Marc Chapuis is a PhD student in History of the Exact Sciences in Antiquity. After learning Latin and Ancient Greek while writing his PhD in mathematics at the University Paris VI (defended in 2017), he got degrees in Indian Studies at Paris III (where he learned Sanskrit and Prakrit) and in Chinese Studies at the INALCO. His interests include ancient astronomy and mathematics, religious studies, and social history throughout the pre-modern world with a particular focus on Tang Dynasty China.

Christopher is a PhD student in Egyptology.  He graduated summa cum laude with honors in both History and Classics from Whitman College in 2018. His thesis argued that anti-black racism existed in the ancient Greco-Roman world and is connected to racism found in the West during and after the Transatlantic Slave Trade. His research interests include ethnicity and race in ancient Egypt and reframing ancient Egypt as an ancient African civilization.

Johanna Garzon is a Ph.D. student in History of the Exact Sciences in Antiquity. Johanna pursued studies in both Astronomy and Literature at the National University of La Plata and graduated in 2021 with a thesis on mythology in Aratus' Phenomena which led to a number of publications. As she was pursuing her studies, Johanna was involved in numerous projects linked to her interests in the intersection of Science, Language, History, and Culture through which she could serve her broader communities. Johanna participated in Anthropological work in the Gran Chaco, trained instructors in the vulgarization of astronomy, and served as a member of the Department of Hellenistic Studies in La Plata. Now at Brown, Johanna plans to pursue work engaging her interests in the development of astronomy during the early Hellenistic period.

Erica is a Ph.D. student in History of Science. She earned an M.A. in Social Science with a History of Science focus from the University of Chicago, an M.A. in Linguistics and Graduate Certificate in Artificial Intelligence from Eastern Michigan University, and a B.A. in Classical Languages from the College of Wooster. Her research focuses on how the language we use to describe scientific knowledge and advancements changes over time, particularly as it is expressed through metaphor. She also works with NASA Langley Research Center on linguistic analysis to evaluate human/autonomous system teaming and interface design to aid in trusted autonomy. In her spare time, she trains for the circus.

Jonathan is a 4th year PhD student in Assyriology. He is a 2019 graduate of Grove City College, where he majored in History and had the opportunity to participate in archeological conservation projects in Sardinia and central Italy. His chief area of interest is first millennium BC Mesopotamia, particularly the Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian Empires. His topics of interest include history writing and historical memory in the ancient Near East, the relationship between Mesopotamian scholarly communities and imperial administration, wisdom literature, ancient warfare, and interconnections between Mesopotamia and the Biblical and classical worlds. More broadly, he is also interested in the afterlife of cuneiform culture in the Late Antique and early medieval Near East, and the role Near Eastern empires played in the development of Western historiography through the perspectives of both later historians and travelers to the region.

Rafa is a Ph.D. candidate in Egyptology. He holds an M.A. degree in Egyptology from the Autonomous University of Barcelona and an M.Sc. degree in Industrial Engineering from the University of Navarra. His M.A. thesis focused on how the Demotic tales of Setne Khaemwaset reflect the Egyptians’ perception of their own relationship with the divine world. His research interests center on how the cultural contacts between Egypt and other ancient Near Eastern civilizations during the second half of the first century BCE transcended into the ideological and literary spheres.

Rafa’s dissertation will analyze a Demotic historiographic text —the so-called "Demotic Chronicle"— and investigate its modes and methods of constructing an image of the past. On a second step, the literary characteristics and compositional strategies of this text will be compared to exemplary historiographic-narrative and apocalyptic works in the Hebrew Bible from the Second Temple period (such as the work of the Chronicler and the Book of Daniel). Rafa’s work is part of the ERC-funded project: From Texts to Literature: Demotic Egyptian Papyri and the Formation of the Hebrew Bible (DEMBIB), hosted at the Humboldt University of Berlin.