Early Human Occupation of the Tibetan Plateau and the Development of High Altitude Adaptations

早期人类对青藏高原的占领和高海拔适应的发展

• 批准号: 0841435
• 负责人: P Jeffrey Brantingham
• 金额: $ 19.01万
• 依托单位: University of California-Los Angeles
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-01-01 至 2012-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0841435&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Early; Human; Occupation; Tibetan; Plateau

With National Science Foundation support, Dr. P. Jeffrey Brantingham and a team of U.S. and Chinese scientists will conduct three years of archaeological and paleoenvironmental research on the northern margins of the Qinghai Tibet Plateau. Genetic studies of contemporary Tibetans and stone tools found in surface archaeological settings have been used to suggest that human foragers first colonized of the Plateau environment as early as 30,000 year ago. Recent evidence collected by the research team suggests, however, that human humans first ventured into the high elevation areas, in excess of 3000m above sea level, as recently as 15,000 years BP, and possibly did not permanently occupy the Plateau until around 8000 BP. The late colonization of the Qinghai Tibet Plateau stands in sharp contrast to the early movement of people into other extreme environments such as the Gobi desert and high arctic at 40,000 BP, which researchers generally attribute to an expanded biogeographic capacity among early anatomically modern humans. The goal of the current project is to understanding the processes driving initial human colonization of the northern Qinghai Tibet Plateau and establish why the timing and characteristics of colonization differed so markedly.Dr. Brantingham hypothesizes that colonization of the Qinghai Tibet Plateau occurred in several phases and was driven by a combination of social and environmental pressures. Late Upper Paleolithic foragers first occupied the margins of the northern Plateau during the late Pleistocene (15,000-11,000 BP) only seasonally, relying on cultural adaptations developed in low elevation environments surrounding the Plateau. During the early Holocene (8200-6400 BP), competitive displacement by low-elevation sedentary farming communities forced foragers to permanently occupy high elevation areas and established conditions sufficient for the evolution of pastoralism based on mutualistic relationships with farmers in low-elevation environments. The team will test these hypotheses using a combination of field survey and excavation, anchored by an intensive geochronological dating program. A series of buried sites on the upper margins of the northeast Qinghai Tibet Plateau are known to span the critical 15,000-5,000 BP period when the basic characteristics of modern adaptations on the Plateau developed. Excavation of these sites will allow characterization of the adaptive strategies that facilitated successful colonization. Survey in the surrounding areas will allow us to characterize the accompanying land use patterns.The intellectual merit of the project will be to offer new insights into the relative roles of biogeographic constraints and competitive/mutualistic processes in driving human population movements and the emergence of radically new adaptive strategies such as pastoralism. The results will therefore be relevant to broader questions surrounding the origin and spread of modern humans and the development of complex social and economic adaptations.The research explicitly supports broader positive societal impacts by fostering long-term international scientific collaborations, delivering quality graduate educational experiences to the next generation of American and Chinese archaeologists, and expanding knowledge about our own species' broad history and adaptive capacities to public and professional audiences.

在美国国家科学基金会的支持下，P. Jeffrey Brantingham博士和一个由美国和中国科学家组成的团队将对青藏高原北方边缘进行为期三年的考古和古环境研究。 对当代藏人的遗传学研究和在地表考古环境中发现的石器工具表明，早在3万年前，人类觅食者就首次在高原环境中定居。 然而，研究小组最近收集的证据表明，人类首次冒险进入海拔超过3000米的高海拔地区，最晚是在距今15,000年前，并且可能直到大约8000年前才永久占领高原。 青藏高原的晚期殖民与人类早期迁移到其他极端环境形成鲜明对比，如戈壁沙漠和高北极地区，研究人员通常将其归因于早期解剖学现代人类的扩张地理能力。 当前项目的目标是了解人类最初在青藏高原北方殖民的过程，并确定为什么殖民的时间和特征如此显著不同。Brantingham博士假设青藏高原的殖民发生在几个阶段，并受到社会和环境压力的共同驱动。 旧石器时代晚期的觅食者在更新世晚期（15，000 - 11，000 BP）首次占据了北方高原的边缘，只是季节性的，依赖于高原周围低海拔环境中发展的文化适应。 在全新世早期（8200-6400 BP），低海拔定居农业社区的竞争性位移迫使觅食者永久占据高海拔地区，并建立了足够的条件，为畜牧业的发展与农民在低海拔环境中的互利关系的基础上。该团队将通过实地调查和挖掘相结合的方式来测试这些假设，并以密集的地质年代测定程序为基础。 青藏高原东北部上缘的一系列埋藏遗址已被证实跨越了15000 - 5000 BP的关键时期，这一时期是高原现代适应的基本特征发展的时期。 挖掘这些网站将允许表征的适应性策略，促进成功的殖民化。 在周边地区的调查将使我们能够描述伴随而来的土地使用模式，该项目的智力价值将是提供新的见解，地理限制和竞争/互惠过程中的相对作用，推动人口流动和出现全新的适应战略，如畜牧业。 因此，研究结果将与围绕现代人类起源和传播以及复杂的社会和经济适应发展的更广泛问题相关。该研究通过促进长期的国际科学合作，为下一代美国和中国考古学家提供高质量的研究生教育经验，并向公众和专业观众扩展我们自己物种的广泛历史和适应能力的知识。