A parasitological paradox: Why is ascarid infection so rare in the prehistoric Americas?

Ascaris lumbricoides (giant roundworm) and Trichuris trichiura (whipworm) are the most common intestinal parasites found in humans worldwide today and they almost always co-occur. However, we find two distinct patterns in archaeological material. In historical North American and Old World contexts, the association of A. lumbricoides and T. trichiura is similar to the modern epidemiological picture. In contrast, the co-occurrence of A. lumbricoides and T. trichiura eggs in prehistoric South America is rare. For prehistoric contexts, T. trichiura is the most common parasite found in archaeological material. Recently molecular biology techniques pointed to a subdiagnosis of roundworm infection in pre-Columbian South American populations. This is contrary to the modern epidemiological picture in which A. lumbricoides infection is predominant. This is a paradox, especially when one considers the number of eggs laid by female daily, 200,000 and 20,000 thousand per day, for A. lumbricoides and T. trichiura respectively. By reviewing the records of these parasites, this paradox is presented and explanations for the paradox are explored. Taphonomy, prehistoric behavior patterns and medicinal plant use seem to be most relevant to the explanation of the paradox. Nematophagous fungi is a less likely factor creating the near absence of A. lumbricoides eggs in the prehistoric New World.     

“Stuck In-Between”: Placing the Underdocumented Youth Movement in Georgia

This paper draws on participant-observation and a series of focus group interviews with TPS and DACA youth in Northeast Georgia to understand youth activism emerging from their positionality of being “stuck in-between”. “Stuck in-between” captures the liminal legal status of DACA and TPS, denotes the feeling of “stuckness” in mixed-status multigenerational families, and foregrounds the profound ways in which place and race intersect with legal, social, and ideological practices of inclusion/exclusion. Underdocumented youth form multiracial coalitions, guided by Black geographies of the region, to challenge imperial borders that criminalise and (re)produce categories of vulnerability. This place in-between shapes underdocumented youth understanding of the world, informed by, rather than in competition with, Black radical visions of themselves and of the place of the US South.     

Masonry Italian Code-Conforming Buildings. Part 2: Nonlinear Modelling and Time-History Analysis

ABSTRACT

The unreinforced masonry (URM) buildings designed to be conforming with the Italian building code, as illustrated in the companion paper, were analyzed by performing time-history analyses on models realized using an equivalent frame approach and by adopting two different constitutive laws. Both the effect of record-to-record variability and of epistemic and aleatory uncertainties in modelling were explored. The achieved results constitute the basis for the evaluation of the risk level implicit in Italian code-conforming buildings. Two main performance conditions are considered, namely usability-preventing damage and global collapse limit states.     

Elite migrations in modern Italy: patterns of settlement,integration and identity negotiation

Abstract

Francesco Crispi has often appeared a paradoxical figure. In the earlier part of his life he was a revolutionary republican and a friend of Mazzini. After 1860 he accepted the monarchy, but remained very much a man of the Left and in many ways a quintessential democrat. Yet he ended his career as an authoritarian Prime Minister, a vigorous opponent of the Far Left, and an imperialist, who prorogued parliament and contemplated dispensing with representative government altogether. This article contends that Crispi's career has more coherence than is commonly suggested; it focuses on an important but hitherto neglected aspect of his thinking, namely the problem of how to achieve a sense of national consciousness in Italy through ‘political education’. The article traces the development of the idea of national political education throughout Crispi's career and argues that his two terms as Prime Minister in 1887–91 and 1893–6 can only be fully understood in the context of his long‐standing concern with this problem.     

Designs for Detecting Spatial Dependence

The aim of this article is to find optimal or nearly optimal designs for experiments to detect spatial dependence that might be in the data. The questions to be answered are: how to optimally select predictor values to detect the spatial structure (if it is existent) and how to avoid to spuriously detect spatial dependence if there is no such structure. The starting point of this analysis involves two different linear regression models: (1) an ordinary linear regression model with i.i.d. error terms—the nonspatial case and (2) a regression model with a spatially autocorrelated error term, a so-called simultaneous spatial autoregressive error model. The procedure can be divided into two main parts: The first is use of an exchange algorithm to find the optimal design for the respective data collection process; for its evaluation an artificial data set was generated and used. The second is estimation of the parameters of the regression model and calculation of Moran's I , which is used as an indicator for spatial dependence in the data set. The method is illustrated by applying it to a well-known case study in spatial analysis.     

Sind W?hler wetterfühlig? Ein Beitrag zur Nichtw?hlerdiskussion

Die Bundesrepublik Deutschland gilt für viele L?nder, vor allem für ehemals kommunistisch regierte, als ein Vorbild der modernen Demokratie. Dieser Vorbildcharakter drückte sich auch in den hohen Wahlbeteiligungen aus, mit denen die Bundesrepublik weltweit einen Spitzenplatz einnahm. Doch seitdem die W?hlerzahlen in den vergangenen fünfzehn Jahren teilweise drastisch zurückgegangen sind, wird die Wahlbeteiligung aufmerksam beobachtet. Oftmals finden sich nach Wahlen interessante Begründungen für die geringe Wahlbeteiligung: Bei der nordrhein-westf?lischen Kommunalwahl am 12. September 1999, die an einem Tag mit Sonnenschein und Temperaturen über 30 Grad stattfand, lag die Wahlbeteiligung bei nur 54 Prozent. Natürlich war das hei?e Badewetter für viele Politiker schuld daran, da? es eine so geringe, bisher ungekannt schlechte Wahlbeteiligung gab. ?hnlich auch die ?u?erungen nach einer „hei?en Kommunalwahl“ im Frühjahr 1992 in Berlin, die der Regierende Bürgermeister mit den Worten kommentierte: „Wir haben eins auf die Bademütze bekommen“ (vgl. Berliner Zeitung, 28.5.1992).     

New compositional data on ancient mortars from Hagia Sophia (Istanbul,Turkey)

This study shows the results of a multidisciplinary collaboration between the University of Calabria (Italy) and the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), about the compositional characterization of some mortars taken from Hagia Sophia in Istanbul (Turkey), one of the most important buildings in antiquity. Twenty samples of joint mortars were analysed by micro-chemical analyses (SEM-EDS), X-ray powder diffraction (XRPD), optical microscopy (OM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The compositional study allowed us to define, with more detail, the construction phases of the fifth, sixth and tenth century. The petrographic analysis in thin section by optical microscopy showed four typologies of sands, used as aggregate, with specific compositional features. SEM-EDS analyses and TEM observations of the binder around the ceramic fragments of the aggregate showed the presence of different morphologies of single C-S-H compounds.     

Disclosing mineralogical phases in medioeval iron nails by non-destructive neutron techniques

There is not only one methodology for the study of mineralogical phases in archaeological samples. In this paper, we discuss a strategy applied to ancient iron nail samples completely based on non-destructive analyses. The archaeological samples come from the archaeological site of Valle delle Forme (province of Brescia–Italy) and date back to the 1300–1400 ad. Neutron-based techniques, like time-of-flight neutron diffraction and neutron tomography, have been used to determine the mineralogical composition and the structure of nails. An independent check for the assessment of the presence of different mineralogical phases was given by Raman spectroscopy. The combination of different non-destructive techniques has provided very useful information on their chemical composition, nature of the patina and corrosion features of the nails (also in the bulk of the samples).