FOOTSTEP · How did our ancestors use their feet? Evidence of bipedalism and climbing from internal bone structure.
Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
- Duration
- 2022-01-10 → 2024-01-09
- EU contribution
- €212,934
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MSCA-IF
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
How did our ancestors use their feet? Evidence of bipedalism and climbing from internal bone structure.
The FOOTSTEP project addressed longstanding questions about the evolution of locomotion in fossil human relatives. We know that at some stage in our evolutionary history, we transitioned from an ape-like ancestor that spent a large amount of time in the trees, to a committed, terrestrial biped. However, the mode of this transition is as yet unclear. Recently, new discoveries of fossil human relatives (hominins), have shown that different species may have used different types of bipedal locomotion and some may have spent a substantial amount of time climbing in trees. To reconstruct locomotor behaviour in our fossil relatives, the objectives of FOOTSTEP were to analyse the internal bone structure of the foot in humans, non-human ape species that are alive today, and in several fossil hominins. This is because the internal bone structure of the skeleton remodels during life in response to behaviour and so can reveal how an individual actually behaved. The three Research Objectives were: (RO1) establish the relationship between internal bone structure and locomotion in the foot of living groups; (RO2) compare internal bone structure of the foot among active and sedentary human groups; and (RO3) reconstruct foot loading in key hominin taxa. This has societal implications, as understanding the diversity of anatomy among living humans and fossil hominins, and their biomechanics, has relevance for understanding the evolution of the modern human foot, with implications for clinical medicine.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
During the course of human evolution, we have transitioned from the arboreal environment of our ancestors to become committed, terrestrial bipeds. These changes are reflected in many aspects of our postcranial skeleton, including our highly specialised foot. Due to the mosaic morphology of fossil hominins, it is remains unknown in what ways their locomotion differed from our own, both in a continued dependence on arboreal environments and in the way they walked bipedally. As internal bone structure, both cortical and trabecular bone, remodel during an individual’s lifetime in response to their behaviour it has the potential to reveal how they actually behaved. FOOTSTEP will answer these questions by using state-of-the-art, whole-bone methods to analyse the internal bone structure of the foot (all tarsals and metatarsals) of extant non-human great apes and humans from a range of populations. These methods will include a cutting-edge geometric morphometric approach. FOOTSTEP will analyse internal bone structure of all tarsals and metatarsals of Australopithecus africanus, Paranthropus robustus, Australopithecus sediba, Homo naledi, Homo floresiensis and the OH8 foot (Homo habilis/Paranthropus). The project will change our understanding of locomotor evolution in the human lineage, and through including a range of taxa, will resolve questions about locomotor variability among hominins. Results of the project will be disseminated to a broad range of target audiences, via high-impact, open access journal publications, at scientific conferences across three continents and to non-specialists through public outreach activities. The training that I will receive during the fellowship, along with the opportunities available at the University of Kent to further develop my transferable skills, will provide me with the knowledge and experience required to enhance my future career prospects.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- UNIVERSITY OF KENT · Canterbury, KentCoordinatorUnited Kingdom
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union