The archaeosciences expertise unit works on plant, animal, human remains and sediments from archaeological sites in Belgium. These analyses are carried out in the framework of conventions with the Walloon Region and the Brussels Capital Region.

In particular this includes the following tasks:

1. to conduct analyses of organic remains and sediments from excavations under the auspices of Walloon and Brussels Capital Regions;
2. to interpret and integrate the results of those analyses in the framework of the available palaeoenvironmental and archaeological evidence from those sites;
3. to contribute to the publications, exhibitions and further forms of dissemination of the results, in close collaboration with the archaeologists and other specialists involved.

This expertise related research is part of the broad interdisciplinary topics in the research programmes of the Directorate Earth and History of Life, and in particular the integration of archaeological and historical sources with evidence from natural sciences. This approach allows reconstructing the past subsistence, lifestyle, cultural, ritual and religious practices, demography, health, past biodiversity and its change through time, paleoenvironment, land use and human induced landscape change. Collaboration with specialists of other expertise centers are also developed (CReA-Patrimoine, KIK/IRPA, CAS,…).

At request of the archaeologists, the archaeosciences specialists from the RBINS take part in field campaigns to give advice amongst others on the sampling strategies. In this respect, manuals for best field practices in environmental archaeology and sampling are developed.