Omics studies have gained an ever increasing foothold in archaeology over the last couple of decades. Today, many areas of research are profiting from aDNA contributions, or have seen proteomic or lipidomic approaches of some type. While metabolomics also belong to this group of biomolecular methodologies, direct archaeological applications remain scarce, specifically in North America. In this talk, I will synthesize the potential and challenges of archaeometabolomics from the perspective of someone invested in ethnopharmacology and evolutionary medicine. I will also draw from our group's recent projects to discuss unexpected research results and their implications in terms of the direction of ongoing and future work.
