Transgenerational, dynamic methylation of stomata genes in response to low relative humidity

Transgenerational inheritance of abiotic stress-induced epigenetic modifications in plants has potential adaptive significance and might condition the offspring to improve the response to the same stress, but this is at least partly dependent on the potency, penetrance and persistence of the transmitted epigenetic marks. We examined transgenerational inheritance of low Relative Humidity-induced DNA methylation for two gene loci in the stomatal developmental pathway in Arabidopsis thaliana and the abundance of associated short-interfering RNAs (siRNAs). Heritability of low humidity-induced methylation was more predictable and penetrative at one locus (SPEECHLESS, entropy ≤ 0.02; χ2 < 0.001) than the other (FAMA, entropy ≤ 0.17; χ2 ns). Methylation at SPEECHLESS correlated positively with the continued presence of local siRNAs (r2 = 0.87; p = 0.013) which, however, could be disrupted globally in the progeny under repeated stress. Transgenerational methylation and a parental low humidity-induced stomatal phenotype were heritable, but this was reversed in the progeny under repeated treatment in a previously unsuspected manner.

Care in the community? Interpretations of a fractured goat bone from Neolithic Jarmo, Iraq

A case study of a goat metatarsal exhibiting a complex diaphyseal fracture from Pottery Neolithic Jarmo in the Central Zagros region of the eastern Fertile Crescent is here described and analysed. The Central Zagros is one of the areas with the earliest evidence for goat domestication. The significance of the pathology may be viewed within the context of domestic goat ecology in the landscape of Jarmo, potentially impacting browsing behaviour (goats raise themselves on their hind limbs to browse) and movement with the herd in the landscape (the terrain around Jarmo is very steep in places, which would be difficult for an animal to navigate on three legs). In the light of this, possible levels of care that the Neolithic human community may have afforded this animal are discussed – from a situation where therapeutic intervention may have occurred, to one of stall confinement of the animal to allow the pathology to heal, to a position of simple awareness of the condition – and how this impacts on our understanding of changes in attitudes towards animals through the process of domestication.

Shops, stalls, stores: pre-consumption deposits and centrally organised distribution in Antonine Britain

Michael Fulford writes: Recent research is shedding more light on how certain goods, particularly durable materials like pottery, were distributed in the Western provinces of the Roman Empire and on the steps which connected producer with consumer.15 This paper develops the theme further by exploring the contribution to the debate of three British sites with Antonine assemblages of unused pottery and other goods. While interest has previously focused on the samian because of the contribution that it can make to dating, this paper considers the implications of the assemblages as a whole.

Object-love at the Science Museum: cultural geographies of museum storerooms

The field of museum geography is taking on new significance as geographers and museum-studies scholars make sense of the spatial relations between the people, things, practices and buildings that make and remake museums. In order to strengthen this spatial interest in museums, this paper makes important connections between recent work in cultural geography and museum studies on love, materiality and the museum effect. This paper marks a departure from the preoccupation with the public spaces of museums to go behind the scenes of the Science Museum in London to explore its rarely visited, but nonetheless lively, small-to-medium-sized object storerooms at Blythe House. Incorporating field diary entries and interview extracts from two research projects based upon the museum storerooms at Blythe House, this paper brings to life the social interactions that take place between museum curators and conservators and the objects they care for. This focus on object-love enables scholars to consider anew what museums are and what they are for, the life of the museum object in the storeroom, and the emotional practices of professional curatorship and conservation. This journey into the storeroom at Blythe House makes explicit how object-love shapes museum space.

Vegetation and environmental changes in Northern Anatolia between 134 and 119ka recorded in Black Sea sediments

This multiproxy study on SE Black Sea sediments provides the first detailed reconstruction of vegetation and environmental history of Northern Anatolia between 134 and 119 ka. Here, the glacial–interglacial transition is characterized by several short-lived alternating cold and warm events preceding a meltwater pulse (~ 130.4–131.7 ka). The latter is reconstructed as a cold arid period correlated to Heinrich event 11. The initial warming is evidenced at ~ 130.4 ka by increased primary productivity in the Black Sea, disappearance of ice-rafted detritus, and spreading of oaks in Anatolia. A Younger Dryas-type event is not identifiable. The Eemian vegetation succession corresponds to the main climatic phases in Europe: i) the Quercus–Juniperus phase (128.7–126.4 ka) indicates a dry continental climate; ii) the Ostrya–Corylus–Quercus–Carpinus phase (126.4–122.9 ka) suggests warm summers, mild winters, and high year-round precipitation; iii) the Fagus–Carpinus phase (122.9–119.5 ka) indicates cooling and high precipitation; and iv) increasing Pinus at ~ 121 ka marks the onset of cooler/drier conditions. Generally, pollen reconstructions suggest altitudinal/latitudinal migrations of vegetation belts in Northern Anatolia during the Eemian caused by increased transport of moisture. The evidence for the wide distribution of Fagus around the Black Sea contrasts with the European records and is likely related to climatic and genetic factors

