Koyal Info Group Mag
The "Rising Star Expedition", known for its recent recovery of one of the largest troves of hominin (early human) fossils ever discovered in one place, is now ambitiously seeking new early-career scientists to study the more than 1,200 fossil elements retrieved from the site and now housed at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits University) in Johannesburg, South Africa.
"The fossil material is an exceptional sample representing most of the parts of the skeleton, and our first task is to describe the material and place it into the context of hominin evolution," says John Hawks, a paleoanthropologist with the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a key member of the team that recovered the fossils during the Fall of 2013.
To that end, Professor Lee Berger of Wits University initiated an effort to recruit the best young minds he can find to help examine the finds and publish some of the first scientific observations, analyses and conclusions about the morphology, among other aspects, of the fragments, and what they might mean in terms of their place in the broad scope of human evolution. Berger has been at the forefront of major hominin fossil discoveries in South Africa, such as the recent Australopithecus sediba finds at the Malapa cave site.
The workshops are also intended to help build a bigger, brighter future for the science.
"We are recruiting an international team, and we are especially interested in building a group that will continue to produce great science in the future," says Hawks.
Berger plans to return to the site for further excavation.
More information about the Rising Star Expedition can be acquired at the National Geographic website dedicated to covering the project. For scientists interested in applying for the Workshop, see this website for additional information.