On the taxonomic resolution of pollen and spore records of Earth’s vegetation

Premise of research. Pollen and spores (sporomorphs) are a valuable record of plant life and have provided information on subjects ranging from the nature and timing of evolutionary events to the relationship between vegetation and climate. However, sporomorphs can be morphologically similar at the species, genus, or family level. Studies of extinct plant groups in pre-Quaternary time often include dispersed sporomorph taxa whose parent plant is known only to the class level. Consequently, sporomorph records of vegetation suffer from limited taxonomic resolution and typically record information about plant life at a taxonomic rank above species.Methodology. In this article, we review the causes of low taxonomic resolution, highlight examples where this has hampered the study of vegetation, and discuss the strategies researchers have developed to overcome the low taxonomic resolution of the sporomorph record. Based on this review, we offer our views on how greater taxonomic precision might be attained in future work. Pivotal results. Low taxonomic resolution results from a combination of several factors, including inadequate reference collections, the absence of sporomorphs in situ in fossilized reproductive structures, and damage following fossilization. A primary cause is the difficulty of accurately describing the very small morphological differences between species using descriptive terminology, which results in palynologists classifying sporomorphs conservatively at the genus or family level to ensure that classifications are reproducible between samples and between researchers. Conclusions. In our view, the most promising approach to the problem of low taxonomic resolution is a combination of high-resolution imaging and computational image analysis. In particular, we encourage palynologists to explore the utility of microscopy techniques that aim to recover morphological information from below the diffraction limit of light and to employ computational image analyses to consistently quantify small morphological differences between species

The magic duel from Sumer to Grail: Considerations on a Study by A. Coomaraswamy

In 1944 Ananda Coomaraswamy published an essay on the parallels between the plot of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, a Medieval English poem that forms part of the cycle of The Knights of the Round Table, and the mythological Hindu tale on the fight between the god Indra and Namuci. By means of this essay Coomaraswamy expounded his manifesto of Philosophia perennis, and referred to many mythologies of other cultures to illustrate the metaphysical theme of the One and the Many, the creation of Time and Space, and the Reintegration into the One. At that time the Sumerian poem Lugal-e ud melambi nirĝal was not well known. Now it is not only possible to integrate the documentation Coomaraswamy put forward with this poem and other Mesopotamian myths, but also to include Mesopotamian religious thought in the general pattern he outlinedNel 1944 Ananda Coomaraswamy pubblicò un saggio sui paralleli tra la trama del poema inglese medievale Sir Gawain e il Cavaliere Verde, che fa parte del ciclo dei Cavalieri della tavola Rotonda, e il mito indiano sullo scontro tra il dio Indra e Namuci. Con questo saggio Coomaraswamy rese pubblico il suo manifesto di Philosophia perennis, e riferì su molte mitologie di altre culture, per illustrare il tema metafisico dell'Uno e del Molteplice, la creazione di Tempo e Spazio e la Reintegrazione nell'Uno. A quel tempo, il poema sumerico Lugal-e ud melambi nirĝal non era ben conosciuto. Ora non solo è possibile integrare la documentazione addotta da Coomaraswamy con questo poema ed altri miti mesopotamici, ma anche includere il pensiero religioso mesopotamico nello schema generale che egli deline

An Automated Framework for Structural Test-data Generation

Structural testing criteria are mandated in many software development standards and guidelines. The process of generating test data to achieve 100% coverage of a given structural coverage metric is labour-intensive and expensive. This paper presents an approach to automate the generation of such test data. The test-data generation is based on the application of a dynamic optimisation-based search for the required test data. The same approach can be generalised to solve other test-data generation problems. Three such applications are discussed-boundary value analysis, assertion/run-time exception testing, and component re-use testing. A prototype tool-set has been developed to facilitate the automatic generation of test data for these structural testing problems. The results of preliminary experiments using this technique and the prototype tool-set are presented and show the efficiency and effectiveness of this approac