Aug 13, 2015 07:18 PM EDT By Staff Reporter, UniversityHerald Reporter

New research suggests that analyzing tooth wear in fossils can help track the diet of ancient ancestors and animals.

Researchers at the University of Arkansas-Fayetteville has validated data and found a new model for paleontologists to use to track the diet of our ancient ancestors and animals by analyzing the wear on their teeth.

Dental wear is among the top techniques scientists use to reconstruct and analyze dietary patterns of human ancestors and animals.

"This challenge has led paleontologists to question decades of results," Peter Ungar, distinguished professor and chair of the University of Arkansas Department of Anthropology, said in a statement. "Our findings validate the use of tooth wear for understanding diet of fossil animals. What does this tell us about diet? That habitat doesn't necessarily skew dental wear data."

For the study, Ungar and his colleagues verified the tie between tooth wear and diet.

The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published the findings this month.

"We found that materials softer than enamel can wear teeth," Ungar said. "This allowed us to develop a whole new way to model tooth wear."

Ungar explained that enamel is made up of particles bonded together by a protein glue. He and the team found through experiments that as chewing occurs, those bonds break and tiny enamel particles break away from teeth.

This finding validates the long-held premise that tooth wear can be related to specific types of diets and environments.

For example, scratches on fossilized teeth indicate a shearing chewing motion used with tougher meats and plant-based diets. Pits in teeth indicate a hard and brittle natural diet such as animal bones or nuts.

"We determined that microwear is not just about grit in the environment," Ungar said. "There certainly can be a diet component to it."

The team's discovery opens the door to study the properties of other materials.

"What Mother Nature does in tooth enamel encourages us to revisit known theories in nanocrystal science, polymer, composite, biomineralization, self-assembly and surface science," researcher Ryan Tian said in a statement.

The findings are detailed in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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