Archives for locomotion


From the Field: Kelly Ostrofsky, Uganda

From the Field
Leakey Foundation grantee Kelly Ostrofsky spent the last several months working at Bwindi Impenetrable National Park, Uganda, getting to know the mountain gorillas that live in the Ruhija sector of the forest.

Grantee Spotlight: Kelly Ostrofsky

Grantee Spotlight
Leakey Foundation grantee Kelly Ostrofsky studies how wild apes move and climb in their natural habitats. As our closest living relatives, these apes provide an important comparative context for understanding how our ancestors may have moved and climbed.

Evolution and the Mammalian Spine

Journal Article
"Nearly all mammals have the same number of cervical vertebrae, no matter how long or short their necks are--humans, giraffes, mice, whales, and platypuses all have exactly seven cervical vertebrae," said Jeff Spear, a doctoral student from New York University, and part of a team whose Leakey Foundation supported research explored why this characteristic has stayed the same through time and across species.

Surprising trunk rotational capabilities in chimpanzees

Journal Article
Nathan Thompson is a PhD candidate at Stony Brook University who was awarded a Leakey Foundation research grant in the spring of 2014. He and his team were published in this month’s issue of Nature Communications, and he has been kind enough to provide us a brief summary of the article.  Compared to our great ape relatives, humans possess a long and flexible trunk (the part of the body that includes the… more »

Grantee Spotlight: Michael Granatosky

Grantee Spotlight