Research as part of the Excellence Strategy

Current news

Plague of locusts in Kenya. Countless locusts in one place.

Following your nose into the swarm

Locusts adapt their sense of smell to better detect sparse food sources in crowded swarms of up to billion animals, as researchers from the Cluster of Excellence Collective Behaviour at the University of Konstanz discovered. They published their results in the journal Nature Communication.

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Tracking animals without markers

Researchers from the Cluster of Excellence Collective Behaviour developed a computer vision framework for posture estimation and identity tracking which they can use in indoor environments as well as in the wild. They have thus taken an important step towards markerless tracking of animals in the wild using computer vision and machine learning.

Two meerkats. One seems to speek into the ear of the other one.

Meerkat chit-chat

Konstanz researchers unravel the vocal interactions of meerkat groups and show they use two different types of interactions to stay in touch.

Uneven perceptions of inequality

How do researchers study perceptions of inequality? This question is the focus of a new episode of the podcast "Exzellent erklärt" (great explanations) with political scientist Marius Busemeyer and microsociologist Claudia Diehl from the Cluster of Excellence "The Politics of Inequality".

Individual small robot

"Turing test" for animal systems

What advantages do robots offer in researching the behavioural rules of animal groups? How is robotics research inspired by nature? Three robotics researchers from the Cluster of Excellence "Collective Behaviour" (CASCB) at the University of Konstanz provide insights.

Six pupils sit in two rows in the classroom.

The German school sorting system

A research project by the Cluster of Excellence "The Politics of Inequality" at the University of Konstanz studies whether school students feel that (early) sorting into different types of schools is fair – this focus on the children's perspective is new.

Drawing of a man and a woman sitting opposite each other on chairs. He is agitated or angry. His feelings are being transferred to her.

Stress transmission

Can stress be transmitted across individuals? How about other physiological states? Researchers from the Cluster of Excellence Collective Behaviour investigated this question for humans and animals.