Symposiumon the Evolution ofMarine Mammals

honoring Guram Mchedlidze

29 September – 1 October 2016

The Georgian National Museum, Tbilisi, Georgia is organizing a symposium dedicated to the 85thanniversary of Dr. Guram Mchedlidze (1931–2009),an internationally renownedGeorgian marine mammal paleontologist.

Oral and poster presentationsare welcome on variousaspects of the evolution of marine mammals, including but not limited to:

  • Paleontology
  • Taxonomy and phylogeny
  • Anatomy
  • Genetics
  • Phylogeography/Paleobiogeography
  • Paleoecology and evolutionary ecology
  • Field collection, lab preparation, and study of museum collections

The symposium will be held in the Georgian National Museum, Tbilisi, Georgia from September 29 to October 1 2016.

Guram Mchedlidze

Dr. Guram Mchedlidze (1931-2009) was a Georgian academician and a world-renowned paleobiologist who studied fossil whales.Dr. Guram Mchedlidze surveyedgeologyand paleobiology ininstitutions and museums all over the Soviet Union. His primary interests included excavating and studying Mio-Pliocene vertebrate sites in the Caucasus region (Georgia, Azerbaijan, and North Caucasus) and identified new fossils, which were previously unknown. The collection of marine mammals gathered by Dr. Mchedlidze is one of the richest in Europe. This collection now is stored in the S. Janashia Museum of Georgia (one of the ten museums unified under the GeorgianNationalMuseum).

Dr. Guram Mchedlidze published more than one hundred scientific papers, seven monographs,and is one of the co-authors of the Encyclopedia of Marine Mammals. Dr. Guram Mchedlidze successfully combined productive scientific research with numerous teaching responsibilities. He was a member of several editorial boards of various scientific journals, a board member of the committee on issues of evolution of flora and fauna at the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, a corresponding member of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology (USA), and a member of the Georgian Academy of Sciences.

Dr. Guram Mchedlidze was a director of Leo Davitashvili Institute of Paleobiology from 1989 until the end of his life. Guram was “a renaissance man”, who wasa highly trained pianist, a noble, internationally respected professor and scientist, anda real Georgian patriot.

The Museum of Georgia, Institute of Paleobiology and collections of fossil vertebrates

The Museum of Georgia - the institution where the fossil mammal collections are stored, is the oldest museum in the region; its history dates back to the founding of the Museum of the Caucasian Department of the Russian Royal Geographic Society in 1852, soon transformed into the Caucasian Museum (in 1865). Today, it is one of the ten museums unified under the Georgian National Museum (GNM), while the Institute of Paleobiology is one of the scientific centers of the GNM.

Since 2005, efforts have been made to consolidate and organize fossil collections kept in the National Museum of Georgia and the Institute of Paleobiology. Presently,all vertebrate fossil collections of the Museum and the Institute of Paleobiologyare stored in the Vertebrate Paleontology Collections of the Museum of Georgia. These holdings include some of the very first vertebrate fossil collections from the region, such as fossils collected by the Swedish geologist Hjalmar Sjögren from Perekeshkul, Azerbaidjan, and Dr. Guram Mchedlidze’s collection of marine mammals.

Preliminary Program of the Symposium

  • Wednesday, September 28- Arrival and registration
  • Thursday and Friday, September 29-30- Scientific presentations and discussions
  • Saturday, October1- field trip

Meeting Contributions

Abstracts for oral and poster contributions should include: Abstract title, Authors’ names, Authors’ affiliations and e-mail addresses. Abstract text should be no more than 500 words; please do not include tables, figures or reference lists.

Oral presentations: 20 minutes, including questions and answers, unless you are invited to give a plenary talk.

Poster presentations: A0 (117x84 cm) or a similar format is the most suitable size. Additional small poster handouts are welcome.

International travel and accommodation

The symposium will not cover international travel and accommodation. Participants are expected tobook their own accommodation in Tbilisi. A list withdifferent hotels, accommodations and prices will be included in the SecondCircular.

Registration fee will be announced in the 2nd circular. It will include costs of conference materials, coffeebreaks, meals and the field trip. The GNM is now fundraising to partially cover these costs.

Deadlines

  • Please, fill and return the pre-registration form attached below before January31, 2016.
  • Distribution of the Second Circular: February 28, 2016
  • Short papers or abstracts submission: May 30, 2016
  • Distribution of Third Circular: June 30, 2016

Contact

Maia Bukhsianidze

GeorgianNationalMuseum

3, Rustaveli ave. Tbilisi 0105, Georgia

e-mail:

Looking forward to seeing you in Tbilisi

Cordially,

Members of the organizing and scientific committee:

David Lordkipanidze, GeorgianNationalMuseum, Tbilisi

Maia Bukhsianidze, GeorgianNationalMuseum, Tbilisi

Pavel Gol’din, Schmalhausen Institute of Zoology, Kiev

Irina Koretsky, HowardUniversity, WashingtonDC

Mark D. Uhen, GeorgeMasonUniversity, Fairfax, Virginia