Jeremy DeSilva

Professor

Appointments

Endowed Dartmouth Professorship of Archaeology, Paleontology, and Ethnology

Faculty in Ecology, Evolution, Environment and Society (EEES) graduate program

Honorary Research Fellow, Evolutionary Studies Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa

Area of Expertise

Human evolution,

Australopithecus,

Bipedalism,

Primate locomotion,

Foot functional anatomy,

Birth evolution

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Biography

Jeremy "Jerry" DeSilva is a paleoanthropologist, specializing in the evolution of the first apes (hominoids) and early human ancestors (hominins). His particular anatomical expertise-- the human foot and ankle-- has contributed to our understanding of the origins and evolution of upright walking in the human lineage. He has studied wild chimpanzees in Western Uganda and digs for ancient human fossils at sites in South Africa and Tanzania. From 1998-2003, Jerry worked as an educator at the Boston Museum of Science and continues to be passionate about science education. He is the author of the 2021 book First Steps: How Upright Walking Made Us Human and the forthcoming Us: The Amazing Story of Human Evolution. Jerry lives in Norwich, VT with his wife Erin and their twins Ben and Josie.

Education

Ph.D. University of Michigan, 2008

B.A. Cornell University, 1998

Publications

Chapman, T.J., Walker, C., Churchill, S.E., Marchi, D., Vereecke, E.E., DeSilva, J.M., Zipfel, B., Hawks, J., Van Sint Jan, S., Berger, L.R., Throckmorton, Z. 2025. Long legs and small joints: the locomotor capabilities of Homo naledi. Journal of Anatomy. 246: 892-906.

Miller, C.K., McCann, R., Hatala, K., Musiba, C., DeSilva, J.M. 2024. Early hominin movement patterns at Laetoli, Tanzania. PaleoAnthropology. 2024: 139-147.

Miller, C.K., DeSilva, J.M. 2024. A review of the distal femur of Australopithecus. Evolutionary Anthropology. 33: e22012

Fannin, L.D., Joy, M.S., Dominy, N.J., McGraw, W.S., DeSilva, J.M. 2023. Downclimbing and the evolution of ape forelimb morphologies. Royal Society Open Science. 10, 230145.

DeSilva, J.M. 2022. Childbirth and infant care in early human ancestors: what the bones tell us. In: Hart, S., Bjorklund, D.F. eds. Evolutionary Perspectives on Infancy. Springer.

Harper, C.M., Zipfel, B., DeSilva, J.M., McNutt, E., Thackeray, F., Braga, J. 2022. A new early hominin calcaneus from Kromdraai (South Africa). Journal of Anatomy. 241(2), 500-517.

Rosen, K., Jones, C., DeSilva, J.M. 2022. Bipedal locomotion in zoo apes: Revisiting the hylobatian model for bipedal origins. Evolutionary Human Sciences. 1-16.

DeSilva, J.M., J. Traniello, Fannin, L., Claxton, A. 2021. When and why did human brains decrease in size? A new change-point analysis and insights from brain evolution in ants. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. 712.

McNutt, E.J., Hatala, K., Miller, C.K., Adams, J., Casana, J., Deane, A.S., Dominy, N.J., Fabian, K., Fannin, L.D., Gaughan, S., Gill, S.V., Gurtu, J., Gustafson, E., Hill, A.C., Johnson, C., Kallindo, S., Kilham, B., Kilham, P., Kim, E., Liutkus-Pierce, C., Maley, B., Prabhat, A., Reader, J., Rubin, S., Thompson, N.E., Thornburg, R., Williams-Hatala, E.M., Zimmer, B., Musiba, C.M., DeSilva, J.M. 2021. Footprint Evidence for Early Hominin Locomotor Diversity at Laetoli, Tanzania. Nature. 700: 468-471.

DeSilva, J.M. 2021. First Steps. How Upright Walking Made Us Human. HarperCollins.

DeSilva, J.M. 2021. Editor. A Most Interesting Problem. What Darwin's Descent of Man Got Right and Wrong About Human Evolution. Princeton University Press.

DeSilva, J.M., McNutt, E., Benoit, J., Zipfel, B. 2019. One Small Step: A review of Plio-Pleistocene hominin foot evolution. Yearbook of Physical Anthropology. S67: 63-140.

Contact

Jeremy.M.DeSilva@dartmouth.edu

Silsby, Room 409

HB 6047