Daniel Hanus

Daniel Hanus is a Researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in the Department of Comparative Cultural Psychology. He coordinates the Wolfgang Köhler Primate Research Center and Global Primate Study Network, with over 15 years of experience in African chimpanzee sanctuaries. His work spans

• Physical cognition
• Causal understanding
• Visual illusions
• Numerical competence
• Meta-cognition

research in human and non-human primates.

As an International Primatological Society member and ad hoc reviewer for journals like Animal Behaviour and Science, he contributes to methodological advancements. He teaches at the University of Leipzig and has held visiting positions at Free University Berlin and University of Tübingen.

Hanus's research combines fieldwork at chimpanzee sanctuaries with controlled experiments to explore cognitive evolution. His 2025 publications in Nature Communications and Animal Behaviour examine neural precursors of language and social attention mechanisms, while 2023 work in Nature Ecology & Evolution reveals cognitive stability across primate development.

• 2009 Poster Competition Winner, Workshop on Cognition and Evolution, Rovereto
• 2003 Poster Competition Winner, German Primatological Society, Leipzig

He coordinates research collaborations with

• Chimfunshi (Zambia)
• Tacugama (Sierra Leone)
• LCRP (Liberia)

sanctuaries and maintains active research stays at Ngamba Island (Uganda) and Tchimpounga (Congo). Fluency in German, English, and French supports cross-cultural research initiatives.