Multispectral Recovery of a Fragment of Richard FitzRalph’s Summa de Questionibus Armenorum from University of Rochester, D.460 1000-03

Multispectral imaging—the process of obtaining image data from a range of both visible and invisible wavelengths—is a new frontier in medieval studies, raising the possibility of recovering damaged or palimpsested texts that have been illegible for centuries. In this paper we show the remarkable results of applying this technology to University of X, MS D.460 1000-003, a previously unidentified single-folio fragment that was gifted to the university in 1968. Formerly used as a limp vellum binding for a seventeenth-century volume, the text has become so worn that it is all but completely unreadable to the naked eye. The fragment has consequently received little scholarly attention prior to our investigation. Our team recovered nearly all of the lost text and identified the fragment as an excerpt from Richard FitzRalph’s Summa de Questionibus Armenorum. Although this text survives in 45 other manuscripts and fragments, our discovery is highly significant because the Rochester fragment is the only copy of any of FitzRalph’s works in a non-European collection. Moreover, the fragment, whose handwriting dates to no later than 1370, may be the oldest extant copy of the Summa by at least half a decade. We present the process of this discovery, our conclusions about the text, and the potential for multispectral imaging to unlock new information hidden in known but understudied fragments held in archival collections around the world

Genome-wide association and transcriptome studies identify target genes and risk loci for breast cancer

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified more than 170 breast cancer susceptibility loci. Here we hypothesize that some risk-associated variants might act in non-breast tissues, specifically adipose tissue and immune cells from blood and spleen. Using expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL) reported in these tissues, we identify 26 previously unreported, likely target genes of overall breast cancer risk variants, and 17 for estrogen receptor (ER)-negative breast cancer, several with a known immune function. We determine the directional effect of gene expression on disease risk measured based on single and multiple eQTL. In addition, using a gene-based test of association that considers eQTL from multiple tissues, we identify seven (and four) regions with variants associated with overall (and ER-negative) breast cancer risk, which were not reported in previous GWAS. Further investigation of the function of the implicated genes in breast and immune cells may provide insights into the etiology of breast cancer.Peer reviewe

Love and Honor in Cligès

Heyworth Gregory. Love and Honor in Cligès. In: Romania, tome 120 n°477-478, 2002. pp. 99-117

Verblaste Notenschätze der SLUB wieder lesbar: Multispektralfotografie macht es möglich

Der Handschriftenfundus der Sächsischen Landesbibliothek – Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Dresden (SLUB) befindet sich im Keller hinter einer Serie grauer Metalltüren. Je mehr Türen man durchschreitet, desto wertvoller werden die Objekte, und umso kälter wird die Temperatur. Unterwegs wird das Auge magisch angezogen von akribisch gefüllten Regalen voller sorgsam konservierter Manuskripte. Indessen bleibt so manches Werk unlesbar, weil nach den Luftangriffen 1945 auf Dresden eingedrungenes Grund- und Löschwasser der Tinte so zugesetzt hat, dass die Noten nur noch mit Mühe und die Notenlinien gar nicht mehr zu erkennen sind. Zu diesem Kreislauf des Vergessens gehören Originalhandschriften des österreichischen Komponisten Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf, der wie seine berühmteren Kollegen Mozart und Haydn zu den musikalischen Koryphäen des Barock zählte. Ganz in der Nähe stehen die Kompositionsautographen von Johann David Heinichen, seines Zeichens Kapellmeister von August dem Starken. Wiederum in direkter Nachbarschaft befindet sich die umfangreichste Sammlung von Vivaldi-Manuskripten außerhalb Italiens, darunter eine zweistellige Zahl von Autographen. Zusammen bilden die genannten und viele weitere Handschriften dieses Magazinbereichs eine der erlesensten Barockmusiksammlungen in Europa. Zwar ist die Tinte nur selten so stark ausgewaschen wie im Falle Dittersdorf. Doch wo es der Fall ist, haben wir nur noch einen schwachen Abklatsch des Originals vor uns, gleichsam einen leblosen Schatten klassischer Musik

