Soil and plant phytoliths from the Acacia-Commiphora mosaics at Oldupai Gorge (Tanzania)

This article studies soil and plant phytoliths from the Eastern Serengeti Plains, specifically the mosaics from Oldupai Gorge, Tanzania, as present-day analogue for the environment that was contemporaneous with the emergence of the genus . We investigate whether phytolith assemblages from recent soi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	PeerJ (San Francisco, CA) CA), 2019-12, Vol.7, p.e8211-e8211, Article e8211
Main Authors:	Mercader, Julio, Clarke, Siobhán, Bundala, Mariam, Favreau, Julien, Inwood, Jamie, Itambu, Makarius, Larter, Fergus, Lee, Patrick, Lewiski-McQuaid, Garnet, Mollel, Neduvoto, Mwambwiga, Aloyce, Patalano, Robert, Soto, María, Tucker, Laura, Walde, Dale
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Acacia Acacia-Commiphora woodland and grassland mosaics African palaeoenvironments Analog for early human evolution Anthropology Commiphora Community structure East Africa Ecology Ecosystems Evolutionary Studies Mosaics Plant communities Reference collections Soil and plant phytoliths Soil Science Statistical analysis Vegetation
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Summary:	This article studies soil and plant phytoliths from the Eastern Serengeti Plains, specifically the mosaics from Oldupai Gorge, Tanzania, as present-day analogue for the environment that was contemporaneous with the emergence of the genus . We investigate whether phytolith assemblages from recent soil surfaces reflect plant community structure and composition with fidelity. The materials included 35 topsoil samples and 29 plant species (20 genera, 15 families). Phytoliths were extracted from both soil and botanical samples. Quantification aimed at discovering relationships amongst the soil and plant phytoliths relative distributions through Chi-square independence tests, establishing the statistical significance of the relationship between categorical variables within the two populations. Soil assemblages form a spectrum, or cohort of co-ocurring phytolith classes, that will allow identifying environments similar to those in the - ecozone in the fossil record.
ISSN:	2167-8359 2167-8359