Research by anthropologists at the School of Anthropology and Conservation has identified hand-use behaviour in fossil human relatives that is consistent with modern humans.<\/p>\n
The\u00a0human lineage\u00a0can be defined by a\u00a0transition\u00a0in hand use.\u00a0Early human ancestors\u00a0used their hands to\u00a0move around\u00a0in the\u00a0trees, like\u00a0living primates\u00a0do today, whereas\u00a0modern human hands\u00a0have\u00a0evolved\u00a0to primarily perform\u00a0precision grips.<\/p>\n
However, new research led by\u00a0Dr Christopher Dunmore<\/a>,\u00a0Dr Matthew Skinner<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Professor Tracy Kivell <\/a>has revealed that the hand of an\u00a0ancient human relative\u00a0was used for\u00a0both\u00a0human-like\u00a0manipulation\u00a0as well as\u00a0climbing.<\/p>\n Their\u00a0discovery\u00a0came from analysing and comparing the\u00a0internal bony structures\u00a0of fossil knuckle and thumb joints from the\u00a0hands\u00a0of\u00a0several fossil species\u00a0from South Africa, eastern Africa and Europe. These included:\u00a0Australopithecus sediba, Australopithecus africanus, Australopithecus afarensis, Homo neanderthalensis\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0Homo sapiens\u00a0<\/em>dated between\u00a012 thousand\u00a0and\u00a0three million years old.<\/p>\n The\u00a0knuckles\u00a0at the base of\u00a0Australopithecus sediba\u2019s\u00a0<\/em>fingers\u00a0were found to have an internal trabecular structure\u00a0consistent\u00a0with\u00a0branch grasping, but that of their\u00a0thumb joints\u00a0is consistent with\u00a0human-like manipulation. This\u00a0unique combination is different to that found in the other\u00a0Australopithecus<\/em>\u00a0species studied and provides\u00a0direct evidence\u00a0that\u00a0ape-like features\u00a0of this species were\u00a0actually used, probably during climbing. Furthermore, it supports the idea that the transition\u00a0to\u00a0walking on two legs\u00a0was\u00a0gradual\u00a0in this late surviving member of the\u00a0Australopithecus<\/em>\u00a0genus.<\/p>\n Dr Dunmore said, “Internal bone structures are shaped by frequent behaviours\u00a0during life. Therefore, our findings can support\u00a0further research\u00a0into the internal structure of\u00a0hands\u00a0in relation to\u00a0stone-tool use\u00a0and\u00a0production. This approach may also be used to\u00a0investigate\u00a0how other\u00a0fossil hominin species\u00a0moved around and to what degree\u00a0climbing\u00a0might have remained an\u00a0important part\u00a0of their\u00a0lifestyle.”<\/p>\n Professor Kivell commented, “The internal bone structure can reveal hidden evidence\u00a0that gives us\u00a0insight\u00a0into how our fossil human relatives\u00a0behaved. We were really excited to see this particular\u00a0hand-use pattern\u00a0in\u00a0Australopithecus sediba<\/em>\u00a0as it was\u00a0so different\u00a0from other australopiths. The\u00a0fossil record\u00a0is revealing more and more\u00a0diversity\u00a0in the ways our ancestors\u00a0moved\u00a0around, and\u00a0interacted\u00a0with, their\u00a0environments\u00a0\u2013 the\u00a0human evolutionary story is even more\u00a0complex\u00a0and\u00a0interesting than we previously thought.”<\/p>\n The position of\u00a0Australopithecus sediba<\/em> within fossil hominin hand use diversity<\/a> by Christopher J. Dunmore,\u00a0Matthew M. Skinner,\u00a0Ameline Bardo<\/a>,\u00a0Lee R. Berger,\u00a0Jean-Jacques Hublin,\u00a0Dieter H. Pahr,\u00a0Antonio Rosas,\u00a0Nicholas B. Stephens\u00a0&\u00a0Tracy L. Kivell\u00a0is published in Nature Ecology & Evolution. (<\/em>DOI:\u00a0https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1038\/s41559-020-1207-5<\/a>.)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Research by anthropologists at the School of Anthropology and Conservation has identified hand-use behaviour in fossil human relatives that is consistent with modern humans. The\u00a0human … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40284,"featured_media":4928,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[159347,124,70,6600,142272],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4926"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40284"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4926"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4926\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4938,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4926\/revisions\/4938"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/sac-news-events\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}