Ancient human-animal interactions with isotopes – Michael Ziegler

Michael Ziegler is a PhD student studying the rich history of humans and animal interactions in South America during the late Pleistocene – Holocene. He and the LASTJOURNEY team worked to describe the morphology of potential megafauna depicted in the rock art painting and to determine the chronology human inhabitance at Serranía de La Lindosa. He is currently working on analysing other late Pleistocene – Holocene sites in Colombia as a complement to the work in La Lindosa and to detail human and animal interactions from an inter-regional approach. By sampling fossils from curated museum collections and newly discovered sites in Colombia we aim to better understand the legacy of these interactions and expand our palaeoecological knowledge of endemic South American species. Specifically, direct dating through radiocarbon analysis will provide a refined timeline of human-fauna overlap and contribute to ongoing discussions of human occupancy. Further application of stable carbon (δ¹³C), nitrogen (δ¹⁵N) and oxygen (δ¹⁸O) isotope analysis allow insights into dietary patterns, hunting and subsistence strategies as well as regional paleoecology and changes in paleoenvironmental conditions.