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Stable Isotope Ecology And Human-Animal Interactions In Northern Peru, Paul Szpak
Stable Isotope Ecology And Human-Animal Interactions In Northern Peru, Paul Szpak
Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository
This dissertation addresses several issues related to isotopic ecology in northern Peru. The first portion of the dissertation focuses on baseline carbon and nitrogen isotopic variability in plants for comparison with paleodietary data. The second portion applies these data to assess animal management practices (camelids) in the Virú Valley on the north coast of Peru using isotopic analysis of bone collagen and serially sampled hair. A detailed survey of plants from the Moche River Valley region demonstrates significant east-west variation in plant carbon and nitrogen isotopic compositions, following changes in altitude from the Pacific coast to the highlands. A growth …
Origins Of Stable Isotopic Variations In Late Pleistocene Horse Enamel And Bone From Alberta, Nicolle S. Bellissimo
Origins Of Stable Isotopic Variations In Late Pleistocene Horse Enamel And Bone From Alberta, Nicolle S. Bellissimo
Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository
Oxygen and carbon isotopic measurements of coevally formed bone and tooth enamel bioapatite from a modern equid show that these tissues record drinking water and diet isotopic signals in an identical fashion. Hence, data for both tissues can be combined to track movement, dietary changes, and seasonal variability over the animal’s lifetime, and climatic variability over longer time periods. This tool was tested for horses using ten paired tooth and bone samples to reconstruct conditions in Alberta during the Late Pleistocene. While post-mortem isotopic alteration confounded interpretation of the results, two key findings emerged: (i) pre- and post-Last Glacial Maximum …