PhD Student

My research primarily focuses on creating new locomotor efficiency models for fossil hominin species by using extant human limb morphological variation. Conventional hominin locomotor efficiency estimates use body mass as their determinant variable because it scales allometrically with energetic efficiency. But bodies can vary phenotypically beyond body mass in terms of absolute and relative size, shape and composition of their limbs, called phenotypic plasticity. Therefore, by using limb morphological variation as primary determinants I hope to create novel locomotor efficiency models that are unbound by body mass. Offering nuanced fossil human ecology interpretations.

My past project involved re-assessing the relative facial size of Homo floresiensis, a diminutive species of hominin from the Indonesian island of Flores, in comparison to the relative facial sizes of living and extinct hominin species. The project helped re-interpret claims that Homo floresiensis shared similar features to Asian Homo erectus; contrary to the claim our results found Homo floresiensis shared more features with African hominin such as Homo habilis and Homo rudolfensis. I have also been involved in a population/ecology estimation project for Flores’ Pleistocene species, including Homo floresiensis.

Keywords: form-function adaptation, skeletal biomechanics, limb morphology plasticity, paleoanthropology, bioarcheology.