Skeletal remains of a group of hunter-gatherers massacred around 10,000 years ago are raising questions about humankind’s propensity for warfare.
The fossilised bones of the Stone Age victims were unearthed at Nataruk — 30km west of Kenya’s fossil-rich Lake Turkana — and are believed to be the earliest scientifically dated historical evidence of human conflict.
The new Director of Griffith University’s Research Centre of Human Evolution, Professor Rainer Grün, was part of the Nataruk research team led by the University of Cambridge’s Leverhulme Centre for Human Evolutionary Studies (LCHES).
The site was discovered on the western side of Lake Turkana in 2012 when researchers found the partial remains of 27 individuals, including at least eight women and six children.
Of these, 12 skeletons were relatively complete and 10 revealed clear signs of violent death, including: extreme blunt-force trauma to crania and cheekbones; broken hands, knees and ribs; arrow lesions to the neck; and stone projectile tips lodged in the skull and thorax of two men.
Several skeletons were found face down, with four — including a woman in the final stages of pregnancy — in positions indicating their hands had probably been bound.
While the bodies were not buried, some had fallen into a lagoon that has long since dried, with the bones preserved in sediment.
The research is published in the latest edition of the prestigious journalNature.
Professor Rainer Grün, from Griffith’s Environmental Futures Research Institute
“The findings are one of the earliest indications of humankind’s propensity for group violence,” said Professor Grün, who joined Griffith’s Environmental Futures Research Institute from the Australian National University in October. He used laser ablation technology to examine and date the fossils.
“Not only does this broaden our knowledge of early human behaviour, it raises questions about whether the capacity for organised violence is elemental to our nature or a product of circumstances and opportunity.”
One adult male skeleton was found with an obsidian bladelet still embedded in his skull. Another suffered two blows to the head, both crushing his skull at the point of impact.
Meanwhile, the remains of a six-to-nine month-old foetus were recovered from within the abdominal cavity of its mother, who was discovered in an unusual sitting position.
A woman, found reclining on her left elbow, with fractures on the knees and possibly the left foot. The position of the hands suggests her wrists may have been bound
Now scrubland, 10,000 years ago the area around Nataruk was a fertile lakeshore sustaining a substantial population of hunter-gatherers. It may also have been a location coveted by others.
Project leader Dr Marta Mirazon Lahr, from LCHES, said the victims may have been members of an extended family who were attacked by a rival group of hunter-gatherers in an ancient precursor to what we call warfare.
“The deaths at Nataruk are testimony to the antiquity of inter-group violence and war,” she said.
“These remains record the intentional killing of a small band of foragers with no deliberate burial, and provide unique evidence that warfare was part of the repertoire of inter-group relations among some prehistoric hunter-gatherers.”
Professor Robert Foley, also from Cambridge’s LCHES, summarised the implications of the research by saying: “I’ve no doubt it is in our biology to be aggressive and lethal, just as it is to be deeply caring and loving.
“A lot of what we understand about human evolutionary biology suggests these are two sides of the same coin.”
Griffith University’s Centre for Environment and Population Healthhas begun the new year full of optimism and inspiration after ending 2015 with a string of awards and acknowledgments for staff, PhD researchers and alumni.
These include —
At a special ceremony in Beijing in November, Mr Song Tie — Vice Director of China’s Guangdong Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention — received the Australia China Alumni Award for Research and Innovation.
Song’s connection with Griffith began in 2008 after he won a leadership fellowship to attend the University’s Master of Science in Public Health degree program.
Since studying in Australia, Song has implemented many initiatives to advance international health security.
Most notable of these was the establishment in 2010 of the Health Emergency Information Communication System in the Pearl River Delta Region, aninnovative information platform strategically linking Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao and which continues to prevent and control H1N1, H7N9 and Ebola.
Closer to home, the 2015 Griffith University PVC’s Science Excellence Awards saw CEPH and School of Environment Research Fellow Dr Dung Phung receive a Highly Commended award in the Early Career Research category.
Since completing his PhD, Dr Phung has published numerous papers in high ranking journals, nurtured PhD candidates and led research projects.
His commitment to research and the demonstration of influential outcomes are particularly evident through his work exploring climate variability and health impacts through water and temperature changes in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, a region extremely vulnerable to climate change.
