Sentences with phrase «says paleoanthropologist»

The Morocco fossils indicate that humankind's emergence involved populations across much of Africa, and started about 100,000 years earlier than previously thought, says paleoanthropologist Jean - Jacques Hublin of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany.

The skulls do share traits with some other fossils in east Asia dating from 600,000 to 100,000 years ago that also defy easy classification, says paleoanthropologist Rick Potts of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. Those features include a broad cranial base where the skull sits atop the spinal column and a low, flat plateau along the top of the skull.

But although the team avoids the word, «everyone else would wonder whether these might be Denisovans,» which are close cousins to Neandertals, says paleoanthropologist Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London.

«This is exactly what the DNA tells us when one tries to make sense of the Denisova discoveries,» says paleoanthropologist Jean - Jacques Hublin of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany.

About half of the 31 copies came from the girl's mother and half from her father, producing a genome «of equivalent quality to a recent human genome,» says paleoanthropologist John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, who was not part of the team.

But these data don't directly measure brain shape, making it difficult to untangle precisely how quickly or slowly human brains became as round as they are today, says paleoanthropologist Christoph Zollikofer of the University of Zurich.

So the discovery of eight ancient bones from another foot is «a really important step in our evolution of the human gait,» says paleoanthropologist Brian Richmond of George Washington University in Washington, D.C., who is not a co-author.

Whatever its name, others agree that the foot is unexpectedly primitive for 3.4 million years ago: «I would have expected such a foot from a much older hominin, not one that overlapped with A. afarensis, which has a much more derived foot than this thing,» says paleoanthropologist Jeremy DeSilva of Boston University, who is not a member of Haile - Selassie's team.

«It is notoriously difficult to identify the species of coprolites,» says paleoanthropologist Michael Richards of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, who studies isotopes in the Neandertal diet.

Paranthropus skulls show that «these guys were chewing machines,» says paleoanthropologist Bernard Wood of George Washington University.

Future studies will be needed to see if this pattern is found just in A. africanus or in other members of Australopithecus as well, says paleoanthropologist Brian Richmond of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City.

«Our provisional family tree shows typically several hominids were living at the same time,» says paleoanthropologist and best - selling author Ian Tattersall.

But fossil evidence of hominid origins in Africa is also sparse and controversial (SN: 4/9/05, p. 227), says paleoanthropologist David Begun of the University of Toronto, a coauthor of Fuss» study.

«Finally,» says paleoanthropologist Bruce Latimer of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, «we can put the mystery hominid at Laetoli to rest.»

For now, there is no way to know whether Graecopithecus jaws and teeth belonged to an ape with some hominid - like features or a hominid with some apelike features, says paleoanthropologist Bernard Wood of George Washington University in Washington, D.C. «My guess is the former.»

Even among early hominids, the number of premolar roots varies enough to raise serious questions about whether Graecopithecus can be classified among them, says paleoanthropologist Yohannes Haile - Selassie of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.

«It's exciting to find Homo sapiens outside of Africa this early,» says paleoanthropologist Shara Bailey of New York University, an expert on early human teeth, who was not involved in the new Misliya cave study.

The new study coincides with previous evidence that Ardi's lower back was flexible enough to support straight - legged walking, says paleoanthropologist Owen Lovejoy of Kent State University in Ohio.

This is a «plausible scenario for the demise of Lucy,» says paleoanthropologist William Jungers of the State University of New York at Stony Brook, who reviewed the paper for Nature.

Still, «it is absolutely essential that the remains be dated,» says paleoanthropologist Curtis Marean of Arizona State University, Tempe.

«Meat eating was a big, significant change,» says paleoanthropologist Robert Foley of the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom.

Most breaks on fossilized bones are «the result of geological processes well after death,» says paleoanthropologist Tim White of the University of California, Berkeley, such as movement in water or soil, tectonic forces, pressure of overlying sediments, and weathering or trampling of fossils as they erode out of sandstone.

«This is astonishingly young for a species that still displays primitive characteristics found in fossils about 2 million years old,» says paleoanthropologist Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London.

But where it really fit in our family tree «hinged on the date,» says paleoanthropologist William Kimbel of Arizona State University in Tempe.

A date would also illuminate whether the fossils represent an ancient population or an isolated relic that persisted until fairly recently, says paleoanthropologist Bernard Wood of George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

«I have a big question mark about the dates,» says paleoanthropologist Randall White of New York University, co-author of a paper published earlier this year in the Bulletin de la Société préhistorique française that challenged the reliability of this dating method.

