WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (AP): A Purdue University archaeologist is returning to Africa to resume excavating ancient burial tombs in the Nile River Valley that her team began unearthing last year.

Associate anthropology professor Michele Buzon will leave next week for Sudan for excavations that will continue through early March in the Nubian Desert in northeastern Africa.

She’ll be working with Purdue graduate students and others to excavate tombs built about 3,000 years ago. Buzon, who’s a bioarchaeologist, says the site they’re exploring appears to have three large chambers.

Their work is shedding light on the relationship between the Egyptians and Nubians during the New Kingdom Empire. Egyptians colonized the area to access Nile River trade routes.

Buzon is making her sixth trip to the Nubian Desert in far northern Sudan.