Lakeside Cemeteries in the Sahara: 5000 Years of Holocene Population and Environmental Change

Background: Approximately two hundred human burials were discovered on the edge of a paleolake in Niger that providea uniquely preserved record of human occupation in the Sahara during the Holocene (,8000 B.C.E. to the present). CalledGobero, this suite of closely spaced sites chronicles the rapid pace of biosocial change in the southern Sahara in response tosevere climatic fluctuation.Methodology/Principal Findings: Two main occupational phases are identified that correspond with humid intervals in theearly and mid-Holocene, based on 78 direct AMS radiocarbon dates on human remains, fauna and artifacts, as well as 9 OSLdates on paleodune sand. The older occupants have craniofacial dimensions that demonstrate similarities with mid-Holocene occupants of the southern Sahara and Late Pleistocene to early Holocene inhabitants of the Maghreb. Theirhyperflexed burials compose the earliest cemetery in the Sahara dating to ,7500 B.C.E. These early occupants abandon thearea under arid conditions and, when humid conditions return ,4600 B.C.E., are replaced by a more gracile people withelaborated grave goods including animal bone and ivory ornaments.Conclusions/Significance: The principal significance of Gobero lies in its extraordinary human, faunal, and archaeologicalrecord, from which we conclude the following:(1) The early Holocene occupants at Gobero (7700–6200 B.C.E.) were largely sedentary hunter-fisher-gatherers withlakeside funerary sites that include the earliest recorded cemetery in the Sahara.(2) Principal components analysis of craniometric variables closely allies the early Holocene occupants at Gobero with askeletally robust, trans-Saharan assemblage of Late Pleistocene to mid-Holocene human populations from the Maghreband southern Sahara.(3) Gobero was abandoned during a period of severe aridification possibly as long as one millennium (6200–5200 B.C.E).(4) More gracile humans arrived in the mid-Holocene (5200–2500 B.C.E.) employing a diversified subsistence economybased on clams, fish, and savanna vertebrates as well as some cattle husbandry.(5) Population replacement after a harsh arid hiatus is the most likely explanation for the occupational sequence at Gobero.(6) We are just beginnin

“Saharan Waterscapes”. Traditional Knowledge and Historical Depth of Water Management in the Akakus Mts. (SW Libya).

We present a preliminary report from the project “Saharan Waterscapes”, a multi-disciplinary research programme based on geoarchaeological, ethnoarchaeological, and ethnobotanic surveys carried out in the last years in the Acacus Mts. (SW Libya, central Sahara). The main aim was to assess the water resources available in the area, completing the first repertory of the natural (gheltas) and artificial (excavated wells and abonkor) water-related features. The relations between rainfall, landscape and resources (plants, animals, flock, etc) are crucial for the understanding of many segments of kel Tadrart Tuareg universe. The relevance of water resources and cultivation in the Acacus Mt. in historical and social memory of Kel Tadrart have also been approached, and compared with local and regional data on the variability of rainfall, indicating interesting potential analogies for the analysis of social responses to climate fluctuations during the late Holocene

Land-use and cultivation in the etaghas of the Tadrart Acacus (south-west Libya): The dawn of Saharan agriculture?

The hyperarid climate of the central Sahara precludes permanent agriculture, although occasional temporary ponds, or etaghas, as a result of rain-fed flooding of wadi beds in the Tadrart Acacus Mountains of the Libyan Sahara allow the pastoral Kel Tadrart Tuareg to cultivate cereals. Geoarchaeological and archaeological data, along with radiocarbon dating and evidence from rock art, however, suggest a much greater antiquity for the exploitation of these etaghas. The authors propose that the present-day cultivation of etaghas mirrors attempts at flood-recession or rain-fed cultivation by late prehistoric Pastoral Neolithic groups, who first exploited residual water resources to supplement their pastoral subsistence practices

Multi‐generational responses of a marine polychaete to a rapid change in seawater pCO2

Data archiving statement: Life‐history, metabolic and water chemistry data have been deposited in the British Oceanographic Data Centre (http://www.bodc.ac.uk, doi:10.5285/22b54764‐2448‐1318‐e053‐6c86abc01ae1).Little is known of the capacity that marine metazoans have to evolve under rapid pCO2 changes. Consequently, we reared a marine polychaete, Ophryotrocha labronica, previously cultured for approximately 33 generations under a low/variable pH regime, under elevated and low pCO2 for six generations. The strain used was found to be tolerant to elevated pCO2 conditions. In generations F1 and F2 females’ fecundity was significantly lower in the low pCO2 treatment. However, from generation F3 onwards there were no differences between pCO2 treatments, indicating that trans‐generational effects enabled the restoration and maintenance of reproductive output. Whilst the initial fitness recovery was likely driven by trans‐generational plasticity (TGP), the results from reciprocal transplant assays, performed using F7 individuals, made it difficult to disentangle between whether TGP had persisted across multiple generations, or if evolutionary adaptation had occurred. Nonetheless, both are important mechanisms for persistence under climate change. Overall, our study highlights the importance of multi‐generational experiments in more accurately determining marine metazoans’ responses to changes in pCO2, and strengthens the case for exploring their use in conservation, by creating specific pCO2 tolerant strains of keystone ecosystem species.This work was supported by a NERC‐Defra‐DEC UKOA Research Programme grant NE/H017127/1 to J.I.S. and P.C. A.R.R. was supported by a Junta de Andalucía (Spanish Regional Government) grant RNM‐3924. P.C. is supported by a NSERC Discovery Program grant and G.M.N. is supported by a EU Marie Curie‐Skłodowska Research Fellowship (EVOLMARIN‐GA 659359).Peer reviewe

