Category Archives: Evolution

Evidence that cross-continental Stone Age networking events powered human evolution ramped up in 2021.

A long-standing argument that Homo sapiens originated in East Africa before moving elsewhere and replacing Eurasian Homo species such as Neandertals has come under increasing fire over the last decade. Research this year supported an alternative scenario in which H. sapiens evolved across vast geographic expanses, first within Africa and later outside it.

The process would have worked as follows: Many Homo groups lived during a period known as the Middle Pleistocene, about 789,000 to 130,000 years ago, and were too closely related to have been distinct species. These groups would have occasionally mated with each other while traveling through Africa, Asia and Europe. A variety of skeletal variations on a human theme emerged among far-flung communities. Human anatomy and DNA today include remnants of that complex networking legacy, proponents of this scenario say.

Its not clear precisely how often or when during this period groups may have mixed and mingled. But in this framework, no clear genetic or physical dividing line separated Middle Pleistocene folks usually classed as H. sapiens from Neandertals, Denisovans and other ancient Homo populations.

Headlines and summaries of the latest Science News articles, delivered to your inbox

Thank you for signing up!

There was a problem signing you up.

Middle Pleistocene Homo groups were humans, says paleoanthropologist John Hawks of the University of WisconsinMadison. Todays humans are a remix of those ancient ancestors.

New fossil evidence in line with that idea came from Israel. Braincase pieces and a lower jaw containing a molar tooth unearthed at a site called Nesher Ramla date to between about 140,000 and 120,000 years ago. These finds features suggest that a previously unknown Eurasian Homo population lived at the site (SN Online: 6/24/21), a team led by paleoanthropologist Israel Hershkovitz of TelAviv University reported. The fossils were found with stone tools that look like those fashioned around the same time by Middle Easterners typically classified as H. sapiens, suggesting that the two groups culturally mingled and possibly mated.

Interactions like these may have facilitated enough mating among mobile Homo populations to prevent Nesher Ramla inhabitants and other Eurasian groups from evolving into separate species, Hershkovitz proposed.

But another report provided a reminder that opinions still vary about whether Middle Pleistocene Homo evolution featured related populations that all belonged to the same species or distinct species. Researchers studying the unusual mix of features of a roughly 146,000-year-old Chinese skull dubbed it a new species, Homo longi (SN Online: 6/25/21). After reviewing that claim, however, another investigator grouped the skull, nicknamed Dragon Man, with several other Middle Pleistocene Homo fossils from northern China.

If so, Dragon Man like Nesher Ramla Homo may hail from one of many closely related Homo lines that occasionally mated with each other as some groups moved through Asia, Africa and Europe. From this perspective, Middle Pleistocene Homo groups evolved unique traits during periods of isolation and shared features as a result of crossing paths and mating.

Back-and-forth migrations by Homo groups between Africa and Asia started at least 400,000 years ago, discoveries in Saudi Arabia suggest (SN: 10/9/21 & 10/23/21, p. 7). Monsoon rains periodically turned whats now desert into a green passageway covered by lakes, wetlands and rivers, reported archaeologist Huw Groucutt of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Jena, Germany, and colleagues. Each of five ancient lake beds identified at a Saudi site once hosted hunter-gatherers who left behind stone tools.

Occupations occurred intermittently between about 400,000 and 55,000 years ago. By about 200,000 years ago, stone tools at one of the lake beds resembled those made around the same time by H. sapiens in northeastern Africa. Some of those Africans may have stopped for a bit in a green Arabia before trekking into southwestern Asia, Groucutt suggests.

Either H. sapiens or Neandertals made stone tools unearthed in the youngest lake bed. Neandertals inhabited parts of the Middle East by around 70,000years ago and could have reached a well-watered Arabia by 55,000 years ago. If thats what happened, Neandertals may have mated with H. sapiens already there, Groucutt speculates.

Although Arabian hookups have yet to be detected in ancient DNA, European Neandertals and H. sapiens mated surprisingly often around 45,000 years ago (SN: 5/8/21 & 5/22/21, p. 7), other scientists reported. DNA extracted from H. sapiens fossils of that age found in Bulgaria and the Czech Republic indicates that these ancient individuals possessed between about 2 percent and 4 percent Neandertal ancestry, a large amount considering H. sapiens migrants had only recently arrived in Europe.

So even after the Middle Pleistocene, networking among ancient Homo groups may have helped make us who we are today.

See the original post:

2021 research reinforced that mating across groups drove human evolution - Science News Magazine

Screenshot: Jurassic World Evolution 2.

I enjoyed playing the original Jurassic World Evolution, and I was ecstatic to get a chance to play Jurassic World Evolution 2. Despite its initial lukewarm reception, Ive spent a good amount of time with the dino park simulator and while its sequel is mostly just more of the same, there are some changes and additions that make the sequel picking up for those who want to see if they can succeed where InGen failed.

Jurassic World Evolution 2 building and management game where your task is to create a park or research facility and fill it with dinosaurs. Instead of (only) dealing with the logistical issues of park visitors and amenities, you also have to worry about the dinosaurs, their comfort requirements, and the realities of keeping them in their enclosures so they cant nom on your scientists and parkgoers. Jurassic World Evolution 2 isnt a huge step forward from Jurassic World Evolutionbut it does have some additions that make this sequel compelling.

Screenshot: Jurassic World Evolution 2.

While Jurassic World Evolution 2 has multiple modes to start, most will probably jump into the campaign mode. This mode follows the events of the last Jurassic World film, with dinosaurs actively roaming the United States. The campaign follows Owen Grady and Claire Dearing as they establish research outposts and containment facilities across the US. While Chris Pratt nor Bryce Dallas Howard reprised their roles, but Jeff Goldblum reprised his role as idiosyncratic chaos theory mathematician Ian Malcolm. While the campaign does serve as a sort of tutorial for the rest of the game, its far too short and far too easy.

