We had a great time at the BioSyst.EU meeting in Uppsala (16-20 Aug 2026) and we hope you did too. Now we can all look forward to the next one – Paris, 2030. Thanks to everyone and with very best wishes, from the organisers, Mårten Klinth, Tobias Andermann & Aelys Humphreys.

Planning for the Congress is well underway. Visit the Congress website (www.ibccapetown2029.co.za) and sign up to receive the latest news.

Prof Stephen Boatwright, Organising Committee President

On behalf of the Organising Committee of the XXI International Botanical Congress in Cape Town, South Africa, I would like to express our excitement for the opportunity to bring one of the most important of botanical conferences to Africa in 2029. We are already hard at work with planning and logistics, and hope that all interested participants will save the dates, 21-28 July 2029, and join us for what promises to be an exciting meeting at the tip of the continent.

Sandy Knapp, Natural History Museum, London

Not only does South African have amazing botanical diversity, there’s also a hugely diverse botanical community of scientists that I can’t wait to interact with, not only from South Africa, but from the whole continent of Africa. The fact that an IBC is happening on the continent of Africa for the very first time, I think is a huge milestone and I am really excited to be there.

IMPORTANT DATES

First call for symposium proposals: July 2027

Registration opens: July 2028

Nomenclature Section dates: 16 – 20 July 2029

Congress dates: 21 – 28 July 2029

Contact us

IBC Cape Town 2029

organiser@ibccapetown2029.co.za

www.ibccapetown2029.co.za

Visit the Congress website to sign up to receive future information emails from the organizers

Tidpunkt och plats

18 november 2026, kl 15:00

Zoom: https://stockholmuniversity.zoom.us/j/65486712713

Dagordning

1. Mötet öppnas

2. Val av mötesordförande, mötessekreterare och två justeringspersoner.

3. Fråga om mötet blivit i behörig ordning utlyst.

4. Styrelsens årsberättelse inklusive ekonomisk berättelse.

5. Revisionsberättelse.

6. Fråga om ansvarsfrihet för styrelsen för föregående års förvaltning.

7. Ändring av föreningens stadgar för att inkludera en 4:e medlem i valberedningen (andra omröstningen).

8. Val av ordförande för föreningen.

9. Val av övriga styrelseledamöter.

10. Val av en revisor och en revisorssuppleant.

11. Val av valberedning (se punkt 7).

12. Fastställande av eventuell årsavgift.

13. Ärenden, som styrelsen förelägger årsmötet.

14. Övriga frågor som med motivering inkommit till styrelsen senast fyra veckor innan årsmötet (21 okt)

15. Mötet avslutas

Passa också gärna på att bli medlem, för att stödja föreningen! Avgiften för 2026/2027 är 100 kr (gratis för grundutbildningsstudenter).

Väl mött!

Styrelsen

Invitation to the Annual General Meeting of the Swedish Systematics Society

Date and place

18 November 2026 at 15:00

Zoom: https://stockholmuniversity.zoom.us/j/65486712713

Agenda

1. Meeting opens.
2. Election of meeting chair, meeting secretary and two attestors.
3. Question whether the meeting has been advertised in accordance with the statutes.
4. The board’s annual report, including financial report.
5. Auditor’s report.
6. Question about discharge of liability for the board for the previous year’s administration.
7. Change the association’s statutes to allow a 4th member in the nomination committee (second vote).
8. Election of chairperson of the association.
9. Election of other board members.
10. Election of one auditor and one deputy auditor.
11. Election of nomination committee (see item 7).
12. Decision on annual membership fee (if any).
13. Other matters which the board submits to the meeting.
14. Other matters submitted to the board at least 4 weeks prior to the meeting (21 Oct).
15. Meeting closes.

Don’t forget to become a member to support the society! The fee for 2026/2027 is 100 SEK (free for undergratuate students).

Welcome!

The board

I am in the process of recruiting a postdoc with phylogenetic/macroevolutionary skills to work on two projects:

1. Diversification of Asteraceae in southern Africa.
2. A project using the collections at the Gothenburg Botanic Garden and/or supporting GBG’s activities.

