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Research Article

Thoracic vertebral count and thoracolumbar transition in Australopithecus afarensis

Carol V. Ward, Thierra K. Nalley, Fred Spoor, View ORCID ProfilePaul Tafforeau, and Zeresenay Alemseged
  1. aIntegrative Anatomy Program, Department of Pathology and Anatomical Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65212;
  2. bDepartment of Medical Anatomical Sciences, College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific, Western University of Health Sciences, Pomona, CA 91766-1854;
  3. cDepartment of Human Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig 04103, Germany;
  4. dDepartment of Cell and Developmental Biology, University College London, London WC1E 6BT, United Kingdom;
  5. eEuropean Synchrotron Radiation Facility, CS-40220 38043 Grenoble Cedex 09, France;
  6. fDepartment of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637

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PNAS first published May 22, 2017; https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1702229114
Carol V. Ward
aIntegrative Anatomy Program, Department of Pathology and Anatomical Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65212;
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  • For correspondence: WardCV@missouri.edu
Thierra K. Nalley
bDepartment of Medical Anatomical Sciences, College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific, Western University of Health Sciences, Pomona, CA 91766-1854;
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Fred Spoor
cDepartment of Human Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig 04103, Germany;
dDepartment of Cell and Developmental Biology, University College London, London WC1E 6BT, United Kingdom;
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Paul Tafforeau
eEuropean Synchrotron Radiation Facility, CS-40220 38043 Grenoble Cedex 09, France;
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  • ORCID record for Paul Tafforeau
Zeresenay Alemseged
fDepartment of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637
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  1. Edited by Bruce Latimer, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, and accepted by Editorial Board Member C. O. Lovejoy March 26, 2017 (received for review February 8, 2017)

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Significance

The discovery of a 3.3 million-year-old partial skeleton of Australopithecus afarensis, from Dikika, Ethiopia, preserved all seven cervical (neck) vertebrae and provided the only known evidence for the presence of 12 thoracic (rib-bearing) vertebrae in hominins prior to 60,000 years ago. This skeleton has seven cervical and only 12 thoracic vertebrae like humans, rather than 13 like African apes. However, the anatomical transition from thoracic to lumbar (lower back) vertebral form occurs at the 11th thoracic segment. This distinctive pattern of vertebral segmentation, rare in modern apes and humans, is also seen in the three other early hominins for which this area is known, with the Dikika skeleton providing the earliest and most complete example.

Abstract

The evolution of the human pattern of axial segmentation has been the focus of considerable discussion in paleoanthropology. Although several complete lumbar vertebral columns are known for early hominins, to date, no complete cervical or thoracic series has been recovered. Several partial skeletons have revealed that the thoracolumbar transition in early hominins differed from that of most extant apes and humans. Australopithecus africanus, Australopithecus sediba, and Homo erectus all had zygapophyseal facets that shift from thoracic-like to lumbar-like at the penultimate rib-bearing level, rather than the ultimate rib-bearing level, as in most humans and extant African apes. What has not been clear is whether Australopithecus had 12 thoracic vertebrae as in most humans, or 13 as in most African apes, and where the position of the thoracolumbar transitional element was. The discovery, preparation, and synchrotron scanning of the Australopithecus afarensis partial skeleton DIK-1-1, from Dikika, Ethiopia, provides the only known complete hominin cervical and thoracic vertebral column before 60,000 years ago. DIK-1-1 is the only known Australopithecus skeleton to preserve all seven cervical vertebrae and provides evidence for 12 thoracic vertebrae with a transition in facet morphology at the 11th thoracic level. The location of this transition, one segment cranial to the ultimate rib-bearing vertebra, also occurs in all other early hominins and is higher than in most humans or extant apes. At 3.3 million years ago, the DIK-1-1 skeleton is the earliest example of this distinctive and unusual pattern of axial segmentation.

  • Australopithecus afarensis
  • vertebrae
  • Dikika
  • segmentation
  • thoracic

Footnotes

  • ↵1To whom correspondence should be addressed. Email: WardCV{at}missouri.edu.
  • Author contributions: C.V.W. and Z.A. designed research; C.V.W., T.K.N., F.S., P.T., and Z.A. performed research; C.V.W., T.K.N., F.S., and Z.A. analyzed data; and C.V.W., T.K.N., F.S., P.T., and Z.A. wrote the paper.

  • The authors declare no conflict of interest.

  • This article is a PNAS Direct Submission. B.L. is a guest editor invited by the Editorial Board.

  • Data deposition: The DIK-1-1 fossil is housed at the National Museum of Ethiopia. Requests to study it should be made to the museum and to Z.A. (alemseged{at}uchicago.edu). Scan data are archived at the University of Chicago and the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (requests for these data should also be made to Z.A.).

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Vertebral count in Australopithecus afarensis
Carol V. Ward, Thierra K. Nalley, Fred Spoor, Paul Tafforeau, Zeresenay Alemseged
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences May 2017, 201702229; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1702229114

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Vertebral count in Australopithecus afarensis
Carol V. Ward, Thierra K. Nalley, Fred Spoor, Paul Tafforeau, Zeresenay Alemseged
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences May 2017, 201702229; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1702229114
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