Antarctic meteorite descriptions 1976-1977-1978-1979

All previously distributed meteorite data sheets, plus a number of new ones for 1979 chondrites are included. A comprehensive sample index listing meteorite name/number, classification, and weathering category is also included. Separate indexes listing all petrologic type 3 and type 4 chondrites, all irons, all achondrites, and all carbonaceous chondrites in the collection is provided

Lessons from Love-Locks: The archaeology of a contemporary assemblage

This document is the Accepted Manuscript version. The final, definitive version of this paper has been published in Journal of Material Culture, November 2017, published by SAGE Publishing, All rights reserved.Loss of context is a challenge, if not the bane, of the ritual archaeologist’s craft. Those who research ritual frequently encounter difficulties in the interpretation of its often tantalisingly incomplete material record. Careful analysis of material remains may afford us glimpses into past ritual activity, but our often vast chronological separation from the ritual practitioners themselves prevent us from seeing the whole picture. The archaeologist engaging with structured deposits, for instance, is often forced to study ritual assemblages post-accumulation. Many nuances of its formation, therefore, may be lost in interpretation. This paper considers what insights an archaeologist could gain into the place, people, pace, and purpose of deposition by recording an accumulation of structured deposits during its formation, rather than after. To answer this, the paper will focus on a contemporary depositional practice: the love-lock. This custom involves the inscribing of names/initials onto a padlock, its attachment to a bridge or other public structure, and the deposition of the corresponding key into the water below; a ritual often enacted by a couple as a statement of their romantic commitment. Drawing on empirical data from a three-year diachronic site-specific investigation into a love-lock bridge in Manchester, UK, the author demonstrates the value of contemporary archaeology in engaging with the often enigmatic material culture of ritual accumulations.Peer reviewe

The Penny’s Dropped: Renegotiating the contemporary coin deposit

This is the Accepted Manuscript of the following article: Ceri Houlbrook, “The penny’s dropped: Renegotiating the contemporary coin deposit”, Journal of Material Culture, Vol. 20(2): 173-189, March 2015. The final published version is available at: http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1359183515577120#articleCitationDownloadContainer © 2015, © SAGE Publications.This article examines the status of coins as contemporary deposits in the British Isles. With a focus on both historical and contemporary sites, from the Neolithic long barrow of Wayland’s Smithy, Oxfordshire, to the plethora of wishing-wells and coin-trees distributed across the British Isles, it demonstrates the popularity of coins as ritual deposits. The author considers how they are perceived and treated by site custodians, and concludes with a case study of an archaeological excavation, the 2013 Ardmaddy Wishing-Tree Project, which recovered a large amount of contemporary coin deposits. This article does not aim to locate itself within the debates of site custodianship and accessibility, nor does it propose to address the broader dilemmas of a site’s ritual continuity or resurgence. Instead, its aim is to encourage archaeologists to consider the contemporary deposit as an integral part of the ritual narrative of a site, rather than as disposable ‘ritual litter’.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio

Small Change: Economics and the British coin-tree

This is the accepted manuscript for the following article: Ceri Houlbrook, “Small Change: Economics and the British coin-tree”, Post Medieval Archaeology, Vol. 49(1), June 2015. The final published version can be found at: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1179/0079423615Z.00000000074 © Society for Post-Medieval Archaeology 2015Throughout the c.2000 year period coins have been circulated in Britain, they have also been ritually employed, most notably as votive deposits. Focusing specifically on the understudied custom of the British coin-tree, whereby coins are ritually embedded into the barks of trees, this paper considers the coin’s role and applicability as a deposit. It aims to demonstrate that our understanding of the coin’s past, present, and future ritual employment is not only aided by a consideration of economics and the coin’s secular function; it would be utterly incomplete without it.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio

Mutations in ASXL1 are associated with poor prognosis across the spectrum of malignant myeloid diseases

The ASXL1 gene is one of the most frequently mutated genes in malignant myeloid diseases. The ASXL1 protein belongs to protein complexes involved in the epigenetic regulation of gene expression. ASXL1 mutations are found in myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPN), myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), chronic myelomonocytic leukemia (CMML) and acute myeloid leukemia (AML). They are generally associated with signs of aggressiveness and poor clinical outcome. Because of this, a systematic determination of ASXL1 mutational status in myeloid malignancies should help in prognosis assessment

Compared Efficacy of Adjuvant Intravesical BCG-TICE vs. BCG-RIVM for High-Risk Non-Muscle Invasive Bladder Cancer (NMIBC): A Propensity Score Matched Analysis