Building WF16: construction of a PPNA pisé structure in Southern Jordan

The Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA) period in Southwest Asia is essential for our understanding of the transition to sedentary, agricultural communities. Developments in architecture are key to understanding this transition, but many aspects of PPNA architecture remain elusive, such as construction techniques, the selection of building materials, and the functional use of space. The primary aim of the research described within this contribution was to build a PPNA-like structure in order to answer questions about PPNA architecture in general, while specifically addressing issues raised by the excavation of structures at the site of WF16, Southern Jordan. The second aim was to display a ‘PPNA’ building to visitors in Wadi Faynan to enhance their understanding of the period. The experimental construction based on one of the WF16 structures showed that 1) required materials can be acquired locally; 2) a construction technique using mud layers as described in this paper was likely used; 3) flat, or very slightly dome-shaped, roofs are functional and can also be used as a solid working platform; 4) the WF16 small semi-subterranean buildings appear inappropriate for housing a nuclear family unit.

Glastonbury Abbey: archaeological investigations 1904-79

This volume reports on the results of the Glastonbury Abbey Archaeological Archive Project, a collaboration between the University of Reading and the Trustees of Glastonbury Abbey, funded principally by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. The project has reassessed and reinterpreted all known archaeological records from the 1908–79 excavations and made the complete dataset available to the public through a digital archive hosted by the Archaeology Data Service (http://dx.doi.org/10.5284/1022585). The scope of the project has included the full analysis of the archaeological collections of Glastonbury Abbey by thirty-one leading specialists, including chemical and compositional analysis of glass and metal and petrological analysis of pottery and tile, and a comprehensive geophysical survey conducted by GSB Prospection Ltd. For the first time, it has been possible to achieve a framework of independent dating based on reassessment of the finds and radiocarbon dating of surviving organic material from the 1950s excavations. The principal aim of the Glastonbury Abbey Archaeological Project was to set aside previous assumptions based on the historical and legendary traditions and to provide a rigorous reassessment of the archive of antiquarian excavations. This research has revealed that some of the best known archaeological ‘facts’ about Glastonbury are themselves myths perpetuated by the abbey’s excavators.

Limitations to recording larger mammalian predators in savannah using camera traps and spoor

Traditionally, spoor (tracks, pug marks) have been used as a cost effective tool to assess the presence of larger mammals. Automated camera traps are now increasingly utilized to monitor wildlife, primarily as the cost has greatly declined and statistical approaches to data analysis have improved. While camera traps have become ubiquitous, we have little understanding of their effectiveness when compared to traditional approaches using spoor in the field. Here, we a) test the success of camera traps in recording a range of carnivore species against spoor; b) ask if simple measures of spoor size taken by amateur volunteers is likely to allow individual identification of leopards and c) for a trained tracker, ask if this approach may allow individual leopards to be followed with confidence in savannah habitat. We found that camera traps significantly under-recorded mammalian top and meso-carnivores, with camera traps more likely under-record the presence of smaller carnivores (civet 64%; genet 46%, Meller’s mongoose 45%) than larger (jackal sp. 30%, brown hyena 22%), while leopard was more likely to be recorded by camera trap (all recorded by camera trap only). We found that amateur trackers could be beneficial in regards to collecting presence data; however the large variance in measurements of spoor taken in the field by volunteers suggests that this approach is unlikely to add further data. Nevertheless, the use of simple spoor measurements in the field by a trained field researcher increases their ability to reliably follow a leopard trail in difficult terrain. This allows researchers to glean further data on leopard behaviour and habitat utilisation without the need for complex analysis.

Arnold v. Britton: a ratio and two sets of obiter dicta

Arnold v Britton marks the final stage of the longstanding dispute as to the correct interpretation of a number of 99-year leases of chalets on a leisure park at Oxwich, in the Gower peninsula, near Swansea. The aspect of the case which has attracted most discussion has, understandably, been its main ratio: the proper way to construe a provision of a lease which arguably has an absurd result. This will be considered in this case-note. The judgment of the Supreme Court – particularly the judgment of Lord Neuberger PSC – does, however contain some observations on the possible reform of the law on service charges which are of interest to those engaged in this field. It also contains some obiter comments on ‘letting schemes’ which are – in the view of the present author – highly unorthodox. These three rather disparate issues which are raised by this case will be considered in turn. As they have little in common with each other, they will be considered as separate sections.

War and culture studies in 2016. Putting 'translation' into the transnational?