The campaign isnt the only way to play Jurassic World Evolution 2, howeveryou can also jump into Challenge mode, Chaos theory mode, and Sandbox modebut be warned, locations in Sandbox mode are only unlocked through playing the other modes, so if you want to make a park on Isla Nublar (for example) youll have to first play that specific Chaos Theory mission to unlock it. Challenge Mode has you race against time to build a five star park, while Chaos Theory has you revisit moments from the various films, with the goal of doing it better than your movie counterparts.

Screenshot: Jurassic World Evolution 2.

While creating dinos from DNA, or even capturing rampaging groups of carnivores from the US countryside might sound complicated, you have the top people and spared no expensemost of the really difficult logistics are left to button presses. Most of what you do, as park manager (so to speak) is to design the facility, create enclosures with all of the proper amenities, and clean up after anything that goes wrong. None of this is very difficult, with money being your biggest obstacle. In the campaign mode, I never once even came close to hitting a zero dollar amountbut through the challenges and Chaos Theory levels, there are some interesting scenarios to work your way out of. While most of your work is done from a long-view, isometric perspective, you can get in on the ground as part of a capture, response, or medical teamthough your participation isnt really necessary outside of a full compulsory moments during the campaign. While it may be fun to take control of a helicopter to attempt to tranquilize dinosaurs from the air, I found that the AI was a tad more efficient at itat least enough that I could trust them to it while I focused my attention elsewhere. If you want to get up close and personal with your dinos, theres an excuse to, however: photo mode lets you take shots of your dinosaurs, and supplement your income at the same time.

Jurassic World Evolution 2 is a gorgeous game, with both environments and the dinosaurs looking fantastic. Each environment is breathtaking, though I wish you were given more buildable area in each to make truly sprawling parks. The dinosaurs all look great, with fantastic animations. The sheer amount of dinosaurs available to capture or hatch is astounding, toowith paid DLC that adds even more. The dinosaurs range from those that walk the land to those that swim and flyboth of which require special enclosures. If you love looking at dinosaurs, Jurassic World Evolution 2 is the best game to do it. Theres even a huge in-game database with all of the dinosaurs, different possible ailments, buildings, and even paleobotany.

Screenshot: Jurassic World Evolution 2.

Jurassic World Evolution 2 isnt really a disappointment; it just wasnt the sequel I was hoping for. But I cant really complain, because its more of what made the first game great with more dinos, more options for enclosures, and better graphics. However, it does feel like it treads water a bit, and is more of an elaborate DLC than a full game, especially with the incredibly short and disappointing campaign mode. The Chaos Theory mode makes up for it a bit, but it still feels like it needs more contentand not just in the form of paid DLCs.

Jurassic World Evolution 2 is available on PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store and on PlayStation or Xbox consoles.

A Steam key was provided to us for this review.

Related

Read more:

Review: Jurassic World Evolution 2 Is More of the Same, But I'm Okay With That - thirdcoastreview.com

Photo credit: Eva Blue viaUnsplash.

Editors note: The following is an excerpt from the newly released book,Animal Algorithms: Evolution and the Mysterious Origin of Ingenious Instincts, from Discovery Institute Press.

The fundamental claim of intelligent design is there are natural systems that cannot be adequately explained in terms of undirected natural forces and that exhibit features which in any other circumstance we would attribute to intelligence.1

Scientists typically specialize, and a biologist who does this may see problems for evolutionary theory in his or her own subdiscipline but then figure those problems are the exception and that evolutionary theory has things well in hand elsewhere in the life sciences. For this reason, it is vital to step back and take in the broader picture. Doing so reveals that while evolutionary theory nicely accounts for some things in the history of life, it runs into significant problems in many other areas. This should give us pause and encourages an objective consideration of how the theory of intelligent design holds up by comparison. Figure 7.1 summarizes such a comparison. A check mark indicates the theory or theories consistent with the observations related to the given category. The remainder of the chapter explains the basis for the comparisons.

Some discriminators dont get us very far in deciding which is the better explanation between blind evolution and intelligent design. Ive listed these first in the table and will discuss each of them only briefly here.

The first listed is microevolution. One problem with the views of William Paley and other advocates of natural theology prior to Darwin is that they viewed the characteristics of organisms as fixed. Darwin demonstrated inThe Originthat species were not immutable, but changed over time. A key element of Darwins evolutionary theory is adaptation. This may involve physical adaptation, such as brown bears evolving into polar bears in Arctic regions, or a strain of bacteria developing antibiotic resistance. And it may involve behavioral plasticity as organisms adapt their behavior to changing environments. Here the modern theory of intelligent design has more in common with evolutionary theory than with Paley, since the capacity of plants and animals to adapt to changing environments is understood as fully compatible with a design perspective; after all, an adaptable engineering design is superior to an inflexible one, all other things being equal.

This, by the way, is a case where a systems biology perspective regarding a biological system as an optimal or near-optimal engineered system for the purpose of studying and better understanding how it works would lead one to expect and look for system features that enhance adaptability or, as we might say in a purely engineering context, robustness. (More on systems biology below.) Also, much microevolutionary change is devolutionary, and the design perspective has no difficulty with the idea that a design may show some degradation over time. Both perspectives account for the effect of genetic mutations. Even the best-engineered systems, after all, show wear and tear over time. So both modern Darwinism and intelligent design well accommodate microevolutionary change. The marvel is that there is so little biological devolution over time, thanks in no small part, we now know, to sophisticated DNA error-correcting mechanisms at the level of genes and proteins.

What about similarities in functional traits (homology) across taxa, such as the recurrence of the pentadactyl (five digit) structure among various animals which is used for such diverse activities as grasping, climbing, crawling, and flying? Evolutionary theory does account for this. Darwin and his followers attribute such common features to inheritance from a common ancestor. At the same time, design also readily accounts for such similarities. Design theorists point to the reuse of successful design strategies in human-made designs, such as the reuse of pulleys, wheels, and gears in widely different technological contexts. (Convergence is a related issue that will be discussed below.)

