Human bony labyrinth is an indicator of population history and dispersal from Africa.

The dispersal of modern humans from Africa is now well documented with genetic data that track population history, as well as gene flow between populations. Phenetic skeletal data, such as cranial and pelvic morphologies, also exhibit a dispersal-from-Africa signal, which, however, tends to be blurred by the effects of local adaptation and in vivo phenotypic plasticity, and that is often deteriorated by postmortem damage to skeletal remains. These complexities raise the question of which skeletal structures most effectively track neutral population history. The cavity system of the inner ear (the so-called bony labyrinth) is a good candidate structure for such analyses. It is already fully formed by birth, which minimizes postnatal phenotypic plasticity, and it is generally well preserved in archaeological samples. Here we use morphometric data of the bony labyrinth to show that it is a surprisingly good marker of the global dispersal of modern humans from Africa. Labyrinthine morphology tracks genetic distances and geography in accordance with an isolation-by-distance model with dispersal from Africa. Our data further indicate that the neutral-like pattern of variation is compatible with stabilizing selection on labyrinth morphology. Given the increasingly important role of the petrous bone for ancient DNA recovery from archaeological specimens, we encourage researchers to acquire 3D morphological data of the inner ear structures before any invasive sampling. Such data will constitute an important archive of phenotypic variation in present and past populations, and will permit individual-based genotype-phenotype comparisons

Prolactin

During an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) glucose and insulin levels were measured in 26 patients with prolactin-producing pituitary tumours without growth hormone excess. Basal glucose and insulin levels did not differ from the values of an age-matched control group. After glucose load the hyperprolactinaemic patients showed a decrease in glucose tolerance and a hyperinsulinaemia. Bromocriptine (CB 154), which suppressed PRL, improved glucose tolerance and decreased insulin towards normal in a second OGTT. — Human PRL or CB 154 had no significant influence on insulin release due to glucose in the perfused rat pancreas. — These findings suggest a diabetogenic effect of PRL. CB 154 might be a useful drug in improving glucose utilization in hormone-active pituitary tumours

Building a training image with digital outcrop models

Current standard geostatistical approaches to characterizing subsurface heterogeneity may not capture realistic facies geometries and fluid flow paths. Multiple-point statistics (MPS) has shown promise in portraying complex geometries realistically; however, realizations are limited by the reliability of the model of heterogeneity upon which MPS relies, that is the Training Image (TI). Attempting to increase realism captured in TIs, a quantitative outcrop analog based approach utilizing terrestrial lidar and high-resolution, calibrated digital photography is combined with lithofacies analysis to produce TIs. Terrestrial lidar scans and high-resolution digital imagery were acquired of a Westwater Canyon Member, Morrison Formation outcrop in Ojito Wilderness, New Mexico, USA. The resulting point cloud was used to develop a cm scale mesh. Digital images of the outcrop were processed through a combination of photogrammetric techniques and manual digitizing to delineate different facies and sedimentary structures. The classified images were projected onto the high-resolution mesh creating a physically plausible Digital Outcrop Model (DOM), portions of which were used to build MPS TIs. The resulting MPS realization appears to capture realistic geometries of the deposit and empirically honors facies distributions

Human bony labyrinth is an indicator of population history and dispersal from Africa.

The dispersal of modern humans from Africa is now well documented with genetic data that track population history, as well as gene flow between populations. Phenetic skeletal data, such as cranial and pelvic morphologies, also exhibit a dispersal-from-Africa signal, which, however, tends to be blurred by the effects of local adaptation and in vivo phenotypic plasticity, and that is often deteriorated by postmortem damage to skeletal remains. These complexities raise the question of which skeletal structures most effectively track neutral population history. The cavity system of the inner ear (the so-called bony labyrinth) is a good candidate structure for such analyses. It is already fully formed by birth, which minimizes postnatal phenotypic plasticity, and it is generally well preserved in archaeological samples. Here we use morphometric data of the bony labyrinth to show that it is a surprisingly good marker of the global dispersal of modern humans from Africa. Labyrinthine morphology tracks genetic distances and geography in accordance with an isolation-by-distance model with dispersal from Africa. Our data further indicate that the neutral-like pattern of variation is compatible with stabilizing selection on labyrinth morphology. Given the increasingly important role of the petrous bone for ancient DNA recovery from archaeological specimens, we encourage researchers to acquire 3D morphological data of the inner ear structures before any invasive sampling. Such data will constitute an important archive of phenotypic variation in present and past populations, and will permit individual-based genotype-phenotype comparisons

AMINOPEPTIDASES FROM HUMAN-LEUKOCYTES

RAUTENBERG W, Tschesche H. AMINOPEPTIDASES FROM HUMAN-LEUKOCYTES. HOPPE-SEYLERS ZEITSCHRIFT FUR PHYSIOLOGISCHE CHEMIE. 1984;365(1):49-58

Application of computational mechanics to the analysis of natural data: an example in geomagnetism

We discuss how the ideal formalism of computational mechanics can be adapted to apply to a noninfinite series of corrupted and correlated data, that is typical of most observed natural time series. Specifically, a simple filter that removes the corruption that creates rare unphysical causal states is demonstrated, and the concept of effective soficity is introduced. We believe that computational mechanics cannot be applied to a noisy and finite data series without invoking an argument based upon effective soficity. A related distinction between noise and unresolved structure is also defined: Noise can only be eliminated by increasing the length of the time series, whereas the resolution of previously unresolved structure only requires the finite memory of the analysis to be increased. The benefits of these concepts are demonstrated in a simulated times series by (a) the effective elimination of white noise corruption from a periodic signal using the expletive filter and (b) the appearance of an effectively sofic region in the statistical complexity of a biased Poisson switch time series that is insensitive to changes in the word length (memory) used in the analysis. The new algorithm is then applied to an analysis of a real geomagnetic time series measured at Halley, Antarctica. Two principal components in the structure are detected that are interpreted as the diurnal variation due to the rotation of the Earth-based station under an electrical current pattern that is fixed with respect to the Sun-Earth axis and the random occurrence of a signature likely to be that of the magnetic substorm. In conclusion, some useful terminology for the discussion of model construction in general is introduced