Revisiting Homo Taxonomy: A Geometric Morphometric Analysis of the Hominin Skeleton

本行动资助美国国家科学基金会2020年度生物学博士后研究奖学金，利用生物馆藏进行研究。该奖学金支持将以创新的方式利用生物收集的研究员的研究和培训。人类属于令人难以置信的多样化和地理分布广泛的人属。在人类及其祖先（古人类）的骨骼中看到的广泛多样性使得科学地对它们进行分类变得困难——古人类是属于一个令人难以置信的多样化物种还是属于几个不同的物种？从历史上看，骨骼化石的形状和特征被用来帮助确定它属于哪个物种，尽管这些分类忽略了一个事实，即广泛的多样性应该使我们重新思考我们如何定义一个物种。这个项目调查了人类祖先的变异范围在多大程度上模仿了另一种地理上广泛分布的灵长类动物——猕猴。这项研究通过允许更准确的分类方法来推进科学知识，这将使我们更好地了解我们自己和我们的祖先，以及我们之间的关系。项目中生成的3D模型将作为K-12教师的教育资源发布在网上，并附带相应的课程计划，告诉学生我们祖先的身体与我们的身体有何不同。本研究探讨了整个骨骼的形态变化如何影响人属的分类评估。一些骨骼标本，包括现代人，尼安德特人，来自印度尼西亚的小型物种（弗洛瑞斯人），新发现的南非化石（纳勒迪人），以及其他将使用最先进的技术进行3D扫描，以使用几何形态计量学统计分析等新方法进行分析。此外，这些数据将与研究员之前的猕猴数据集进行比较，以比较在地理上广泛分布的灵长类物种中可能存在多少变异。该项目验证了两个假设：（H1）在类人猿属中观察到的形态变异与在类人猿属中观察到的相似；（H2）颅后骨骼，特别是肢带和相关骨骼，反映了亚属分类，可用于分类评估。这项研究促进了一名女科学家的职业生涯，将招募来自STEM中代表性不足领域的本科生来帮助该项目。结果将通过遵循NC教育标准的课程计划传播给历史上代表性不足的群体的K-12学生。公众宣传也将通过博客文章、讲习班和研讨会来实现。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2020, Research Using Biological Collections. The fellowship supports research and training of the Fellow that will utilize biological collections in innovative ways. Humans belong to the incredibly diverse and geographically widespread genus Homo. The wide range of diversity seen in the skeletons of humans and their ancestors (hominins) makes it difficult to scientifically classify them – do hominins belong to one incredibly diverse species or to several different species? Historically, the shape and features of a skeletal fossil are used to help identify what species it belongs to, though these classifications ignore the fact that the wide range of diversity should cause us to rethink how we define a species. This project investigates the extent to which the range of variation seen in human ancestors mimics that of another group of geographically widespread primates, macaque monkeys. This research advances scientific knowledge by allowing for more accurate classification methods that will allow us to better understand ourselves and our ancestors, and how we are related. The 3D models generated during the project will be published online as educational resources for K-12 teachers, along with corresponding lesson plans to teach students about how our ancestor’s bodies are different from ours. This research explores how morphological variation throughout the skeleton informs the taxonomic assessment of genus Homo. Several skeletal specimens, including modern humans, Neandertals, the small-bodied species from Indonesia (H. floresiensis), the newly discovered South African fossils (H. naledi), and others will be 3D scanned using state-of-the-art technology for analysis with novel methods such as geometric morphometric statistical analyses. Further, this data will be compared to the Fellow’s previous dataset of macaque monkeys in order to compare how much variation feasibly exists in a geographically widespread primate species. This project tests two hypothesis: (H1) the morphological variation seen in genus Homo mimics what is observed intra-generically in comparable primate species and (H2) postcranial bones, particularly the limb girdles and associated bones, reflect sub-generic taxonomy which can be used for taxonomic assessment. This research advances the career of a woman scientist and undergraduate students from underrepresented areas in STEM will be recruited to help with the project. Results will be disseminated to K-12 students from historically underrepresented groups via lesson plans following NC education standards. Public outreach also will be achieved through blog posts, workshops, and seminar presentations.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.