Rolfe Mandel, distinguished professor of anthropology at Kansas University, will deliver his inaugural distinguished professor lecture this week.

The lecture, “The Peopling of the Central Great Plains Near the End of the Last Ice Age: A Geoarchaeological and Paleoecological Perspective,” is planned for 5:30 p.m. Thursday in the Summerfield Room of the Adams Alumni Center.

Mandel, who has been at KU since 2003, was named university distinguished professor in 2014. He is senior scientist and executive director of the Odyssey Geoarchaeological Research Program at Kansas Geological Survey and associate chair of the Department of Anthropology.

Over the past 35 years Mandel has worked with archaeologists on projects looking at the effects of geologic processes on the archaeological record throughout the United States and eastern Mediterranean, according to an announcement from KU. Much of his research involved the use of geoscientific methods to search for the earliest evidence of humans in the Great Plains and Midwestern United States.