Luminescence Sediment Dating of Pleistocene Hominin and Tool Sites at Atapuerca, Spain

西班牙阿塔普尔卡更新世人类和工具遗址的发光沉积物测年

• 批准号: 0841059
• 负责人: Glenn Berger
• 金额: $ 12.9万
• 依托单位: Nevada System of Higher Education, Desert Research Institute
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-06-01 至 2013-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0841059&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Luminescence; Sediment; Dating; Pleistocene; Hominin

Supported by the National Science Foundation, Dr. Glenn Berger will conduct 2 weeks of field work in northern Spain with Spanish colleagues at the UNESCO World Heritage Archeological Site of Atapuerca, near Burgos. For the last 1-million-year period, this is one of the world's most important site for fossils, tools and faunal finds related to the presence of ancestors to modern humans, yet much of the timing for the deposition of the various finds at the 3-4 related sites at Atapuerca is uncertain. Understanding when human ancestors arrived in Europe and how they evolved thereafter requires knowing the ages of the fossil and stone-tool finds. Absent evidence for use of fire and pottery (none yet found at Atapuerca before the last 50,000 yrs), such stone tools are the main preserved representations of the cultural behaviors of human ancestors of such antiquity. Furthering an international collaboration begun in 1997, Berger and Spanish colleagues will collect sediment samples throughout 3 of the cave sites (Gran Dolina, Galería, Elefante) at Atapuerca. In his laboratory in Reno, Nevada, Berger will apply several variations of a sediment-dating technique that measures luminescence to be stimulated artificially from unheated mineral grains. His 2008 published report (Journal of Human Evolution) demonstrated for the first time that luminescence techniques could date sediments from 2 (Gran Dolina and Galería) of the Atapuerca cave deposits, back to about 1 million years. The current project not only will attempt to provide a better age for the old skull at Gran Dolina, but will provide the first numeric ages for stone tools from a relatively new cave site (Elefante), and more precise and accurate ages for tools from the 2 other mentioned cave sites. In a broader context, these ages will place the development of the tool styles into a numeric time series and thus permit relating these developments in the technologies of human ancestors to those from other sites around the world. Knowledge of the sequence of development of tool styles in different areas of the world is an important key to understanding human evolution. As well, such numeric time scales are essential for relating the migration and evolution of human ancestors in Europe to their likely connections to Asian-African forebears. Numeric time scales are critical for the search for causes of and effects on the evolutionary changes in regional fossil plants and animals, such as climatic changes. This project also will develop a cross-comparison of luminescence ages with the few available numeric ages from two other dating techniques (ESR and cosmogenic-nuclide dating). Such comparisons are rare in archeological studies beyond the age range of radiocarbon dating (about 35,000 yrs) in areas lacking volcanic deposits (such as much of Europe). Moreover, this project will permit undergraduate students in Reno to participate in cutting-edge laboratory research.

在国家科学基金会的支持下，格伦·伯杰博士将与西班牙同事一起在西班牙北部布尔戈斯附近的联合国教科文组织世界遗产阿塔普尔卡考古遗址进行为期两周的实地考察，这是过去一百万年来的一次实地考察。世界上最重要的化石、工具和动物发现地点，这些化石、工具和动物发现与现代人类祖先的存在有关，但各种发现的大部分时间都沉积在 3-4 个相关地点要了解人类祖先何时到达欧洲以及此后如何进化，需要了解化石和石器发现的年龄（缺乏使用火和陶器的证据（在过去 5 万年前尚未在阿塔普尔卡发现过））。这些石器是古代人类祖先文化行为的主要保存代表。为了进一步推进 1997 年开始的国际合作，伯杰和西班牙同事将收集整个时期的沉积物样本。伯杰在内华达州里诺市的 3 个洞穴遗址（Gran Dolina、Galería、Elefante）中应用了沉积物测年技术的多种变体，该技术测量了他 2008 年发表的人工激发的发光。报告（《人类进化杂志》）首次证明，发光技术可以确定来自 2 个地区（Gran Dolina 和 Galería）的沉积物的年代。 Atapuerca 洞穴沉积物，可追溯到大约 100 万年前 当前的项目不仅将尝试为 Gran Dolina 的古老头骨提供更好的年龄，还将提供来自相对较新的洞穴遗址 (Elefante) 的石器的第一个数字年龄。 ，以及来自其他两个提到的站点的工具的更精确和准确的年龄在更广泛的背景下，这些年龄将把工具样式的发展放入数字时间序列中，从而允许将人类祖先的技术发展与这些技术发展联系起来。从了解世界不同地区工具风格的发展顺序是了解人类进化的重要关键，而且这种数字时间尺度对于联系欧洲人类祖先的迁徙和进化至关重要。数字时间尺度对于寻找区域化石植物和动物进化变化的原因和影响至关重要，例如气候变化。年龄在缺乏火山沉积物的地区（例如欧洲大部分地区），在超出放射性碳测年年龄范围（约 35,000 年）的考古研究中，这种比较很少见。此外，该项目将允许里诺的本科生参与前沿的实验室研究。