Alastair Wills
PhD Researcher,
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Biography
I am a Geography PhD student at the 糖心原创, where I have been studying since my undergraduate degree. My research focuses on applying novel modelling techniques alongside biogeochemical analyses to reveal the extents of ancient Indigenous food plant practices in southeastern Australia throughout the Holocene.
Research Summary
My specialisations are within palaeoecology, specifically in Palynology-the study of pollen and spores-and how the pollen record can inform us about ancient land cover and land use. I employ… read more
Current Research
My specialisations are within palaeoecology, specifically in Palynology-the study of pollen and spores-and how the pollen record can inform us about ancient land cover and land use. I employ mechanistic models that correct several biases within the pollen records of lakes and bogs, which act as regional archives of vegetation history, to glean a more realistic representation of ancient land cover and land usage. Additionally, I utilise Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) to differentiate pollen taxa with shared physical shapes, textures, and sizes (morphologies) using their absorption spectrum of infrared light. These taxa are within the Poaceae family and Cichorioideae subfamily (Asteraceae family), which at a family level have undifferentiated pollen morphologies but are important families as a food plant source for ancient Indigenous communities.