关于古猿露西的有趣事实

关于古猿露西的有趣事实

One day during the Pliocene Epoch, a young adult ape died in the Awash Valley of East Africa. She was soon forgotten, and wouldn't be seen again for 3.2 million years. During that time, her species went extinct, new apes appeared across Africa and some evolved huge brains, helping them basically conquer the planet.

上新世的一天，东非的阿瓦什山谷里，一只年轻的成年猿死了。她很快就被遗忘了，320万年后再也没有出现过。在那段时间里，她的物种灭绝了，非洲各地出现了新的类人猿，一些类人猿进化出了巨大的大脑，帮助它们基本上征服了地球。

Lucy belonged to the extinct species Australopithecus afarensis, portrayed here in a sculptor's rendering. (Photo: Dave Einsel/Getty Images)

Then, 3.2 million years after that fateful day, two of these brainy apes finally stumbled across her skeleton in what's now Ethiopia. Realizing they'd found something historic, they began to carefully dig her out of the desert.

然后，在那个灾难性的日子过去320万年后，这两只聪明的猿类终于在现在的埃塞俄比亚偶然发现了她的骨架。意识到他们发现了一些具有历史意义的东西，他们开始小心翼翼地把她从沙漠中挖出来。

First, however, they gave their long-lost relative a name: "Lucy."

然而，他们首先给他们失散多年的亲戚起了个名字:“露西”。

Here are a few interesting facts you may not know about Lucy, from groundbreaking revelations about her life to random trivia about her name(s):

以下是一些你可能不知道的关于露西的有趣事实，从对她生活的突破性发现到关于她名字的随机琐事:

1. She walked on two feet, but also hung out in trees.

她用两只脚走路，但也在树上闲逛。

New research supports the idea that Lucy walked upright similar to modern humans, but also spent a lot of time in trees — as implied by this exhibit from the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. (Photo: Tim Evanson [CC BY-SA 2.0]/Flickr)

Lucy lived at a pivotal time for human-like apes known as hominins. Her species was transitional, with key traits of earlier apes as well as later humans. (It's worth noting, though, the "missing link" concept is a fallacy. It's based on an outdated belief that evolution is linear, and on a misinterpretation of inevitable gaps in the fossil record.)

露西生活在人类类人猿的关键时期。她的物种是过渡性的，具有早期猿类和晚期人类的关键特征。(不过值得注意的是，“缺失环节”的概念是一种谬论。它基于一种过时的信念，即进化是线性的，以及对化石记录中不可避免的空白的误解。

Lucy's skeleton offers several signs of bipedalism, or walking on two feet. (Photo: Juan Aunion/Shutterstock)

Lucy walked on two feet, a major step in human evolution. We know this from several clues in her bones, such as the angle of her femur in relation to knee-joint surfaces — an adaptation that helps bipedal animals balance while walking. Her knee joints also show signs of carrying her full body weight, rather than sharing the burden with her front limbs, and various other indications have been found in her pelvis, ankles and vertebrae. Still, her skeleton couldn't have moved quite like ours does, and her big, chimp-like arms suggest she hadn't yet abandoned the trees.

露西用两只脚走路，这是人类进化的重要一步。我们从她骨头上的一些线索知道这一点，比如她股骨与膝关节表面的角度——一种帮助两足动物在行走时保持平衡的适应性。她的膝关节也显示出承载全身重量的迹象，而不是与前肢共同承担这个负担，她的骨盆、脚踝和脊椎也有各种其他迹象。尽管如此，她的骨架不可能像我们的骨架那样移动得那么快，而她那巨大的黑猩猩般的手臂表明，她还没有抛弃树木。

2. She made us rethink the rise of big human brains.

她让我们重新思考人类大脑的崛起。

The brains of Lucy's species, Australopithecus afarensis, were about one-third the size of a modern human brain. Pictured above is an endocast, a brain model based on the space in an animal's cranial vault. (Photo: Tim Evanson [CC BY-SA 2.0]/Flickr)

Before Lucy, it was widely believed that hominins evolved big brains first, and then became bipedal later. Lucy, however, was clearly built for bipedal walking — an extremely rare adaptation for mammals — and yet her skull only had space for a brain about the size of a chimpanzee's. Her cranial capacity was less than 500 cubic centimeters, or roughly one-third as big as that of a modern human.

在露西之前，人们普遍认为人类首先进化出大脑，然后才进化成两足动物。然而，露西显然是为两足行走而生的——这是哺乳动物极其罕见的适应能力——然而，她的头骨却只有黑猩猩大脑大小的空间。她的脑容量不足500立方厘米，大约是现代人的三分之一。

3. She was an adult, but only stood as tall as a modern 5-year-old.

她是个成年人，但身高只有现代5岁孩子的水平。

A human child poses next to the skeleton of an adult Australopithecus afarensis. (Photo: James St. John [CC BY 2.0]/Flickr)

Lucy's brain may have been smaller than ours, but to be fair, so was her whole body. She was a fully grown young adult when she died, yet stood just 1.1 meters (3.6 feet) tall and weighed about 29 kilograms (64 pounds).

露西的大脑可能比我们的小，但平心而论，她的整个身体也是如此。她去世时已经是一个完全成年的年轻人，但身高只有1.1米(3.6英尺)，体重约29公斤(64磅)。

4. She may have died by falling out of a tree.

她可能是从树上掉下来而死的。

This illustration shows a leading — but not universally accepted — theory about Lucy's death. It's from a 2016 study that concludes she suffered fatal injuries from a fall, 'probably out of a tree.' (Image: John Kappelman/UT-Austin)

For all we've learned about Lucy's life over four decades, her death has remained mysterious. Her skeleton doesn't show signs of gnawing by carnivores or scavengers (aside from a single tooth mark on one of her bones), so scientists doubt she was killed by a predator. Otherwise, though, they've been stumped.

40多年来，我们对露西的生活了解甚多，但她的死仍然是个谜。她的骨骼没有被食肉动物或食腐动物咬伤的迹象(除了骨头上有一颗牙印)，所以科学家怀疑她是被食肉动物咬死的。然而，在其他方面，他们却被难倒了。

Then, in August 2016, a team of U.S. and Ethiopian researchers announced a break in Lucy's cold case. Their study, published in the journal Nature, concluded her death "can be attributed to injuries resulting from a fall, probably out of a tall tree." They used high-resolution CT scans to make 35,000 virtual "slices" of her skeleton, one of which showed something odd. Lucy's right humerus had a type of fracture uncommon in fossils: a series of sharp, clean breaks with bone fragments and slivers still in place. Along with other, less severe fractures at the left shoulder and elsewhere, this is consistent with a long fall in which the victim tries to break the impact by extending an arm before landing.

然后，2016年8月，一个由美国和埃塞俄比亚研究人员组成的团队宣布，露西的死亡之谜出现了转机。他们的研究发表在《自然》杂志上，结论是她的死亡“可能是由于从一棵大树上摔下来而受伤。”他们使用高分辨率CT扫描技术对她的骨骼进行了35000次虚拟“切片”，其中一次显示出了一些奇怪的现象。露西的右肱骨有一种在化石中罕见的骨折类型:一系列锋利的、干净的骨折，骨头碎片和碎片仍在原地。与其他左肩和其他地方不太严重的骨折一样，这与长时间的坠落相一致，受害者试图在着陆前伸出手臂来打破撞击。