Collaborative Research: Integrated Modeling and Experimental Assessment of Chimpanzee and Hominin Locomotion

合作研究：黑猩猩和人类运动的综合建模和实验评估

• 批准号: 0935327
• 负责人: Brian Umberger
• 金额: $ 59.35万
• 依托单位: University of Massachusetts Amherst
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-10-01 至 2015-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0935327&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Integrated; Modeling; Experimental

Habitual upright bipedalism - walking exclusively on two straight legs - is one of the key evolutionary adaptations that sets modern humans apart from other primates. In contrast, the crouched form of bipedalism used by our nearest relatives, chimpanzees, represents the best available example of how our early bipedal ancestors would have walked. Therefore, advancing our understanding of bipedal locomotion in chimpanzees is central to understanding the evolution of locomotion in humans. In this project, an interdisciplinary team of scientists will use state-of-the-art computer modeling and lab-based experimental techniques to study the mechanics, energetics, and control of bipedal locomotion in chimpanzees. Specifically, the researchers will develop a computer model of the chimpanzee musculoskeletal system that will be used to generate simulations of bipedal walking. The musculoskeletal model will be used to evaluate the impact of specific morphological adaptations that have been proposed to play a role in the evolution of human bipedalism. The computer model will be complemented by a detailed set of empirically derived locomotor data that will be collected on chimpanzee subjects. These data will fully document bipedal locomotion in chimpanzees, and will aid in generating and validating the bipedal walking simulations. Together, these modeling and experimental investigations will be used to reconstruct the most likely manner in which the australopithecine ancestors of humans walked on two legs, and by so doing, determine if australopithecine bipedality was transitional between that of apes and humans. The broader impacts of this research will target both scientific and educational domains. The researchers plan to make the computer simulation models and corresponding experimental data widely and freely available to other scientists, and develop a learning module based on the models that can be used in teaching functional morphology and biomechanics. Moreover, this project will support the research of two successful female scientists, and the mentoring of postdoctoral fellows and both graduate and undergraduate students. By training the next generation of scientists and creating freely-available model and data resources, this project will facilitate discoveries in the evolution of human locomotion that go far beyond the present project.

习惯性直立的双皮主义 - 仅在两条直腿上行走 - 是将现代人类与其他灵长类动物区分开来的关键进化适应之一。相比之下，我们最近的亲戚黑猩猩使用的蹲伏形式是我们早期的双皮亚祖先如何行走的最佳例子。因此，促进我们对黑猩猩的两足动力的理解对于理解人类运动的演变至关重要。在这个项目中，一个跨学科的科学家团队将使用最先进的计算机建模和基于实验室的实验技术来研究黑猩猩双皮亚运动的力学，能量和控制。具体而言，研究人员将开发黑猩猩肌肉骨骼系统的计算机模型，该模型将用于生成两足动物的模拟。肌肉骨骼模型将用于评估提出的特定形态适应的影响，这些适应性在人类两性主义的进化中发挥作用。计算机模型将通过一组详细的经验得出的运动数据来补充，这些运动将在黑猩猩受试者上收集。这些数据将充分记录黑猩猩中的两足球运动，并有助于生成和验证两足步行模拟。总之，这些建模和实验研究将用于重建人类的祖先在两条腿上行走的最可能的方式，然后这样做，确定猿类和人类之间的过渡性是否是过渡的。这项研究的更广泛影响将针对科学和教育领域。研究人员计划将计算机模型模型和相应的实验数据广泛且可自由地提供给其他科学家，并根据可用于教学功能形态和生物力学的模型开发学习模块。此外，该项目将支持两位成功的女科学家的研究，并指导博士后研究员以及研究生和本科生。通过培训下一代科学家并创建自由利用的模型和数据资源，该项目将促进人类运动发展的发现，这远远超出了当前项目。