Dating and Digging Stratified Archaeology in Circumpolar North America : A View from Nunalleq, Southwestern Alaska

The results presented in this paper were funded by a NERC Radiocarbon Facility grant (NRCF 1917.0415), while the wider project is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AH/K006029/1). The authors wish to thank all the members of the excavation crew from the 2014 field season for their hard work in the challenging weather conditions of southwest Alaska – without their attention to detail this study would not have been possible. Additional thanks are also due to Qanirtuuq Incorporated for logistical support and warm hospitality in Quinhagak. We also wish to thank Kevin Edwards and Kate Britton, who read an earlier draft of this paper, and three anonymous reviewers for highly constructive criticism that helped us to improve the final manuscript.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Ethnic differences in calcium, phosphate and bone metabolism

The prevalence of osteoporosis and the incidence of age-related fragility fracture vary by ethnicity. There is greater than 10-fold variation in fracture probabilities between countries across the world. Mineral and bone metabolism are intimately interlinked, and both are known to exhibit patterns of daily variation, known as the diurnal rhythm (DR). Ethnic differences are described for Ca and P metabolism. The importance of these differences is described in detail between select ethnic groups, within the USA between African-Americans and White-Americans, between the Gambia and the UK and between China and the UK. Dietary Ca intake is higher in White-Americans compared with African-Americans, and is higher in White-British compared with Gambian and Chinese adults. Differences are observed also for plasma 25-hydroxy vitamin D, related to lifestyle differences, skin pigmentation and skin exposure to UVB-containing sunshine. Higher plasma 1,25-dihydroxy vitamin D and parathyroid hormone are observed in African-American compared with White-American adults. Plasma parathyroid hormone is also higher in Gambian adults and, in winter, in Chinese compared with White-British adults. There may be ethnic differences in the bone resorptive effects of parathyroid hormone, with a relative skeletal resistance to parathyroid hormone observed in some, but not all ethnic groups. Renal mineral excretion is also influenced by ethnicity; urinary Ca (uCa) and urinary P (uP) excretions are lower in African-Americans compared with White-Americans, and in Gambians compared with their White-British counterparts. Little is known about ethnic differences in the DR of Ca and P metabolism, but differences may be expected due to known differences in lifestyle factors, such as dietary intake and sleep/wake pattern. The ethnic-specific DR of Ca and P metabolism may influence the net balance of Ca and P conservation and bone remodelling. These ethnic differences in Ca, P and the bone metabolism may be important factors in the variation in skeletal health

Comparison of Bacterial Diversity within the Coral Reef Sponge, Axinella corrugata, and the Encrusting Coral Erythropodium caribaeorum

We compared the Caribbean reef sponge, Axinella corrugata, with the Caribbean reef coral, Erythropodium caribaeorum for differences in their resident microbial communities. This cursory survey of bacterial diversity applied 16S rRNA gene sequences. Over 100 culture-independent sequences were generated from five different Axinella 16S rRNA libraries, and compared with 69 cultured isolates. The cultureindependent 16S rDNA clones displayed a higher diversity of Proteobacteria, including “uncultured” or “unknown” representatives from the Deltaproteobacteria. Arcobacterium, and Cyanobacteria were also found. We have also confirmed that Axinella sponges appeared to host specific microbial symbionts, similar to the previously identified clones termed “OSO” environmental samples. In contrast, seawater samples near Axinella were dominated by Pseudoalteromonas. Adjacent sediment samples yielded clones of Planctomycetacea, Proteobacteria, sulfate-reducing Desulfovibrio spp, and other Deltaproteobacteria. Anaerobe-like 16S rRNA sequences were detected after the oxygen supply to one Axinella sample was deliberately curtailed to assess temporal changes in the microbial community. E. caribaeorum yielded more Betaproteobacteria relative to Axinella 16S libraries, and also included the Gammaproteobacteria genus Spongiobacter. However, Axinella-derived microbes appeared phylogenetically deeper with greater sequence divergences than the coral. Overall this study indicated that marine microbial community diversity can be linked to specific source hosts and habitats

Nunalleq, Stories from the Village of Our Ancestors:Co-designing a multivocal educational resource based on an archaeological excavation

