Steven E. Churchill
I am a human paleontologist studying morphological and behavioral adaptation in archaic and modern humans of the Middle and Late Pleistocene. My recent research includes:
1) functional morphological and biomechanical analyses of upper limb bones for the information they contain about adaptive and technological change in the later stages of human evolution. Over the past several years I have been analyzing skeletal robusticity and patterns of upper limb bilateral asymmetry in Neandertals and early modern humans, primarily through analysis of humeral diaphyseal cross-sectional geometry. By comparing fossil samples with samples of recent humans from foraging, agricultural and industrialized populations this work is adding to our understanding of the behavioral shifts in the late Pleistocene and the role of adaptive evolution in the origins of modern humans.
2) experimental work (with Drs. Daniel Schmitt and William Hylander) aimed at better understanding how mechanical forces generated during specific subsistence and technological activities influence postcranial skeletal morphology. This work involves analysis of kinematic, electromyographic, force plate and accelerometer data on humans engaged in a variety of manipulative behaviors.
3) experimental analysis of the effects of human nasal morphological variation on airflow dynamics in the upper respiratory tract. This work combines flow studies using water and dye flowing through anatomically accurate nasal models with computer analysis of upper respiratory tract geometry to better understand how ecogeographic variation in human nasal morphology relates to climatic adaptation (specifically, demands of warming and humidifying inspired air in different environments). The ultimate goal of this work is a better understanding of the adaptive significance of Neandertal nasal anatomy.
4) paleontological and archeological fieldwork in southern Africa. In collaboration with Drs. Lee Berger (Palaeo-Anthropological Unit for Research and Exploration, Bernard Price Institute of Palaeontology, University of the Witwatersrand), James Brink (Florisbad Quaternary Research Department, National Museum Bloemfontein) and Peter Ungar (Department of Anthropology, University of Arkansas) our team has been conducting surveys of Middle and Late Pleistocene fossil-bearing deposits in the Free State Province of South Africa and in northern Botswana (for more information, check out National Geographic Outpost). Given the importance of southern Africa to our understanding of the origins of modern humans (evidence suggests that both modern humans and some aspects of modern behavior developed first in this region), the goal of this work is to increase the geochronological, paleoecological, paleontological and archeological data necessary to reconstruct the Quaternary evolutionary history of the genus Homo in this region. Undergraduate and graduate students have been actively involved in this fieldwork through the Duke Paleoanthropology Field School.
Publications