Alexandre Lucquin
Research Associate

Profile

Biography

I completed my undergraduate and Maîtrise degrees in archaeology at the Université de Paris I (France) and a DEA and Ph.D. in 2007 in archaeological sciences at the Université de Rennes 1 (France). My Ph.D. dissertation entitled Etude physico-chimique des méthodes de cuisson pré et protohistorique focused on the study of pre and protohistoric culinary practices and the use of biomolecular archaeology to study cooking technologies and remains of food residues in ceramics pots but also in stones and anthropogenic sediments generally associated with fire structures (hearths remains). After my Ph.D., I was involved in various research projects in the UMR 6566 (Rennes, France) to conduct fire structure studies and residues analysis from Paleolithic and Neolithic sites. In the same period, I carried out a short postdoc research about cook-stone technologies of Prehistoric North American hunter gatherers at the Department of Anthropology of Texas A&M University (USA).

In 2012, I became a member of the BioArCh group and joined the Department of Archaeology and the Department of Chemistry at the University of York as a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Research fellow (EU-IEF). My current research uses the potential of organic biomarkers to assess spatial organisation of prehistoric dwellings in order to recognise daily life activities through soil organic matter analysis (AnthroSOIL).

Research

Overview

During my past research, I have worked mainly on archaeological organic residue analysis. If my work has principally focused in the study of cooking practices during prehistoric times and how they interact within society, I had the opportunity to conduct study on other context such as grave. My interests have expanded now to the use of biomolecular archaeology in the reconstruction of daily life activities.

Projects

AnthroSOIL:

Using the potential of organic biomarkers, AnthroSOIL will assess spatial organisation of prehistoric dwellings in order to recognise daily life activities through soil organic matter analysis. At the interface of archaeology and chemistry, the project aims to develop a new methodological approach for the organic analysis of palaeosoils. State-of-the-art methods and cutting edge technology in organic residue analysis will be assessed and used to characterise and to map the organic content of soil (elemental analysis, PyGC & ultrafast-GC, LC-MS/MS, GC-MSMS, GC-c-IRMS, MALDI imaging, ZooMS, starch analysis).The project will investigate activity patterns within Stonehenge World Heritage site by an extensive study of the Late Neolithic settlement of Durrington Walls a short-lived but large village probably inhabited by the builders of Stonehenge. Durrington Walls present a unique opportunity to examine activities across one of Europe’s finest and most well excavated prehistoric sites.

External activities

Memberships