1.5.3 Anthropological Diversity in Human Populations

Research Area 1. Social Science and Humanities Aspects of Human Capital → Research Program 1.5 Anthropological Diversity and Adaptive Capacity in Human Populations

Sergey Vasilyev
Project Leader

Project period

2020-2025

Context of Research Project within a Subject of Human Capital

The human body adaptive abilities reveal to us human potential through the human dispersal. The scientific project Anthropological Diversity in Human Populations focuses on the research of the human potential for adaptation to the different environmental conditions. These are the Far North, the Far East, the islands and the highlands. It is important to shed more light on the physiological and cognitive potentials of the ancient man during its settlement on the Eurasian continent to understand the capacity of the contemporary populations. Paleogenetics and computer tomography studies of the Upper Paleolithic Man from Sunghir (Vladimir oblast, Russia) contribute a lot to this question. The study of the nomads’ adaptive potential in the Neolithic and Bronze Age is of great interest too. Adaptive morphological types, paleodiet, diseases of ancient people, paleodemography are approaches and methods for the study of human potential when settling new territories, sometimes with critical climatic conditions

Project Aim

Conducting a comprehensive study of the anthropological diversity and adaptive capabilities in human populations, both ancient and modern, identification of the morphological and demographic competitive factors of human dispersal

Project Objectives:

1. Studying of the human remains from Stone Age excavations.; identifying their taxonomic status: studying pathogenetic features and to trace the migration routes in ancient times

2. Identifying the dynamics of the dental morphology traits and their complexes in various populations of Northern Eurasia (Southern Urals, Volga region, Caucasus, Siberia); studying the adaptive variability in different populations based on the dental diseases data and identifying the adaptation directions

3. Conducting an intragroup study of the craniological series from different geographic zones: the North Caucasus, Sakhalin Island, Greenland Island, Lusson Island, Egypt, the Kola Peninsula, etc.

4. Studying morphology and paleodemography of the Russian first settlers in Siberia

Key Findings

2020

A pronounced gap of socially determined boundaries with the physiological duration of the reproductive period of Kalmyks has been revealed. The type of fertility in the populations is regulated, more characteristic of the urban population with social pressure linked to abortions percentage. A hypothesis has been proposed explaining reproductive compensation, proceeding by the type of reduction of embryonic losses, developed in generations by the evolutionary trend of biological fitness for nomadic life

2021

Cranial studies revealed that representatives of the “Greenland type” have width of the skull smaller than its height and width of the face, in Alaska and Asian Eskimos the skull is wider and less long. However, the ancient series of Chukotka are morphologically closer to the series of modern Eskimos of Greenland and Labrador than to the series of modern Chukchi Eskimos. In ancient times, the “Greenland type” was represented both in Alaska and in Chukotka. Thus, the distribution of variants of the Eskimo anthropological type in time and space does not give definite indications of either their antiquity or genetic relationships.

A Micro-CT study of the unique Upper Paleolithic Sunghir human remains has been carried out for the research of the adaptation to cold conditions. Strong relation of the several features of the face shape to the temperature and humidity has been shown, especially of the relative sizes of the external nose, inner nose and maxillary sinuses. Judging by these features, Sunghir and Mladeč Upper Palaeolithic humans showed adaptation to a dry environment, while first was strongly associated with cold temperatures, and the second – with temperatures from warm to high.

It has been revealed that the oldest population of the European North (Oleniy ostrov burial ground) had significantly common dental pathologies. Oral health of the Olenyi ostrov inhabitants is characterized by a high level of mechanical stress, the rarity of the pronounced spread of tartar, periodontopathies and enamel hypoplasia. The absence of statistically significant differences in the frequency of manifestation of certain diseases between men and women indicates equality in access to food resources in the studied group

2022

The endocrine membrane of the Sungir man was studied using computed tomography. In general, the human endocrine from Sungir indicates the development of brain structures similar to that of modern humans. Individual features may be associated with individual variations. It is possible to note too deep furrows of the transverse sinuses on the occipital bone, as well as furrows of the middle meningeal artery on the right and left parietal bones. These same arteries protrude strongly above the surface of the corresponding zones of the endocrine. Apparently, this is an individual feature of the Sungir man, not related to any pathologies. A feature of the skull of this individual is many rather large lacunae (pits) located along the furrow of the upper sagittal sinus. On the endocrine, in all its images, near the lateral sections of the upper sagittal sinus, more or less large tubercles are visible, reflecting lacunae on the corresponding areas of the cerebral surface of the skull. These bulges are formed by granulations (loops) of the arachnoid membrane of the brain, which penetrate into the sinuses of the dura mater and squeeze out the spent liquor from the subarachnoid space there. Sometimes groupings of granulations form a structure that presses the hard shell into the bone tissue. This is why gaps are formed as a result. This individual from Sungir has a lot of these lacunae, some of them are very large. All these features were previously associated with increased intracranial pressure (Rokhlin 1965). Currently, it is believed that this is a variant of normal anatomy. The wound inflicted on the right side of the frontal bone most likely caused damage to the membranes of the brain and the neural layer of the cerebral cortex.

The endocrine of the Sungir man

Scans of the Sungir man's skull

2023

A study of the temporal bone labyrinth of Upper Paleolithic people from Sungir (an adult man and two children) showed that while two young individuals are uniquely identified as representatives of Homo sapiens, the structure of the adult human labyrinth allows it to be attributed with equal probability to both the Neanderthaloid group and people of modern morphological type. The neanderthaloid morphology of the structure of the pyramid labyrinth of the temporal bone (large size of the lateral semicircular canal and high sagittal index) occurs in small but noticeable numbers among people of the modern morphological type of the Upper Paleolithic.

A scientific reconstruction of the appearance of six soldiers who died from September 1941 to January 1944 on the Volkhov front in the Kirovsky district of the Leningrad region near the village of Apraksin near the Karbusel and Voronovo tracts has been created.