Textile technology in Nepal in the 5th-7th centuries CE: the case of Samdzong

The first results of textile and dye analyses of cloth remains recovered in Samdzong, Upper Mustang, Nepal, are presented. The site consists of ten shaft tombs, dated between the 400-650 CE, cut into a high cliff face at an elevation of 4000 m asl. The dry climate and high altitude favoured the exceptional preservation of organic materials. One of the objects recovered from the elite Samdzong 5 tomb complex is composed of wool fabrics to which copper, glass and cloth beads are attached and probably constitutes the remains of a complex decorative headwear, which may have been attached to a gold/silver mask. SEM was used to identify the fibre sources of the textiles, which are all of animal nature. Two of the textiles are made of degummed silk. There is no evidence for local silk production suggesting that Samdzong was inserted into the long-distance trade network of the Silk Road. HPLC-DAD analysis permitted identification of a variety of organic dyes, including Indian lac, munjeet, turmeric and knotweed/indigo, while cinnabar was identified through micro Raman spectrometry. The results indicate that locally produced materials were used in combination with those likely imported from afar, including China and India.The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP/2007-2013-312603). Excavations at Samdzong have been supported by grants to Aldenderfer from the National Geographic Society and the Henry Luce Foundation. Many thanks to Alexia Coudray and Marie-Christine Maquoi for their dedicated work in the KIK/IRPA laboratory.This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from Taylor & Francis via http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/20548923.2015.111042

Of gold masks, bronze mirrors and brass bracelets: Analyses of metallic artefacts from Samdzong, Upper Mustang, Nepal 450–650 CE

© 2019 Elsevier Ltd The site of Samdzong is composed of a series of shaft tombs situated at 4000 m altitude in the Himalayas. Recent archaeological expeditions have recovered an exceptional metal assemblage including gold and silver masks, copper vessels, iron daggers, brass bangles and a bronze medallion. The richness and variety of the collection provided an unusual starting point to investigate trade and regional exchange patterns in the period 450–650 CE, in combination with data from other materials. Here we present a stylistic, metallographic, elemental and isotopic study of a selection of the metal objects. The results suggest a South Asian origin for the bulk of the metals, while evidencing a variety of technological and cultural traditions that show connections with Central Asia and the Silk Road. This is one of the first comprehensive analyses of archaeological metal objects from the High Himalayas, offering a baseline for future comparative studies

Environmental management decision-making in certified hotels

This paper analyses environmental decision-making against two axes, motivations and decision-making processes, to understand the reasons for pro-environmental behaviour by the managements of Spanish Eco-management and Audit Scheme (EMAS)-certified hotels. Mixed methods were used to study perceptions of EMAS and reasons for being certified, with current and lapsed EMAS-certified firms triangulated against expert interviews and documentary evidence. Four groups of hotels were differentiated: Strategic hotels (22%) (with high levels of integrated environmental management), Followers (48%), Greenwashers (11%) and Laggers (19%) (with low levels of integrated environmental management). Most hotels were found to be internally driven in their purpose and ad hoc in their decision-making, with limited understanding of externally driven benefits and motivation for more systematic management systems. This questions the success of EMAS as both a continuous improvement management and as a market-based regulation tool for hotels. Few hotels overall related high environmental standards to the possibilities of gaining market advantage: most wished to avoid legal challenges. The paper also illustrates the ways in which hotels opportunistically switch certification systems to get what they see as a better deal. © 2011 Taylor & Francis

Motivation profiles in sport: A self-determination theory perspective

The present study examined the link between motivation profiles among adult sports participants and the outcomes of enjoyment, effort, positive and negative affect, attitude toward sport participation, intention to continue sport participation, satisfaction, and persistence in sport. Two samples of participants (n = 590 and n = 555) completed the Sport Motivation Scale and a range of self-report measures to assess the outcome variables. Exploratory cluster analyses applied to Sample 1 and confirmatory cluster analysis applied to Sample 2 identified two clusters of sport participants. The first comprised participants with high scores on both non self-determined and self-determined motives. The second comprised participants with high scores on self-determined motives but low scores on non self- determined motives. Participants in the first cluster scored higher on all outcome variables. The results are discussed with reference to a more in-depth understanding of the motivation dynamics of sport participation based on Self-Determination Theory

