Historical data reveal power-law dispersal patterns of invasive aquatic species

Understanding how invasive species spread is of particular concern in the current era of globalisation and rapid environmental change. The occurrence of super-diffusive movements within the context of Lévy flights has been discussed with respect to particle physics, human movements, microzooplankton, disease spread in global epidemiology and animal foraging behaviour. Super-diffusive movements provide a theoretical explanation for the rapid spread of organisms and disease, but their applicability to empirical data on the historic spread of organisms has rarely been tested. This study focuses on the role of long-distance dispersal in the invasion dynamics of aquatic invasive species across three contrasting areas and spatial scales: open ocean (north-east Atlantic), enclosed sea (Mediterranean) and an island environment (Ireland). Study species included five freshwater plant species, Azolla filiculoides, Elodea canadensis, Lagarosiphon major, Elodea nuttallii and Lemna minuta; and ten species of marine algae, Asparagopsis armata, Antithamnionella elegans, Antithamnionella ternifolia, Codium fragile, Colpomenia peregrina, Caulerpa taxifolia, Dasysiphonia sp., Sargassum muticum, Undaria pinnatifida and Womersleyella setacea. A simulation model is constructed to show the validity of using historical data to reconstruct dispersal kernels. Lévy movement patterns similar to those previously observed in humans and wild animals are evident in the re-constructed dispersal pattern of invasive aquatic species. Such patterns may be widespread among invasive species and could be exacerbated by further development of trade networks, human travel and environmental change. These findings have implications for our ability to predict and manage future invasions, and improve our understanding of the potential for spread of organisms including infectious diseases, plant pests and genetically modified organisms.

"...and they won land among the Picts by friendly treaty or the sword": How a re-examination of early historical sources and an analysis of early medieval settlement in north Co. Antrim confirms the validity of traditional accounts of Dál Riatic migration to Scotland from Ulster

Much recent scholarship has been critical of the concept of a Dál Riatic migration to, or colonisation of, Argyll. Scepticism of the accuracy of the early medieval accounts of this population movement, arguing that these are late amendments to early sources, coupled with an apparent lack of archaeological evidence for such a migration have led to its rejection. It is argued here, however, that this rejection has been based on too narrow a reading of historical sources and that there are several early accounts which, while differing in detail, agree on one point of substance, that the origin of Scottish Dál Riata lies in Ireland. Also, the use of archaeological evidence to suggest no migration to Argyll by the Dál Riata is flawed, misunderstanding the nature of early migrations and how they might be archaeologically identified, and it's proposed that there is actually quite a lot of evidence for migration to Argyll by the Dál Riata, in the form of settlement and artefactural evidence, but that it is to be found in Ireland through the mechanism of counterstream migration, rather than in Scotland.

The anticipatory space of the bunker, modernity’s dark mirror

The buried and semi-buried bunker, bulwark since the early eighteenth century against increasingly sophisticated forms of ordnance, emerged in increasing number in Europe throughout the twentieth century across a series of scales from the household Anderson shelter to the vast infrastructural works of the Maginot and Siegfried lines, or the Atlantic Wall. Its latest proliferation took place during the Cold War. From these perspectives, it is as emblematic of modernity as the department store, the great exhibition, the skyscraper or the machine-inspired domestic space advocated by Le Corbusier. It also represents the obverse, or perhaps a parodic iteration, of the preoccupations of early architectural modernism: a vast underground international style, cast in millions of tons of thick, reinforced concrete retaining walls, whose spatial relationship to the landscape above was strictly mediated through the periscope, the loop-hole, the range finder and the strategic necessity to both resist and facilitate the technologies and scopic regimes of weaponry. Embarking from Bunker Archaeology, this paper critically uncoils Paul Virillo’s observation, that once physically eclipsed in its topographical and technical settings, the bunker’s efficacy would mutate to other domains, retaining and remaking its meaning in another topology during the Cold War. ‘The essence of the new fortress’ he writes ‘is elsewhere, underfoot, invisible from here on in’. Shaped by this impulse, this paper seeks to render visible the bunker’s significance in a wider milieu and, in doing so, excavate some of the relationships between the physical artefact, its implications and its enduring metaphorical and perceptual ghosts.

Financial reintegration assistance for veterans of the Irish revolution (1916-23): post-conflict policy in an historical setting

In the aftermath of the Irish revolution and Civil War the governments of independent Ireland introduced various compensation schemes to provide financial reintegration assistance to revolutionary veterans. This would be recognised today as part of a programme for DDR. This paper will examine various service and disability pensions paid to veterans in the context of literature on post-conflict reintegration. It will examine various challenges to reintegration in an effort to analyse the success of revolutionary compensation as a post-conflict reintegration mechanism in independent Ireland after 1922.

From the past to the Future: integrating archaeology and conflict resolution in Northern Ireland

Contested understandings about the past continue to reify the divided character of post-Troubles Northern Ireland. In particular, the unresolved legacies of the extension of English control over Ireland in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries through warfare and plantation continue to structure daily lives in the province. Yet the archaeological record of this period complicates the accepted dichotomous narratives through highlighting complexity. These nuances, however, have been lost in recent decades as an overly simplistic model of colonizer versus colonized has emerged as the dominant political paradigm. The management and presentation of sites associated with the process of plantation can arguably create the space necessary to bridge the divide, and to challenge accepted understandings. Cross-community engagement in the process of archaeological discovery and interpretation on plantation-period sites in Northern Ireland highlights the critical role archaeology can play in peace and reconciliation in post-conflict societies.

Living in the Landscape: Essays in Honour of Graeme Barker

This edited volume reflects on the multitude of ways by which humans shape and are shaped by the natural world, and how Archaeology and its cognate disciplines recover this relationship. The structure and content of the book recognize Graeme Barker’s pioneering contribution to the scientific study of human-environment interaction, and form a secondary dialectic between his many colleagues and past students and the academic vista which he has helped define. The volume comprises 22 thematic papers, arranged chronologically, each a presentation of front-line research in their respective fields. They mirror the scope of Barker’s legacy through a focus on transitions in the human-environment relationship, how they are enacted and perceived. The assembled chapters illustrate how climate, demographic, subsistence, social and ecological change have affected cultures from the Palaeolithic to Historical, from North Africa and West-Central Eurasia to Southeast Asia and China. They also chronicle the innovations and renegotiated relations that communities have devised to meet and exploit the many shifting realities involved with Living in the Landscape.

Special condition wind power forecasting based on Gaussian process and similar historical data

Due to the variability of wind power, it is imperative to accurately and timely forecast the wind generation to enhance the flexibility and reliability of the operation and control of real-time power. Special events such as ramps, spikes are hard to predict with traditional methods using solely recently measured data. In this paper, a new Gaussian Process model with hybrid training data taken from both the local time and historic dataset is proposed and applied to make short-term predictions from 10 minutes to one hour ahead. A key idea is that the similar pattern data in history are properly selected and embedded in Gaussian Process model to make predictions. The results of the proposed algorithms are compared to those of standard Gaussian Process model and the persistence model. It is shown that the proposed method not only reduces magnitude error but also phase error.

The Historical Use of Amnesties, Immunities, and Sentence Reductions in Northern Ireland

While it is widely believed that the use of amnesties and similar measures would mark a new departure in NI and the UK, so that speculation about their introduction causes public controversy and threatens political instability, the report demonstrates that such measures have in fact been repeatedly used in a wide range of circumstances since the foundation of the NI state. The paper offers definitions of the key measures which have been employed, including amnesties, sentence reductions linked to peace building and use immunities. It explores their historical use and its consequences.