How to Read an Invisible Classic

What if there were a technology to recover these lost and unknown texts? Imagine worldwide how a trove of hundreds of thousands of previously unreadable and unknown works could change our knowledge of the past! What new classics would we discover that could rewrite the canons of literature, history, music, mathematics, philosophy, political science? Or more provocatively, how could they rewrite our cultural identities, building new bridges between cultures and people? Gregory Heyworth is associate professor of English at the University of Mississippi. He is a medievalist and founder of the discipline of textual science. Professor Heyworth directs the Lazarus Project, a not-for-profit initiative to restore damaged and illegible cultural heritage objects, especially manuscripts and maps, using spectral imaging technology. He has helped recover numerous important objects including the Vercelli Book and the 1491 Martellus Map. Currently he is working on a project to recover the manuscript fragments of the lost Cathedral Library of Chartres, France, bombed in WWII

Verblaste Notenschätze der SLUB wieder lesbar: Multispektralfotografie macht es möglich

Der Handschriftenfundus der Sächsischen Landesbibliothek – Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Dresden (SLUB) befindet sich im Keller hinter einer Serie grauer Metalltüren. Je mehr Türen man durchschreitet, desto wertvoller werden die Objekte, und umso kälter wird die Temperatur. Unterwegs wird das Auge magisch angezogen von akribisch gefüllten Regalen voller sorgsam konservierter Manuskripte. Indessen bleibt so manches Werk unlesbar, weil nach den Luftangriffen 1945 auf Dresden eingedrungenes Grund- und Löschwasser der Tinte so zugesetzt hat, dass die Noten nur noch mit Mühe und die Notenlinien gar nicht mehr zu erkennen sind. Zu diesem Kreislauf des Vergessens gehören Originalhandschriften des österreichischen Komponisten Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf, der wie seine berühmteren Kollegen Mozart und Haydn zu den musikalischen Koryphäen des Barock zählte. Ganz in der Nähe stehen die Kompositionsautographen von Johann David Heinichen, seines Zeichens Kapellmeister von August dem Starken. Wiederum in direkter Nachbarschaft befindet sich die umfangreichste Sammlung von Vivaldi-Manuskripten außerhalb Italiens, darunter eine zweistellige Zahl von Autographen. Zusammen bilden die genannten und viele weitere Handschriften dieses Magazinbereichs eine der erlesensten Barockmusiksammlungen in Europa. Zwar ist die Tinte nur selten so stark ausgewaschen wie im Falle Dittersdorf. Doch wo es der Fall ist, haben wir nur noch einen schwachen Abklatsch des Originals vor uns, gleichsam einen leblosen Schatten klassischer Musik

Texts and Technologies

Ivo Kamps, moderato

Treatment of intact hepatocytes with either the phorbol ester TPA or glucagon elicits the phosphorylation and functional inactivation of the inhibitory guanine nucleotide regulatory protein Gi

The antiserum AS7 can specifically immunoprecipitate alpha-Gi from membrane extracts as well as from a mixture of purified alpha-Gi and alpha-Go as ascertained using [32P]ADP-ribosylated G-proteins. Using this antiserum to immunoprecipitate alpha-Gi from hepatocytes labelled with 32P it was evident that alpha-Gi was phosphorylated under basal (resting) conditions. Challenge of hepatocytes with the tumour promoting phorbol ester TPA, however, elicited a marked enhancement of the phosphorylation state of alpha-Gi. This was accompanied by the loss of inhibitory effect of Gi on adenylate cyclase, as judged by the inability of low concentrations of p[NH]ppG to inhibit forskolin-stimulated adenylate cyclase activity. Such actions were mimicked by treatment of hepatocytes with either glucagon or TH-glucagon, an analogue of glucagon which is incapable of activating adenylate cyclase and elevating intracellular cyclic AMP concentrations. Pre-treatment of hepatocytes with either glucagon, TPA or insulin did not affect the ability of pertussis toxin to cause the NAD+-dependent, [32P]ADP-ribosylation of alpha-Gi in membrane fractions isolated from such pre-treated hepatocytes. We suggest that protein kinase C can elicit the phosphorylation and functional inactivation of alpha-Gi in intact hepatocytes. As pertussis toxin only causes the ADP-ribosylation of the holomeric form of Gi, it may be that phosphorylation leaves alpha-Gi in its holomeric state