Former Members
Dr. Jonas Gregorio de Souza (former Co-Principal Investigator and Project Manager)
Dr. Souza completed his PhD at the University of Exeter, UK, and later worked as a Marie-Curie fellow at Pompeu Fabra University, Spain. His research has focused on computer simulation of prehistoric demographic expansions and human responses to climate change across South America.
Prof. André Menezes Strauss (former Co-Principal Investigator)
Prof. André Strauss is an archaeologist and geologist. He is a professor at the University of São Paulo, Brazil, and is the coordinator of the Laboratory of Archaeology and Environmental Anthropology. As a specialist in virtual archeology he works with the emergence of symbolic behaviour in South Africa and Lebanon. Dr. Strauss has collaborated with the Max Planck Institute, and was a pioneer in the extraction of ancient DNA and archaeological human remains in Brazil.
Dr. Alan Tapscott (former Database Administrator)
Dr. Tapscott has researched on human-computer interaction and user experience at Universitat Pompeu Fabra and symbolic artificial intelligence and cognitive science at Universidad Complutense de Madrid. He has also worked in the industry as data scientist, software engineer, and technological consultant.
Dr. Shaddai Heidgen (former Project Researcher)
Dr. Heidgen's research interests cover a wide range of disciplines including sedimentology, biostratigtraphy but specially paleolimnology, micropaleontology, and paleo-environmental reconstructions involving human activity. In her doctoral project, she sought for an explanation between the relationship of climate and human occupation, depopulation, and resettlements since the last 50,000 years in Southwestern Germany.
Dr. Rodrigo Elias de Oliveira (former Project Researcher)
Dr. Rodrigo Elias de Oliveira's research has focused on the health and subsistence of the first inhabitants of the Cerrado biome (Central Brazil) during the Early and Middle Holocene, through a combined approach of site excavation, Bioanthropology, Dental Anthropology, Paleopathology, studies using medical imaging, and research in Human Ecology.
Dr. Sina Mohammadi (former Project Researcher)
Dr. Sina Mohammadi is a researcher at Leiden University, the Netherlands. He received his PhD in 2024 from the University of Twente, where his research focused on crop type mapping using deep learning. His main research interests include remote sensing data analysis with machine learning and deep learning, computer vision, time-series classification, and computational archaeology.
Natalia Álvarez Correa (former Project Researcher)
Natalia Álvarez Correa's expertise lies in studying pre-Hispanic societies of Colombia, where she combines various archaeological methods to uncover insights into their ways of life. Her research focuses on understanding the interactions between humans and their environment, and how these shaped the social and economic structures of ancient communities. Her work in zooarchaeology involves the analysis of animal remains to reconstruct past diets and hunting practices. Additionally, she has a strong interest in spatial analysis to better understand the distribution and organization of ancient settlements.
Juan Camilo Palacio Madrid (former Collaborating Researcher)