ArticlePloS one2023
The ROCEEH Out of Africa Database (ROAD): A large-scale research database serves as an indispensable tool for human evolutionary studies.
Article in PloS one, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 11 papers.
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Who cites it
11 citing papers in PubMed.
- The European Upper Palaeolithic Palaeoecological and Archaeological Dataset for sites north of 50°N.Scientific data · 2026Article
- Pan-African model explainsbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Specialised and persistent raw material procurement by humans in the Middle Pleistocene.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Archaeogenetic insights into the demographic history of Late Neanderthals.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- roadDB: An R package for exploring early human prehistory and environments with the ROCEEH Out of Africa Database.PloS one · 2026Article
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- 3.3 million years of stone tool complexity suggests that cumulative culture began during the Middle Pleistocene.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
- Diversity-dependent speciation and extinction in hominins.Nature ecology & evolution · 2024Article
- The Neanderthal niche space of Western Eurasia 145 ka to 30 ka ago.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- A pan-European dataset revealing variability in lithic technology, toolkits, and artefact shapes ~15-11 kya.Scientific data · 2023Article
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15 authors.
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Abstract
Large scale databases are critical for helping scientists decipher long-term patterns in human evolution. This paper describes the conception and development of such a research database and illustrates how big data can be harnessed to formulate new ideas about the past. The Role of Culture in Early Expansions of Humans (ROCEEH) is a transdisciplinary research center whose aim is to study the origins of culture and the multifaceted aspects of human expansions across Africa and Eurasia over the last three million years. To support its research, the ROCEEH team developed an online tool named the ROCEEH Out of Africa Database (ROAD) and implemented its web-based applications. ROAD integrates geographical data as well as archaeological, paleoanthropological, paleontological and paleobotanical content within a robust chronological framework. In fact, a unique feature of ROAD is its ability to dynamically link scientific data both spatially and temporally, thereby allowing its reuse in ways that were not originally conceived. The data stem from published sources spanning the last 150 years, including those generated by the research team. Descriptions of these data rely on the development of a standardized vocabulary and profit from online explanations of each table and attribute. By synthesizing legacy data, ROAD facilitates the reuse of heritage data in novel ways. Database queries yield structured information in a variety of interoperable formats. By visualizing data on maps, users can explore this vast dataset and develop their own theories. By downloading data, users can conduct further quantitative analyses, for example with Geographic Information Systems, modeling programs and artificial intelligence. In this paper, we demonstrate the innovative nature of ROAD and show how it helps scientists studying human evolution to access datasets from different fields, thereby connecting the social and natural sciences. Because it permits the reuse of "old" data in new ways, ROAD is now an indispensable tool for researchers of human evolution and paleogeography.
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