Engaging with Biological Anthropology Lab Activities

Dr. Melissa A. Clark is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Cuyahoga Community College in the School of Liberal Arts and Sciences. She has over a decade of fieldwork and teaching experience, having taught at numerous community colleges and four-year institutions before accepting her dream job in her hometown of Cleveland, Ohio.  

Melissa earned two bachelor’s degrees from The Ohio State University in 2013: one in Anthropology and the other in International Studies. She earned her MSc in Osteology and Paleopathology at the University of Bradford under the mentorship of Dr. Julia Beaumont and Jo Buckberry. She returned to OSU in 2016 and graduated with her PhD in Anthropology and graduate minor in University College and Teaching in May 2020 under the mentorship of Dr. Debbie Guatelli-Steinberg and Mark Hubbe. She is currently pursuing an urban archaeology project in Cleveland, collaborating with local experts in anthropology, history, geography, mathematics, and health sciences.  

Dr. Emma M. Lagan is a postdoctoral scholar at The Ohio State University where her background in bioarchaeology helps her complete repatriation of ancestral human remains to descendant communities (NAGPRA). Emma's dental anthropology research considers the relationship between dental wear (at microscopic and macroscopic levels), diet, and social relationships; currently, she is asking these questions of baboon samples both modern and nearly a century old. Emma is also interested in exploring visual means of communicating anthropology, and is excited to bring some of these contributions to this manual.

Dr. Mackie C. O'Hara is an Assistant Teaching Professor of Biology at Ball State University. Mackie earned her Bachelor's in Anthropology from University of Arkansas at Little Rock in 2014 and her master's and PhD in Anthropology at The Ohio State University in 2016 and 2021, respectively. As a biological anthropologist and evolutionary biologist specializing in the biology of human and primate teeth, Mackie's research provides a unique lens for understanding biology at multiple scales—from individual life histories to population-level adaptations across evolutionary time, with teeth serving as extraordinary windows into human development and adaptation.

Dr. Mark Hubbe is the Head of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Tennessee – Knoxville. His research program draws from a strong quantitative and evolutionary framework and is structured around wide interdisciplinary collaborative networks with colleagues and students from the US, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, and Germany. His work spans a broad range of topics, including the early peopling of South America, the evolution of cranial morphology within the genus Homo, and the study of frailty and stress in past populations.

Dr. Douglas E. Crews is a Professor in the Department of Anthropology at The Ohio State University. As a biological anthropologist and human biologist, he has explored allostatic load, frailty, health, stressor responses, and patterns of survival across ecological and sociocultural settings, including Samoa, Japan, Kuwait, Poland, and the United States. His current research includes developing and applying frailty indices to examine health and stress among ancient human remains and both allostatic load and frailty among older adults residing in Poland and Japan.