Browse
Submit Data
Databases
API
Help

Dataset Information

22 Views

0 Connections

0 Citations

0 Reanalyses

0 Downloads

Omics score: 0

Contracting eastern African C₄ grasslands during the extinction of Paranthropus boisei.

ABSTRACT: The extinction of the Paranthropus boisei estimated to just before 1 Ma occurred when C₄ grasslands dominated landscapes of the Eastern African Rift System (EARS). P. boisei has been characterized as an herbivorous C₄ specialist, and paradoxically, its demise coincided with habitats favorable to its dietary ecology. Here we report new pedogenic carbonate stable carbon (δ¹³C_PC) and oxygen (δ¹⁸O_PC) values (nodules = 53, analyses = 95) from an under-sampled interval (1.4-0.7 Ma) in the Turkana Basin (Kenya), one of the most fossiliferous locales of P. boisei. We combined our new results with published δ¹³C_PC values from the EARS dated to 3-0 Ma, conducted time-series analysis of woody cover (ƒ_WC), and compared the EARS ƒ_WC trends to regional and global paleo-environmental and -climatic datasets. Our results demonstrate that the long-term rise of C₄ grasslands was punctuated by a transient but significant increase in C₃ vegetation and warmer temperatures, coincident with the Mid-Pleistocene Transition (1.3-0.7 Ma) and implicating a short-term rise in pCO₂. The contraction of C₄ grasslands escalated dietary competition amongst the abundant C₄-feeders, likely influencing P. boisei's demise.

SUBMITTER: Quinn RL

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8009881 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Json Xml

Similar Datasets

Baboon feeding ecology informs the dietary niche of Paranthropus boisei.

Project description:Hominins are generally considered eclectic omnivores like baboons, but recent isotope studies call into question the generalist status of some hominins. Paranthropus boisei and Australopithecus bahrelghazali derived 75%-80% of their tissues' δ(13)C from C4 sources, i.e. mainly low-quality foods like grasses and sedges. Here I consider the energetics of P. boisei and the nutritional value of C4 foods, taking into account scaling issues between the volume of food consumed and body mass, and P. boisei's food preference as inferred from dento-cranial morphology. Underlying the models are empirical data for Papio cynocephalus dietary ecology. Paranthropus boisei only needed to spend some 37%-42% of its daily feeding time (conservative estimate) on C4 sources to meet 80% of its daily requirements of calories, and all its requirements for protein. The energetic requirements of 2-4 times the basal metabolic rate (BMR) common to mammals could therefore have been met within a 6-hour feeding/foraging day. The findings highlight the high nutritional yield of many C4 foods eaten by baboons (and presumably hominins), explain the evolutionary success of P. boisei, and indicate that P. boisei was probably a generalist like other hominins. The diet proposed is consistent with the species' derived morphology and unique microwear textures. Finally, the results highlight the importance of baboon/hominin hand in food acquisition and preparation.

| S-EPMC3885648 | biostudies-literature

Dental microwear and diet of the Plio-Pleistocene hominin Paranthropus boisei.

Project description:The Plio-Pleistocene hominin Paranthropus boisei had enormous, flat, thickly enameled cheek teeth, a robust cranium and mandible, and inferred massive, powerful chewing muscles. This specialized morphology, which earned P. boisei the nickname "Nutcracker Man", suggests that this hominin could have consumed very mechanically challenging foods. It has been recently argued, however, that specialized hominin morphology may indicate adaptations for the consumption of occasional fallback foods rather than preferred resources. Dental microwear offers a potential means by which to test this hypothesis in that it reflects actual use rather than genetic adaptation. High microwear surface texture complexity and anisotropy in extant primates can be associated with the consumption of exceptionally hard and tough foods respectively. Here we present the first quantitative analysis of dental microwear for P. boisei. Seven specimens examined preserved unobscured antemortem molar microwear. These all show relatively low complexity and anisotropy values. This suggests that none of the individuals consumed especially hard or tough foods in the days before they died. The apparent discrepancy between microwear and functional anatomy is consistent with the idea that P. boisei presents a hominin example of Liem's Paradox, wherein a highly derived morphology need not reflect a specialized diet.

| S-EPMC2315797 | biostudies-literature

Diet of Paranthropus boisei in the early Pleistocene of East Africa.

