Jessica Ilinkova

Anthropology 1020
Signature Assignment

In the article, Unique Dental Morphology of Homo floresiensis and Its

Evolutionary Implications, by Yousuke Kaifu ,Reiko T. Kono, Thomas Sutikna,
Emanuel Wahyu Saptomo, Jatmiko, and Rokus Due Awe they discuss their findings
from Homo floresiensis which is an extinct species discovered in Indonesia having
primitive canine-premolar and advanced molar morphologies, a combination of
dental traits unknown in any other hominin species. Their dental traits are even
more advanced than modern humans. They examined traits such as crown
contours, tooth size, metrics, and proportion. Their teeth indicated a possible new
species, or speculation of evolution or close relative to a different species.
In this article the scientific method was used. Since their findings of the teeth
the researchers had thought the Homo floresiensis had evolved from a different
species which turned out to be incorrect. Their findings did not support the
hypothesis which they had first come up with. I do think the scientific method was
used well in this case because they had several credible references to go by in
forming a hypothesis in the first place, and conducted the experiment through the
investigation of the teeth. After they had the data and results they were able to
analyze how the species came to have such teeth and where that might have been
derived from. This goes to show how many possibilities there are and how much
background research must be done. In this article, there was countless references
that derived their conclusions.
I did have to conduct additional research on the scientific names of the
species themselves and the definitions of specific teeth and characteristics to have

a better understanding of this article. A lot of this article was most of the data they
collected which was written in more scientifical terms than a traditional paper. This
made it more difficult to understand, as I had to interpret what they were saying. It
did not necessarily change my opinion on anything since it was a new find, which I
was not aware of or had an opinion of previously. Before reading this article I knew
that every species must have some differing in their teeth, and so do individuals of
the same species.
This article did have over 100 references which I was not able to read since
they were all rather lengthy. From the references themselves it seems that they
were mostly around the history of the species mentioned and teeth which would
have helped aid their use of the scientific method and to have a better
understanding of why exactly their teeth had such characteristics and where those
characteristics came from.
Additional research would have to be conducted to further support their
conclusion that H.floresiensis is more similar to early Javanese H. erectus rather
than to African H. ergaster o rH. habilis. The article does state that, Although more
detailed comparisons with Dmanisi Homo have yet to be conducted, the above
results give additional, strong support to the hypothesis that H. floresiensis evolved
from an early Javanese H. erectus population or a related form from the ancient
Sundaland with substantial body and brain size dwarfism [1,2,20,25].
I found this article to be very interested and informative. Not only did it open
my eyes on teeth and how vastly they can change but how something as simple as
teeth can define you. I agree with their conclusion and findings based on the
evidence and research that was conducted. I walked away with a better

understanding of how much intensive research is needed in order for us to proceed

with science and tracking our evolution.

References :
Site used - http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?
id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0141614
Yousuke Kaifu, Reiko T. Kono, Thomas Sutikna,, Emanuel Wahyu Saptomo,, and
Rokus Due Awe. "Unique Dental Morphology of Homo Floresiensis and Its
Evolutionary Implications." PLOS ONE: Unique Dental Morphology of Homo
Floresiensis and Its Evolutionary Implications. 18 Nov. 2015. Web. 25 Feb. 2016.