Contacts
Laura Kooistra
Laura I. Kooistra graduated in 1985 at the University of Leiden with a Master of Science in biology with the specialization in palaeoethnobotany and palynology.
Her current field of work and research is archaeobotany, palynology, palaeoecology and forensic botany. She is specialized in macro- and microfossil, wood and charcoal analysis. Laura is particularly interested in the relation between men and landscape in the past with much of her research committed to the (pre)history of agriculture, food economy and land use.
In 1996 she defended her PhD dissertation at the University of Leiden. Her PhD study was focused on the possibilities and limitations of agriculture in the Kromme Rijn area (in the Netherlands) and in the loess region north of the Ardennes and the Eifel during the Roman Period and Early Middle Ages. Laura’s PhD work was supported by a research grant that she was awarded in 1989 by the Foundation for Archaeological Research (ARCHON), financed by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO).
Prior to her PhD study, she had worked on free-lance bases for the municipal archaeological services in 's-Gravenhage and Rotterdam. Between 1986 and 1989 she was working for the State Service for Archaeological Investigations in the Netherlands (ROB) in Amersfoort. Her research work was focused on botanical material from two archaeological sites in Voerendaal-Ten Hove and Houten-Tiellandt. In 1985 she completed wood and charcoal course in Eidgenössische Anstalt für das Forstliche Versuchswesen, Birmensdorf, Zwitserland lectured by Dr. W. Shoch and Prof. dr. F.H. Schweingruber.
Between 1996 and 2002 she was a Secretary of the Dutch Association of Palynologists. Since 1996 she is associated with the Netherlands School of Archaeological Research (ARCHON).
Since 1994 she is a partner in BIAX Consult.
