Seminar: "Unveiling the hidden faunal diversity of archaeological bone assemblages through ZooMS", by Krista McGrath

The Ocean's Challenge groups are organizing a new seminar.
 

Seminar: "Unveiling the hidden faunal diversity of archaeological bone assemblages through ZooMS"

Speaker: Krista McGrath, TRADITION project researcher
 

Date: Thursday, January 25th, 2024
Time: 1pm
Venue: Room Z/033 and online https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81681944336?pwd=VlpBNnl6M1l3cUJaN3BROTI3N1I3Zz09

Species identification of archaeological faunal remains not only plays a key role in many aspects of understanding past human populations, from dietary patterns and hunting practices to species selection for tool manufacture, but it can also hold great significance for understanding past local species diversity, and thus important implications for current conservation agendas. It is rare, however, to find sites in which most of the faunal assemblage has been taxonomically identified, and often the proportion of faunal remains that are identifiable using traditional zooarchaeological methods is quite low due to fragmentation and/or modification. Zooarchaeology by Mass Spectrometry (ZooMS) has emerged as a fast and cost-effective technique for taxonomic identification of bone remains; however, it’s application in South America has been relatively limited thus far. Here, in the context of the ERC project TRADITION, I will present several case studies using ZooMS to look at the hidden diversity of unidentifiable bone remains from multiple sites and time periods in southeastern coastal Brazil.