Our understanding of the initial period of agriculture in the southwestern United States has been transformed by recent discoveries that establish the presence of maize there by 2100 cal. B.C. ...(calibrated calendrical years before the Christian era) and document the processes by which it was integrated into local foraging economies. Here we review archaeological, paleoecological, linguistic, and genetic data to evaluate the hypothesis that Proto-Uto-Aztecan (PUA) farmers migrating from a homeland in Mesoamerica introduced maize agriculture to the region. We conclude that this hypothesis is untenable and that the available data indicate instead a Great Basin homeland for the PUA, the breakup of this speech community into northern and southern divisions ≈6900 cal. B.C. and the dispersal of maize agriculture from Mesoamerica to the US Southwest via group-to-group diffusion across a Southern Uto-Aztecan linguistic continuum.
Climate change is dramatically restructuring agriculture and damaging crops, food security, and human health, especially in deserts. To radically redesign food systems to buffer against climatic ...disruptions, we focus on agroecological function, human health, and community well‐being. Using arid North America (“Aridamerica”) as a laboratory for the future, we employed 18 criteria to select 17 desert plant genera with high potential as food crops. When integrated into perennial polycultures modeled after arid ecosystems and traditional knowledge, desert plants can stabilize yields, produce disease‐preventing foods, and generate rural livelihoods. We envision food systems that can reduce disparities while enhancing resilience in a hotter, drier world.
Societal Impact Statement
Climate change is dramatically restructuring agriculture and damaging crops, food security, and human health, especially in deserts. To radically redesign food systems to buffer against climatic disruptions, we focus on agroecological function, human health, and community well‐being. Using arid North America (“Aridamerica”) as a laboratory for the future, we employed 18 criteria to select 17 desert plant genera with high potential as food crops. When integrated into perennial polycultures modeled after arid ecosystems and traditional knowledge, desert plants can stabilize yields, produce disease‐preventing foods, and generate rural livelihoods. We envision food systems that can reduce disparities while enhancing resilience in a hotter, drier world.
Summary
Climate disruptions and water scarcity are threatening food security and human well‐being. We provide a framework for selecting a more diverse set of arid‐adapted food crops to reduce food system vulnerabilities to climate change, climate‐related illness, and economic disparities in arid lands. We constructed a list of candidate crops based on the diets of the Comcaac, O'odham, and Pima Bajo peoples of the Sonoran Desert. Representative genera were then screened for traits related to agroecological functionality, human health, community well‐being, and agronomic suitability. Of the 154 species (86 genera) used by these Sonoran Desert Indigenous cultures, 101 species (80 genera) were more broadly used in Aridamerica, suggesting wide acceptability and value of desert plants for arid‐adapted agriculture in North America. We highlight 17 genera with high potential to simultaneously improve agricultural resilience, human health, and community prosperity in the face of climate change, over a third of which are water‐use efficient crassulacean acid metabolism (CAM) succulents. Assembling these candidate crops into perennial polycultures coupled with solar energy and rainwater harvesting systems can maximize yield reliability while minimizing fossil fuel, agrichemical, and surface and groundwater use. Now is the time to invest in desert‐adapted farming and food systems, with climate change already accelerating damages to agricultural landscapes. Biomimicry and traditional knowledge can aid in designing co‐located food, water, and energy provisioning systems adapted to arid climates and scarce resources that improve agroecological and human health. Adopting such designs will require transdisciplinary integration of plant, environmental, social, and health sciences.
The use of radiocarbon frequency distributions to reconstruct prehistoric human and animal populations must account for taphonomic loss and other factors that affect the archaeological and ...paleontological records. Surovell et al. (
JAS, 36, 1715–1724) have recently proposed a correction for “taphonomic bias” that is based on the radiocarbon frequency of a global sample of volcanic deposits. Analysis of 717 radiocarbon dates sampled from the alluvium of the San Pedro and Santa Cruz rivers and their tributaries in southeastern Arizona shows that discovery and scientific biases also play an important role in the creation of radiocarbon frequency distributions, and that the rate of “taphonomic bias” in prehistory is not predicted by the radiocarbon frequency of volcanic deposits. The latter principle is further argued using a sample of 123 Pliocene to Clovis-age proboscideans from the San Pedro Valley. We propose an alternative model that is based on the nature of the stratigraphic record, with discovery bias, scientific bias, taphonomic loss, and the shape of the calibration curve all operating to influence the temporal frequency distribution of radiocarbon-dated prehistoric phenomena.
