Feedback by Desanka Lazic

By Desanka Lazic

I am happy to report that I participated in the Second EVOLTREE conference from 10. – 15. September in the beautiful city of Brasov in Romania. I attended to present my poster on the topic of speciation and evolution of oaks and the conference proved to be the perfect platform for the topic, as the room was packed with not only oak specialists, but also experts in speciation, hybridization, adaptation, and a myriad of related areas.

It was a pleasure listening to keynote speakers like Jill Hamilton, an inspiring professor from the USA presenting the work of her team on hybrid zones of Populus species. The audience was particularly expectant of the talk from another keynote speaker Brandon Lindt. His newest preprint on the comparison of different genomic offset methods was well-discussed with the group of experts, some of whom worked on developing methods themselves and some applying them in their own work.

I had the opportunity to present my poster in a one-minute poster slam session and have fruitful discussions with the audience online and in person. Exchanging knowledge on oaks with Sam Belton from Ireland and Louise Gathercole from the UK both dwelling in oak hybridization was very valuable. Getting advice from people who are already publishing a lot in the field like Christian Rellstab was also very helpful.

Overall, it was a very relaxed atmosphere at the conference, and it was an amazing opportunity for early-carrier researchers to meet people and discuss their work. The social part was beyond all expectations where Romanian colleagues showed us their famous hospitality with a lot of beautiful forests, food, and drinks. We did not see Dracula this time, but one more reason to go back to Romania. I would like to thank the EVOLTREE network for the opportunity to attend this conference and for all the knowledge I gathered on the way.