Itinerari e Laboratori all'Orto Botanico: 3. Le piante, gli adattamenti e le difese

Il Gruppo Guide dell'Orto Botanico presenta il terzo contributo alle attivit\ue0 didattiche extra-universitarie rivolte alle scuole, illustrando l'itinerario "Le piante, gli adattamenti e le difese". vengono trattai alcuni degli adattamenti pi\uf9 straordinari, che permettono alle piante di occupare i diversi ambienti presenti sulla terra

Exploiting a monastic territory: a multi-disciplinary approach using GIS and pollen analysis to study the evolution of medieval landscape of the Jure Vetere monastery (Calabria-Italy)

Lo sfruttamento di un territorio monastico: un approccio multidisciplinare con l\u2019utilizzo del GIS e delle analisi polliniche per lostudio dell\u2019evoluzione del paesaggio medievale del monastero di Jure Vetere (Calabria-Italia).Nelle pagine che seguono analizzeremo i dati relativi all\u2019ambiente naturale e le modalit\ue0 di sfruttamento del territorio dell\u2019insediamentomonastico di Jure Vetere, sorto nell\u2019altipiano silano della Calabria (1100 m s.l.m.), tra gli ultimi anni del XII secoloe i primi decenni del XIII. Si tratta dei due periodi cronologici (Periodi I e II) riferibili alla frequentazione medievale delComplesso Architettonico A, cos\uec come essa risulta dalle ricerche multidisciplinari condotte sul sito dall\u2019IBAM-CNR dal 2002fino al 2005. Del complesso Architettonico A sono stati riconosciuti due episodi costruttivi: il Corpo di Fabbrica 1 e il Corpo diFabbrica 2. Alla fine del Periodo II si verificano il definitivo trasferimento della comunit\ue0 monastica e l\u2019abbandono del sito. Diparticolare importanza si \ue8 rivelato lo studio di ricostruzione paleoambientale relativa al territorio circostante, prima e durantel\u2019epoca della frequentazione del monastero nonch\ue9 dopo il suo abbandono, ottenuto su base palinologica. Tali analisi hannoconsentito di ricostruire l\u2019ambiente e il paesaggio vegetale del pianoro dove era stato fondato il protomonastero, fornendo i datinecessari per la lettura interpretativa delle dinamiche di sfruttamento delle risorse vegetali da parte della comunit\ue0 monastica.Le analisi dei manufatti archeologici e degli ecofatti eseguite sul GIS hanno permesso di calcolare il costo di spostamento in terminidi tempo e di avanzare una proposta di classificazione dei diversi tipi di suoli potenzialmente sfruttabili attorno al sito. L\u2019elaborazioneinformatica dei dati ha suggerito quindi di riconoscere due principali aree di provenienza delle materie primarie esecondarie necessarie alla vita nel monastero: un bacino interno funzionale allo sfruttamento totale intensivo delle risorse, unbacino esterno per le attivit\ue0 lavorative sussidiarie a carattere estensivo (suoli per orti e seminativi, aree a vocazione pastoralee aree per lo sfruttamento dei boschi). Infine, in una prospettiva del proseguimento futuro delle ricerche, si forniscono alcuneindicazioni riguardo i possedimenti ubicati a lunga distanza dal sito e sono avanzate ipotesi in merito ai terreni per il pascolo invernale,i tenimenti con colture e i punti di sosta lungo i tragitti di collegamento

Recupero delle comunità macrozoobentoniche in seguito all'estrazione di sabbie relitte in un'area al largo delle coste dell'Emilia Romagna.

online] URL: http://www.xvcongresso.societaitalianaecologia.org/articles/Massamba-N-Siala-19.pd

Recolonization and recovery dynamics of the macrozoobenthos after sand extraction in relict sand bottoms of the Northern Adriatic Sea

International audienc

The Messak Project. Cultural and Natural Preservation and Sustainable Tourism (south-western Libya).

The Messak Project started in summer 2010 as a joint project of the Libyan Department of Archaeology and the Italian-Libyan Archaeological Mission in the Acacus and Messak of Sapienza University of Rome, a three-year programme of heritage research and management of the Messak plateaux in south-western Libya. At the end of February 2011, in the final stages of the first season, the civil uprising interrupted the research and determined the termination of the project. After eight months of conflict, there is growing concern from the international scientific community about the state of the Libyan cultural heritage and its role in the future of the country (http://whc.unesco.org/en/news/799/). In this respect, we believe that communication of the preliminary results of the project can contribute to keep focusing attention on the Libyan situation, and to emphasise the wealth and outstanding value of the cultural heritage in a remote but crucial area for the country