Mongoloid - Features - Cold Adaption

Cold Adaption

Professor of anthropology, Akazawa Takeru (Japanese:赤沢威) of the International Research Center for Japanese Studies in Kyoto Japan, said Mongoloid features are an adaption to the cold of the Mammoth Steppe. He mentions the Lewis waves of warm blood cyclical vasodilation and vasoconstriction of the peripheral capillaries in Mongoloids as an adaption to the cold. He lists the short limbs, short noses, flat faces, epicanthic fold and lower surface to mass ratio as further Mongoloid adaptions to cold.

Takasaki Yuji (Japanese:高崎裕治) of Akita University, Japan, in the Journal of Physiological Anthropology and Applied Human Science said, "Mongoloid ancestors had evolved over time in cold environments" and the short limbs of the Mongoloid was due to Allen's ecological rule.

Professor of anthropology at Trent University Ontario, Canada, Joseph K. So (Chinese: 蘇) (198) cited a study by J. T. Steegman (1965) that the so-called cold-adapted Mongoloid face has been shown in an experiment, using Japanese and European subjects, to not offer greater protection to frostbite. In explaining Mongoloid cold-adaptiveness, So (蘇) cites the work of W. L. Hylander (1977) where Hylander said that in the Eskimo, for example, the reduction of the brow ridge and flatness of the face is due to internal structural configurations that are cold adapted in the sense that they produce a large vertical bite force necessary to chew frozen seal meat.

Miquel Hernández of the Department of Animal Biology at the University of Barcelona said the high and narrow nose of Eskimos and Neanderthals is an adaption to a cold and dry environment, since it contributes to warming and moisturizing the air and the "recovery of heat and moisture from expired air".

A.T. Steegman of the Department of Anthropology at State University of New York investigated the assumption that Allen's rule caused the structural configuration of the Arctic Mongoloid face. Steegman did an experiment that involved the survival of rats in the cold. Steegman found the rats with narrow nasal passages, broader faces, shorter tails and shorter legs survived the best in the cold. Steegman paralleled his findings with the Arctic Mongoloids, particularly the Eskimo and Aleut, by claiming these Arctic Mongoloids have similar features in accordance with Allen's rule: a narrow nasal passage, relatively large heads, long to round heads, large jaws, relatively large bodies, and short limbs.

Kenneth L. Beals of the Department of Anthropology at Oregon State University noted that the indigenous people of the Americas have cephalic indexes that are an exception to Allen's rule, since the indigenous people of the hot climates of North and South America have cold-adapted, high cephalic indexes. Beals explanation is that these peoples have not yet evolved the appropriate cephalic index for their climate, being, comparatively, only recently descended from the cold-adapted Arctic Mongoloid.