Peter S. Ungar (born May 4, 1963) is an American
paleoanthropologist
Paleoanthropology or paleo-anthropology is a branch of paleontology and anthropology which seeks to understand the early development of anatomically modern humans, a process known as hominization, through the reconstruction of evolutionary kinship ...
and
evolutionary biologist.
Life
Peter S. Ungar is Distinguished Professor and Director of the Environmental Dynamics Program at the
University of Arkansas
The University of Arkansas (U of A, UArk, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Fayetteville, Arkansas. It is the flagship campus of the University of Arkansas System and the largest university in the state. Founded as Arkansas ...
. Before arriving at Arkansas, he taught at the
Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and the
Duke University Medical Center.
Ungar is known primarily for his work on the role of diet in
human evolution
Human evolution is the evolutionary process within the history of primates that led to the emergence of ''Homo sapiens'' as a distinct species of the hominid family, which includes the great apes. This process involved the gradual development of ...
. He has spent thousands of hours observing wild apes and other primates in the rainforests of Latin America and Southeast Asia, studied fossils from
tyrannosaurid
Tyrannosauridae (or tyrannosaurids, meaning "tyrant lizards") is a family of coelurosaurian theropod dinosaurs that comprises two subfamilies containing up to thirteen genera, including the eponymous ''Tyrannosaurus''. The exact number of genera ...
s to
Neandertals, documented oral health of the Hadza Hunter-Gatherers of Tanzania, and developed new techniques for using advanced surface analysis technologies to tease information about diet from tooth shape and patterns of use wear.
Ungar has written or coauthored more than 200 scientific works on
ecology
Ecology () is the study of the relationships between living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere level. Ecology overlaps wi ...
and
evolution
Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
for books and journals including ''Nature'', '' Science'', ''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences'', and ''Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society''. These have focused on food choices and feeding in living primates, and the role of diet in the evolution of human ancestors and other fossil species. His book ''Mammal Teeth: Origin, Evolution and Diversity'' won the PROSE Award for best book in the Biological Sciences, and he edited ''Evolution of the Human Diet: The Known, the Unknown and the Unknowable'' and coedited ''Human Diet: Its Origins and Evolution''. His forays into popular science writing include ''Teeth: A Very Short Introduction'', and his most recent trade book,
''Evolution's Bite: A Story about Teeth, Diet, and Human Origins''.
Ungar's work has been featured in hundreds of electronic, print, and broadcast media outlets, and he appeared recently in documentaries on the ''Discovery Channel'', ''BBC Television'', and the ''Science Channel''.
Selected publications
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Peter S. Ungar
Peter S. Ungar (born May 4, 1963) is an American paleoanthropologist and evolutionary biologist.
Life
Peter S. Ungar is Distinguished Professor and Director of the Environmental Dynamics Program at the University of Arkansas. Before arriving at ...
, "The Trouble with Teeth: Our teeth are crowded, crooked and riddled with cavities. It hasn't always been this way", ''
Scientific American
''Scientific American'', informally abbreviated ''SciAm'' or sometimes ''SA'', is an American popular science magazine. Many famous scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it. In print since 1845, it i ...
'', vol. 322, no. 4 (April 2020), pp. 44–49. "Our teeth
..evolved over hundreds of millions of years to be incredibly strong and to align precisely for efficient chewing.
..Our dental disorders largely stem from a shift in the oral environment caused by the introduction of softer, more sugary foods than the ones our ancestors typically ate."
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Books
* Ungar, P.S. Evolution's Bite: A Story of Teeth, Diet, and Human Origins. 2017.
* Ungar, P.S. Teeth: A Very Short Introduction. 2014.
* Ungar, P.S. Mammal Teeth: Origin, Evolution, and Diversity. 2010.
References
External links
Tedx, The ancestral human dietTedEd Lesson, How did teeth evolve?Scientific American blog, The true human dietAeon blog, It’s not that your teeth are too bigDepartment of Anthropology, University of ArkansasEnvironmental Dynamics Program, University of ArkansasDiet reconstruction of the "Nutcracker Man"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ungar, Peter
American paleoanthropologists
Living people
1963 births
Binghamton University alumni