In exciting news – PI Sandy Harrison has secured, alongside international colleagues, a new SYNERGY grant titled EcoARCH!
EcoARCH stands for Ecological Archaeologies of the Afrotropics and will investigate human, climate, and fire interactions across Africa and Arabia in the past 6000 years. The SPECIAL group are excited to continue to work on fire and vegetation interactions, as well as merge this with the group’s focus on paleoecology.
EcoARCH is going to be funded by the European Research Council (ERC) under the Horizon Europe Synergy Grant Scheme with the project receiving €12 million. A huge congratulations goes out to Professor David Wright (lead PI, University of Oslo), Sanne Boessenkool (University of Oslo) and Sarah Ivory (Penn State University), as well as our own Sandy Harrison on securing this funding. The project will also involve collaborations with, and inputs from, colleagues across Africa. The project will begin in March 2026 and will last for 6 years.
Research highlights include:
- Field sampling of environmental indicators
- Ancient DNA sampling
- Use of AI tools and other data analysis to assess relationships between humans and climate across scales
- Land cover reconstructions
Pictured: David Wright, Sanne Boessenkool, Sandy Harrison and Sarah Ivory – the EcoARCH Team.
You can read some of the official press releases here: University of Oslo, Penn State
And keep a look out on our website for job opportunities with a number of Post Doctoral Research Associate posts and PhD positions to become available next year. We look forward to sharing the exciting research development and outputs with you in the future!