300088 PP Projektpraktikum: Human Evolution and Archaeological Science (2026S)

The goals are to train scientific skills related to Human Evolution and Archaeological Science in the context of biomolecular approaches. This includes experimental design, statistical analysis, interpretation and discussion of results. The project will be presented in a written publication (bachelor thesis).
The aim is to actively implement scientific methods on novel projects in the frame of the ongoing research.

Possible projects include:

Prof. Stahlschmidt: Microarchaeological studies of archaeological sediments, e.g. fire remains, bones, floor constructions, depositional environments.

Prof. Kuhlwilm: 1) Introgression detection in genome data using state-of-the-art bioinformatic methods, with the goal to characterise differences between populations or through time. 2) Analysis of sequencing data from historical great ape specimens to inspect quality, characterise ancestry or detect pathogens.

Prof. Gelabert: Paleogenomic studies of late-Holocene populations of Patagonia and genomic analyses of European Pleistocene snow leopards.

Prof. Higham: Improving radiocarbon dating methods to understand the pathway of Neanderthal extinction, when, where and how. What does this tell us regarding possible overlap with early Homo sapiens?

Prof. Vernot: 1. Investigating resources that people used in past societies by studying the plant and animal DNA in ancient house floors and alleys. 2. Looking at the microbial DNA in those sediments, for both pathogens and beneficial species. We will try to figure out what diseases people or their animals had, and also the origin of the animal DNA (i.e. if you find dog DNA, do the bacteria in those samples match dog skin, or dog feces?).

Prof. Douka: 1. Improvement of ancient protein detection workflows (protocol comparison). 2. Near Infrared methodology for collagen and aDNA prediction and taxonomic identification.