Early Holocene aeolian sediments in southwestern Crete−preliminary results

The soilscapes along the southern and western coast of Crete (Greece) are dominated by coarse-grained reddish-brown slope sediments whose natural (pre-anthropogenic) configuration and properties are difficult to reconstruct due to the long history of intense land use. As a consequence, datable terrestrial sediment archives of pre-anthropogenic genesis are scarce. We present preliminary results of a study performed on an accumulation within an alluvial fan south of Stomio Bay in southwestern Crete. The studied profile is located in a small depression and is composed of a sequence of sandy to silty yellowish-brown calcareous sediments overlying coarse-grained slope sediments, including a fossil topsoil horizon. Based on macroscopic, micromorphological, geochemical, geophysical and mineralogical analysis, we interpret the fine-grained sediments to have a local aeolian origin. OSL dating indicates a final deposition phase during the early Holocene. Considering the scarcity of early Holocene terrestrial archives in Crete, the analysed profile provides valuable data for the reconstruction of landscape dynamics and paleoecological conditions as well as soil-sediment configurations during this time period. Additional research is needed to address the specific source area(s) as well as the ages of the deposition of slope sediments and formation of the fossil topsoil

Mikromorphologische Untersuchungen geschichteter Böden im Hessischen Spessart

Mit Hilfe feldbodenkundlicher, schwermineralanalytischer und mikromorphologischer Methoden wird die Genese eines typischen Bodenprofils im hessischen Teil des Vorspessarts untersucht. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass der große Tongehaltsunterschied zwischen Haupt- und Mittellage keine Folge von Tonverlagerung ist, sondern dass der meiste Ton schon vor der Formung der Hauptlage in der Mittellage vorhanden war. Ohne die mikromorphologischen Analysen wäre die Genese des Profils als Phäno-Parabraunerde nur schwer zu belegen, da der schichtungsbedingte Tongehaltsunterschied durch rezente Tonverlagerung maskiert wird. Weitere aktuelle, bodenbildende Prozesse wie eine starke Bioturbation und die hydromorphe Prägung des Profils sind in den Dünnschliffen nachweisbar

"urbs libzi"-Geoarchäologische Untersuchungen an der Hainspitze in Leipzigs Innenstadt

Die Verfüllung von archäologischen Befunden ist bedeutend für Informationen zur Nutzungs- und Auflassungsgeschichte. In interdisziplinärer Zusammenarbeit wurde versucht, die Geschichte zweier anthropogener Strukturen zu untersuchen und anhand der Ergebnisse eine verbesserte Einschätzung der frühen Stadtgeschichte Leipzigs zu erhalten. Die geoarchäologischen Untersuchungen erfolgten im Bereich einer vermutlich hochmittelalterlichen Materialentnahmegrube sowie des ehemaligen Außengrabens der „urbs libzi“, der das Vorburggelände nach Osten hin abschloss. In die Arbeiten wurde auch ein weitgehend ungestörter Bereich einbezogen. Die freigelegten Profile wurden 2012 im Gelände dokumentiert und beprobt. Das entnommene Material wurde geochemisch untersucht. An Proben besonders exponierter Standorten wurden außerdem Dünnschliffe erstellt, die unter dem Polarisationsmikroskop interpretiert wurden. In dauerhaft feuchten Sedimenten sind meist Pollenkörner zu finden, welche die bei der Entstehung der Verfüllung vorhandene Vegetation widerspiegeln. Die beiden unterschiedlichen Verfüllungen werden durch die Korngrößenverteilung und die Kohlenstoffgehalte deutlich. Stellenweise deuten hohe Phosphor- und Stickstoffwerte in der oberen Verfüllung auf eine starke Kontamination mit organischem Abfall hin. Die geoarchäologischen Untersuchungen haben wichtige neue Erkenntnisse zur Zeit der Stadtwerdung erbracht. Der hochmittelalterliche Graben war kein Wassergraben, ist zu großen Teilen intentionell verfüllt worden und blieb danach mehrere Jahrzehnte unbebaut. Die mittelalterliche Materialentnahmegrube belegt den Bedarf an sandig-kiesigem Baumaterial in der frühen Phase der Stadtwerdung. Pseudogleye an der urbs libzi zeigen, dass die geomorphologische und verkehrgeographische Lage für die Burganlage wichtiger war als die Bodenqualität

Kaum Tonverlagerung in 7000 Jahren – Untersuchungen zur Bodenentwicklung im Bereich einer frühneolithischen Siedlung in Groitzsch, NW-Sachsen

