After several months of lockdown, labs have slowly started to reopen. It has been great to get back to work on microwear analysis training and assessment of awls. My work has been focusing on analysis of some of the awls I've been using to create an experimental reference collection. The reference collection is composed of stone awls used for drilling different materials, with reference to Star Carr awls and the types of wear that have been recorded on the awls in previous studies. As the project progresses, the reference collection will be expanded further and a larger sample of awls from Star Carr will be analysed informed by this reference material.

Jess Bates and I have been working on the analysis and the microwear results of some of the experimental awls has been really interesting and informative so far. The results of experiments and microwear analysis will be intergrated int oa new paper abou the production of beads at Star Carr.