08/23/2013    

FOOT-RELATED RESEARCH - PART 1

Human Feet Still Built for Life in Trees, Like Our Ape Relatives

Although our human ancestors climbed down from the trees millions of years ago, our feet have retained the type of flexibility seen in today’s tree-dwelling primates, new research shows. Thanks to a pressure-sensitive treadmill, researchers at the University of Liverpool were able to examine 25,000 footsteps made by 45 healthy human volunteers. About two-thirds of those volunteers took some steps in which their mid-foot touched the ground, they found.

“Humans are supposed to have unique feet, but it looks like we don’t,” said Robin Crompton, a musculoskeletal biologist at the University of Liverpool, who worked on the study. Why human feet have remained somewhat suited to life in the trees is still unclear. Crompton thinks that adaptations to tree-dwelling may also be useful for moving over irregular terrain.

Source: Melissa Pandika, The Los Angeles Times [8/21/13] via Dr. Jay Sung