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Australopithecus sediba at 1.977 Ma and implications for the origins of the genus Homo
Robyn Pickering1, Paul H G M Dirks, Zubair Jinnah
1School of Earth Sciences, University of Melbourne, Victoria, 3010, Australia. r.pickering@unimelb.edu.au
Abstract:
Newly exposed cave sediments at the Malapa site include a flowstone layer capping the sedimentary unit containing the Australopithecus sediba fossils. Uranium-lead dating of the flowstone, combined with paleomagnetic and stratigraphic analysis of the flowstone and underlying sediments, provides a tightly constrained date of 1.977 ± 0.002 million years ago (Ma) for these fossils. This refined dating suggests that Au. sediba from Malapa predates the earliest uncontested evidence for Homo in Africa.
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