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Recreating the musculature of the leg and pelvis, the imagery supports the supposition that this part-time tree-dwelling hominin walked completely erect, like humans, but more than three million years earlier.Starting with human MRI and CT scans to map muscle pathways, Wiseman next focused on virtual reconstructions of Lucy's bones and joints, and then married up cues from muscle "scarring" on the bones.The resulting model shows how Lucy was capable of upright, erect locomotion but also possessed powerful leg muscles that facilitated her species' half-land, half-arboreal lifestyle. Researchers believe the extra muscle power in the legs – 74% of the total...

Neanderthals are often depicted as having straight spines and poor posture. However, these prehistoric humans were more similar to us than many assume. University of Zurich researchers have shown that Neanderthals walked upright just like modern humans - thanks to a virtual reconstruction of the pelvis and spine of a very well-preserved Neanderthal skeleton found in France... Since the 1950s, scientists have known that the image of the Neanderthal as a hunched over caveman is not an accurate one. Their similarities to ourselves - both in evolutionary and behavioral terms - have also long been known, but in recent years...

JEFFERSON TOWNSHIP — A bear walking upright around a township development that has become an Internet sensation is injured and needs to be left alone, according to wildlife officials monitoring the situation. The black bear has an injury to both front legs, including its paws and possibly an elbow, said Tracy Leaver, the executive director of the Woodlands Wildlife Refuge. There's no official cause of how the bear got injured. Kelcey Burguess, a black bear biologist with the New Jersey Division of Fish and Wildlife, said he most likely "got hit by a car." Burguess said the bear is expected...

Upright Walking Began 6 Million Years Ago Newswise — A shape comparison of the most complete fossil femur (thigh bone) of one of the earliest known pre-humans, or hominins, with the femora of living apes, modern humans and other fossils, indicates the earliest form of bipedalism occurred at least six million years ago and persisted for at least four million years. William Jungers, Ph.D., of Stony Brook University, and Brian Richmond, Ph.D., of George Washington University, say their finding indicates that the fossil belongs to very early human ancestors, and that upright walking is one of the first human characteristics...