Human ancestors' diet changed 3.5 million years ago

[dipsydoodle]

New analysis of early human teeth from extinct fossils, has found that they expanded their diets about 3.5 million years ago to include grasses and possibly animals.

Before this, humanlike creatures - or hominins - ate a forest-based diet similar to modern gorillas and chimps.

Researchers analysed fossilised tooth enamel of 11 species of hominins and other primates found in East Africa.

The findings appear in four papers published in PNAS journal.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22752937

[exboyfil]

1. Did chimps evolve separately

for their meat eating? The claim for hominins is that tool use allowed for much more efficient scavaging. Plant/grain based diet is much more efficient when combined with fire and method for grinding.

[Lugal Zaggesi]

3. Fire changed everything

In Catching Fire, renowned primatologist Richard Wrangham argues that our evolutionary success is the result of cooking. Once our hominid ancestors began cooking, the human digestive tract shrank and the brain grew; and pair bonding, marriage, the household, and even the sexual division of labor emerged. A pathbreaking theory of human evolution, Catching Fire will fascinate anyone interested in our ancient origins or our modern eating habits.

http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/0465020410

[Orsino]

2. Does this ecological niche make me look fat? n/t