Apes of the World

American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 2007

Journal of anatomy, 2016

Apes, members of the superfamily Hominoidea, possess a distinctive suite of anatomical and behavioral characters which appear to have evolved relatively late and relatively independently. The timing of paleontological events, extant cercopithecine and hominoid ecomorphology and other evidence suggests that many distinctive ape features evolved to facilitate harvesting ripe fruits among compliant terminal branches in tree edges. Precarious, unpredictably oriented, compliant supports in the canopy periphery require apes to maneuver using suspensory and non-sterotypical postures (i.e. postures with eccentric limb orientations or extreme joint excursions). Diet differences among extant species, extant species numbers and evidence of cercopithecoid diversification and expansion, in concert with a reciprocal decrease in hominoid species, suggest intense competition between monkeys and apes over the last 20 Ma. It may be that larger body masses allow great apes to succeed in contest compet...

Comptes Rendus Palevol, 2004

Genetic studies have demonstrated that humans and chimpanzees are sister taxa, with gorillas, orangutans and gibbons successively more distant. Hominoid similarities suggest that the crown ape ancestor was a suspensory, frugivorous, tropical forest ape. The common ancestor of Pan and Gorilla would likely have been Pan-like. It is therefore likely that the common ancestor of chimpanzees and humans was also Pan-like, and lived in Late Miocene Africa. But it is possible that most if not all Miocene apes are unrelated to crown hominoids. More fossils are urgently needed from within the probable Later Neogene geographical range of the living ape clades. Recent discoveries of very early hominids from Chad raise interesting questions about this hypothesis.

2016

Comparative Life History research of three sympatric Anthropoids (Lar-gibbon, Siamang and the Orangutan) living in the Bornean and Sumatran rainforest. Observed behaviors of all three species of Apes (other than Humans) in their natural habitats.

International journal of primatology, 1991

Quantitative studies on the positional behavior of members of the Hominoidea are compared in order (1) to identify consistencies across the superfamily, (2) to contrast ape positional behavior with that of Old World monkeys (forest-living Papio anubis were chosen for study to reduce body size effects), and (3) to identify distinctive behaviors in each of the ape taxa. Differences in the way behaviors were sampled in the various studies necessitated considering posture and locomotion separately. Unimanual arm-hanging and vertical climbing were the most distinctive shared postural and locomotor modes among the apes (the gorilla excepted), constituting >_5.0% and >_4.9% of all behavior in each species. Arm-hanging and brachiation (sensu stricto) frequencies were the highest by far in hylobatids. Hand-foot hanging, bipedal posture, and clambering, an orthograde suspensory locomotion assisted by the hindlimbs, were more common in orangutans than in any other hominoid. Sitting and walking were observed in the highest frequencies in the African apes but were no more common than in the baboon. Relatively high frequencies of brachiation (sensu stricto) were reported for all apes except chimpanzees and gorillas. Brachiation and arm-hanging were kinematically different in apes and baboons, involving complete humeral abduction only in the former, whereas vertical "climbing appeared to be kine-maticaUy similar in apes and baboons. It is concluded that the morphological specializations of the apes may be adaptations to (1) the unique physical demands of arm-hanging and (2) less kinematicaUy distinct, but still quantitatively significant, frequencies of vertical climbing.

Journal of human evolution, 2003

In an analysis of hominoid postcranial variation, ‘Evol. Anthrop. 6 (1998) 87’ argued that many purportedly unique features of the hominoid postcranium are actually much more variable than previously reported and in many instances overlap with both suspensory (Ateles) and non-suspensory primates. Based on these results, it was concluded that parallelism in the living ape postcranium was a plausible and even likely possibility given the Miocene hominoid postcranial record. However, this analysis did not distinguish whether within-hominoid variability or overlap with non-hominoids involved one or all ape taxa, a distinction which has potentially important effects on the interpretation of results. To address this issue, primate postcranial morphometric data from the trunk and forelimb were reanalyzed using three techniques: cladistic analysis, principle components analysis, and cluster analysis. Results reveal that these postcranial characters distinguish not only suspensory and quadrupedal primates but also discriminate hominoids and Ateles from all other taxa, great apes from lesser apes and Ateles, cercopithecines from colobines, and cercopithecoids from platyrrhines. The majority of hominoid variability and overlap with Ateles occurs with Hylobates humeral head and shoulder joint characters related to brachiation. This suggests that Hylobates’ specializations may skew analyses of hominoid postcranial uniqueness and variability, and that great apes are relatively similar in their postcranium.

Journal of Comparative Psychology, 1994

Several investigators have reviewed animal behavior literature as a tool for content analysis. Burkhardt (1987) reviewed all 150 papers from the Journal of Animal Behavior for the 7 years of its existence (1911â€"1917) to reveal differences in research undertaken by psychologists and zoologists. Beach (1950) reviewed 613 experimental studies published in the Journal of Animal Behavior and the Journal of Comparative and Physiological Psychology between 1911 and 1948. He categorized seven types of animal behavior and logged the number of species studied, and he concluded that

International Journal of Primatology, 2007

Biological clock data from protein sequences indicate times for the divergence of humans and African apes that are only 2-3 million years before the present and hence inconsistent with the generally accepted view of Australopithecus on the evolutionary line to Homo. This inconsistency has been reconciled for most investigators by postulating a slowing of the biological clock among higher primates. However, there is no independent evidence for such a slowing, and for a number of reasons a specific slowing is unlikely. Therefore, an alternative paradigm is considered here based on the hypothesis that the molecular clock data are correct. The main consequence of this hypothesis is the placement of A. afarensis in a position ancestral to African apes. An argument in support of this alternative paradigm is formulated concerning the evolution of knuckle-walking in African apes from ancestors whose bipedalism was already well developed. Published data are cited, particularly concerning the structure of the wrist, which accommodate poorly the evolution of African apes from palmigrad-walking or brachiating ancestors resembling Proconsul africanus or Pongo. These arguments suggest that an alternative paradigm of hominoid evolution placing A. a[arensis ancestral to Homo, Gorilla, and Pan warrants further consideration.

The Gibbons, 2009