Another feature of living things that evolutionary theory accounts for is design flaws (dysteleology) the most obvious being disease and harmful mutations. These are to be expected from a mindless trial-and-error evolutionary process, it is argued. But the design paradigm also accommodates the presence of design flaws. The theory of intelligent design is not a theory of perfect design, and as noted above, even the best designs may degrade over time.

For example, if someone who had never encountered modern technology stumbled across a paved road, and in the next moment a man in a convertible Ferrari stopped and gave the primitive fellow a ride, the astonished rider would not be deterred from inferring that the car was the work of intelligent design just because the driver regaled his astonished passenger with the various ways his Ferrari was beginning to give him trouble underbelly rust, burning too much oil, pulling to the right, etc. That the Ferrari was the product of creative intelligence would remain abundantly obvious to the passenger. In the same way any evidence of imperfect design in the biosphere cannot by itself negate whatever evidence for foresight and conscious design in biology does exist.

Moreover, and as discussed above, those working out of an evolutionary paradigm often are so primed to find bad design in biology that they find it where none exists as for example in the case of junk DNA and so-called vestigial organs that turned out to have genuine functions. (More on the issue of imperfect design and dysteleology in Chapter 8.)

In addition to these, there are several other comparisons that can be made between Darwinian evolution and intelligent design. They include overall change over time and the progression from less complex to more complex species. Those issues have not been addressed in the book, but in any event they do not provide a discrimination in favor of either theory, since both models account for these patterns.

Next we move into discriminators that do weigh in favor of one explanation over the other. Taken together these make for a strongly positive case for design.

See the original post here:

Complex Programmed and Designed Behaviors - Discovery Institute

Country

United States of AmericaUS Virgin IslandsUnited States Minor Outlying IslandsCanadaMexico, United Mexican StatesBahamas, Commonwealth of theCuba, Republic ofDominican RepublicHaiti, Republic ofJamaicaAfghanistanAlbania, People's Socialist Republic ofAlgeria, People's Democratic Republic ofAmerican SamoaAndorra, Principality ofAngola, Republic ofAnguillaAntarctica (the territory South of 60 deg S)Antigua and BarbudaArgentina, Argentine RepublicArmeniaArubaAustralia, Commonwealth ofAustria, Republic ofAzerbaijan, Republic ofBahrain, Kingdom ofBangladesh, People's Republic ofBarbadosBelarusBelgium, Kingdom ofBelizeBenin, People's Republic ofBermudaBhutan, Kingdom ofBolivia, Republic ofBosnia and HerzegovinaBotswana, Republic ofBouvet Island (Bouvetoya)Brazil, Federative Republic ofBritish Indian Ocean Territory (Chagos Archipelago)British Virgin IslandsBrunei DarussalamBulgaria, People's Republic ofBurkina FasoBurundi, Republic ofCambodia, Kingdom ofCameroon, United Republic ofCape Verde, Republic ofCayman IslandsCentral African RepublicChad, Republic ofChile, Republic ofChina, People's Republic ofChristmas IslandCocos (Keeling) IslandsColombia, Republic ofComoros, Union of theCongo, Democratic Republic ofCongo, People's Republic ofCook IslandsCosta Rica, Republic ofCote D'Ivoire, Ivory Coast, Republic of theCyprus, Republic ofCzech RepublicDenmark, Kingdom ofDjibouti, Republic ofDominica, Commonwealth ofEcuador, Republic ofEgypt, Arab Republic ofEl Salvador, Republic ofEquatorial Guinea, Republic ofEritreaEstoniaEthiopiaFaeroe IslandsFalkland Islands (Malvinas)Fiji, Republic of the Fiji IslandsFinland, Republic ofFrance, French RepublicFrench GuianaFrench PolynesiaFrench Southern TerritoriesGabon, Gabonese RepublicGambia, Republic of theGeorgiaGermanyGhana, Republic ofGibraltarGreece, Hellenic RepublicGreenlandGrenadaGuadaloupeGuamGuatemala, Republic ofGuinea, RevolutionaryPeople's Rep'c ofGuinea-Bissau, Republic ofGuyana, Republic ofHeard and McDonald IslandsHoly See (Vatican City State)Honduras, Republic ofHong Kong, Special Administrative Region of ChinaHrvatska (Croatia)Hungary, Hungarian People's RepublicIceland, Republic ofIndia, Republic ofIndonesia, Republic ofIran, Islamic Republic ofIraq, Republic ofIrelandIsrael, State ofItaly, Italian RepublicJapanJordan, Hashemite Kingdom ofKazakhstan, Republic ofKenya, Republic ofKiribati, Republic ofKorea, Democratic People's Republic ofKorea, Republic ofKuwait, State ofKyrgyz RepublicLao People's Democratic RepublicLatviaLebanon, Lebanese RepublicLesotho, Kingdom ofLiberia, Republic ofLibyan Arab JamahiriyaLiechtenstein, Principality ofLithuaniaLuxembourg, Grand Duchy ofMacao, Special Administrative Region of ChinaMacedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic ofMadagascar, Republic ofMalawi, Republic ofMalaysiaMaldives, Republic ofMali, Republic ofMalta, Republic ofMarshall IslandsMartiniqueMauritania, Islamic Republic ofMauritiusMayotteMicronesia, Federated States ofMoldova, Republic ofMonaco, Principality ofMongolia, Mongolian People's RepublicMontserratMorocco, Kingdom ofMozambique, People's Republic ofMyanmarNamibiaNauru, Republic ofNepal, Kingdom ofNetherlands AntillesNetherlands, Kingdom of theNew CaledoniaNew ZealandNicaragua, Republic ofNiger, Republic of theNigeria, Federal Republic ofNiue, Republic ofNorfolk IslandNorthern Mariana IslandsNorway, Kingdom ofOman, Sultanate ofPakistan, Islamic Republic ofPalauPalestinian Territory, OccupiedPanama, Republic ofPapua New GuineaParaguay, Republic ofPeru, Republic ofPhilippines, Republic of thePitcairn IslandPoland, Polish People's RepublicPortugal, Portuguese RepublicPuerto RicoQatar, State ofReunionRomania, Socialist Republic ofRussian FederationRwanda, Rwandese RepublicSamoa, Independent State ofSan Marino, Republic ofSao Tome and Principe, Democratic Republic ofSaudi Arabia, Kingdom ofSenegal, Republic ofSerbia and MontenegroSeychelles, Republic ofSierra Leone, Republic ofSingapore, Republic ofSlovakia (Slovak Republic)SloveniaSolomon IslandsSomalia, Somali RepublicSouth Africa, Republic ofSouth Georgia and the South Sandwich IslandsSpain, Spanish StateSri Lanka, Democratic Socialist Republic ofSt. HelenaSt. Kitts and NevisSt. LuciaSt. Pierre and MiquelonSt. Vincent and the GrenadinesSudan, Democratic Republic of theSuriname, Republic ofSvalbard & Jan Mayen IslandsSwaziland, Kingdom ofSweden, Kingdom ofSwitzerland, Swiss ConfederationSyrian Arab RepublicTaiwan, Province of ChinaTajikistanTanzania, United Republic ofThailand, Kingdom ofTimor-Leste, Democratic Republic ofTogo, Togolese RepublicTokelau (Tokelau Islands)Tonga, Kingdom ofTrinidad and Tobago, Republic ofTunisia, Republic ofTurkey, Republic ofTurkmenistanTurks and Caicos IslandsTuvaluUganda, Republic ofUkraineUnited Arab EmiratesUnited Kingdom of Great Britain & N. IrelandUruguay, Eastern Republic ofUzbekistanVanuatuVenezuela, Bolivarian Republic ofViet Nam, Socialist Republic ofWallis and Futuna IslandsWestern SaharaYemenZambia, Republic ofZimbabwe

