509 research outputs found

    Preliminary Report on a Stratified Late Archaic-Woodland Era Rockshelter in Rogers County, Oklahoma

    Get PDF
    In northeastern Oklahoma, very little is known about the transition from the Late Archaic to the Woodland period (Wyckoff and Brooks, 1983: 55). To date, most of the archeological evidence documenting this time period has been derived from sites with mixed or otherwise uncertain components. In this report, we present a preliminary description of a small rockshelter, 34RO252, which has a Late Archaic deposit stratigraphically below a Woodland era cultural deposit. These two deposits are unmixed, discrete, and are physically separated by an apparently sterile clay soil horizon. It is anticipated that the stratified cultural deposits at this site will help characterize the transition from the Late Archaic to the Early Woodland period along the Verdigris River in northeast Oklahoma. This site was first reported in April 1994 by two men who had discovered partially exposed human skeletal remains located in the rear remnant of a rockshelter at Oologah Lake in Rogers County, Oklahoma. The two men illegally excavated the remains and removed them from the site. 1 The rockshelter where the remains originated was subsequently examined by the authors and additional skeletal material was identified, in situ, in an exposed soil profile. A series of three radiocarbon assays, described below, placed the cultural deposit and the human remains within the Late Archaic-Woodland period (circa 780 B.C. to A.O. 900).2 This site is provisionally classified as corresponding to a cultural sequence that includes the old Grove C described by Purrington and Vehik

    A Comparison of Small and Large Business Managers' Attitudes Toward Innovation and the Role of Government in Promoting Technology

    Get PDF
    House  Resolution  820 calls for   the establishment  of  technology  partnerships,  funded by  the federal    government,   designed   specifically   to  improve   small   businesses  access  to technology.   However, government-industry partnerships  have been criticized for  creating a government-assisted organization to compete with do1nestic private sector firms. The critics of  such  partnerships   argue  that  marker  intervention   by  the  government   often  results  in competitive  disadvantages for   the  very firms   the partnership   was  intended  to help.     This study assessed  the attitudes of small  business owners and managers toward  government  directed market interventions such as that proposed  in HR 820.  The results suggest  that there are some important  differences  between  managers  at  large  corporations  and  small  businesses  on  the effectiveness  of  market  intervention  by  the government,  both  in terms of job   creation  and technology   enhancement.      Within  the  subsample   of  small  firms,   however,   there   is  sharp disagreement on the value of government  programs  such as those proposed  in H.R. 820

    Helianthus winteri (Asteraceae), a New Perennial Species From the Southern Sierra Nevada Foothills, California

    Get PDF
    Helianthus winteri is described from Fresno and Tulare Counties in the southern Sierra Nevada foothills of California. It is distinguished from H. annuus by its woody trunk, year-round blooming, and morphological characteristics. It occurs in open, ungrazed foothill woodlands and annual grasslands on well-drained, granitic soils, generally on lower-elevation, south-facing foothill slopes east of the San Joaquin Valley

    Strategic Implications of Current Small Business Waste Reduction Programs

    Get PDF
    The strategic importance of environmental awareness has received a great deal of recognition recently, but attention has centered primarily on residential or municipal recycling and waste reduction efforts. The small amount of research done on commercial waste reduction policies has focused on the altitudes and programs of large corporations. As governmental agencies impose waste reduction mandates on communities and corporations, many small businesses will be forced 10 adopt waste reduction programs in the future. In addition, a growing body of evidence suggests that environmental programs are associated with profitability, indicating the need for a more strategic approach 10 the management of environmental issues in order to effectively administer required programs. This study presents results of survey research indicating that small businesses are willing 10 commit 10 strategic waste reduction programs, but are concerned primarily with the convenience  of such programs. Although convenience is frequently related 10 operating cost in small businesses, issues regarding the expense of waste reduction programs are of secondary concern 10 small business executives. The implications of these results are discussed, along with recommendations for small business executives, consult­ ants, and policy  makers

    Snapshots in time: MicroCT scanning of pottery sherds determines early domestication of sorghum (Sorghum bicolor) in East Africa

