Student and ECR Research Support Award

Program Description

The Society for Archaeological Sciences (SAS) launched a more flexible research funding program to support the work of its student and early career members during the COVID-19 pandemic. The SAS Research Support Award temporarily replaces the existing Student Research International Travel Award and a Postdoctoral Conference Travel Award that was to have debuted in 2020. In light of many conferences, symposia, and workshops being held online or in hybrid form, and some obstacles to research travel remaining, we will continue to channel the budget that was originally allocated for the two above travel awards to a more flexible research funding scheme to cover both laboratory and fieldwork expenses.

Eligibility

• The applicants must be either graduate students (Master's or Doctoral) or early career researchers. In the latter case, they must have been awarded their PhD within the previous eight years at the time of application. Exceptions may be made for the applicants with a career break, such as but not limited to parental leave, long-term illness or disability, or national service. The circumstances for exceptions must be clearly indicated in the application.
• The award is only open to graduate students and early career researchers who are current dues-paid members of The Society for Archaeological Sciences at the time of application.

Application Procedure

• Applications for the award should be submitted by 9 January 2023 and must be received before the analyses and field research described in the proposal take place.
• Eligible expenses for this award include laboratory analytical fees and consumables, software licenses, imagery and geospatial products, delivery costs (for mailing the samples through reliable couriers), fieldwork and research travel expenses, including transportation and accommodation costs and consumables for field research (excluding food supplies).
• An application should consist of
  • a standard curriculum vitae of the graduate student/early career researcher
  • a (max.) two-page proposal describing the research objectives and methodology, the justification of budget, and plans for disseminating the results
  • one recommendation letter from the academic/professional supervisor of the applicant
  • an agreement with the laboratory where analyses will be carried out in form of email correspondence or other written documentation, and/or the applicable permits indicating that you are allowed to carry out field research
• Applications should be addressed to the SAS President (https://socarchsci.org/about-us/sas-executive-officers.html) and sent via e-mail as combined pdf (with the following order: CV, research proposal, additional documentation) to the SAS General Secretary (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.). Reference letters must be sent directly to the General Secretary by the relevant deadline. Potential applicants may contact Evangelia Kiriatzi, SAS President (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.), for further information.

Evaluation Procedure

• Proposals will be evaluated by a committee selected by the President of The Society for Archaeological Sciences, including, if necessary, suitable referees chosen from the membership of the Society.
• The committee evaluates the eligibility and merit of the application for support of the candidate. The criteria used will be the record of the candidate, the letter of recommendation, and the scientific merit and potential career impact of the proposal. The amount granted is determined by the committee, according to funds available, but shall not exceed $500 USD per award. SAS has allocated a maximum of $1500 to each cycle of this funding program
• At least one award will be given to a graduate student and one to an early career researcher for each round of competition. However, if we only receive applications from graduate students for a specific round, all three awards will be granted to graduate students, and vice versa. In case no worthy proposals are received in a given round, the funds allocated will be repurposed for the next round.

Terms and Conditions of the Award

• The successful applicant is committed to submitting a brief summary of the results of analyses and/or field investigation to the SAS Bulletin no later than one year after the award is made to the recipient (not one year after the completion of the project).
• No redress against the decision of the evaluating committee is possible.
• The award will be made in advance of the applicable research, but the awardee must send copies of all relevant receipts to the General Secretary of The Society for Archaeological Sciences within one month of the conclusion of the supported work. If the awardee submits receipts that sum to a total less than the amount awarded by the Society, then the awardee is obligated to return the difference to the Society at the time of receipt submission.
• Failure to comply with these terms and conditions will result in the renunciation of the award, including the return to The Society for Archaeological Sciences of the full value of the funds dispersed and a ban on the awardee from future participation in all awards and competitive opportunities sponsored by the Society.

