Most dental microwear texture studies to date have focused on enamel surfaces. However,
for xenarthran microwear we must, in effect,“reinvent the wheel,” because adult xenarthrans
lack enamel. Dentin is softer than enamel and may record microwear differently. Thus, we
aim to determine if dental microwear texture analysis (DMTA, which quantifies microwear in
3 dimensions) of dentin can yield biologically meaningful results by asking: do dentin and
enamel in other eutherians record microwear texture the same way; and can DMTA …