Sulphur isotope analysis of modern and archaeological animal remains from marine, freshwater and terrestrial ecosystems on the west coast of Canada
Final Report Abstract
The project aimed to reconstruct ecological and dietary conditions at the West coast of British Columbia and North-America. Therefore, the focus for this is the analysis of sulphur isotopes in conjunction with carbon and nitrogen isotopes from bone collagen of marine, terrestrial and freshwater faunal species. Four sub-projects were defined with specific research hypotheses: 1) marine mammalian behavior, 2) isotopic changes in migratory fish, 3) characterizing marine and freshwater isotopic compositions, and 4) the distinction between freshwater and terrestrial dietary resources. The obtained results offer interpretations about the importance of the marine and freshwater ecology at the west coast of British Columbia for First Nation groups as well as their dietarycultural habits in the past. Furthermore, the findings allowed to be implemented in forensic, climatic and ecological research and will be further conducted in several following externally funded projects.
Publications
- (2012) Investigation of Diachronic Dietary Patterns on the Islands of Ibiza and Formentera, Spain: Evidence from Sulphur Stable Isotope Ratio Analysis. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 149(1): 115-124
Nehlich O, Fuller BT, Marquez-Grant N, Richards MP
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1002/ajpa.22104) - (2010/2013) Migration und Mobilität in der Bandkeramik – Multi- Isotopenanalyse an Menschen und Tieren aus Bad Nauheim–Nieder-Mörlen (Hessen). Fundberichte aus Hessen 50: 69-91
Nehlich O, Schade-Lindig S
- (2013) 2,000 years of parallel societies in Stone Age Central Europe. Science 342(6157): 479-481
Bollongino R, Nehlich O, Richards MP, Orschiedt J, Thomas MG, Sell C, Fajkosova Z, Powell A, Burger J
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1245049) - (2013) Sulphur isotope evidence of bone collagen for changing feeding ecology of modern and mediaeval cod. Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry 27(20): 2255-2262
Nehlich O, Barrett J, Richards MP
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1002/rcm.6682) - (2014) Comparison of two methods of extracting bone collagen for stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis: comparing whole bone demineralization with gelatinization and ultrafiltration. Journal of Archaeological Science, 47, 64- 69
Sealy J, Johnson M, Richards MP, Nehlich O
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2014.04.011) - (2014) Sulphur isotope ratios of multi-period archaeological skeletal remains from central Germany: A dietary and mobility study. Anthropologie (BRNO) 52(1), 15-33
Nehlich O, Oelze V, Jay M, Conrad M, Stäuble H, Teegen W-R, Richards MP
