Neanderthals Carb Loaded, Helping Grow Their Big Brains; Fossils of 9 Found in Italian Cave
takyon writes:
Neanderthals carb loaded, helping grow their big brains
Here's another blow to the popular image of Neanderthals as brutish meat eaters: A new study of bacteria collected from Neanderthal teeth shows that our close cousins ate so many roots, nuts, or other starchy foods that they dramatically altered the type of bacteria in their mouths. The finding suggests our ancestors had adapted to eating lots of starch by at least 600,000 years ago-about the same time as they needed more sugars to fuel a big expansion of their brains.
The study is "groundbreaking," says Harvard University evolutionary biologist Rachel Carmody, who was not part of the research. The work suggests the ancestors of both humans and Neanderthals were cooking lots of starchy foods at least 600,000 years ago. And they had already adapted to eating more starchy plants long before the invention of agriculture 10,000 years ago, she says.
Journal Reference:
James A. Fellows Yates, Irina M. Velsko, Franziska Aron, et al. The evolution and changing ecology of the African hominid oral microbiome [open], Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2021655118)
upstart writes in with an IRC submission for c0lo:
Evidence of nine Neanderthals found in Italian cave:
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