Late Holocene climatic changes in Tierra del Fuego based on multiproxy analyses of peat deposits

A ca. 1400-yr record from a raised bog in Isla Grande, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina, registers climate fluctuations, including a Medieval Warm Period, although evidence for the 'Little Ice Age' is less clear. Changes in temperature and/or precipitation were inferred from plant macrofossils, pollen, fungal spores, testate amebae, and peat humification. The chronology was established using a C-14 wiggle-matching technique that provides improved age control for at least part of the record compared to other sites. These new data are presented and compared with other lines of evidence from the Southern and Northern Hemispheres. A period of low local water tables occurred in the bog between A.D. 960-1020, which may correspond to the Medieval Warm Period date range of A.D. 950-1045 generated from Northern Hemisphere tree-ring data. A period of cooler and/or wetter conditions was detected between ca. A.D. 1030 and I 100 and a later period of cooler/wetter conditions estimated at ca. cal A.D. 1800-1930, which may correspond to a cooling episode inferred from Law Dome, Antarctica. (C) 2004 University of Washington. All rights reserved.

Nationalist Multiculturalism in Late Imperial Austria as a Critique of Contemporary Liberalism: The Case of Bauer and Renner,

This article evaluates Bauer's theory of the nation and the debateon national-cultural autonomy in late imperial Austria. It finds important similarities with contemporary liberal debates on multiculturalism and the rights of ethnic and national minorities. It argues that the debate on national-cultural autonomy went in some respects beyond the contemporary debate on multiculturalism. National-cultural autonomy rejects the idea of the nation-state and proposes instead a multi-nation-state that recognises differential rights for ethnic and national minorities. It seeks to break the limitations of liberal democracy and the territorial principle of the nation-state by organising national communities as deterritorialised national corporations, and multination-states as territorialised non-national identities.

Global Governance and International Migration: A Case Study of Trafficking of Human Beings

The purpose of this article is to explore the concept of “global governance” and the way it applies to the management of international migration by using trafficking of human beings as a case study. Globalization has altered the scene of world politics. A traditional State-centric view of the world order has been overshadowed by the increasing importance of other actors, including the United Nations, multi-national corporations and non-governmental organizations. Globalization has also altered the dynamics of rule making and their enforcement within the international system, in that not only States but also these non-State actors exercise enormous influence. The concept of global governance acknowledges this as it aims to include all the pertinent actors involved. To illustrate this further, the author will use trafficking of human beings as a case study. Two key principles of global governance are participation and accountability. This article will analyse how these principles are reflected and implemented in the regime dealing with the prevention and suppression of trafficking of human beings.

Marketing secondhand goods in late medieval England

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to identify the main practitioners, goods, customers and locations of secondhand marketing activities in late medieval England. It questions how important was the economic role played by such markets and what was the interaction with more formal market structures?

Design/methodology/approach – A broad range of evidence was examined, covering the period from 1200 to 1500: regulations, court rolls, wills, manorial accounts, literature, and even archaeology. Such material often provided mere scraps of information about marginal marketing activity and it was important to recognise the severe limitations of the evidence. Nevertheless, a wide survey of the available sources can give us an insight into medieval attitudes towards such trade, as well as reminding us that much marketing activity occurred beyond the reach of the surviving documentation.

Findings – Late medieval England had numerous outlets for secondhand items, from sellers of used clothes and furs who wandered the marketplaces to craftsmen who recycled and mended old materials. Secondhand marketing was an important part of the medieval makeshift economy, serving not only the needs of the lower sectors of society but also those aspiring to a higher status. However, it is unlikely that such trade generated much profit and the traders were often viewed as marginal, suspicious and even fraudulent.

Originality/value – There is a distinct lack of research into the extent of and significance of medieval secondhand marketing, which existed in the shadowy margins of formal markets and is thus poorly represented in the primary sources. A broad-based approach to the evidence can highlight a variety of important issues, which impact upon the understanding of the medieval English economy.

WASP-8b: a retrograde transiting planet in a multiple system

We report the discovery of WASP-8b, a transiting planet of 2.25 ± 0.08 MJup on a strongly inclined eccentric 8.15-day orbit, moving in a retrograde direction to the rotation of its late-G host star. Evidence is found that the star is in a multiple stellar system with two other companions. The dynamical complexity of the system indicates that it may have experienced secular interactions such as the Kozai mechanism or a formation that differs from the “classical” disc-migration theory.

