Research Teams

There are 5 main research teams within the MEMELAND projectm, each based in a different institution and led by a different Principal Investigator:

• The Arctic University of Norway, Norway
• University of Oxford, UK
• Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (Eawag), Switzerland
• University of Salzburg, Austria
• Charles University, Czech Republic

The Arctic University of Norway

The ArcEcoGEN Research Centre within Tromsø Museum, Arctic University of Norway (UiT) is the host institution of MEMELAND. At Tromsø Prof Tony Brown and his team both administer the project and specialize in the extraction and analysis of ancient DNA from sediments (sedaDNA). In conjunction with the Strasbourg Team Tromsø runs a field sampling team who will core lakes and some wetlands in the northern and western parts of the study area including all of Scandinavia, Central Europe and Northern Germany and France. In addition the project is using material from many other institutions that is suitable for sedaDNA analysis. In total there will be over 100 cores and 4000-8000 samples which will be used to address the changing nature of European biodiversity, focusing on the last 2000 years, or since the Roman period. This will be enabled by high-resolution dating (see the Salzburg section), and complimented by fecal and other biomarkers (Eawag Team) as well as archaeobotanical studies (Oxford Team). The group at Tromsø are specialists in the extraction and analysis of sedaDNA from a variety of palaeo-contexts, mostly lakes but also wetlands, floodplains, hillslope sediments and archaeological sites. This study will focus on small lakes embedded within the agricultural landscape of NW Europe. We largely use two methodologies; firstly amplicon or metabarcode analysis in which the DNA in a sample is selectively targeted and amplified before being sequenced. This is the work-horse methodology of the project as it has been shown to be the most reliable and value-for money. However, it is generally restricted to certain organism groups including vascular plants and vertebrates, although other DNA can be amplified. It also cannot be intrinsically authenticated (from damage patterns) and cannot easily go below the species level. These limitations can be overcome using non-amplicon or shotgun sequencing. The group at Tromsø is continuously developing new methods in order to improve the depth of information that can be gained from these sedimentary environments and to understand the limitations and biases of the data.

In many instances this data will be combined with both the biomarker data and archaeobotanical data, including pollen, in order to provide a more holistic reconstruction of past agricultural ecologies. This includes not only the crops and domesticated animals, but also weeds, synanthropic species (parasites, pests, commensals etc.) and changes in NW European lowland ecosystems. This data will facilitate a new narrative of European biodiversity at two levels, the stories of individual localities and species and regional-biome scale patterns that define the biodiversity of NW Europe. This is important evidence in the fight to maintain high biodiversity and environmental quality in the face of both our changing climate and increasing pressure from population growth and technological development. Interestingly this has happened before, and the history of agriculture since the Romans were in northern Europe is one of continued population growth and prosperity but with complex implications for biodiversity and nature. This archaeological and historical dimension is the focus of the Oxford Team. The results will be published at a variety of spatial scales and be used to understand the changing nature of landscapes and ecology across the region including spatial modelling which will be undertaken in conjunction with the Laboratory of Quantitative Ecology at Charles University in Prague.

University of Oxford

The Oxford team will examine how sedaDNA data align with archaeobotanical and pollen data, settlement archaeology and written sources. We will focus on ecological change (or continuity) during pivotal eras, such as the late Roman to post-Roman transition (4th-6th centuries), the medieval ‘agricultural revolution’ (10th-13th centuries), and the demographic crises of the 14th century. Functional weed ecology will allow us to trace changes in soil fertility and disturbance, notably in regions where arable regimes became increasingly large-scale and low-input. Archaeobotanical analysis will also be used to trace changes in crop diversity and the appearance of new crops while pollen data will allow us to gauge the relative importance of arable, pasture, and woodland. The impact of the mouldboard plough is critically important in this period. It resulted in increasing levels of soil disturbance as reflected in arable weed ecologies. Cultivation experiments at the Lauresham Laboratory for Experimental Archaeology will explore the impact of the mouldboard plough on crop stable isotopes and arable weed ecology, allowing us to interpret isotope and weed data from archaeological excavations more accurately. Animal bone assemblages from excavated settlements will be compared to the sedaDNA and faecal biomarkers to trace changing animal husbandry practices, e.g. stocking densities, changing ratios of sheep/cattle/pig, etc. Working with local historians, we will use written sources alongside local archaeological records to contextualize science-based results and trace changes in farming regimes, biodiversity and land use at individual sites and regions.

We will collate bioarchaeological data from the sites’ catchments drawing on existing databases, including measurements of stable isotope values of cereals, as this can reflect nutrient status and manuring. Functional weed ecology will be applied to the archaeobotanical, pollen and sedaDNA data along with a new approach to functional grazing ecology. Pollen data will be obtained from local studies or the European Pollen Database; where needed, new cores will be taken. Special attention will be paid to coprophilous spores which can provide independent data for comparison with the sedaDNA and the faecal biomarkers. Micro-charcoal will also be counted as the use of fire is a variable part of medieval land management. To establish a uniform dataset of fossil pollen records across whole Europe for map-wise comparison with our sedaDNA results, we will employ the FOSSILPOL workflow. This methodology enables us to acquire data from the Neotoma Paleoecology Database, which is the most extensive curated repository of paleo-environmental research, and apply project-specific criteria to curate data of high quality. The multi-proxy core data will be used for spatial modelling of vegetation combined with functional ecological analysis to assess land management regimes.

Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (Eawag)

At Eawag,Prof. Nathalie Dubois and Tobias Schneider use lake sediments as natural archives to investigate the climate-environment-human nexus throughout the Holocene. Within the MEMELAND project, their work focuses on fecal biomarkers, biomolecules such as sterols and bile acids produced by animals, to reconstruct grazing and manuring activity during the “medieval agricultural revolution”. Their research revolves around questions such as (1) can fecal biomarkers provide new insights into past land use changes? (2) Can these molecular traces reveal spatio-temporal differences in agricultural practices across Europe? (3) Can lake eutrophication and oxygen depletion be linked to increased nutrient input through fecal biomarkers?

To tackle these questions and identify anthropogenic land-use signatures, they integrate biomarker data with hyperspectral imaging and combine it with complementary geochemical and geochronological data acquired by the University of Salzburg Team.

Beyond reconstructing land use, the fecal biomarker data will (a) help validate animal sedaDNA records, (b) provide independent evidence for grazing, manuring and even direct human fecal inputs. The biomarker analyses will be complemented by compound-specific radiocarbon dating of pre-aged leaf waxes, and analyses of refractory organic carbon (ROC) to infer ploughing and stock-related soil erosion. Finally, species-specific plant biomarkers such as miliacin (millet) and cannabinol (Cannabis spp) will be used to detect crop cultivation (for food, medicine, fiber) and practices such as hemp retting.

The results from the Eawag team will directly contribute to MEMELAND’s interdisciplinary framework, which brings together archaeobotany, sedimentary DNA, and socio-environmental modeling to reconstruct Europe’s medieval landscapes.

University of Salzburg

At the University of Salzburg, Prof. Andreas Lang and his team investigate how landscape processes and sediment archives record medieval environmental change. Their work begins with identifying suitable lake sites across northern, western and central Europe, followed by paired-site coring to recover continuous sediment sequences for MEMELAND. Using rapid bathymetric surveys, sediment-thickness testing, and continuous 10 cm diameter Nesje corers together with Uwitec gravity corers, they obtain overlapping cores that include the mud–water interface and preserve the upper 1–3 m of sediment representing the last two millennia. Each core is processed using a complete barcoding sample labelling system to ensure consistent and traceable sampling from field to laboratory.

Their research centres on providing the chronological backbone necessary to link European cultural history to ecodynamics using accurate and moderate-high-precision chronologies. Dating sediments from this period is described as “notoriously difficult,” so the team applies a multi-method modelling approach. This combines 14C AMS dating of un-charred annual plant macrofossils with short-lived isotopes (210Pb and 137Cs), spheroidal carbonaceous particles, optically stimulated luminescence, and tie-points where tephra or historic flooding events can be identified. These chronometric results are transformed into age–depth models using Bayesian and AI modelling in Bacon and CSciBox, with the aim of achieving under 100 years precision (2σ) for the last 2000 years. Age inversions reveal periods of severe catchment erosion, linking chronological uncertainties to soil disturbance and the pre-ageing of biomarkers.

To understand how sediments reflect land-use impacts, the Salzburg team also conducts sampling within the catchments to characterise soil profiles, colluvial and alluvial deposits, and to establish catchment connectivity using a small-catchment modelling approach. These analyses support interpretations of erosion intensity, sediment delivery, and the wider landscape context of the cores.

Together, the University of Salzburg provides the essential drilling, catchment characterisation, and precise chronological framework that underpin MEMELAND’s reconstruction of environmental change and farming intensity across the last two millennia.

Charles University

The Laboratory of Quantitative Ecology at Charles University in Prague, led by Dr. Ondřej Mottl (Assistant Professor for Plant Ecology and Open Science Champion at Charles University), focuses on examining vegetation biodiversity trends across spatial and temporal scales. The laboratory specializes in cutting-edge quantitative and statistical methods, alongside state-of-the-art data science and machine learning approaches. Their research integrates concepts and methodologies from various fields, including macroecology, palaeoecology, biodiversity science, and quantitative ecology.

A core pillar of the laboratory’s work is a strong commitment to open science and scientific reproducibility. All research outputs, including data, code, and methodologies, are made publicly available and fully reproducible, ensuring transparency and enabling the broader scientific community to build upon their work. This dedication to open science principles ensures that MEMELAND’s complex spatial models and analytical workflows can be verified, reused, and extended by researchers worldwide.

In MEMELAND, the laboratory plays a crucial role in integrating the multi-proxy datasets generated by the other teams (sedaDNA, lipid biomarkers, archaeobotanical data, and chronological data) into comprehensive spatial models. Using advanced quantitative palaeoecological methods, they will elucidate patterns of biodiversity and land-use change across northern and central Europe over the last two millennia. This work will span diverse spatial scales—from local biomes to continents—enabling a holistic understanding of how human activities have shaped European vegetation dynamics throughout history. The laboratory’s expertise in developing new methodologies ensures that MEMELAND remains at the forefront of ecological science, expanding our understanding of long-term vegetation patterns and their drivers.