There's «no evidence» that these or other known species «persisted that late» in mainland Asia, says paleoanthropologist Russell Ciochon of the University of Iowa in Iowa City.

However, the hominin bones have been stored in a safe in the armory and so far show no visible damage, says paleoanthropologist Lorenzo Rook of the University of Florence in Italy, who delivered the letter to the Italian ministry last Friday.

«Ardi seems to have been able to bridge both worlds,» says paleoanthropologist Carol Ward of the University of Missouri in Columbia, who was not part of the team.

Studies of DNA from living Africans, and from the 2,000 - year - old African boy, so far indicate that at least several branches of Homo — some not yet identified by fossils — existed in Africa roughly 300,000 years ago, says paleoanthropologist John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin — Madison, a member of the H. naledi team who refrains from classifying Jebel Irhoud individuals as H. sapiens.

Al Wusta's ancient human fossil — combined with comparably ancient stone tools found at other Arabian Peninsula sites (SN: 4/4/15, p. 16)-- challenges the view that humans left Africa in one or a few major migrations, says paleoanthropologist María Martinόn - Torres.

Despite the age and unprecedented completeness of the new ape skull, no reported tooth or skull features clearly place N. alesi close to the origins of living apes and humans, says paleoanthropologist David Begun of the University of Toronto.

«Sediba is too late to sit on the lineage,» says paleoanthropologist Tim White of the University of California, Berkeley.

None of us expected that,» says paleoanthropologist Michael Westaway of Griffith University, Nathan, in Australia, a co-author on the Willerslev paper.

It also shows that these ancient «populations moved around a lot and intermixed,» says paleoanthropologist Erik Trinkaus of Washington University in St. Louis in Missouri, who is not a co-author.

«What I found fascinating is the interdigitization of the Neandertals and Denisovans — that both groups were in and out of the cave,» says paleoanthropologist Leslie Aiello of the Wenner - Gren Foundation in New York City.

If the new dates for the Spanish cave art are confirmed, they could indicate that Neandertals and H. sapiens exchanged artistic traditions earlier than previously thought, says paleoanthropologist Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London, who was not involved in the studies.

«This is a real lineage, and we have to work out what the hell it looks like,» says paleoanthropologist Bernard Wood of George Washington University in Washington.

Crocodile bites damage animal bones in virtually the same ways that stone tools do, say paleoanthropologist Yonatan Sahle of the University of Tübingen in Germany and his colleagues.

Efforts are under way to date the fossils and sediment from which they were excavated with a variety of techniques, said paleoanthropologist John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin — Madison.

«This is a momentous and well - researched discovery,» said paleoanthropologist Bernard Wood of George Washington University, who was not involved in the study.

Not exact matches

«If you're going to walk into someone else's territory, you want to signal that you're a friend, not a foe,» says George Washington University paleoanthropologist Alison Brooks.

Tim White, a paleoanthropologist not connected to the project, says the findings were published too early, with too much left unknown — including the age of the fossils and whether concrete evidence for the intentional placement of the dead exists.

But A. deyiremeda and its neighbors do indicate that hominins with ape - size brains had developed successful adaptations to different environments, says the study's lead author Yohannes Haile - Selassie, a paleoanthropologist at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.

Others, like William Jungers, a paleoanthropologist at Stony Brook University, say there isn't enough evidence to confirm that H. naledi is necessarily a new species.

«You need to point out to them that this is inappropriate,» said Fred Smith, a paleoanthropologist at Illinois State University in Normal.

Yet other paleoanthropologists say the picture is even more complex than crocs versus tools.

«I think basically everyone in zooarchaeology knows there's a problem with cutmarks,» says David Braun, a paleoanthropologist at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., who wasn't involved in the study.

Manuel Domínguez - Rodrigo, a paleoanthropologist at the Complutense University of Madrid, says that in his own analysis of the Dikika bones, he found micro-abrasions along the bones» surface and intersecting striations within grooves, textures that suggest neither crocodile bites nor stone - tool cuts, but instead damage by animal trampling.

Paleoanthropologists know a lot more about cutmarks now than they did 20 years ago precisely because bold claims about Australopithecine butchers thrust the research into the spotlight, he says.