Tracking the development of agricultural lifestyles in island Southeast Asia through modern and prehistoric rodent communities.

    Project: Research

    Project Details

    Description

    The emergence of agriculture, a key transformational event in human history, seems to have occurred significantly later in island SE Asia than surrounding regions. However, the early stages of agriculture may be archaeologically ‘invisible’ in the tropics due to simple material culture and housing. We propose to use the recent evolutionary history of agricultural rodent pests, all of which emerged in situ from among a native rodent fauna, as a proxy for the origins and spread of agriculture, and its subsequent intensification. We will use phylogeography and population genetics to infer the history of contemporary rodent populations, combined with archaeozoological and ancient DNA analyses of prehistoric samples to test our inferences.
    StatusFinished
    Effective start/end date30/06/1430/06/17

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