Field Research in the Middle Awash Valley, Ethiopia

埃塞俄比亚阿瓦什河谷中部的实地研究

• 批准号: 9910344
• 负责人: Tim White
• 金额: $ 63.19万
• 依托单位: University of California-Berkeley
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2000
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2000-07-01 至 2007-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9910344&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Field; Research; Middle; Awash; Valley

The research involves paleoanthropological fieldwork conducted in Ethiopia's Afar Depression. The Middle Awash research project is a multidisciplinary, international effort to help illuminate the origin and evolution of human ancestors and close relatives during the past six million years. The research project gives priority to placing archaeological and paleontological discoveries within accurate time-stratigraphic and paleoenvironmental contexts. The Middle Awash is a tectonically active segment of the African rift system. This study area offers a patchwork of sediments exposed by tectonic action and erosion, and calibrated by interbedded volcanic horizons. This unique set of geological circumstances allows the project to simultaneously explore different time horizons, and to generate data bearing on different aspects of human origins and evolution. The study area has yielded fossil hominoid remains spanning five million years; a longer record than is available anywhere else on earth. Six species in three hominid genera have already been discovered here, and every stage of paleolithic technological development is represented. The project's field investigations can be loosely divided into three stages for each major fossiliferous sedimentary package. First, exploration identifies and constrains the package. Geologists attempt to link it chronologically with other sites, and with the record of global climatic change embedded in cores of contemporary marine sediment taken from the floor of the adjacent Gulf of Aden. Next, focused research establishes the contents and chronostratigraphic relationships within each sediment package, generating much primary data in the form of rock samples, fossils, and artifacts. Finally, long-term management of each major exposed sedimentary package allows additional fossil and artifact recovery as erosion and excavation continue. Research funded by the current proposal will represent the final stage of overall exploration in the study area. Focused research is targeted on sedimentary packages in the critical c. 5.2 myr, c. 2.5 myr, and 1.0 million-year-old periods. Management of adjacent, already proven localities will provide additional data.

这项研究涉及在埃塞俄比亚阿法尔洼地进行的古人类学实地考察。 中阿瓦什研究项目是一项多学科的国际努力，旨在帮助阐明过去600万年来人类祖先和近亲的起源和进化。 该研究项目优先考虑将考古和古生物学发现置于准确的时间地层和古环境背景下。 中阿瓦什是非洲裂谷系的构造活动段。 该研究区提供了一个由构造作用和侵蚀暴露的沉积物的拼凑，并通过层间火山层位进行校准。 这套独特的地质环境使该项目能够同时探索不同的时间范围，并生成与人类起源和进化不同方面有关的数据。 研究区域已经产生了跨越500万年的化石类人猿遗骸;这是地球上其他任何地方都无法获得的更长的记录。 这里已经发现了三个属的六个物种，旧石器时代技术发展的每个阶段都有代表。 该项目的实地调查可以大致分为三个阶段，每个主要的含油气沉积包。 首先，探索识别和约束包。 地质学家试图将它与其他遗址按时间顺序联系起来，并与从邻近的亚丁湾海底采集的当代海洋沉积物核心中嵌入的全球气候变化记录联系起来。 接下来，重点研究建立每个沉积物包内的内容和年代地层关系，以岩石样品，化石和人工制品的形式产生许多原始数据。 最后，随着侵蚀和挖掘的继续，对每个主要暴露沉积物包的长期管理允许更多的化石和人工制品恢复。 本提案资助的研究将是研究区域全面勘探的最后阶段。 重点研究的是沉积包在关键c。5.2迈尔角2.5 MYR和100万年的周期。 对邻近的、已经证实的地点进行管理将提供更多的数据。