Rob Foley

It was a wonderful day and so deserved. Very proud!

Episode 3 of our Ng'ipalajem video series with Justus Erus Edung, talking about the biggest discovery of his career, Kenyanthropus!

Sehemu 3 ya video Ng'ipalajem na Justus Erus Edung anazungumza uguduzi mkuu wa maisha ya kazi yake, Kenyanthropus!

Announcement at the British Academy

Fabulous news that @martamlahr.bsky.social has been elected a Fellow of the British Academy 🍾🍾🍾

Episode 2 of our Ng'ipalajem video series showing this summer's research! Today, I show some antelope teeth I'm using to understand paleoenvironments

Sehemu 2 wa Ng'ipalajem video inaonyesha utafiti wa kiangazi hiki! Leo naonyesha meno wa nyumbu na swala ambayo natumia kwa kuelewa mazingira ya kale

The joy of sorting LSA lithics from Turkana under the guidance of @robfoley.bsky.social

Follow us on Instagram for more www.instagram.com/palaeotrails...

It's a bit late for #FossilFriday but I have to show this lovely young adult Palaeoloxodon (giant elephant) jaw from the new Middle Pleistocene site I'm working at in Turkana, Kenya!

New blog posting, inspired by @robfoley.bsky.social 's witty critique of UK universities

The Great University Subsidy Scandal

21percent.org?p=2278

Many of us routinely invite the examiner to lunch or dinner at our homes with other students & postdocs at our expense

Findings from our accents study follow up: image showing that study accent–listeners had the highest probability of a correct response (62.49%–70.12%), followed by UK/Ireland (53.18%–62.44%), and other English-speaking country (50.03%–56.85%) and non-English speaking country (49.72%–58.32%).

In a follow-up to our study on accent mimicry last year, we've found that natives are the best at detecting accent mimicry.

People from other English speaking countries were, however, worse at mimicry detection than were native listeners.

@robfoley.bsky.social

www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

We spend long periods of time in Kenya collecting data in the collections, understanding the landscape and looking for fossils. Picture credits: Sarah Paris

The rest of the year is spent analysing data, honing skills and preparing for upcoming field work. During this time, we develop new methodologies, attend conferences, write papers and discuss our findings Picture credits: Sarah Paris, Eleanor Williams

What does the Ng'ipalajem team do?

Ng’ipalajem, meaning Ancestors in Turkana, is an ERC-funded project.

Led by @martamlahr.bsky.social, the project investigates how the emergence of Homo sapiens is deeply intertwined with Africa’s long-term environmental and ecological history.

#humanevolution

Eighteen million years of diverse enamel proteomes from the East African Rift - Nature The isolation of dental proteins from fossils deposited 1.5 million to 18 million years ago in the Turkana Basin in Kenya, a tropical region, demonstrate the promise of dental enamel for palaeoproteom...

Breaking the barriers! Important new paper by Daniel Green and others discovering 18 million years of proteins of East African mammals!

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Talking yesterday evening with @jonathanrgoodman.bsky.social at the launch of his new book Invisible Rivals (yalebooks.co.uk/book/9780300... )

Race, ethnicity don’t match genetic ancestry, according to a large U.S. study Data from the All of Us program confirm what many geneticists have long promoted

Race, ethnicity don’t match genetic ancestry, according to a large U.S. study www.science.org/content/arti...

Are we hardwired to fall for autocrats? It’s human nature to trust strongmen, but we’ve also evolved the tools to resist them

Are we hardwired to fall for autocrats? It’s human nature to trust strongmen, but we’ve also evolved the tools to resist them www.theguardian.com/books/2025/m...

Many congratulations, Rob! So deserved!

Nearly 50 years since David 'Analytical Archaeology’ Clarke died tragically young. A sunny day seemed the right time to pay a much overdue visit to where he is buried in Great Chesterford. Still much missed - not just for what he would have contributed but as a brilliant, witty and cheerful person.

Amazing work with a fabulous team 🤩

Our new paper on 3D GM has all the models and script available for others to apply our method. We use it to demonstrate interregional variability of Nubian Levallois cores but it has broader potential for lithic studies #openscience #archaeology #3DGM @icarehb.bsky.social @jmcascalheira.bsky.social

Excellent thread - the revolution in our understanding of cellular biology, critical for modern medicine, and now tragically impacted by US cuts to NIH funding

The early origins of bone-tool manufacturing traditions by hominins 1.5 million years ago Excavations at Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, reveal evidence of the systematic use of animal bones as a raw material for prehistoric tools.

Congratulations to @martamlahr.bsky.social on her News and Views in Nature on Ignacio de la Torre and colleagues' discovery of early bone tools at Olduvai. The site that keeps on giving!
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Thanks so much to Jean Black @yalebooks.bsky.social @yalepress.bsky.social and @robfoley.bsky.social – would not have been possible without you

@darwincollegecam.bsky.social @cambridgeuni.bsky.social @sangerinstitute.bsky.social @engagewcs.bsky.social

A researcher holding up a flint tool

A selection of flakes produced by John Lord

Two researchers comparing flint tools

The group of researchers with John Lord

This morning, some of our researchers took part in a McDonald Institute knapping workshop focused on microlithic technologies with brilliant guidance from expert John Lord!

Thanks to @robfoley.bsky.social for organising this opportunity and to @kingscollege.bsky.social for kindly hosting us

Government needs to show that its AI plan can be trusted to deal with serious risks when it comes to health data The use of patient data has been controversial in the past.

In an article for @uk.theconversation.com, @rjmilne.bsky.social and I argue that while the UK's plan to foster innovation through AI is ambitious, it will rely on public trust for success.

Yet anyone can claim to be trustworthy: how do we tell who actually is?

theconversation.com/government-n...

Margo Wilson, and how to do evolutionary human science In October 2024, I had the great honour of travelling to Hamilton to give the Margo Wilson Memorial Lecture.  It was fifteen years since Margo’s death. Preparing the lecture gave me the oppo…

Very nice post from Daniel Nettle, honouring Margo Wilson

"..a particularly successful example of how you can bring evolutionary understanding to social science topics and be genuinely constructive"

www.danielnettle.eu/2025/01/26/m...

The HEIRS meeting at ICArEHB last week was as enjoyable as it was impressive. A wealth of early career talent (and the occasional older ones!). The development of scientific and quantitative techniques is really transforming human evolutionary studies. Congratulations and thanks to the organisers.

Setbacks in the use of a handaxe: lithic investment and seasonality in the Early Acheulean - Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences From their first appearance in the archaeological record, the varying degree of biface presence in individual assemblages has long been a notable aspect of discussions surrounding the nature of the Ea...

🏺🦣 Very pleased to share the latest chapter from my PhD (with Gonzalo Linares-Matás), “Setbacks in the use of a handaxe: lithic investment in the Early Acheulean” doi.org/10.1007/s125... /1

Are you studying technological complexity in #archaeology? If so, here is an open call for a Special Issue on 'Technological Complexity & Archaeological Interpretation in the Deep Past' which I am co-editing in JAMT! More information here or contact me! link.springer.com/collections/... - Pls share!

Glad you’re enjoying it. Lessons for surviving academia!

I'm reading it now. It's a must read. Illuminating.

Less a basement, more opening a window to throw light on some of the worrying things that are happening in universities today. Enjoy!

Many thanks for these kind words! I hope you avoid too much napkin folding (you have to read the book for the reference 😂)