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Millet noodles in Late Neolithic China

Article in Nature · November 2005

DOI: 10.1038/437967a · Source: PubMed

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Vol 437|13 October 2005

BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS
Millet noodles in Late Neolithic China
A remarkable find allows the reconstruction of the earliest recorded preparation of noodles.

Noodles have been a popular staple food in

many parts of the world for at least 2,000 a b
years1, although it is debatable whether the
Chinese, the Italians or the Arabs invented
them first. Here we analyse a prehistoric sam-
ple of noodles contained in a well preserved,
sealed earthenware bowl discovered in the
Late Neolithic2–4 archaeological site of Lajia in
northwestern China. We identify millet as the
source of the abundant seed-husk phytoliths
and starch grains present in the vessel. This
c
shows that the conversion of ground millet
flour into dough that could be repeatedly
stretched into long, thin strands for the prepa- d
ration of boiled noodles was already estab-
lished in this region 4,000 years ago.
The Lajia archaeological site (35° 49
40 N,
102° 51
15 E) is located on a terrace on the
upper reaches of the Yellow River in north-
western China, and has been excavated since
1999 (refs 2, 3). The Neolithic cultural settle- Figure 1 | Late Neolithic noodles from China. a, Noodles dating to 4,000 years ago, shown here on top
ment2 containing the prehistoric bowl of of an in-filled sediment cone and revealed after the inverted earthenware bowl containing them was
noodles was found beneath a floodplain sedi- removed. Scale bar, 1 cm. b, Dendriform-1 husk phytoliths (left) from the noodle sample compared
ment layer that was about 3 metres thick. with husks from the modern millet Panicum miliaceum (right). c, Dendriform-2 husk phytoliths
from the noodles (left) compared with husks from the modern millet Setaria italica (right); the
Radiocarbon (14C) measurements date its
dendriform-2 type mostly occurred at the lemma end of S. italica. d, Polarized-light (left) and
occupation to around 4,000 yr BP (ref. 4) (see light micrographs (right) of starch grains from the prehistoric noodles. Although the lamellae
supplementary information). A very large characteristics of noodle starch were mostly lost as a result of gelatinization during cooking, their size
earthquake and catastrophic flooding proba- and cross-shaped birefringence under polarized light are similar to those of starch from the millets
bly destroyed the Lajia settlement at about S. italica and P. miliaceum. Scale bar, 20 m for b, c, and d.
this time3.
The bowl was found upside-down and tigations revealed that the genera Hordeum noodles, which are generally made from
embedded in brownish-yellow, fine clay. (barley), Triticum (wheat), Panicum (broom durum wheat (tetraploid) and bread wheat
When we lifted off the bowl, the remains of the corn millet) and Setaria (foxtail millet) were (hexaploid), respectively, the prehistoric noo-
noodles were found inside, on top of the cone distinguishable from other grasses native to dles show no evidence that wheat, barley or
of sediment that had filled the inverted earthen- the study region by their phytolith patterning other non-grass plants were used to supply
ware container (Fig. 1a). The noodles were and by the morphology and size of their their ingredients. Our findings support the
thin (about 0.3 cm in diameter), delicate, more starch grains. belief that early plant domestication and food
than 50 cm in length and yellow in colour. We examined six phytolith samples from production relied on millet crops10–12 in the
They resemble the La-Mian noodle, a tradi- the sediment that had filled the bowl, and used semi-arid Loess Plateau region of China.
tional Chinese noodle that is made by repeat- them to diagnose their plant of origin. Three Houyuan Lu*†, Xiaoyan Yang*, Maolin Ye‡,
edly pulling and stretching the dough by hand. samples from the noodle layer near the bottom Kam-Biu Liu§, Zhengkai Xia¶, Xiaoyan Ren#,
To determine the taxa of the cereals present of the bowl contained abundant husk phyto- Linhai Cai#, Naiqin Wu*, Tung-Sheng Liu*
at the site at the time, and to establish which liths of the types known as dendriform-1 *Institute of Geology and Geophysics, Chinese
might have been used for the fine flour needed (Fig. 1b) and dendriform-2 (Fig. 1c) at con- Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100029, China
for noodle preparation, we analysed the phyto- centrations of 9.81104 and 4.36104 grains e-mail: houyuanlu@mail.iggcas.ac.cn
liths and starch grains present in the sediment per gram, respectively. Their shape and pat- †Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese
associated with the noodles. Assignment of terning allowed us to diagnose them as millets, Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China
phytolith morphotypes and starch grains to and they were identified as belonging to Pan- ‡Institute of Archaeology, Chinese Academy of
plant taxa was based on our modern reference icum miliaceum and Setaria italica, respec- Social Sciences, Beijing 100710, China
collection of more than 85 grasses, commercial tively (see supplementary information). The §Department of Geography and Anthropology,
plants and weeds native to the study region. In starch grains found in the noodle sample Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana
addition, we used published keys of phytoliths (Fig. 1d) closely resemble those of millets, 70803, USA
and starch grains to aid identification5–9. based on our comparison with modern refer- ¶College of Environmental Science, Peking
We paid particular attention to plant taxa ence samples from different cereal grains. University, Beijing 100871, China
cultivated in northwest China10–12. Our inves- Unlike modern Italian pasta and Asian #Qinghai Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics
967
©2005 Nature Publishing Group
BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS NATURE|Vol 437|13 October 2005