WASP-24 b: A New Transiting Close-in Hot Jupiter Orbiting a Late F-star

We report the discovery of a new transiting close-in giant planet, WASP-24 b, in a 2.341 day orbit, 0.037 AU from its F8-9 type host star. By matching the star's spectrum with theoretical models, we infer an effective temperature T eff = 6075 ± 100 K and a surface gravity of log g = 4.15 ± 0.10. A comparison of these parameters with theoretical isochrones and evolutionary mass tracks places only weak constraints on the age of the host star, which we estimate to be 3.8+1.3 –1.2 Gyr. The planetary nature of the companion was confirmed by radial velocity measurements and additional photometric observations. These data were fit simultaneously in order to determine the most probable parameter set for the system, from which we infer a planetary mass of 1.071+0.036 –0.038 M Jup and radius 1.3+0.039 –0.037 R Jup.

Impaired Immune Tolerance to Porphyromonas gingivalis Lipopolysaccharide Promotes Neutrophil Migration and Decreased Apoptosis.

Periodontitis, a chronic inflammatory disease of the tissues supporting the teeth, is characterized by an exaggerated host immune and inflammatory response to periopathogenic bacteria. Toll-like receptor activation, cytokine network induction, and accumulation of neutrophils at the site of inflammation are important in the host defense against infection. At the same time, induction of immune tolerance and the clearance of neutrophils from the site of infection are essential in the control of the immune response, resolution of inflammation, and prevention of tissue destruction. Using a human monocytic cell line, we demonstrate that Porphyromonas gingivalis lipopolysaccharide (LPS), which is a major etiological factor in periodontal disease, induces only partial immune tolerance, with continued high production of interleukin-8 (IL-8) but diminished secretion of tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-) after repeated challenge. This cytokine response has functional consequences for other immune cells involved in the response to infection. Primary human neutrophils incubated with P. gingivalis LPS-treated naïve monocyte supernatant displayed a high migration index and increased apoptosis. In contrast, neutrophils treated with P. gingivalis LPS-tolerized monocyte supernatant showed a high migration index but significantly decreased apoptosis. Overall, these findings suggest that induction of an imbalanced immune tolerance in monocytes by P. gingivalis LPS, which favors continued secretion of IL-8 but decreased TNF- production, may be associated with enhanced migration of neutrophils to the site of infection but also with decreased apoptosis and may play a role in the chronic inflammatory state seen in periodontal disease.

An Ecological Correlation Study of Late Age-Related Macular Degeneration and the Complement Factor H Y402H Polymorphism

PURPOSE:
To investigate whether variation in the distribution of the risk allele frequency of the Y402H single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) across various ethnicities and geographic regions reflects differences in the prevalence of late age-related macular degeneration (AMD) in those ethnicities.

METHODS:
Published data were obtained via a systematic search. Study samples were grouped into clusters by ethnicity and geographic location and the Spearman correlation coefficient of the prevalence of late AMD and risk allele frequencies was calculated across clusters.

RESULTS:
Across all ethnicities, AMD prevalence was seen to increase with age. Populations of European descent had both higher risk allele frequencies and prevalence of late AMD than did Japanese, Chinese, and Hispanic descendants. Results for African descendants were anomalous: although allele frequency was similar to that in European populations, the age-specific prevalence of late AMD was considerably lower. The correlation coefficient for the association between allele frequency and AMD prevalence was 0.40 (95% confidence interval [CI] = -0.36 to 0.84, P = 0.28) in all populations combined and 0.71 (95% CI = 0.02-0.94, P = 0.04) when people of African descent were excluded.

CONCLUSIONS:
Evidence was found at the population level to support a positive association between the Y204H risk allele and the prevalence of AMD after exclusion of studies undertaken on persons of African ancestry. Data in African, Middle Eastern, and South American populations are needed to provide a better understanding of the association of late AMD genetic risk across ethnicities.

Prevalence of Early and Late Age-Related Macular Degeneration in India: The INDEYE Study

PURPOSE. To estimate the prevalence of early and late age-related macular degeneration (AMD) in India.

Association of serum AACT levels and AACT signal polymorphism with late-onset Alzheimer's disease in Northern Ireland

alpha 1-antichymotrypsin (AACT) is a serine protease inhibitor that has been associated with amyloid plaques in the brains of patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD). It has been reported that AACT serum levels are higher in AD patients than in age and sex matched controls. In addition, polymorphisms in the signal peptide and 5' of the AACT gene have been reported to increase the risk of developing AD, Serum AACT has also been suggested to be associated with cognitive decline in elderly subjects. Our objective was to investigate whether a relationship existed between serum AACT levels, AACT genotypes and risk for AD in a case control association study using 108 clinically well defined late onset AD cases and 108 age and sex matched controls from Northern Ireland. We also wished to determine whether higher serum AACT affected levels of cognition as had been previously reported. Serum AACT levels were found to bet significantly raised in cases compared to controls (t = 3.8, df = 209, p