Human skull study causes evolutionary headache

University of Manchester ^ | December 20, 2011

[decimon]

Scientists studying a unique collection of human skulls have shown that changes to the skull shape thought to have occurred independently through separate evolutionary events may have actually precipitated each other.

Researchers at the Universities of Manchester and Barcelona examined 390 skulls from the Austrian town of Hallstatt and found evidence that the human skull is highly integrated, meaning variation in one part of the skull is linked to changes throughout the skull.

The Austrian skulls are part of a famous collection kept in the Hallstatt Catholic Church ossuary; local tradition dictates that the remains of the town's dead are buried but later exhumed to make space for future burials. The skulls are also decorated with paintings and, crucially, bear the name of the deceased. The Barcelona team made measurements of the skulls and collected genealogical data from the church's records of births, marriages and deaths, allowing them to investigate the inheritance of skull shape.

The team tested whether certain parts of the skull – the face, the cranial base and the skull vault or brain case – changed independently, as anthropologists have always believed, or were in some way linked. The scientists simulated the shift of the foramen magnum (where the spinal cord enters the skull) associated with upright walking; the retraction of the face, thought to be linked to language development and perhaps chewing; and the expansion and rounding of the top of the skull, associated with brain expansion. They found that, rather than being separate evolutionary events, changes in one part of the brain would facilitate and even drive changes in the other parts.

[decimon]

Skull duggery ping.

[GOP Poet]

bookmark

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

***Skull duggery ping.***

I saw that movie back in 1970. Starred Burt Reynolds.
A funny scene is the one where a white official asks a native...”Are you a cannibal?”

The native, offended, says back...”ME METHODIST!”

[mamelukesabre]

So the forces that pull the spine towards the chin and the chin towards the spine are connected and may also be connected to the enlargement of the top of the skull. Wow. Not really earth shattering.

I wouldn’t be surprised if they find out the skull shape shifting process has nothing to do with anything they think it does. I remember an experiment the russians did on foxes. They bred them to be more docile in cages to help the fur industry. All of a sudden they started getting dog like secondary characteristics...white spots in their coats, odd colors, floppy ears, barking...all because they bred for a subdued fight/flight response to stress.

The movements of human skull development that pinches spine to chin together could be something as simple as a response to dietary changes, or lack of sun exposure due to indoor living. Or something completely unexpected like a result of not going barefoot.

[bgill]

With the shoulder bone connected
to the back bone,
and the back bone connected
to the neck bone,
and the neck bone connected
to the head bone.
Oh mercy how they scare!

Oh those bones, oh those bones,
oh those skeleton bones.
Oh those bones, oh those bones,
oh those skeleton bones.
Oh those bones, oh those bones,
oh those skeleton bones.
Oh mercy how they scare!

[SunkenCiv]

GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach	join list or digest view topics view or post blog bookmark post a topic subscribe
Thanks decimon. ...local tradition dictates that the remains of the town's dead are buried but later exhumed to make space for future burials. The skulls are also decorated with paintings and, crucially, bear the name of the deceased. The Barcelona team made measurements of the skulls and collected genealogical data from the church's records of births, marriages and deaths, allowing them to investigate the inheritance of skull shape. To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list.

[gleeaikin]

Long narrow skulls or broad full skulls can be influence by the amount of Vitamin D in the diet. My mother had a narrow jaw and very crowded crooked teeth. I had a similar situation. When my oldest son’s face started to narrow at age 1, I had just read Adelle Davis’ book “Let’s Have Healthy Children” where she explained the influence of Vitamin D on bone growth. I started giving my son cod liver oil in the recommended amount, and his face began to grow broader again. He never needed orthodontic work, and he has never had a cavity at age 41. He did have to have his 6 wisdom teeth pulled. Six you say!! They wanted to know if he had any Esquimo blood. I said his father was 1/16 Cree Indian, so perhaps that is where this came from as they are Canadian indians.

[ZULU]

Gene linkage - same thing with domesticated foxes. The same genes which produced tamed foxes produced animals with coats and tails similar to domestic dogs, not wild foxes.

[mamelukesabre]

IIRC, with the foxes it wasn’t a gene at all. it was a hormone. There was a hormone affecting coat colors AND personality AND brain development AND adrenaline response to fear...all at the same time. They thought they were breeding for a more docile animal but what they were really breeding for was an animal lacking(or partially lacking) one particular type of hormone from development through adulthood.

[Daffynition]

Science tells us that humans evolved from more ape-like primates, but it's not every day that so much evidence winds up in one place. The skull replicas on this table belong to a whole slew of distant human cousins and ancestors. Taken together, the contents of this table represent 4.5 million years of human evolution. Can you name all of the species?

[decimon]

Can you name all of the species?

Can't name any.

[Daffynition]

You may have to zoom+ your screen to see the answers.

[Daffynition]

You may have to zoom+ your screen to see the answers.

[ZULU]

Was the hormone gene connected?

[colorado tanker]

That’s quite a skull session.

[Daffynition]

Off the top of my head, I think one of these belongs to the smartest president the world has ever known.