Eleanor Scerri
@elliescerri.bsky.social
Archaeologist, head of the Human Palaeosystems Group at the MPI-GEA, Reader at the University of Cologne, A/Prof at the University of Malta & NatGeo Explorer. Human evolution, niche expansion & the transition to human dominated landscapes.
This made me happy!
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences@pnas.org · 4d agoOne of the most-viewed PNAS Nexus articles in the last week is “Life on the edge: Mesolithic population size and viability on Malta.” Explore the article here: https://ow.ly/VGRn50Zyw67 To learn more about submitting your own research, visit PNAS Nexus at https://ow.ly/g5gi50Zyw68.
One more from us, again led by the amazing @jblinkhorn.bsky.social - Neanderthals were likely responsible for the production of stone tool assemblages found in the Arabian Desert, giving key new insights into their possible range and where to look!
Jimbob Blinkhorn@jblinkhorn.bsky.social · 2w agoNew paper klaxon! Neanderthals in the Desert? Our new paper suggests that Neanderthals may have been responsible for producing MIS 3 Middle Palaeolithic Levallois blanks in northern Arabia! Have a look at this: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
We've been coring into submerged terrestrial sediments! Excited to see what these will yield!
The new paper from the RIVAGE working group is out 🎉 Check a summary of our findings on island exposure to global change here ➡️ link.growkudos.com/1f0hyldthq8 Or access the full paper here ➡️ www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... 🌐 Maps of biodiversity threats on islands for 2050 ✅ @frbiodiv.bsky.social
Island biodiversity disproportionately exposed to global change
Island ecosystems are biodiversity-rich, but face an alarming level of exposure to global change. We found that by 2050, climate change will be the dominant threat for 65% of islands; 22% will be affected primarily by land-use change; and 13% will face greater threats from biological invasions. We call for these ecosystems to be incorporated into global biodiversity conservation strategies and for their protection to be strengthened.
link.growkudos.com
New paper: Mesolithic mariners in the Central Mediterranean made sustained, long distance sea journeys. Not accidents, one offs, and not rare events. See thread in the comments. academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar..., led by @jblinkhorn.bsky.social
This is the paper, in case you are interested. It was led by @margheritac17.bsky.social and @elliescerri.bsky.social just like the malaria one www.pivotscipub.com/hpgg/5/1/0001
The legacy of Luca Cavalli-Sforza on human evolution
The legacy of Luca Cavalli-Sforza on human evolution
pivotscipub.com
Looking forward to this!
Dr Laura T. Buck@ltbuck.bsky.social · 4mo agoWe're excited to welcome @elliescerri.bsky.social for the next MENDLS lecture - 06.05.26 at the Uni of Liverpool. If you're around, please join us - see poster for details and sign up. @lucytimbrell96.bsky.social @jblinkhorn.bsky.social @phoebebakerrr.bsky.social @paddytkaczynski.bsky.social
We're excited to welcome @elliescerri.bsky.social for the next MENDLS lecture - 06.05.26 at the Uni of Liverpool. If you're around, please join us - see poster for details and sign up. @lucytimbrell96.bsky.social @jblinkhorn.bsky.social @phoebebakerrr.bsky.social @paddytkaczynski.bsky.social
1/7 Our papers may seem to address different themes, but they coalesce around the deep human past as a process of niche expansion and feedbacks, into the transition to human dominated landscapes. A starting point was the pan-African structured theory of human origins: www.cell.com/trends/ecolo...
Did Our Species Evolve in Subdivided Populations across Africa, and Why Does It Matter?
We challenge the view that our species, Homo sapiens, evolved within a single population and/or region of Africa. The chronology and physical diversity of Pleistocene human fossils suggest that morpho...
cell.com
1/5 Well over three years of work and I’m thrilled to see it out today in Science Advances: the cover feature no less! Using an innovative pipeline, we show that malaria shaped the spatial organization of human groups in sub-Saharan Africa over the last 74,000 years. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Malaria shaped human spatial organization for the past 74 thousand years
Malaria has shaped human habitat choice, exchange, and dispersal since the late Pleistocene in sub-Saharan Africa.
science.org
New paper alert. My new article just published in Quaternary Science Reviews, "Revolution, modernity, and the dispersal of Homo sapiens beyond Africa". www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Revolution, modernity, and the dispersal of Homo sapiens beyond Africa
In the recent past, evolutionarily speaking, every other kind of hominin, from the Neanderthals of western Eurasia to the ‘hobbits’ of Flores, became …
sciencedirect.com
Our new paper exploring the measurement of complexity in tools - the result of significant and ongoing work, including that which emerged from our Complexity in Lithics Conference! link.springer.com/article/10.1...
The Tool Systems Approach: Measuring Complexity in the Primatological, Archaeological, and Ethnographic Records - Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory
Measuring technological complexity across species, as well as across temporal and spatial scales, is an ongoing challenge among authors who work on primatological, archaeological, and/or ethnographic ...
link.springer.com
Couple of nice new papers for the lithics folks, congratulations to all authors. www.nature.com/articles/s41... and www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Regional variability in the Acheulian to Middle Stone Age transition in southern Africa - Scientific Reports
Homo sapiens emerged in Africa around 300 − 200 thousand years ago (ka). Although the earliest H. sapiens fossils are associated with the Middle Stone Age (MSA), lithic technologies considered diagnos...
nature.com
New paper alert! Part of our work in West Africa also involves trying to understand later processes, in this case the expansion of pearl millet agriculture into Senegal. www.tandfonline.com/doi/citedby/...