This work was funded by the UK-based Arts and Humanities Research Council through grants (AH/K006029/1) and (AH/R014523/1), a University of Aberdeen IKEC Award with additional support for travel and subsistence from the University of Dundee, DJCAD Research Committee RS2 project funding. Thank you to the many people who contributed their support, knowledge, feedback, voices and faces throughout the project, this list includes members of the local community, colleagues, specialists, students, and volunteers. If we have missed out any names we apologize but know that your help was appreciated. Jimmy Anaver, John Anderson, Alice Bailey, Kieran Baxter, Pauline Beebe, Ellinor Berggren, Dawn Biddison, Joshua Branstetter, Brendan Body, Lise Bos, Michael Broderick, Sarah Brown, Crystal Carter, Joseph Carter, Lucy Carter, Sally Carter, Ben Charles, Mary Church, Willard Church, Daniele Clementi, Annie Cleveland, Emily Cleveland, Joshua Cleveland, Aron Crowell, Neil Curtis, Angie Demma, Annie Don, Julia Farley, Veronique Forbes, Patti Fredericks, Tricia Gillam, Sean Gleason, Sven Haakanson, Cheryl Heitman, Grace Hill, Diana Hunter, Joel Isaak, Warren Jones, Stephan Jones, Ana Jorge, Solveig Junglas, Melia Knecht, Rick Knecht, Erika Larsen, Paul Ledger, Jonathan Lim Soon, Amber Lincoln, Steve Luke, Francis Lukezic, Eva Malvich, Pauline Matthews, Roy Mark, Edouard Masson-MacLean, Julie Masson-MacLean, Mhairi Maxwell, Chuna Mcintyre, Drew Michael, Amanda Mina, Anna Mossolova, Carl Nicolai Jr, Chris Niskanen, Molly Odell, Tom Paxton, Lauren Phillips, Lucy Qin, Charlie Roberts, Chris Rowe, Rufus Rowe,Chris Rowland, John Rundall, Melissa Shaginoff, Monica Shah, Anna Sloan, Darryl Small Jr, John Smith, Mike Smith, Joey Sparaga, Hannah Strehlau, Dora Strunk, Larissa Strunk, Lonny Strunk, Larry Strunk, Robbie Strunk, Sandra Toloczko, Richard Vanderhoek, the Qanirtuuq Incorporated Board, the Quinhagak Dance Group and the staff at Kuinerrarmiut Elitnaurviat. We also extend our thanks to three anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on our paper.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Drought rewires the cores of food webs

Droughts are intensifying across the globe, with potentially devastating implications for freshwater ecosystems. We used new network science approaches to investigate drought impacts on stream food webs and explored potential consequences for web robustness to future perturbations. The substructure of the webs was characterized by a core of richly connected species surrounded by poorly connected peripheral species. Although drought caused the partial collapse of the food webs, the loss of the most extinction-prone peripheral species triggered a substantial rewiring of interactions within the networks’ cores. These shifts in species interactions in the core conserved the underlying core/periphery substructure and stability of the drought-impacted webs. When we subsequently perturbed the webs by simulating species loss in silico, the rewired drought webs were as robust as the larger, undisturbed webs. Our research unearths previously unknown compensatory dynamics arising from within the core that could underpin food web stability in the face of environmental perturbations

Suppression Subtractive Hybridization PCR Isolation of cDNAs from a Caribbean Soft Coral

Transcriptomic studies of marine organisms are still in their infancy. A partial, subtracted expressed sequence tag (EST) library of the Caribbean octocoral Erythropodium caribaeorum and the sea fan Gorgonia ventalina has been analyzed in order to find novel genes or differences in gene expression related to potential secondary metabolite production or symbioses. This approach entails enrichment for potential non- housekeeping genes using the suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH) polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method. More than 500 expressed sequence tags (ESTs) were generated after cloning SSH products, which yielded at least 53 orthologous groups of proteins (COGs) and Pfam clusters, including transcription factors (Drosophila Big Brother), catalases, reverse transcriptases, ferritins and various hypothetical protein sequences. A total of 591 EST sequences were deposited into GenBank [dbEST: FL512138 - FL512331, and GH611838]. The results represent proof of concept for enrichment of unique transcripts over housekeeping genes, such as actin or ribosomal genes, which comprised approximately 17% of the total dataset. Due to the gene and sequence diversity of some ESTs, such sequences can find utility as molecular markers in current and future studies of this species and other soft coral biogeography, chemical ecology, phylogenetics, and evolution

Computation of the velocity field induced by a planar source distribution approximating a symmetrical non-lifting wing in subsonic flow

The singular double integrals which arise in the calculation of the components of perturbation velocity due to a swept wing with given thickness distribution by linearised theory, have been evaluated by a numerical method. Two computer programs have been written, one for points on the wing planform and one for points off. Following the techniques adopted by Sells, the integral over the wing is constructed from the sum of analytic spanwise integrals taken along lines of local sweep. The results obtained were tested against calculations by Freestone for points on the wing planform for both sheared and tapered wings. Further comparisons for points on the wing surface were made with results by the method of A. M. O. Smith