This is Scientific Americans 60 Second Science.

I'm Karen Hopkins.

Neanderthal walks into a bar.

Bartender says why the long forward projecting face?

Well, according to a new study, it helped the Neanderthal air condition,

the large volumes of oxygen he inhale to support his active lifestyle.

The work appears in the proceedings of the Royal Society B. The bartender appears in many, many jokes.

Neanderthals had a distinct facial appearance, heavy brows, big noses, and a protruding upper jaw.

And scientists have long wondered why that configuration.

With the far heads it appears, they inherited from their ancestors.

But the jutting mid-face was an evolutionary innovation all their own.

Some scientists say it's so they could use those prominent front teeth for some serious chomping.

Others say it gave their nasal passages the right size and shape to warm and moisten the cold, dry ice age air.

To put the theories to the test, researchers constructed a set of 3D simulations of the skulls of various humans. a

newandrut of the skulls of various humans.

They included a Neanderthal

and an earlier Homo Heidelbergenses,

as well as a handful of more modern noggins,

males and females from Europe and Asia and an Arctic Inuit.

And they digitally crash tested the faces to see how they responded to the loads imposed by

heavy biting. Seems the protruding chompers of the Neanderthal were not particularly

well suited to forceful mastication. Some of the modern humans seem to be more efficient when it comes

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