Diane Doran-Sheehy
Department Chair

Erik R. Seiffert
Director

The Interdepartmental Doctoral Program in Anthropological Sciences (IDPAS), in the College of Arts and Sciences, is an interdisciplinary and interdepartmental program leading to the Ph.D. degree that draws upon faculty and resources from the Departments of Anatomical Sciences, Anthropology, Asian Studies, Geosciences, and History. The goal of the IDPAS is to train students for careers in research and teaching in archaeology, cultural anthropology, and physical anthropology. Students in the Ph.D. program who have already been advanced to candidacy may, upon petition, receive a master’s degree without submitting a master’s thesis.

Extensive laboratory space as well as desk space is available for all graduate students. The archaeology and physical anthropology labs housed in the Department of Anthropology provide facilities for the analysis of artifact collections— especially stone tools and faunal remains, application of remote sensing and Geographic Information Systems (GIS), analysis of primate or human remains, and advanced electron microscopy (EM). Housed in the Department are archaeological collections from Africa, Long Island, the Near East, and South America. A fully equipped preparation lab provides opportunities for state-of-the-art mineralized tissue research.

Outside of the Department of Anthropology, interested students have access to the research facilities for comparative primate morphology, human anatomy, and human and primate evolution housed in the Department of Anatomical Sciences, which are at present unparalleled at any other institution. The collections include primate fossils; primate osteological material from Africa, Asia, and South America; and living nonhuman primates, including New and Old World monkeys and lemurs.

Also in the Department of Anatomical Sciences is a biomechanics lab that includes equipment and facilities for force-plate analysis, high-speed cinematography and cineradiography, and three-dimensional morphometrics, as well as bone strain and telemetered electromyography. Scanning and transmission electron microscope facilities are available elsewhere on campus. Students have access to excellent libraries and collections and to campus computing services. Fieldwork opportunities are available in archaeology, paleontology, and primatology.