Exploratory Pollen Analysis of Hargrove Lake, Davy Crockett National Forest Houston County, Texas

The objectives of this exploratory pollen analysis of selected samples from a sediment core taken at Hargrove Lake, Davy Crockett National Forest, Houston County, Texas, are to ascertain the quality of pollen preservation in the lake bottom matrix and to evaluate the potential of the pollen spectra deposited in the lake for providing information about former environmental conditions on Davy Crockett National Forest. Hargrove Lake is a natural lake in the floodplain of the Neches River in Houston County, Texas. The Hargrove Lake site (41H0150) lies a short distance to the west. The lake is presently is surrounded by a 10m wide stand of buttonbush (Cephalanthus). These plants are three m tall and have two to ten em diameter trunks. A woodland dominated by water oaks (Quercus nigra) and sweetgum (Liquidambar styraciflua) lies beyond the button bush. These trees are 30 to 40 m tall, and the woodland canopy is 90 to 98 percent closed. The lake is normally about 50 m wide by 200 m long, giving it a normal surface area of approximately 2.5 hectares. The mean depth of the lake at high water is about 90 em. Bedrock marl underlies the area, and the lake retains water during even the most severe droughts. It should provide a continuous pollen deposition record

Pollen Record Formation Processes at the Isles of Shoals: Botanical Records of Human Behavior

Exploratory pollen analysis on Appledore Island at the Isles of Shoals, a group of nine islands located approximately eight miles off the coast of southern Maine and New Hampshire, indicates that pollen preservation is excellent in exposed island soil deposits in the temperate zone and that pollen percolation into deposits from surface preserves the record of natural and cultural events where dep cultural deposits have not developed. The Appledore pollen spectra registered the establishment of the resort hotel industry on the island in the mid-19th-century, the virtual abandonment of the island after a major fire in 1914, and the chestnut blight of ca. 1925 on the mainland. The high rate of pollen percolation, ca. 1 cm in 4.2 years, in the loose, organic soils and the shallow deposits on the island limit the palynological land-use record in exposed soils to ca. 175 years. Because pollen is protected from leaching by large flat stones, evidence for 17th-, 18th-, and early 19th-century land use should be recovered by seriating pollen proflies taken from under surface-laid foundation stones and from under foundation stones cast down during dismantling of structures

Four Historical Landscapes of the Merchant’s House Museum Backlot, Manhattan Island, New York, Identified through Pollen Analysis

The Merchant’s House Museum is on Manhattan Island in New York City, at 29 East Fourth Street, between Lafayette Street and the Bowery. It is the sole, remaining, intact 19th-century family home in the city with original, period furnishings. An archaeological study of the Merchant’s House backyard was undertaken in 1991–1995 in conjunction with an historical-structure study of the house. This pollen analysis of a soil profile from a central parterre was part of the backlot study

Battlefield Palynology: Reinterpretation of British Earthworks, Saratoga National Historical Park, Stillwater, New York

Pollen analysis was done on a core through a linear mound formerly identified as a 1777 British earthwork at Saratoga National Historical Park. Documents indicate that the British earthwork was built in a forest in a sparsely settled region. Pollen data record a 71-year reforestation sequence under the mound, indicating that it cannot be a Revolutionary War earthwork

The Use of Opal Phytolith Analysis in a Comprehensive Environmental Study: An Example from 19th-Century Lowell, Massachusetts

The value of opal phytolith analysis is demonstrated in a comprehensive environmental study of a historical site, the Kirk Street Agents\u27 House, Lowell, Massachusett. A method to measure phytolith degradation percentages is tested and shown to yield similar results to pollen corrosion indices; further research on this new method is suggested, however. Fluctuations in two classes of grass phytoliths indicate changing environmental conditions that support and expand upon changes noted in the pollen spectra. The results of the phytolith analysis are integrated with information derived from documentary research, artifactual analysis, stratigraphic interpretation, and other ethnobotanical methods to arrive at conclusions based on a truly multicomponent strategy. All lines of evidence point to a series of discrete occupational episode at the Kirk Street Agents\u27 House coupled with con-comitant changes in the use of yard space

The Pollen Record Formation Processes of a Rural Cellar Fill: Identification of the Captain Brown House, Concord, Massachusetts

Captain David Brown was a major participant in the April 19, 1775 skirmish at the North Bridge, Concord, Massachusetts, and his house stood very close to the battlefield. Diary entries record that his house was dismantled in 1868 and that the filling of the cellar hole began on October 16th of the same year. Archaeologists uncovered the cellars of two houses on the David Brown property: one cellar fill contained only probable 18th-century artifacts; the second contained 18th- to mid-19th-century artifacts. Pollen data indicating that the second cellar hole was filled in the fall link that cellar hole to diary entries, confirming the identification of the structure as the David Brown house

Exploratory Pollen Analysis of the Ditch of the 1665 Turf Fort, Jamestown, Virginia

Pollen analysis of subsoil, slopewash, episodic fill, plowzone, and archaeological backdirt deposits in a core from a ditch associated with the 1665 Turf (earthwork) Fort at Jamestown, Virginia, record bare, slightly weedy local conditions around 17th-century artisan dwellings on the Jamestown waterfront and register the Virginia forest in the background before construction of the fort. Goosefoot dominated the earthwork slope; close relatives of the goldenrods were initially the most prominent plants in the open-ditch period. Pollen percolation rates adjusted for plowing and applied to ragweed-type (Ambrosia-type) percentages suggest that cultivation over the ditch began ca. 1729. Cultural matrix depostition, slopewash, and pollen percolation were crticial to the preservation of this record, and serve to emphasize the importance of evaluating pollen record formation processes in cultural landscape studies

Insignoic acids A – E, unusual α, β-unsaturated keto fatty acids isolated from the exocarp of Australian rainforest tree Endiandra insignis (Lauraceae)

Anti-inflammatory bioassay-guided compound isolation from the exocarp of the Australian rainforest tree Endiandra insignis (family Lauraceae) has led to the discovery and structural elucidation of unusual α, β-unsat- urated twenty-four carbon fatty acids and their positional isomers, insignoic acids A – E (1a – 5c). The stereo- chemistry and position of the double bond within the aliphatic chain were independently determined via NMR spectroscopy and Ozone-Induced Dissociation (OzID) Mass Spectrometry, respectively. Compounds (1a – 5c) displayed good to moderate anti-inflammatory activity in the range of 8–84 μM. The low therapeutic index observed when assessing the cell viability in the RAW macrophage cell lines, prompted us to investigate the anticancer potential of these unusual fatty acids. The anti-cancer activity was assessed in A-431 carinoma cell lines and MM649 melanoma cell lines. Insignoic acid C (3a-f) exhibited the highest level of potency with an IC50 value of 5–7 μM against both the cell lines. The insignoic acids are the first of their kind known for incorporating an alpha-beta unsaturated system flanked next to a keto group with an additional level of oxygenation at C-6 in a 24‑carbon fatty acid backbone