TY  - JOUR
A1  - Bocherens, Herv
A1  - Sandrock, Oliver
A1  - Kullmer, Ottmar
A1  - Schrenk, Friedemann
T1  - Hominin palaeoecology in Late Pliocene Malawi : first insights from isotopes (13C, 18O) in mammal teeth
T2  - South African journal of science
N2  - Carbon-13 and oxygen-18 abundances were measured in large mammal skeletal remains (tooth enamel, dentine and bone) from the Chiwondo Beds in Malawi, which were dated by biostratigraphic correlation to ca. 2.5 million years ago. The biologic isotopic patterns, in particular the difference in carbon-13 abundances between grazers and browsers and the difference in oxygen-18 abundances between semi-aquatic and terrestrial herbivores, were preserved in enamel, but not in dentine and bone. The isotopic results obtained from the skeletal remains from the Chiwondo Beds indicate a dominance of savannah habitats with some trees and shrubs. This environment was more arid than the contemporaneous Ndolanya Beds in Tanzania. The present study confirms that robust australopithecines were able to live in relatively arid environments and were not confined to more mesic environments elsewhere in southern Africa.
KW  - carbon-13
KW  - Chiwondo Beds
KW  - enamel
KW  - Homo
KW  - Malawi
KW  - mammals
KW  - oxygen-18
KW  - palaeoecology
KW  - Paranthropus
KW  - Pliocene
Y1  - 2011
UR  - http://publikationen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/21851
UR  - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hebis:30-85830
SN  - 0038-2353
SN  - 1996-7489
N1  - © 2011. The Authors. Licensee: OpenJournals Publishing. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License
VL  - 107
IS  - 3-4, Art. 331
SP  - 1
EP  - 6
PB  - Academy of Science of South Africa
CY  - Pretoria
ER  -