Paleoanthropology of the Kibish Formation, Ethiopia

在过去的十年里，人类进化中没有一个话题比解剖学上的现代人的起源更吸引公众和研究界的关注。它已经成为许多会议和编辑卷的主题，并吸引了广泛学科的科学家的关注和努力，包括地质学，古生物学，考古学，遗传学以及古人类学家。该项目将通过澄清几十年前收集的一系列化石的时间位置，为这一问题提供重要的新信息，这些化石已成为非洲解剖学上早期现代人出现的重要文件，并将为过去13万年东非环境和动物变化提供一个广泛的框架。鉴于之前在基比什地层的发现和未开发矿床的范围，该项目有可能在这一关键时期提供新的现代人骨骼和考古遗迹，这一时期涉及我们物种的重大文化进步，可能还有认知进步。由地质学家、地质年代学家、古生物学家和考古学家组成的考察队将于1999年1月和2月进行为期两个月的实地考察。这项研究的目的是澄清先前收集的基比什组原始人类遗骸的地层学，并通过收集和随后对可测材料（包括火山灰、木材或动物遗骸）的分析，巩固不同成员的年龄，并调查新的古生物学和考古遗址。

In the past ten years, no topic in human evolution that has attracted more attention from both the public and the research community than the origin of anatomically modern humans. It has been the subject of numerous conferences and edited volumes and has attracted the attention and efforts of scientists in a wide range of disciplines, including geology, paleontology, archeology, and genetics as well as paleoanthropologists. This project will contribute important new information to this issue by clarifying the chronometric position of a series of fossils collected several decades ago that have become critical documentation for an early appearance of anatomically modern humans in Africa, and will provide a broad framework for environmental and faunal change in East Africa during the past 130,000 years. In view of the previous finds from the Kibish Formation and the extent of unexplored deposits, this project has the potential of providing new skeletal and archeological remains of modern humans during this critical time period that involved major cultural, and probably cognitive, advances in our species. A two month field season will be undertaken in January and February of 1999 with team composed of geologists, geochronologists, paleontologists and archeologists. The goals of this research will be to clarify the stratigraphy of previously collected hominid remains from the Kibish Formation and solidify the age of the different members through collection and subsequent analysis of datable materials, including volcanic ashes, wood or animal remains, and to survey for new paleontological and archeological sites.