Expanding data-driven research on human prehistory

What is it about?

Research into human evolution is becoming increasingly data-driven. Today, computational analyses are used to study the expansion of the human ecological niche, the evolution and interaction of different human species, and the spread of cultural capacities, to name just a few examples. The ROCEEH Out of Africa Database is therefore an invaluable source of data that compiles information on thousands of archaeological and anthropological finds, along with related environmental data from Africa and Eurasia, spanning much the last 3 million years. We have integrated this dataset into a comprehensive scientific software ecosystem to make the data accessible to everyone in an open-source and reproducible manner.

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Photo by Mike Leyder on Unsplash

Photo by Mike Leyder on Unsplash

Why is it important?

This software package provides open and efficient access to the R software ecosystem. By directly integrating the data source into the research software, data acquisition becomes transparent, reproducible, and therefore more reliable. This allows anyone to easily access the data and use a wide variety of processing methods, ranging from simulation and statistics to machine learning and artificial intelligence, to pursue creative approaches to researching human evolution.