Bipedalism And Australopithecus

Introduction: Bipedalism and the change of dentition have been landmarks for evolution of the early hominins that once wandered our planet up to three million years ago (Shook, 2015). One of the specific species that has exhibited bipedalism and changes within their skeletal structure is Australopithecus africanus, that some may recognize better as the Taung Child (Barak). Living from 3 to 2.5 million years ago, this species has been known to have developing dentition and obligate bipedalism, which can be represented in their change of teeth over time along with the distal end of the tibia (Skinner); (Barak). On my expedition to the outskirts of Taung, South Africa, my crew and I discovered two bones of an Australopithecus africanus which
If they were determined to be hominins, my next obligation was to figure out what kind of hominin based of key feature on the bones. With the tibia, a bone that is distal from the femur and patella, I noticed that at the distal end of the tibia, the medial malleolus angle is about 10 degrees off of the human tibia, and it is the same degree measurement when compared to the Taung boy skeleton (Barak). Yet, when compared to the chimpanzee tibia, they are significantly different, displaying definite change from chimpanzee towards Homo sapien (Barak). The length of the tibia was 17.5 centimeters long, making the approximate height to be two feet and 2 inches tall; not full grown while not being a young child. The growth plate between the epiphysis and the metaphysis was slightly larger than the Taung child, so I used that to determine that my discovered fossil was in the earlier juvenile stage than Taung child. The length of the tibia helped me determine if it was an Au. africanus tibia, along with the overall size because I had another skeleton to compare it to
The molars of the teeth I found did not have as much growth like the Taung child. This correlates with the approximate height I found, because the Taung child was three feet tall while mine is two feet and two inches tall (Lacruz), (Barak). The molars were larger than human molars, but not nearly as large as a chimpanzee’s or any later hominins that have been discovered (Barak). The root length within my specimen’s mouth seemed to be an estimated one half to three fourths of a centimeter shorter than the Taung child, adding to the younger