Professor Yuan Jing from IA CASS visited France
Research fellow Yuan Jing, the Center for Archaeological Sciences and Experiments, IA CASS, was invited to Paris, France at the behest of Jean-Denis, the director of the French National Museum of Natural History's ecological and behavioral research department. The academic visit took place from September 8 to 17 in 2011, and there were three benefits of this visit.
The first gain is a comprehensive understanding of the physical skeletal characteristics of chicken, and its' difference from a pheasant. This will be of great importance in future research, as well as helping shine new light on past studies. This visit will help generate morphological identification criteria of the chicken bone family for national zooarchaeological research. Using past research, this area of study will be able to advance.
Secondly, France hopes further cooperation based on international cooperation project "Sino-Eu bioarchaeological research". To further strengthen cooperation, they made a number of specific requests, including the use of a variety of animals; methods of research into the origin of Chinese cattle and sheep; archaeological pig research in China; zooarchaeological information about excavated mice (for the purpose of studying the origins and development of agriculture, the spread of diseases, etc.); research on shell midden sites; inviting young zooarchaeologists on visits, joint development of zooarchaeology undergrad, grad, and post doctoral students; and joint publishing of research results. The Center for Archaeological Sciences and Experiments, IA CASS, would not only have zooarchaeological researchers, but also undertake researches involving ancient DNA, diet analysis, strontium isotope analysis, scanning electron microscopes and equipment, which will provide basic reliable protection for the equipments and researchers to aid multiple collaborative researches except the morphological study of animals. These measures will help promote the development of Sino-Franco archaeological research.
The French National Museum of Natural History's ecological and behavioral research department was founded by Georges Cuvier, an internationally renowned zoologist. Their collection contains the largest number of animal skeletons after the US Smithsonian Institute. There are thousands of bird specimens; many of which were collected in the 18th and 19th centuries, and owns a long tradition of research, thus a wealth of research data. As a national research organization, they assembled some outstanding researchers, in order to ensure that they will stay at the forefront of global research. By comparison, the zooarchaeological research in China is relative weak, beginning from the related research on Yinxu Ruins by Professor Yang Zhongjian., which only went through four generations and the staff are too limited. Sino-France cooperation will greatly promote the development of our discipline research. (Translator: Marie Kerwin)