Project description
Reconstructing environments of the earliest hominins
Pinpointing how and where early humans evolved requires reconstructing environments from millions of years ago. Unfortunately, the vast spatiotemporal scales of existing palaeoenvironmental models mask the seasonal shifts early hominins experienced during the Late Miocene, 7.5 to 6 million years ago. Supported by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the REHO project aims to develop novel enamel isotope analysis techniques to evaluate ancient seasonal climate and vegetation dynamics. Gathering serial enamel isotope data from the Lothagam fossil site in Kenya, it will construct species-specific tooth growth models that enable the extraction of seasonality signals. Its key objectives include uncovering evidence of seasonal vegetation and moisture changes to provide a framework of seasonality patterns from the last 10 million years.
Objective
REHO combines cutting-edge methodological development with the generation of new seasonality records from ~7.5-6 Ma to reconstruct climate, vegetation and environmental changes at spatiotemporal scales most relevant to characterizing the palaeoenvironmental context of hominin origins. The Late Miocene ~7.5-6 Ma interval captures the emergence of the earliest hominins broadly, and at the study site of Lothagam, Kenya, specifically. REHO aims to tackle a critical, long-standing issue in human evolutionary studies concerning the environments of the earliest hominins and the problems presented by the varied spatiotemporal scales spanned by existing palaeoenvironmental records. REHO will accomplish this through isotopic analysis of ‘serial’ enamel samples taken sequentially down the crown of fossil mammal teeth, which provide records of annual to subannual dietary and body water change in these taxa and, by extension, the environments occupied by the hominins associated with them. REHO aims to collect serial enamel isotope data and develop new complex species-specific models of tooth growth that facilitate the extraction of seasonality signals from these isotope data. The three objectives of the project are to: (1) provide evidence of seasonal vegetation change via serial sampling of hypsodont herbivores at Lothagam, (2) provide evidence of seasonal moisture and precipitation change through serial sampling of fossil papionin monkeys using Secondary Ion Mass Spectroscopy (SIMS), and the generation of tooth growth models based on synchrotron micro-CT histological data and (3) provide a comparative framework of seasonality patterns from the last 10 million years in the Turkana Basin, Kenya, by serial sampling fossil impala. The researcher will develop methods at the cutting-edge of isotope analysis, pairing this with enhanced skills in fieldwork and faunal analysis, which will set her apart from others in fields related to human evolution, archaeology and palaeobiology.
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CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- humanities history and archaeology archaeology
- social sciences sociology anthropology physical anthropology
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Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
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Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
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Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
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(opens in new window) HORIZON-MSCA-2025-PF
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CB2 1TN CAMBRIDGE
United Kingdom
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