Read the original here:

Coworking Pioneer Office Evolution Ends 2021 on a High Note - The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel

The mouth of the Arma Veirana cave, a site in the Ligurian mountains of northwestern Italy. Credit: Dominique Meyer

Ten thousand years ago, just after the last Ice Age, a group of hunter-gatherers buried an infant girl in an Italian cave. They entombed her with a rich selection of their treasured beads and pendants, and an eagle-owl talon, signaling their grief, and showing that even the youngest females were recognized as full persons in their society. The excavations and analysis of the discovery are published this week in Nature Scientific Reports and offers insight into the early Mesolithic period, from which few recorded burials are known. Claudine Gravel-Miguel, postdoctoral researcher with the Institute of Human Origins at Arizona State University (ASU) and coauthor on the paper, performed the analysis of the ornaments, which includes over 60 pierced shell beads and four shell pendants.

Mortuary practices offer a window into the worldviews and social structure of past societies. Child funerary treatment provides important insights into who was considered a person and afforded the attributes of an individual self, moral agency, and eligibility for group membership. The seemingly egalitarian funerary treatment of this infant female, who the team nicknamed Neve, shows that as early as 10,000 years ago in Western Europe, even the youngest females were recognized as full persons in their society.

The evolution and development of how early humans buried their dead as revealed in the archaeological record has enormous cultural significance, says Jamie Hodgkins, ASU doctoral graduate and paleoanthropologist at the University of Colorado Denver.

Arma Veirana, a cave in the Ligurian pre-Alps of northwestern Italy, is a popular spot for local families to visit. Looters also discovered the site, and their digging exposed the late Pleistocene tools that drew researchers to the area.

The research team started surveying the site in 2015 and discovered the remains during the last week of the 2017 field season. The team of project coordinators includes Italian collaborators Fabio Negrino, University of Genoa, and Stefano Benazzi, University of Bologna, as well as researchers from the University of Montreal, Washington University, University of Ferrara, University of Tubingen, and the Institute of Human Origins.

Illustration showing the placement of beads and shells along with the cranium. Credit: Claudine Gravel-Miguel

The first two excavation seasons were spent near the mouth of the cave, exposing stratigraphic layers that contained tools over 50,000 years old typically associated with Neandertals in Europe (Mousterian tools). They also found the remains of ancient meals such as the cut-marked bones of wild boars and elk and bits of charred fat. In addition, they found stone tools that were much more recent and that had likely been eroding from deeper inside the cave. To better understand the stratigraphy of the cave and document its occupation history, the team opened new sections further inside the cave in 2017. As the team explored this new section, they began to unearth pierced shell beads, which Hodgkins examined more carefully back in the lab.

A few days after they found the first bead, one of the excavators uncovered a small piece of the infants cranial vault.

I was excavating in the adjacent square and remember looking over and thinking thats a weird bone, says Gravel-Miguel. It quickly became clear that not only we were looking at a human cranium, but that it was also of a very young individual. It was an emotional day.

Using dental tools and a small paint brush, researchers spent that week and the following field season to carefully expose the whole skeleton, which was adorned with articulated lines of pierced shell beads.

The excavation techniques are state-of-the-art and leave no doubt to the associations of the materials with the skeleton, said Curtis Marean, who was not involved in the study. Marean is associate director of the Institute of Human Origins and Foundation Professor with the School of Human Evolution and Social Change at ASU.

In a series of analyses coordinated across multiple institutions and numerous experts, the team uncovered critical details about the ancient burial. Radiocarbon dating determined that the child lived 10,000 years ago, and amelogenin protein analysis and ancient DNA revealed that the infant was a female belonging to a lineage of European women known as the U5b2b haplogroup.

Theres a decent record of human burials before around 14,000 years ago, said Hodgkins. But the latest Upper Paleolithic period and earliest part of the Mesolithic are more poorly known when it comes to funerary practices. Infant burials are especially rare, so Neve adds important information to help fill this gap.

The Mesolithic is particularly interesting, said coauthor Caley Orr, ASU doctoral graduate and paleoanthropologist and anatomist at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. It followed the end of the final Ice Age and represents the last period in Europe when hunting and gathering was the primary way of making a living. So, its a really important time period for understanding human prehistory.

