Unlocking the hard tissue record of primate adaptability to environmental change

现代人类已经能够适应各种各样的自然环境，而非人类灵长类动物可以提供相关的模型来理解人类这种适应性多样性的进化起源。本计画将利用热带草原狒狒的气候、行为与骨骼资料，研究其成长型态与饮食对早期生活环境的反应。这项研究将推进人类和非人类灵长类动物进化记录中生活史灵活性和环境变异性之间关系的知识。该项目还将支持代表性不足的群体更广泛地参与STEM研究，学生指导和培训，以及通过史密森学会计划和展览的公众参与。研究和教育的基础设施将得到加强，建立第一个可用的骨骼收集代表灵长类动物从一个记录良好的萨凡纳栖息地，被认为是一个重要的环境塑造早期人类的适应。研究结果将在网上公布，并提供给当地的野生动物管理人员。 生物人类学的关键问题涉及环境变异在塑造现代人类行为和生活史中所起的作用，这会增加生育率，并在长期的青少年依赖中最大化后代投资。发育可塑性，包括通过生长速度、成熟时间和其他性状的变化对环境变化做出反应的能力，是现代人类生活史策略的潜在机制。然而，人类谱系中生活史灵活性的进化起源和生态背景仍然知之甚少。该项目将长期气候数据与肯尼亚Amboseli盆地单一高度动态环境中野生狒狒的发育，行为和生态数据相结合，以测试早期生命的物理和社会/母体环境如何影响（1）牙齿和身体大小发育的硬组织显微解剖参数，以及（2）牙齿碳和氮稳定同位素特征的饮食质量和组成。具体来说，这项研究调查了出生于低降雨量和恶劣的母亲/社会环境中的后代是否会经历在硬组织中可检测到的负面后果，包括低质量的饮食，减少对身体生长的投资，以及对晚年压力的易感性增加。 阐明Amboseli狒狒早期环境挑战是如何通过发育和行为机制介导的，将提高对该物种适应能力的理解，尽管环境发生了重大变化。 此外，通过贡献一个框架来破译硬组织中的生活史变化的近似生态背景，这项研究具有变革性的潜力，在人类进化过程中的适应性和环境变化之间的关系进行调查。

Modern humans have been able adapt to a diverse range of natural environments, and non-human primates can provide relevant models for understanding the evolutionary origins of this adaptive versatility in humans. This project will investigate variability in growth patterns and diet in response to early life environments, using climate, behavioral, and skeletal data for savanna baboons. The research will advance knowledge about relationships between life history flexibility and environmental variability in the human and non-human primate evolutionary record. The project also will support broader participation of underrepresented groups in STEM research, student mentoring and training, and public engagement through Smithsonian Institution programs and exhibits. Infrastructure for research and education will be enhanced by establishing the first available skeletal collection representing primates from a well-documented savannah habitat, thought to have been an important environment shaping early human adaptation. Results from the study will be communicated online, and to local wildlife managers. Key questions in biological anthropology concern the role that environmental variability played in shaping modern human behavior and life history, which increases fertility and maximizes offspring investment over a prolonged juvenile dependency. Developmental plasticity, including the capacity to respond to environmental change through shifts in growth rates, maturational timing, and other traits, is a proposed mechanism underlying the modern human life history strategy. However, the evolutionary origins and ecological context of life history flexibility in the human lineage remain poorly understood. This project integrates long-term climate data with developmental, behavioral and ecological data in wild baboons from a single, highly dynamic environment in the Amboseli basin, Kenya, to test how early life physical and social/maternal environments influence (1) hard tissue microanatomical parameters of dental and body size development, and (2) tooth carbon and nitrogen stable isotope signatures of diet quality and composition. Specifically, this research investigates whether offspring born into low rainfall and poor maternal/social environments experience negative consequences that are detectable in hard tissues, including lower quality diets, reduced investment in physical growth, and increased susceptibility to later-life stress. Elucidating how early environmental challenges in Amboseli baboons are mediated by developmental and behavioral mechanisms will improve understanding of this species' resilience despite significant environmental change. Further, by contributing a framework for deciphering the proximate ecological context of life history variation in hard tissues, this research has transformative potential for investigating relationships between adaptive versatility and environmental change during human evolution.