Project description
How early human expansion and migration made today’s global population possible
About 70 000 years ago, humans started leaving Africa to expand across the globe. Their remarkable journey was successful because they were resilient, versatile and innovative. The EU-funded DISPERSALS project will explore the forces and processes at work in the migration and dispersal of early Homo sapiens in Africa. It will assess the model that Homo sapiens developed first in Africa and then spread around the world. To do so, it will study continuity and discontinuity in culture and biology, and movements in population in the last 100 000 years in central Mozambique. The aim is to shed light on what caused migrations and dispersals within and beyond Africa.
Objective
Genetic evidence suggests that successful modern human migration out of Africa is believed to have started c. 70,000 years ago, populating the whole world, at different rates and times. This incredible voyage took place because of humans unique resilience, versatility, and innovation, both biological and cultural, to external stimuli, including ecological and environmental changes.
The main objective of DISPERSALS is to investigate the migration and dispersal dynamics of early Homo sapiens in Africa and archaeologically evaluate the genetic model that southern African human populations were the genesis of the successful out-of-Africa some 70,000 years ago. This will be accomplished by investigating cultural and biological continuity/discontinuity issues and human population movements in the last c. 100,000 years in the poorly studied Limpopo and the Save river basins, central Mozambique, an area mediating the two key regions of human development, i.e. southern and eastern Africa.
DISPERSALS will compare the human occupation and ecology between central Mozambique and eastern and southern Africa using a multi-scale approach based on the study of regional diachronic cultural traits. It will reconstruct regional population patterns, followed by comparative quantitative population genetics combined with GIS computational network analyses. The results will be then integrated through Agent-based modeling, based on the incremental creation, elimination, or reorientation of network links to simulate a quantitative framework to study the evolution of population dispersal across southern-eastern Africa. The project will be crucial in providing ground-breaking high-resolution archaeological, chronological, and paleoenvironmental data. DISPERSALS will deliver a fundamental perspective on the key processes that triggered migrations and dispersals within Africa and out-of-Africa which ultimately resulted in the human diaspora over the entire planet.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- natural sciences earth and related environmental sciences physical geography cartography geographic information systems
- natural sciences biological sciences ecology
- natural sciences physical sciences astronomy planetary sciences planets
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2021-ADG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
8005 139 FARO
Portugal
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.