Megan Clarke's summer research activities in Irkutsk, Russia
November 13, 2013
Megan Clarke, BHAP Masters student at University of Saskatchewan, has written a short report on her summer 2013 research activities in Irkutsk, Russia. Thanks, Meg!
This summer I conducted the data collection portion of my thesis in Irkutsk, Russian Federation. I scored the amount of dental calculus on tooth surfaces from individuals from four of the Cis-Baikal cemetery sites (Lokomotiv, Shamanka II, Ust'-Ida I, and Khuzhir-Nuge XIV) and collected 45 dental calculus samples to analyze microscopically in order to study different ways dental calculus can be used as a proxy for diet. Some of the samples collected are quite large and it is hoped that it may be possible to run stable isotope analyses on these.
The experience was very rewarding; not only did I get to conduct my own research on the Cis-Baikal populations, but I got to do it while being immersed in Russian culture. I would like to thank Alexei Novikov, Olga Ivanovna Goriunova, Vladimir Ivanovich Bazaliiskii, Ben Shepard, Ben Osipov, Samantha Purchase, Angela Lieverse, Elizabeth Robertson (University of Saskatchewan), Andrea Hiob, and Andrzej Weber for all of their help and support this summer.