This award is for partial support of a collaborative research project between Dr. Elwyn Simons, Department of Biological Anthropology & Anatomy at Duke University, and an Egyptian team headed by Dr. Gaber M. Naim, Chairman of the Egyptian Geological Survey and Mining Authority in Cairo, Egypt. The objective of the project is to learn more about the earliest forerunners of monkeys, apes, and humans, by study of fossils from the Fayum basin of Egypt. The project will yield skulls, jaws and post-cranial skeletal elements from a broad range of early primates of both Eocene and Oligocene age represented in the Fayum. These date to between 36 and 26 million years ago. Africa appears to be the continent where higher primates arose, and the Fayum holds the only continuous sequence of deposits in Africa during the time period of interest. Scope: This project will support collaboration between two teams with complementary capabilities and institutional facilities. The US team is well qualified in the theoretical studies, the excavation, identification, and mounting of the fossils. The US team also will provide access to the state-of-the-art facilities needed for this work. The Egyptian scientists are familiar with the excavation sites and the recent historical events that may effect the data interpretation. They are also capable of maintaining the samples and preserving them during the assembling and mounting process. The primary research funding for the US team is provided under a large 3-year award from the Division of Social, Behavioral and Economic Research. The project fits well within the objectives of the Division of International Programs.
