This is an undated picture provided by Mission Paloanthropologique Franco-Tchadienne showing the reconstructed skull of the Sahelanthropus tchadensis fossil. New fossil finds and a computer skull reconstruction bolster the case that the skull belongs to the earliest known ancestor of modern humans according to researchers. The fossil, found in Chad, was nicknamed "Toumai."(Photo: Xinhua/AFP)

Michel Brunet, of the University of Poitiers, shows the skull "Toumai". (Photo: Xinhua/AFP)

The ancient hominid, named Sahelanthropus tchadensis, was found by Michel Brunet, of the University of Poitiers, in the Sahara desert, far to the west of other graveyards of ancient humankind in east Africa and Ethiopia. (Photo: Xinhua/AFP)

(Photo: Xinhua/AFP)

 

    BEIJING, April 7 (Xinhuanet) -- New evidence based on computer skull reconstruction shows that a 7 million year-old skull unearthed in Chad in 2002 is the earliest known ancestor of humans beings.    

(Photo: Xinhua/AFP)

    The ancient hominid, named Sahelanthropus tchadensis, was found by Michel Brunet, of the University of Poitiers, in the Sahara desert, far to the west of other graveyards of ancient humankind in east Africa and Ethiopia.

    It also has a nickname Toumai, or "hope of life", the name given to babies born in the Djurab before the dry season.

    But the fossilised cranium had been damaged by millions of years of burial, and some experts have since argued that Toumai might instead have been an ancient ape.

    Scientists now think S. tchadensis was probably a hominid, and more evidence provided by Michel Brunet appears in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature. 

    The evidence comes from a virtual reconstruction of the original look of the skull, based on a technique called computed tomography.

    "The digital restoration is excellent," said anthropologist Tim D. White of the University of California. "The original interpretation (that Toumai was a hominid) is probably correct."

    The reconstruction confirms that S. tchadensis shared several features with later hominids, the researchers wrote.

    Certain features of the restored virtual skull hint that S. tchadensis may have walked upright, unlike its ape contemporaries.

    Prof. Brunet estimates that Toumai was more than a metre tall and had a brain about the size of a chimpanzee's. "This process allows us to undo the effects of time, taking the cranium back to the death of Toumai, seven million years ago," he said.

    "Toumai is not a chimp. Toumai is not a gorilla," Brunet was quoted as saying by Reuters. "It is perfectly clear Toumai is a hominid." Enditem

    (Agencies)