    Get PDF
    MicroCT visualisations of organic inclusions within pottery sherds from Khashm el Girba 23 (KG23), Sudan, reveal domesticated sorghum (Sorghum bicolor subsp. bicolor) at c. 3700–2900 BCE. The percentage of non-shattering spikelet bases was c. 73% of identifiable visualizations, with c. 27% representing wild types. These analyses demonstrate the domestication of sorghum is significantly earlier than suggested by previous archaeological research. These results also demonstrate that microCT scanning is a major qualitative and quantitative advance on pre-existing methods for the investigation of crop remains in pottery sherds, which hitherto have been reliant on surface impressions; it is non-destructive, provides higher resolution 3D imaging of organic inclusions, and enables greater archaeobotanical recovery of inclusions within a sherd. MicroCT analysis of ceramics, mudbrick and other building materials has considerable potential for improving the chronologies and resolution for the domestication of other cereals in the past

    Evidence for Sorghum Domestication in Fourth Millennium BC Eastern Sudan: Spikelet Morphology from Ceramic Impressions of the Butana Group

    Get PDF
    Since the 1970s, the quest for finding the origins of domesticated sorghum in Africa has remained elusive despite the fact that sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench. sensu stricto) is one of the world’s most important cereals. Recognized as originating from wild populations in Africa (Sorghum arundinaceum (Desv.) Stapf), however, the date and cultural context of its domestication has been controversial, with many scholars inferring an early Holocene origin in parallel with better-known cereal domestications. This paper presents firm evidence that the process of domesticating sorghum was present in the far eastern Sahel in the southern Atbai at an archaeological site associated with the Butana Group. Ceramic sherds recovered from excavations undertaken by the Southern Methodist University Butana Project during the 1980s from the largest Butana Group site, KG23, near Kassala, eastern Sudan, were analyzed, and examination of the plant impressions in the pottery revealed diagnostic chaff in which both domesticated and wild sorghum types were identified, thus providing archaeobotanical evidence for the beginnings of cultivation and emergence of domesticated characteristics within sorghum during the fourth millennium BC in eastern Sudan

    On the Origins and Dissemination of Domesticated Sorghum and Pearl Millet across Africa and into India: a View from the Butana Group of the Far Eastern Sahel

    Get PDF
    Four decades have passed since Harlan and Stemler (1976) proposed the eastern Sahelian zone as the most likely center of Sorghum bicolor domestication. Recently, new data on seed impressions on Butana Group pottery, from the fourth millennium BC in the southern Atbai region of the far eastern Sahelian Belt in Africa, show evidence for cultivation activities of sorghum displaying some domestication traits. Pennisetum glaucum may have been undergoing domestication shortly thereafter in the western Sahel, as finds of fully domesticated pearl millet are present in southeastern Mali by the second half of the third millennium BC, and present in eastern Sudan by the early second millennium BC. The dispersal of the latter to India took less than 1000 years according to present data. Here, we review the middle Holocene Sudanese archaeological data for the first time, to situate the origins and spread of these two native summer rainfall cereals in what is proposed to be their eastern Sahelian Sudan gateway to the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean trade

    Expression of Distal-less, dachshund, and optomotor blind in Neanthes arenaceodentata (Annelida, Nereididae) does not support homology of appendage-forming mechanisms across the Bilateria

    Get PDF
    The similarity in the genetic regulation of arthropod and vertebrate appendage formation has been interpreted as the product of a plesiomorphic gene network that was primitively involved in bilaterian appendage development and co-opted to build appendages (in modern phyla) that are not historically related as structures. Data from lophotrochozoans are needed to clarify the pervasiveness of plesiomorphic appendage forming mechanisms. We assayed the expression of three arthropod and vertebrate limb gene orthologs, Distal-less (Dll), dachshund (dac), and optomotor blind (omb), in direct-developing juveniles of the polychaete Neanthes arenaceodentata. Parapodial Dll expression marks premorphogenetic notopodia and neuropodia, becoming restricted to the bases of notopodial cirri and to ventral portions of neuropodia. In outgrowing cephalic appendages, Dll activity is primarily restricted to proximal domains. Dll expression is also prominent in the brain. dac expression occurs in the brain, nerve cord ganglia, a pair of pharyngeal ganglia, presumed interneurons linking a pair of segmental nerves, and in newly differentiating mesoderm. Domains of omb expression include the brain, nerve cord ganglia, one pair of anterior cirri, presumed precursors of dorsal musculature, and the same pharyngeal ganglia and presumed interneurons that express dac. Contrary to their roles in outgrowing arthropod and vertebrate appendages, Dll, dac, and omb lack comparable expression in Neanthes appendages, implying independent evolution of annelid appendage development. We infer that parapodia and arthropodia are not structurally or mechanistically homologous (but their primordia might be), that Dll’s ancestral bilaterian function was in sensory and central nervous system differentiation, and that locomotory appendages possibly evolved from sensory outgrowths
    • …
    corecore