30 Years of Research and Discovery

WE ARE PROUD TO ANNOUNCE A YEAR-LONG ANNIVERSARY
CELEBRATION OF THE INSTITUTE OF HUMAN ORIGINS

• Read about the 30th Anniversary in the ASU News

• Gala Celebration Dinner–April 26, 2012: Held at the Phoenix Zoo starting at the new Orangutan pavilion and proceeding Lakeside for dinner, the Gala will feature keynote speaker Donald Johanson to benefit ASU's Institute of Human Origins research, educational outreach, and academic scholarships. Tickets and table sponsorship information at iho.asu.edu/gala or contact Lindsay Mullen at Lindsay.Mullen@asu.edu or 480.727.6580 or Julie Russ at jruss@asu.edu or 480.727.6571.
  

Sponsor our 30th anniversary events! Become a sponsor for the Gala Dinner! Sponsor benefit options (depending on level) include:

Donation waived for travel with Institute of Human Origins' scientists to Galapagos, France Caves, or South Africa.

Eight tickets to the gala featuring keynote speaker Don Johanson

Recognition on 30th anniversary materials for the symposium and gala

• Symposium–April 27, 2012: A culmination of the year's events, with a symposium featuring international experts in human origins along with IHO faculty debating the future of human origins research and education. Neeb Hall on the ASU Tempe campus from 9:00 am to 4 pm. More information at iho.asu.edu/symposium_2012.
  

• Lecture Series: The lecture series is now complete and brought world-renowned scientists and experts in human origins to the ASU campus. See lecture series information below.

• Museum Exhibition: Read about the museum opening in ASU News. Museum exhibition closed December 16, 2011.

• Essay Competition: “Letters to Lucy”— for middle and high school students through the BecomingHuman.org website. The essay competition is now closed and the judging has taken place! Thank you to all the schools, teachers, and students that participated in this great competition. The essays are excellent! The winners and their essays are now posted! Click here for the link. 

• THE ETHIOPIA TRIP is done and it was amazing! See the IHO Trips webpage for more information about future travel to Ethiopia, Galapagos, or South Africa.Travel–January 2012: A guided trip to Ethiopia by Founding Director Donald Johanson, with a visit to Hadar—the "Lucy" site—during a working field research season
  

• Full calendar of events poster (pdf).
  

INSTITUTE OF HUMAN ORIGINS ANNIVERSARY EVENTS: 30th Anniversary Lecture Series Concluded

 

Neandertals Revisited

Katerina Harvati, University of Tubingen, Germany

Thursday, February 23, 2012

 

 

 

 

 

Neandertals inhabited Western Eurasia from approximately 300- to 30-thousand years ago. They are distinguished by a unique combination of anatomical traits and are commonly associated with Middle Paleolithic lithic industries. Current consensus among paleoanthropologists is that they represent a separate Eurasian human lineage, which evolved in isolation and which shared a common ancestor with modern humans in the Middle Pleistocene. Some aspects of the distinctive Neandertal anatomy may have evolved in response to selection related to the extreme cold of the European glacial cycles, although genetic drift seems to be responsible for the evolution of many Neandertal characteristic features. Neandertals disappear from the fossil record ca. 30 ka BP, a few millennia after the arrival of modern humans in Europe, and the causes of their extinction are debated. The retrieval of ancient mitochondrial and, more recently, nuclear DNA from Neandertal fossils puts us in the unique position to combine fossil with genetic evidence to address questions about their evolution, paleobiology, and eventual fate.

Katerina Harvati is Professor of Paleoanthropology at the Institute for Early Prehistory and Medieval Archaeology and the Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution and Paleoecology, University of Tübingen. Her research focuses on Neandertal evolution, modern human origins, and the application of 3D geometric morphometrics and virtual anthropology to paleoanthropology.

To download a pdf of the lecture poster, click here. These lectures are free and open to the public. Seating may be limited due to auditorium capacity. Parking is available on campus. See a campus parking map here.

 

 

Origins of Modern Humans

Chris Stringer, Natural History Museum London

 

Thursday, February 2, 2012

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Human evolution can be divided into two main phases: a prehuman phase in Africa prior to two million years ago where walking upright had evolved but many other characteristics were still essentially ape-like, and a human phase with an increase in both brain size and behavioral complexity and an expansion from Africa. Evidence points strongly to Africa as the major center for the genetic, physical, and behavioral origins of both ancient and modern humans, but new discoveries are prompting a rethink of some aspects of our evolutionary origins, including the likelihood of interbreeding between archaic humans (for example the Neanderthals) and modern humans. Stringer has worked at the Natural History Museum London since 1973 and is now Research Leader in Human Origins and a Fellow of the Royal Society. His early research was on the relationship of Neanderthals and early modern humans in Europe, but through his work on the “Out of Africa” theory of modern human origins, he now collaborates with archaeologists, dating specialists, and geneticists in attempting to reconstruct the evolution of modern humans globally. He has excavated at sites in Britain and abroad and is currently leading the Ancient Human Occupation of Britain project in its third phase funded by the Leverhulme Trust.

 

Drawing on the fossil record and comparative evidence from humans and other living animals, it is becoming clear that cooperation must have evolved early and was one of the most important factors in the evolution of Homo. Through cooperation, hominins created their own niche within the changing landscape of early Africa, which in turn became essential to their survival, evolution, and ultimate expansion into the rest of the world.

Terry Harrison is a professor of Anthropology and Director of the Center for the Study of Human Origins at New York University. This lecture explores the inherent difficulties in identifying the earliest hominins and in drawing inferences about what they may have looked like. Harrison's research focuses on the evolutionary history of primates using the fossil evidence. He has conducted paleontological fieldwork in Europe, East Africa, and China. Currenly, he is the director of an international multidisciplinary field project at the Pliocene hominin locality of Laetoli in northern Tanzania.

Peter deMencoal is a Professor and Vice Chair in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University. He studies marine sediments to understand how and why past climates have changed, with a specific interest in placing contemporary climate change trends within the context of climate changes during the prehistoric past. Current areas of research include stability of warm climate periods, African monsoonal climate, ancient cultural responses to rapid climate change, and the role of climate change in evolution of early human ancestors. This lecture is cosponsored by Late Lessons from Early History Lecture Series, an initiative of the School of Human Evolution and Social Change and the Institute of Human Origins.

McGrew, a Fellow of the Leverhulme Centre for Human Evolutionary Studies at University of Cambridge, UK, is the inaugural speaker for a lecture series celebrating IHO's 30th Anniversary. McGrew, a professor in primatology and author of the book, The Cultured Chimpanzee: Reflections on Cultural Primatology, has been chasing wild chimpanzees since 1972.

Additional Past Events

September 8, 2011: Museum of Anthropology IHO Exhibition opening.

May 5, 2011: Johanson/Leakey Event: An historic meeting of two of anthropology's groundbreaking scientists—Founding Director Donald Johanson and Richard Leakey of the Turkana Basin Institute on stage at the American Museum of Natural History, May 5, 2011.

March 9, 2011: Kick off of a year of activities.