Greek Biologist and Professor of Paleoanthropology Katerina Harvati-Papatheodorou was nominated was awarded the most important research prize in Germany, the "Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize", for her research on Homo neanderthalensis and their behavior.

The research prize, which comes with 2.5m euros, will be given to ten scientists. Katerina Harvati, Professor of Paleoanthropology at the Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment at the University of Tübingen, is considered a pioneer in her field.

Her research provided new insights into the processes of human evolution and a new perspective on Neanderthals and their behavioral repertoire. Harvati has taken a decisive step in the study of human fossils by combining the field research with the latest technology of technical imaging with the help of 3D morphology. In this way, she contributed to the clarification of the kinship of the Neanderthal man, but also to the description and analysis of the first anatomically modern humans.

Her contribution to the Paleoanthropology of Greece is also very important. Until recently, Neanderthals were thought to have lived alone in Europe until 60,000 years ago, when anatomically modern humans arrived from Africa and contributed to their extinction. Only an international team of researchers, led by the distinguished Greek Paleoanthropologist, digitally reconstructed the two skulls at the site of Apidima (cave), west of Areopolis in Western Mani in the Southern Peloponnese, made comparisons with other high-quality human fossils, and used a high definition radiometric method of dating in order to redefine the age of the two skulls. The skull named “Apidima 2” dates back over 170 thousand years and has Neanderthal features. Therefore, its initial classification in the species H. neanderthalensis was confirmed.

On the contrary, "Apidima 1" dates back more than 210 thousand years and presents a mixture of modern human and primitive features, referring to an early member of the H. sapiens. This is the oldest modern man outside Africa, transporting the arrival of Homo sapiens in Europe more than 150 thousand years earlier than what we thought!

Katerina Harvati-Papatheodorou goes through the steps you need to take in order to conduct a good excavation methodology.