page where you can also follow all of our updates. https://www.facebook.com/bergstirling/ Looking forward to seeing you all next week! Best wishes, Donna

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Please vote for Matt's incredible conservation work with chimpanzees in Uganda!
by Donna Kean 17 Oct '17

17 Oct '17

Dear BERGers, Please see the link below to vote for Dr. Matt McLennan’s and his teams fantastic conservation program in Bulindi, Uganda to receive funding. This is the organization supported by Ally and the team at Blair Drummond Safari Park who work with the local people to help restore chimpanzee and other wildlife habitats and promote ecotourism. It is truly a great model as a solution for human/wildlife conflict - its working! http://bit.ly/VoteForChimpConservation Spread the word! Deadline tomorrow at noon. Thanks, Donna

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This week's BERG: Dr. Alexander Weiss describing personality in the chimpanzees of Gombe National Park
by Donna Kean 16 Oct '17

16 Oct '17

Dear BERGers, This week we have Dr. Alexander Weiss from the University of Edinburgh delivering a talk entitled: “An open data set describing personality in the chimpanzees of Gombe National Park” [cid:image001.png@01D34694.EB96D070] Abstract: Researchers increasingly view animal personality traits as products of natural selection. Alex will present data that describe the personalities of 128 eastern chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) currently living in or who lived their lives in the Kasekela and Mitumba communities of Gombe National Park, Tanzania. He obtained ratings on 24 items from an established, reliable, well-validated questionnaire used to study personality in captive chimpanzee populations. Ratings were made by former and present Tanzanian field assistants who followed individual chimpanzees for years and collected detailed behavioral observations. Interrater reliabilities across items ranged from acceptable to good, but the personality dimensions they formed were not as interpretable as those from captive samples. However, the personality dimensions corresponded to ratings of 24 Kasekela chimpanzees on a different questionnaire in 1973 that assessed some similar traits. These correlations established the repeatability and construct validity of the present ratings, indicating that the present data can facilitate historical and prospective studies that will lead to better understanding of the evolution of personality in chimpanzees and other primates. We look forward to seeing you all there from 5.30pm, with drinks and nibbles as usual! Best, Donna

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This week's BERG: Prof. Christine Caldwell discussing human and nonhuman culture
by Donna Kean 09 Oct '17

09 Oct '17

Dear BERGers, This week we will have a talk from Prof. Christine Caldwell. Christine will be repeating a talk given at the inaugural meeting of the Cultural Evolution Society, held last month in Jena, Germany. The talk will discuss experimental approaches to the study of cultural evolution, particularly in relation to understanding differences between human and nonhuman culture. [cid:image002.jpg@01D3411E.681C0F10] Drinks and snacks from 5.30pm in the common room. We have one BERG slot left for this semester on Wed 22nd November if anyone would like to host a discussion or give a talk. Please use the Doodle poll below if you would like to nab it! https://doodle.com/poll/4gigufnkunz3hzzx Best, Donna

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Talk 11 a.m. this morning in 4U5
by Liz Williamson 03 Oct '17

03 Oct '17

Dear BERGers, Apologies for the quick fire messages. An interesting talk in Biology this morning about elephants and other large mammals. The talk is in 4U5 (thanks to Matt Tinsley). Best, Liz ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Kirsten Hazelwood <k.j.hazelwood(a)stir.ac.uk> Date: 2 October 2017 at 12:22 Subject: [TEAC] Christopher's Tuesday seminar tomorrow To: "teac-group-mail(a)googlegroups.com" <teac-group-mail(a)googlegroups.com> Hi All, Just a quick reminder about tomorrows seminar at 11am by Christopher Orbell. Chris spends most of his time in Gabon, so we are lucky to have him in the department just now to talk about his PhD research and kick start the seminar series for the Autumn. He will be speaking about his work using camera traps to study ecological connectivity in large mammals. Hope to see you all there Kirstie

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Talk 11 a.m. this morning Gabon camera trap study
by Liz Williamson 03 Oct '17

03 Oct '17

Dear BERGers, An interesting talk in Biology this morning about elephants and other large mammals starting shortly! Sorry I don't know the room number. Best, Liz ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Kirsten Hazelwood <k.j.hazelwood(a)stir.ac.uk> Date: 2 October 2017 at 12:22 Subject: [TEAC] Christopher's Tuesday seminar tomorrow To: "teac-group-mail(a)googlegroups.com" <teac-group-mail(a)googlegroups.com> Hi All, Just a quick reminder about tomorrows seminar at 11am by Christopher Orbell. Chris spends most of his time in Gabon, so we are lucky to have him in the department just now to talk about his PhD research and kick start the seminar series for the Autumn. He will be speaking about his work using camera traps to study ecological connectivity in large mammals. Hope to see you all there Kirstie

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