Abstract
The morphology of the temporal bone has been determined to reflect both phylogenetic relationships among hominoid species and population history among modern human groups. It is a tightly genetically determined component of the skull in adults; however, it is currently unknown at what point during development this pattern emerges, and whether diverse human populations follow the same ontogenetic trajectories for temporal bone growth. To address these questions, 15 ectocranial landmarks were digitized on an ontogenetic series of temporal bones from seven human populations. A MANOVA and DFA confirmed that modern human populations are significantly different in temporal bone shape even at early developmental ages, and that they can be sorted with relative reliability. Mahalanobis distances based on temporal bone shape were also significantly correlated with molecular distances among the sampled populations at each age category, suggesting that temporal bone morphology reflects genetic distances starting very early in development and continuing into adulthood. The ontogenetic trajectories were not found to differ significantly among most pairs of populations. These findings suggest that temporal bone shape diverges and reflects genetic relatedness from an early age, after which human populations develop along similar ontogenetic trajectories to reach their adult forms.Grant Funding Source : n/a
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