Meanwhile, PhD candidate Ms Nicola Banwell has received an Endeavour Postgraduate Scholarship to support her international research.
This highly competitive scholarship — only 30 were chosen from 5000 applicants — is sponsored through the Department of Education and Training and supports Australians as they undertake postgraduate studies and professional development overseas.
This year Nicola’s work will take her to the Philippines, where she will be focusing on disaster and climate-related health risks. This will be followed by six months in Geneva with the United Nations Institute for Training and Research on the Capacity for Disaster Reduction Initiative.
Nicola received a Prime Minister’s Award in 2012.
Esther Achieng Onyango addresses the 3rd GRF One Health Summit in Switzerland
Among other notable achievements by CEPH PhD researchers,Ms Esther Achieng Onyango received a conference award certificate for her presentation — A Conceptual Framework for Conducting an Integrated Vulnerability Assessment in Climate Change and Malaria Transmission — at the 3rd GRF One Health Summit in Davos, Switzerland.
Furthermore, Ms Kultida Bunjongsiri won a USE 2015 Best Paper PhD Award for her presentation, Barriers and Challenges to Apply Health and Safety Criteria Regards to Eco-Industrial Regulation: A Case Study of Saha Groups — Sriracha, Thailand, at the Understanding Small Enterprises conference in the Netherlands.
And as the year gets underway, the CEPH welcomes Professor Scott Baum as Deputy Director-Research.
Professor Baum and Dr Shannon Rutherford (Deputy Director-Training and Capacity Building) recently visited Bangladesh where they discussed building collaborations, particularly in climate change and health.
Listening to the ‘player’s voice’ is pivotal to analysis of the Essendon supplements scandal, a sport management expert says.
“In the aftermath we need to understand why players, who receive anti-doping education and are aware of their responsibilities regarding the use of substances, agree to be injected with substances despite their education, and then fail to disclose their use,” Dr Riot says.
“Why are our players and athletes complicit in a culture of substance abuse, secrecy and concealment, and what can be done to change this?”
Caroline Riot researches elite athlete personal development and performance, elite sport systems, and health and physical activity promotion at Griffith University.
She has worked as a consultant to professional and international sport organisations including the International Olympic Committee, International Cricket Council, International Association of Athletics Federations and Queensland Rugby Union.
“Looking forward we need to examine the inherent cultures and ethics in sport and the pressures and expectations on players from club management.”
Opportunity
Dr Riot says a great opportunity now exists for sport to re-examine its governance structures, its communication processes, its priorities and support systems.
“This applies not only to individual players and athletes but also to the administrators and coaches who need considerable and targeted support and education to produce true excellence in performance and the personal development of players and athletes.
“While I feel in some way sympathetic for the players in question and the club and its supporting community, for me this really highlights an opportunity for sport and our broader communities to discuss and debate the culture that exists in professional sport and high performance sport more generally.
“There is a need for change, a move towards a culture of disclosure to prevent substance abuse in sport.”
Once immediate reactions of shock and disbelief among the AFL community have passed, Dr Riot proposes that the focus should turn to longer-term considerations such as the implications for players, coaches and administrators during the coming year and beyond.
“What does this mean for players’ careers? What does it mean for new talent coming through and its potential to rise?
“How do the Essendon club and the AFL code rebuild from here, and regain trust and faith in the sport and its ‘actors’? How can these processes be reinvigorated?
“This is an opportunity for positive change and we now have to find innovative and new ways of thinking about how we educate young people, coaches and administrators.”
For Dr Riot the outcome of the CAS investigation was not unexpected. “It’s an authority that ‘plays by the rules’ and has the right to enforce such penalties given the evidence provided.”
By Professor David Ellwood, Griffith University’s Menzies Health Institute Queensland and Associate Professor Vicky Flenady, University of Queensland.
Around 20,000 late-pregnancy stillbirths could have been avoided globally, according to research published in The Lancet medical journal.
Author Vicki Flenady, from the Mater Research Institute at the University of Queensland, and colleagues concluded these reductions would occur if all high-income countries achieved stillbirth rates equal to the best-performing countries.
The findings were part of The Lancet’s Ending Stillbirth Series, which consisted of five papers estimating stillbirth rates in each country, numbers that could be avoided and new revelations on how they could be prevented.
