In this charming animated interview from the PBS Series Blank on Blank, Jane Goodall discusses her early dreams of studying animals in the wild, and how meeting Louis Leakey in Kenya made it possible for her to start her pioneering chimpanzee research.… more »
We are pleased to introduce Elizabeth Moffett, PhD candidate from University of Missouri, who was awarded a Leakey Foundation research grant in December 2014 for her project entitled “Birth and its effects on anthropoid pelvic shape and integration.” Elizabeth Moffett
Birth selection is thought to be one of the most important pressures shaping the primate pelvis. Yet, it remains unclear… more »
A close up view of the fossil just steps from where it was discovered by Chalachew Seyoum. Photo by Brian Villmoare.
A fossil lower jaw found in the Afar Region of Ethiopia pushes back evidence for the human genus Homo to 2.8 million years ago. The jaw with five teeth was found by Chalachew Seyoum, a Baldwin Fellow and Arizona State University paleoanthropology graduate student from Ethiopia.… more »
By Jeremy DeSilva of Boston University. Jeremy will discuss the question “Why walk on two legs?” at a SciCafe at the American Museum of Natural History on April 1, 2015. This article is an excellent introduction to the pros and cons of bipedalism. Humans are weird. We are mammals, yet we have very little body hair. We are primates, yet unlike most primates, we are generally uncomfortable in… more »
Samantha Porter in the lithics lab at the University of Minnesota The next grantee from our fall 2014 granting cycle is Samantha Porter. She is a PhD candidate from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, and her project is entitled “Investigating cultural transmission across the Middle to Upper Paleolithic transition in Western Europe.” Around 40,000 years ago, anatomically modern… more »
Our understanding of human evolution has grown exponentially since Darwin’s time. This week marks the 206th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, so we’re sharing a Darwin-related Leakey Foundation lecture from our archives. In this lecture, recorded in 2009 at the Field Museum in Chicago, Daniel Lieberman of Harvard University discusses the evolution and dysevolution… more »
The next fall 2014 grantee we would like to introduce to you is Maura Tyrrell. She is a PhD candidate from the University at Buffalo, State University of New York, and her dissertation project is entitled “Effect of competition on male coalition patterns in crested macaques.” Maura Tyrrell and a crested macaque
My dissertation focuses on the social relationships between… more »
Leakey Foundation grantees Israel Hershkovitz and Ofer Marder led an international team of archaeologists who discovered a 55,000 year old cranium in Manot Cave in Israel. Their discovery was described last week in the journal Nature.
Photo courtesy of : Clara Amit, Israel Antiquities Authority
A key event in human evolution was the expansion of modern humans of African origin across Eurasia, replacing… more »
Naomi Cleghorn, University of Texas at Arlington, was awarded a Leakey Foundation research grant in the fall of 2014 for her project entitled “Investigating a rare Early Later Stone Age site at Knysna, South Africa.” Naomi Cleghorn at Pinnacle Point site 5/6, Mossel Bay, South Africa
Despite widespread interest in the potential origins of modern human cognitive, social, and technological… more »
We are happy to introduce another one of our fall 2014 grantees, Shelby S. Putt, PhD candidate from the University of Iowa. Her dissertation project is entitled “Investigating the co-evolution of language and toolmaking: An fNIRS study.” Shelby S. Putt
Our language and cognition are arguably the features that most distinguish us from other species, and yet, we still know so little about… more »
03.26.15
03.16.15
03.06.15
03.06.15
02.23.15
02.09.15
02.05.15
02.04.15
01.29.15