Ancestors go South.Some of the oldest fossils in the human evolutionary family--including the skull and upper-arm bone shown above--come from South Africa, according to a study in the April 25 Science. A mix of new and already excavated Australopithecus Australopithecus (ôstrā'lōpĭth`əkəs, –pəthē`kəs), an extinct genus of the hominid family found in Africa between about 4 and 1 million years ago. At least seven species of australopithecines are now generally recognized, including Australopithecus afarensis, A. fossils, found in two caves, date to 4 million years ago, reports a team led by Timothy C. Partridge partridge, common name applied to various henlike birds of several families. The true partridges of the Old World are members of the pheasant family (Phasianidae); the common European or Hungarian species has been successfully introduced in parts of North America. In some areas of the United States the name partridge is applied to the ruffed grouse, the bobwhite, and the plumed quail; in Europe the South American tinamou is called a partridge. of University of the Witwatersrand Witwatersrand (wĭtwô`tərzrănd') [Afrik.,=white water ridge] or the Rand, region, Gauteng (formerly a part of Transvaal), South Africa. The area, which forms the watershed between the Vaal and Olifants rivers, is c. in Johannesburg. That's as many as 1 million years earlier than previous estimates for South Africa. The scientists suspect that the bones represent two forms of Australopithecus. An Australopithecus species of comparable age lived in eastern Africa (SN: 5/15/99, p. 315). The age estimates of the South African fossils hinged on measurements of the decay of radioactive isotopes in cave sediments. |
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