Here's something from the news that sounds familiar...
Malocclusion and dental crowding arose 12,000 years ago with earliest farmers
Hunter-gatherers had almost no malocclusion and dental crowding, and the condition first became common among the world's earliest farmers some 12,000 years ago in Southwest Asia, according to findings published in the journal PLOS ONE.I really doubt this has that much to do with chewing activity. People also got shorter with the advent of agriculture. Put that together with smaller mandibles and you probably have Human Growth Hormone deficiency....
By analysing the lower jaws and teeth crown dimensions of 292 archaeological skeletons from the Levant, Anatolia and Europe, from between 28,000-6,000 years ago, an international team of scientists have discovered a clear separation between European hunter-gatherers, Near Eastern/Anatolian semi-sedentary hunter-gatherers and transitional farmers, and European farmers, based on the form and structure of their jawbones.
"Our analysis shows that the lower jaws of the world's earliest farmers in the Levant, are not simply smaller versions of those of the predecessor hunter-gatherers, but that the lower jaw underwent a complex series of shape changes commensurate with the transition to agriculture," says Professor Ron Pinhasi from the School of Archaeology and Earth Institute, University College Dublin, the lead author on the study.
The switch in diet changed our hormones.
In the case of
hunter-gatherers, the scientists from University College Dublin, Israel
Antiquity Authority, and the State University of New York, Buffalo,
found a correlation between inter-individual jawbones and dental
distances, suggesting an almost "perfect" state of equilibrium between
the two. While in the case of semi-sedentary hunter-gatherers and
farming groups, they found no such correlation, suggesting that the
harmony between the teeth and the jawbone was disrupted with the shift
towards agricultural practices and sedentism in the region. This, the
international team of scientists say, may be linked to the dietary
changes among the different populations.
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2015-02-malocclusion-dental-crowding-arose-years.html#jCp
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2015-02-malocclusion-dental-crowding-arose-years.html#jCp
By analysing the lower jaws
and teeth crown dimensions of 292 archaeological skeletons from the
Levant, Anatolia and Europe, from between 28,000-6,000 years ago, an
international team of scientists have discovered a clear separation
between European hunter-gatherers, Near Eastern/Anatolian semi-sedentary
hunter-gatherers and transitional farmers, and European farmers, based
on the form and structure of their jawbones.
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2015-02-malocclusion-dental-crowding-arose-years.html#jCp
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2015-02-malocclusion-dental-crowding-arose-years.html#jCp
