A 19th-century researcher, George Cuvier stated that “Show me your teeth and I will show you who you are”. The dental formation holds quite a legacy from the early ages until the recent times. The teeth usually adapt to the type of diet it is used to regarding strength and size. Various factors have attributed to the modification of the teeth. The factors vary from cooking food, processing food and food preparation. The evolution of the masticatory is also associated with the changes of other parts of the body like the brain and facial structure as explained below.
The masticatory system does involve not only the teeth but also the mandible, maxilla joints and muscles. The change in teeth structure over the years means that the rest of the masticatory also changes its structure and functionality. The evolution of the teeth also helped in speech advancement. There is a distinct uniqueness when one vies the masticatory system of the men in the old days to that of the men in the present.
To start with, the teeth structure regarding size have reduced over centuries. Data shows that the human teeth are smaller compared to the Apes teeth due to diet changes. During the early years, the human and the ape diet was no different. The scientist concludes that the teeth size and structure was similar. The morphological variation that distinguishes the humans from the apes consists of the dental formation, skull and brain, teeth. The canine teeth of the apes are seen to be dimorphic, but the human’s canine is dilapidated and is smoothed to the occlusal surface of the posterior teeth. The modern human jaws are smaller and project less compared to the apes’.
Teeth are therefore an essential part of the digestive system that tells a history of the diet a human takes. The teeth enamel or morphological formation or even the rate of teeth wear talks of diet. For example, research on the early hominine diets concentrates more on the teeth. The teeth are most long-lasting part of the gastrointestinal tract. From an ecological point of view, teeth help any animal to interact with the surrounding environment. The early human, had a tough enamel since they engaged in a diet where they consumed grass. The early hominine commonly referred as the Australopithecus, consumed in a wide variety of foods. The foods included wild plants, grass, herbs and seeds. The Australopithecus has a small set of incisors and huge molars since they were used to consuming seeds (Emes, Bucket, and Serhat, 40). The Australopithecus have large molars and premolars an adaptation most common in omnivorous animals. The hominines were most likely to eat a diet, which included meat. Seeds and vegetables.
The Paranthropus, on the other hand, had a complete teeth modification. Their dentition was more of flattened molar and premolar a dentition perfect for vegetable consumption. Researchers indicate that their diet consisted of shoots, leaves wild berries, fruits, and earthly seeds. The study shows that the Paranthropus and the Australopithecus had almost a similar diet. Their teeth dentition and cheeks are identical in shape and size. Both species had blunt canines and molars well suited for consuming hard fruits; seed, crushing flowers, shoots, and leaves. Both species are also identified to have tough cheek muscles due to the similarity in their diets.
During the Miocene era, the Australopithecus who had large molars and premolars had adapted to eat nuts, seeds and vegetables. Their teeth adaptation was a limitation to meat consumption since their teeth dentition was used to eating fruits and vegetables so they could not tear flesh. Therefore, the Australopithecus used tools to crush and cut meat making it easy to chew. When the early hominine started to used tools to cut down meat, the teeth stopped to adapt into those similar to the carnivorous, sharp canines and strong molars.
Food usually leaves distinctive marks in teeth, food prints. The A.P. Boise fossil found in the Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania has a dental formation that consists of huge molars and premolars and strong cheek muscles. The specimen had widened cheekbones altered to hold the massive cheek muscles. The teeth adaptation indicates that the fossil mostly chewed roots and nuts. This particular diet leaves dents in teeth. Peter Ungar research show that in Kenya at a fossil site, Koobi Fora (Eronen and Jernvall, 2000). The massive animal remains, and curved stone artefacts showed that the human-adapted an omnivorous diet (Teaford and Peter, 13507). The use of tools to slice, cut and grind meat lead to smaller molars and premolars since their function for grinding and slicing meat had been made easier by the artefacts tools.
The human change from hunting to agriculture also has a significant contribution to the shift in dentition. During the days when people practised farming certain foods eaten by the Australopithecus and Paranthropus became hard to gather. The human learnt there are various methods to make food more accessible to chew through methods like cooking and grinding. The people had a reduction of jaws. Researchers continue to argue out that with the reduced natural selection, teeth will continue to transform. The teeth will be small in structure and unable to eat tough kinds of foods. Over the course of time, the teeth size and structure are continuously reducing in size. The modern human teeth are smaller compared to earlier humans, the cheeks and muscles are also smaller in size.
Cooking is also a significant attribute that lessens the human need for carnivore adaption to eating meat effectively. Cooking a discovery made in the 300 million years ago, helped soften meat making it easy to chew and crush. Studies show that people’s dental sizes significantly reduces when the cooking of meals was discovered. Teeth evolution also resulted in the development of speech which, had its advantages and disadvantages. Speech development helped humans to communicate with efficacy. However, teeth formation resulted to sleep apnea because of the collapse the pharyngeal.
The modern human has a weak teeth adaptation due to the soft meals eaten. The diets have been broken down through processing and cooking such that the teeth do not fully develop. Most humans have either cracked teeth, crowded or crooked teeth. The soft diets contribute to poor dentition. Some modern diets have also brought undeniable harm to the versatility of the teeth. For example, the modern people love sugared diets which lead to the decreased integrity of teeth through tooth decay and cavities.
Some of the diet changes have to be useful. For example, diet changes lead to speech recognition that helped people to communicate. Some of the adverse changes brought by teeth evolution are teeth crowning. The early humans did not encounter such problems because the diet they ate enabled teeth development. However, a modern diet which includes soft highly processed foods discourages proper teeth development leading to crowning. Sugar is also a significant part of the modern-day diet. Sugar is a major contributor to tooth decays and cavities which a major drawback to dental health. The soft diet mostly from vegetables and fruits, which is similar to the early farmers, lead to reduced teeth strength (Teaford, Moya, Smith, and Mark Ferguson,2007). The reduced strength is because the diet eaten did not require much chewing or crushing hence the incidences of teeth falling out is a common disadvantage experienced by modern humans. The teeth evolution is a vital part of history as it tells a lot of human history.
A certain scientist discovered that the cavity-causing germs were more common among the human in Agrarian area. In fact, caries causing bacteria persisted in the industrialisation revolution and the modern days due to the dieting. The modern teeth dentition is weak, and consumption of hard foods like nuts or certain types of seeds may lead to teeth abrasion and crack.
In conclusion, the teeth evolution is an eminent process that can be noticed from the facial features of the early man and the modern man. The Australopithecus, for example, had flattened molars and premolars that were well suited for eating a wide variety of foods. Their dentition also showed strong incisors and molars an adaptation common among the carnivorous, which aided them in eating flesh. However, some of the teeth dentition diminished in the Agrarian era indicating that the human diet had changed. Their dentition displayed smaller molars and premolars due to the exposure to soft, processed foods that did not require a lot of energy to chew. The cheekbones and cheek muscles of the modern human also grew smaller unlike those of the early man that was adapted to chewing tough foods like grass, raw meat nuts and seeds
Works cited
Eronen, J. T., and J. Jernvall. "Evolution of teeth." Duodecim; laaketieteellinen aikakauskirja 125.18 (2009): 2017-2022.
Emes, Yusuf, Buket Aybar, and Serhat Yalcin. "On the evolution of human jaws and teeth: A review." Bulletin of the International association for paleodontology 5.1 (2011): 37-47.
Teaford, Mark F., and Peter S. Ungar. "Diet and the evolution of the earliest human ancestors." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
97.25 (2000): 13506-13511.
Teaford, Mark F., Moya Meredith Smith, and Mark WJ Ferguson, eds. Development, function and evolution of teeth. Cambridge University Press, 2007
