Neanderthals did not brush their teeth....

FOSSILS. In a recent publication from PNAS, a group of researchers found important information from microfossils in dental calculus of neanderthal skeletons from Shanidar Cave (Iraq) and Spy Cave (Belgium). The microfossil analysis showed that neanderthals (in those regions) made use of the diverse plants foods and transformed them into more easily digestible food in part through cooking them. Previous studies in Amud Cave and Kebara Cave also showed that vegetal food was also present in neanderthal diet. Maybe, one of the most interesting aspect of this recent report is the use of fire to cook their food. The authors of this article conclude that "Overall, these data suggest that Neanderthals were capable of complex food-gathering behaviors that included both hunting large game animals and the harvesting and processing of plant foods".
After reviewing another recent article published on PLoS One, where the authors concluded "Results indicate that either Neanderthals and Modern humans did not influence fire regime or that, if they did, their respective influence was comparable at a regional scale, and not as pronounced as that observed in the biomass burning history of Southeast Asia" it seems that not all archaic populations exploited their environment in the same way.