Project description:The East African hominin Paranthropus boisei was characterized by a suite of craniodental features that have been widely interpreted as adaptations to a diet that consisted of hard objects that required powerful peak masticatory loads. These morphological adaptations represent the culmination of an evolutionary trend that began in earlier taxa such as Australopithecus afarensis, and presumably facilitated utilization of open habitats in the Plio-Pleistocene. Here, we use stable isotopes to show that P. boisei had a diet that was dominated by C(4) biomass such as grasses or sedges. Its diet included more C(4) biomass than any other hominin studied to date, including its congener Paranthropus robustus from South Africa. These results, coupled with recent evidence from dental microwear, may indicate that the remarkable craniodental morphology of this taxon represents an adaptation for processing large quantities of low-quality vegetation rather than hard objects.

| S-EPMC3111323 | biostudies-literature

Isotopic evidence for the timing of the dietary shift toward C4 foods in eastern African Paranthropus.

Project description:New approaches to the study of early hominin diets have refreshed interest in how and when our diets diverged from those of other African apes. A trend toward significant consumption of C4 foods in hominins after this divergence has emerged as a landmark event in human evolution, with direct evidence provided by stable carbon isotope studies. In this study, we report on detailed carbon isotopic evidence from the hominin fossil record of the Shungura and Usno Formations, Lower Omo Valley, Ethiopia, which elucidates the patterns of C4 dietary utilization in the robust hominin Paranthropus The results show that the most important shift toward C4 foods occurred at ∼2.37 Ma, within the temporal range of the earliest known member of the genus, Paranthropus aethiopicus, and that this shift was not unique to Paranthropus but occurred in all hominins from this fossil sequence. This uptake of C4 foods by hominins occurred during a period marked by an overall trend toward increased C4 grazing by cooccurring mammalian taxa from the same sequence. However, the timing and geographic patterns of hominin diets in this region differ from those observed elsewhere in the same basin, where environmental controls on the underlying availability of various food sources were likely quite different. These results highlight the complexities of dietary responses by hominins to changes in the availability of food resources.

| S-EPMC7486737 | biostudies-literature

First partial skeleton of a 1.34-million-year-old Paranthropus boisei from Bed II, Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania.

Project description:Recent excavations in Level 4 at BK (Bed II, Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania) have yielded nine hominin teeth, a distal humerus fragment, a proximal radius with much of its shaft, a femur shaft, and a tibia shaft fragment (cataloged collectively as OH 80). Those elements identified more specifically than to simply Hominidae gen. et sp. indet are attributed to Paranthropus boisei. Before this study, incontrovertible P. boisei partial skeletons, for which postcranial remains occurred in association with taxonomically diagnostic craniodental remains, were unknown. Thus, OH 80 stands as the first unambiguous, dentally associated Paranthropus partial skeleton from East Africa. The morphology and size of its constituent parts suggest that the fossils derived from an extremely robust individual who, at 1.338±0.024 Ma (1 sigma), represents one of the most recent occurrences of Paranthropus before its extinction in East Africa.

| S-EPMC3855051 | biostudies-literature

Abrasive, silica phytoliths and the evolution of thick molar enamel in primates, with implications for the diet of Paranthropus boisei.

Project description:BackgroundPrimates--including fossil species of apes and hominins--show variation in their degree of molar enamel thickness, a trait long thought to reflect a diet of hard or tough foods. The early hominins demonstrated molar enamel thickness of moderate to extreme degrees, which suggested to most researchers that they ate hard foods obtained on or near the ground, such as nuts, seeds, tubers, and roots. We propose an alternative hypothesis--that the amount of phytoliths in foods correlates with the evolution of thick molar enamel in primates, although this effect is constrained by a species' degree of folivory.Methodology/principal findingsFrom a combination of dietary data and evidence for the levels of phytoliths in plant families in the literature, we calculated the percentage of plant foods rich in phytoliths in the diets of twelve extant primates with wide variation in their molar enamel thickness. Additional dietary data from the literature provided the percentage of each primate's diet made up of plants and of leaves. A statistical analysis of these variables showed that the amount of abrasive silica phytoliths in the diets of our sample primates correlated positively with the thickness of their molar enamel, constrained by the amount of leaves in their diet (R(2)?=?0.875; p<.0006).Conclusions/significanceThe need to resist abrasion from phytoliths appears to be a key selective force behind the evolution of thick molar enamel in primates. The extreme molar enamel thickness of the teeth of the East African hominin Paranthropus boisei, long thought to suggest a diet comprising predominantly hard objects, instead appears to indicate a diet with plants high in abrasive silica phytoliths.

| S-EPMC3233556 | biostudies-literature

Phylogenetic patterns of extinction risk in the eastern arc ecosystems, an African biodiversity hotspot.

