Gristhorpe Man: an Early Bronze Age log-coffin burial scientifically defined

© 2010 Antiquity PublicationsA log-coffin excavated in the early nineteenth century proved to be well enough preserved in the early twenty-first century for the fill armoury of modern scientific investigation to give its occupants and contents new identity, new origins and a new date. In many ways the interpretation is much the same as before: a local big man buried looking out to sea. Modern analytical techniques can create a person more real, more human and more securely anchored in history. This research team shows how.The project has been funded by grants from the British Academy, British Association for the Advancement of Science, Natural Environment Research Council, Royal Archaeological Institute and Scarborough Museums Trust. CJK’s participation in this project was funded by a Leverhulme Research Fellowship (RF/6/RFG/2008/0253)

Metabolic pathways in the apicoplast of apicomplexa

Intracellular parasites of the phylum Apicomplexa harbor a plastid-like organelle called apicoplast that is the most reduced organelle of this type known. Due to the medical importance of some members of Apicomplexa, a number of fully sequenced genomes are available that have allowed to assemble metabolic pathways also from the apicoplast and have revealed initial clues to its essential nature for parasite survival in the host. We provide a compilation of Internet resources useful to access, reconstruct, verify, or annotate metabolic pathways. Then we show detailed and updated metabolic maps and discuss the three major biosynthetic pathways leading to the generation of isoprenoids, fatty acids, and heme, and compare these routes in the different species. Moreover, several auxiliary pathways, like iron-sulfur cluster assembly, are covered and put into context with the major metabolic routes. Finally, we highlight some aspects that emerged from recent publications and were not discussed previously with regard to Apicomplexa