Brigitte Senut | |
|---|---|
 Senut in 2009 | |
| Born | 27 January 1954 Paris, France |
| Nationality | French |
| Alma mater | Pierre-et-Marie-Curie University Muséum National d'Histoire naturelle |
| Occupation(s) | Paleoprimatologist and paleoanthropologist |
| Spouse | Martin Pickford |
Brigitte Senut (27 January 1954, Paris) is a French paleoprimatologist and paleoanthropologist and a professor at the National Museum of Natural History, Paris. She is a specialist in the evolution of great apes and humans.
Senut is a naturalist and geologist by training and began studying human paleontology and paleoprimatology at a young age. She earned her master's degree in geology at the Pierre-et-Marie-Curie University of Paris in 1975, and specialized in vertebrate and human paleontology, obtaining a doctorate (DEA) in 1976 and defended her doctoral dissertation in 1978. She was interested in the function-phylogeny link in her thesis entitled Contribution à l'étude de l'humérus et de ses articulations chez les Hominidés du Plio-Pléistocène (Contribution to the study of the humerus and its joints in Plio-Pleistocene Hominids). [1]
In 1987, Senut obtained her post doctoral habilitation degree to direct research at the National Museum of Natural History, France, under the direction of anthropologist Yves Coppens, with her thesis entitled Le coude des primates hominoïdes: aspects morphologiques, fonctionnels, taxonomiques et évolutifs (The elbow of hominoid primates: morphological, functional, taxonomic and evolutionary aspects). [1] Senut participated in research on Lucy with the French contingent studying it. [2] Additionally, her research related to the fossils from the African Great Lakes and Ethiopia has allowed her to push back the date of hominid presence in this subregion. [3] She collaborated with Christine Tardieu on these research projects. [2] [3]
Senut has been a professor in the Department of Earth History at the National Museum of Natural History, France, since 1986. [1] [4]
Senut has initiated and led several international cooperation projects in Africa, including sites in Uganda, Kenya, Namibia, South Africa, Angola and Botswana. [1] [4] She joined forces with the British researcher Martin Pickford, who became her life partner and with whom she has made several major discoveries. She participated in many discoveries of fossil great apes in Africa: Otavipithecus in Namibia (12 to 13 million years ago (Mya)), Ugandapithecus and Kogolepithecus in Uganda (20 Mya), the oldest great ape found in South Africa (18 Mya), and in 2011 an exceptionally well preserved skull of Proconsul major . [1] [5]
In 2000, Senut, Pickford and their team discovered in Kenya 12 fossil fragments of a new species of Hominina, which they named in 2001 Orrorin tugenensis. The fossils were found in three Kenyan localities in the Tugen Hills (Baringo district), in the Lukeino formation. They are dated to about 5.9 Mya and thus represent the second oldest hominina known to date, after Sahelanthropus tchadensis. [5]
She also helped establish a local community museum at Kipsaraman, Kenya. [1]
Senut has authored more than 240 original scientific publications. [1]
The abbreviation Senut is used to indicate Brigitte Senut as an authority on description and taxonomy in zoology.
Homininae, is a subfamily of the family Hominidae (hominids). This subfamily includes two tribes, Hominini and Gorillini, both having extant species as well as extinct species.
Orrorin is an extinct genus of primate within Homininae from the Miocene Lukeino Formation and Pliocene Mabaget Formation, both of Kenya.
Sahelanthropus is an extinct genus of hominid dated to about 7 million years ago during the Late Miocene. The type species, Sahelanthropus tchadensis, was first announced in 2002, based mainly on a partial cranium, nicknamed Toumaï, discovered in northern Chad.
Oreopithecus is an extinct genus of hominoid primate from the Miocene epoch whose fossils have been found in today's Tuscany and Sardinia in Italy. It existed nine to seven million years ago in the Tusco-Sardinian area when this region was an isolated island in a chain of islands stretching from central Europe to northern Africa in what was becoming the Mediterranean Sea.
Meave G. Leakey is a British palaeoanthropologist. She works at Stony Brook University and is co-ordinator of Plio-Pleistocene research at the Turkana Basin Institute. She studies early hominid evolution and has done extensive field research in the Turkana Basin. She has Doctor of Philosophy and Doctor of Science degrees.
