Dear readers,
The Second Latin-American Radiocarbon Conference (CLARa2) took place from September 4–8, 2023, in Mexico City, Mexico, as part of the celebration of the ten-year anniversary of the National Laboratory of Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (LEMA) of the Institute of Physics at UNAM. The Conference was held at the Templo Mayor Museum with an attendance of about 110 participants from 13 countries.
The Latin American community dedicated to radiocarbon dating has entered a phase of expansion and maturity, driven by new AMS capabilities, the emergence of laboratories, and—above all—the creation of networks that raise standards of quality and collaboration. At the initiative of LACUFF, under the leadership of its director, Kita Macario, the first Latin American Radiocarbon Conference (CLARa1) was held in Niteroi, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from July 29 to August 2, 2019. The objective was to convene, for the first time, researchers from Latin America and representatives of the global radiocarbon community. This decision was a step toward rewriting colonial narratives and positioning Latin America as an indispensable actor in global scientific discussions. Our main objective is to foster a sense of belonging within this regional community, so that we can grow together, enhancing our protagonism, especially when dealing with climate changes and the preservation of our cultural and natural heritage.
CLARa2 confirms the consolidation of this network of laboratories, groups, and early-career researchers that, across diverse institutional contexts, share common standards, challenges, and scientific ambitions. This special issue of Radiocarbon brings together a selection of contributions that reflect this dynamism and, at the same time, demonstrate the breadth of topics in which 14C—measured either by accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) or by scintillation spectrometry—is crucial for addressing questions not only in archaeology, one of the traditional pillars of dating in Latin America, but also in climate change, geosciences, forensics, and AMS methodology itself.
The CLARa2 program consisted of 38 invited talks and a lively poster session with 31 posters covering a large variety of topics in radiocarbon history, including the local perspective of Latin America, radiocarbon dating and pre-Columbian America, hydrology, ocean and reservoir effects, tools and modeling, climate and paleoclimate studies, radiocarbon and environment, earliest human occupations in America, technical aspects about radiocarbon and AMS, AMS and other cosmogenic applications, and one workshop on calibration and modeling of dates using R.
The works compiled here demonstrate advances in pretreatment and quality control, as well as in quantifying and correcting reservoir effects in both marine and continental contexts. Several articles address challenges characteristic of the region—preservation in tropical environments, volcanic influence, complex mixtures of carbon sources, discontinuous chronologies—proposing robust and transparent methodological solutions. Others contribute to high-resolution chronologies for archaeological and palaeoecological sequences, validation of dates through multiproxy approaches, and emerging applications, including the construction and use of archaeometric databases in Latin America.
A constant throughout the contributions is the adoption of best practices: sample traceability, comprehensive reporting of pretreatments, explicit calibration and Bayesian modeling, and data availability. Likewise, there is a clear regional commitment to capacity building and expansion: modernization of facilities, creation of reference collections, and strengthening of intra- and intercontinental partnerships that facilitate access to infrastructure, knowledge transfer, and independent evaluation.
CLARa2 has not only been a forum to present results; it has, above all, been an exercise in community-building. The diversity of sites, periods, and problems addressed coexists with a shared ethic of metrological rigor and openness. We hope this special issue will help make visible the work of a growing collective and serve as a meeting point for future collaborations that deepen—through the power of 14C—our understanding of the past, present and future of Latin America. We thank the authors for their submissions, the reviewers for their diligent assessments, and the institutions that, within the region and beyond, sustain this shared scientific endeavor.
