Maria Saña graduated in History at the Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona in 1991. She obtained the PhD in History at the UAB in 1997. Since 2002 she has been a full-time lecturer in Prehistory Department (UAB) and lead the Archaeozoology Laboratory. Since 2005 she has formed part of the SAPPO/GRAMPO (Seminar on Near East Prehistoric Archaeology) research group. Since 2007she has led the Spanish research team in the European network BIOARCH (Bioarchaeological Investigations of the Interactions between Holocene Human Societies and their Environments). She has played an active role in multiple National and International Research Projects and has been the main research in 33 of them. Since 2003 she has supervised theses and research connected with Bioarchaeology and Biogeochemistry. She has headed the archaeozoological study of over 87 archaeological sites in the Iberian Peninsula, France, Italy, Algeria, Syria, Turkey, Jordan and Iraq and she has published more than 175 scientific works.

Research interests

Maria Saña’s research focuses on the origins and changing nature of animal domestication. Recent research dealt with the study of the origins of the Neolithic, working in Southeast Asia, Europe and Africa. Interested in archaeozoology, she directs her research towards the adaptation of new analytical procedures based on biogeochemistry and bone biomechanics to the study of the archaeological record. Current research is focused on two areas, exploring diverse converging lines linked to the study of first farming societies. In the first area, research has concentrated on the origins of Neolithic societies, by obtaining the data needed to attain a global perspective of the environmental, economic, social, and political changes during the early Holocene. Research in methodology has focused on the integration in archaeozoological studies of stable isotopes and palaeoproteomics-based analyses with the aim of achieving greater temporal and historical resolution of bioarchaeological samples.

Keywords

Bioarchaeology, Neolithic, Mediterranean, Animal domestication, stable isotopes, palaeoproteomics