How can we ever know what ancient animals ate? For the first time, the changing diets of elephants in the last two million years in China have been reconstructed, using a technique based on analysis of the surface textures of their teeth.
The work was carried out by a University of Bristol student, working with an international team of researchers. The research was published online in Quaternary International.
Today, elephants live only in remote, tropical parts of Africa and southern Asia, but before the Ice Ages they were widespread.