One review of the more recent evidence is from a popular science article in Scie
ID: 85279 • Letter: O
Question
One review of the more recent evidence is from a popular science article in Scientific American: “New Evidence of Mysterious Homo naledi Raises Questions about How Humans Evolved:
The much-anticipated dating of the enigmatic species, along with stunning new fossils, challenge key assumptions about human evolution.”
Read Article:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/new-evidence-of-mysterious-homo-naledi-raises-questions-about-how-humans-evolved/
1) Imagine you have just received a million-dollar grant from NSF. You proposed to collect multiple lines of evidence from the new H. naledi fossils found in an adjacent cave in the Rising Star Complex (referred to in the Scientific American article cited above.) Tell me
a) What data you would collect to verify the age of the fossils
b) What other fossil information you would try to collect to learn more about this hominin, and
c) Describe at least one hypothesis you want to explore to place H. naledi in a phylogeny of hominin evolution. (Be specific. Think about how phylogenies are developed and what they can tell us about selection.)
Explanation / Answer
a) The age of the fossil can be detrmined using:
Stratigraphy:The study of rock layer and layering process.if fossil is found between two layers of rocks whose age is known the fossil age is thought between there two known ages.
Biostratigraphy:enables to match rockswith particular fossil to other rock with those fossil to determine age.
Radiocarbon Dating:is the method to determine the age of the fossilcontaing organic material by using properties of radio active isotope of carbon C14.
b)Homo Naledi lives in Africa between 236,000 and 335,000 years ago.The fossil information about its wrist bone and thumb,brain size,jaw line,finger bones,carnio dental charecters etc should be collected to get more information.
c)Phylogenies are hypothesis based on indirect evidence.The species feet shares features with modern human foot well adapted for walking and standing.they had delicate bone of the inner eye segment and nose.average height was around 5 feet.Brain size is 1/3 of the size of human brain.They may have stored the dead suggesting that they were intelligent species.
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