Awardees of The Society for Archaeological Sciences Student Research Support Award

Caitlyn Pallas,  Master's Student, University of Missouri, USA (June 2022). Project: An Archaeometric Analysis of Structural Mortars from the Sanctuary of Venus, Pompeii. Caitlyn’s MA thesis examines the Roman concrete used to construct the Temple of Venus at Pompeii. Concrete construction played a major role in the architectural development of the sanctuary, but to date there has not been extensive analysis of the mortars employed in the various parts of the complex. Caitlyn hopes to discover the composition of the concrete, the aggregates that were used to create the concrete, hydraulic properties of the concrete, the types of concrete used on site and where the different types of concrete were used, and how the concrete evolved both in terms of composition and use at the site from the Samnite period (late 4th c. BCE to late 2nd c. BCE) to the Flavian period (69 CE until the eruption in 79 CE). She will first use Raman microscopy to examine the density and porosity of the concrete used throughout the Sanctuary of Venus. Following this, she will take 30 samples from the sanctuary to analyze at U. of Missouri’s electron microscopy core (EMCore) facility and research reactor (MURR), using a variety of techniques for textural and compositional characterization.

Melissa Cadet,  Postdoctoral Researcher, Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taïwan (June 2022). Project: Copper Metallurgy during the Philippines’ Metal Period: Technologies and Exchanges. Despite the developments of metallurgical research in Mainland Southeast Asia, Island Southeast Asia has for the moment remained little studied, including the Philippines. Copper/bronze metallurgy most probably dispersed through the South China Sea via contacts/exchanges with the mainland but we still have limited knowledge of how, when and why this occurred. This project aims to record and analyze with an archaeometric approach, copper-based objects from the Filipino Metal Period to identify the different post-casting treatments; the different alloying traditions and to discuss the exchange networks with lead isotopy. The data obtained from the scientific analyses will be used to begin discussing the different copper technologies present in the Philippines as well as potential exchange networks with Taiwan but also with other regions of Southeast Asia. The results may also permit discussion about the timing, origin, and pattern of dispersion of the metallurgy in the South China Sea.

Dylan Multari,  PhD student, Macquarie University, Australia (June 2022). Project: Developing a molecular approach to the species identification of plant-based fibres in Ancient Egyptian textiles. The project will focus on exploring novel ways in which ancient textiles can studied to better understand the human past. Current textile fibre identification is performed through the use of microscopic observation, however this technique is potentially limited by textile degradation where diagnostic markers are lost over time. This project aims to apply proteomics analysis, which has been demonstrated to be effective at the species identification of anthropological and zoological materials in the archaeological record, to identify the species of origin for a collection of 26th Dynasty Egyptian burial wrappings, housed in the Nicholson Collection of the Chau Chak Wing Museum, The University of Sydney, Australia.

Ahana Ghosh,  Doctoral student, Archaeological Sciences Centre, Indian Institute of Technology, Gandhinagar, India (December 2021). Project: From the cradle to the grave: Understanding food processing in the ancient Harappan habitation site of 'Dholavira' and in the burial site of 'Dhaneti. This research examines the ancient food processing and cultural use of vessels by identifying the absorbed lipids inside the ceramic metrics within the Harappan settlement of Dholavira, Rann of Kutch, Gujarat. Further, it compares the obtained results with the identified residues from the vessels used as grave goods from Dhaneti, an Early Harappan burial settlement also located in Kutch, Gujarat. This project peeks into the diet and ritual practices involving ceramics by examining the biomolecular components lying in the lipid residues within ceramics used by the site inhabitants during their lifetime and even seeks for residues inside the ones eventually became part of their grave goods, adding a distinct symbolic value to it. Such analyses allow archaeologists to identify organic materials held and prepared in ancient ceramic vessels and will aid in further understanding economic and subsistence practices associated with the more extensive proto-historic cultural and technological traditions of the Harappans from Dholavira and Dhaneti.

Lindsey Paskulin,  PhD Candidate, University of British Columbia, Canada (December 2021). Project: Biomolecular Insights to Foodways among the Moche of North Coastal Peru. Lindsey’s PhD thesis is centred around the application of shotgun proteomics – a method of ancient protein analysis – for the identification of food-derived proteins in Late Moche and Transitional (600-900 CE) pottery from Huaca Colorada (Peru). Local communities in Jequetepeque Valley, the region encompassing Huaca Colorada, operated within and alongside external political pressures, weaving together internal and external influences across time and space in the creation of local identity. Considering cuisine as one expression of identity, Lindsey’s research seeks to reconstruct past recipes in times of political change through the analysis of plant and animal proteins preserved in ancient pottery. While in Peru, she sampled approximately 30 pottery residues from ceramic vessels at Huaca Colorada. Proteins within the residue samples will be extracted at the ADaPT Laboratory Facility (University of British Columbia) and then analyzed using liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry. With the characterization of food-derived proteins in ancient pottery, Lindsey seeks to better understand how individual foodstuffs were being actively combined in expressions of cuisine.

