Achievement

Trainee Sarah Freidline completed her dissertation research on the evolution and ontogenetic development of the face in Middle Pleistocene humans (between 800,000-125,000 years ago). She worked with NYCEP resource faculty members at the Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology (Leipzig, Germany) and the Center for Scientific Archaeology of the University of Tuebingen (Germany), using the latest cutting-edge techniques of semilandmark geometric morphometrics. Combining analyses of allometry, genetics, growth, mathematical biology and paleontology with CT and surface scanning, Sarah found that some population and species-specific features are already established at the time of birth and that postnatal facial growth further contributes to shape differences among adults. Allometric scaling played an important role in the facial differences between Middle Pleistocene humans and Neanderthals, while modern human facial morphology is the derived condition.