Question: how have our kidneys changed over time due to our diet throught our stage of evolution

Keith Siew answered on 17 Jun 2013:

It would depend on what period of time we’re talking about… as evolution doesn’t usually happen that fast… and the diet of humankind has probably only radically changed in the last couple of centuries with the increase of our populations, farming and hunting skills.

I would say that there has been no large “evolutionary” change to speak of and if you looked at the kidneys of our ancestors a say someone a couple of thousand years ago you would be unlikely to find much difference… the only thing I would be inclined to believe is that our kidneys are subject to higher amounts of stress and higher degrees of toxicity than our ancestors may have been exposed to… so our kidneys throughout our lives may not be as healthy as our ancestors would have been at the same stage of their lives… but that’s more down to environment than genetics!