Citations: Westward expansion of pearl millet agriculture into the Lac de Guiers basin, Senegal, by c. AD 200
Subscribe to citation updates from Westward expansion of pearl millet agriculture into the Lac de Guiers basin, Senegal, by c. AD 200
tandfonline.com
A paper over then years in the making! Using Latent Class Models to categorise stone tool classes. Great to see it out after so long, and huge thanks to @lucytimbrell96.bsky.social for taking this to the finish line!
Lucy Timbrell@lucytimbrell96.bsky.social · 6mo agoWith @elliescerri.bsky.social and Matt Grove, we explore latent class modelling for quantifying stone tool assemblages in our new paper published in the Journal of Palaeolithic Archaeology 😊 link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Job alert in Malta on my ERC funded IslandLab Project for a post excavation research assistant. A bachalor's degree in Archaeology, or related fields is required, ideally with experience working on faunal assemblages and handling bones/fossils, and curating finds. www.um.edu.mt/media/um/doc...
um.edu.mt
www.newscientist.com/article/2511...
Ancient humans were seafaring far earlier than we realised
Thousands of years before the invention of compasses or sails, prehistoric peoples crossed oceans to reach remote lands like Malta and Australia. Doing so meant striking out in unknowable conditions. ...
newscientist.com
Our new paper is out! Here's a thread from @huwgroucutt.bsky.social
Dr Huw Groucutt@huwgroucutt.bsky.social · 9mo ago(1/18) New paper alert, a thread! Just published in PLoS ONE, our study: “Novel archaeological and palaeontological findings in cave and palaeoriver landscapes of inland northeast Arabia”. Link: journals.plos.org/plosone/arti...
Happening now! www.gea.mpg.de/177655/the-e...
The evolution of human niche size in East Asia across the Pleistocene
Humans can thrive in nearly all terrestrial environments, exhibiting exceptional ecological flexibility among primates. However, it remains unclear how and when this flexibility first emerged in the h...
gea.mpg.de
You've heard of the human "cognitive revolution" around 40 kya—a moment when our species suddenly became "behaviorally modern." Have you also heard that this story is wrong? From the archive, our episode w/ @elliescerri.bsky.social & @manuelwill.bsky.social! Listen: disi.org/revisiting-t...
Independence day in #Malta! Hunter-gatherers were crossing at least 100K of open water to reach the Mediterranean island 8,500 years ago, 1K years before the arrival of the first farmers. From consortium led by @elliescerri.bsky.social @maxplanckpress , inc. @UMmalta . 🖼️ © Daniel Clarke/MPI_GEA
Thank you @prelights.bsky.social & Alejandra Leffer's group for choosing our preprint on @biorxiv-evobio.bsky.social and for this chance to talk about human- #malaria coevolution!🦟 @eegcam.bsky.social @elliescerri.bsky.social @MPI_GEA
preLights@prelights.bsky.social · 12mo agoThe distribution of early human settlements in Sub-Saharan Africa might have been influenced by avoidance of mosquitoes that spread malaria A new #prelight of Alejandra Leffer's group talks about the preprint by @margheritac17.bsky.social , and the team.
New paper from all of us led by the amazing @lucytimbrell96.bsky.social!
Lucy Timbrell@lucytimbrell96.bsky.social · last yr.Very pleased to see our paper published online at Climate of the Past: cp.copernicus.org/articles/21/... We present model-data comparisons of Late Quaternary climate across the Northern Hemisphere, showing that increasing model resolution has little net effect on coherence with pollen proxies 😊
New paper alert! Led by @jblinkhorn.bsky.social, we look at refugia for baboons in the Pleistocene and Holocene, offering a potential analogue for early hominins where climatic tolerances are shared. www.nature.com/articles/s42...
Identifying late Pleistocene and Holocene refugia for baboons - Communications Biology
Hindcasted species distribution modelling of baboons illuminates potential refugia across Africa and Arabia, with predicted maxima and minima of habitable ranges pulsed by orbital precession and obliq...
nature.com
"Do Recent DNA Studies Refute a 65 kya Arrival of Humans in Sahul?" See comment by @elliescerri.bsky.social and myself here: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...
Do Recent DNA Studies Refute a 65 kya Arrival of Humans in Sahul?
Click on the article title to read more.
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
🌲Great to see our @cp-oneearth.bsky.social study on #rewilding-inspired #forestry featured 2x in @mongabay.com . It’s a land-sharing approach—restoring #biodiversity & resilience in used #forests, not replacing protected areas. 🔗 news.mongabay.com/2025/04/dive... (further links below)🌳🌴🦬🍒🪵♨️
Diverse forests and forest rewilding offer resilience against climate change
When it comes to reforestation, planting a diversity of tree species could have a plethora of positive effects on forest health and resilience, climate mitigation and biodiversity. That’s based on res...
news.mongabay.com
Gift article about our work that also mentions our recently published paper in @nature.com on rainforests as well! Thank you @carlzimmer.com!
Carl Zimmer@carlzimmer.com · last yr.About 70,000 years ago, a new study suggests, our species learned to live just about anywhere. Later, that ability helped our ancestors expand from Africa across the world. Here’s my story on the human niche [Gift link] nyti.ms/3ZBc7ID
1/5 Why do all non-Africans descended from a group that left Africa 50k ago? In @nature.com we model 120k years of human niche dynamics. From 70ka, a big expansion of the human niche in Africa likely equipped later OOA dispersals with a unique ecological flexibilty. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Major expansion in the human niche preceded out of Africa dispersal - Nature
Analysis of species distribution models in a pan-African database comprising chronometrically dated archaeological sites over the past 120,000 years shows major expansion in the human niche from 70 ka...
nature.com
