FAH215H1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Paranthropus Robustus, Australopithecus Afarensis, Laetoli
Document Summary
Lecture 5 thursday january 31 the holocene prequel: life and times of our earlies ancestors up to 12000 ya. Part 1 climate & history of the quaternary. Ardipithecus ramidus: 4. 4 4. 0 mya, africa, arboreal adaptations, small brain. Australopithecus afarensis: 3. 9 2. 9 mya, africa, kenya, fully bipedal. Paranthropus boisie: east africa, robust, sagittal crest. Laetoli footprints: earliest evidence of bipedalism, 3. 7 mya, africa, heel-toe pattern. Theories for the origins of bipedalism: savannah and out of the trees, thermoregulation, travelling and carrying, weary warning, wading (aquatic ape) Pilo-pleistocene boundary: went from warm to cool, global cooling during the pleistocene, expansion of grasslands and savannahs. Pleistocene epoch: alternating glacial and interglacial periods, glacial periods characterized by: dry and cold conditions. Identified through oxygen isotopes form marine cores levels. Retraction of ice sheets, higher sea levels: stadials and interstadials: terms fro glacial interglacial cycling, stadials: cold. Marine cores: similar to lake varves (sedimentation, organic rich sediments (sapropels, pollen, marine fauna, plankton.
