Metazoa Morphology and Evolution of Animals: A Practical Guide to the Dissection and Comparative Study of Animals

About Achim PaululatGünter Purschke

Prof. Dr. Achim Paululat born in 1961 in Soest Germany studied biology chemistry and education at the University of Münster. After his first state examination he decided to pursue an academic career and received his doctorate in 1990 under the supervision of Dietrich Ribbert at the University of Münster. During this time Dr. Paululat was a lecturer at the Pedagogical University of Münster and a freelance guide at the Natural History Museum of Münster. He then moved to the Philipps University of Marburg to work as a postdoc in Prof. Dr. Renate Renkawitz-Pohl's laboratory on the differentiation of muscle tissue in Drosophila. A research internship in the laboratory of Alan Michelson at HHMI Harvard Medical School in Boston was funded by the German Science Foundation (DFG). There he analyzed the asymmetric cell division of muscle progenitor cells. With Dr. Aria Bahniamad now Professor of Genetics at the University of Jena he joined the Collaborative Research Center SFB 397 as a junior group leader for an independent research project. After his habilitation in Zoology and Developmental Biology at the University of Marburg Dr. Paululat was appointed to the chair of Zoology and Developmental Biology at the University of Osnabrück in 2004. As a member of several collaborative research centers (SFB 397 SFB 431 SFB 944 and SFB 1557) as a project leader in international consortia (EU-Myores) and after two terms as dean of the faculty he is currently devoted to research on genetic and cell physiological processes in cardiogenesis myogenesis and nephrocyte differentiation in the model organism Drosophila melanogaster. In addition to his research interests he is particularly interested in field biology. He offers avifaunistic excursions e.g. to Heligoland and organizes wet lab and field courses at the Biological Station Roscoff in Brittany (France). Since 2020 Dr. Paululat has been an elected member of the DFG Review Board 203 (Zoology) and served as a co-editor of the German edition of the textbook Campbell Biology. Prof. Dr. Günter Purschke born in Hamburg in 1954 studied biology and chemistry at the Georg-August-University in Göttingen. After the first state examination he received his doctorate in 1984 supervised by Wilfried Westheide. Since his doctoral studies he has been continuously involved in teaching first as a student and research assistant then as a research associate at the University of Osnabrück at the Chair of Systematic Zoology under Wilfried Westheide. After his habilitation in zoology in 1997 he was appointed associate professor in 2002. After holding the chair in this department for 2003/2004 he continues to work in the current Department of Zoology and Developmental Biology under Achim Paululat. His research focuses on the morphology phylogeny and systematics of annelids. His scientific interests have focused on the structure and evolution of the nervous system and sensory organs with several studies devoted to eyes and photoreceptors. In addition to numerous original publications he is co-editor of several scientific books: 2005s Morphology Molecules Evolution and Phylogeny in Polychaeta and Related Taxa (with Thomas Bartolomaeus Bonn) 2016s Structure and Evolution of Invertebrate Nervous Systems (with Andreas Schmidt-Rhaesa Hamburg and Steffen Harzsch Greifswald) one volume each in  2019 2020 2021 and 2022 (with Markus Böggemann Vechta and Wilfried Westheide Osnabrück) of the Handbook of Zoology Annelida each of which contained his review contributions. He has also been an author of Westheide/Rieger Systematic Zoology (Spezielle Zoologie) since its 1st edition in 1996. He has made multiple revisions to the chapters on phylogeny diversity and evolution of metazoans including both invertebrates and vertebrates in the textbook Campbell Biology since the German version was taken over by biologists from Osnabrück starting with the 8th edition in 2009.