A fossilized leg bone found in Chad more than 20 years ago showed that a creature known as Sahelanthropus tchadensis was an early bipedal human ancestor. The researchers looked at 23 features in the fossils, which they claim link their ancestor to bipedal or upright walking and show a closer relationship to humans than to apes. The discovery was reported in the journal Nature. S.tchadensis was found by a French and Chadian team in the Toros-Menalla region of the Djurab Desert in the Lake Chad Basin in July 2001. Also read | Just not the face, some doppelgängers may have the same DNA too: Study An almost intact, but severely damaged skull was the main discovery. he was nicknamed Toumaï which in Chad Daza’s language means “hope of life”. However, the current discovery was not made from the hope of living the skull, but is based on the examination of a femur bone and two forearm bones. “We can conclude from the evidence that we have ordinary bipedalism, plus quadrupedal arborealism, which is what is seen for early hominids and then gradually turns into obligate bipedalism in Homo,” said a co-author of the study, Jean-Renaud Boisserie. , from the University of Poitiers. Also read | Researchers create floating artificial leaves that produce clean fuel from sunlight, water and CO2 Other experts, however, have raised skepticism about the study. Professor Bernard Wood of George Washington University, who co-authored an earlier study that found Sahelanthropus was not typically bipedal, called the paper “bad.” The Guardian reports that he said: “These critical fossils deserve better treatment than this shoddy paper. The study cherry-picks evidence, ignores recent studies that lead to different conclusions than the authors are trying to defend, and fails to explore others equally, if not more likely, functional interpretations of these fossils. (With information from agencies) Watch WION LIVE HERE: Now you can write for wionews.com and join the community. Share your stories and opinions with us here.
