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Copyright of Archivo de Prehistoria Levantina is the property of Museu de Prehistoria de Valencia and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In the last decade, different soil types have been analysed to evaluate the effect of human activities from an archaeological point of view. In particular, in the last few years, tremendous advances have been made in sample preparation and analytical methods used in archaeological soil analyses. However, there is still a need to set standardized protocols to achieve different archaeological goals. Therefore, in this study, the analytical methods available to study archaeological soils have been reviewed together with a critical discussion on the challenging archaeological questions, which could be answered by determining their mineral composition. Data on trace elements and rare earth elements, which could provide a fingerprint of the human activities, have been evaluated in different studies and discussed here. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The aim of this study was to define a strategy for a correct selection of bone samples by employing inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectroscopy (ICP-OES) for reconstructing the biological mineral content in bones through the determination of major elements, trace elements and Rare Earth Elements (REE, lanthanides) in skeletal cremains of ancient Iberians (III–II B.C), discovered in the Necropolis of Corral de Saus (Moixent, Valencia) between 1972 and 1979. The biological mineral content was determined taking into account diagenetic factors. A control method for a better reading of results was applied. To explore large geochemical datasets and to reduce the number of variables, Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used, thus, providing a deeper insight into the structure of the variance of the dataset. PCA shows that the elemental profiles of bone and soil samples are clearly different. Bone samples obtained from the outer bone layer were shown to have a different elemental composition; more similar to soil samples than samples of the inner bone layer. PCA scores and loadings plots were preferred to dendrograms obtained using Cluster Analysis, due to the limits of the latter one to appreciate the spatial ordering of samples. Partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA), a frequently used supervised classification method, was applied to differentiate between degradation states of bone samples. PLS-DA results obtained in this study confirmed that changes derived from different burning conditions were associated with transformations in the mineral part of the bones. Accordingly, carbonized bones can be differentiated from cremated bones. Class assignment of bone samples with uncertain thermal conditions in dependence on their elemental composition has shown to be feasible. Consequently, for biochemical-archaeological studies the analysis and statistical classification of carbonized and cremated archaeological bones, as well as those exposed to unknown thermal conditions together with experiments in modern bones, are recommended. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Copyright of Archivo de Prehistoria Levantina is the property of Museu de Prehistoria de Valencia and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

An innovative methodological approach has been developed for the prediction of the mineral element composition of bone remains. It is based on the use of Fourier Transform Near Infrared (FT-NIR) diffuse reflectance measurements. The method permits a fast, cheap and green analytical way, to understand post-mortem degradation of bones caused by the environment conditions on different skeletal parts and to select the best preserved bone samples. Samples, from the Late Roman Necropolis of Virgen de la Misericordia street and En Gil street located in Valencia (Spain), were employed to test the proposed approach being determined calcium, magnesium and strontium in bone remains and sediments. Coefficients of determination obtained between predicted values and reference ones for Ca, Mg and Sr were 90.4, 97.3 and 97.4, with residual predictive deviation of 3.2, 5.3 and 2.3, respectively, and relative root mean square error of prediction between 10% and 37%. Results obtained evidenced that NIR spectra combined with statistical analysis can help to predict bone mineral profiles suitable to evaluate bone diagenesis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]