In the period just before they went extinct, the American lions and saber-toothed cats that roamed North America in the late Pleistocene were living well off the fat of the land. That is the conclusion of the latest study of the microscopic¹ wear patterns on the teeth of these great cats recovered from the La Brea tar² pits in southern California. Contrary to previous studies, the analysis did not find any indications that the giant carnivores（食肉动物） were having increased trouble finding prey³ in the period before they went extinct 12,000 years ago.

 

The results, published on Dec. 26 in the scientific journal PLOS ONE, contradicts previous dental studies and presents a problem for the most popular explanations for the Megafaunal (or Quaternary) extinction⁴ when the great cats, mammoths（猛犸象） and a number of the largest mammals that existed around the world disappeared.

 

"The popular theory for the Megafaunal extinction is that either the changing climate at the end of the last Ice Age or human activity -- or some combination of the two -- killed off most of the large mammals," said Larisa DeSantis, assistant professor of earth and environmental sciences at Vanderbilt, who headed the study. "In the case of the great cats, we expect that it would have been increasingly difficult for them to find prey, especially if had to compete with humans. We know that when food becomes scarce, carnivores like the great cats tend to consume more of the carcasses they kill. If they spent more time chomping⁵ on bones, it should cause detectable⁶ changes in the wear patterns on their teeth."

 

In 1993, Blaire Van Valkenburgh at UCLA published a paper on tooth breakage in large carnivores in the late Pleistocene. Analyzing⁷ teeth of American lions, saber-tooth cats, dire⁸ wolves and coyotes from La Brea, she found that they had approximately three times the number of broken teeth of contemporary predators⁹ and concluded, ." ..these findings suggest that these species utilized¹⁰ carcasses（尸体，兽体） more fully¹¹ and likely competed more intensely for food than present-day large carnivores."

 

The latest study uses a new technique, called dental microwear texture¹² analysis (DMTA), developed by co-author Peter Ungar at the University of Arkansas. It uses a confocal microscope to produce a three-dimensional image of the surface of a tooth. The image is then analyzed¹³ for microscopic wear patterns. Chowing down on red meat produces small parallel scratches. Chomping on bones adds larger, deeper pits. Previous methods of dental wear analysis relied on researchers to identify and count these different types of features. DMTA relies on automated¹⁴ software and is considered more accurate because it reduces the possibility of observer bias¹⁵.

 

DeSantis and Ungar, with the assistance of Blaine Schubert from East Tennessee State University and Jessica Scott from the University of Arkansas, applied¹⁶ DMTA to the fossil teeth of 15 American lions (Panthera atrox) and 15 saber-tooth cats (Smilodon fatalis) recovered from the La Brea tar pits in Los Angeles.

 

Their analysis revealed that the wear pattern on the teeth of the American lion most closely resembled those of the present-day cheetah¹⁷, which actively¹⁸ avoids bones when it feeds. Similarly, the saber-tooth cat's wear pattern most closely resembled those of the present-day African lion, which indulges in（沉溺于） some bone crushing when it eats. (This differs from a previous microwear study using a different technique that concluded saber-tooth cats avoided bone to a far greater extent.)

 

The researchers examined how these patterns changed over time by selecting specimens¹⁹ from tar pits of different ages, ranging from about 35,000 to 11,500 years ago. They did not find any evidence that the two carnivores increased their "utilization²⁰" of carcasses throughout this period. If anything, their analysis suggests that the proportion of the carcasses that both kinds of cats consumed actually declined toward the end.

 

The researchers acknowledge the high rate of tooth breakage reported in the previous study, but they argue that it is more likely the result of increased breakage when taking down prey instead of when feeding.

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