By Pallab Ghosh Science correspondent, BBC News, Addis Ababa
Zeresenay Alemseged and the skull of "Lucy's baby"A tropical storm beats against the national museum in Addis Ababa. The violent thunder and lashing rain contrasts with the serene activity within.
Inside a solitary figure is cleaning up a 3.3-million-year-old skull.
Dr Zeresenay Alemseged has spent five years removing sandstone, grain by grain, from his precious find.
Illuminated by a single focussed beam of light, this is intricate, delicate work: one mistake and crucial scientific detail could be lost forever.
Alemseged showed me that what has emerged are the delicate features of a creature that was part ape and part human.
"What you have here is the backbone and the thoracic and all the ribs, the shoulder blades the collar bones. But in addition, what you have here is a compete face and the sandstone impression of the brain of a 3.3-million-year-old infant." Full Story..
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