title: The effectiveness of using carbonate isotope measurements of body tissues to infer diet in human evolution: Evidence from wild western chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus).
abstract: Changes in diet throughout hominin evolution have been linked with important evolutionary changes. Stable carbon isotope analysis of inorganic apatite carbonate is the main isotopic method used to reconstruct fossil hominin diets; to test its effectiveness as a paleodietary indicator we present bone and enamel carbonate carbon isotope data from a well-studied population of modern wild western chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus) of known sex and age from Taï, Cote d'Ivoire. We found a significant effect of age class on bone carbonate values, with adult chimpanzees being more (13)C- and (18)O-depleted compared to juveniles. Further, to investigate habitat effects, we compared our data to existing apatite data on eastern chimpanzees (P. troglodytes schweinfurthii) and found that the Taï chimpanzees are significantly more depleted in enamel δ(13)Cap and δ(18)Oap compared to their eastern counterparts. Our data are the first to present a range of tissue-specific isotope data from the same group of wild western chimpanzees and, as such, add new data to the growing number of modern non-human primate comparative isotope datasets providing valuable information for the interpretation of diet throughout hominin evolution. By comparing our data to published isotope data on fossil hominins we found that our modern chimpanzee bone and enamel data support hypotheses that the trend towards increased consumption of C4 foods after 4 Ma (millions of years ago) is unique to hominins.
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Department of Human Evolution, Deutscher Platz 6, 04103 Leipzig, Germany; Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Department of Primatology, Deutscher Platz 6, 04103 Leipzig, Germany; School of Anthropology and Conservation, Marlowe Building, University of Kent, Canterbury CT2 7NR, Kent, United Kingdom. Electronic address: g.fahy@kent.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Geraldine E
authors.initials: GE
authors.lastname: Fahy
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Department of Primatology, Deutscher Platz 6, 04103 Leipzig, Germany.
authors.forename: Christophe
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Boesch
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Department of Human Evolution, Deutscher Platz 6, 04103 Leipzig, Germany.
authors.forename: Jean-Jacques
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Hublin
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Department of Human Evolution, Deutscher Platz 6, 04103 Leipzig, Germany; Department of Anthropology, University of British Columbia, 6303 NW Marine Drive, Vancouver, British Columbia V6T 1Z1, Canada; Department of Archaeology, University of Durham, Durham, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Michael P
authors.initials: MP
authors.lastname: Richards
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D000818:Animals; D000885:Anthropology, Physical / Q000379:methods*; D005075:Biological Evolution; D001842:Bone and Bones / Q000737:chemistry*; D002247:Carbon Isotopes / Q000032:analysis; D002254:Carbonates / Q000032:analysis*; D007560:Cote d'Ivoire; D003743:Dental Enamel / Q000737:chemistry*; D004032:Diet; D017753:Ecosystem; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010103:Oxygen Isotopes / Q000032:analysis; D002679:Pan troglodytes / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D002247:Carbon Isotopes; D002254:Carbonates; D010103:Oxygen Isotopes
keywords: Carbonate; Diet; Human evolution; Pan troglodytes; Stable isotope