Louise Leakey, the internationally renowned palaeoanthropologist, will be the guest speaker at a seminar titled “Six Decades of Palaeoanthropological Exploration in the Turkana Basin”, organised by the Interdisciplinary Centre for Archaeology and the Evolution of Human Behaviour (ICArEHB) at the University of Algarve on 22nd April.
Free of charge and open to the general public, the event will be delivered by Louise Leakey, who currently leads the Koobi Fora Research Project, dedicated to studying the Turkana Basin in Kenya, “one of the world’s most important archaeological sites containing evidence of human prehistory”.
The seminar will begin at 4.30pm in the Teresa Gamito Auditorium, Building 1, Gambelas Campus, Faro.
According to ICArEHB, the project has, over more than five decades, recovered numerous hominin fossils and faunal remains that have proved fundamental to understanding human evolution. These collections are now housed at the Turkana Basin Institute and the National Museums of Kenya. The research centre itself has also conducted work in the region.
During the seminar, Leakey will present the history and scientific context of palaeoanthropological research in the Turkana Basin, highlighting recent discoveries.
Louise Leakey is part of the historic family behind the Leakey Foundation, one of the world’s leading funders of archaeological and palaeoanthropological research, which supports young doctoral students and researchers through international grant programmes.
The Interdisciplinary Centre for Archaeology and the Evolution of Human Behaviour (ICArEHB), established in 2013 and based in Faro, is a research unit of the University of Algarve.
Dedicated to the study of prehistoric archaeology and the evolution of human behaviour, the centre adopts a multidisciplinary approach combining archaeology, anthropology, geology and biology through international research projects across Europe and Africa.
