Anthropology posts
- December 2, 2015
- 08:18 PM
- 759 views
Our pale blue dot in the wake of destruction
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
This is our home, that pale blue dot, dwarfed by an arrow that takes up less space on your screen than this sentence. For all our might and “overwhelming” intelligence, if we flexed our mental might and developed a weapon to destroy this pale blue dot, it would almost certainly go unnoticed in the universe.... Read more »
Carl Sagan. (2007) The Voyager 1 spacecraft image shows the earth as a pale blue dot against the black of deep space. Science Direct. DOI: 10.1016/B978-008044045-3/50001-3
- November 28, 2015
- 03:20 PM
- 409 views
The silence of the genes, an epigenetic tale
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Research led by Dr. Keiji Tanimoto from the University of Tsukuba, Japan, has brought us closer to understanding the mechanisms underlying the phenomenon of genomic imprinting. In this intriguing event, one copy of a gene is ‘turned off’, or silenced, depending on whether it was derived from the mother or the father.... Read more »
Matsuzaki H, Okamura E, Takahashi T, Ushiki A, Nakamura T, Nakano T, Hata K, Fukamizu A, & Tanimoto K. (2015) De novo DNA methylation through the 5'-segment of the H19 ICR maintains its imprint during early embryogenesis. Development (Cambridge, England), 142(22), 3833-44. PMID: 26417043
- November 24, 2015
- 04:36 PM
- 582 views
Cultural brokering
by Ingrid Piller in Language on the Move
Recently, I signed a contract for a revised second edition of my 2011 book Intercultural Communication: A Critical Introduction to be published in 2017. One way in which I am planning to extend the book is to have a greater … Continue reading →... Read more »
Boyle, J. (1971) Rashīd al-Dīn: The First World Historian. Iran, 19-26. DOI: 10.2307/4300435
- November 22, 2015
- 10:30 PM
- 443 views
History of neuroscience: The mystery of trepanation
by neurosci in Neuroscientifically Challenged
In 1867, an archaeologist and diplomat named Ephraim George Squier sought out the help of Paul Pierre Broca, the esteemed anatomist and surgeon. He was trying to solve a mystery about an ancient Incan skull that had been given to him by a wealthy artifact collector in Peru. In addition to its age, the Neolithic skull had a unique feature: on the top of the cranium a rectangular piece of bone had been removed. The presence of several cross-cuts surrounding the hole suggested that it was not a sim........ Read more »
Clower, W., & Finger, S. (2001) Discovering Trepanation: The Contribution of Paul Broca. Neurosurgery, 49(6), 1417-1426. DOI: 10.1097/00006123-200112000-00021
- November 22, 2015
- 03:01 PM
- 524 views
Neuroscience and the search for happiness
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Exercising, meditating, scouring self-help books… we go out of our way to be happy, but do we really know what happiness is? Wataru Sato and his team at Kyoto University have found an answer from a neurological perspective.... Read more »
Sato, W., Kochiyama, T., Uono, S., Kubota, Y., Sawada, R., Yoshimura, S., & Toichi, M. (2015) The structural neural substrate of subjective happiness. Scientific Reports, 16891. DOI: 10.1038/srep16891
- November 21, 2015
- 05:09 PM
- 411 views
The mysterious fungus that has major health consequences
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Researchers at the University of Toronto examined fungi in the mucus of patients with cystic fibrosis and discovered how one particularly cunning fungal species has evolved to defend itself against neighbouring bacteria. A regular resident of our microbiome – and especially ubiquitous in the lungs of cystic fibrosis patients -the Candida albicans fungus is an “opportunistic pathogen.”
... Read more »
Kim, S., Clark, S., Surendra, A., Copeland, J., Wang, P., Ammar, R., Collins, C., Tullis, D., Nislow, C., Hwang, D.... (2015) Global Analysis of the Fungal Microbiome in Cystic Fibrosis Patients Reveals Loss of Function of the Transcriptional Repressor Nrg1 as a Mechanism of Pathogen Adaptation. PLOS Pathogens, 11(11). DOI: 10.1371/journal.ppat.1005308
- November 21, 2015
- 10:40 AM
- 551 views
Where Are All the Wearables We Want to Wear?
