Dr. Mozes P.K. Blom
Mozes, also known as ‘Moos’ (though not pronounced like the humongous deer!), did his PhD at the Australian National University under supervision of Prof. Craig Moritz. He is also a former graduate of the Erasmus Mundus MEME program in Evolutionary Biology during which he spend time at Uppsala University (Sweden), the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology Seewiesen (Germany) and Harvard University (USA). Following his dissertation work, he moved back to Sweden (can’t go without cinnamon rolls for too long!) for a postdoctoral project at the Swedish Museum of Natural History (Sweden). In his research, he focuses on natural study systems and utilises recently developed molecular techniques to infer the evolutionary history of species, populations and genes. In his free time he loves going on adventures with his favourite Greeky and 2x Dutch-Korean-Greek F1’s, and can often be found scouring Berlin for the best ramen place.

Postdocs
Opportunities
The Museum für Naturkunde is an exciting place to do your research, with state-of-the-art facilities for genomic studies in place and direct access to the museum’s world renowned collections. Moreover, Germany has a number of Postdoctoral fellowships for early career researchers (e.g. Humboldt and DFG Walter Benjamin program) and we are keen to chat about any possible collaborative projects.

PhD students
Incoming 2025:
Elisia Menezes Arauja (2025 – 2028)

Sofía Hayden (2020 – 2023)
Sofía is currently doing her PhD Project at the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin, the city in which she also pursued her Bachelor’s degree in Biology and Master’s degree in Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolution. Sofía is interested in understanding the evolutionary history of species and the processes involved, and is now focusing on climate change effects on population demography and ecological diversification of Cryptoblepharus skinks in Australia. In her free time, she loves going for a walk with her dog.

Mario Ernst (2021-2024)
Mario completed his Master’s at Stockholm University and did his degree project on avian population genomics at the Swedish Museum of Natural History. Now he is doing a PhD at the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin under the joint supervision of PD Dr. Mark-Oliver Rödel and Dr. Mozes Blom. During his PhD, he studies West African leaf-litter frogs to identify regions of importance for the survival of forest-dependent species throughout periods of past climatic adversity. He is broadly interested in evolutionary questions and conservation research. Beyond his work, he is an avid climber and is always on the lookout for the next fieldwork opportunity.

Previous:
Dr. Ingo Müller (2025)
Looking for a Postdoc!
Dr. Filip Oskar Thörn (2024)
Moved on for a Postdoc on Butterfly Genomics with Prof. Niclas Backström, Uppsala University (Swe) 

Opportunities
We are always keen to host new PhD students since they are really the ones that push our research into unexplored directions. The Museum für Naturkunde has an excellent infrastructure to accommodate a broad spectrum of research questions (e.g. wet-lab facilities, 3D imaging, HPC cluster) and provides additional support to develop personal research skills (conference attendance, workshop visits, etc.). Besides research, we all strongly value a good work/life balance and the city of Berlin is a vibrant, affordable and unique place to live. If interested, please do not hesitate to contact us and we can discuss common interest and possible funding opportunities (e.g. Elsa-Neumann or DAAD).

Master students

Opportunities
Recruiting stop for 2023 due to parental leave

Previous:
Yunqi “Emma” Song (2022)
Moved on for a PhD project with Prof.  Adriano Senatore at University of Toronto (Can)
Sophie Smith (2022)
Moved on for a PhD project with Dr. Astrid Böhne at Museum Koenig Bonn (Ger)
Saphira Schroers (2021 – 2022)
Moved on for a PhD project with Prof. Simon Ho at the University of Sydney (Aus)
Mario Ernst (2019-2020)
Currently a PhD student in our group