Autonomous clustering using rough set theory

This paper proposes a clustering technique that minimises the need for subjective human intervention and is based on elements of rough set theory. The proposed algorithm is unified in its approach to clustering and makes use of both local and global data properties to obtain clustering solutions. It handles single-type and mixed attribute data sets with ease and results from three data sets of single and mixed attribute types are used to illustrate the technique and establish its efficiency

Holistic corpus-based dialectology

This paper is concerned with sketching future directions for corpus-based dialectology. We advocate a holistic approach to the study of geographically conditioned linguistic variability, and we present a suitable methodology, 'corpusbased dialectometry', in exactly this spirit. Specifically, we argue that in order to live up to the potential of the corpus-based method, practitioners need to (i) abandon their exclusive focus on individual linguistic features in favor of the study of feature aggregates, (ii) draw on computationally advanced multivariate analysis techniques (such as multidimensional scaling, cluster analysis, and principal component analysis), and (iii) aid interpretation of empirical results by marshalling state-of-the-art data visualization techniques. To exemplify this line of analysis, we present a case study which explores joint frequency variability of 57 morphosyntax features in 34 dialects all over Great Britain

Developing an Individual-level Geodemographic Classification

Geodemographics is a spatially explicit classification of socio-economic data, which can be used to describe and analyse individuals by where they live. Geodemographic information is used by the public sector for planning and resource allocation but it also has considerable use within commercial sector applications. Early geodemographic systems, such as the UK’s ACORN (A Classification of Residential Neighbourhoods), used only area-based census data, but more recent systems have added supplementary layers of information, e.g. credit details and survey data, to provide better discrimination between classes. Although much more data has now become available, geodemographic systems are still fundamentally built from area-based census information. This is partly because privacy laws require release of census data at an aggregate level but mostly because much of the research remains proprietary. Household level classifications do exist but they are often based on regressions between area and household data sets. This paper presents a different approach for creating a geodemographic classification at the individual level using only census data. A generic framework is presented, which classifies data from the UK Census Small Area Microdata and then allocates the resulting clusters to a synthetic population created via microsimulation. The framework is then applied to the creation of an individual-based system for the city of Leeds, demonstrated using data from the 2001 census, and is further validated using individual and household survey data from the British Household Panel Survey

An effective non-parametric method for globally clustering genes from expression profiles

Clustering is widely used in bioinformatics to find gene correlation patterns. Although many algorithms have been proposed, these are usually confronted with difficulties in meeting the requirements of both automation and high quality. In this paper, we propose a novel algorithm for clustering genes from their expression profiles. The unique features of the proposed algorithm are twofold: it takes into consideration global, rather than local, gene correlation information in clustering processes; and it incorporates clustering quality measurement into the clustering processes to implement non-parametric, automatic and global optimal gene clustering. The evaluation on simulated and real gene data sets demonstrates the effectiveness of the algorithm. <br /

The efficacy of whole human genome capture on ancient dental calculus and dentin

Objectives: Dental calculus is among the richest known sources of ancient DNA in the archaeological record. Although most DNA within calculus is microbial, it has been shown to contain sufficient human DNA for the targeted retrieval of whole mitochondrial genomes. Here, we explore whether calculus is also a viable substrate for whole human genome recovery using targeted enrichment techniques. Materials and methods: Total DNA extracted from 24 paired archaeological human dentin and calculus samples was subjected to whole human genome enrichment using in-solution hybridization capture and high-throughput sequencing. Results: Total DNA from calculus exceeded that of dentin in all cases, and although the proportion of human DNA was generally lower in calculus, the absolute human DNA content of calculus and dentin was not significantly different. Whole genome enrichment resulted in up to fourfold enrichment of the human endogenous DNA content for both dentin and dental calculus libraries, albeit with some loss in complexity. Recovering more on-target reads for the same sequencing effort generally improved the quality of downstream analyses, such as sex and ancestry estimation. For nonhuman DNA, comparison of phylum-level microbial community structure revealed few differences between precapture and postcapture libraries, indicating that off-target sequences in human genome-enriched calculus libraries may still be useful for oral microbiome reconstruction. Discussion: While ancient human dental calculus does contain endogenous human DNA sequences, their relative proportion is low when compared with other skeletal tissues. Whole genome enrichment can help increase the proportion of recovered human reads, but in this instance enrichment efficiency was relatively low when compared with other forms of capture. We conclude that further optimization is necessary before the method can be routinely applied to archaeological samples