Emma Karoune at our project partner Historic England) recently described the work their research group is doing with support from EOSC-Life to create a global open phytoliths community and improve data sharing.
When living plant cells uptake groundwater, inorganic silica is deposited in these cells. These extremely robust remains called phytoliths provide archeological evidence long after the living plant is gone.
These archeological data are a rich resource for researchers, but they need to be carefully preserved for future research and effectively documented and archived to be truly useful.
The ‘FAIR Phytoliths Project’ is a collaboration led by Historic England and University of Pompeu Fabra (Barcelona, Spain) with the involvement of members from the Spanish National Research Council and Texas A&M University. In this case study on how data management, publishing, and archiving can be improved in the field of scientific archaeology, the project partners are striving to increase the use of the ‘FAIR’ data principles in phytolith research.
Learn more this project on the Historic England website.
Link to a related past news item
An initial presentation about the project given in 2021 to provide context of how far the project has come!
