Newswise — The December 24 issue of TIME Magazine selected to its list of "Top 10 Scientific Discoveries in 2007" the findings of a Stony Brook University-led team of international scientists that used a sophisticated method to accurately date a human skull found in South Africa in 1952. The discovery was first reported in the January 12, 2007 issue of Science by Principal investigator Frederick E. Grine, Ph.D., Professor of Anthropology and Anatomical Sciences at Stony Brook University, and colleagues, and provides critical evidence that supports the theory that modern man originated in sub-Saharan Africa.
The Grine team discovery is cited by TIME as the eighth most significant discovery in a listing which includes the brightest supernova ever recorded, breakthroughs in stem cell research, and the naming of hundreds of new organisms.
The specific citation from TIME reads, "Early this year, an international team of scientists announced that analysis of a skull discovered in South Africa in 1952 revealed the first fossil evidence that modern humans left Africa between 65,000 and 25,000 years ago. Scientists determined the age of the skull, unearthed near Hofmeyr, South Africa, by testing the levels of radiation in sand that had filled the braincase. They figured it was about 36,000 years old -- give or take 3,000 years -- and matched skulls found in Europe, eastern Asia and Australia, in age and appearance, which supports the theory that modern man originated in sub-Saharan Africa and fanned out from there."
"I am very pleased that TIME has identified our work as one of the top 10 scientific discoveries of the past year," says Professor Grine. "Given the growing influence of the creationism movement that is threatening the teaching of evolution in public schools, I am equally delighted that such a widely read magazine has chosen to highlight the scientific basis of research in human evolution in this way."
The team's findings, detailed in a Science article titled "Late Pleistocene Human Skull from Hofmeyr, South Africa, and Modern Human Origins," are in agreement with the genetics-based "Out of Africa" theory. Essentially, the theory predicts that humans like those that inhabited Eurasia in the Upper Paleolithic should be found in sub-Saharan Africa around 36,000 years ago.
"We are delighted that the research made the list of TIME Magazine's top 10 scientific discoveries for 2007," says Shirley Strum Kenny, President of Stony Brook University. "We at Stony Brook University are very proud of our top caliber paleoanthropological faculty."
"The work of Dr. Grine and colleagues is a tremendous contribution to understanding the origins of humans and evolution," says Diane Doran-Sheeey, Ph.D, Professor and Chair of Anthropology at Stony Brook University.
"Dr. Grine and his colleagues are most deserving of this recognition and honor," adds William Jungers, Ph.D., Chair of the Department of Anatomical Sciences at Stony Brook University. "The results of his fossil study are exciting and serve to corroborate inferences drawn from genetic research that modern humans originated in Africa relatively recently. This is the final nail in the coffin of the 'regional continuity hypothesis,' which predicts people evolved in parallel throughout the Old World from Homo erectus."
The Leakey Foundation, an international organization with a mission to increase scientific knowledge and public understanding of human origins, evolution, behavior, and survival, provides some of the financial support for the work done by Grine's team. Don Dana, Trustee and Chairman of the Grants Committee of the Leakey Foundation, calls the work "landmark research" that fills a major gap in the knowledge of human evolution and work the foundation is pleased to support. The foundation highlights the research on the Hofmeyr fossil skull from South Africa on the 2007 cover of its annual award magnet publication.
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