and Archaeology, Sining 810007, China 8. Piperno, D. R., Weiss, E., Holst, I. & Nadel, D. Nature 430, operated at 1 mA and 1.5 GHz for 40 h without
670–673 (2004). degradation or a decrease in current output
1. Hou, G. Adv. Food Nutr. Res. 43, 143–193 (2001). 9. Fujita, S., Sugimoto, Y., Yamashita Y. & Fuwa, H. Food Chem. (within the measurement error of 5%). With
2. Institute of Archaeology, Chinese Academy of Social 55, 209–213 (1996).
Sciences & Qinghai Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics 10. Shelach, G. J. World Prehist. 14, 363–413 (2000).
an applied radiofrequency electric field of
and Archaeology Archaeology 12, 12–25 (2002). 11. Institute of Archaeology, Chinese Academy of Social 29 megavolts per metre, the output at the
3. Yang, X. Y., Xia, Z. K. & Yi, M. L. Chinese Sci. Bull. 48, Sciences & Qinghai Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics anode reaches 3.2 mA, with an average current
1877–1881 (2003). and Archaeology Archaeol. Cult. Relics 2, 85–91 (2004). density of 1.3 A cm2 (Fig. 1d). This corre-
4. Institute of Archaeology Archaeology 12, 58–76 (2003). 12. Ren, S. N. Archaeology 1, 37–49 (1995). sponds to a peak current of 30 mA and a
5. Ball, T. B., Gardner, J. S. & Anderson, N. Am. J. Bot. 86,
current density of 12 A cm2 in the output
1615–1623 (1999). Supplementary information accompanies this
6. Pearsall, D. M. Paleoethnobotany: A Handbook of Procedures communication on Nature’s website. waveform (see supplementary information).
2nd edn (Academic, San Diego, 2000). Competing financial interests: declared none. The ability directly to generate or modulate
7. Lu, H. Y. & Liu, K. B. Div. Distrib. 9, 73–87 (2003). doi:10.1038/437967a an electron beam at high current density and
gigahertz frequencies from carbon nanotubes
is an important technological advance.
Thermionic sources used in today’s
MICROWAVE DEVICES microwave devices are operated by direct cur-
rent or at low frequency; their electron beam
Carbon nanotubes as cold cathodes is usually modulated downstream in an
extended interaction line, leading to physically
long devices. In contrast, carbon-nanotube
To communicate, spacecraft and satellites Because it weighs little, responds instanta- cold cathodes that have a vacuum gap to a
rely on microwave devices, which at present neously and has no need of heating, this stand-off grid or anode of a few hundred
are based on relatively inefficient thermionic miniaturized electron source should prove micrometres or less, as we describe here, have
electron sources that require heating and valuable for microwave devices used in low capacitances and can be operated at very
cannot be switched on instantaneously. Here telecommunications. high frequencies (for example, 32-GHz mod-
we describe a microwave diode that uses a We constructed a microwave diode in ulation of carbon-nanotube emitters has been
cold-cathode electron source consisting of which the carbon-nanotube field-emission achieved from a microwave diode and triode;
carbon nanotubes1 and that operates at high source was directly driven at gigahertz (GHz) L.H. et al., manuscript in preparation). They
frequency and at high current densities. frequencies. Arrays of vertically aligned car- can therefore be used directly as the input
bon nanotubes were integrated on stage of a microwave amplifier.
a 13.00 c a coaxial post in a resonant cavity. Carbon-nanotube emitters are robust and
I A In the device simulation shown in do not suffer from electromigration because of
8.00
6.00 Fig. 1a, radiofrequency electro- their strong C–C covalent bonding. Metal
y
E
magnetic radiation at the input emitters, on the other hand, often fail owing
4.00
CN
induces a high, oscillating electric to field-induced sharpening, which leads to
z x 2.00 field at the end of the coaxial post; thermal runaway of the emitters.
0.50 this electric field is further ampli- Our carbon-nanotube cathode already
0.05 fied by the carbon-nanotube array delivers average- and peak-current densities
d (for details, see supplementary that are similar to those used in present-day
Average current density (A cm–2)

