Mak Itambu receives MPG Africa Mobility Grant

The Department of Archaeology (DA) welcomes Dr. Makarius Itambu to Jena. Mak is a lecturer at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania and specializes in rock art research and phytolith analysis. Funded by an Africa Mobility Grant from the Max Planck Society, Mak will come to MPI-SHH to do laboratory analysis while also learning new lab methods and protocols. For his current research, Mak is looking for new rock shelter sites, conducting archaeological excavations for Stone Age artifacts, and applying different paleoenvironmental reconstruction techniques in the Singida Region of Central Tanzania. The laboratory facilities in Jena will help advance his paleoenvironmental work.

Mak will stay in Jena for about four weeks per year for three years and conduct research in the DA's laboratories. "I am very happy to be given the opportunity to work in the institute's excellently equipped laboratories and to learn and exchange information about state-of-the-art methods in archaeology and paleoecology with all of the researchers in the department,” he says. In the coming years, Mak and Bob Patalano, postdoc in the DA, are planning a number of joint research projects focused on Stone Age archaeology and palaeoecology in Central and Northern Tanzania. Mak looks forward to sharing his expertise in departmental research talks and hopes that his stay in Jena will open up possibilities for new collaborations.

Background: The Africa Mobility Grant of the Max-Planck-Society aims to offer excellent African scientists from Postdoc to senior scientist level the opportunity for annual research stays at a Max Planck Institute with access to research facilities, training and networking opportunities as well as scientific exchange. In order to sustainably anchor the research collaborations and support longer-term projects, the grant will fund a total of three stays over a period of three years.