Graduate Students and Research Associates
Aaron Armstrong: Aaron Armstrong is interested in the origins of modern human behavior. His research is primarily focused on the nutritional and dietary resources exploited by Middle and Late Stone Age populations of southern Africa. He is trained in zooarchaeology and taphonomy. Aaron is also interested in the paleohabitats occupied by MSA and LSA humans. There is a bunch of other stuff Aaron is interested in as well, but he feels that this description may become too cumbersome and random if he lists everything.
Kent Bakken: North American prehistory and stone tool technology. Kent’s disseration explores the history of lithic raw material use patterns in Minnesota. He also started the Elliot Park Neighborhood Archaeology project. This project promotes neighborhood stewardship of its own history by involving community residents in the excavation and study of urban historic sites.
Linda Chisholm: Prehistoric and early contact coastal communities in Southwestern Alaska. Chisholm is interested in the exploitation of avian resources during the Koniag tradition, specifically, parsing out the anthropogenic taphonomic signatures and patterns produced during butchery (consumption) and skinning (parka production). These data will supplement the current knowledge of Koniag ceremonialism and, in a more general fashion, the role of birds in human subsistence practices on the Peninsula. Additional support for this and related avian analyses conducted by Chisholm, is generously provided by the Bell Museum of Natural History and the Alaska Regional office of the National Park Service.
Ellery Frahm: Ellery Frahm's research interests lie at the intersections of the natural sciences and archaeology, particularly chemical analyses of geoarchaeological materials in order to investigate their procurement, exchange, use, and value in different socio-political structures. Ellery is also interested in both theoretical and practical issues of sourcing studies. His doctoral dissertation involves Anatolian and Transcaucasian obsidian in northeastern Syria, especially at Tell Mozan, the ancient Hurrian capital of Urkesh. Similar issues were also explored in his Master's research on North American native copper, which showed that the spatial distributions, not just concentrations, of the impurities are important for sourcing. His analytical technique of choice is electron microprobe analysis, which combines non-destructive chemical analysis with scanning electron microscopy. Electron microprobe analysis is frequently used in the geosciences, but Ellery finds it quite useful in archaeology as well. Humans in antiquity exploited a wide variety of materials (lithics, glasses, metals, ceramics) that are well suited to analysis using the electron microprobe. To assist colleagues in their research, he has also analyzed coins, slags, metal artifacts, ancient brick, ancient and medieval ceramics, bone, teeth, jewelry, and a variety of other materials. Ellery is also a senior research fellow in the Department of Geology and Geophysics.
Matthew Hunstiger: I am interested in the archaeology of the Old World Paleolithic. My
focus is on lithics and identifying new ways of analyzing lithics
using computer generated 3D models.
Claire Kirchhoff: Research interests: -Primate skeletal biology emphasizing chimpanzees, Human evolution, and Human anatomy
Dissertation research: Dominance rank is an important life history factor for chimpanzees, but its skeletal effects are unknown. I am currently examining skeletal health indicators in 39 chimpanzees with known life histories from the Gombe National Park, Tanzania. This will facilitate the interpretation of skeletons without known life histories by better defining the relationship between behavior and the skeleton. I use multivariate regression models to assess the effects of dominance rank, age, and sex on health indicators including enamel defects, skeletal / dental pathology and trauma, and fluctuating asymmetry. Higher ranking chimpanzees should show skeletal signs of better health than lower ranking chimpanzees.
Ceilidh Lerwick: So I'm Ceilidh Lerwick and I am working with the human remains from a medieval site on Inis Mor in Ireland. I am also working on determining sexual dimorphism in the human petrosal.
Ali Moyer: Migrations of anatomically modern humans, using evolutionary theory, osteology, and stable isotope analysis to answer archaeological questions. Ali is also interested in culture contact and the ways immigrants and native peoples adapt, culturally and biologically, to each other's presence; negotiation of identity in frontier zones; and interactions between hunter-gatherers and agriculturalists. Her dissertation research focuses on the Jomon-Yayoi transitional period in Japan (ca. 1000 BC-AD 800).
Andrea Torgerson: Investigation of variables influencing the preservation and successful recovery of DNA from archaelogical and forensic samples.Variables such as elemental composition, pH, and oxidation/reduction potential of the burial environment, time since death, macroscopic and microscopic condition of the specimen, and exposure to UV radiation are being explored, through experimentation on modern DNA as well as analysis of soil/sediment and biological samples from the Silvernale Village site in Red Wing, Minnesota and from the Kromdraai, Wonderwerk Cave, and Border Cave sites in South Africa.