Project description:There is an urgent need to reduce drastically the rate at which biodiversity is declining worldwide. Phylogenetic methods are increasingly being recognised as providing a useful framework for predicting future losses, and guiding efforts for pre-emptive conservation actions. In this study, we used a reconstructed phylogenetic tree of angiosperm species of the Eastern Arc Mountains - an important African biodiversity hotspot - and described the distribution of extinction risk across taxonomic ranks and phylogeny. We provide evidence for both taxonomic and phylogenetic selectivity in extinction risk. However, we found that selectivity varies with IUCN extinction risk category. Vulnerable species are more closely related than expected by chance, whereas endangered and critically endangered species are not significantly clustered on the phylogeny. We suggest that the general observation for taxonomic and phylogenetic selectivity (i.e. phylogenetic signal, the tendency of closely related species to share similar traits) in extinction risks is therefore largely driven by vulnerable species, and not necessarily the most highly threatened. We also used information on altitudinal distribution and climate to generate a predictive model of at-risk species richness, and found that greater threatened species richness is found at higher altitude, allowing for more informed conservation decision making. Our results indicate that evolutionary history can help predict plant susceptibility to extinction threats in the hyper-diverse but woefully-understudied Eastern Arc Mountains, and illustrate the contribution of phylogenetic approaches in conserving African floristic biodiversity where detailed ecological and evolutionary data are often lacking.

| S-EPMC3466253 | biostudies-literature

Eastern African ancient DNA

Project description:Ancient DNA reveals a multi-step spread of the first herders into sub-Saharan Africa

| PRJEB31373 | ENA

Gut Microbiota Dynamics during Dietary Shift in Eastern African Cichlid Fishes.

Project description:The gut microbiota structure reflects both a host phylogenetic history and a signature of adaptation to the host ecological, mainly trophic niches. African cichlid fishes, with their array of closely related species that underwent a rapid dietary niche radiation, offer a particularly interesting system to explore the relative contribution of these two factors in nature. Here we surveyed the host intra- and interspecific natural variation of the gut microbiota of five cichlid species from the monophyletic tribe Perissodini of lake Tanganyika, whose members transitioned from being zooplanktivorous to feeding primarily on fish scales. The outgroup riverine species Astatotilapia burtoni, largely omnivorous, was also included in the study. Fusobacteria, Firmicutes and Proteobacteria represented the dominant components in the gut microbiota of all 30 specimens analysed according to two distinct 16S rRNA markers. All members of the Perissodini tribe showed a homogenous pattern of microbial alpha and beta diversities, with no significant qualitative differences, despite changes in diet. The recent diet shift between zooplantkon- and scale-eaters simply reflects on a significant enrichment of Clostridium taxa in scale-eaters where they might be involved in the scale metabolism. Comparison with the omnivorous species A. burtoni suggests that, with increased host phylogenetic distance and/or increasing herbivory, the gut microbiota begins differentiating also at qualitative level. The cichlids show presence of a large conserved core of taxa and a small set of core OTUs (average 13-15%), remarkably stable also in captivity, and putatively favoured by both restricted microbial transmission among related hosts (putatively enhanced by mouthbrooding behavior) and common host constraints. This study sets the basis for a future large-scale investigation of the gut microbiota of cichlids and its adaptation in the process of the host adaptive radiation.

| S-EPMC4433246 | biostudies-literature

Six-fold increase of atmospheric pCO2 during the Permian-Triassic mass extinction.

Project description:The Permian-Triassic mass extinction was marked by a massive release of carbon into the ocean-atmosphere system, evidenced by a sharp negative carbon isotope excursion. Large carbon emissions would have increased atmospheric pCO2 and caused global warming. However, the magnitude of pCO2 changes during the PTME has not yet been estimated. Here, we present a continuous pCO2 record across the PTME reconstructed from high-resolution δ13C of C3 plants from southwestern China. We show that pCO2 increased from 426 +133/-96 ppmv in the latest Permian to 2507 +4764/-1193 ppmv at the PTME within about 75 kyr, and that the reconstructed pCO2 significantly correlates with sea surface temperatures. Mass balance modelling suggests that volcanic CO2 is probably not the only trigger of the carbon cycle perturbation, and that large quantities of 13C-depleted carbon emission from organic matter and methane were likely required during complex interactions with the Siberian Traps volcanism.

| S-EPMC8035180 | biostudies-literature