Early residents of the Tibetan Plateau, one of the least hospitable places on earth, survived in large part by consuming large amounts of dairy products, according to a new study that chipped away at ancient teeth.
Sometimes referred to as the world’s Third Pole, the Tibetan Plateau is beset by dry, cold, unpredictable conditions that would have made life tough for the humans who lived there some 3,600 years ago. Conditions would have stymied efforts to raise crops, such as the barley raised in warmer Tibetan valleys and lowlands. And they would have lowered oxygen levels far enough to cause potentially fatal hypoxia.
