carbonell
34 scientists from Catalan centers in ‘Highly Cited Researchers’ ranking
Half belong to University of Barcelona or Hospital Clínic-Idibaps
Objective: getting to know life better 60,000 years ago
Archaeologists from all over the world are at work on the Abric Romaní site hoping to find remains of animals, hearths and tools
53 archaeologists to document Neanderthal life from 60,000 years ago
University researchers from all over the world excavate together in the Abric Romaní in Catalonia in this 35th campaign
Anti-Franco activist Jordi Carbonell dies aged 92
He was the president of the left-wing pro-independence party Esquerra Republicana (ERC) between 1996 and 2004 and a renowned Catalan philologist. Carbonell was responsible for the first four volumes of the Gran Enciclopèdia Catalana (the ‘Big Catalan Encyclopaedia’), that he compiled between 1965 and 1971. During the Franco dictatorship he was incarcerated twice because of his anti-fascist and pro-Catalan language activism. One of the more famous sentences of the pro-independence movement is his: “Que la prudència no ens faci traïdors”, (“Don’t let caution turn us into traitors”, in English). He pronounced it on the 11th of September 1976, during the first Catalan National Day demonstration after the death of the dictator.
Neanderthal’s period of greater expansion to be discovered at Catalan archaeological site Abric Romaní
The archaeological site known as Abric Romaní is currently being excavated for the 31st year in order to continue documenting and understanding how Neanderthals lived and organised communities in the north-eastern Iberian Peninsula. The archaeologist, palaeontologist and Director of excavations, Eudald Carbonell, has explained to the CNA that this campaign will be “very interesting” as the dig will be in the level corresponding to the time when the Neanderthals lived “their maximum expansion period”. Carbonell, who is one of the directors of Atapuerca site (where the Homo Antecessor was discovered), leads a team of 20 including research staff and doctoral students. The site is located some 50 kilometres west of Barcelona city and is open for the public to visit.
A world-leading centre in human evolution unveils new facilities in Tarragona
The Catalan Institute of Human Paleoecology and Social Evolution (IPHES) is one of the 3 centres with the highest scientific production internationally in its field. It is directed by Eudald Carbonell, the palaeontologist who has been directing the Atapuerca site since its discovery. Atapuerca was where the oldest human specimens in Europe were found, the so-called Homo Antecessor. The IPHES started its activities in 2006 but due to its increasing relevance it needed more room. Since last June the institute has moved to a new building in the Sescelades Campus of the Rovira i Virgili University (URV) in southern Catalonia. On Friday the President of the Catalan Government, Artur Mas, officially unveiled the facilities. The new building cost €6 million and it has 3,000 square metres to host 62 members of staff.