Conferences & Workshops

Presentations & Guest Lectures

May 2020 — Invited remote lecture through the Evolutionary Biology Department at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology. Anthropogenic Evolution Under Early Plant Cultivation

February 2020 — Invited lecture at Nara University, Japan, to explore the potential for biomolecular methods in millet detection on ancient ceramics. Ancient Crop Dispersals Through Central Asia

December 2019 – Invited lecture on the “Fruit of the Silk Road” as part of the “Spread of Agriculture into Tibet and Neighboring Regions” conference in Xian, China, at Northwest University

December 2019 – Discussant at the “Spread of Agriculture into Tibet and Neighboring Regions” conference in Xian, China, at Northwest University

December 2019 – Invited Lecture at the Arnold Arboretum at Harvard University on the “Fruit from the Sands: The Silk Road origins of the foods we eat”.

December 2019 – Talk at the SAB in Jena, Germany, on the progress of research in the Archaeobotany Laboratories.

November 2019 – Invited Lecture at Washington University in St Louis on “Rethinking Agriculture: The evolution of crops under cultivation” as part of the Bison Seed-Dispersal Project

June 2019 — Lecture at the International Workgroup on Paleoethnobotany Meetings in Lecce, Italy, on the “Role of Seed Dispersal Shifts in Early Crop Domestication”

May 2019 — Talk on the “Fruits of the Silk Road: The spread of Agriculture through Central Asia” in the Silk Road series at the Institute for Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology in Beijing, China

May 2019 — Keynote speech on the “Spread of Agriculture along the pre-Silk Road” in the SIDRR2019: Paleoenvironmental Change and Disaster along the Silk Roads at the Beijing International Convention Center in Beijing, China

April 2019 — Co-organized the “Food Sustainability in the Ancient World” workshop at the Max Planck 2019 Institute in Jena, Germany – Co-organizer and presented an opening talk

April 2019 — Talk at the “Food Sustainability in the Ancient World” workshop on “The contentious links between agricultural intensification and Urbanization: The case study of the Steppe Empires”

September 2018 — Talk at the European Association of Archaeologists, Barcelona, Spain, session: “Farming Under the Crescent Moon: Agriculture in the Medieval Islamic world,” “Archaeobotanical Studies at the Tashbulak Archaeological Site during the Qarakhanid Period”

September 2018 – Talk at the European Association of Archaeologists, Barcelona, Spain, session: “Water Management in Ancient Central Asia” “Using Archaeobotanical Data to Discuss Irrigation Systems in Ancient Central Asia”

June 2018 — Talk at the Conference of the Society for East Asian Archaeology, Nanjing, China, “Archaeobotany of the Silk Road”

June 2018 — Discussant Talk at the Conference of the Society for East Asian Archaeology, Nanjing, China, “Stretching North East Asian Prehistory: Integrating Linguistics and Genetics with Archaeology”

May 2018 — Talk at the Comparative Pathways to Agriculture Symposium 2018, "Early Arboriculture in Eurasia," Sponsored by the ComPAg ERC project and the Domestication, Human Niche Construction and the Anthropocene Research Network of the UCL Institute of Archaeology. University College London

April 2018 — Talk at the International Congress on Archaeology of the Ancient Near East (ICAANE), session: “Redefining Interaction and Mobility in Prehistoric Southern Central Asian Archaeology,” “Archaeobotany of the Silk Road”

February 2018 — Invited Lecture for The Oxford Centre for Asian Archaeology, Art & Culture School of Archaeology, University of Oxford, “Fruits of the Silk Road”

February 2018 — Invited Lecture for The Oxford Centre for Asian Archaeology, Art & Culture School of Archaeology, University of Oxford, “How Nomadic were the Eurasian Nomads?”

November 2017 — Invited Lecture for the Paleontology Department at Free University Berlin, “Ongoing Research and Laboratory Facilities at the Jena Max Planck Branch”

November 2017 — Talk at the Central Asia Workshop that I co-organized for the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany, "Breadth of Dietary Economy in the Central Asian Prehistory"

October 2017 — Invited Lecture for the Graduate School "Human Development in Landscapes" and the CRC 1266 "Scales of transformation" Lecture Series at Kiel University, “Millet Dispersal”

May 2017 – Fruits of the Silk Road, Friends of the Archaeological Institute of America, New York Branch, New York City

April 2017 — Fruits of the Silk Road, Global Issues, Critical Topics, and Expert Lectures, New York University School of Professional Studies

April 2017 – Chenopodium Seeds in the Archaeobotanical Record of Central Asia, Society for American Archaeology Meetings, Vancouver, Canada

April 2017 — Revisiting the Topic of Dung Burning in the Archaeobotanical Record of Central Asia, Fryxell Award Session for Naomi Miller, Society for American Archaeology Meetings, Vancouver, Canada

February 2017 – Fruits of the Silk Road, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany

