Visiting  Scholars

Dr Mike Simms is working with Dr Ruffell on evidence for climate change in the Late Triassic as part of their ongoing investigation of the Carnian Pluvial Episode, and with Prof Reimer on the timing and scale of Holocene sea level change on the east coast of Northern Ireland. 

Dr Gillian Allmond is working with Professor Murphy on a project to mark the 175th anniversary of the Great Famine in Ireland.  She has completed a background history to 'famine roads' in County Fermanagh and future work will identify and record the surviving stretches of the roads in the modern landscape of County Fermanagh.  Gill is also developing a research project on the history and archaeology of children within the asylum system in Northern Ireland in the Victorian and Edwardian periods. 

Dr Bell is working with Prof Eileen Murphy and a number of colleagues within the School.  This will include work on:

- the significance of decorative motifs common to a range of Bronze Age artefact types inlcuding metal work and ceramics.   

- Assist in the development of a UG module on Cognitive Thinking in relation to archaeological research. 

Following more than 4 years of research at the SUNDASIA and PALAEOKARST project at Queen’s University, Dr Kahlert is collaborating with project PI Dr Ryan Rabett on a number of follow-on activities: 

1. To improve our palaeo-shore model for the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Trang An Landscape Complex in northern Vietnam. They are currently conducting a dating programme for a number of geomorphological sea level markers, which will allow the addition of a temporal component to a model that currently operates on morphological and spatial variables.

2. To develop a digital exhibit for an exhibition space that is currently in development in Trang An.  The exhibit will include a series of interactive maps that summarises the research outcomes of SUNDASIA and PALAEOKARST and presents them to a wider public.

3. To continue research into vegetation classification modelling to remotely search for non-native plant species in Trang An that could help to identify human interaction with the forest.

Visiting Students

a.everard.19@abdn.ac.uk 

Researching coastal archaeology and the impacts of climate change, using remote sensing techniques to investigate and track coastal change and develop mitigation strategies to help the sector manage the threatened coastal archaeological resource.

This PhD research will explore the potential of multi-tissue sulphur and strontium isotope analysis and isoscape modelling to reconstruct past faunal movements. As a part of this she will be building sulphur isotope bioavailability maps (‘isoscapes’) across Scotland and southwest France using various sample materials. Additionally, she will measure movement in a wide variety of Palaeolithic fauna (including cave bear, horses, reindeer, and cattle) across various sites in Europe using both strontium and sulphur isotopes then attempt to recreate their migration patterns using spatial ecology and isoscapes. This project is based at the University of Aberdeen and Queens’s University Belfast, facilitating the use  of mass spectrometers for sulphur analysis. Her supervisors are Dr Kate Britton (University of Aberdeen) and Dr Neil Ogle (QUB).

In October of 2020, Emilie began her NERC (Natural Environmental Research Council) funded QUADRAT DTP PhD in Geoscience at the University of Aberdeen. Her research is to be conducted along side the ‘Chronologies and Changing Cultures on the Mongolian Steppe’ project under the supervision of Dr. Joshua Wright (University of Aberdeen) and Prof. Paula Reimer (14CHRONO Centre @ Qub). Her research will focus on compiling existing radiocarbon dates alongside newly dated samples from both northern and southern Mongolia, and aims to explore how nomadic pastoral communities of Mongolia adapted to the dynamic and changing environments of the Eurasian Steppe during the Middle Holocene, and the Bronze and Iron Ages. This project seeks to utilize the availability of high-quality chronological data to compile a model in which the periods of north-central Mongolia can be re-examined alongside attributes associated with these chronological periods such as; subsistence, monuments, and technologies in order to cross-examine these attributes against the changing environmental conditions of the Mongolian Steppe. Emilie will be conducting 14C dating at the 14CHRONO Centre for Climate, the Environment and Chronology at Queen’s University under the guidance of Prof. Reimer.

This research will build upon past research by (a) compiling existing radiocarbon dates, (b) collecting new radiocarbon dates from animal and human bone, (c) conducting Carbon and Nitrogen Stable Isotope analysis of both animal and human remains to examine changes in subsistence, herding and grazing (d) to explore the application of stable isotope analysis of elements such as C/N and oxygen as a proxy for environmental and landscape change to explore periods of climatic change, and (e) to construct a synthesis of new and existing data into a high-resolution chronological model focused within the Egiin Gol area, in which cultural changes can be examined against environmental data to explore responses to dynamic environments and identify the ‘moments’ of change. 

My PhD focuses on how the EU defines and sets its external borders in post-conflict areas (Ireland and Cyprus).  I came to QUB to conduct fieldwork in Belfast to study the implementation of the Withdrawal Agreement, and more specifically the NI Protocol, in relation to the creation of a new external border of the European Union in the Irish Sea.  Through observations and interviews, I will study the implementation or lack of border checks into Northern Ireland and other mechanisms such as phytosanitary controls, while comparing such mechanisms to the european framework in Cyprus over the Green Line.