Detailed virtual histology, or study of the tissue and structure, of the infants teeth showed that she died 40 to 50 days after birth and that she experienced stress that briefly halted the growth of her teeth 47 days and 28 days before she was born. Carbon and nitrogen analyses of the teeth revealed that the babys mother had been nourishing the infant in her womb on a land-based diet.

Gravel-Miguel performed an analysis of the ornaments adorning the infant, which demonstrated the care invested in each piece and showed that many of the ornaments exhibited wear that proves they were passed down to the child from group members. The details of this researchalong with further resultsare the focus of a separate article, currently under review.

Citing a similar burial of two infants dating to 11,500 years ago at Upward Sun River, Alaska, Hodgkins said the funerary treatment of Neve suggests that the recognition of infant females as full persons has deep origins in a common ancestral culture that was shared by peoples who migrated into Europe and those who migrated to North America. Or it may have arisen in parallel in populations across the planet.

Reference: An infant burial from Arma Veirana in northwestern Italy provides insights into funerary practices and female personhood in early Mesolithic Europe by Jamie Hodgkins, Caley M. Orr, Claudine Gravel-Miguel, Julien Riel-Salvatore, Christopher E. Miller, Luca Bondioli, Alessia Nava, Federico Lugli, Sahra Talamo, Mateja Hajdinjak, Emanuela Cristiani, Matteo Romandini, Dominique Meyer, Danylo Drohobytsky, Falko Kuester, Genevive Pothier-Bouchard, Michael Buckley, Lucia Mancini, Fabio Baruffaldi, Sara Silvestrini, Simona Arrighi, Hannah M. Keller, Roco Beln Griggs, Marco Peresani, David S. Strait, Stefano Benazzi and Fabio Negrino, 14 December 2021, Scientific Reports.DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-02804-z

The research, excavation, and analysis were made possible with funding from The Wenner-Gren Foundation, Leakey Foundation, National Geographic Society Waitt Program, Hyde Family Foundations, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the European Unions Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme, and the Max Planck Society.

See the article here:

Evolution of Personhood: Earliest Adorned Female Infant Burial in Europe Reveals Significant Insights - SciTechDaily

Article In Brief

A new gene delivery vector and methodology called directed evolution enables more potent delivery of corrective genes to the muscles in mice and primate models, and holds promise for reducing the cost and risk of treatment for muscle disorders.

A new gene delivery vector, building on over 20 years of basic virology research, holds promise for accelerating gene therapy research and reducing the cost and risk of treatment, according to a paper published September 16 in the journal Cell.

We are watching the validation of basic science translated into therapeutic reagents to eventually treat unmet needs for muscle disorders, said R. Jude Samulski, PhD, professor of pharmacology and director of the Gene Therapy Center at the University of North Carolina, who was not involved in the new study.

Hope for delivering therapeutic genes for human diseases has focused in recent years on the handful of naturally occurring adeno-associated viruses (AAV), whose various serotypes differ in their affinity for different tissues. For neuromuscular diseases such as Duchenne muscular dystrophy and spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), AAV9 has been the preferred vector, due to its relative tropism for muscle tissue.

But that tropism is still only partial and is in fact rather limited; autopsies of patients who have received AAV9 for SMA suggest that about 90 percent of the vector is taken up by the liver instead. This is part of the reason that it requires an enormous number of viral particles to treat a patient, explained Mohammadsharif Tabebordbar, PhD, lead author of the new study and until recently a research scientist at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard University.

That necessary excess accounts in part for the astronomically high cost of even preclinical gene therapy studies. It also increases the risk of liver toxicity and immune reaction in patients receiving treatment. The risk and expense of high doses of AAV vectors is such that older and heavier patients are largely excluded from clinical trials altogether.

That led Dr. Tabebordbar and colleagues to try to design an AAV capsid that could overcome these limitations. The problem we were trying to solve was whether we could engineer the capsid of the virus in such a way that we could switch it from mainly going into the liver, to mainly going to the muscle, he told Neurology Today.

To do so, the team turned to a technique called directed evolution, whose developer, Frances Arnold, PhD, was one of three recipients of the 2018 Nobel Prize for Chemistry. Like evolution through natural selection, directed evolution is an iterative process, in which a large number of variants are produced and then screened by a selection process. Through multiple rounds, the most fit variant emerges.

In the current study, in the first round, Dr. Tabebordbar generated more than 5 million variants of one protein in the AAV9 capsid, each carrying the gene for its own variant, and then injected the resulting vectors into mice.

He then used a stringent selection process to find the most suitable vectors for muscle gene therapy. Much previous work in the field has identified myotropic vectors by identifying virus genomes from variants that entered the muscle, based on the assumption that more virus genomes in meant more therapeutic protein produced. But that assumption has proved faulty, Dr. Tabebordbar said.

There are many steps involved in effectively transducing a muscle cell, he said. It begins with binding and internalization, then intracellular trafficking and escape from the endosomes, entering the nucleus, release of the genome, and conversion to double-stranded DNA. Only variants that get through this whole process can express the transgene.

So rather than measuring the number of viral genomes per cell, the team looked instead at the level of capsid mRNA. From the original 5 million variants, they selected about 30,000 that expressed the highest levels of mRNA, and used these for another round of variation and selection.

That second round led to an interesting discoverythe top 12 variants all bore a three amino-acid motif (arginine-glycine-aspartic acid, or RGD). Further work with the top candidate, dubbed MyoAAV-1a, showed it to be between 10 and 29 times better than AAV9 at delivering a reporter gene to muscles, including the heart, and reduced delivery to the liver. They observed improved transduction in multiple breeds of mice, and treatment with two different therapeutic genes in models of Duchenne muscular dystrophy and X-linked myotubular myopathy both led to functional improvement.

Doing directed evolution in mice provides you a good research tool, Dr. Tabebordbar said, no mean feat if it can reduce the cost of preclinical evaluation of potential therapies or speed the discovery of new biology critical for developing better treatments. But whether you can actually get a drug out of it is a different question.

