Evolutionary modelling group (PI: Piet van den Berg)

Evolutionary Modelling Group | KU Leuven We develop evolutionary models to understand how living organisms adapt - from antibiotic resistance to human language evolution.

Take a look at our new website at www.pietervdberg.com !

For everything on our research topics, publications, and ourselves.

Waarom bestaat er geen Protulees? Over het verschil tussen communicatie en taal, en waarom we nooit Protulees zullen spreken.

Nieuwe blogpost :)

kathetgedacht.com/2026/02/13/w...

#MeetOurMembers
Today, we would like to introduce our PhD student, Kat Van der Poorten!

Back in Belgium after traveling the world! She is an autistic evolutionary biologist intrigued by all things ‘language’.

Follow her on Bluesky to learn more about her work: @kathetgedacht.bsky.social

#Meetourmembers
Happy New Year! 🎉
Today, we would like to introduce our PhD candidate, Ronja Hulst! She came from Grunn with a smile :)
Follow her on Bluesky to learn more about her work: @ronbaas.bsky.social

A huge thank you to our secretary Conny Coeckelberghs and everyone from my team for the fantastic organisation - Viviana Di Pietro, Helena Mendes Ferreira, Anneline Mattens, @kdebeuckelaere.bsky.social and @anvandoren.bsky.social.

The @iussi-nwes.bsky.social that we organised this week in Leuven (18-19 December, www.iussi-nweurope.org/meetings) was a success! @rmash.bsky.social and @patrick-kennedy.bsky.social delivered fantastic keynote talks and there was a great set of contributed talks and posters.

Talk I gave about our recent Evolution Letters paper, in which we quantified the benefits of helping at the origin of eusociality using a combination of experiment & theory, at the @iussi-nwes.bsky.social winter meeting in Leuven this week! Powerpoint here: www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/4w3hw...

@julietteluiselli.bsky.social et al. introduce a mathematical model of genome size evolution, showing that the noncoding fraction of the genome is shaped by biases in mutational neutrality, and robustness selection arising from structural mutations

🔗 doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msaf315

#evobio #molbio

#meetourmembers!
Today, we would like to introduce our PhD Student Alger Jorritsma! He is an 'oprjochte Fries'.

Our team member Kat speaking to a diverse audience (including the rector of KU Leuven!) about the challenges of being an autistic researcher.

@kathetgedacht.bsky.social @lavavzw.bsky.social

Forced sterilization in Europe | DW Documentary YouTube video by DW Documentary

Forced sterilisation for disabled people? Still happening

youtu.be/7ac_LxNHSOU?...

@sara-rocha.bsky.social

Figure 1. Common approaches to modeling the relationship between genotype and phenotype (A,B) and phenotype and fitness (C,D) in models of mutational robustness evolution.

"The evolutionary role of mutational robustness: theoretical insights"
by Pieter van den Berg & co

"Here, we categorize and critically discuss the main approaches for modeling the evolutionary causes and consequences of mutational robustness."

FREE till Jan 18:
authors.elsevier.com/a/1mBGtcQbJF...

#meetourmembers!
Today, we would like to introduce our newest labmate: Juliette. She joined us from France just last month!
Add her on Bluesky to follow her work: @julietteluiselli.bsky.social !!

Very proud of our PhD student (@kathetgedacht.bsky.social) who gave a beautiful talk today!!

The evolution of plasticity and evolvability in a simple gene regulatory network How do organisms adapt to changing environments? Do they respond plastically or evolve through genetic alterations? We present a large-scale simulation stu

#paper How do organisms adapt to changing environments? Through plasticity, evolution, or a combination of both?
Find out in our new paper by Alger Jorritsma, where we show which strategies evolve under different environmental conditions. @journal-evo.bsky.social

academic.oup.com/evolut/advan...

The evolutionary role of mutational robustness: theoretical insights Mutational robustness, the ensemble of mechanisms that allow organisms to maintain a stable phenotype despite genetic mutations, affects adaptive evol…

Excited to share our new review: The evolutionary role of mutational robustness: theoretical insights, in Trends in Genetics!
Our review distils the main theoretical insights into when robustness evolves and how it shapes evolvability.

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

@cp-trendsgenetics.bsky.social @ronbaas.bsky.social @michielslab.bsky.social @goverssander.bsky.social @verstrepenlab.bsky.social

The evolutionary role of mutational robustness: theoretical insights Mutational robustness, the ensemble of mechanisms that allow organisms to maintain a stable phenotype despite genetic mutations, affects adaptive evol…

#Review: The evolutionary role of mutational robustness: theoretical insights in Trends in Genetics by @ronbaas.bsky.social

We bring together results across models to clarify when robustness is favoured and how it influences a population’s capacity to evolve.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Hi everyone! We are the Evolutionary Modelling Group!
We are interested in many topics, from the evolution of microbial mutational robustness to the evolution of language and culture in humans. We rely on a variety of methods, both computational (evolutionary simulations) and mathematical.

Hi I am Piet! Pi of the Evolutionary Modelling Group!
Isn’t it just fascinating that we are all here because of evolution?
If you feel the same, feel free to reach out to me to join our group!