ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA—According to a Cosmos Magazine report, a new study of a fossilized infant’s jawbone discovered among Oldowan and Acheulean stone tools in 1981 at the Melka Kunture archaeological site, which is located in the Ethiopian Highlands, suggests that it belonged to a Homo erectus child. Margherita Mussi of the Italo-Spanish Archaeological Mission and her colleagues made the identification by examining the fossil with synchrotron imaging to analyze the surfaces of the infant’s teeth and the composition of the tooth enamel and comparing the results with those of other known hominin fossils. Tools uncovered in the more recent layer above the infant’s remains have been dated to some 1.95 million years ago, Mussi added, indicating that the fossil is about two million years old. The researchers think that as Africa’s climate became drier some 2.8 million years ago, hominins may have been pushed into new locations, such as the higher altitude environment where the infant’s jawbone was discovered. With their larger bodies and brains, Homo erectus may have been better suited to the highland’s lower oxygen levels, stronger UV rays, cooler temperatures, and wetter climate than smaller hominins, they concluded. For more on Homo erectus, go to "Homo erectus Stands Alone," one of ARCHAEOLOGY's Top 10 Discoveries of 2013.