About the Centre

The Centre for Human Evolutionary Studies was established in the University of Cambridge in 2000 to promote research in human evolution and diversity. The Centre was founded by Robert Foley and Marta Mirazon Lahr, and funded by a £5.1M award from the Wellcome Trust through its Scientific Research Infrastructure Fund. Further funding came from the American Friends of the University of Cambridge, and the University of Cambridge. In 2001 the Leverhulme Trust gave a £2.1M grant to support research into human evolution and development for ten years to the Centre and the Department of Zoology, and in recognition of this the Centre became known as the Leverhulme Centre for Human Evolutionary Studies (LCHES). In December 2005, the Centre moved into its own dedicated building (the Henry Wellcome Building) in Fitzwilliam Street, central Cambridge. The modern building provides laboratory facilities, housing for the Duckworth Collection, office and seminar space. LCHES has strong links with other institutions within the University of Cambridge, especially the sub-Department of Animal Behaviour, and the Faculty of Archaeology and Anthropology of which it is an integral part. It was opened in 2006 by the renowned palaeoanthropologist, Richard Leakey, FRS.

The focus of research in LCHES is the integration of biological, anthropological and archaeological approaches to the study of human evolution and human diversity. It grew out of the work of the King's College Research Centre project on the Evolution of Human Diversity. Its central theme is that human evolution must be studied within an integrated multidisciplinary framework. From anthropology and archaeology comes both the classical approaches relating to evolutionary history, phenotypic variation and the evolution of behaviour; from biology comes the emerging techniques of molecular genetics and an increasing understanding of the genetic and environmental mechanisms of development, as well as an increasingly powerful array of techniques for measuring phenotypes, while from an evolutionary paradigm comes the emphasis on interpreting biological variation in humans within the environmental context - both natural and cultural - within which evolution occurred. LCHES research includes projects on morphological and behavioural evolution, life history, archaeological excavations, surveys and analyses, human genetic and developmental diversity, as well as human behavioural ecology, with a particular emphasis on exploring human evolution as both a historical event and the product of evolutionary processes. The aim of the Centre is to act as the means by which researchers in many fields can develop projects that explore the nature of the human species and its diversity.

In addition to its research strategy, the Centre also houses the Duckworth Laboratory, which is one of the major human biological collections in the world, and is available for application to study from scientists around the world. The development of this as an archive of human diversity for wide ranging research was a major element in the establishment of the Centre.

Members of the Centre are involved in undergraduate teaching and graduate supervision in the Department of Biological Anthropology and Faculty of Archaeology and Anthropology.