Background: Intravesical immunotherapy with bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) is the standard therapy for high-risk non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC). The superiority of any BCG strain over another could not be demonstrated yet. Methods: Patients with NMIBCs underwent adjuvant induction ± maintenance schedule of intravesical immunotherapy with either BCG TICE or RIVM at two high-volume tertiary institutions. Only BCG-naïve patients and those treated with the same strain over the course of follow-up were included. One-to-one (1:1) propensity score matching (PSM) between the two cohorts was utilized to adjust for baseline demographic and tumor characteristics imbalances. Kaplan-Meier estimates and multivariable Cox regression models according to high-risk NMIBC prognostic factors were implemented to address survival differences between the strains. Sub-group analysis modeling of the influence of routine secondary resection (re-TUR) in the setting of the sole maintenance adjuvant schedule for the two strains was further performed. Results: 852 Ta-T1 NMIBCs (n = 719, 84.4% on TICE; n = 133, 15.6% on RIVM) with a median of 53 (24-77) months of follow-up were reviewed. After PSM, no differences at 5-years RFS, PFS, and CSS at both Kaplan-Meier and Cox regression analyses were detected for the whole cohort. In the sub-group setting of full adherence to European/American Urology Guidelines (EAU/NCCN), BCG TICE demonstrated longer 5-years RFS compared to RIVM (68% vs. 43%, p = 0.008; HR: 0.45 95% CI 0.25-0.81). Conclusion: When routinely performing re-TUR followed by a maintenance BCG schedule, TICE was superior to RIVM for RFS outcomes. However, no significant differences were detected for PFS and CSS, respectively

Hypereosinophilic syndromes

Hypereosinophilic syndromes (HES) constitute a rare and heterogeneous group of disorders, defined as persistent and marked blood eosinophilia (> 1.5 × 109/L for more than six consecutive months) associated with evidence of eosinophil-induced organ damage, where other causes of hypereosinophilia such as allergic, parasitic, and malignant disorders have been excluded. Prevalence is unknown. HES occur most frequently in young to middle-aged patients, but may concern any age group. Male predominance (4–9:1 ratio) has been reported in historic series but this is likely to reflect the quasi-exclusive male distribution of a sporadic hematopoietic stem cell mutation found in a recently characterized disease variant. Target-organ damage mediated by eosinophils is highly variable among patients, with involvement of skin, heart, lungs, and central and peripheral nervous systems in more than 50% of cases. Other frequently observed complications include hepato- and/or splenomegaly, eosinophilic gastroenteritis, and coagulation disorders. Recent advances in underlying pathogenesis have established that hypereosinophilia may be due either to primitive involvement of myeloid cells, essentially due to occurrence of an interstitial chromosomal deletion on 4q12 leading to creation of the FIP1L1-PDGFRA fusion gene (F/P+ variant), or to increased interleukin (IL)-5 production by a clonally expanded T cell population (lymphocytic variant), most frequently characterized by a CD3-CD4+ phenotype. Diagnosis of HES relies on observation of persistent and marked hypereosinophilia responsible for target-organ damage, and exclusion of underlying causes of hypereosinophilia, including allergic and parasitic disorders, solid and hematological malignancies, Churg-Strauss disease, and HTLV infection. Once these criteria are fulfilled, further testing for eventual pathogenic classification is warranted using appropriate cytogenetic and functional approaches. Therapeutic management should be adjusted to disease severity and eventual detection of pathogenic variants. For F/P+ patients, imatinib has undisputedly become first line therapy. For others, corticosteroids are generally administered initially, followed by agents such as hydroxycarbamide, interferon-alpha, and imatinib, for corticosteroid-resistant cases, as well as for corticosteroid-sparing purposes. Recent data suggest that mepolizumab, an anti-IL-5 antibody, is an effective corticosteroid-sparing agent for F/P-negative patients. Prognosis has improved significantly since definition of HES, and currently depends on development of irreversible heart failure, as well as eventual malignant transformation of myeloid or lymphoid cells

The Origin and Nature of Tightly Clustered BTG1 Deletions in Precursor B-Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia Support a Model of Multiclonal Evolution

Recurrent submicroscopic deletions in genes affecting key cellular pathways are a hallmark of pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). To gain more insight into the mechanism underlying these deletions, we have studied the occurrence and nature of abnormalities in one of these genes, the B-cell translocation gene 1 (BTG1), in a large cohort of pediatric ALL cases. BTG1 was found to be exclusively affected by genomic deletions, which were detected in 65 out of 722 B-cell precursor ALL (BCP-ALL) patient samples (9%), but not in 109 T-ALL cases. Eight different deletion sizes were identified, which all clustered at the telomeric site in a hotspot region within the second (and last) exon of the BTG1 gene, resulting in the expression of truncated BTG1 read-through transcripts. The presence of V(D)J recombination signal sequences at both sites of virtually all deletions strongly suggests illegitimate RAG1/RAG2-mediated recombination as the responsible mechanism. Moreover, high levels of histone H3 lysine 4 trimethylation (H3K4me3), which is known to tether the RAG enzyme complex to DNA, were found within the BTG1 gene body in BCP-ALL cells, but not T-ALL cells. BTG1 deletions were rarely found in hyperdiploid BCP-ALLs, but were predominant in other cytogenetic subgroups, including the ETV6-RUNX1 and BCR-ABL1 positive BCP-ALL subgroups. Through sensitive PCR-based screening, we identified multiple additional BTG1 deletions at the subclonal level in BCP-ALL, with equal cytogenetic distribution which, in some cases, grew out into the major clone at relapse. Taken together, our results indicate that BTG1 deletions may act as “drivers” of leukemogenesis in specific BCP-ALL subgroups, in which they can arise independently in multiple subclones at sites that are prone to aberrant RAG1/RAG2-mediated recombination events. These findings provide further evidence for a complex and multiclonal evolution of ALL