Neandertal birth canal shape and the evolution of human childbirth
Edited by Richard G. Klein, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, and approved March 11, 2009
Abstract
Childbirth is complicated in humans relative to other primates. Unlike the situation in great apes, human neonates are about the same size as the birth canal, making passage difficult. The birth mechanism (the series of rotations that the neonate must undergo to successfully negotiate its mother's birth canal) distinguishes humans not only from great apes, but also from lesser apes and monkeys. Tracing the evolution of human childbirth is difficult, because the pelvic skeleton, which forms the margins of the birth canal, tends to survive poorly in the fossil record. Only 3 female individuals preserve fairly complete birth canals, and they all date to earlier phases of human evolution. Here we present a virtual reconstruction of a female Neandertal pelvis from Tabun, Israel. The size of Tabun's reconstructed birth canal indicates that childbirth was about as difficult in Neandertals as in present-day humans, but the canal's shape indicates that Neandertals had a more primitive birth mechanism. A significant shift in childbirth apparently occurred quite late in human evolution, during the last few hundred thousand years. Such a late shift underscores the uniqueness of human childbirth and the divergent evolutionary trajectories of Neandertals and the lineage leading to present-day humans.
Acknowledgments.
This work was supported by the L.S.B. Leakey Foundation, the Morrison Institute for Population and Resource Studies, the A.W. Mellon Foundation, the “EVAN” Marie Curie Research Training Network (Grant MRTN-CT-019564), and the Max Planck Society. We thank Chris Stringer for access to Tabun and Yoel Rak for access to Kebara; D. Hunt, I. Tattersall, K. Mowbray, G. Avery, A. Morris, the late C. Simon, R. Orban, P. Semal, L. Humphrey, Robert Kruszynski, R. Foley, M. Bellatti, A. Langaney, P. Mennecier, G. Spedini, G. Manzi, B. Chiarelli, and G. D'Amore for access to the comparative specimens; Robert Kruszynski, Heather Gunson, Susan Wakeling, Tarek Yousry, Marc Braun, Alex Foedisch, Heiko Temming, and Andreas Winzer for assistance with the CT scanning; and Philipp Gunz, Yoel Rak, Teresa Steele, and 2 anonymous reviewers for comments.
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© 2009.
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Received: December 9, 2008
Published online: May 19, 2009
Published in issue: May 19, 2009
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Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the L.S.B. Leakey Foundation, the Morrison Institute for Population and Resource Studies, the A.W. Mellon Foundation, the “EVAN” Marie Curie Research Training Network (Grant MRTN-CT-019564), and the Max Planck Society. We thank Chris Stringer for access to Tabun and Yoel Rak for access to Kebara; D. Hunt, I. Tattersall, K. Mowbray, G. Avery, A. Morris, the late C. Simon, R. Orban, P. Semal, L. Humphrey, Robert Kruszynski, R. Foley, M. Bellatti, A. Langaney, P. Mennecier, G. Spedini, G. Manzi, B. Chiarelli, and G. D'Amore for access to the comparative specimens; Robert Kruszynski, Heather Gunson, Susan Wakeling, Tarek Yousry, Marc Braun, Alex Foedisch, Heiko Temming, and Andreas Winzer for assistance with the CT scanning; and Philipp Gunz, Yoel Rak, Teresa Steele, and 2 anonymous reviewers for comments.
Notes
This article is a PNAS Direct Submission.
This article contains supporting information online at www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/0812554106/DCSupplemental.
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The authors declare no conflict of interest.
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Neandertal birth canal shape and the evolution of human childbirth, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.
106 (20) 8151-8156,
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0812554106
(2009).
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