The first issue of the 'Journal of War and Culture Studies' in 2008 mapped out the academic space which the discipline sought to occupy. Nearly a decade later, the location of war, traditionally within the nation-state, is being challenged in ways which arguably affect the analytical spaces of War and Culture Studies. The article argues for an overt engagement with a reconceptualization of the location of war as broader in both spatial and temporal terms than the nation-state. Within this framing, it identifies local 'contact zones' which are multi-vocal translational spaces, and calls for an incorporation of 'translation' into our analyses of war: translating identities, including associations of the material as well as of subjective identities, and espousing a conscious interdisciplinarity which might lead us to focus more on the performative than the representational. Putting 'translation' into the 'transnational' marks the spaces of War and culture studies as multilingual, making accessible the cultural products and cultural analyses of a much broader range of sources and reflections. The article calls for the discipline of Translation Studies to become a leading contributor to War and Culture Studies in the years to come.

A late Neoproterozoic paleomagnetic pole for the Congo craton: Tectonic setting, paleomagnetism and geochronology of the Nola dike swarm (Central African Republic)

New structural, geochronological and paleomagnetic data were obtained on dolerite dikes of the Nola region (Central African Republic) at the northern border of the Congo craton. In this region metavolcanic, successions were thrust southward onto the craton during the Panafrican orogenic events. Our structural data reveal at least two structural klippes south of the present-day limits of the Panafrican nappe suggesting that it has once covered the whole Nola region, promoting the pervasive hydrothermal green-schist metamorphism observed in the underlying cratonic basement and also in the intrusive dolerite dikes. Paleomagnetic measurements revealed a stable dual-polarity low-inclination magnetization component in nine dikes (47 samples), carried by pyrrhotite and magnetite. This component corresponds to a paleopole at 304.8 degrees E and 61.8 degrees S (dp = 5.4, dm = 10.7) graded at 2 = 6. Both metamorphism and magnetic resetting were dated by the Ar-40/Ar-39 method on amphibole grains separated from the dikes at 571 +/- 6 Ma. The Nola pole is the first well-dated paleomagnetic pole for the Congo craton between 580 and 550 Ma. It marks a sudden change in direction of the Congo craton apparent polar wander path at the waning stages of the Panafrican orogenic events. (c) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Discovery of two distinct red clumps in NGC 419: a rare snapshot of a cluster at the onset of degeneracy

Colour-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) star cluster NGC 419, derived from Hubble Space Telescope (HST)/Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) data, reveal a well-delineated secondary clump located below the classical compact red clump typical of intermediate-age populations. We demonstrate that this feature belongs to the cluster itself, rather than to the underlying SMC field. Then, we use synthetic CMDs to show that it corresponds very well to the secondary clump predicted to appear as a result of He-ignition in stars just massive enough to avoid e(-)-degeneracy settling in their H-exhausted cores. The main red clump instead is made of the slightly less massive stars which passed through e(-) degeneracy and ignited He at the tip of the red giant branch. In other words, NGC 419 is the rare snapshot of a cluster while undergoing the fast transition from classical to degenerate H-exhausted cores. At this particular moment of a cluster`s life, the colour distance between the main-sequence turn-off and the red clump(s) depends sensitively on the amount of convective core overshooting, Lambda(c). By coupling measurements of this colour separation with fits to the red clump morphology, we are able to estimate simultaneously the cluster mean age (1.35(-0.04)(+0.11) Gyr) and overshooting efficiency (Lambda(c) = 0.47(-0.04)(+0.14)). Therefore, clusters like NGC 419 may constitute important marks in the age scale of intermediate-age populations. After eye inspection of other CMDs derived from HST/ACS data, we suggest that the same secondary clump may also be present in the Large Magellanic Cloud clusters NGC 1751, 1783, 1806, 1846, 1852 and 1917.

Behavioral suites mediate group-level foraging dynamics in communities of tropical stingless bees

Competition for floral resources is a key force shaping pollinator communities, particularly among social bees. The ability of social bees to recruit nestmates for group foraging is hypothesized to be a major factor in their ability to dominate rich resources such as mass-flowering trees. We tested the role of group foraging in attaining dominance by stingless bees, eusocial tropical pollinators that exhibit high diversity in foraging strategies. We provide the first experimental evidence that meliponine group foraging strategies, large colony sizes and aggressive behavior form a suite of traits that enable colonies to improve dominance of rich resources. Using a diverse assemblage of Brazilian stingless bee species and an array of artificial ""flowers"" that provided a sucrose reward, we compared species` dominance and visitation under unrestricted foraging conditions and with experimental removal of group-foraging species. Dominance does not vary with individual body size, but rather with foraging group size. Species that recruit larger numbers of nestmates (Scaptotrigona aff. depilis, Trigona hyalinata, Trigona spinipes) dominated both numerically (high local abundance) and behaviorally (controlling feeders). Removal of group-foraging species increased feeding opportunities for solitary foragers (Frieseomelitta varia, Melipona quadrifasciata and Nannotrigona testaceicornis). Trigona hyalinata always dominated under unrestricted conditions. When this species was removed, T. spinipes or S. aff. depilis controlled feeders and limited visitation by solitary-foraging species. Because bee foraging patterns determine plant pollination success, understanding the forces that shape these patterns is crucial to ensuring pollination of both crops and natural areas in the face of current pollinator declines.