GW Researchers Defend Species Status of "Hobbit"

The current issue of Research & Discovery, the magazine about research at GW, features the work of three University paleoanthropologists who analyzed the skull of the three-foot-tall hominid from the island of Flores and concluded that it merited status as a new species.

GW postdoctoral scientist Adam Gordon, Hominid Paleobiology doctoral candidate Lisa Nevell, and University Professor of Human Origins Bernard Wood published their analysis in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in March. They used six cranial measurements to analyze the Flores skull and compare it to other hominids.

For the GW feature story, visit:
http://www.gwu.edu/~magazine/2008_research_fall/docs/feat_headcase.htm

A PDF version of the PNAS article, "The Homo floresiensis cranium (LB1): Size, scaling, and early Homo affinities," is on Dr. Wood's home page: http://home.gwu.edu/~bwood/#pubs