Reconstructing hominin phylogeny using a combined genomic-morphometric approach.

进化基因组学的科学突破彻底改变了我们对人类进化的理解。但事实证明，将基因组洞察与古人类形态研究结合起来具有挑战性，使用基因组数据集推断的关键进化事件的日期很难与形态证据相一致。贝叶斯统计提供了一种弥合这一差距的方法。估计物种分化时间的分子方法只能提供物种之间的相对距离。通过应用贝叶斯方法来模拟形态进化，物种之间的形态距离可以类似地导出，并增加了适用于安全断代的化石遗骸的好处，奠定了地质时代的形态距离的基础。因此，使用这种方法，结合来自基因组和形态计量数据的信息，可以更确定地估计形态变化的分歧时间和进化率。该项目将是第一个将基因组和形态计量学相结合的方法应用到人类进化中。利用现代人、尼安德特人和丹尼索瓦人的基因组和形态变异之间的关系，可以推断出其余人种的进化关系和分化时间。该项目将为人类进化的基本进化过程提供新的见解，从形态和遗传变异的关键驱动因素到它们与地理和古气候事件的关系。

Scientific breakthroughs in evolutionary genomics have revolutionised our understanding of hominin evolution. But combining genomic insights with studies of hominin morphology has proved challenging, and the inferred dates for key evolutionary events using genomic datasets have been difficult to reconcile with the morphological evidence. Bayesian statistics provides a method for bridging this gap. Molecular methods of estimating species divergence times provide only relative distance between species. By applying Bayesian methods to model morphological evolution, the morphological distance between species can be similarly derived with the added benefit of applicability to securely dated fossil remains, grounding morphological distance in geological time. Using this method, divergence times and evolutionary rates of morphological change can therefore be estimated with greater certainty, incorporating information from both genomic and morphometric data. This project will be the first to apply this combined genomic-morphometric approach to human evolution. Using the relationship between genomic and morphological variation in modern humans, Neanderthals and Denisovans, the evolutionary relationships and divergence times in the rest of the hominin line will be inferred. The project will provide new insights into the evolutionary processes underlying hominin evolution, from key drivers of morphological and genetic variation to their relationship to geographical and paleoclimatic events.