'Brainy' chickpeas conquered the world/Blue-eyed men prefer blue-eyed girls

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I couldn't live without hummous. It may have started a more intellectual phase from the sole meat eating one. N

'Brainy' chickpeas conquered the world

 

09 January 2007 NewScientist.com news service

 

 

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19325854.300-brainy-chickpeas-conquered-the-world.html

 

Could the humble chickpea have changed the course of history? As one of the founder crops cultivated in the fertile crescent of Mesopotamia, the chickpea's nutritional benefits have been cited as one of the reasons for the rise of civilisation there.

Now Zohar Kerem from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, thinks he has evidence to support that view. Kerem and colleagues collected wild chickpeas (Cicer reticulatum) and compared their nutritional value with that of cultivated varieties. Wild chickpeas are rare and difficult to cultivate, so there must have been a good reason why our ancestors persevered with growing them around 11,000 years ago.

That reason, says Kerem, is the amino acid tryptophan - a precursor of the neurotransmitter serotonin. Increased amounts in the diet may improve performance when under stress. Tryptophan also promotes ovulation, an advantage during a time of human expansion. Cultivated chickpeas had over 3 times as much tryptophan as their wild cousins (Journal of Archaeological Science, in press).

Kerem speculates that prehistoric people knew chickpeas were nutritious. "It probably made them feel good," he says. Not everyone is convinced that chickpeas kick-started human empires. "There is no clear indication of when selection for increased brain effects occurred - was it 10,000 years ago or 5000?" says Bruce Smith of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC.

From issue 2585 of New Scientist magazine, 09 January 2007, page 16

 

 

 

Blue-eyed men prefer blue-eyed girls

 

18 January 2007 From New Scientist Print Edition. Subscribe and get 4 free issues.

 

 

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19325875.400-blueeyed-men-prefer-blueeyed-girls.html

 

Jealous man seeks partner for meaningful relationship. Tall, handsome, blue eyes, looking for blue-eyed women only.

Why? Because men with blue eyes are drawn towards blue-eyed women, and prefer to choose them as their partner because this can provide reassurance that the woman's babies are theirs too.

When surveyed, blue-eyed men find pictures of women with the same eye colour significantly more attractive than those with brown eyes, whereas neither brown-eyed men nor brown-eyed women show any preference for eye colour, Bruno Laeng of the University of Tromsø, Norway, and his team have discovered.

The effect is seen in real relationships, too. Blue-eyed men are more likely to be romantically involved with a woman of the same eye colour than they are with brown-eyed women, or brown-eyed men are with a partner of any eye colour (Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, vol 61, p 371).

Blue eyes are a recessive trait, Laeng explains, so two blue-eyed parents should produce a blue-eyed child, while a child with any other eye colour must have been fathered by another man. Blue-eyed men seeking a partner unconsciously know this, Laeng claims, and select women of similar eye colour to ensure they can more easily spot if they have been cuckolded.

From issue 2587 of New Scientist magazine, 18 January 2007, page 16