From Arctic Expeditions to High-Tech Bird Tracking
In an exciting development for 2024, our colleague Dr. Birte Seffert embarks on a nationwide tour to meet with the Klaus Tschira Boost Fund Fellows across Germany. The Keeping Up with the Boost Fellows series aims to shine a spotlight on the journeys, challenges, and achievements of our Fellows.
Eunbi Kwon´s fascination with migrating shorebirds started when she was camping in a tent for the first time. Not on a camping site, though, but in snowy Alaska for more than two months of fieldwork as a behavioural ecologist. She observed tiny shorebirds flying thousands of kilometres to return to the exact same spot year after year to monogamously mate with their partner.
Her research interest took her to the secluded Max Planck Institute for Biological Intelligence in Seewiesen. Nestled between forests and a lake, reachable only by car or bus from Starnberg, it’s a quiet, remote place—but for Eunbi, that focus is exactly what she needs.
Eunbi’s path to Seewiesen was shaped by a lucky conference meeting, and the move to rural southern Bavaria has opened doors she never expected—leading her to work on multiple continents. Her story is a reminder that career paths are rarely linear and that sometimes, the most remote places can be the best ones to think, focus, and innovate.
Eunbi Kwon
From Arctic expeditions to high-tech bird tracking
Eunbi’s work is all about understanding how shorebirds choose their breeding sites. Social interactions likely play a major role, but tracking them in the wild has always been nearly impossible. To change this, Eunbi is contributing to developing a miniature GPS audio transmitter—a device that tracks not only where birds go but also their sounds and those of other nearby birds. Could the presence of other birds influence their decision to settle in a certain area? This is one of the questions Eunbi’s research aims to answer.
Collaborating with industry: A unique partnership
Eunbi is one of the Boost Fellows closely cooperating with a company as part of her project, Druid Technology, a company that develops wildlife tracking devices. What started as a standard client-supplier relationship evolved into a real collaboration—one where both sides benefit. However, working with industry partners comes with certain challenges.
Here’s what Eunbi has learned about collaborations with industry partners:
1. Find partners who share your scientific curiosity. A good collaboration goes beyond business—it’s about shared intellectual interest.
2. Be clear on information boundaries. If a device you co-develop is later sold commercially, define early on what research findings or technical details can be shared.
3. Ask for modifications. Don’t assume the products in a company’s catalogue are the only options. Many companies are willing to customize their technology—especially if field researchers can provide valuable real-world testing in return.
How AI is transforming behavioral ecology
Eunbi’s field is changing rapidly with machine learning. Instead of spending hours watching birds, researchers can now use AI to analyze sensor data—detecting movement, temperature, and even estimating how much energy a migrating bird uses on a 10,000 km journey. The new audio-tracking technology Eunbi contributes to will add another layer, helping researchers understand the role of sound in bird decision-making.
We wish for Eunbi´s research to make a positive impact both on understanding migrating shorebirds and their protection!
This is the penultimate post in our Boost Fellows series—before we take a break and return in 2026. Stay tuned for one more story!
The KT Boost Fund is a joint program of GSO and the Klaus Tschira Foundation for postdoctoral researchers in the Natural Sciences, Mathematics, and Computer Science. It offers flexible funding for risky and interdisciplinary research on the way to academic independence. Funding can be used to hire staff, buy equipment, or build collaborations – tailored to the research project.
