There has been a long-standing interest in the interactions of cultural, physiological, and genetic adaptations in relation to food systems and nutritional patterns.
One type of research that falls within this general category includes studies of behavioral adaptations that permit people to create and sustain diets that, over the long run, would be untenable biologically without such adaptations.
For example, in Central America, ancient cultures developed the technique of soaking maize kernels in an alkaline solution, which improves its amino acid composition and the bioavailability of the B vitamin, niacin. - Without these improvements, a population that subsisted on maize as its primary staple food would be at risk of serious malnutrition