Með seiglunni hefst það. Saga Benedikts Davíðssonar

BókardómurÍ umsögn gagnrýnanda kemur meðal annars eftirfarandi fram: "Hér er á ferðinni rit sem allir áhugamenn um stjórn- og verkalýðsmál verða að kynna sér. Framhjá þessari bók verður ekki gengið þegar nánar verður fjallað um ýmislegt það sem þar er drepið á. Í því sambandi skiptir miklu máli sú vinna sem höfundur hefur lagt í vinnslu heimilda.

Vigurklerkurinn. Ævisaga Sigurðar prests Stefánssonar

BókardómurBók sú sem hér er til umfjöllunar á sér langa sögu. Talið er að höfundur hafi lokið við síðasta hluta hennar 1924, skömmu áður en hann lést, en 85 ár liðu þar til hún loks kom út. Þó hafði hún í millitíðinni verið notuð við rannsóknir á því tímabil sem hún spannar og líklega kom til greina að gefa hana út kringum 1977, til þess bendir eftirmáli Sigurðar Bjarnasonar í Vigur sem þá var ritaður. Hvað kom í veg fyrir útgáfu þá skal ósagt látið en úr því hefur nú Sögufélag Ísfirðinga bætt

Sigurður Stefánsson prestur; Guðfinna M. Hreiðarsdóttir bjó til prentunar og ritaði: Vigurklerkurinn - ævisaga Sigurðar prests Stefánssonar rituð af honum sjálfum

Saga sú sem hér er sögð er sjálfsævisaga, eins og titillinn ber með sér, og verður sjálfsagt aðeins ein úr stórum flokki slíkra sagna sem boðið verður uppá í jólabókaflóðinu. Við lestur á henni rekst lesandinn þó fljótlega á sitthvað kemur honum spánskt fyrir sjónir og er ólíkt því sem gerist í nútímaævisögum. Framandlegast er þó líklega að höfundur talar ætíð um sjálfan sig í þriðju persónu, gjarnan sem Sigurð prest eða bara prestinn. Jón Þ. Þór getur þess í inngangi sínum að fyrstu persónu frásögn hafi jafnvel þótt óviðeigandi í æviminningum á þessum tíma og því sé þessi háttur hafður á

Snorri - ævisaga Snorra Sturlusonar 1179-1241

BókardómurÍ umsögn gagnrýnanda kemur meðal annars eftirfarandi fram: "Hér er saman kominn mikill fróðleikur, ekki bara um Snorra Sturluson heldur einnig samtímamenn hans og sögu þjóðarinnar á þessum örlagatímum, enda er höfundur meðal fróðustu manna um íslenska miðaldasögu. ....greinargott yfirlit um efni Sturlungu og annarra fornrita á því tímabili sem Snorri kemur þar við sögu. Sturlunga er óneitanlega harla óárennileg við fyrstu sýn og því gæti verið góður kostur fyrir þá sem vilja kynna sér efni hennar að lesa Snorra áður en menn hella sér út í lestur á Sturlungu sjálfri.

Conditions Associated with the Cystic Fibrosis Defect Promote Chronic Pseudomonas aeruginosa Infection.

Rationale: Progress has been made in understanding how the cystic fibrosis (CF) basic defect produces lung infection susceptibility. However, it remains unclear why CF exclusively leads to chronic infections that are non-invasive and highly resistant to eradication. While biofilm formation has been suggested as a mechanism, recent work raises questions about the role of biofilms in CF. Objectives: To learn how airway conditions attributed to CFTR dysfunction could lead to chronic infection, and to determine if biofilm-inhibiting genetic adaptations that are common in CF isolates affect the capacity of P. aeruginosa to develop chronic infection phenotypes. Methods: We studied P. aeruginosa isolates grown in agar and mucus gels containing sputum from CF patients and measured their susceptibility to killing by antibiotics and host defenses. We also measured the invasive virulence of P. aeruginosa grown in sputum gels using airway epithelial cells and a murine infection model. Measurements and Main Results: We found that conditions likely to result from increased mucus density, hyper-inflammation, and defective bacterial killing could all cause P. aeruginosa to grow in bacterial aggregates. Aggregated growth markedly increased the resistance of bacteria to killing by host defenses and antibiotics, and reduced their invasiveness. In addition, we found that biofilm-inhibiting mutations do not impede aggregate formation in gel growth environments. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that conditions associated with several CF pathogenesis hypotheses could cause the non-invasive and resistant infection phenotype, independently of the bacterial functions needed for biofilm formation

Stable isotope analysis of specimens of opportunity reveals ocean-scale site fidelity in an elusive whale species

Elusive wildlife are challenging to study, manage, or conserve, as the difficulty of obtaining specimens or conducting direct observations leads to major data deficiencies. Specimens of opportunity, such as salvaged carcasses or museum specimens, are a valuable source of fundamental biological and ecological information on data-deficient, elusive species, increasing knowledge of biodiversity, habitat and range, and population structure. Stable isotope analysis is a powerful indirect tool that can be used to infer foraging behavior and habitat use retrospectively from archived specimens. Beaked whales are a speciose group of cetaceans that are challenging to study in situ, and although Sowerby's beaked whale (Mesoplodon bidens) was discovered >200 years ago, little is known about its biology. We measured δ13C and δ15N stable isotope composition in bone, muscle, and skin tissue from 102 Sowerby's beaked whale specimens of opportunity collected throughout the North Atlantic Ocean to infer movement ecology and spatial population structure. Median δ13C and δ15N values in Sowerby's beaked whale bone, muscle, and skin tissues significantly differed between whales sampled from the east and west North Atlantic Ocean. Quadratic discriminant analysis that simultaneously considered δ13C and δ15N values correctly assigned >85% of the specimens to their collection region for all tissue types. These findings demonstrate Sowerby's beaked whale exhibits both short- and long-term site fidelity to the region from which the specimens were collected, suggest that this species is composed of two or more populations or exhibits a metapopulation structure, and have implications for conservation and management policy. Stable isotope analysis of specimens of opportunity proved a highly successful means of generating new spatial ecology data for this elusive species and is a method that can be effectively applied to other elusive species