0.00
100 information). microwave transmission devices. Because of
b 10–1 The carbon-nanotube array their small size, and ability to generate and
10 –2 (Fig. 1b) consists of uniform indi- modulate the beam directly and on demand
vidual carbon nanotubes2 spaced without the need for high temperatures, car-
10–3 at a distance corresponding to bon-nanotube cathodes hold promise for a
10–4 roughly twice their height in new generation of lightweight, efficient and
10–5
order to minimize electrostatic- compact microwave devices for telecommuni-
field shielding from adjacent cations in satellites or spacecraft.
10–6 emitters3. Each cathode has an Kenneth B. K. Teo*, Eric Minoux†,
10 15 20 25 30
Radiofrequency electric active area of 0.50.5 mm2 (or Ludovic Hudanski‡, Franck Peauger‡,
field (MV m–1)
2,500 carbon nanotubes) and 16 Jean-Philippe Schnell†, Laurent Gangloff*,
cathodes can be created simulta- Pierre Legagneux†, Dominique Dieumegard‡,
Figure 1 | Features of the carbon-nanotube microwave diode.
neously (Fig. 1b, inset). Gehan A. J. Amaratunga*, William I. Milne*
a, Simulation of the coaxial resonant cavity (a cross-section is
shown) that was used to generate a high electric field (red) at
The device was operated at *Department of Engineering, University of
the carbon-nanotube-array cathode from the radiofrequency 1.5 GHz using various radio- Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 1PZ, UK
input; colour scale shows the applied macroscopic electric frequency-input powers to gener- e-mail: wim@eng.cam.ac.uk
field in volts (105) per metre. White arrow, coaxial ate different macroscopic electric †Thales Research and Technology, RD 128, 91767
radiofrequency input; black arrow, emitted electron beam, fields at the array of carbon-nano- Palaiseau Cedex, France
collected by an antenna; scale bar 10 mm. b, Electron tube emitters. As the cavity walls ‡Thales Electron Devices, BP 23, 78141 Vélizy-
micrograph of the carbon-nanotube-array cold cathode at a and emitters are grounded, the Villacoublay, France
tilt of 45. The carbon nanotubes have an average diameter radiofrequency electric field exists
of 49 nm, height of 5.5 µm and a spacing of 10 m; scale bar, only inside the cavity, as shown in 1. de Jonge, N. & Bonard, J. M. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. A 362,
15 m. Inset, photograph of 16 cathodes. c, Representation of 2239–2266 (2004).
the equivalent electrical circuit 2. Teo, K. B. K. et al. Nanotechnology 14, 204–211 (2003).
the equivalent electrical circuit, where E is the applied electric
field and I is the emitted current; CN, carbon nanotube array. in Fig. 1c. A spectrum analyser 3. Nilsson, L. et al. Appl. Phys. Lett. 76, 2071–2073 (2000).
d, Measured average current density plotted against applied connected to the output antenna
Supplementary information accompanies this
radiofrequency electric field using 1.5-GHz sinusoidal input. confirmed the presence of the fun- communication on Nature’s website
The circled point corresponds to I3.2 mA. The cavity-quality damental 1.5-GHz peak in the Competing financial interests: declared none.
factor was 3,160 (see supplementary information). cavity. In this study, cathodes were doi:10.1038/437968a

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