by Aurametrix team in Health Technologies
Millions of years ago our ancestors straightened up and started carrying tools around, instead of dropping them after use. And so technology became a part of daily routine.As time passed, more useful tools were made than it was feasible to carry or wear over the shoulder. One solution to this problem was monetary exchange, the other was a better technology. Wearables promised to add more convenience than carryables and, ever since humans started to wear clothes some 170,000 years ag........ Read more »
Toups MA, Kitchen A, Light JE, & Reed DL. (2011) Origin of clothing lice indicates early clothing use by anatomically modern humans in Africa. Molecular biology and evolution, 28(1), 29-32. PMID: 20823373
Bouzouggar A, Barton N, Vanhaeren M, d'Errico F, Collcutt S, Higham T, Hodge E, Parfitt S, Rhodes E, Schwenninger JL.... (2007) 82,000-year-old shell beads from North Africa and implications for the origins of modern human behavior. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 104(24), 9964-9. PMID: 17548808
Mombers C, Legako K, & Gilchrist A. (2015) Identifying medical wearables and sensor technologies that deliver data on clinical endpoints. British journal of clinical pharmacology. PMID: 26542184
Sungmee Park, & Jayaraman S. (2014) A transdisciplinary approach to wearables, big data and quality of life. Conference proceedings : .. Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society. Annual Conference, 4155-8. PMID: 25570907
- November 17, 2015
- 04:48 PM
- 539 views
What’s in a name? More than you think…
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
What’s in a name? In the case of the usernames of video gamers, a remarkable amount of information about their real world personalities, according to research. Analysis of anonymised data from one of the world’s most popular computer games by scientists in the Department of Psychology at York also revealed information about their ages.... Read more »
Kokkinakis, A., Lin, J., Pavlas, D., & Wade, A. (2016) What's in a name? Ages and names predict the valence of social interactions in a massive online game. Computers in Human Behavior, 605-613. DOI: 10.1016/j.chb.2015.09.034
- November 17, 2015
- 11:47 AM
- 523 views
Landscapes of Death and Mass Graves from the Roman Empire
by Katy Meyers Emery in Bones Don't Lie
There is an amazing relationship between human behavior and space. Our landscape and environment shapes what we can do on it, how we move through it, and where we can […]... Read more »
McCormick, M. (2015) Tracking mass death during the fall of Rome’s empire (I). Journal of Roman Archaeology, 325-357. DOI: 10.1017/S1047759415002512
- November 15, 2015
- 12:58 PM
- 413 views
Bioanthro lab activity: Hominin brain size
by zacharoo in Lawn Chair Anthropology
Last week in my Human Evolution class we looked at whether we could estimate hominin brain sizes, or endocranial volumes (ECV), based on just the length and width of the bony brain case. Students took these measurements on 3D surface scans… … and then plugged their data into equations relating these measurements to brain size […]... Read more »
Coqueugniot, H., & Hublin, J. (2012) Age-related changes of digital endocranial volume during human ontogeny: Results from an osteological reference collection. American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 147(2), 312-318. DOI: 10.1002/ajpa.21655
Neubauer, S., Gunz, P., Schwarz, U., Hublin, J., & Boesch, C. (2012) Brief communication: Endocranial volumes in an ontogenetic sample of chimpanzees from the taï forest national park, ivory coast. American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 147(2), 319-325. DOI: 10.1002/ajpa.21641
- November 14, 2015
- 04:18 PM
- 427 views
3-D printing aids in understanding food enjoyment
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Tasting food relies on food volatiles moving from the back of the mouth to the nasal cavity, but researchers have wondered why airflow doesn’t carry them in the other direction, into the lungs. Now a team of engineers, using a 3D printed model of the human airway from nostril to trachea, has determined that the shape of the airway preferentially transfers volatiles to the nasal cavity and allows humans to enjoy the smell of good food.... Read more »
Ni, R., Michalski, M., Brown, E., Doan, N., Zinter, J., Ouellette, N., & Shepherd, G. (2015) Optimal directional volatile transport in retronasal olfaction. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1511495112
- November 8, 2015
- 08:40 AM
- 577 views
Osteology Everywhere: Bacon or first rib?
by zacharoo in Lawn Chair Anthropology
I went to a cafe today to eat breakfast and get some work done. It’s important to be properly nourished to ensure maximal productivity. But I was aghast to behold the food they placed before me: First of all, this is not a sufficient amount of bacon. Secondably, this bacon is a spitting image of a first rib: […]... Read more »
Lordkipanidze D, Jashashvili T, Vekua A, Ponce de León MS, Zollikofer CP, Rightmire GP, Pontzer H, Ferring R, Oms O, Tappen M.... (2007) Postcranial evidence from early Homo from Dmanisi, Georgia. Nature, 449(7160), 305-10. PMID: 17882214
Schmid P, Churchill SE, Nalla S, Weissen E, Carlson KJ, de Ruiter DJ, & Berger LR. (2013) Mosaic morphology in the thorax of Australopithecus sediba. Science, 340(6129), 1234598. PMID: 23580537
White TD, Asfaw B, Beyene Y, Haile-Selassie Y, Lovejoy CO, Suwa G, & WoldeGabriel G. (2009) Ardipithecus ramidus and the paleobiology of early hominids. Science, 326(5949), 75-86. PMID: 19810190
- November 7, 2015
- 10:07 AM
- 446 views
Bioanthro lab activity: Sexual dimorphism
by zacharoo in Lawn Chair Anthropology
A few weeks ago we examined sexual dimorphism - characteristic differences between males and females - in my Intro to Bioanthro class. Sexual dimorphism roughly correlates with aspects of social behavior in animals, and so we compared dimorphism in our class with what is seen in other primates. For the lab, we collected our body masses, heights, […]... Read more »
