Doctoral Dissertation Research: Body Size and Shape Variation in Modern and Late Pleistocene-Holocene Gazelles: A 3D Approach

这一博士论文研究项目的目标是开发一种新的3D分析方法，以理清环境和人为因素对过去人类和动物种群的影响，最终为人类从觅食者到农民的转变提供洞察力。通过提供新的3D定量技术，使动物骨骼能够被用作过去人类和环境影响的替代品，该项目有助于关于这种过渡周围条件的重要讨论。这些数据提供了人类聚居论和农业产生的背景条件，使这些事件能够在当地范围内进行调查，同时有助于了解地球主要系统如何随着时间的变化而变化。重要的是，这项研究强调了考古学在认识人类对环境的长期影响方面的重要作用，以及考古数据如何通过告知人类、气候变化和生物群落之间正在进行的相互作用来帮助指导政策和保护工作。这项研究将与一个国际团队合作，开发新的3D形状分析定量算法，包括两个新的完整模型分析(CMA)程序，用于定位(在3D空间中定位)和分割3D骨骼模型以进行定量分析。这些程序将应用于现代骨骼材料的3D骨骼模型，这些材料来自已知年龄、性别和地理位置的山区瞪羚，以识别提供良好性别、降水、温度和运动标记的骨骼表面区域。这些算法将应用于来自考古遗址的14个动物骨骼组合，横跨觅食-耕作过渡，以更好地了解在这一人类史前关键时期人与环境相互作用的强度和性质。这项研究将通过开发新的算法来分析3D骨骼模型，并通过提供必要的工具来解释动物形态数据，从而做出贡献。此外，由该项目产生的CMA算法将适用于广泛的研究问题，并可被其他学科改编。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The goal of this doctoral dissertation research project is to develop a new 3D analytical approach to untangle the impact of environmental and anthropogenic factors on past human and animal populations, ultimately offering insight into the transition of humans from foragers to farmers. By providing new 3D quantitative techniques that enable animal bones to be utilized as proxies of past anthropogenic and environmental impacts, this project contributes to important discussions about the conditions surrounding this transition. These data provide the background conditions under which human sedentism and agriculture arose, allowing these events to be investigated on a local scale while simultaneously contributing to knowledge of how the earth’s major systems changed through time. Importantly, this research highlights the essential role of archaeology in recognizing the long-term impacts of humans on the environment, and how archaeological data can help guide policy and conservation efforts by informing on the ongoing interactions between humans, climate change and biotic communities. In collaboration with an international team this research will develop new quantitative algorithms for 3D shape analysis including two new complete model analysis (CMA) procedures to position (orient in 3D space) and segment 3D bone models for quantitative analysis. These procedures will be applied to 3D bone models from modern skeletal material from mountain gazelles of known age, sex and geographic location to identify areas of bone surfaces that provide good markers of sex, precipitation, temperature and locomotion. These algorithms will be applied to 14 animal bone assemblages from archaeological sites spanning the foraging-farming transition to better understand the intensity and nature of human-environment interactions during this pivotal time in human prehistory. This study will contribute both by developing new algorithms to analyze 3D bone models, and by providing the necessary tools to interpret animal morphological data. Furthermore, the CMA algorithms generated by this project will have applicability to a wide set of research questions and can be adapted by other disciplines.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.