LGBT+ Histories and Historians

In February 2019, the Royal Historical Society established a working group to explore the teaching of LGBT+ and queer histories, and to coIn February 2019, the RHS established a working group to explore the teaching of LGBT+ and queer histories, and to consider the experiences of LGBT+ historians. Between July and September 2019 we ran an open survey which attracted 852 responses. This is the resulting report. While indicating that much more needs to be done, the report noted that “LGBT+ and queer histories are an integral part of human history. To reflect the methodological advances and rich research findings across a wide spectrum of fields, chronologies and geographical regions more fully, LGBT+ histories and perspectives in all their diversity need to be represented in teaching and university-based research, as well as in museums, galleries, archives and libraries.

Lars Hætta’s miniature world: Sámi prison op-art autoethnography

This article examines a collection of miniature objects, now held in museum collections, which were originally made by a Sámi political prisoner in Norway during the mid-19th century as part of an educational programme. The author draws on recent developments in the theory of miniaturization to consider these miniatures as examples of prison op-art autoethnography: communicative devices which seek to address broad and complex social issues through the process of the creation and distribution of semiophorically functionless mimetic objects of reduced scale and complexity, and which reflect the restrictions of incarcerated artistic expression and the questions this raises regarding authenticity and hybridity

Standards for Scalable Clinical Decision Support: Need, Current and Emerging Standards, Gaps, and Proposal for Progress

Despite their potential to significantly improve health care, advanced clinical decision support (CDS) capabilities are not widely available in the clinical setting. An important reason for this limited availability of CDS capabilities is the application-specific and institution-specific nature of most current CDS implementations. Thus, a critical need for enabling CDS capabilities on a much larger scale is the development and adoption of standards that enable current and emerging CDS resources to be more effectively leveraged across multiple applications and care settings. Standards required for such effective scaling of CDS include (i) standard terminologies and information models to represent and communicate about health care data; (ii) standard approaches to representing clinical knowledge in both human-readable and machine-executable formats; and (iii) standard approaches for leveraging these knowledge resources to provide CDS capabilities across various applications and care settings. A number of standards do exist or are under development to meet these needs. However, many gaps and challenges remain, including the excessive complexity of many standards; the limited availability of easily accessible knowledge resources implemented using standard approaches; and the lack of tooling and other practical resources to enable the efficient adoption of existing standards. Thus, the future development and widespread adoption of current CDS standards will depend critically on the availability of tooling, knowledge bases, and other resources that make the adoption of CDS standards not only the right approach to take, but the cost-effective path to follow given the alternative of using a traditional, ad hoc approach to implementing CDS

The Anthropocene monument:on relating geological and human time

In the Parthenon frieze, the time of mortals and the time of gods seem to merge. Dipesh Chakrabarty has argued that with the advent of the Anthropocene the times of human history and of the Earth are similarly coming together. Are humans entering the ‘monumental time’ of the Earth, to stand alongside the Olympian gods of the other geological forces? In this paper I first look at the cultural shifts leading to the modern idea of separate human and Earth histories. I examine the changing use of monuments to mediate between human and other temporalities. I explore the use of ‘stratigraphic sections’ as natural monuments to mark transitions between the major time units of Earth history, and the erection of intentional monuments nearby. I suggest that the Anthropocene, as a geological epoch-in-the-making, may challenge the whole system of monumental semiotics used to stabilise our way of thinking about deep time

Miniatures from domestic contexts in Iron age Iberia

This article reviews a set of miniatures from domestic contexts in Iron Age eastern Iberia, and interprets them in terms of their role in forging social personae. After an introduction to the historical case under consideration, the miniatures are described in terms of their typology and their contexts of provenance are outlined. Though not abundant, they tend to occur in central places in the landscape; specifically, they are often found in houses of the powerful. The vast majority are miniatures of pottery and tools, though some miniature weapons are recorded. We contend that these objects were used as a means of enculturation and for the learning of values and norms. It is no coincidence that they emerge in the archaeological record of Iron Age Iberia at the same time as the rise of a social structure based on hereditary power

A national clinical decision support infrastructure to enable the widespread and consistent practice of genomic and personalized medicine

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In recent years, the completion of the Human Genome Project and other rapid advances in genomics have led to increasing anticipation of an era of genomic and personalized medicine, in which an individual's health is optimized through the use of all available patient data, including data on the individual's genome and its downstream products. Genomic and personalized medicine could transform healthcare systems and catalyze significant reductions in morbidity, mortality, and overall healthcare costs.</p> <p>Discussion</p> <p>Critical to the achievement of more efficient and effective healthcare enabled by genomics is the establishment of a robust, nationwide clinical decision support infrastructure that assists clinicians in their use of genomic assays to guide disease prevention, diagnosis, and therapy. Requisite components of this infrastructure include the standardized representation of genomic and non-genomic patient data across health information systems; centrally managed repositories of computer-processable medical knowledge; and standardized approaches for applying these knowledge resources against patient data to generate and deliver patient-specific care recommendations. Here, we provide recommendations for establishing a national decision support infrastructure for genomic and personalized medicine that fulfills these needs, leverages existing resources, and is aligned with the <it>Roadmap for National Action on Clinical Decision Support </it>commissioned by the U.S. Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology. Critical to the establishment of this infrastructure will be strong leadership and substantial funding from the federal government.</p> <p>Summary</p> <p>A national clinical decision support infrastructure will be required for reaping the full benefits of genomic and personalized medicine. Essential components of this infrastructure include standards for data representation; centrally managed knowledge repositories; and standardized approaches for leveraging these knowledge repositories to generate patient-specific care recommendations at the point of care.</p

Whole-genome sequencing and annotation of Bacillus safensis RIT372 and Pseudomonas oryzihabitans RIT370 from Capsicum annuum (bird\u27s eye chili) and Capsicum chinense (yellow lantern chili), respectively

Here, we report the genome sequences of Bacillus safensis RIT372 and Pseudomonas oryzihabitans RIT370 from Capsicum spp. Annotation revealed gene clusters for the synthesis of bacilysin, lichensin, and bacillibactin and sporulation killing factor (skfA) in Bacillus safensis RIT372 and turnerbactin and carotenoid in Pseudomonas oryzihabitans RIT370

Redating the formation of Lake Bafa, western Turkey: Integrative geoarchaeological methods and new environmental and dating evidence

The ancient Gulf of Latmos is an iconic example of a dynamic landscape and humankind's historical relationship with it. Using extensive new primary data and original models for calibrating radiocarbon dates in transitional lagoon environments, we demonstrate that Lake Bafa (or Bafa Gölü, in Turkish) formed at a much earlier date than previously thought. In questioning the logical process by which previous dates were achieved, we re‐examine the relationship between sedimentological data, archaeology and written history. We reassert the need to establish independently dated environmental data sets as the foundation of regional studies as distinct from archaeological and historical interpretive processes. We conclude that Lake Bafa slowly transitioned to become an isolated lagoon sometime between the end of the second millennium B.C. and end of the first millennium B.C.; becoming a fully closed brackish lake during the second millennium A.D. This marks a major shift in our understanding of the nature of human occupation and activity here during the last four millennia but also in the way we date ancient lagoons and integrate historical and environmental data in general