Prof. RNDr. Vojtěch Novotný, CSc.

Research Group Leader, University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice, Czech Republic

The research of prof. Novotný is focused on tropical ecology and interactions of herbivores and plants in the tropics. Prof. Novotný has founded a research station in Papua New Guinea and received a prestigious ERC Advanced Grant for his research.

See more information about Prof. Novotný´s research and the research station in Papua New Guinea here.

Hosted by

Stanislav Pekár

About the lecture

Tropical rainforests have fascinated biologists since the early days of colonial exploration, and that fascination was primarily due to the enormous number of plant and animal species that coexist in tropical rainforests. The modern ecology has been so far only partly successful in explaining the conundrum of extraordinary biodiversity in the tropics. The lecture surveys the state of the art of tropical biodiversity research, illustrated also by our own studies in Papua New Guinea. It will also address the pressing scientific, societal and political problems of conserving the tropical biodiversity for the future.