Fish diet may have given our brain its cutting edge

Sydney, June 2:- Two million years ago, humans began eating crocodiles, turtles and fish - a diet that could have given our brains its cutting edge, research says.

In what is the first evidence of consistent amounts of aquatic foods in the human diet, an international team of researchers has discovered that early stone tools and cut marked animal remains in northern Kenya.

"This site in Africa is the first evidence that early humans were eating an extremely broad diet," says Andy Herries of the University of New South Wales, a member of the team.

The project represents a collaborative effort with the National Museums of Kenya and is led by David Braun of the University of Cape Town in South Africa and Jack Harris of Rutgers University in the US.

The researchers found evidence of the early humans eating both freshwater fish and land animals at the site in the northern Rift Valley of Kenya.

It is thought that small-bodied early Homo would have scavenged the remains of these creatures, rather than hunting for them.

Said Herries: "A broader diet as suggested by the site's archaeology may have been the catalyst for brain development and humanity's first footsteps out of Africa."

The work was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.

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