The tattoos of the Tyrolean Iceman: a light microscopical, ultrastructural and element analytical study

The Tyrolean iceman, a 5300-year-old mummy, presents tattoos on different parts of his body. Skin samples of several line tattoos and a cross tattoo were investigated by optical microscopy and various electron microscopy techniques (TEM, EFETEM, EELS, EDXS, electron diffraction). The epidermis of the investigated skin areas was mostly lacking. The tattooing particles are distributed in the connective tissue and could be identified as soot. In some areas between the soot particles, different silicate crystals are present such as almandine and quartz, along with some not exactly definable crystals. The crystals possibly derived from stones of the fireplace from which the soot was taken for tattooing. Additionally, in the medial part of the right leg, putative ash particles were seen in the tattooed area. Furthermore, in non-tattooed skin areas, a vivianite crystal and small grains of CaPO₄ and nearby Fe, P and O could be detected, these having formed most probably after the death of the Tyrolean Iceman during his long period in the mountains. On the surface of two leg specimens, a small layer with brown granules was visible by means of optical microscopy, and these were identified as melanin granules in the stratum basale of the epidermis.     

The Adaptative Nature of Neoliberalism at the Local Scale: Fifteen Years of City Improvement Districts in Cape Town and Johannesburg

Abstract: By unravelling the adoption and adaptation of the North American Business Improvement District (BID) model in South African cities, this paper considers the way neoliberal principles are making their way in the post‐apartheid context. Drawing on a comparative approach of BIDs in Johannesburg and Cape Town, we analyse the tensions and conflicts surrounding their implementation and unpack the resilience of this model. As unexpected as this resilience might be in such a context, that is, far away from the heartland of neoliberalism, we argue that this resilience is linked to the permeability of the local contexts and to the plasticity of the model itself at the city and neighbourhood levels, reflecting a capacity to adapt to inherited regulatory frameworks, patterns of territorial development and embedded socio‐political alliances of the local terrains, as well as an ability to accommodate post‐apartheid issues through the crafting of what we refer to as “local Third Ways”.     

Housing Choice in a Regulated Market: A Nested Multinomial Logit Analysis

The paper integrates several important elements of the institutionalized and regulated nature of the housing market and analyzes the relationship between household type and housing choice in Vienna within a nested multinomial logit framework. In particular, the concept of household specific choice sets is used to account for institutional, informational and income-based constraints of the choice process. Government subsidies (such as housing and rent allowances, non-interest-bearing state loans) are explicitly taken into account in the definition of variables. Housing choice is considered in three stages: the choice of a dwelling unit given dwelling type and residential zone, the choice of a dwelling type given residential zone, and the marginal choice of a residential zone. The coefficients are derived by means of a sequential ML-procedure. The empirical results clearly indicate that demographic variables have significant impacts on housing choice behavior. Income as a single explanatory variable as well as its interacting with size measures and the quality of the house are found to be important criteria for dwelling unit choice, as housing cost variables for dwelling type choice behavior. The dwelling unit and dwelling type choice submodels fit reasonably well, whereas the residential zone model is less successful.     

State of preservation of polymorphic plasma proteins recovered from ancient human bones

Protected by the mineral matrix, bone proteins are capable of surviving inhumation periods of several hundreds or thousands of years in soil. While the preservation of the bone matrix protein, collagen I, is the prerequisite for a variety of archaeometric approaches, such as radiocarbon dating and the reconstruction of palaeodiet by stable isotope analysis, little is known about both the rate and state of preservation of non‐collagenous proteins. We succeeded in the isolation, electrophoretic separation (SDS‐PAGE, IEF) and immunological detection (radial immunodiffusion, IEF immunoblotting and ELISA) of plasma proteins preserved in archaeological human bones. However, sample preparation and electrophoretic methods had to be adapted to the specific demands of these aged proteins, since they are not only degraded and fragmented but also cross‐linked to other organic components, either indigenous to the bone or to contaminants from the burial environment. Complex decomposition phenomena are responsible for the altered mode of migration of aged proteins through a gel. After isoelectric focusing, the ancient proteins mainly concentrate below pH 4.45 in the pH‐gradient. Thus, highly negatively charged protein components have a better chance of preservation in bone after death. Isoelectric focusing with subsequent immunoblotting of ancient protein samples revealed protein patterns which showed marked charge‐modifications in comparison with those of modern human plasma proteins due to protein degradation (e.g. α₂‐HS‐glycoprotein and α₁‐antitrypsin). Nevertheless, in combination with different immunological analyses, previous results concerning the selective enrichment of α₂‐HS‐glycoprotein in bone compared with other plasma glycoproteins could be confirmed. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Ludwig Guttmann: Emerging Concept of Rehabilitation after Spinal Cord Injury

Ludwig Guttmann was a pioneer of the idea of rehabilitation for victims of spinal cord injury. He looked beyond the physical survival of his patients, to their re-integration into a social life worth living. While the International Stoke Mandeville Games are fairly well known to the general public as a gathering for physically handicapped athletes, less is known about the man who helped start the movement. On the occasion of the recent Sydney 2000 Paralympics, this paper reviews the contribution of Ludwig Guttmann, who introduced sport into the life of paralyzed patients.