How countries perform
Nordic countries occupied the top three places for lowest rates of stillbirths worldwide. In Iceland, Denmark and Finland, 1.3, 1.7 and 1.8 stillbirths occurred per 1,000 births respectively in 2015.
Australia came 15th in the world rankings, with 2.7 stillbirths for every 1,000 births. This compared to New Zealand in 10th place, with 2.3 for every 1,000.
“We estimate conservatively that 200 families every year in Australia would be spared the tragedy of a stillbirth in the last three months of pregnancy if we could get our rates down,” said Dr Flenady.
Among several ways in which to lower rates, the study authors called on the international community to acknowledge the burden of stillbirths, address actions needed to prevent stillbirths with appropriate care, and monitor stillbirths with a consistently agreed target.
Late-gestation stillbirths are those at 28 weeks or more, which is the World Health Organisation’s recommended cut-off for international comparison.
Dr Flenady and her team estimated there were 2.6 million stillbirths globally in 2015, equating to around 7,200 every day. This number hasn’t changed since The Lancet published a similar stillbirth series, with a call to action, in 2011.
“It’s probably even more than that, because we are limited by the fact that to compare across the globe we can only focus on stillbirths after 28 weeks. They’re often not counted below that,” said Dr Flenady.
She said about 50% of stillbirths occurred before this period, which, if included as official data, would bring the 2.6 million up to around 5 million.
The research showed while stillbirth rates have fallen marginally since 2000, these are failing to keep pace with falls in childhood and maternal mortality rates.
Authors estimated 98% of stillbirths happen in low and middle-income countries. But they also remain a problem for high-income countries where substandard care contributes to 20% to 30% of all stillbirths.
Another 30% remains unexplained, which is the basis for the authors’ call for all high-income countries to implement national perinatal mortality audit programs.
Knowing the risks
Professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at Griffith University David Ellwood said many health providers still underestimated risk factors, including the increase in age of mothers and more people with obesity, contributing to stillbirths.
“There’s a delicate balance involved in not stigmatising women who are overweight and obese. Getting the balance right between treating people as human beings and recognising they have a health problem is a difficult balancing act,” he said.
“There is also an element of lack of awareness. I think there are some people who probably don’t appreciate the fact that those risk factors are there and there is a role for better education for health care providers.”
Dr Flenady said the research also showed disadvantaged women in high-income countries had double the stillbirth risk of women in higher socioeconomic brackets.
“Women who can’t understand English are at a real disadvantage,” she said, calling for access to culturally sensitive health care.
“Some groups in Indigenous communities are smoking in pregnancy, up to 60%, whereas around 16% to 17% do so in the general population. We’ve got to provide them with support to stop smoking, ideally before pregnancy.”
Another paper in the series estimated 60% to 70% of grieving mothers in high-income countries reported clinically significant depressive symptoms one year after their baby’s death.
If these figures are extrapolated to the 2.6 million women who had a stillbirth globally each year, an estimated 4.2 million women are living with depressive symptoms after stillbirth.
Data from 18 countries also suggested congenital abnormalities accounted for only 7.4% of stillbirths, dispelling the myth that all stillbirths were inevitable.
Griffith University student Michael Neser hopes to lead the Adelaide Strikers to their first KFC Big Bash League title as the T20 cricket competition finals loom.
The BBL has dramatically increased in popularity this season, with some games drawing crowds of more than 80,000.
Griffith Business student and Adelaide Striker cricket player Michael Neser
Neser, a third-year Bachelor of Business student, said it was an amazing experience playing to such a large audience.
“It has been crazy,” he said. “When it first started, we never imagined the BBL would end up like this with crowds of 80,000 and selling out most games.
“Some days it’s a bit overwhelming but it is a really cool experience and I am so stoked to be a part of it.”
Neser is back with the Strikers after missing last season’s BBL with a back injury.
However, he made good use of the time away by resuming study at Griffith University. He is now a member of the Griffith Sports College.
“Returning to study really helped me focus and take my mind off things. The Sports College helped me to bring a good balance back to my life and it has given me a new focus.”
Born in South Africa, Neser moved to the Gold Coast with his family at the age of 10 and emerged in the Queensland’s Under-19 cricket side in 2008-09.
