美国亚利桑那州立大学Kaye E. Reed课题组近日取得一项新成果。经过不懈努力，他们提出了埃塞俄比亚Ledi-Geraru地区新发现的南方古猿与人属化石。2025年8月13日，国际知名学术期刊《自然》发表了这一成果。

在这里，小组描述了从埃塞俄比亚的Ledi-Geraru研究项目地区发现的新古人类化石的年龄、地质背景和牙齿形态，其中包括这个严重缺乏代表性的时期的沉积物。课题组研究人员报告了278万年前和259万年前人属和263万年前猿属的存在。虽然南方古猿标本还不能在物种水平上进行鉴定，但它们的形态与阿法南猿和南方古猿garhi不同。这些标本表明，早在250万年前，阿法尔地区的猿人和早期人属就作为两个非猿人谱系共存，而古人类化石记录的多样性也比之前所知的更为丰富。因此，在300万至250万年前的东非，有多达5种人科谱系：早期的Homo1、Paranthropthem2、A. garhi3和新发现的Ledi-Geraru南方古猿。

据悉，大约300万到200万年前的时间间隔是人类进化的一个关键时期——这是人类属和类人猿属首次在化石记录中出现的时间，而这些属的一个可能的祖先——阿法种猿（Athemtralopithecthem afarensis）消失了。在非洲东部，由于缺乏能够捕捉到这段时间间隔的化石，测试导致这些事件的适应性背景假设的尝试受到了限制。

附：英文原文

Title: New discoveries of Australopithecus and Homo from Ledi-Geraru, Ethiopia

Author: Villmoare, Brian, Delezene, Lucas K., Rector, Amy L., DiMaggio, Erin N., Campisano, Christopher J., Feary, David A., Ali, Baroo Mohammed, Chupik, Daniel, Deino, Alan L., Garello, Dominique I., Hayidara, Mohammed Ahmeddin, Locke, Ellis M., Omar, Omar Abdulla, Robinson, Joshua R., Scott, Eric, Smail, Irene E., Geleta Terefe, Kebede, Werdelin, Lars, Kimbel, William H., Arrowsmith, J. Ramn, Reed, Kaye E.

Issue&Volume: 2025-08-13

Abstract: The time interval between about three and two million years ago is a critical period in human evolution—this is when the genera Homo and Paranthropus first appear in the fossil record and a possible ancestor of these genera, Australopithecus afarensis, disappears. In eastern Africa, attempts to test hypotheses about the adaptive contexts that led to these events are limited by a paucity of fossiliferous exposures that capture this interval. Here we describe the age, geologic context and dental morphology of new hominin fossils recovered from the Ledi-Geraru Research Project area, Ethiopia, which includes sediments from this critically underrepresented period. We report the presence of Homo at 2.78 and 2.59 million years ago and Australopithecus at 2.63 million years ago. Although the Australopithecus specimens cannot yet be identified to species level, their morphology differs from A. afarensis and Australopithecus garhi. These specimens suggest that Australopithecus and early Homo co-existed as two non-robust lineages in the Afar Region before 2.5 million years ago, and that the hominin fossil record is more diverse than previously known. Accordingly, there were as many as four hominin lineages living in eastern Africa between 3.0 and 2.5 million years ago: early Homo1, Paranthropus2, A. garhi3, and the newly discovered Ledi-Geraru Australopithecus.

DOI: 10.1038/s41586-025-09390-4

Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09390-4