The Development of Human Innovation in an Arid Biodiverse Environment.

这个项目的目标是研究食物、农业和燃料使用的长期动态，这些变化与一个环境敏感地区数千年来发生的一系列大规模社会和环境变化有关，经历了几次革命性的社会转型，包括最早从狩猎和采集转向农业，乡村生活的出现，以及具有明显社会等级的城市和帝国的建设。该项目审查了与燃料开采、农业变化、人口规模和密度的变化、居住模式的变化以及对气候事件的反应有关的景观修改。解释为什么会发生这些变化的理论经常提到粮食生产或人口变化，尽管很少考虑食物的实际残留物；同样，燃料很少与社会变化相关的讨论，尽管燃料在维持手工业经济和使社会发挥作用方面发挥着核心作用。这项研究的重点是长期变化的动态，以探索食物、燃料、农业、社会组织和环境变化之间持续的相互联系。了解它们相互联系的深度，有助于为应对当前全球变暖带来的许多问题提供信息。通过考察稳定和变化时期，就有可能考察对社会和环境变化的不同适应性反应。正在考虑的两个遗址总共跨越了大约1万年，记录了世界上最早的从狩猎和采集到农业的转变，以及新兴的社会复杂性和帝国的形成和崩溃。考古植物学是对过去植物用途的研究，它为记录和探索食物、燃料和农业提供了一个强大的工具，提供了对这些动态的洞察。研究小组利用新创建的参考集来重新检查来自每个地点的经过精选的考古植物浮选样本，以补充现有的宏观植物学数据，并帮助识别和记录：(1)植硅体、灰假形(允许观察到历史上代表性较低的分类群)和粪球形体(通常被忽略的1 mm“残留物”部分)；以及(2)4 mm无定形的块，可以代表食物、面包或燃料。傅里叶变换红外光谱用于探索沉积层序和沉积历史，以帮助更好地解释植物数据。谷物的同位素分析被用来帮助追踪随着时间的推移的种植策略。总体而言，综合方法有助于抵消每种技术固有的保存和方法偏差，提供对古代植物使用的更全面的看法。通过这个项目产生的数字参考材料将在网上公开分享，为其他研究人员提供资源。这个奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The goal of this project is to examine the long-term dynamics of food, farming, and fuel use in relation to a series of large-scale social and environmental changes that took place over several thousand years in an environmentally sensitive region witnessed several, sequential revolutionary social transitions, including the earliest shift from hunting and gathering to agriculture, the emergence of village life, and the construction of cities and empires with distinct social hierarchies. The project examines modifications to the landscape linked with fuel extraction, agricultural changes, morphing population sizes and densities, changing settlement patterns, and responses to climatic events. Theories explaining why these changes took place often invoke food production or population change, although actual remains of foods are rarely considered; similarly, fuel is rarely discussed in relation to social change, despite the central role that fuel plays in maintaining craft economies and allowing societies to function. This study focuses on the dynamics of long-term change, to explore the ongoing interconnectedness of food, fuel, farming, social organization, and environmental change. Understanding the depth of their interconnections can help inform responses to the many problems current global warming presents. By examining periods of both stability and flux, it is possible to examine variable adaptive responses to social and environmental change. Two sites under consideration collectively span roughly 10,000 years and document the earliest transitions in the world from hunting-and-gathering to farming emergent social complexity and the formation and collapse of an empire. Archaeobotany, the study of plant use in the past, provides a powerful tool to document and explore food, fuel and farming, providing insights into these dynamics. The research team employs newly created reference collections to reexamine curated archaeobotanical flotation samples from each site to supplement existing macro-botanical data and help identify and document: (1) phytoliths, ash pseudomorphs (that allow historically underrepresented taxa to be observed), and dung spherulites within the oft neglected 1mm "residue" fraction; and (2) 4mm amorphous chunks that could represent food, bread, or fuel. FTIR spectroscopy is used to explore depositional sequences and pyric histories to help better inform the interpretation of plant data. Isotopic analyses of grains are used to help track cultivation strategies through time. Collectively, the integrated approach helps offset preservation and methodological biases inherent to each technique, providing a more comprehensive view of ancient plant use. Digital reference material generated through this project will be openly shared online providing a resource for other researchers.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.