Current research activities centre on the evolution, growth and development of humans, their ancestors, and their closest relatives. Main focus is the quantitative analysis and comparison of hominoid skulls and teeth using geometric and biomechanical properties.

Born 29^th August 1961 in Mödling, Austria.

Married, three children (F25, F21, M16).

Current positions and appointments

2010-present      Head of the Core Facility "Vienna Micro-CT Lab" at Faculty of Life Sciences, Univ. Vienna.

2009-present       Chairman of the "EVAN-Society" (www.evan-society.org).     

2002-present       Chief Editor of the “digital@rchive of Fossil Hominoids” (Int.Reg.No. VLB 5162563)

2001-present       Associated Professor, Department of Anthropology, Univ. Vienna

2001-present       Leader of the workgroup “Virtual Anthropology”

Education and Professional Career:

2001                     Venia docendi (“Habilitation”) for Anthropology: “Virtual Anthropology and further

                              contributions to the phylogeny and ontogeny of Homo sapiens”

1994-2001           Assistant Professor, Institute of Human Biology, Univ. Vienna

1995                     Postdoctoral Fellow, North Carolina, USA: Bowman Gray School of Medicine (Prof. James F. Toole, Neurology) & Wake Forest University (Prof. David Weaver, Anthropology)

1992-1999           Member of the Tyrolean Iceman Research Consortium

1982-1991           Ph. D. (Dr. phil.) degree at Univ. Vienna, Supervisor: Prof. Horst Seidler

1981                     Austrian Army Service, Tank Battalion 9

1980                     Vienna Business School for Economics, general qualification for university entrance     

Other Functions

2011-present       Head of the international workgroup "3D Craniometry for Dentistry" (members
                              from Austria, Canada, Hungary, Italy, Russia, Spain)

2008-2012           Deputy Head of the Department of Anthropology, University of Vienna

2006-2009           Initiator and Coordinator of the “European Virtual Anthropology Network – EVAN”

                              EU FP6 Marie Curie Actions MRTN-CT-2005-019564

2005-2006           Deputy Head of the Department of Anthropology, University of Vienna

Prizes/Awards/Academy memberships

2011                     Founding and board member of the European Society for Studying Human Evolution ESHE

2010-present       Board member of the "NESPOS Society" (www.nespos.org).

2009                     Award for my workgroup Virtual Anthropology by the Faculty of Life Science, UNIVIE
1999                     Science Award by the government of Lower Austria

Academic teaching:

Lecture                 Evolution (1.5 ECTS)

Lecture                 Virtual Anthropology - Introduction into digital 3D-methods (2 ECTS)

Lab                        Virtual Anthropology - 3D Applications and Software (2 ECTS)

Lecture & Lab      Applied statistics for anthropologists (9 ECTS)

Lecture                 Applied statistics for biologists (3 ECTS)

Lab                        Computer Training to Applied Statistics for biologists (6 ECTS)

Seminar                Hominid Evolution Seminar (2 ECTS)

Lab                        Micro-CT and the handling of volume data (2 ECTS)

Publication output

Since 1995 I have published 106 ISI listed publications (2x Nature, 1x Science, 3x PNAS) that received 1010 citations. I also published 11 book chapters, 14 electronic media with digital data and context information of hominin fossils, and the worldwide first textbook on the new interdiscipline of Virtual Anthropology at Springer Verlag. A complete list of publications can be viewed at http://www.researcherid.com, ID = F-2583-2010. The current citation metrics (20. Jan. 2014) is given in the adjacent figure. Particularly the last three years show a marked increase of citations which is due to the spread of our technology by means of an EU funded action (EVAN, s. below) and the interaction with the largest American NSF-funded network for investigating the biomechanics of primates (Biofeed, NSF 01-120 Hominid Grant 2007-2012).

Scientific network

I have many well established national and international collaborations to leading institutions. As leader of the EVAN-Society, founding and board member of the ESHE, executive board member of NESPOS, and initiator and coordinator of EVAN (15 partners), I have strong ties to many partner sites in Europe. As participant of the largest NSF project in biomechanics I have also strong relationships to relevant leading scientists in the US.

Funding ID

My total amount of funding raised is 4.1 Million €. Among the 9 third party fund projects was the largest anthropological project in Europe ("European Virtual Anthropology Network EVAN", MRTN-CT-2005-019564, 3.3 M€) and US funding from NSF ("The Mechanics of Primate and Early Hominid Feeding within the Context of Hypotheses about Australopithecine Diets", NSF 01-120, 0.42 M$). Other funding came from Austrian Science Foundation ("Morphological comparison and fragment reassembly of fossil and modern skulls using parameterised reference models", 0.2 M€), Austrian Ministry of Science ("The 3D Archive of Fossil Hominid Anatomy for Research and Teaching", 0.16 M€), a private company (A.E.R.S GmbH, "3D-Craniometry for Dentistry", 0.11M€) and other public (ÖNB) and university funds (30 k€). None of the funding covers the work proposed in this application.

Organisation of international conferences, museum displays, reviewer

I have organised and co-organised several international meetings in Vienna, among them the 3^rd Meeting of the European Society for the Study of Human Evolution (ESHE, 330 participants) in Vienna, two summer-schools for teaching Geometric Morphometrics (2006, 2008), a final conference of our EU project (2009), and an international workshop bringing together renowned scientists from Virtual Anthropology and biomechanics (2010). Each of these events had between 70-100 participants. Beside these, I have organised several yearly meetings of large research consortia (between 30-70 participants). As coordinator of the EVAN consortium, I was leading the Steering Committee and also involved in the organisation of several museum exhibitions and the creation of a European traveling exhibition (Frankfurt, Vienna, Leipzig, Toulouse, Meersburg, Görlitz) with a total of more than 100.000 visitors. I have served as ad hoc reviewer for the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), the L’Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR), the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG), the Journal of Human Evolution (JHE), and many others.

Public outreach

My research is well received in the public since evolutionary and medical topics are of broad interest. This offered the opportunity to improve the picture of anthropology as a science in general and to inform tax payers about the research funded by public institutions. I contributed to many large print and online media (Discovery Channel, National Geographic, GEO international in 11 languages, New Scientist, sciencedaily, Sciencedirekt, MSNBC, ABC News, Daily Telegraph, Times online, dailysciencenews, Spektrum Wissenschaft, europapress, aboutcom, IDW, NZZ, Die Presse, der Standard, etc.) and also to radio and TV broadcastings (Deutschlandfunk, Deutsche Welle, ORF Ö1, ORF 1, ORF 2).