I am a four-field-trained paleoanthropologist with a scientific-mathematical background and a broad interest in the evolution of hominin technology and the cultural processes that govern it. The last few decades of work in Paleolithic archaeology have made it clear that, in order to tackle the crucial issues of technological complexity, diffusion, invention, evolution, and link with cognitive development, our discipline needs a thorough revision of its basic units of analysis. At the same time, the increasing integration of molecular biological results into paleoanthropology has shown that we are missing large chunks of the story, especially for the poorly known regions outside of Western Europe and the Near East.
My research targets both of these problems directly, on two fronts: through the laboratory study of stone tool morphology and function, and through geoarchaeological surveys in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.