Stephen Frost, Ph.D. - US grants

The allocation of fossil specimens to a taxon, and in some cases to an individual, is a frequent and important problem of paleontology. When multiple individuals of one (or more) species are recovered from a site, it is often vital to associate elements of a single individual in order to determine the number of individuals preserved, as well as examine proportions, functional adaptations and other factors. In this project, the PIs propose a relatively new approach to these problems, combining laser surface scans of opposing joint surfaces with advanced statistical analyses to examine ways to differentiate taxa and associate elements of unique individuals using a sample of extant hominoids where individuals are known. Previous studies using a laser scanner suffered from the lack of suitable computational power and statistical methodology. Delson and colleagues will build upon that work in combination with their own extensive familiarity with high-resolution scanning, geometric morphometric analysis and joint surfaces of extant and extinct catarrhine taxa. This work also has implications for analyses of forensic and archaeological accumulations of multiple-individual human remains.
This study will focus on the bony components of two important joints: the elbow (humero-ulnar) and ankle (tibio-talar). Both of these joints are relatively "tight" showing a high degree of congruence where the proposed method has a higher chance of success. The elbow joint is "tighter" than the ankle, further allowing some evaluation of how tightly a joint articulates influences how well the method works. Finally, both of these joints are of functional interest among hominoids and are also well-represented in the human fossil record, the planned focus of later phases of research. Preliminary analysis of limited data has demonstrated that this basic approach can successfully discriminate between tibio-talar surfaces of different human individuals and among joints belonging to different hominoid species. The present study will collect additional data and concentrate on development of statistically powerful methods for their analysis.
In addition to these questions, this work has broader impacts in that it will: 1) recruit Lehman College undergraduates from groups underrepresented in science to be research assistants; 2) enhance infrastructure through collaboration with other universities as well as British colleagues and by developing and freely distributing algorithms and software with which to analyze congruence patterns; 3) expand collaboration with computer scientists in the development of software and analytical methods; and 4) integrate research, teaching and wider dissemination of results by developing and freely distributing three-dimensional virtual models and visualizations of joint surfaces for use in teaching.

The accumulation and analysis of large datasets, on hominids, as well as associated faunal, floral, and geological contexts, has allowed paleoanthropologists many exciting new insights and findings. Modern computing power and networking capabilities have greatly facilitated the collection, analysis, and dissemination of these datasets. As a consequence, the size and number of databases have increased in paleoanthropology and allied disciplines.
However, datasets are controlled by the researcher(s) who collected them, and they may not be broadly available, even after they have been analyzed and published. Making paleoanthropological data more widely accessible and readily useable has been a concern among researchers for many years. It is appreciated that there are diverse stake holders in this process, including, but not necessarily limited to: those who collect material in the field, those who analyze data collected by others, and those charged with the management and care of paleoanthropological collections housed in various museums.
A further issue is repeated collection of similar datasets by researchers (and especially students) unaware that such data have already been collected and may be available for study. Repeated collection of data on the same specimens is not only a poor use of limited research time and funds, but also potentially detrimental to the conservation of those specimens.
Given these concerns, the PIs will hold a two-day workshop in New York to bring together representatives of these different stake holders, as well as colleagues from sister disciplines such as vertebrate paleontology and systematic museology, to exchange ideas and plan new approaches to this topic. Discussion topics will include: the need for collaboration on databasing and data access; the types of data to be included (catalogue "metadata", metrical data, digital imagery); levels of access to such data; types of database systems which could be employed and whether they should be local, centralized or linked.
The intellectual merit of this project is that it will bring together representatives of diverse communities within and outside paleoanthropology to consider the value of facilitating data exchange and implementing ways to do so. The broader impacts of this workshop are that database development and the questions of open access to data and means of distribution are of general interest across a great range of science disciplines; a report on the deliberations at this meeting will be of value to colleagues in diverse fields, and may lower the barriers to database implementation for researchers considering this option for their data; the inclusion of colleagues from around the world helps to build infrastructure and global collaboration as they educate each other. Improved access to data, allowing sampling of broader datasets, will benefit the training of advanced students and also reduce duplication of effort through repetition of measurements. The study of human origins is a topic of great public interest, and wider access to data will broaden public understanding of and interest in paleoanthropology and related fields. Finally, as more and more types of data are quantified (and therefore lend themselves to databasing) these concerns will only grow in the future.

The fossil representatives of the baboon genus Theropithecus are often used as indicators of past environments and as analogues for human evolution. However, data are essentially limited to one species, the grassland adapted T. oswaldi, masking potential morphological and ecological breadth within the genus. New fossil material of the putatively forest adapted species, T. brumpti, is now available. This project presents a detailed description of the paleobiology of T. brumpti including postcranial functional morphology and locomotor mode, and documents morphological correlates of cercopithecine locomotor behavior. Linear measurements collected from all available T. brumpti postcranial material and an extensive comparative sample are used to examine both general size and postcranial features that are thought to be related to locomotor mode. These features vary significantly among known cercopithecids. These measurements are analyzed using qualitative as well as univariate and multivariate quantitative approaches to test the hypotheses that (1) contrary to the current literature T. brumpti is actually relatively terrestrial (compared to most cercopithecids) even though associated with forest habitats, (2) yet, has more arboreal adaptations than other Theropithecus species, and (3) was a dexterous manual forager. This project is the first comprehensive postcranial functional analysis of T. brumpti. These data, along with the comparative sample, can be used to further explore (1) how climatic changes influence Theropithecus anatomy and behavior, (2) patterns of species occurrence and evolution in specific environmental contexts and (3) the interpretation of additional fossil taxa in future studies and (4) the paleoecological context of human evolution.

This project will add new morphological data to be disseminated widely through shared databases (i.e. PRIMO) and publications, as well as strengthening ties between American, Ethiopian and Kenyan researchers. In addition, the project supports the research of a female graduate student.

Skeletal anatomy across extinct and living colobine monkey species will be studied to understand relationships among physical form and function, behavior and environment, and to explore how extinct forms may have responded to forces like climate change, habitat loss, and competition with larger species. Project findings will serve as a resource for scientists interested in not only primate evolution, but also for understanding what locomotor behaviors can tell us about changing paleoenvironments. Some of the extinct species that will be included in this project are from sites that also contain early human fossils, providing an opportunity to examine environments in which early humans evolved. This study will provide undergraduate training opportunities in both data collection and project development, through the Primate Osteology and Primate Morphometrics Laboratories at the University of Oregon. Many of the extant colobine species are listed as either threatened or endangered, and this research will support primate conservation efforts.

Studies of human evolution have focused on the effects of climatic and broad environmental change on species diversity. In this project, the investigator will focus on the effects of inter-specific interactions and competition during primate and human evolution. The aims of this project are to describe for the first time sets of associated colobine postcranial remains, to describe the functional morphology of these remains, and to assess the diversity of these and other fossil species in an ecological context, with an emphasis on the role of niche partitioning in colobine evolution. Both extant and fossil specimens will be described qualitatively and quantitatively. The quantitative portion will include skeletal measurements that are either standard for postcranial description or have been suggested to be functionally relevant in previous studies. The qualitative descriptions will be performed in more detail on the fossil specimens, particularly on those that have not yet been described. These data will be analyzed with respect to phylogenetic relationships, diet and body mass, and other ecologically relevant variables.