The dynamic all-rounder made his debut for Queensland in 2010-11, playing in the Sheffield Shield and Ryobi Cup.
He was named the Adelaide Strikers Most Valuable Player for the 2013-14 BBL League season.
The Strikers play the Melbourne Renegades at Melbourne’s Etihad Stadium tonight before heading into the semi-finals on January 21.
Griffith also had two other students playing in the BBL, with Jimmy Peirson (Bachelor of Business) and Sam Heazlett (Bachelor of Exercise Science) lining up for Brisbane Heat, while graduate Jessica Jonassen (Bachelor of Laws) represented the Heat in the Women’s BBL.
Jessica, who was 2014-15 Women’s International Cricket League Player of the Year, said she was excited that the WBBL had also gained momentum and interest from the public.
“It’s been amazing and the exposure that we are getting is really exciting,” she said.
“We are getting up to 14,000 people at our matches — it’s great for women in sport.”
Griffith Sports College manager Duncan Free OAM said it was great to see Griffith students, both male and female, represented in the BBL not just in Brisbane but around the country.
“Personally I love watching our athletes compete,” he said. “Tt’s a sense of pride for me and the University and I like to think that perhaps we’ve have helped them in their journey to success along the way.”
Megan Owen-Jones will be the third generation of her family to study at Griffith University.
With her grandmother Margaret, father William, uncle Robert and aunts Catherine and Judith already holding Griffith degrees, it’s now Megan’s turn to keep the family name going on campus.
Her father, Gold Coast City Councillor William Owen-Jones, couldn’t be more proud of his daughter’s choice to continue the family legacy.
“It is exciting and I think it is great that there is a third generation going to Griffith University,” he said.
“I’ve seen the Gold Coast campus move from just two TAFE buildings to what it is today and the growth is amazing and a fantastic thing for our city.
“Particularly Griffith’s partnership with the Commonwealth Games, there is nothing better than being able to sell education and our city to the rest of the world and the opportunities that exist with internships and scholarships will be great.”
“It is nice to know that my family have all gone through it, so it’s something that is close to home,” Megan said.
Megan’s grandmother Margaret decided to study for the first time in 1989 enrolling in Australian Comparative Studies. She now uses her new found knowledge to help people learn English as a second language.
“I came from the era where it was still possible to stay at home with my children and there was no pressure to go back to work and I loved doing that but by the time my youngest was at school I found myself looking for something more,” she said.
“I really enjoyed my time at Griffith and I think Megan will too.”
When commerce student Jamie Crowe assessed her university options at the end of high school, she found it difficult to look beyond the Sir Samuel Griffith Scholarship she was offered and the abundance of new experiences the Griffith Honours College promised.
“Going to Griffith felt like going home,” says Jamie who used to pass the Gold Coast campus each day on her way to high school at St Hilda’s in Southport.
The (soon-to-be) third year double major student of economics and finance has eagerly embraced the swag of opportunities that university life has brought.
“I’ve connected with like-minded students, a wonderful experience for me, and also engaged with different parts of the university and wider community,” she says.
The program includes community service, a leadership camp and a series of professional development seminars. “I’ve had access to opportunities I would not have had otherwise.”
Jamie says her involvement with the Griffith Business School Student Leadership Program also sparked her first interest in Model United Nations, where students from around the world come together to debate global issues using UN-based structures.
Now president of the Gold Coast MUN Society, she heads to Rome in March for what she calls ‘the Olympics of MUN’.
“The GBS Leadership Program initially gave me the opportunity to go to the Brisbane MUN and take part in an event focused on the International Monetary Fund. My involvement has taken off from there.”
It will also incorporate a trip to Germany in April for the G200 Youth Forum 2016 which brings together more than 500 young leaders, students, academics and business and government representatives from 200 countries.
The flexibility of Jamie’s program allowed Jamie to build a course in international relations into her degree and this has already paid off at the Asia Pacific MUN Conference, and in part-time employment at a Gold Coast-based business where she works as an executive assistant.
“It’s a small software business with an Asia-Pacific presence where my international relations knowledge is proving valuable. Doing accounting at university has also been a major plus. My university experience has helped to make me a much more valuable player in the firm.”
