Andrew Michael Zipkin, Scientist, Eurofins EAG Laboratories, 103 Commerce Blvd, Liverpool, NY 13088; Adjunct Professor, School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State University, 900 S. Cady Mall, Tempe, AZ 85281, USA
Andrew Zipkin is an archaeological scientist with over a decade of experience in elemental characterization, isotope geochemistry, compositional data analysis, provenience studies, geographic information science, and ethnoarchaeology. He currently works as an analytical chemist and materials scientist for the commercial laboratory and contract research organization EAG Laboratories. His instrumental specialty is Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry and its variants (e.g., single quadrupole, triple quad, magnetic sector multicollector), with an emphasis on in situ analyses of non-traditional materials by laser ablation. Zipkin has also been affiliated with ASU in multiple capacities since 2018. Previously, he was a National Science Foundation SBE Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a Ph.D. student at The George Washington University. He conducted archaeological, ethnographic, and geological field work in Alaska, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, South Africa, and Zambia between 2007 and 2019. In academic research, Andrew primarily focuses on developing minimally destructive methods for geochemical provenience studies and other classification-oriented problems in archaeology. Secondary research areas include material properties of hafting adhesives, identification of heat treated toolstone, and detecting chemical diagenesis in faunal hard tissue. His main archaeomaterials of interest are ochre, silcrete, and ostrich eggshell.
Vana Orfanou, MSCA Postdoctoral Fellow, Ludwig Maximilian University (LMU) Munich, Schellingstrasse 12, 80799 Munich, +49 (0)89-2180-5360;
Vana’s research focuses on studying past technologies through the analytical examination of archaeomaterials, with a particular emphasis on archaeometallurgy. She has worked with materials spanning a wide chronological and geographical scope, from the Bronze Age to Medieval times, across northern and southeastern Europe, the eastern Mediterranean, and western Asia. Much of Vana’s work has dealt with materials from Greece, which has led to a close association with the Hellenic Society for Archaeometry (HSA). Since its founding in 1982, the HSA has been the largest professional association of archaeological scientists in Greece, with members both within and outside Greece. The HSA has also actively supported the journal Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences since its foundation in 2009.
Ester Oras, Department of Archaeology, Institute of Chemistry, University of Tartu, Ülikooli 18, 50090, Tartu, Estonia;
Ester Oras is the professor of archaeochemistry at the Institute Chemistry, and History and Archaeology, and the director of the Archemy Lab at the University of Tartu, Estonia. Her main field of research is biomolecular archaeology, especially ancient dietary reconstructions through stable isotope, lipidomic and proteomic analyses, but she has also experience in past disease, migration and provenance studies. Ester has been the member of ISBA since 2016, and served as the ISBA Society Programming and Affiliate coordinator in 2023-2025. Ester will liaise between SAS and ISBA to enhance the dialogue between the different fields of archaeological sciences and develop the multifaceted collaboration between the two societies.
Kyle P. Freund, Cultural Resource Research Lead, Idaho National Laboratory, Idaho, USA
Kyle Freund (Ph.D. McMaster University) is the Cultural Resource Research Lead at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) whose specializations include lithic analysis, obsidian sourcing via XRF spectrometry, GIS and spatial statistics, and field survey. Prior to joining INL, Kyle served as a Principal Investigator at Far Western Anthropological Research Group in Henderson, Nevada, and an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Indian River State College in Ft. Pierce, FL. He has been involved in a diverse range of field projects throughout Italy, Greece, Turkey, Canada, and the United States, although his primary research centers on how obsidian sourcing studies can be used to address questions of broad archaeological significance. This includes focusing on the role of obsidian exchange and gift-giving practices in structuring early farming societies of the Mediterranean as well as identifying long-term mobility patterns of hunter-gatherers in the U.S. Great Basin.
Steven A. Vitale, Department of Physics and Nuclear Engineering, United States Military Academy at West Point, West Point NY, USA,
Steven Vitale is an experimental physicist, exploring the processing and properties of novel materials for future optical and microelectronic devices. Prior to his current faculty position at the United State Military Academy at West Point he was a research scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He has extensive experience in material surface analysis, processing, and modification. Dr. Vitale has spent many summers participating in Bronze Age and Classical archaeological excavations at various Mediterranean and Aegean sites. He is currently exploring how to increase the impact of materials analysis toward answering important archaeological questions. He has organized several colloquia and workshops on the topic and is co-editor of a special issue in the journal Advances in Archeomaterials. Dr. Vitale holds a BS from Johns Hopkins University, MS and PhD from MIT, and is currently pursuing a BA in Classical Studies at the Open University.