What is the scientific name of the hominid fossil 'Lucy'?

The scientific name of the hominid fossil Lucy is Australopithecus afarensis. Lucy is the famous partial skeleton of an adult female discovered in Ethiopia in 1974.

Her species lived in East Africa roughly 3.9 to 2.9 million years ago. The name Australopithecus means “southern ape,” while afarensis refers to the Afar region of Ethiopia, where the fossil was found. Lucy’s skeleton preserves about 40 percent of the body and provides strong evidence that her species walked upright.

The discovery was made by a team led by Donald Johanson and Tom Gray at Hadar. The specimen was nicknamed Lucy after the Beatles song “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” which the research team played during celebrations after the find.

Lucy was not the first or only Australopithecus afarensis fossil, but she became its best-known representative. Australopithecus anamensis is an older related species, while Ardipithecus ramidus and Homo habilis belong to different branches or later stages of hominin evolution. Her small brain and human-like bipedalism also show that upright walking evolved before modern-sized brains.