An attempt to reconstruct the behaviour of australopithecines: the evidence for interpersonal violence

The evidence for inter-personal violence in australopithecines has been reviewed critically. In most instances invalid conclusions have been drawn because ante-mortem damage to specimens has not been isolated conclusively from post-tossilisation ettects. It is concluded that the question of the incidence of inter-personal violence in this group must remain an open one

Book Reviews

Book Review 1Book Title: Sharks and Rays of AustraliaBook Authors: P.R. Last & J.D. StevensPrinted and distributed by CSIRO, P.O. Box 89 East Melbourne. 3002 Australia, 1994. 612 pages and 84 colour plates.Book Review 2Book Title: The Ecology of Mangrove and Related Ecosystems.  Proceedings of the International Symposium held at Mombasa, Kenya 24-30 September 1990Book Authors: Edited by Victor Jaccarini & Els MartensKluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht 1993. 272 pages. Hardbound. ISBN 0-7923-2049-2.Book Review 3Book Title: Rotifer Symposium VI. Proceedings of the Sixth International Rotifer Symposium, held in Banyoles, Spain, June 3-8, 1991Book Authors: Edited by J.J. Gilbert, E. Lubzens & M.R. MiracleReprinted from Hydrobiologia, vols 255-256, as Developments in Hydrobiology 83Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht /Boston /London. 572 pagesBook Review 4Book Title: Identification Guide to the Ant Genera of the WorldBook Author: Barry BoltonHarvard University Press, 1994. 224 pages, 522 SEM photographs. ISBN 0-674-44280-

Salinity tolerance of diapausing eggs of freshwater zooplankton

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/73091/1/j.1365-2427.2004.01185.x.pd

Composition of the Swartkrans bone accumulations, in terms of skeletal parts and animals represented

The Swartkrans cave is one of the classic early hominin sites where more remains of the Australopithecus robustus ape-man have been found than at any other locality in Africa. Australopithecus robustus is also known as Paranthropus robustus. For over 20 years an investigation of this extraordinary cave has been conducted by C. K. Brain producing a wealth of information of the life and death of this early hominins, their associated fauna and the environment. Results of the last seven years of excavation are presented in this volume in 13 chapters by noted specialists in various parts of the world. The foreword to this work is written by F. Clark Howell. This is Transvaal Museum Monograph no. 8

Composition of the Swartkrans bone accumulations, in terms of skeletal parts and animals represented

The Swartkrans cave is one of the classic early hominin sites where more remains of the Australopithecus robustus ape-man have been found than at any other locality in Africa. Australopithecus robustus is also known as Paranthropus robustus. For over 20 years an investigation of this extraordinary cave has been conducted by C. K. Brain producing a wealth of information of the life and death of this early hominins, their associated fauna and the environment. Results of the last seven years of excavation are presented in this volume in 13 chapters by noted specialists in various parts of the world. The foreword to this work is written by F. Clark Howell. This is Transvaal Museum Monograph no. 8

Do we owe our intelligence to a predatory past? (James Arthur lecture on the evolution of the human brain, no. 70, 2000).

32 p. : ill. ; 23 cm. Includes bibliographical references (p. 28-32)

The first animals : ca. 760-million-year-old sponge-like fossils from Namibia

One of the most profound events in biospheric evolution was the emergence of animals, which is thought to have occurred some 600–650 Ma. Here we report on the discovery of phosphatised body fossils that we interpret as ancient sponge-like fossils and term them Otavia antiqua gen. et sp. nov. The fossils are found in Namibia in rocks that range in age between about 760 Ma and 550 Ma. This age places the advent of animals some 100 to 150 million years earlier than proposed, and prior to the extreme climatic changes and postulated stepwise increases in oxygen levels of Ediacaran time. These findings support the predictions based on genetic sequencing and inferences drawn from biomarkers that the first animals were sponges. Further, the deposition and burial of Otavia as sedimentary particles may have driven the large positive C-isotopic excursions and increases in oxygen levels that have been inferred for Neoproterozoic time

Interpretive problems in a search for micro-invertebrate fossils from a neoproterozoic limestone in Namibia

Attention is focussed on a carbonate sequence in the Auros Formation of the Otavi Group in northern Namibia, where several limestone layers are found to have been phosphatised. These contain an abundance of unusual objects, some of which suggest sponge-like microfossils, whereas others superficially resemble bivalved shells. Alternatively they may be pseudofossils - the deceptive products of a phosphatisation process and subsequent diagenetic effects in the limestone. Since this deposit antedates the ca. 590 million-year-old Ghaub or Marinoan glaciation, the presence of any potential metazoan fossils is worth investigating. The objects in question are described and alternative interpretations are discussed