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Congratulations to New PhD Graduates

11 December 2012

IAMS would like to congratulate our three newest PhD graduates in metallurgy from UCL's Institute of Archaeology: Dr.

Miljana Submitting her thesis Wenli Zhou, Dr. Miljana Radivojević, and Dr. Thomas Thondhlana.

Dr. Wenli Zhou's thesis, entitled "Distilling zinc in China: The technology of large-scale zinc production in Chongqing during the Ming and Qing Dynasties (AD 1368-1911)" (Full text available) has offered us new insight into zinc production in China. Until her research, little was known about zinc distillation technology in this part of the world due to a lack of studies of production remains. She therefore studied production remains from several sites and reconstructed the Chaîne opératoire and studied the way in which this industry was integrated into wider international trade. Dr. Zhou's research was funded by the Sun Hung Kai Properties Kwok Foundation (2008-2011) and also supported by ICCHA and IAMS. Upon graduation she has been offered and taken a post at the Institute of the History for the Natural Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences. We wish her the best of luck back in Beijing and expect her to continue to greatly contribute to the field of archaeometallurgy!

Dr. Miljana Radivojević submitted her thesis last spring on the always hot topic of the beginnings of smelting technology. Her research "On the Origins of Metallurgy in Europe: Metal Production in the Vinča culture" has rewritten the map so to speak on the earliest emergence of metallurgy in Eurasia with evidence of copper smelting in Serbia dating to c. 5000 BC. IAMS is proud to have funded this examplary and defining research and we are happy to report that Dr. Radivojević will remain at the Institute of Archaeology for her post-doc research. Her new AHRC-funded research aims at excavating a number of new sites in Serbia to further explore the emergence of metallurgy in the Balkans. We certainly will be hearing more from this talented researcher in the near future!

Dr. Thomas Thondhlana has just recently submitted and defended a thesis entitled Thomas Thondhlana "Metalworkers and Smelting Precincts: Technological Reconstructions of Second Millenium Copper Production around Phalaborwa, Northern Lowveld of South Africa". His work on copper production in South Africa has shed new light on how this metal was produced prior to colonization. He has found some fascinating details of the integration of iron and copper smelting practices. Dr. Thondhlana was also funded by IAMS and has now returned to his home country of Zimbabwe. We wish him the best of luck in his future endeavours!

Several metallurgy students at UCL and funded by IAMS are currently at various stages of their PhDs, but keep an eye on this space for up to date news on cutting-edge archaeometallurgical research!