Synchrotron Light to Reveal How Early Homo sapiens and Neanderthals Grew Up (10/9/2007)

The Moustier 1 Neanderthal jaw (center of laser) poses for a National Geographic photographer on the ID19 beamline at the European Sychrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble, France. Fossil courtesy of the Museum Fur Vor-und Fruhgreschichte Berlin. Photo Credit: Paul Trafforeau.

An international team of researchers led by scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Athropology (MPI-EVA) and the European Synchrtron Radiation Facility (ESRF) is working together in Grenoble (France) to study the teeth of some famous fossil children, which will reveal if different species of humans experienced similar timings of maturation and reproduction. Scientists want to compare the Neanderthal fossils, discovered approximately 100 years ago from the famous sites Le Moustier (France) and Krapina (Croatia), to early fossil homo sapiens from Qafzeh (Israel) and Jebel Irhoud (morocco). The Isreali Homo Sapiens children are from one of the earlists groups of modern humand so leave Africa between 100-90,000 years ago, approximately 100,000 years after the origin of our species.

Reporters from National Geographic and Science magazines are documenting this historic meeting of himinin fossils at the powerful European Synchrotron microtomography developed by ESRF paleontologist Paul Tafforeau, the team is able to see inside the teeth to reveal tiny daily growth lines without any damage to these invaluable fossils. Currently, only the ESRF in Grenoble offers the possibility of such cutting edge imaging on teeth. From this information, MPI-EVA scientists Tanya Smith and Paul Tafforeau and collegues will reconstruct the time of tooth growth and the age of the children at death. This will reveal if these fossils show the typical slow maturation and long childhood of living people. This is likely to resolve long-standing debates over developmental differences between Neanderthals and our own species.

Fossil Homo sapiens child from Qafzeh Cave in Israel. The skeleton was originally found at the feet of an adult female skeleton, and believed to be one of the earlist instances of intentional burial. Fossil courtesy of the Department of Anatomy and Anthropology (Tel Aviv University) and Rockefeller Museum (Tel Aviv) - Photo Credit: Paul Tafforeau

The team recently used the new application, detailed in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Human Evolution, to demonstrate the earliest evidence of the modern human life history in the early Homo sapiends juvenile from Jevel Irhoud (Morocco) (published in the April 10 issue of the PRoceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA).

"This is really a historic event - thanks to the synchrotron we are able to go inside the teeht non-destructively to precisely assess the timing of tooth formation, which relates to other developmental landmarks, including the duration of childhood and the age at firt reproduction," says Tanya Smith

Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by the Max Plack Institute

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