The Pine Tree Mound Site and the Entrada of the Hernando De Soto Expedition of 1542

The entrada into Texas of the Hernando de Solo expedition in July 1542, which was led by Luis de Moscoso after de Soto\u27s death in June of that year, is relevant to the Pine Tree Mound site (4IHS15) because it appears that the site was occupied at that time, and the entrada likely followed a path that brought it very close to the site. In fact, we hypothesize that the Pine Tree Mound site, along with associated villages nearby, is specifically mentioned in entrada accounts as the province of Nondacao. These may have been the forebears of the Nadaco (Anadarko) Caddo, who apparently lived in this same area through the first quarter of the 19th century before moving west to north-central Texas and then to Indian Territory in Oklahoma. The three components of this hypothesis deal with the age of the site, the route of the entrada, and the persistence of Nadaco settlements in this area long after the time of the entrada, and these are addressed in tum below. The Pine Tree Mound site is a Middle to Late Caddo period ceremonial and civic center in central Harrison County, Texas. It occupies a broad upland surface between Potters and Starkey creeks, about 7.3 km north of where Potters Creek flows onto the floodplain of the Sabine River. The site is large, covering an area 800 m cast-west by 720 m north-south. Its most conspicuous features are three earthen mounds that stand 0.4 to 2.4 m above the modern land surface. The three mounds are within an area measuring 210 m east-west by 150 m north-south. These mounds are associated with a possible buried mound, at least five areas with off-mound structures, a plaza, and at least one cemetery. Together, these constitute the core of the site, measuring about 360 m both east-west and north-south and covering 27 acres. This core area is owned by The Archaeological Conservancy. Test excavations in 2004 identified eight possible associated village areas ringing the core on the west, and Prewitt and Associates, Inc., conducted intensive excavations at three of these in 2006-2007 under a contract with the Sabine Mining Company. These excavations uncovered the remains of dozens of houses, as well as outside activity areas, middens, and 27 human burials. Analysis of the wealth of data recovered from the site is ongoing and will not be finished for several years. This article provides a preview of one of the topics that the analysis will address

The George C. Davis Site, Cherokee County, Texas: Spring 1980 Archeological Investigations

The results of archeological investigations in portions of the George C. Davis Site are presented in this report prepared by Ross Fields and J. Peter Thurmond . Stringent contract requirements and the provisions of Texas Antiquities Permit No. 237 dictate that this report be brief and descriptive in nature. Requirements such as inclusion of a detailed site investigation history and environmental data were excluded and extensive excavations were stressed in preference to detailed analyses and comparisons. Field investigations were limited by contract to 20 working days and the analysis/write-up to 10 working days. The governing research design was prepared by the Texas Antiquities Committee staff to reflect agreements between the Committee and the Texas Forest Service. Sighificant findings include the general delineation of extensive, and in places intensive, Archaic and Late Prehistoric occupations. Of primary importance is the lack of an identifiable Alto Focus occupation within the northern portion of the Davis Site. This suggests that the small left bank tributary to Bowles Creek existed during Alto Focus times and served as a natural boundary for the village area during that period of site usage. There are hints that significant variations in the selection and use of lithic resources through time are identifiable. It is indeed ! unfortunate that time limitations precluded pursuit of this line of investigation. Ross and Pete have successfully accomplished a most challenging task under less than ideal conditions. They and their field crew are commended for their outstanding work at the Davis Site

Bell's Theorem from Moore's Theorem

It is shown that the restrictions of what can be inferred from classically-recorded observational outcomes that are imposed by the no-cloning theorem, the Kochen-Specker theorem and Bell's theorem also follow from restrictions on inferences from observations formulated within classical automata theory. Similarities between the assumptions underlying classical automata theory and those underlying universally-unitary quantum theory are discussed.Comment: 12 pages; to appear in Int. J. General System

On Carbon Burning in Super Asymptotic Giant Branch Stars

We explore the detailed and broad properties of carbon burning in Super Asymptotic Giant Branch (SAGB) stars with 2755 MESA stellar evolution models. The location of first carbon ignition, quenching location of the carbon burning flames and flashes, angular frequency of the carbon core, and carbon core mass are studied as a function of the ZAMS mass, initial rotation rate, and mixing parameters such as convective overshoot, semiconvection, thermohaline and angular momentum transport. In general terms, we find these properties of carbon burning in SAGB models are not a strong function of the initial rotation profile, but are a sensitive function of the overshoot parameter. We quasi-analytically derive an approximate ignition density, $\rho_{ign} \approx 2.1 \times 10^6$ g cm$^{-3}$, to predict the location of first carbon ignition in models that ignite carbon off-center. We also find that overshoot moves the ZAMS mass boundaries where off-center carbon ignition occurs at a nearly uniform rate of $\Delta M_{\rm ZAMS}$/$\Delta f_{\rm{ov}}\approx$ 1.6 $M_{\odot}$. For zero overshoot, $f_{\rm{ov}}$=0.0, our models in the ZAMS mass range $\approx$ 8.9 to 11 $M_{\odot}$ show off-center carbon ignition. For canonical amounts of overshooting, $f_{\rm{ov}}$=0.016, the off-center carbon ignition range shifts to $\approx$ 7.2 to 8.8 $M_{\odot}$. Only systems with $f_{\rm{ov}}$ $\geq 0.01$ and ZAMS mass $\approx$ 7.2-8.0 $M_{\odot}$ show carbon burning is quenched a significant distance from the center. These results suggest a careful assessment of overshoot modeling approximations on claims that carbon burning quenches an appreciable distance from the center of the carbon core.Comment: Accepted ApJ; 23 pages, 21 figures, 5 table

