معرفی
Kristina Reetz is a doctoral researcher at the Curt Engelhorn Center for Archaeometry (CEZA) specializing in Soil Geography and Biomarker Analysis. Born in 1986 in Hattingen, she studied geography at Johannes Gutenberg University (JGU), completing her Abitur in 2011 and earning her university degree in 2018. She is currently pursuing her doctorate while employed at CEZA, where she uses radiocarbon dating and biomarker analysis to investigate historical environmental changes.
Her educational journey began with undergraduate studies at JGU, where she discovered her passion for biomarkers. She describes her work as combining 'Potions and Defense Against the Dark Arts,' reflecting the chemical nature of her research. Her methodology involves wet-chemical analysis of soil and sediment samples to isolate specific biomarkers, with particular focus on lake sediments as environmental archives.
Kristina's research examines how vegetation has changed throughout history, identifies animal and human presence through fecal biomarkers, and analyzes human impacts on past environments. She specializes in component-specific radiocarbon dating of n-alkanes (for vegetation reconstruction) and steroids (including Δ5-sterols, stanols, stanones, and bile acids) to detect biological remains in archaeological contexts.
Her professional affiliations include the German Soil Science Society, CSRA Community, and Scientists for Future Mainz-Wiesbaden. She actively supports STEM education through the 'Discover Chemistry' competition for schoolgirls and advocates for women in science.
In her daily work, Kristina balances laboratory analysis (troubleshooting equipment, preparing samples, interpreting chromatograms) with desk work (data analysis, writing). She values both the technical aspects of lab work and the intellectual challenges of data interpretation, finding particular satisfaction when her analytical equipment functions properly and when she can clearly identify molecular peaks in chromatograms.
