@article {323240,
	title = {Increased ecological resource variability during a critical transition in hominin evolution},
	journal = {Science Advances},
	volume = {6},
	year = {2020},
	month = {2020/10/01},
	pages = {eabc8975},
	abstract = {<p>Although climate change is considered to have been a large-scale driver of African human evolution, landscape-scale shifts in ecological resources that may have shaped novel hominin adaptations are rarely investigated. We use well-dated, high-resolution, drill-core datasets to understand ecological dynamics associated with a major adaptive transition in the archeological record ~24 km from the coring site. Outcrops preserve evidence of the replacement of Acheulean by Middle Stone Age (MSA) technological, cognitive, and social innovations between 500 and 300 thousand years (ka) ago, contemporaneous with large-scale taxonomic and adaptive turnover in mammal herbivores. Beginning ~400 ka ago, tectonic, hydrological, and ecological changes combined to disrupt a relatively stable resource base, prompting fluctuations of increasing magnitude in freshwater availability, grassland communities, and woody plant cover. Interaction of these factors offers a resource-oriented hypothesis for the evolutionary success of MSA adaptations, which likely contributed to the ecological flexibility typical of Homo sapiens foragers.</p>
},
	doi = {10.1126/sciadv.abc8975},
	url = {https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/43/eabc8975},
	author = {Potts, Richard and Dommain, Ren{\'e} and Moerman, Jessica W. and Behrensmeyer, Anna K. and Deino, Alan L. and Riedl, Simon and Beverly, Emily J. and Brown, Erik T. and Deocampo, Daniel and Kinyanjui, Rahab and Lupien, Rachel and Owen, R. Bernhart and Rabideaux, Nathan and Russell, James M. and Stockhecke, Mona and deMenocal, Peter and Faith, J. Tyler and Garcin, Yannick and Noren, Anders and Scott, Jennifer J. and Western, David and Bright, Jordon and Clark, Jennifer B. and Cohen, Andrew S. and Keller, C. Brehnin and King, John and Levin, Naomi E. and Brady Shannon, Kristina and Muiruri, Veronica and Renaut, Robin W. and Rucina, Stephen M. and Uno, Kevin}
}