► Temporal frequency distributions track sampling, not paleodemography. ► Late Quaternary volcanic deposits a poor proxy for taphonomic losses in alluvium. ► Taphonomic deletion has not occurred at a predictable rate.
Archaeological investigations have been conducted along the northern coast of Sonora, Mexico where over 60 prehistoric middens have been identified around Bahía Adair and the town of Puerto Peñasco. ...The middens include low densities of pottery, chipped and ground stone tools, and some shell tools and ornaments, as well as molluscs, fish bones, crab claws, sea turtle bones, terrestrial animal bones, and charred plant remains. Radiocarbon dates indicate nearly continuous use of the coast from as early as 4,000 BC through late historic times. Pottery types found are associated with the Patayan, Hohokam, Trincheras, and the Ancestral Comcaac cultures. These middens were created by peoples occupying the western Papaguería who interacted extensively with neighboring groups in California, Arizona, and Sonora, Mexico. The Areneños (Sand Papago or Hia ced O'odham) occupied the area in historical times and their subsistence, settlement, and interaction patterns can be used as a model for prehistoric groups.
ABSTRACT
Introduction
The Military Health System serves to globally provide health services and trained medical forces. Military providers possess variable levels of deployment preparedness. The aim ...of the Clinical Readiness Program is to develop and assess the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) needed for combat casualty care.
Methods
The Clinical Readiness Program developed a KSA metric for general and orthopedic surgery. The KSA methodology underwent a proof of concept in six medical treatment facilities.
Results
The KSA metric feasibly quantifies the combat relevance of surgical practice. Orthopedic surgeons are more likely than general surgeons to meet the threshold. Medical treatment facilities do not provide enough demand for general surgery services to achieve readiness.
Conclusion
The Clinical Readiness Program identifies imbalances between the health care delivery and readiness missions. To close the readiness gap, the Military Health System needs to recapture high KSA value procedures, expand access to care, and/or partner with civilian institutions.
BackgroundOncolytic immunotherapy represents a unique therapeutic platform for the treatment of cancer. Here, we evaluated the safety and efficacy of the combination of pexastimogene devacirepvec ...(PexaVec) plus durvalumab (anti-programmed death ligand 1) with and without tremelimumab (anti-cytotoxic T-lymphocyte associated protein 4) in patients with standard chemotherapy refractory mismatch repair proficient (pMMR) metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) in a phase I/II trial.MethodsAdult patients with histologically confirmed advanced pMMR mCRC, who had progressed on at least two prior lines of systemic chemotherapy were studied in four cohorts. Patients received four doses of PexaVec IV at a dose of 3×108 plaque forming units (pfu) (dose level 1) or 1×109 pfu (dose level 2) every 2 weeks. Twelve days after the first PexaVec administration, patients received either 1500 mg of durvalumab every 28 days alone or an additional single dose of 300 mg tremelimumab on day 1. Responses were assessed every 8 weeks by CT or MRI. AEs were recorded. The primary endpoints were safety and feasibility. Secondary endpoints included progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival. Paired tumor samples and peripheral blood were collected to perform immune monitoring.ResultsThirty-four patients with mCRC enrolled on to the study: 16 patients in the PexaVec/durvalumab cohorts and 18 patients in the PexaVec/durvalumab/tremelimumab cohorts. Overall, the combination of PexaVec plus immune checkpoint inhibitors did not result in any unexpected toxicities. Most common toxicities observed were fever and chills after PexaVec infusion. Two cases of grade 3 colitis, one case of a grade 2 myositis and one case of grade 3 hypotension resulted in discontinuation of immune checkpoint inhibitor and PexaVec treatment, respectively. The median PFS in the PexaVec/durvalumab/tremelimumab cohorts was 2.3 months (95% CI: 2.2 to 3.2 months) vs 2.1 months (95% CI: 1.7 to 2.8 months; p=0.57) in the PexaVec/durvalumab cohorts. Flow cytometry analysis of peripheral blood mononuclear cells revealed an increase in Ki67+CD8+ T cells on treatment.ConclusionPexaVec in combination with durvalumab and tremelimumab is safe and tolerable. No unexpected toxicities were observed. The combination of PexaVec/durvalumab/tremelimumab demonstrated potential clinical activity in patients with pMMR mCRC, but further studies are needed to identify the predictive biomarkers.Trial registration numberNCT03206073.
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