Amplitudes of orbitally induced climatic cycles and patterns of hominin speciation

Grove, M. La

doi:10.1016/j.jas.2012.04.023

Cited by 25 publications

(26 citation statements)

References 75 publications

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“…The significant correlation between prolonged high CV stages and FADs but not LADs may indicate different drivers of speciation versus extinction in the hominin lineage. These results are consistent with Grove's (2012) hypothesis that speciation in the hominin lineage is driven by climate whereas extinction is driven primarily by biotic processes, including competition between species (contra Foley, 1994). However, there is evidence that climate change plays an important role in extinctions across other African lineages (Faith and Behrensmeyer, 2013;Faith, 2014), raising the possibility that the mechanisms underlying turnover patterns may be dependent on the ecological characteristics of the lineage in question (see also Patterson et al, 2013).…”

Section: Discussion: Hominin Responses To Environmental Dynamics and supporting

confidence: 83%

Alternating high and low climate variability: The context of natural selection and speciation in Plio-Pleistocene hominin evolution

Potts

Faith

2015

Journal of Human Evolution

170

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Interaction of orbital insolation cycles defines a predictive model of alternating phases of high- and low-climate variability for tropical East Africa over the past 5 million years. This model, which is described in terms of climate variability stages, implies repeated increases in landscape/resource instability and intervening periods of stability in East Africa. It predicts eight prolonged (>192 kyr) eras of intensified habitat instability (high variability stages) in which hominin evolutionary innovations are likely to have occurred, potentially by variability selection. The prediction that repeated shifts toward high climate variability affected paleoenvironments and evolution is tested in three ways. In the first test, deep-sea records of northeast African terrigenous dust flux (Sites 721/722) and eastern Mediterranean sapropels (Site 967A) show increased and decreased variability in concert with predicted shifts in climate variability. These regional measurements of climate dynamics are complemented by stratigraphic observations in five basins with lengthy stratigraphic and paleoenvironmental records: the mid-Pleistocene Olorgesailie Basin, the Plio-Pleistocene Turkana and Olduvai Basins, and the Pliocene Tugen Hills sequence and Hadar Basin--all of which show that highly variable landscapes inhabited by hominin populations were indeed concentrated in predicted stages of prolonged high climate variability. Second, stringent null-model tests demonstrate a significant association of currently known first and last appearance datums (FADs and LADs) of the major hominin lineages, suites of technological behaviors, and dispersal events with the predicted intervals of prolonged high climate variability. Palynological study in the Nihewan Basin, China, provides a third test, which shows the occupation of highly diverse habitats in eastern Asia, consistent with the predicted increase in adaptability in dispersing Oldowan hominins. Integration of fossil, archeological, sedimentary, and paleolandscape evidence illustrates the potential influence of prolonged high variability on the origin and spread of critical adaptations and lineages in the evolution of Homo. The growing body of data concerning environmental dynamics supports the idea that the evolution of adaptability in response to climate and overall ecological instability represents a unifying theme in hominin evolutionary history.

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Section: Discussion: Hominin Responses To Environmental Dynamics and supporting

confidence: 83%

Alternating high and low climate variability: The context of natural selection and speciation in Plio-Pleistocene hominin evolution

Potts

Faith

2015

Journal of Human Evolution

170

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“…In addition, arid regions such as the Saharo-Arabian desert belt have been the setting for major environmental changes throughout the course of human history, with large scale variations in water availability potentially driving the evolutionary and techno-cultural trajectories of human populations throughout the Pleistocene and Holocene periods (e.g. Staubwasser and Weiss, 2006;Trauth et al, 2007;Shea, 2008;Grove, 2012;Maslin et al, 2014;Groucutt et al, 2015a). Palaeoenvironmental and palaeoecological data derived from these records, therefore, also provide an important means to explore the connections between environmental change and past demographic variability.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Middle-late Quaternary palaeoclimate variability from lake and wetland deposits in the Nefud Desert, Northern Arabia

Parton

Clark-Balzan

Parker

et al. 2018

Quaternary Science Reviews

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Records of former lake and wetland development in present day arid/hyper-arid environments provide an important source of information for palaeoclimatic and palaeoenvironmental studies. In Arabia, such records are typically confined to eccentricity-modulated insolation maxima, and are often spatially and temporally discontinuous. Here we present records from a single locality in Northern Arabia of wetter interludes during both global interglacial and glacial conditions, providing a unique opportunity to examine the nature of these events in a common setting. At Jubbah, in the southern Nefud Desert, lake and wetland deposits reveal the repeated formation of a water body within a large endorheic basin over the past ca. 360 kyr. Lake/wetland formation occurred during MIS 11/9, 7, 5, 3 and the early Holocene, assisted by local topographic controls, and spring recharge. Palaeoenvironmental and palaeoecological data reveal the existence of a large still water body formed during either MIS 11 or 9 (ca. 363 ka), and basin wide alluviation followed by lake formation during MIS 7 (ca. 212 ka). During MIS 5e (ca. 130 ka) a large freshwater lake occupied the basin, while during MIS 5a (ca. 80 ka) the basin contained a shallow wetland and freshwater lake complex. Lake/wetland formation also occurred during early MIS 3 (ca. 60 ka), at the Terminal Pleistocene-Holocene transition (ca. 12.5 ka), and the early-middle Holocene (ca. 9-6.5 ka). Phases of lake and wetland development coincided with human occupation of the basin during the Middle Palaeolithic, Epipalaeolithic and Neolithic periods, highlighting the significance of the region for early demographic change.

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“…8,9 It has furthermore been proposed that excessive UVR may have had far-reaching effects on mammalian evolutionary processes. UVR has been implicated in several extinction events, including the disappearance of megafauna during the late Pleistocene 10,11 and the extinction of a number of hominin species 12,13 . These hypotheses are difficult to test because of the uncertainties concerning the dating of extinction events and in calculating the impact of UVR changes at different latitudes and among different populations.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing the photoprotective effects of red ochre on human skin by in vitro laboratory experiments

Rifkin¹,

d’Errico²,

Dayet³

et al. 2015

S. Afr. J. Sci.

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Archaeological indicators of cognitive complexity become increasingly prevalent during the African Middle Stone Age, with the habitual exploitation of red ochre widely viewed as a key feature of the emergence of modern human behaviour. Given that some of the uses of ochre remain ambiguous, we present the preliminary results of an ongoing study in which we explore the efficacy of red ochre as a photoprotective device or sunscreen. The capacity of ochre to inhibit the susceptibility of humans to the detrimental effects of ultraviolet radiation was confirmed through the in vitro calculation of the sun protection factor values of samples derived from the Kunene Region in Namibia and the Bokkeveld Group deposits, Western Cape Province, South Africa. Visible spectroscopy was employed to determine colourimetric parameters of samples and assess the correlation between ochre colour and sun protection factor. The possible role of ochre as a sunscreen agent for hominin populations, including modern humans, during the Middle Stone Age in Africa is explored. We conclude that the habitual use of red ochre as a photoprotective agent likely played a role in the ability of prehistoric humans to adapt to novel environmental circumstances.

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Amplitudes of orbitally induced climatic cycles and patterns of hominin speciation

Cited by 25 publications

References 75 publications

Alternating high and low climate variability: The context of natural selection and speciation in Plio-Pleistocene hominin evolution

Alternating high and low climate variability: The context of natural selection and speciation in Plio-Pleistocene hominin evolution

Middle-late Quaternary palaeoclimate variability from lake and wetland deposits in the Nefud Desert, Northern Arabia

Assessing the photoprotective effects of red ochre on human skin by in vitro laboratory experiments

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