Petra Vaiglova,  Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Griffith Center for Social and Cultural Research, Griffith University, Australia (December 2021). Project: New high-resolution technique for investigating human–wild boar interactions. In her project, Petra Vaiglova is developing a new method for integrating dental histological features (i.e., incremental features that enable us to trace the developmental geometry of dental enamel) with fine scaled stable oxygen isotope sequences measured on a Sensitive High-Resolution Ion Microprobe (SHRIMP) to reconstruct the life histories of animals from archaeological assemblages. The method will enable us to extract seasonal climatic and mobility patterns from animal teeth at an approximately weekly resolution. The method will be applicable for answering questions of past climatic fluctuations, human–animal interactions, and change of animal feeding patterns through time. Petra is applying this technique to probing the dynamic between humans and animals in Early Neolithic Southwestern Asia.

Nicolás C. Ciarlo, Early Career Researcher, National Scientific and Technical Research Council - CONICET, Argentina (August 2021). Project: New insights into the European mid-17th century gun founding practice: analyses of scrap bronze cannons recovered from the cargo of a Dutch merchant vessel sunk in Cadiz, Spain. This research is focused on the characterization of an array of mid-17th century scrap bronze cannons recovered from the Delta III site, identified as a Dutch merchant ship which sank in Cadiz, Spain. A metallurgical examination of the quality and manufacturing process of the remains will be conducted. Combining archaeological, historical, and archaeometric data, this study will provide novel information to assess the functioning of melting furnaces, the technical factors underlying failed casting, and the knowledge of the properties and behavior of cast copper alloys available at the time. This will shed light on early modern European gun foundry and recycling practices.

Ian Nathaniel Roa, PhD Student, Department of Anthropology, University of Pittsburgh, USA, (August 2021). Project: The Cultural Effects of Animal Ritual Use and Sacrifice in Maya Lowlands. In the ancient Maya world, animals played a fundamental role in mythology and religion, and their symbolic value meant that animals were agents rather than items for subsistence. Animals were also important in ritual and political activities for the Maya, where they were consumed at feasts and left as offerings at altars and in burials. This project uses oxygen (δ18O) and carbon (δ13C) stable isotope analyses of enamel to reconstruct movement and diet of animals from ritually significant contexts to examine ancient animal engagement. While δ18O values represent ecological conditions present where the animals originated, δ13C reflect the total diet of the individuals. Specimens represent seven taxa, ranging from dog to crocodile from four sites in the Belize River Valley of western Belize, providing a regional perspective on human-animal engagement. The ritual contexts include burials, caches and other special deposits that span the occupational history of the Belize River Valley from more than 1500 years from the Middle Preclassic (900-300 BC) to the Terminal Classic (AD 750-900/1000). The results will address hypotheses about whether these animals were traded along distances, fed while in captivity, and shed light on ritual activity during critical transitions in Maya prehistory in the Belize Valley. 

Irini Sifogeorgaki, PhD Student, Leiden University, Faculty of Archaeology, Netherlands, (August 2021). Project: Geoarchaeology at Umhlatuzana Rock Shelter, South Africa. Umhlatuzana rockshelter (KwaZulu Natal, South Africa) is one of the few sites with a sequence spanning the Middle to Later Stone Age transition (∼40–20 ka). This project employs geoarchaeological techniques, with a focus on micromorphological analysis, to shed light on the events and processes that concluded in the creation of the site. With the SAS support, I will visit the Wiener Lab in Athens, and with the assistance of Dr. Karkanas, I will solve outstanding geoarchaeological questions related to post-dispositional processes (e.g., phosphate mineral formation, bioturbation activities, dating issues). The results of this research will be of great archaeological significance and will be published in open-access peer-reviewed journals.