Dental microwear texture analysis (DMTA) is widely used for diet inferences in extant and extinct vertebrates. Often, a reference tooth position is analysed in extant specimens, while isolated teeth are lumped together in fossil datasets. It is therefore important to test whether DMT is tooth position specific, and if so, what the causes for wear differences are. Here we present results from controlled feeding experiments with 72 guinea pigs, which either received fresh or dried natural plant diets of different phytolith content (lucerne, grass, bamboo), or pelleted diets with and without mineral abrasives (frequently encountered by herbivorous mammals in natural habitats). We test for gradients in dental microwear texture along the upper cheek tooth row. Regardless of abrasive content, pelleted diets display an increase in surface roughness along the tooth row, indicating that posterior tooth positions experience more wear compared to anterior teeth. Guinea pigs feedings on plants of low phytolith content and low abrasiveness (fresh and dry lucerne, fresh grass) show almost no DMT differences between tooth positions, while individuals feeding on more abrasive plants (dry grass, fresh and dry bamboo) show a gradient of decreasing surface roughness along the tooth row. We suggest that plant feeding involves continuous intake and comminution by grinding, resulting in posterior tooth positions mainly processing food already partly comminuted and moistened. Pelleted diets require crushing, which exerts higher loads, especially on posterior tooth positions, where bite forces are highest. These differences in chewing behaviour result in opposing wear gradients for plant versus pelleted diets.
Dental microwear texture gradients in guinea pigs reveal that material properties of the diet affect chewing behaviour
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Daniela E. Winkler, Marcus Clauss, Maximilian Rölle, Ellen Schulz-Kornas, Daryl Codron, Thomas M. Kaiser, Thomas Tütken; Dental microwear texture gradients in guinea pigs reveal that material properties of the diet affect chewing behaviour. J Exp Biol 2021; jeb.242446. doi: https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.242446
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