Marine living labs

Living labs are also increasingly being established in marine areas. In this way, scientists and practitioners can jointly develop and test solutions for future marine science tasks, such as a transformation to sustainable fisheries. The application of this concept in the marine context is still relatively new, but is increasingly finding its way into larger German and international marine research projects. For the first time, a dedicated session on marine living labs was held at the conference of the “Netzwerk Reallabore der Nachhaltigkeit” in Dresden. On 11 and 12 April 2024, almost 300 experts from German-speaking countries came together to discuss the topic of "Living labs - experimental spaces for the path to a sustainable society". Previous experiences with marine living lab, such as those implemented in the sustainMare research mission of the German Marine Research Alliance (DAM) in the SpaCeParti project, were also presented at the conference.

CeOS employees led two workshops in which the scientists conducted methodological and content-related analyses, for example on what distinguishes living labs in marine areas from urban areas and which research formats could be integrated into living labs in marine contexts. The importance of multi-governance with municipal, national and international regulations also emerged as an important topic. Living labs support transdisciplinary research in particular, which at Kiel University is primarily anchored in the Center for Ocean and Society of the marine research focus Kiel Marine Science (KMS).