The Hominini (hominins) form a taxonomic tribe of the subfamily Homininae (hominines). They comprise two extant genera: Homo (humans) and Pan, but in standard usage exclude the genus Gorilla (gorillas), which is grouped separately within subfamily Homininae.
The Tugen Hills are a series of hills in Baringo County, Kenya. They are located in the central-western portion of Kenya.
Proconsul major, an extinct primate of the genus Proconsul, was possibly the ancestor of Afropithecus and showed hominid characteristics. It occurred during the early Miocene and was roughly, the size of a gorilla. The species previously referred to as Ugandapithecus major is now considered to be a synonym of Proconsul major. Prior to 2000 it was known as Proconsul major and some argue against the renaming.
AL 129-1 is a fossilized knee joint of the species Australopithecus afarensis. It was discovered in Hadar, Ethiopia by Donald Johanson in November 1973.
Michel Brunet is a French paleontologist and a professor at the Collège de France. In 2001 Brunet announced the discovery in Central Africa of the skull and jaw remains of a late Miocene hominid nicknamed Toumaï. These remains may predate the earliest previously known hominid remains, Lucy, by over three million years; however, this conclusion is the subject of a significant controversy.
Hélène Langevin-Joliot is a French nuclear physicist known for her research on nuclear reactions in French laboratories and for being the granddaughter of Marie Curie and Pierre Curie and the daughter of Irene Joliot-Curie and Frédéric Joliot-Curie, all four of whom have received Nobel Prizes, in Physics or Chemistry. Since retiring from a career in research Hélène has participated in activism centered around encouraging women and girls to participate in STEM fields. Her activism also revolves around promoting greater science literacy for the general public.
Martin Pickford is a lecturer in the Chair of Paleoanthropology and Prehistory at the Collège de France and honorary affiliate at the Département Histoire de la Terre in the Muséum national d'Histoire. In 2001, Martin Pickford together with Brigitte Senut and their team discovered Orrorin tugenensis, a hominid primate species dated between 5.8 and 6.2 million years ago and a potential ancestor of the genus Australopithecus.
The Hominidae, whose members are known as the great apes or hominids, are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: Pongo ; Gorilla ; Pan ; and Homo, of which only modern humans remain.
The Shungura Formation is a stratigraphic formation located in the Omo river basin in Ethiopia. It dates to the Late Pliocene to Early Pleistocene. Oldowan tools have been found in the formation, suggesting early use of stone tools by hominins. Among many others, fossils of Panthera were found in Member G of the formation.
Anna Katherine "Kay" Behrensmeyer is an American taphonomist and paleoecologist. She is a pioneer in the study of the fossil records of terrestrial ecosystems and engages in geological and paleontological field research into the ecological context of human evolution in East Africa. She is Curator of Vertebrate Paleontology in the Department of Paleobiology at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History (NMNH). At the museum, she is co-director of the Evolution of Terrestrial Ecosystems program and an associate of the Human Origins Program.
The savannah hypothesis is a hypothesis that human bipedalism evolved as a direct result of human ancestors' transition from an arboreal lifestyle to one on the savannas. According to the hypothesis, hominins left the woodlands that had previously been their natural habitat millions of years ago and adapted to their new habitat by walking upright.
Nathalie Demassieux (1884–1961), was a chemist and French academic who specialized in mineral chemistry. She was, after Irène Joliot-Curie and Pauline Ramart, the third woman to obtain a position as a lecturer in a French university. In tribute to her legacy with the Faculty of Sciences of Paris, the Nathalie Demassieux scientific prize was awarded for many years by the Chancellery of the Universities of Paris.
Panina is a subtribe of tribe Hominini; it comprises all descendants of the human-chimpanzee last common ancestor (LCA) that are not of the branch of human lineage—that is, all those ancestors of the type genus Pan,. This split/divergence occurred around 8 to 6 mya, which compares with a range of other estimates for this event—likely extended by periods of hybridization—of from 15 to 3 mya. Fossils from this subtribe are typically rare because they tend to live in environments with poor fossilization. Some of the earliest chimpanzee fossils are 500,000 years of age.
The Lukeino Formation is a geologic formation located in Kenya and it dates to the Late Miocene (Messinian).
Christine Tardieu, born on 28 April 1949, in Boulogne-Billancourt, is a French researcher, paleontologist, and evolutionary biologist. She specializes in functional morphology and biomechanics, with a particular focus on the origin and progression of human bipedalism.
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