Im Zuge von archäologischen Ausgrabungen im Südwesten der Kleinstadt Groitzsch wurden zwischen 2014 und 2015 umfangreiche Überreste einer frühneolithischen Siedlung und vereinzelte Zeugnisse jungbronzezeitlicher Aktivitäten entdeckt. Groitzsch liegt am südlichen Ende des norddeutschen Tieflandes auf einer Spornlage südlich der Einmündung der Schnauder in das 2 Kilometer breite Tal der Weißen Elster. Zahlreiche Fundstellen entlang des Tals belegen erhebliche anthropogene Aktivitäten seit 7500 Jahren. Der oberflächennahe Untergrund südlich von Groitzsch besteht aus Geschiebelehm/Geschiebemergel und etwa einen Meter mächtigem Löss. Verbreitet kommen hier Parabraunerden vor. Zur Untersuchung von frühneolithischen Gruben und Gräben in Hinsicht auf frühneolithische Hausgrundrisse wurden umfangreiche Beprobungen durchgeführt. Die Auswertung im archäologischen Kontext erbrachten auch pedologisch wichtige Erkenntnisse bzgl. der holozänen Bodenentwicklung in diesem Raum

Two New Loci for Body-Weight Regulation Identified in a Joint Analysis of Genome-Wide Association Studies for Early-Onset Extreme Obesity in French and German Study Groups

Meta-analyses of population-based genome-wide association studies (GWAS) in adults have recently led to the detection of new genetic loci for obesity. Here we aimed to discover additional obesity loci in extremely obese children and adolescents. We also investigated if these results generalize by estimating the effects of these obesity loci in adults and in population-based samples including both children and adults. We jointly analysed two GWAS of 2,258 individuals and followed-up the best, according to lowest p-values, 44 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) from 21 genomic regions in 3,141 individuals. After this DISCOVERY step, we explored if the findings derived from the extremely obese children and adolescents (10 SNPs from 5 genomic regions) generalized to (i) the population level and (ii) to adults by genotyping another 31,182 individuals (GENERALIZATION step). Apart from previously identified FTO, MC4R, and TMEM18, we detected two new loci for obesity: one in SDCCAG8 (serologically defined colon cancer antigen 8 gene; p = 1.85610 x 10(-8) in the DISCOVERY step) and one between TNKS (tankyrase, TRF1-interacting ankyrin-related ADP-ribose polymerase gene) and MSRA (methionine sulfoxide reductase A gene; p = 4.84 x 10(-7)), the latter finding being limited to children and adolescents as demonstrated in the GENERALIZATION step. The odds ratios for early-onset obesity were estimated at similar to 1.10 per risk allele for both loci. Interestingly, the TNKS/MSRA locus has recently been found to be associated with adult waist circumference. In summary, we have completed a meta-analysis of two GWAS which both focus on extremely obese children and adolescents and replicated our findings in a large followed-up data set. We observed that genetic variants in or near FTO, MC4R, TMEM18, SDCCAG8, and TNKS/MSRA were robustly associated with early-onset obesity. We conclude that the currently known major common variants related to obesity overlap to a substantial degree between children and adults

AGO recommendations for the surgical therapy of the axilla after neoadjuvant chemotherapy: 2021 Update

For many decades, the standard procedure to treat breast cancer included complete dissection of the axillary lymph nodes. The aim was to determine histological node status, which was then used as the basis for adjuvant therapy, and to ensure locoregional tumour control. In addition to the debate on how to optimise the therapeutic strategies of systemic treatment and radiotherapy, the current discussion focuses on improving surgical procedures to treat breast cancer. As neoadjuvant chemotherapy is becoming increasingly important, the surgical procedures used to treat breast cancer, whether they are breast surgery or axillary dissection, are changing. Based on the currently available data, carrying out SLNE prior to neoadjuvant chemotherapy is not recommended. In contrast, surgical axillary management after neoadjuvant chemotherapy is considered the procedure of choice for axillary staging and can range from SLNE to TAD and ALND. To reduce the rate of false negatives during surgical staging of the axilla in pN+(CNB) stage before NACT and ycN0 after NACT, targeted axillary dissection (TAD), the removal of > 2 SLNs (SLNE, no untargeted axillary sampling), immunohistochemistry to detect isolated tumour cells and micro-metastases, and marking positive lymph nodes before NACT should be the standard approach. This most recent update on surgical axillary management describes the significance of isolated tumour cells and micro-metastasis after neoadjuvant chemotherapy and the clinical consequences of low volume residual disease diagnosed using SLNE and TAD and provides an overview of this year's AGO recommendations for surgical management of the axilla during primary surgery and in relation to neoadjuvant chemotherapy

