Posted on 06/09/2010 12:45:00 PM PDT by decimon
Your mother was right: Fish really is "brain food." And it seems that even pre-humans living as far back as 2 million years ago somehow knew it.
A team of researchers that included Johns Hopkins University geologist Naomi Levin has found that early hominids living in what is now northern Kenya ate a wider variety of foods than previously thought, including fish and aquatic animals such as turtles and crocodiles. Rich in protein and nutrients, these foods may have played a key role in the development of a larger, more human-like brain in our early forebears, which some anthropologists believe happened around 2 million years ago, according to the researchers' study.
"Considering that growing a bigger brain requires many nutrients and calories, anthropologists have posited that adding meat to their diet was key to the development of a larger brain," said Levin, an assistant professor in the Morton K. Blaustein Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Johns Hopkins' Krieger School of Arts and Sciences. "Before now, we have never had such a wealth of data that actually demonstrates the wide variety of animal resources that early humans accessed." Levin served as the main geologist on the team, which included scientists from the United States, South Africa, Kenya, Australia and the United Kingdom.
A paper on the study was published recently in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and offers first-ever evidence of such dietary variety among early pre-humans.
In 2004, the team discovered a 1.95 million-year-old site in northern Kenya and spent four years excavating it, yielding thousands of fossilized tools and bones. According to paper's lead author David Braun of the University of Cape Town (South Africa), the site provided the right conditions to preserve those valuable artifacts.
"At sites of this age, we often consider ourselves lucky if we find any bone associated with stone tools. But here, we found everything from small bird bones to hippopotamus leg bones," Braun said.
The preservation of the artifacts was so remarkable, in fact, that it allowed the team to meticulously and accurately reconstruct the environment, identifying numerous fossilized plant remains and extinct species that seem to be a sign that these early humans lived in a wet -- and possibly even a marshy -- environment.
"Results from stable isotopic analysis of the fossil teeth helped refine our picture of the paleoenvironment of the site, telling us that the majority of mammals at the site subsisted on grassy, well-watered resources," Levin said. "Today, the Turkana region in northern Kenya is an extremely dry and harsh environment. So, clearly, the environment of this butchery site was very different 1.95 million years ago -- this spot was much wetter and lush."
Using a variety of techniques, the team was able to conclude that the hominids butchered at least 10 individual animals -- including turtles, fish, crocodiles and antelopes -- on the site for use as meals. Cut marks found on the bones indicate that the hominids use simple, sharp-edged stone tools to butcher their prey.
"It's not clear to us how early humans acquired or processed the butchered meat, but it's likely that it was eaten raw," Levin said.
The team theorizes that the wet and marshy environment gave early pre-humans a way to increase the protein in their diets (and grow larger brains!) while possibly avoiding contact with larger carnivores, such as hyenas and lions.
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This research was supported by the National Science Foundation-International Research Fellowship Program, the Rutgers University Center for Human Evolutionary Studies, the University of Cape Town, the Palaeontological Scientific Trust, a University of South Wales Faculty of Medicine research grant, and an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant.
Related website: http://eps.jhu.edu/bios/naomi-levin/index.html
Feed your head ping.
As did other early human ancestors....
“What a Croc!”
Crocodile, hippopotamus, and other humans served as ‘brain food’ for early human ancestors.
As an academic researcher, I believe that at an unspecified time, some unknown people, may have possibly engaged in potential activities (possibly in response to grant money!) while seeking to justify their existence to other academic researchers.
We need to have a big freep party so you can fix up hippo steaks for us!
Clearly somewhere along the line they quit eating brain food of any kind in Kenya!
Ain’t burnt, so the cooks ain’t Irish
Hippo bacon. Mmmmmmmmmmm
Send them an email, "bit off chunk chew and swallow, repeat until you puke.
Besides, there just seems to be something wrong with the logic of associating developing a larger brain on a high protein diet made up of three of the most dangerous animals one can think of to hunt (humans, hippos, and crocs). Good luck living off those and surviving long enough to breed!.
All other species with very large brains are aquatic mammals such as dolphins and whales. Given humans' lack of fur, subcutaneous fat layer, and partly webbed fingers and toes (none of which are possessed our primate "relatives") I would think that would be a more worthwhile angle to make up useless theories about.
Hippo Brain: even a caveman can cook it.
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Thanks decimon. They somehow sensed that killing threatening beasts not only made them safer, but also increased the available food supply. :') |
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