Properties of Carbon-Oxygen White Dwarfs From Monte Carlo Stellar Models

We investigate properties of carbon-oxygen white dwarfs with respect to the composite uncertainties in the reaction rates using the stellar evolution toolkit, Modules for Experiments in Stellar Astrophysics (MESA) and the probability density functions in the reaction rate library STARLIB. These are the first Monte Carlo stellar evolution studies that use complete stellar models. Focusing on 3 M$_{\odot}$ models evolved from the pre main-sequence to the first thermal pulse, we survey the remnant core mass, composition, and structure properties as a function of 26 STARLIB reaction rates covering hydrogen and helium burning using a Principal Component Analysis and Spearman Rank-Order Correlation. Relative to the arithmetic mean value, we find the width of the 95\% confidence interval to be $\Delta M_{{\rm 1TP}}$ $\approx$ 0.019 M$_{\odot}$ for the core mass at the first thermal pulse, $\Delta$$t_{\rm{1TP}}$ $\approx$ 12.50 Myr for the age, $\Delta \log(T_{{\rm c}}/{\rm K}) \approx$ 0.013 for the central temperature, $\Delta \log(\rho_{{\rm c}}/{\rm g \ cm}^{-3}) \approx$ 0.060 for the central density, $\Delta Y_{\rm{e,c}} \approx$ 2.6$\times$10$^{-5}$ for the central electron fraction, $\Delta X_{\rm c}(^{22}\rm{Ne}) \approx$ 5.8$\times$10$^{-4}$, $\Delta X_{\rm c}(^{12}\rm{C}) \approx$ 0.392, and $\Delta X_{\rm c}(^{16}\rm{O}) \approx$ 0.392. Uncertainties in the experimental $^{12}$C($\alpha,\gamma)^{16}\rm{O}$, triple-$\alpha$, and $^{14}$N($p,\gamma)^{15}\rm{O}$ reaction rates dominate these variations. We also consider a grid of 1 to 6 M$_{\odot}$ models evolved from the pre main-sequence to the final white dwarf to probe the sensitivity of the initial-final mass relation to experimental uncertainties in the hydrogen and helium reaction rates.Comment: Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal; 19 Pages, 23 Figures, 5 Table

Probing Grand Unification Through Neutrino Oscillations, Leptogenesis, and Proton Decay

Evidence in favor of supersymmetric grand unification including that based on the observed family multiplet-structure, gauge coupling unification, neutrino oscillations, baryogenesis, and certain intriguing features of quark-lepton masses and mixings is noted. It is argued that attempts to understand (a) the tiny neutrino masses (especially Delta m^2 (nu_2 -nu_3)), (b) the baryon asymmetry of the universe (which seems to need leptogenesis), and (c) the observed features of fermion masses such as the ratio m_b/m_tau, the smallness of V_cb and the maximality of theta_{nu_mu-nu_tau}, seem to select out the route to higher unification based on an effective string-unified G(224) = SU(2)_L x SU(2)_R x SU(4)^c or SO(10)-symmetry, operative in 4D, as opposed to other alternatives. A predictive framework based on an effective SO(10) or G(224) symmetry possessing supersymmetry is presented that successfully describes the masses and mixings of all fermions including neutrinos. It also accounts for the observed baryon asymmetry of the universe by utilizing the process of leptogenesis, which is natural to this framework. It is argued that a conservative upper limit on the proton lifetime within this SO(10)/G(224)-framework, which is so far most successful, is given by (1/3-2) x 10^34 years. This in turn strongly suggests that an improvement in the current sensitivity by a factor of five to ten (compared to SuperK) ought to reveal proton decay. Implications of this prediction for the next-generation nucleon decay and neutrino-detector are noted.Comment: 40 page, 3 figures. Conference proceedings from Erice School (Sept 2002), Neutrino Conference (Stony Brook, 2002), PASCOS Conference (Mumbai, 2003) Version 2: New references and some clarifications adde

Recent Archeological Investigations at the Jewett Mine, East-Central Texas

The Jewett Mine is a ca. 21, 000-acre lignite mine in the post oak savannah of Freestone, Leon, and Limestone counties, Texas. The project area straddles the divide between the Navasota River valley on the west and the Trinity River valley on the east and lies at the western margin of the Caddoan area . Although residential use of the area by the Caddo has not been documented, many sites have yielded small quantities of Caddoan pottery, and it is likely that cultures indigenous to the region were affected by the development of Caddoan culture not far to the east. For reference, the George C. Davis Site (41CE19) lies only 95 km to the east-northeast. In addition to contributing information about the interaction between Caddoan and neighboring groups in the central part of East Texas, the Jewett Mine sites, by virtue of their location in the Eastern Woodlands but outside of the Caddoan area proper, have the potential to shed light on such topics as regional Caddoan settlement systems and the origins of Caddo culture