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。但是，将基因组见解与人类形态学研究相结合已被证明具有挑战性，并且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学证据相一致。贝叶斯统计提供了一种弥合这一差距的方法。估计物种分歧时间的分子方法仅提供物种之间的相对距离。通过应用贝叶斯方法对形态进化进行建模，可以类似地导出物种之间的形态距离，并具有适用于安全日期的化石遗骸的额外好处，从而在地质时间内建立形态距离。使用这种方法，分歧时间和形态变化的进化速率，因此可以估计更大的确定性，结合基因组和形态数据的信息。该项目将是第一个将这种结合基因组学和形态学的方法应用于人类进化的项目。利用现代人类、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，将推断出其余人类系的进化关系和分歧时间。该项目将为人类进化的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.