She is confident that her combination of economics and finance will reward her with a ‘rounded degree’ for the future.
“My dad was a commercial airline pilot and I travelled a lot in my youth. I learned how money connects the world, and became aware of the extent of equity issues across the globe.”
“The demand for economists is set to rise during the next decade. The importance of understanding the impact of globalisation and how the international economy operates has never been greater.
The dollars I spend on a coffee here today can end up on the New York stock exchange in half an hour.”
Through these scholarships students will play an integral part in the build-up to the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games.
This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity that is only offered at Griffith University.
Griffith ranks among the top three per cent of universities world-wide, its lecturers have won the Australian University Teacher of the Year award twice in the past two years and can offer a range of opportunities for students, including 250 internship placements, as an official partner of GC2018.
The scholarships, worth approximately $70,000 each, are open to students from the 71 Commonwealth nations and territories who wish to undertake study or research at Griffith in a sport or event-related area as an undergraduate, post-graduate or higher degree by research student.
There are two categories, which students can apply for:
Griffith University Vice Chancellor and President Professor Ian O’Connor said the University was proud to offer these unprecedented scholarship opportunities to students.
“The Commonwealth Games represents a transformative moment in time for the Gold Coast and, in a similar vein, I know these prestigious scholarships have the potential to transform the lives and ambitions of the recipients,” he said.
Each scholarship will include full tuition fee waiver, accommodation and a contribution towards education expenses. The value of each scholarship will vary depending on the degree of study but on average could be worth more than $70,000 each.
The partnership between Griffith University and GOLDOC was announced on October 6 last year.
Applications need to be submitted by 31 January 2016.
Entrants to Griffith University this year will be in the third year of their degrees when the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games take place.
Following the release of QTAC main round offers, acting Vice Chancellor Professor Adam Shoemaker said he was delighted that the demand for places at Griffith continues to grow.
“We look forward to welcoming a whole new intake of Griffith students and we share in the excitement as they begin their academic journey,” Professor Shoemaker said.
“The steady growth in demand for our courses–particularly in medicine, dentistry, health sciences and the creative and performing arts–is testament to the fact that Griffith continues to build its competitive reputation as a university of choice for students seeking outstanding teaching and learning opportunities.”
There was very strong demand for the new Bachelor of Paramedicine offered on the Gold Coast campus–which had an OP3 cut-off for its first-ever intake. Entry at the Nathan, Logan and Gold Coast campuses is becoming increasingly competitive for a number of programs, including Nursing; Midwifery; Biomedical Science; and Exercise Science.
At the South Bank campus, competition for programs at the Queensland Conservatorium of Griffith University continues to increase. For example, there were more than 450 auditions for just over 30 places in the Bachelor of Musical Theatre degree and there were similar levels of demand across the musical spectrum.
Meanwhile, at the Queensland College of Art and the Griffith Film School, the Bachelor of Fine Art, Bachelor of Film & Screen Media Production and the Bachelor of Animation programs maintained very high rates of demand.
Although those programs are full, Griffith plans to make additional offers to well-qualified applicants across arange of other programs right through until February.
Griffith University’s influence on the global stage continues to rise.
The latest Times Higher Education rankings have placed Griffith at 102 in a list of the 800 most international universities in the world and second in the state of Queensland.
“This ranking reflects the global approach, the global reach and the global impact of Griffith University,” Acting Vice Chancellor and President, Professor Adam Shoemaker, said.
“An international outlook has been at Griffith’s core since its establishment more than 40 years ago when this was the first university to offer Modern Asian Studies.
“Griffith’s reputation as a university of influence in a modern global context continues to increase.”
In total, 13 performance indicators were considered including the diversity of a university’s student body and the extent to which its academics collaborate with international colleagues.
“An institution’s global outlook is one of the key markers of a prestigious university,” Phil Baty, THE Rankings editor, said.
“The top institutions hire faculty from all over the world, attract students from a global market of top talent and collaborate with leading departments wherever they happen to be based.
“It is a sign of great potential, competitiveness and dynamism.”
In October, Griffith was named among the world’s top 300 universities in the Times Higher Education World Rankings for 2015-2016, cementing its position as one of the top 3% of universities in the world on all the major ranking schemes.
