Research Focus - Dating

Luminescence Dating Laboratory

The Luminescence Dating Laboratory provides Thermoluminescence (TL), as well as Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL/IRSL) dating.

It consists of four connected rooms with dimmed red (EncapSulite R10 and R20) lighting. One room is dedicated to the chemical and another one to the mechanical sample preparation. The latter houses a manual hydraulic press (Wassermann WW33), a water cooled diamond rock saw (Isomet 1000) and a dry/wet sieving machine (Fritsch Analysette 3), which allow the required careful preparation of heated rock material for TL-dating and sediment sample preparation for OSL/IRSL dating. The third room provides space for three luminescence readers (Risø DA-15 and DA-20) which are all equipped with beta sources (Sr90/Y90) and one with an alpha source (Am241). The luminescence readers allow the stimulation of samples by heating (TL), by blue/green and IR light of multiple as well as of single mineral grains. An additional stimulation source of green LEDs is available, as well as the possibility to investigate OSL signals with pulse stimulation. Facilities for external alpha (Littlemore 721A) and beta (Littlemore 9022) irradiation are located in the small fourth room.

For γ-dosimetry a dosemeter system based on the optical stimulation of Al2O3:C (TLD-500) crystals, as well as portable gamma spectrometers with NaI (Ortec) and LaBr3 (Canberra IN1KL-2 Inspector 1000) crystals are available

More information on luminescence dating can be found here.

Download our leaflet on Luminescence Dating here.

A list of some of the luminescence dating projects of the MPI-EVA can be found here.

Research Areas of the Luminescence Dating Laboratory

This laboratory is intended to provide chronometric ages especially for Palaeolithic sites. The age information which can be deduced from human remains and typological/technological analyses of artefacts is often rather limited. This is especially true for the Middle Palaeolithic, the time of the Neanderthals. Any model on e.g. the disappearance of Neanderthals and the arrival of modern humans in Europe must be based on age estimates of individual archaeological sites. While geological and palaeoclimatological data sometimes provide precise age information, a more accurate age can be determined by chronometric dating methods. Many dating methods are often not applicable, either due to range limitations (e.g. ¹⁴C), or due to the scarcity of material suitable for dating. Luminescence dating methods use either heated material or sediment, which is usually abundant in Palaeolithic sites. These methods thus help provide the framework for the interpretation of human evolution.

We concentrate our research on the 'transitional' periods, when Neanderthals were replaced by anatomically modern humans and when the technological/typological change of Middle to Upper Palaeolithic took place.

Additionally fundamental work is carried out on the improvement of luminescence dating protocols.