2011 Student Prize winners

Juan Comas prize: Richard Bender, University of Colorado, Boulder. Stable isotopes (13C and 15N) track socioeconomic differences among urban Colombian women.

Earnest Albert Hooton prize: Vanessa Hale, Purdue University School of Veterinary Medicine. Evaluation of methods for preserving fecal microbial DNA from the spider monkey.

Mildred Trotter prize: Amber Heard-Booth, University of Texas at Austin. Eye size and locomotion: A test of Leuckart's Law in mammals.

Ales Hrdlicka Prize: Cara Ocobock, Washington University in St. Louis. Daily energy expenditure in highly active humans in a natural temperate environment.

Sherwood Washburn Prize: M. Teague O'Mara, Arizona State University School of Human Evolution & Social Change. The ontogeny of feeding ecology in ring-tailed lemurs.

Pollitzer Prizes. These are awards of $500 in honor of Dr. William S. Pollitzer. They are designed to help students defray the costs of attending the AAPA meetings.

Essay topic:

In the age of personalized genomics, genetic ancestry testing, and medical genetic testing, do disciplines such as osteology, paleontology, primatology, human adaptation, etc., have relevance anymore for understanding modern human evolution and biology?