CV in Brief

W. Christopher Carleton, Ph.D

Senior Scientist Website: wccarleton.github.io
Coevolution of Land Use and Urbanisation GitHub: github.com/wccarleton
Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology Email: carleton@gea.mpg.de
Kahlaische Str. 10 ORCID: 0000-0001-7463-8638
07745 Jena, Germany Google Scholar: 0ZG-6CsAAAAJ

Profile

Archaeologist and data scientist developing quantitative, spatial, and computational approaches for long-term human-environment records. Current work focuses on comparative urbanism, archaeological data science, remote sensing, Bayesian/time-series modelling, and open scientific software.

Outputs and Awards

  • 36 peer-reviewed publications (16 as first author) in top journals including Nature, Nature Cities, and Nature Communications
  • $368,250 CAD in awards, fellowships, and grants
  • 2017-2019 Human Evolutionary Studies Program Post-Doctoral Fellowship, Simon Fraser University ($90,000 CAD)
  • 2016 Mitacs PhD Fellowship, Simon Fraser University and the University of British Columbia ($60,000 CAD)
  • 2011-2014 SSHRC Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship ($105,000 CAD)

Expertise

Archaeological data science | Spatial analysis | Remote sensing | Bayesian modelling | Time-series analysis | Agent-based modelling | R | Python | Bash

Education

  • 2017: PhD in Archaeology, Simon Fraser University
  • 2010: MA in Anthropology, Trent University
  • 2005: BA Honours in Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology, University of Saskatchewan

Selected Recent Publications

  • Carleton, W.C., et al. (2026) Bayesian modelling of the latent human influence field in archaeological urban sediments at Koh Ker, Cambodia. Journal of Archaeological Science, 193, 106663. DOI: 10.1016/j.jas.2026.106663
  • Carleton, W.C., et al. (2026) Comparative Spatial Analysis Reveals Important Structural Similarities Between Ancient Angkor and Late Anglo-Saxon Hampshire. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory. DOI: 10.1007/s10816-026-09798-w
  • Carleton, W.C., et al. (2026) Making comparative archaeological and historical urbanism rigorous and open access through the URBank data platform. Antiquity, 1-7. DOI: 10.15184/aqy.2026.10287
  • Scerri, E.M.L., … Carleton, W.C., … et al. (2025) Hunter-gatherer sea voyages extended to remotest Mediterranean islands. Nature, 641, 137-143. DOI: 10.1038/s41586-025-08780-y
  • Carleton, W.C., et al. (2025) Parallel scaling of elite wealth in ancient Roman and modern cities with implications for understanding urban inequality. Nature Cities. DOI: 10.1038/s44284-025-00213-1
  • Stewart, M., Carleton, W.C., et al. (2025) The state of the late Quaternary megafauna extinction debate: a systematic review and analysis. Frontiers in Mammal Science, 4, 1678231. DOI: 10.3389/fmamm.2025.1678231
  • Carleton, W., et al. (2023) Bayesian regression versus machine learning for rapid age estimation of archaeological features identified in lidar scans at Angkor. Scientific Reports. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-44875-0
  • Carleton, W., Groucutt, H. (2020) Sum things are not what they seem: Problems with point-wise interpretations and quantitative analyses of proxies based on aggregated radiocarbon dates. The Holocene. DOI: 10.1177/0959683620981700