Wrinkled Fingers Get Better Grip on Wet Objects

The prunelike wrinkles that result from a long, hot bath may have an evolutionary purpose, researchers say.

Writing in the journal Biology Letters, the scientists report that wrinkled fingers and toes allow a better grip on wet objects — so they may have evolved to give early humans an advantage in wet conditions.

“People are about 12 percent quicker” at moving wet objects, said an author of the study, Tom Smulders, an evolutionary biologist at Newcastle University in England, “if their fingers are wrinkled than if their fingers are non-wrinkled.”

He and his colleagues tested how quickly wrinkled and unwrinkled fingers could move wet and dry marbles. All the participants in the study were able to transfer dry [...]

Full article at nytimes.com

 

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