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Science 8 December 2006:
Vol. 314. no. 5805, pp. 1592 - 1594
DOI: 10.1126/science.1132916
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Reports

U-Pb Isotopic Age of the StW 573 Hominid from Sterkfontein, South Africa

Joanne Walker,1 Robert A. Cliff,1* Alfred G. Latham2

Sterkfontein cave, South Africa, has yielded an australopith skeleton, StW 573, whose completeness has excited great interest in paleoanthropology. StW 573, or "Little Foot," was found 25 meters below the surface in the Silberberg Grotto. 238U-206Pb measurements on speleothems immediately above and below the fossil remains, corrected for initial 234U disequilibrium, yield ages of 2.17 ± 0.17 million years ago (Ma) and Formula Ma, respectively, indicating an age for StW 573 of close to 2.2 Ma. This age is in contrast to an age of ~3.3 Ma suggested by magnetochronology and ages of ~4 Ma based on 10Be and 26Al, but it is compatible with a faunal age range of 4 to 2 Ma.

1 School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT, UK.
2 School of Archaeology, Classics, and Egyptology, University of Liverpool, Liverpool L69 3GS, UK.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: bob{at}earth.leeds.ac.uk

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)