I provide below a link to the advertisement for this position which has a closing date of 2026-09-14. I would be very grateful it if you could distribute this notice and advertisement within your institutions and forward it to any others whom you think may be interested.

Göteborgs universitet | Postdoctor in Botany (Plant Science)

Kind regards, Tony Verboom

There is an open position as senior lecturer (universitetslektor) in Vegetation Ecology and Botany at Karlstad University in Sweden. For more information and how to apply, see: https://kau.varbi.com/en/what:job/jobID:897824 (Knowledge of Swedish or another Nordic language is required.)

Dear All,

Here’s a reminder that Early Bird registration and Abstract Submission for the 4th European Systematics meeting (BioSyst.EU) will close on 31 May.

The meeting will be held in Uppsala, Sweden, 17–19 August 2026, hosted by Uppsala University and the Swedish Systematics Society, in partnership with the Swiss, German, Austrian, French and UK societies, as well as the Swedish Species Information Centre (Artdatabanken) and Wallenberg and SciLifeLab Programme for Data Driven Life Science (Evolution and Biodiversity).

Meeting highlights include:

Keynote lectures by Paul Hebert (Barcode of Life, University of Guelph), Sandra Knapp (NHM London) and Fredrik Ronquist (NRM Stockholm).

Themed symposia accepting abstracts:

• Trait Evolution, Lineage Diversification and Historical Biogeography in a Big Data era. Confirmed invited speaker: Isabel Sanmartín, Botanic Gardens Madrid

• Evolution in Deep Time: Fossils, Phylogenies, and Reconstructing the History of Life

• AI and Automated Species Identification: Assets and Drawbacks

• Advances in Museomics for Biosystematics and Taxonomy

• Are biodiversity and ecosystems the same thing?

• Natural History Collections and their actors

• Taxonomic treatments and revisions and their accessibility in biodiversity databases

• Data-driven research in evolution and biodiversity

• Environmental DNA for species discovery and biodiversity inventory

• Speciation, Adaptation and Phylogeography: Microevolutionary Processes Shaping Biodiversity

• As well as open sessions for anyone who wants to present a topic that does not fit well in any of the above.

An early-career event the day before the main meeting (16 August), free of charge – with two invited speakers, Seraina Klopfstein (NHM Basel) and Pablo Muñoz-Rodríguez (Universidad Complutense, Madrid). The event will be followed by some mingling and discussions, and dinner/beers. So don’t miss out!

Post-conference excursion to Linnaeus’ summer house in Hammarby (20 August).

The journal Systematics and Biodiversity will host a ‘meet the editors’ session and are accepting submissions for a special collection of papers arising from the conference.

Conference dinner at Norrland’s Nation – a place that has been the heart of student life in Uppsala for 200 years. The dinner is included in ticket prices.

For more information and registration: https://www.trippus.net/BioSyst2026

We hope to see many of you there,

Mårten Klinth, Tobias Andermann, Emma Kärrnäs & Aelys Humphreys

Dear colleagues, I would like to invite you to the fifth seminar of the series ”Nature and wars”, supported by the SAFIRE and Biodiverse Anthropocenes research programmes at the University of Oulu (Finland). This event will be online on May 4, 2026 (12:15–14:00, Finnish time). The topic will be “Research and education in wartime conditions”. Our speakers will include Dr. Natalia Shyian (M.G. Kholodny Institute of Botany of the NAS of Ukraine, Ukraine) with the presentation ”Ukrainian Herbaria in wartime conditions”, Dr. Olena Kozak (University of Oulu, Finland, and National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, Ukraine), and Dr. Oleksandra Mashtaler (Vasyl` Stus Donetsk National University, Ukraine). Please find more details about speakers and their presentations here: https://www.oulu.fi/en/events/nature-and-wars-seminar-5-research-and-education-wartime-conditions

The registration deadline is April 29, 2026. The registration link: https://link.webropolsurveys.com/S/17855C62CECDA83B

I will be grateful for sharing this information among all interested persons.

Kind regards,

Mykyta