January 2017 – Fruits of the Silk Road, The Archaeological Institute of America, Westchester Society, Westchester, New York

November 2016 – Fruits of the Silk Road: The Spread of Agriculture through Central Asia, Institute for the Study of the Ancient World, New York University, New York City

October 2016 – Guest Lecture at New York University, invited by Sören Stark, “Looking Back to the Origins of the Silk Road”, New York City

July 2016 — “The Globalization of Crops along the Ancient Silk Road” at the IWGP (International Work-Group for Palaeoethnobotany) meetings 2016 held in Paris, France 4-9 July

September 2015 — Presented as part of the Friday Archaeology Series at Washington University. "Anthropogenic Landscapes of Prehistoric Central Eurasia: Archaeobotanical studies of agricultural niche construction"

November 2014 — Presented at the Turkmenistan Ministry of Culture’s conference on “Paleoethnobotanical Methods for the Study of Early Agriculture and Cuisine in the Prehistory of Central Asia” in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, “Experience of Turkmenistan in Research and Museumification of Archaeological Findings”

October 2014 — Presented in the Geokolloquium Series in Earth Sciences at Free University, Berlin. “Spread of Agriculture into Central Eurasia and the Third Millennium B.C. Corridor of Exchange”

April 2014 — Presented at the Society for American Archaeology Meetings, Symposium: “Contrasting Patterns of Collecting, Treatment and Use of Stems and Fiber for Crafts in Hunter-Gatherer versus Horticultural and Agropastoral Groups”, Titled: Textiles as an Early Silk Road Commodity: Mobile Pastoralists in Central Asia”

April 2014 — Presented at the Society for American Archaeology Meetings, Symposium: “Ongoing research in Eurasian archaeology”, Titled: “Late Third Millennium B.C. Agriculture in the Foothills of Central Asia: A Mixing Zone for East and South Asian Crops”

June 2013 — Presented at the Economic Botany Meetings in Plymouth, England, Titled: “Late Third Millennium B.C. Agricultural Innovations in Central Asia”

June 2013 — Presented in the session “Food Globalization in Prehistory” at the International Work Group in Palaeoethnobotany Meetings, in Thessaloniki, Greece, Titled: “The Central Eurasian Corridor of Exchange and the Spread of Agriculture: Late Third and Second Millennia B.C.”

October 2012 — Presented at the Eurasian Archaeology Conference at Cornell, Titled: “The End or Beginning of Nomadism: The Spread of Agriculture and Community Diversification in the Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages in Eastern Central Asia”

April 2012 — Presented at the Society for American Archaeology Meetings, Southwest Asian Session, Titled: “Ecotopes and Herd Foraging Practices in the Bronze and Iron Age, Steppe and Mountain Ecotone of Central Asia”

January 2012 — Presented at Friday Archaeology Lecture Series at Washington University in St. Louis, Titled: “Central Eurasian Crop Corridor: Tracking the Path of Wandering Crops”

April 2011 — Presented at the Society for American Archaeology Meetings, Eurasian Steppe Archaeology Session, Titled: “Paleoethnobotanical Studies in Eastern Kazakhstan: The Bronze and Iron Age Interface”

January 2011 — Presented at Friday Archaeology Lecture Series at Washington University in St. Louis, Titled: “Mountain Pastoralism: Working Agriculture into the Diversity of Archaeological Central Eurasian Pastoral Economies”

December 2010 — Guest lecturer at Sichuan University in Chengdu, China, Titled: “Agriculture in Bronze and Iron Age Central Asia”

November 2010 — Guest lecturer at Buffalo State College, Titled: “Plants and Mobile Pastoralists: A Case Study from Kazakhstan, during the Bronze Age”

August 2010 — Presented at the International Ordos, Inner Mongolia Conference, Titled: “Plants in the Diet of Mobile Pastoralists: Begash, Kazakhstan, during the Bronze Age”

April 2010 — Presented at the Society for American Archaeology Meetings, Eurasian Session, Titled: “Plants in the Diet of Mobile Pastoralist: Semirech’ye, Kazakhstan during the Early Iron Age”

October 2009 — Presented at Friday Archaeology Lecture Series at Washington University in St. Louis, Titled: “Floating Some Models for the Role of Agriculture: Results from a Summer of Flotation in Kazakhstan”

November 2008 — Presented at Friday Archaeology Lecture Series at Washington University in St. Louis, Titled: “Some Food for Thought: Preliminary Results from Begash, Kazakhstan”

April 2006 — Presented completed research on palynological analysis of archaeological sites in western New York and northern Denmark at the University at Buffalo Celebration of Academic Excellence

November 2005 — Presented data from palynological analysis on archeological sites in western New York and northern Denmark at Annual Honors Research Forum

December 2004 — Presented data from a palynological analysis of archeological sites in western New York at the University at Buffalo Celebration of Academic Excellence

October 2004 — Presented a preliminary study of the acetolysis technique at the Annual Honors Research Forum