ARC outcome in Archaeology, Earth Sciences and Environmental Sciences
Yesterday the ARC announced the outcome for Discovery Projects, Discovery Indigenous, Linkage, Infrastructure, Equipment and Facilities and Discovery Early Career Researcher Award.
As usual the scheme was very competitive with 22%, 39%, 17% and 25% respectively. Here is a list of the project funded in the broad discipline of archaeology, palaeanthropology, earth sciences, geochronology and geochemistry.
DISCOVERY PROJECT (few examples, complete list click here ):
DP190100465 Dr Luca Fiorenza; Associate Professor Stefano Benazzi; Dr Rachel Sarig A real-time biomechanical study of Neanderthal anterior dentition. This project aims to advance understanding of the evolution of human dentition using an innovative approach that integrates sophisticated 3D digital modelling with engineering tools. Neanderthals are our closest extinct human relatives that inhabited Eurasia from about 230,000 to 28,000 years ago. However, their protruding faces, large noses and big anterior teeth, raise questions about why these people look so different from us. This project aims to fill this gap in human knowledge about our evolutionary history, and to enhance the international visibility of Australian research in palaeoanthropology and dental biomechanics. 27/11/2018 Monash University $245,600.00
DP190102747: Dr Alice Gorman; Associate Professor Justin Walsh: How archaeology can transform living in space. This project aims to investigate human engagement with material culture in the extreme environment of space by applying archaeological methods to the habitation design of the International Space Station. The project will use NASA data to record astronaut interactions with objects and spaces over time. The project expects to remedy deficiencies in previous psychological and engineering design research by taking a deep-time perspective on how a culture develops in a microgravity environment. The results are intended to identify how humans adapt to space technology and can be applied in the future design of long duration space missions to maximise both survival and efficiency. 27/11/2018 Flinders University $244,400.00
DP190101839, Dr Hsiao-chun Hung; Dr Zhenhua Deng; Associate Professor Michael Carson; Professor Hirofumi Matsumura. Prosperity along the sea in the Asia Pacific at 5000-3000 BC. This project aims to address how complex hunter-gatherers sustained large villages along the South China Coast for 2 millennia. About 7000 years ago, the people and landscape of this region began a long journey of transformation when affluent village systems appeared. Combining archaeology with archaeo-botany, palaeo-landscape reconstruction, and bio-archaeology, this project seeks to learn how these early coastal societies contributed to regional social-economic developments, in a time long prior to written chronicles. The project expects to support new comprehension of these unique coastal communities and their relationship with others in the broader Asia-Pacific region. 27/11/2018 The Australian National University $309,942.00
DP190100159 Professor Bryce Barker; Associate Professor Lara Lamb; Associate Professor Maxime Aubert; Associate Professor Andrew Fairbairn; Dr Matthew Leavesley The archaeology of the Great Papuan Plateau. This project aims to investigate the peopling of the Great Papuan Plateau (GPP), a large karst system situated between Australia and Southeast Asia. Recent discoveries suggest that humans arrived in northern Australia by 65,000 years ago and were in southeast Asia by at least 80,000 years ago. Dating the timing and movement of the human colonisation of the GPP has the potential to reveal evidence of the earliest eastward movement of peoples into Sahul (now Australia and New Guinea). Through archaeological excavations of limestone caves with rock art and deep cultural floor deposit recorded across the plateau, this project will provide answers to fundamental questions about the early occupation of Sahul by early modern humans. 27/11/2018 University of Southern Queensland $549,747.00