Scientists have unearthed remains of a 275-million-year-old reptile with a throbbing mouth, a finding they say has pushed back the earliest evidence of tooth decay to some 200 million years.
The newly-discovered tooth infection may have been the result of animals adapting to life on land after living in the sea for so long, said the researchers.
“Not only does this fossil extend our understanding of dental disease, it reveals the advantages and disadvantages that certain creatures faced as their teeth evolved to feed on both meat and plants,” said lead researcher Robert Reisz, a biologist at the University of Toronto Mississauga. “In this case, as with humans, it may have increased their susceptibility to oral infections,” Reisz told LiveScience.
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World’s new oldest man turns 114
Tokyo: The world’s oldest man greeted his 114th birthday in rural Japan on Tuesday with a breakfast of grilled sea bream, miso soup and red-bean rice — telling interviewers he planned to live until the age of 120. Former postal worker Jirouemon Kimura told city officials of his native Kyotango in western Japan that he was “extremely moved” when he learned he had become the world’s oldest man following the death of a retired US railroad worker on April 14.
“I heard the news and it is a great honour,” he told the officials. His secret was to eat sparingly, stopping when his stomach was about 80 per cent full, he said. Kimura told local officials on his 113th birthday in 2010 that his goal was to reach 120 and on Tuesday he confirmed “that hasn’t changed,” Kyotango officials said in a statement.
City officials described him as alert and lucid as he sat upright and fielded their questions for 50 minutes.