Towards a historical ecology of intertidal foraging in the Mafia Archipelago: archaeomalacology and implications for marine resource management

Understanding the timing and nature of human influence on coastal and island ecosystems is becoming a central concern in archaeological research, particularly when investigated within a historical ecology framework. Unfortunately, the coast and islands of eastern Africa have not figured significantly within this growing body of literature, but are important given their historically contingent environmental, social, and political contexts, as well as the considerable threats now posed to marine ecosystems. Here, we begin developing a longer-term understanding of past marine resource use in the Mafia Archipelago (eastern Africa), an area of high ecological importance containing the Mafia Island Marine Park. Focusing on the comparatively less researched marine invertebrates provides a means for initiating discussion on potential past marine ecosystem structure, human foraging and environmental shifts, and the implications for contemporary marine resource management. The available evidence suggests that human-environment interactions over the last 2000 years were complex and dynamic; however, these data raise more questions than answers regarding the specific drivers of changes observed in the archaeomalacological record. This is encouraging as a baseline investigation and emphasizes the need for further engagement with historical ecology by a range of cognate disciplines to enhance our understanding of these complex issues

Non-classroom special education effectiveness for students with severe developmental, emotional and behavioral disorders

AbstractFew studies exist on the effectiveness of special education day treatment for student youth with emotional and behavioral disorders so severe that they cannot be educated in a day treatment setting. Case studies were performed with two youth who had failed previous special education and day treatment programs. Youth participated in a special education program in a private, non-profit, behavioral health and education agency. Unique to this program were the non-traditional, non-classroom based components of education and therapies. Comprehensive, interdisciplinary interventions resulted in progress for these two youth in areas of medical health, violent /aggressive behavior, communication and social skills, community involvement and educational skills. Additional study needs to be performed on more students along with empirical testing of specific interventions with comparison cases

Leveraging palaeoproteomics to address conservation and restoration agendas

Summary Archaeological and paleontological records offer tremendous yet often untapped potential for examining long-term biodiversity trends and the impact of climate change and human activity on ecosystems. Yet, zooarchaeological and fossil remains suffer various limitations, including that they are often highly fragmented and morphologically unidentifiable, preventing them from being optimally leveraged for addressing fundamental research questions in archaeology, paleontology, and conservation paleobiology. Here, we explore the potential of palaeoproteomics—the study of ancient proteins—to serve as a critical tool for creating richer, more informative datasets about biodiversity change that can be leveraged to generate more realistic, constructive, and effective conservation and restoration strategies into the future.What is the scope for conservation palaeoproteomics? Assessing species richness Establishing ecological baselines Detecting shifts in species abundance and geographic range Disentangling human-environment interactions Tracking the introduction of non-native species Identifying illicitly traded material Prioritizing species for conservation The future of conservation palaeoproteomics Limitations of the stud

Plant wax biomarkers in human evolutionary studies

Abstract Plant wax biomarkers are an innovative proxy for reconstructing vegetation composition and structure, rainfall intensity, temperature, and other climatic and environmental dynamics. Traditionally used in earth sciences and climate studies from ?off-site? ocean and lake records, biomarker research is now incorporated in archeology and paleoanthropology to answer questions relating to past human-environment interactions and human evolution. Biomarker research is generating new and exciting information on the ecological context in which Homo and its closest relatives evolved, adapted, and invented stone tool technologies. In this review, we examine plant wax biomarkers and their use in reconstructing past plant landscapes and hydroclimates. We summarize the applications of plant wax molecular proxies in archeological research, assess challenges relating to taphonomy, consider the role of modern plant ecosystems in interpreting ancient habitats, and examine case studies conducted at key paleoanthropological locations in eastern and southern Africa and Europe.1 Introduction 2 Complementary addition to multi-proxy studies 3 Taphonomic normalization 4 Establishing the plant wax ecology of modern african soil 5 Plant waxes shed light on multiple aspects of human evolution 5.1 Orbital forcing and hominin ecology 5.2 Plant landscape variability 5.3 Hominin targeted ecotones 5.4 Activity areas in caves and rock shelters 6 Where do we go from here

Possible Indication of Narrow Baryonic Resonances Produced in the 1720-1790 MeV Mass Region

Signals of two narrow structures at M=1747 MeV and 1772 MeV were observed in the invariant masses M_{pX} and M_{\pi^{+}X} of the pp->ppX and pp->p\pi^{+}X reactions respectively. Many tests were made to see if these structures could have been produced by experimental artefacts. Their small widths and the stability of the extracted masses lead us to conclude that these structures are genuine and may correspond to new exotic baryons. Several attempts to identify them, including the possible "missing baryons" approach, are discussed.Comment: 17 pages including 8 figures and 3 tables. ReVte