You are viewing a single comment's thread from:
RE: Giant pandas (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) ate a varied diet only 5,000 years ago - much more recently than previously believed
The way this experiment works is that they measure the amount of an isotope of nitrogen in the bone collagen of the specimen, which will be dependent on several factors, and one of them is the diet. The research is based on measuring the level of nitrogen 15, a stable isotope of nitrogen.
Relatively common in forensic and food science, but this is a seriously interesting approach for Pandas.
I've learned something new. Thanks!
Thanks for stopping by, @alexs1320. I'm glad you learned something new!
I didn't know that it was used for forensic and food sciences, but that makes sense. I have seen it being used to determining the exact trophic level of organisms in biology before as well, but this is the first time I have seen it being used to see a big shift in the diet.