Project description
Tracing the timeline of early humans in Iberia
Dating ancient sites in the Iberian Peninsula is a major challenge, particularly those from the Early and Middle Pleistocene. The difficulty lies in the age of the sites and the lack of effective dating methods. Supported by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the S-IRLum project will develop innovative luminescence-based techniques, such as infra-red radiofluorescence (IR-RF) and infrared photoluminescence (IRPL), applied at single-grain resolution. These methods will be used at three crucial Spanish sites, offering precise chronologies and revealing key insights into early human migration and technological progress, such as the use of fire. By refining dating techniques, S-IRLum will enhance our understanding of the timing and development of hominin populations in Europe.
Objective
The Iberian peninsula contains many sites essential to the current understanding of human evolution and population movement, including some of the oldest evidence of hominin occupation in Europe at over a million years ago. However, many of these late Early and Middle Pleistocene sites are challenging to date due to their old age and the scarcity of applicable methods. The main aim of this project is to develop luminescence-based dating tools targeted to such sites, thereby addressing this chronological gap. The S-IRLum project consists of a combination of method development on two complementary luminescence-based dating techniques―infra-red radiofluorescence (IR-RF) and infra-red photoluminescence (IRPL)―at single-grain resolution and their application to three important sites of Early and Middle Pleistocene age in Northern and Southern Spain. Development of an automated spatially resolved analysis through an ultra low-light imaging detection system is the only possibility to isolate grains with appropriate characteristics and avoid contamination by unwanted signal from other minerals. By analysing individual sediment grains, such methods will also be sensitive to natural sediment re-working events, a common occurrence in cave environments, thus increasing the accuracy of resulting ages. The research output will provide (i) an efficient and reproducible analysis pipeline for spatially-resolved luminescence dating and (ii) robust multi-method chronostratigraphies for the three dated sites, providing further insight into the timing of hominin arrival in Spain and the technological developments of these populations, such as the use of fire.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
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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.
- humanities history and archaeology history prehistory
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Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
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Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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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
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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-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
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Call for proposal
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(opens in new window) HORIZON-MSCA-2024-PF-01
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OX1 2JD Oxford
United Kingdom
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