The non-equilibrium nature of culinary evolution

Food is an essential part of civilization, with a scope that ranges from the biological to the economic and cultural levels. Here, we study the statistics of ingredients and recipes taken from Brazilian, British, French and Medieval cookery books. We find universal distributions with scale invariant behaviour. We propose a copy-mutate process to model culinary evolution that fits our empirical data very well. We find a cultural 'founder effect' produced by the non-equilibrium dynamics of the model. Both the invariant and idiosyncratic aspects of culture are accounted for by our model, which may have applications in other kinds of evolutionary processes.

A new fossil Adamussium (Bivalvia: Pectinidae) from Antarctica

Adamussium Jonkersi sp nov is described from the Late Oligocene Destruction Bay Formation Wrona Buttress area King George Island (South Shetlands) West Antarctica The unit characterized by volcanic sandstone is a shallow marine( succession deposited in a moderate- to high-energy environment The thin shelled pectinids collected from the lower part of the unit are preserved mostly as complete valves Shell thickness sculpture pattern and umbonal angle suggest a free-living inactive swimming life habit

Listening to the Whispers of Matter Through Arabic Hermeticism: New Studies on the Book of the Treasure of Alexander

The Jabirian Corpus refers to the K. Thahirat Al-`Iskandar, ""The Book of the Treasure of Alexander"" (hereafter BTA), as one of several forgeries suggesting that alchemical secrets were hidden in inscriptions in various places. The book was neglected until 1926, when Julius Ruska discussed it in his work on the Emerald Tablet, placing the BTA within the literature related to the development of Arabic alchemy. His preliminary study became an essential reference and encouraged many scholars to work on the BTA in the following decades. Some years ago, we completed the first translation of the BTA into a Western language. The work was based on the acephalous Escorial manuscript, which we identified as a fourteenth-century copy of the BTA. This manuscript is peculiar, as part of it is encoded. After finishing our translation, we started to establish the text of the BTA. At present, the text is in process of fixation-to be followed by textual criticism-and has been the main focus of a thorough study of ours on medieval hermeticism and alchemy. A sample of the work currently in progress is presented in this paper: an analysis of the variations between different manuscripts along with a study and English translation of its alchemical chapter.

Effect of different surface treatments on the repair bond strength of indirect composites

Purpose: To evaluate the tensile bond strength of indirect composites repaired with different surface treatments and direct composites. Methods: 180 specimens were prepared with Targis, belleGlass HP and Sculpture indirect composites, light-activated and post-cured according to the manufacturers` recommendations. The specimens were stored in distilled water for 24 hours at 37 degrees C. The bonding surfaces were prepared with air abrasion, hydrofluoric acid or hydrofluoric acid followed by a neutralizing solution. All the treated surfaces were subject to the application of a silane and a bonding agent before the repair procedures with Tetric Ceram and Tetric Flow for the Targis specimens, Herculite XRV and Revolution for the belleGlass HP specimens and Sculp-It and Flow-It for Sculpture specimens. The tensile bond strength tests were carried out using a universal testing machine at cross-head speed of 0.5 mm/minute. The type of fracture was observed under a light microscope at x40 magnification. Data were analyzed by a two-way ANOVA and Tukey`s post-hoc tests (P<0.05). Results: Targis showed a statistically higher repair bond strength than belleGlass HP and Sculpture, which were not significantly different from each other. Air abrasion increased the repair bond strength of belleGlass HP and Sculpture. For Targis, all the surface treatments resulted in similar repair bond strength. The different viscosity of repair composites did not affect the repair of indirect composites. Fractured surfaces showed mostly adhesive failures, mainly with hydrofluoric acid treatment.