The team tested the directed evolution technique in monkeys, and found again after two rounds of selection that the top hits contained the RGD motif, but with different surrounding amino acids, perhaps because of differences in the integrin heterodimer, the surface protein to which the capsid binds, or perhaps because of another part of the story that we don't know yet, Dr. Tabebordbar said. That same RGD motif was independently identified by another group, reported in 2020 in Nature Communications.

Dr. Tabedbordbar is now co-founder and chief scientific officer of Kate Therapeutics in San Diego, a start-up hoping to develop this directed evolution platform for muscle disease therapeutics.

Frustratingly, despite the closer evolutionary similarity to humans, the best vectors in myotube culture were not effective in monkeys. So in vitro and in vivo transduction are two completely different results, he said. It's much more complicated. You can't say that just because it works in myotubes it will work in the human organism.

That presents a challenge for clinical development, but one that may be met by developing better models for further experiments. Using mice with engrafted human muscle, Dongsheng Duan, PhD, professor of neurology at the University of Missouri in Columbia, is pursuing that strategy in an effort to develop a better model for testing new therapies.

This is one step closer, but it will still have to be tested in patients to know if it will work, Dr. Duan said. We hope this new capsid will outperform the previous capsids currently in clinical trials, in order to reduce the dose without compromising gene delivery efficiency. At least for preclinical studies, these results suggest you can use fewer viral particles, which is good, especially for toxicology studies in monkeys.

A single dose of onasemnogene abeparvovec-xioi (Zolgensma), the AAV therapy for SMA, may cost in the low millions of dollars, he pointed out. Cutting that by an order of magnitude or more, which seems possible, should absolutely accelerate the development of gene therapy.

This was an elegant study, said Dr. Samulski. First by testing millions of different possible peptides, then by focusing on the context of the RGD motif that interacts with the heterodimer, they in effect asked the muscle cell which one it liked best. The power of this technique is that you get exactly what you select for.

The role of the integrin heterodimer in capturing and facilitating the entry of AAV emerged from work in Dr. Samulski's lab in 1999.

One of the strengths here is the use of multiple models, from mice to primates to human cells. The field has gone down rabbit holes in focusing almost exclusively on rodent models, Dr. Samulski said, and so the majority of vectors have turned into rodent-specific reagents.

Nonetheless, he cautioned, While it is tempting to think that when you are in the monkey you are closer to the correct species, the reality of it is that until you get into humans, you don't know how close you really are. The animals only give us a guide.

Having seen too many false dawns break over the years, the more seasoned investigators sit back and wait for the clinic, he said.

Dr. Tabebordbar is a co-founder, stakeholder, and full-time employee of Kate Therapeutics

WHAT IT IS

Directed evolution is a technique that rapidly modifies a protein, such as an enzyme or ligand, so that it carries out a reaction faster or fits tighter with a receptor than the original protein.

HOW IT WORKS

Directed evolution is an iterative process, usually involving several rounds of variation and selection. To begin, the gene for the protein is mutated or systematically changed to create many different variants. These gene variants are then expressed in a model system, such as bacteria, that tests the activity of each variant. Those with the strongest activity are chosen for another round of variation and selection, until the desired level of activity is reached or until no further improvement can be detected.

HOW IT IS APPLIED

Directed evolution has been used to develop faster and more efficient enzymes, improving binding ability of therapeutic antibodies, and improving other characteristics of proteins such as stability at high temperatures, for use in industrial production. Additionally, as in the current study, directed evolution can be used to improve the ability of gene therapy vectors to transduce their intended cell targets and minimize off-target transduction.

Go here to read the rest:

Directed Evolution Improves Gene Therapy Vector for... : Neurology Today - LWW Journals

Check out this compilation of some of the iconic jerseys of the members of the NBA 75th Anniversary Team!

NBA Jersey Day: NBAStore.com

The original NBA uniform featured the basics: numbers, letters and were even without team colors. Players wore shorts that measured just three inches long at the inseams, paired with a simple singlet jersey that had to be tucked in, a requirement that still stands in todays NBA.

And while short-shorts and high socks may seem like a blast from the past, current stars still pay homage to many trends and styles from generations before.

As the NBA celebrates its 75th Anniversary Season, take a look back at the most notable trends and style changes of the NBAs uniform on Jersey Day.

In 1957, the NBA jersey resembled a simple singlet with shorts well-above knee length.

Canvas high top sneakers with knee-high socks dominated the NBA until the 1970s.

Once Michael Jordan began wearing longer shorts, the majority of NBA players followed suit.

While most of the NBA adapted to longer shorts, Jazz star John Stockton continued to rock the old-school style until his retirement.

Until 2018, sneakers worn during games were restricted to being either 51 percent white or black, plus a minimal team color accent.

Beginning the 2018-19 season, the NBA allowed players to wear sneakers of any color at any point during the upcoming season.

Follow this link:

NBA Jersey Day: Evolution of the NBA uniform - NBA.com

TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Alexa Translations, a leader in translation services for the legal and financial industries, had a breakthrough year marked by incredible brand growth, prestigious awards, as well as new enhanced A.I. solutions that help organizations break language barriers.

Here is what Alexa Translations has been up to in 2021:

Throughout 2021, the company was focused on accelerating brand growth and optimizing their A.I. platform to empower legal and financial institutions to save time and money without sacrificing quality. As a result, the company made major strategic advancements to better connect with the community and innovate in ways that keep the organization one step ahead of their clients' needs.

Now that 2021 comes to a close, we can look back on this as a monumental year. We have successfully established ourselves as the leader in A.I. translation solutions for Canadian enterprises. Despite the challenging times, our team has shown remarkable resilience and commitment in bringing these important projects to completion while accelerating our brand growth," said Gary Kalaci - CEO of Alexa Translations. In 2022, we look forward to continued growth. We'll continue to enhance our platform with more languages and features based on clients' feedback, expand internationally to serve them where they are based, and engage with them in meaningful ways, both online and offline.

