15/04/2026
Archaeology, Environmental Changes & Geo-Chemistry (AMGC) Research Group is excited to be the host for three Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Postdoctoral Fellowship researchers awarded in the recent 2025 round! These researchers bring new skills and topics to VUB - Vrije Universiteit Brussel and we are excited to work with them!
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Dr Christie Willis - Burnt journeys towards Stonehenge: uncovering rites, networks and traditions in British Neolithic cremations (BURNT) explores how mobility, monumentality and memory shaped communities between 4000-2500 BC. While iconic sites like Stonehenge often steal the spotlight, most people in the Neolithic were cremated, and their stories have remained largely untold. This project analyses cremated human remains from 38 sites across southern England and Wales. Using cutting-edge strontium isotope analysis, radiocarbon dating and osteology, it investigates who was moving across the landscape, who was buried at monuments, and whether these places held long-lasting social memory. By shifting attention from famous stones to burnt bones, BURNT reframes how we understand identity, networks and belonging in prehistoric Europe. Stay tuned as I uncover the journeys hidden in ash!
Dr Vijay Pratap Singh - The project, PRECAM-MM, investigates Earth’s ancient atmosphere by studying fossil micrometeorites, tiny grains of cosmic dust that fell to Earth billions of years ago. By analysing the chemical and isotopic signatures preserved in these "space travelers" found in ancient Indian rocks, PRECAM-MM aims to reconstruct how oxygen and carbon dioxide levels changed during the Great Oxidation Event. This research helps us understand how our planet transformed from a lifeless environment into a world capable of supporting complex life, bridging the gap between planetary science and Earth's deep history.
Dr Patxi Pérez-Ramallo - FLA-MEAL, explores how people ate in medieval Flanders, one of the regions that, together with northern Italy, drove the great urban revival of western Europe. By combining osteology, history, archaeology, and biomolecular analysis, the project seeks to reconstruct the origins, consolidation, development, and height of this complex urban society, as well as its ability to adapt to environmental, economic, political, and social change. FLA-MEAL will pay particular attention to differences between social groups, s*x, and age, and to the role of trade in supplying food to a medieval urban network connected across the continent, including key resources such as fish. As part of the wider Make Up of the Cities project, FLA-MEAL brings the dietary dimension into a broader multidisciplinary framework, helping to reveal the daily lives of people who often remain invisible in written sources.
