Selected press releases in English

Bavarian State Collection of Zoology An international team, led by the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology (ZSM-SNSB), has discovered a minuscule new species of chameleon. The sole known, apparently adult male of the new species has a body size of just 13.5 mm, making it the smallest known male of the roughly 11,500 known non-avian […]

Bavarian State Collection of Zoology Researchers at the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology (SNSB-ZSM), the Ludwig-Maximilians University and Hochschule München have discovered that the web-footed gecko Pachydactylus rangei from Namibia fluoresces neon-green under UV light in a stripe along its flank and around its eye. These markings, best visible from the perspective of a gecko, […]

Bavarian State Collection for Palaeontology and Geology An international team of paleontologists, including SNSB researcher Oliver Rauhut, finds evidence of rapid climate change 180 million years ago as the cause of the spread of the widely known long-necked dinosaurs (Sauropods). The researchers published their results in the prestigious scientific journal “Proceedings of the Royal Society […]

Bavarian State Collection for Botany An international research team including botanist Andreas Fleischmann from SNSB-BSM has evaluated the Red List threat categories for all 860 known species of carnivorous plants in the light of the 21st Century – the Anthropocene, i.e. the geological time impacted by human ecological influences like habitat destruction, pollution and global […]

Bavarian State Collection for Zoology Madagascar is home to almost half of all known 217 chameleon species. However, their habitats are also threatened to a dramatic level and the vast majority of the primary rainforest has already been destroyed. Scientists from Germany and Madagascar have now discovered three new species and revalidated another species. The […]

GeoBio-Center at LMU and Bavarian State Collection for Zoology A collaborative research project carried out under the auspices of the GeoBio-Center at LMU has developed an integrative approach to the classification of fossil cichlids, and identified the oldest known member of the Tribe Oreochromini. Cichlids (Cichlidae) are a group of small to medium-sized fish that […]

DNFS and CETAF We are proud to announce that the CETAF Code of Conduct on Access and Benefit Sharing has just been officially recognised as the first best practice on ABS by the European Commission. The CETAF Code of Conduct (CoC) was submitted officially for recognition as best practice to the EU under Article 8 […]

Bavarian State Collection for Palaeontology and Geology Researchers at the Bavarian State Collection of Paleontology and Geology (SNSB-BSPG) and LMU Munich describe a hitherto unknown bird from the late Jurassic period. It is the second bird capable of flight, after the famous Archaeopteryx, to be identified from this era. Archaeopteryx’s throne is tottering. Since the discovery […]

Bavarian State Collection for Zoology Scientists of the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology (SNSB-ZSM) and the University of Göttingen have discovered two new species of giant stick insects, which measure more than 20 centimeters body length and are among the largest insects in Madagascar. Unlike most other stick insects the adult males of these phasmids […]

Bavarian State Collection for Zoology An international team of scientists has named five new species of tiny frogs found across the island of Madagascar. The largest of them could sit happily on your thumbnail. The smallest is just longer than a grain of rice. The study was published in the open access mega-journal PLoS ONE. […]