This summer, the Turkana Basin Institute in association with Stony Brook University’s Department of Geosciences inaugurated the new Luminescence Dating Research Laboratory. Currently the only one of its kind on the U.S. East Coast, the establishment of this new facility was led by Assistant Professor Marine Frouin, a specialist in geochronology and luminescence dating, who joined [...]
The Turkana Basin Institute has joined the project Consolidating the Future through Mastering the Deep Past (CONFMAP), led by archaeologist Sonia Harmand of Stony Brook University and TBI. The project is funded by the French Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs, and aims to improve access to paleosciences for marginalized populations while raising awareness in Kenyan of the value of the prehistoric archaeological heritage of Turkana County in northern Kenya.
A new study highlights the dramatic biodiversity loss of carnivores in the Turkana Basin's Sibiloi National Park by examining both ecological sampling methods and observations of wildlife by local pastoralists. Sibiloi National Park is located on the north-eastern shore of Lake Turkana and is well known for its paleontological record of human evolution. Historically, Sibiloi [...]
TBI has been organizing a number of football tournaments in Ileret to keep the youth engaged and active during this long school hiatus due to COVID-19. With schools closed indefinitely, students were sent back to their villages with little opportunity for engagement and activity, leaving them vulnerable to early marriages, teenage pregnancies, and drug [...]
The final week of the field school arrived and it started with a lesson in stone tool making! Students had the chance to do some flint knapping and quickly understood the complexities involved in having to produce quality stone tools. It was clear after a couple of hours that making useful stone tools is something [...]
The students started off the Archaeology module with Dr. Elisabeth Hildebrand in Lodwar; the biggest town in the northwestern part of Kenya. Accompanied by Justus Erus Edung, who works with the National Museums of Kenya and has extensive knowledge about Lodwar, the students were escorted to three cultural and historical sites within Lodwar. Justus explained [...]
On our last week of the Human Evolution module Professor Tracy Kivell led the students out to Area 13 where they would be tracking down two hippo humeri to plaster and they would see the site where hominin fossils were found in 2015! The students also go to partake in a hill crawl; which consists [...]
During the past week the field school has been tracing back the origins of our own species with the Human Evolution module led by Dr. Tracy Kivell! Our days have been divided into morning lectures and afternoon lab sessions and so far we’ve covered skeletal anatomy, origins of bipedalism, and the very intricate story of [...]
The students started off the week being introduced to their newest professor, Dr. Mikael Fortelius, a professor at the University of Helsinki, who will be teaching the Vertebrate Paleontology module. Dr. Mikael Fortelius! (Photo: Petra Peretin) They were introduced to the research labs at Illeret and had the opportunity to look at the [...]
The Geology of the Turkana Basin course taught by Dr. Craig Feibel, Dr. Bob Reynolds and Dr. Greg Henkes started last Monday at TBI Ileret! The Origins Field School students explore Area 6A. Photo: Lucía Nadal We’ve been going out on many geological walks taking us back in time millions of years to [...]
Professor Ian McDougall, whose work was integral in the dating of Turkana Basin fossils, passed away on November 10, 2018.
Our last week at TBI was an eventful one, with a lot of things to finish up before we packed up and came back home. We took a trip to Central Island, learned a great deal about human evolution, visited an important paleontological site, and had a goat roast. After a restful day last Saturday, [...]
A groundbreaking study has found the earliest and largest monumental cemetery in eastern Africa built 5,000 years ago by early pastoralists living around Lake Turkana, Kenya. This group is believed to have lived without major inequalities and hierarchies, contradicting long-standing narratives about the origins of early civilizations. The study, led by Elisabeth Hildebrand, PhD, Department [...]
Welcome to part two of our Lomekwi journey! During the second week, we went on a day trip to Nariokotome, went swimming in the lake, and spent more time at the site. The last blog post left off on Saturday the 4thof August. On Sunday we had a rest day, and so decided to take [...]
It’s been a productive week here at TBI! The last part of the archaeology module was all about learning how to excavate a site, and we were lucky enough to participate in an archaological dig with the Later Prehistory of West Turkana (LPWT) team. The site we’re working at, Nakwaperit 2, is thought to be [...]
Welcome back! We’ve had an exciting week. Our last few days at the Mpala research center were spent learning more about the savanna ecosystem surrounding us, and about the community that is a dynamic part of the ecosystem. Wednesday morning, we went with Pat Milligan of the University of Florida to the greenhouses at Mpala [...]
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This Week, the students have been introduced to the story of being and becoming human. The scientific story of human evolution. Humans have always been curious to identify who they really are which poses questions like; how and why are we different from other mammals? What made us develop distinct traits like bipedality and bigger [...]
The students are now well into the Vertebrate Paleontology course with Dr. Bill Sanders from the University of Michigan. Professor Sanders has been teaching the students how to interpret the skeleton and teeth of animals in order to understand how they lived. You can understand a lot about an animal based on its bones. The [...]
Ancient DNA recovered from fossils is a valuable tool to study evolution and anthropology. Yet fossil DNA has not been found yet in any part of Africa, where it’s destroyed by extreme heat and humidity. In a potential first step at overcoming this hurdle, researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine and [...]