MedShapeNet -- A Large-Scale Dataset of 3D Medical Shapes for Computer Vision

Prior to the deep learning era, shape was commonly used to describe the objects. Nowadays, state-of-the-art (SOTA) algorithms in medical imaging are predominantly diverging from computer vision, where voxel grids, meshes, point clouds, and implicit surface models are used. This is seen from numerous shape-related publications in premier vision conferences as well as the growing popularity of ShapeNet (about 51,300 models) and Princeton ModelNet (127,915 models). For the medical domain, we present a large collection of anatomical shapes (e.g., bones, organs, vessels) and 3D models of surgical instrument, called MedShapeNet, created to facilitate the translation of data-driven vision algorithms to medical applications and to adapt SOTA vision algorithms to medical problems. As a unique feature, we directly model the majority of shapes on the imaging data of real patients. As of today, MedShapeNet includes 23 dataset with more than 100,000 shapes that are paired with annotations (ground truth). Our data is freely accessible via a web interface and a Python application programming interface (API) and can be used for discriminative, reconstructive, and variational benchmarks as well as various applications in virtual, augmented, or mixed reality, and 3D printing. Exemplary, we present use cases in the fields of classification of brain tumors, facial and skull reconstructions, multi-class anatomy completion, education, and 3D printing. In future, we will extend the data and improve the interfaces. The project pages are: https://medshapenet.ikim.nrw/ and https://github.com/Jianningli/medshapenet-feedbackComment: 16 page

AI is a viable alternative to high throughput screening: a 318-target study

: High throughput screening (HTS) is routinely used to identify bioactive small molecules. This requires physical compounds, which limits coverage of accessible chemical space. Computational approaches combined with vast on-demand chemical libraries can access far greater chemical space, provided that the predictive accuracy is sufficient to identify useful molecules. Through the largest and most diverse virtual HTS campaign reported to date, comprising 318 individual projects, we demonstrate that our AtomNet® convolutional neural network successfully finds novel hits across every major therapeutic area and protein class. We address historical limitations of computational screening by demonstrating success for target proteins without known binders, high-quality X-ray crystal structures, or manual cherry-picking of compounds. We show that the molecules selected by the AtomNet® model are novel drug-like scaffolds rather than minor modifications to known bioactive compounds. Our empirical results suggest that computational methods can substantially replace HTS as the first step of small-molecule drug discovery

Genome-wide association identifies nine common variants associated with fasting proinsulin levels and provides new insights into the pathophysiology of type 2 diabetes.

OBJECTIVE: Proinsulin is a precursor of mature insulin and C-peptide. Higher circulating proinsulin levels are associated with impaired β-cell function, raised glucose levels, insulin resistance, and type 2 diabetes (T2D). Studies of the insulin processing pathway could provide new insights about T2D pathophysiology. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS: We have conducted a meta-analysis of genome-wide association tests of ∼2.5 million genotyped or imputed single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and fasting proinsulin levels in 10,701 nondiabetic adults of European ancestry, with follow-up of 23 loci in up to 16,378 individuals, using additive genetic models adjusted for age, sex, fasting insulin, and study-specific covariates. RESULTS: Nine SNPs at eight loci were associated with proinsulin levels (P < 5 × 10(-8)). Two loci (LARP6 and SGSM2) have not been previously related to metabolic traits, one (MADD) has been associated with fasting glucose, one (PCSK1) has been implicated in obesity, and four (TCF7L2, SLC30A8, VPS13C/C2CD4A/B, and ARAP1, formerly CENTD2) increase T2D risk. The proinsulin-raising allele of ARAP1 was associated with a lower fasting glucose (P = 1.7 × 10(-4)), improved β-cell function (P = 1.1 × 10(-5)), and lower risk of T2D (odds ratio 0.88; P = 7.8 × 10(-6)). Notably, PCSK1 encodes the protein prohormone convertase 1/3, the first enzyme in the insulin processing pathway. A genotype score composed of the nine proinsulin-raising alleles was not associated with coronary disease in two large case-control datasets. CONCLUSIONS: We have identified nine genetic variants associated with fasting proinsulin. Our findings illuminate the biology underlying glucose homeostasis and T2D development in humans and argue against a direct role of proinsulin in coronary artery disease pathogenesis