Early Anthropoid Evolution in South America

人类学家往往忽视了新大陆的猴子 因为它们与人类的关系不在主线上。 然而，它们包括一个令人兴奋的分支分支， 为人类学家提供了与变化平行的例子， 都发生在卡他鼻类化石记录中。 史 新世界的猴子仍然知之甚少，相比之下， 东部其他主要的高等灵长类动物 半球之间的亲缘关系 不同的宽鼻类化石群在很大程度上尚未得到解决。 直到最近，整个宽鼻类化石记录 只有不到30个人的遗骸 期间 在过去的四年里，哥伦比亚的古生物学研究， 阿根廷发现了大量的新化石， 在理清这些关系中非常重要。 进一步 对阿根廷新化石的系统和功能研究将 有助于澄清现代阔鼻龙之间的关系，并提供 关于其适应性多样性的更多文档。 来自阿根廷的化石大约来自两个 同时期的地层，圣克鲁斯和Pinturas，但 这两个组有不同种类的猴子。 这 该项目将调查这些形态学 差异是由于时间，环境， 和/或两个编队的地理位置，以及PI 将重建这些地层的古环境 的 该项目将有助于我们了解生物学的起源， 新世界灵长类动物的多样化，并允许更广泛的 南美洲和其他国家的比较 大洲

Anthropologists tend to overlook the New World monkeys because they are not on the main line of relationship to humans. Nevertheless, they comprise an exciting side branch which provides anthropologists with examples parallel to changes which have taken place in the catarrhine fossil record. The history of New World monkeys is still poorly known, compared with that of other major radiations of higher primates in the eastern hemisphere, and phylogenetic relationships among the relatively distinct groups of platyrrhine fossils are largely unresolved. Until very recently, the entire fossil record for platyrrhines consisted of remains of fewer than thirty individuals. During the past four years, paleontological research in Colombia and Argentina has yielded an abundance of new fossils that may be very important in sorting out these relationships. Further systematic and functional studies of new Argentine fossils will help clarify relationships among modern platyrrhines, and provide additional documentation about their adaptive diversity. The fossils from Argentina have come from two roughly contemporaneous formations, the Santa Cruz and the Pinturas, yet the two formations have different species of monkeys. This project will investigate the extent to which these morphological differences are the result of differences in time, environment, and/or geographical position of the two formations, and the PI will reconstruct the paleoenvironments of these formations. The project will contribute to our understanding of the phylogeny and diversification of New World primates, and permit broader comparisons between those in South America and those on other continents.