While this year's achievements have thrust the translation industry ahead, Alexa Translations recognizes that there is still a lot of work to be done in 2022 and beyond. As clients' needs continue to evolve, the company aims to be their trusted partner in finding innovative new ways to optimize their translation workflow.

For more information about the company, visit: https://alexatranslations.com

About Alexa Translations

Alexa Translations breaks language barriers with A.I.-powered translations for the worlds most prestigious legal, financial and government institutions. This cutting-edge, secure translation technology is combined with professional translators and certified subject matter experts to meet the evolving needs of clients and the industry overall.

Read more:

Alexa Translations' Year of Evolution and Growth - Business Wire

K-pop has seen massive popularity due to boy bands and girl groups debuts and comebacks with new concepts every year. 2021 was no different, witnessing a continued surge of Korean stars embarking on solo projects, making bolder moves in the U.S. and delving deeper into technology.

The genres success and phenomenal fandom since 2008 has mostly been derived from idol groups. The high-energy, vibrant performances often overshadowed talented singer/songwriters to become the genres trademark.BTS and Blackpink have set a high bar, but there is room for up-and-coming groups and singer-songwriter soloists too.

There are other artists also coming to the surface. Monsta X, Stray Kids, and AB6IX to name a few, but instead of the traditional boy bands or girl groups, perhaps singer/songwriters performing a diverse range of genres would be something to look out for, Shin Cho, head of K-pop for Warner Music Asia, tells Variety. Groups are popular, but solo artists arent getting the same exposure right now. However this could change as we look to the next phase of K-pop.

Korean American singer Eric Nam is a perfect testament to the evolution of the genre since beginning his career as a solo artist in 2012. When asked about his journey, Nam shares, Its hard.Solo artists have to carry everything on their own, Nam says. Idol groups, on the other hand, get to share the load. Other than the music and performances, fans really love the chemistry within idol groups. Its a huge appeal seeing the human side of their favorite idols interacting with others.

On advice hed give his peers embarking on solo projects and breaking new ground beyond Korean shores, Nam says, Id encourage them to do it. But be aware that itll take a lot of time and patience. He adds, Theres opportunity costs, so be willing to invest in the markets youre interested in and make sure your team understands this. Nam has done much of what he wanted in Korea and is now looking to reverse engineer his K-pop success and push the envelope stateside. Despite the pandemic, he is preparing for his There and Back Again World Tour 2022 across 51 cities on both sides of the Atlantic, along with releasing his new album There and Back Again on January 7.

Collaborations, while not a new concept, have seen K-pop artists and massive international acts (i.e. BTS x Coldplay) partner in 2021 and that should continue through 2022. Cho notes all around the world, A&R and marketing people have consistently been experimenting with cross-territory collaborations. Partnerships [major labels with Korean ones] have definitely helped, but K-pops rise in popularity has coincided with peoples understanding and acceptance of different cultures.

HYBE and SM Entertainment announced their commitments and efforts to further penetrate and develop talent in the U.S. market. HYBE is set to unveil a Los Angeles-based girl group developed with a U.S. local training system with Geffen Records under Universal Music Group. SM Entertainment also partnered with MGM Television for a talent audition program in search of the next U.S.-based NCT boy band sub-unit. No stranger to talent audition shows, Korean media conglomerate CJ ENM is in development stages of a talent competition with HBO Max in Latin America, following its success in rookie boy band Enhypens debut through Belift Labs, a joint venture between CJ ENM and HYBE.

On these partnerships, Nam says, I think its great these labels have partnerships. The landscape is changing and theres so much more to do. I would love to see more labels invest in more artists to create a diverse array of talent across the entire music scene.

Apart from taking on a global stage, artists growth will involve experimenting with new genres. We [Warner Music] look forward to a big year ahead for our roster: from R&B, soul and pop/K-pop crossover artists such as BLOO, GSoul, Jamie, oceanfromtheblue, to Dance DJ and singer-songwriters like Shaun, Cho says.

Would extensive globalization and crossovers interfere with K- pops artistry as more songs are sung in English? This was a question posed at the recent Count- down to 2021 Mnet Asian Music Awards. CJ ENM America CEO Angela Killoren explained, A hybrid version [of K-pop songs] will probably keep going and hopefully that will be artist-led. Teddy Park writes for Blackpink. Hes Korean American. The language in their heart is English, which explains why its mixed in. K-pop is a big tent and hopefully everybody can speak in a language they want to.

2022 will likely further spotlight the role of technology in K-pop. Aespa, SMs first virtual K-pop female quartet, recently received CJ ENMs 2021 Visionary Award for its metaverse concept. They were the only K-pop group nominated as one of Hollywoods rising stars in People magazines Ones to Watch 2021 and the first K-pop group to perform at Foxs The Nick Cannon Show.

Cho shares, What Aespa is doing is clever as theyre catching on to the latest trends and technology, which is giving them an edge. Aespas futuristic theme appeals to a younger, digitally savvy crowd, invigorating possibilities to the music business. Korea and K-pop are always fast in embracing new technologies to find innovative ways to create. So much of K-pop is centered around building a deep connection with fans, adds Nam.

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are also likely to be an area of focus in K-pops development. But Cho believes the music element is still very important, though new technologies serve as vehicles for music discovery and artists to expand their business.

For Nam, aware of the controversy behind NFTs, he plans to exercise in their creation with caution. I dont want it to feel transactional, but rather, done with the right purpose and intent. It has to feel personal.

Heading toward 2022, the evolution of K-pop would mean increased inclusiveness, more unique storytelling and greater integration into lifestyles and brands. One could say Motown in the 1960s might be the equivalent of K-pop today.

As Killoren puts it,K-pop represents the renaissance of a whole new music genre that people got behind and was never there before.

Read more here:

Solo Projects, Genre Experiments and More Pave Way for Coming K-Pop Evolution - Variety

Editors note: Table Crumbs is an occasional roundup of a weeks serving worth of Columbia food news, in brief.

