Yum seaweed!

[wet]

Gut Bacteria Give Super Seaweed-Digestion Power to Japanese | Wired Science | Wired.com

Natural selection for seaweed consumption, bacterial digestive enzymes in gut of Japanese people (Ama algae divers) allow more efficient use of seaweed. This may have been selected for more strongly in the past, before fire for cooking. (Ancient chewed wads of seaweed were found in Monte Verde site of Chile 12,000(?) years ago, assumed to have been used for medicine or like chewing gum.)

 

[wet]

Good article by Ed Yong at Discover magazine on it:
Gut bacteria in Japanese people borrowed sushi-digesting genes from ocean bacteria | Not Exactly Rocket Science | Discover Magazine

Interesting that many folks from Japan (including even babies not yet weaned) can digest seaweed via microbial enzymes but not milk because they lack lactase enzyme, while folks from Missouri have just the opposite condition.