The Birney Lab is the national home for research in Archaeo-Ecophysiology,
a new field at the nexus of chemistry, archaeology, philology and environmental science.
What is Archaeo-Ecophysiology?
Ecophysiology is the study of how plants respond to their environments, whether producing chemical compounds to fight off insects, adapting growth rates to manage drought, changing the color of their flowers to attract different pollinators.
Archaeo-Ecophysiology is the study of how ancient plants responded to their original growing environments in the past.
Traditional or indigenous cultivation practices can offer models for how to grow plants in more sustainable ways, or how to use natural methods to grow plants that are more medically potent, more aromatic, more nutritious, or more resilient in the face of climate stress. Our lab uses environmental archaeology, ecophysiology, and ancient texts of the Mediterranean world to reconstruct the landscapes identified as core production areas for key botanical commodities, like crops, perfumes and medicines, decorative or ritual plants. In the lab and greenhouse, we then experimentally assess the ways in which these microclimates, cultivation and post-harvest strategies affected the plants in widespread use in antiquity. We study resiliency traits of crop species and model the ways in which microclimate can affect the phytochemistry — i.e., the potency and efficacy — of ancient medicinal and aromatic plants. Our work provides insight into ancient economies, cultivation methods and cultural practices, and considers their implications for sustainable ecological practices in the present.
Our experimental designs are structured so that our results generate data that can be actively applied by agricultural scientists and farmers in the present day.
Birney Lab is also working to improve methodologies for the interpretation of archaeological organic residues. Archaeological residues often document plant species that are otherwise largely absent from the archaeological record, and thus are an important data source for environmental reconstructions.
Birney Lab research is supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Yale Planetary Solutions Fund, and grants from Wesleyan University. All projects make use of Wesleyan’s robust research infrastructure through partnership with Chemistry’s Advanced Integrated Lab, and incorporates student researchers from Archaeology, Biology, Chemistry, College of the Environment, Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, and Classical Studies.