Foodie bookie: Free Times has dove twice into Taste The State, the one part cookbook-one part food history book from the University of South Carolinas David Shields and chef Kevin Mitchell. The book details the states essential foods and their history, and now it has won a prestigious food book award. The Gourmand World Cookbook Awards, which awards one countrys book in each category, named Taste the State as the top U.S. food tourism book. It will now compete for the global award.

Cake boss: Nothing Bundt Cakes, the bakery chain that specializes in (you guessed it) bundt cakes, opened its third Columbia-area location on Monday. The newest location is in Village at Sandhills, according to a Facebook post. Assuming its like other locations, its a bundt extravaganza, with options ranging from tiered bundt cakes to Bundtinis (cupcake-sized bundt cakes.)

Miracle on Main is the natural evolution of the pop-up

Amid a shower of Christmas lights and wreaths, the former Main Street Public House has been transformed on Columbias Main Street for the rest of the month.

Its now temporarily known as Miracle on Main, a Christmas-themed cocktail bar pop-up that has similar month-long stints in numerous spots around the country. Only here until the end of December, its the latest adaptation of the pop-up concept that has been a hit in the food world for some time.

In the new year, Miracle on Main will convert to the newest outpost of Prohibition, a Charleston-based whiskey bar.

The goal for us is, (this is) Prohibitions introduction to the Columbia community, said Tyler Rothenberg, a consultant with the bar who helped open the Charleston's outpost Miracle and connected Prohibition's owners to the Miracle concept.

Miracle is a somewhat upscale affair, despite its intentionally kitschy digs. The drinks all begin at least at $13 and shots run $9. The drinks are, as you might expect, very thematic. Theres the Christmaspolitan (which features Vodka, St. Germain, spiced cranberry sauce and more) and the On Dasher (which has gin, egg white and marshmallow, among other ingredients.)

The bar, which is open in Charleston and has pop-ups throughout the world, is mostly identical to other Miracle locations. The pop-ups are done through a licensing agreement, Rothenberg explained, and they each share similar aesthetics and drinks. In addition to serving seasonal drinks, the place also sells merchandise like the mugs or glasses some drinks come in.

The differences come from the city and the other options food, mainly.

Its one of those things that when you walk into a Walmart, you walk into a Walmart, theres different people, theres different smiles, different energy, he said. I think though the goal is for you to walk into Miracle on Main in Columbia and know youre in a Miracle pop-up bar. Its also to embody the specific energy and community of Columbia.

Miracle is the only pop-up that Rothenberg, who said he has been involved with multiple pop-up concepts, knew with as many locations as Miracle.

Pop-ups, though, more generally have a lengthy history in the food scene and one that was initially more underground.

In Columbia, chef and caterer Scott Hall is perhaps the main purveyor of pop-up style events in the city.

There is a certain temporary and highly stylized nature to pop-ups that he feels makes them distinct from more general events. For example, a one-night wine dinner or something in that vein, wouldnt quite qualify, the operator of the former Bone-In Barbecue said.

In the past, and with what he hopes to bring back, Hall held X Marks the Spot dinner events and frequently hosts drag brunches. The X Marks the Spot was an adventure-like ordeal, where participants would find clues around town that directed them to the final location, where their meal was held.

He pointed to roughly 2006 as when he first started noticing them. At that time, they were largely in bigger cities like Los Angeles and he going to ones where the chefs geld them in non-restaurant spaces and served things like game meat.

This sort of thing that happens in a snapshot, then its totally gone it really, because of that, it felt special and kind of underground and kind of potentially illegal, Hall shared. That kind of romanticism is what people got excited about.

Hall lauded and lamented the sprawling nature of the Miracle pop-up, with its wide number of spots doing it.

He was uncertain of any other pop-up that has that breadth and described it as exciting, despite it not quite hitting on his underground descriptor of pop-ups a characteristic he said helped foster innovation, something that is more difficult in a financially minded atmosphere.

This is pretty darn corporate, which I feel is at odds with the real spirit and fun of a pop-up, this is corporate as heck, he said. But I dont think that should necessarily take away from the fun of it, the excitement of it, I certainly feel like we need something like this.

I think this is kind of the natural pop-up and progression of where these come from, he continued.

Rothenberg agreed that some pop-ups like Miracle could be seen as slightly commercial but contended that Miracle opens the door for Columbia to experience something new.

I think what is important is to bring the same energy that you experience from a larger market, he concluded. Whats special about a large scale pop-up like Miracle, the community has an opportunity to feel the excitement and continue to go on with their life."

Bierkeller Columbias brewery is ready to go, once the lease is signed.

In September, Scott Burgess met with Columbia policymakers to secure a $100,000 economic development grant. The goal was the build out Bierkeller Columbias first brick-and-mortar brewery.

That plan is still on track, though currently in negotiations before construction and other work can being. Burgess reported that they have the framework and verbally agreed to contracts with a construction company and architect. The only thing left is the most important signing a lease.

I imagine there are people out there who are super euphoric when theyre starting out. They want to get stuff going and you get excited about the beer and introducing it to the public, said Burgess, the brewery owner and lead brewer, said. I dont want to say were more cautions, but were taking a huge step and want to do it right.

While its been over two months since that initial announcement, Burgess said he was as optimistic as before that things were moving along the right path. Hes being tight-lipped as usual about the plans other specifics, too, again declining to say where the brewery will be specifically.

Were still just staying the same thing as before. As close to the riverfront area were known for.

Burgess is still targeting a fall 2022 opening for the brewery, which he said will be unlike other breweries in the area, from its German-only brewing ethos to its aesthetic.

He said they wont include much of the brewery aesthetic that people expect, specifying repurposed wood and tin as things theyre avoiding.

A lot of people have these same preconceived notions of breweries, Burgess said. I have to be conscious of, in the same way we were in the beginning ... this is that times 20. Because there are 20 pieces more to the puzzles that people here havent seen.

See the rest here:

Table Crumbs: The evolution of the pop up in Columbia, Bierkeller negotiating lease - Charleston Post Courier