British Academy Postdoctoral Researcher features on popular German TV show

Posted on Thursday 22 October 2026

Dr Annabell Zander, British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department, was invited on the popular German TV show “Sag die Wahrheit” (“Tell the truth”), bringing climate change archaeology to a prime-time audience. Appearing as one of three contestants claiming to be an expert in the field, Annabell challenged a celebrity panel to spot the real scientist among two convincing impostors.

Once her true identity was revealed following the panel's votes, Annabell highlighted her research into historical human-environment interactions and the key role archaeology can play in the climate change debate.

Annabell is particularly interested in human responses to prehistoric climate change and is using a wide range of sources in her research, including lithics and faunal remains. In her research, she works to integrate traditional archaeological datasets with multidisciplinary datasets, including Bayesian statistics and data from climate and environmental science. Her British Academy Fellowship is titled “Exploring human-environment interactions across the Pleistocene-Holocene transition in north-western Europe” and is being conducted under the mentorship of Professor Nicky Milner.