Oreopithecus: still apelike after all these years.
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Biomedical subjects
Randall L Susman
Publications and source records attributed to Randall L Susman.
Oreopithecus bambolii: an unlikely case of hominid-like grip capability in a Miocene ape.
Oreopithecus bambolii, an ape from the late Miocene of Italy, is said to possess a hand capable of a precision grip like that of humans. Relative hand length, proportions of the thumb, and morphological features of the thumb and wrist were adduced to support the idea that Oreopithecus had a hand that closely matched the pattern in Australopithecus. A reappraisal of earlier arguments and comparisons of Oreopithecus with humans, apes, and Old World monkeys, reveals that Oreopithecus had an essentially ape-like hand that emphasized ape-like power grasping over human-like precision grasping.
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New hominin first metatarsal (SK 1813) from Swartkrans.
A recently recognized hominin hallucal metatarsal, SK 1813, from Swartkrans bears a suite of primitive and derived traits. Comparisons with extant apes, modern humans, SKX 5017, and Stw 562 reveals similar morphology in all three fossils and that these early hominins, while bipedal, possessed a unique toe-off mechanism. The implications of this are that both primitive and derived traits must be used to establish the total biomechanical pattern.
Animals↗