New hominin genus from eastern Africa shows diverse middle Pliocene lineages.

In 1998 and 1999, working in the Lake Turkana region of northern Kenya, Meave Leakey and her team found a cranium and other fossil remains of a 3.5 million year old hominin with a mixture of features unseen in other early human fossils. Noting the unusual combination of traits, Leakey and her team designated the hominin a new genus and species: Kenyanthropus platyops, or “flat-faced human from Kenya.” With F. Spoor, F. H. Brown, P. N. Gathogo, C. Kiarie,, L. N. Leakey, and I. McDougall.