Nelson E, & Shultz S. (2010) Finger length ratios (2D:4D) in anthropoids implicate reduced prenatal androgens in social bonding. American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 141(3), 395-405. PMID: 19862809
Plavcan JM. (2012) Sexual size dimorphism, canine dimorphism, and male-male competition in primates: where do humans fit in?. Human Nature, 23(1), 45-67. PMID: 22388772
- November 6, 2015
- 10:54 PM
- 405 views
Cancer survivors less likely to receive callbacks from potential employers
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Job applicants who are cancer survivors are less likely to receive callbacks from potential retail employers than those who did not disclose their health history, according to a recent study by Rice University and Penn State University researchers.... Read more »
Martinez, L., White, C., Shapiro, J., & Hebl, M. (2015) Selection BIAS: Stereotypes and Discrimination Related to Having a History of Cancer. Journal of Applied Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/apl0000036
- November 5, 2015
- 03:55 PM
- 430 views
Adults’ happiness on the decline
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Are you less happy than your parents were at the same age? It may not be all in your head. Researchers led by San Diego State University professor Jean M. Twenge found adults over age 30 are not as happy as they used to be, but teens and young adults are happier than ever. Researchers analyzed data from four nationally representative samples of 1.3 million Americans ages 13 to 96 taken from 1972 to 2014.... Read more »
Jean M. Twenge, Ryne A. Sherman, & Sonja Lyubomirsky. (2015) More Happiness for Young People and Less for Mature Adults: Time Period Differences in Subjective Well-Being in the United States, 1972–2014. Social Psychological and Personality Science. info:/10.1177/1948550615602933
- November 3, 2015
- 02:26 PM
- 455 views
Lipid helps keep algae and brain fluid moving
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
The same lipid that helps algae swim toward the light also appears to enable one type of brain cell to keep cerebrospinal fluid moving, researchers report. ... Read more »
Kong, J., Hardin, K., Dinkins, M., Wang, G., He, Q., Mujadzic, T., Zhu, G., Bielawski, J., Spassieva, S., & Bieberich, E. (2015) Regulation of Chlamydomonas flagella and ependymal cell motile cilia by ceramide-mediated translocation of GSK3. Molecular Biology of the Cell. DOI: 10.1091/mbc.E15-06-0371
- November 1, 2015
- 03:20 PM
- 487 views
Kids meals, toys, and TV advertising: A triple threat to child health
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Fast food companies advertise children’s meals on TV with ads that feature toy premiums, and it has been suggested that the use of these toy premiums may prompt children to request eating at fast food restaurants. In a new study, researchers found that the more children watched television channels that aired ads for children’s fast food meals, the more frequently their families visited those fast food restaurants.... Read more »
Emond, J., Bernhardt, A., Gilbert-Diamond, D., Li, Z., & Sargent, J. (2015) Commercial Television Exposure, Fast Food Toy Collecting, and Family Visits to Fast Food Restaurants among Families Living in Rural Communities. The Journal of Pediatrics. DOI: 10.1016/j.jpeds.2015.09.063
- October 31, 2015
- 04:56 AM
- 426 views
Osteology everywhere: Halloween skull comet
by zacharoo in Lawn Chair Anthropology
It’s Halloween, a day when it’s socially acceptable for adults to play dress-up like children. Also, people celebrate things that are spooky-scary. So it’s perfect timing that NASA would announce that our planet will be visited by a dead comet, a celestial ghost hoping to haunt a planet full of the living. As NASA pointed out in […]... Read more »
Kimbel WH, White TD, & Johanson DC. (1984) Cranial morphology of Australopithecus afarensis: a comparative study based on a composite reconstruction of the adult skull. American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 64(4), 337-88. PMID: 6435455
Kimbel, W., Johanson, D., & Coppens, Y. (1982) Pliocene hominid cranial remains from the Hadar formation, Ethiopia. American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 57(4), 453-499. DOI: 10.1002/ajpa.1330570404
- October 30, 2015
- 01:48 AM
- 385 views
Bioanthro lab activity: What species is it?
by zacharoo in Lawn Chair Anthropology
We’re learning about the divergence between robust Australopithecus and early Homo 2.5-ish million years ago in my Human Evolution class this week. Because of this multiplicity of contemporaneous species, when scientists find new hominin fossils in Early Pleistocene sites, a preliminary question is, “What species is it?” To help my students learn how we know whether […]... Read more »
Leakey MG, Spoor F, Dean MC, Feibel CS, Antón SC, Kiarie C, & Leakey LN. (2012) New fossils from Koobi Fora in northern Kenya confirm taxonomic diversity in early Homo. Nature, 488(7410), 201-4. PMID: 22874966
- October 29, 2015
- 01:59 PM
- 451 views
What blocks pro-vaccine beliefs?
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Despite rhetoric that pits “anti-vaxxers” versus “pro-vaxxers,” most new parents probably qualify as vaccine-neutral–that is, they passively accept rather than actively demand vaccination. Unless there is an active threat of polio or whooping cough, they have to remind themselves that injecting their crying infant with disease antigens is a good thing.... Read more »
Miton, & Mercier. (2015) Cognitive Obstacles to Pro-Vaccination Beliefs. Trends in Cognitive Sciences. info:/http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2015.08.007
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