Tooth Enamel Indicates that Early Hominid Had a Varied Diet
The early hominid Paranthropus robustus might not be as specialized an eater as researchers thought. Using a new laser technique, anthropologists peered into the teeth of these hominids to discover that the primate actually ate a variety of foods.Between 2.4 and 1.4 million years ago, P. robustus roamed the African savanna. Researchers surmised that, because they had large molars with thick tooth enamel and strong jaw muscles, they ate low-nutrient, fibrous foods whereas their toolmaking relatives, Homo habilis and Homo erectus, ate softer foods such as fruit and meat. “A lot of things made these guys look like chewing machines,” says Matt Sponheimer, an anthropologist at the University of Colorado at Boulder. “Human teeth, by comparison, are quite dainty.” This apparently rigid diet was blamed for P. robustus’s extinction later in the Pleistocene as the climate became drier and more seasonal.