Joely Marie Maak
Report of GLOMAR PhD student Joely Marie Maak about her participation in the "International Meeting on Organic Geochemistry (IMOG)" in Montpellier, France from 10 to 15 September 2023
The International Meeting on Organic Geochemistry (IMOG 2023) was held in Montpellier in the LE CORUM conference hall from the 10th to the 15th of September. The meeting is a biannual conference that focuses on the latest advances in organic geochemistry. The six-day conference began on Sunday with the registration and an icebreaker to finally meet the other participants. Often, I already knew their surnames from papers that I had read in the past. Monday to Friday the meeting was structured very similarly with plenary talks in the morning, followed by a 90-minute poster session and split sessions with more specific topics later.
For the conference, I contributed one plenary talk “Molecular fossil inventory in microbial carbonates and sponges of the deep fore reef of Mayotte and Mohéli, Comoro islands” on Monday morning to present the work that I have been focusing on in the past year during my master's thesis at the University of Hamburg. That was followed by one poster presentation on the same day with the topic “Evaluating the incorporation of aged carbon into the marine carbon cycle at shallow hydrothermal systems” which focused on the work that I now concentrate on during my PhD, which started in January this year. The talk and the poster that I presented both offered me interesting discussions on my work and further possibilities – like incorporating microfossils into my work on hydrothermal vents.
After finishing both my presentations on the first day, I could concentrate (without nervousness) on the coming days, other talks and posters, that had similarities to my work. Especially interesting for me were talks by S. Coffinet et al. (“Evidence for autotrophic metabolism of ca. Bathyarchaeota in wetlands based on compound specific carbon isotope analysis”), J. Groninga et al. (“Unraveling microbial biomarker signatures obtained by mass spectrometry imaging in hydrothermal sediment”), and L. Shawar et al. (“C31 sterols from sponges and their Neoproterozoic fossil counterparts”).
For me, it was the perfect opportunity to include myself in the community of organic geochemists and to get insight into the novel developments in this field. During social events like the icebreaker, the cultural activity, and the conference evening I could connect with prestigious names in the fields of organic geochemistry but also with other PhDs focusing on similar environments as me. The whole experience gave me new insights but also new impressions and inspirations on how to continue my work in the scientific sector.
I am very grateful to GLOMAR for having enabled me to attend the IMOG 2023 by providing financial support.