We look forward to seeing everyone at CLARa3 in 2026 (July 8–10). The meeting will be combined with Radiocarbon and Diet IV (July 6–8) and held at the Catholic University of Chile (Pontificia Universidad Católica) in Santiago. The conference organizers are Kita Macario and Francisca Santana Sagredo (14cdiet.clara3@gmail.com).
Corina Solís Rosales & Kita Macario
Guest Editors
Supplementary material
To view supplementary material for this article, please visit https://doi.org/10.1017/RDC.2026.10190
Local organizing committee
Corina Solís, María Rodríguez, Alberto Alcántara, Miguel Ángel Martínez, Daniel Marín, Grisel Méndez and Berenice Flores Montes de Oca.
Scientific committee
Corina Solís, Kita Macario, Carla Carvalho, María Rodríguez Ceja, Maikel Díaz, Luiz Carlos Pessenda, Timothy Jull, Walter Kutschera, Quan Hua, Lorena Becerra Valdivia, Joaquín Arroyo, Maarten Blaaw, Ingrid Chanca, Efraín Chávez, Christine Hatté, Carla Haden.
Sponsors
Instituto de Física, UNAM; Coordinación de la Investigación Científica, UNAM; Museo de Templo Mayor; Fundación UNAM; HVEE EUROPA; Ion Plus; NEC.
Participants
Guillermo
Edgar
Montserrat
Luis Alberto
José Luis
Elton
Santiago
Roberto
Alessandro
Bernardo
Joaquín
Joana
Antônio Expedito Gomes
Francisco Antonio
Adriana
José M.
Lorena
Lucile
McKenzie
Laura E.
Maarten
Eric
David
Ingrid
Rafael
Carla
José
Ingrid
Alexander
David
Chun-Yen
Marcelo
Megan Anne
Daniel
Sophie
Alexandre Barreto
J. Royce
Hudson
Fabio
Elisabetta
Andrey
Jean-Pascal
Marie-Gabrielle
Stewart
Sabrina
Michel
Alexandre
Mateus
Alejandra
Acosta-Ochoa
Alarcón
Alavez Ortúzar
Alcántara Chávez
Alvarado
Alves
Ancapichún
Anjos
Araújo
Arriaza
Arroyo-Cabrales
Artiles
Azevedo
Balcorta Yépez
Barioni
Bastante
Becerra-Valdivia
Beck
Bentley
Beramendi-Orosco
Blaauw
Boëda
Brown
Caffy
Campos
Carvalho
Castelleti
Chanca
Cherkinsky
Chivall
Chou
Cohen
Conger
Contreras
Cornu
Costa
Cox
de Carvalho
Dias
Dixon
Dolgikh
Dumoulin
Durier
Fallon
Farías-Pelayo
Fontugne
Freitas
Freitas
García-Madrigal
Gerd
Jeffrey B.
Doriedson Ferreira
Fabiana
Kevin
Galia
Catriel
Carla S.
Samuel
Christine
Dora
Quan
Matthias
Enrique Ernesto
Renata
AJ Timothy
Jan
Matthias
Marek
Julio
Walter
Dilyara
Christelle
Philippe
Jošt
Renata
Ingeborg
Hong Chun
Zihan
Bruno
Geraldo Marcelo
Bethan
Valerie
José Marques
Karen
Qian
Kita
Evandro
Lucia Angélica
Miguel Ángel
Carmen Grisel
Nikita
Satabdi
Mihály
Vinicius
Luis
Dirk
Marcelo
Vladymir
Danis
Gleixner
Glover
Gomes
Gomes
Gómez-Ensastegui
González-Hernández
Greco
Hadden
Hammer
Hatté
Hsu
Hua
Huels
Jiménez-Antolín
Jou
Jull
Klaput
Klein
Krapiec
Kulemeyer
Kutschera
Kuzina
Lahaye
Lanos
Lavrič
Leite
Levin
Li
Li
Libardoni
Lima
Linscott
Livina
Lopes
López-Arias
Ma
Macario
Magalhães
Magnin
Martínez Carrillo
Méndez García
Mergelov
Misra
Molnár
Moreira
Morett Alatorre
Mous
Muniz
Myglan
Nurgaliev
Claudio
Fabiana Monteiro
Sam
Valeria
Irina
Adrian
Roxana T.
Jacek
Renan
Igor
Antonio
Luiz
Natalia
Gill
Eduardo
Carlos Alberto
Laszlo
Andrzej
Marcos Paulo
Giliane
Ileana-Andreea
Sérvio
Dominique
Amanda D.
Suellen
María
Carmen
Fermín Rafael
Fernando
Naiana Dias
Olaya Cotera
Oliveira
Olvey
Palamarczuk
Panyushkina
Patrut
Patrut
Pawlyta
Pedrosa
Pedroza
Pérez-Balarezo
Pessenda
Petrucci
Plunkett
Queiroz
Quesada
Rakosy
Rakowski
Ramos
Rasbold
Ratiu
Reis
Rissolo
Roberts Thompson
Rocha
Rodríguez Ceja
Rojas Sandoval
Sánchez Aldana Libano
Sánchez-Martínez
Santos
Tárcio Henrique Ribeiro
Rita
Grazia
Sergey
Tzu-Tsen
Dominika
Sylwia
Carlos A
Marc
Karolayne
Igor
Maciej
Corina
Jonas Gregório de
Alexander
Brigitte
Daniel
Susan
Leonardo
Yazmín Rivera
Tamas
Jonatan Hernan
Luciana
Bruno Chávez
Alexa
Karl F.
Damian
Stephan
María Susana
Elya
Maria do Rosário
Santos
Scheel-Ybert
Scognamiglio
Sedov
Shen
Sieczkowska
Siemanowska
Sierra
Sieudat
Silva
Sljusarenko
Sobczyk
Solís Rosales
Souza
Stolz
Strohmaier
Tremmel
Trumbore
Umberger
Uria
Varga
Veliz
Ventura
Vergara
Villavicencio-Queijeiro
von Reden
Wiktorowski
Woodborne
Xelhuantzi-López
Zazovskaya
Zucchi
Conference photos
Conference participants at Mexico City Zócalo.

Conference registration desk.

Fun at LEMA.

Poster Session 1.

Poster Session 2.

Participants at Templo Mayor.

Tour of Templo Mayor Museum.

Lunch at the cave restaurant La Gruta.

Conference group at Teotihuacán.

Night view of the conference dinner.
