Demographic Studies in Southwestern Prehistory

1975 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 94-103 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fred Plog

In this Essay, I will focus on inferences about the size of prehistoric populations based on estimates of the quantity of space utilized by those populations. I wish to recognize at the outset that there are many other data bases that have been employed by archaeologists in making inferences about prehistoric demography. While I do not intend to question the validity of alternative data bases for making paleo-demographic inferences, there are reasons why I believe that utilized space is potentially our most significant data base. Let us consider some of the alternatives. (1) Simulation models. Simulation models are powerful tools for gaining insight into the demography of prehistoric populations. Yet, if the implications of such models are to be tested, a means of making direct inferences about the population of prehistoric groups is needed.(2) Burial populations. Burial populations are likely to remain the data base from which the most comprehensive demographic inferences can be made. However, there are many areas of the world in which burial populations are so rare that one cannot count on using this data base. In addition, Cook (1972) and Baker and Sanders (1973) have identified a number of significant limitations on the utility of burial data.

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lihui Chen ◽  
Jie Li ◽  
Wu Zhu ◽  
Yehong Kuang ◽  
Tao Liu ◽  
...  

Psoriasis affects the health of myriad populations around the world. The pathogenesis is multifactorial, and the exact driving factor remains unclear. This condition arises from the interaction between hyperproliferative keratinocytes and infiltrating immune cells, with poor prognosis and high recurrence. Better clinical treatments remain to be explored. There is much evidence that alterations in the skin and intestinal microbiome play an important role in the pathogenesis of psoriasis, and restoration of the microbiome is a promising preventive and therapeutic strategy for psoriasis. Herein, we have reviewed recent studies on the psoriasis-related microbiome in an attempt to confidently identify the “core” microbiome of psoriasis patients, understand the role of microbiome in the pathogenesis of psoriasis, and explore new therapeutic strategies for psoriasis through microbial intervention.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dan V. Nicolau ◽  
Alexander Hasson ◽  
Mona Bafadhel

AbstractThe COVID-19 pandemic is placing unprecedented demands on healthcare systems worldwide and exacting a massive humanitarian toll. This makes the development of accurate predictive models imperative, not just for understanding the course of the pandemic but more importantly for gaining insight into the efficacy of public health measures and planning accordingly. Epidemiological models are forced to make assumptions about many unknowns and therefore can be unreliable. Here, taking an empirical approach, we report a 20-30 day lag between the peak of confirmed to recovered cases and the peak of daily deaths in each country, independent of the epoch of that country in its pandemic cycle. This analysis is expected to be largely independent of the proportion of the population being tested and therefore should aid in planning around the timing and easing of public health measures. Our data also suggests broad predictions for the number of fatalities, generally somewhat lower than most other models. Finally, our model suggests that the world as a whole is shortly to enter a recovery phase, at least as far as the first pandemic wave is concerned.


Author(s):  
Mahendran Maliapen

This chapter examines the application of system archetypes as a systems development methodology to create simulation models. Rapid organizational change and need to adapt to new business models limits the lifespan of both the databases and software applications. With the information representation permitted by archetypes, diagnostic analysis and can help to evolve generic classes and models for representing the real world. Archetypes do not describe any one problem specifically. They describe families of problems generically. Their value comes from the insights they offer into the dynamic interaction of complex systems. The case of a healthcare system is discussed here. As part of a suite of tools, they are extremely valuable in developing broad understandings about the hospital and its environment, and contribute more effectively to understanding problems. They are highly effective tools for gaining insight into patterns of strategic behavior, themselves reflective of the underlying structure of the system being studied. Diagnostically, archetypes help hospital managers recognize patterns of behavior that are already present in their organizations. They serve as the means for gaining insight into the underlying systems structures from which the archetypal behavior emerges. In the casemix model of the hospital, the investigation team discovered that some of the phenomena as described by these generic archetypes could be represented. The application of system archetypes to the strategic business analysis of the hospital case reveals that it is possible to identify loop holes in management’s strategic thinking processes and it is possible to defy these fallacies during policy implementation as illustrated by the results of the archetype simulation model. In this research study, hospital executives found that policy modification with slight variable changes helps to avoid such pitfalls in systems thinking and avoid potentially cost prohibitive learning had these policies been implemented in real life.


2018 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 211-223
Author(s):  
Aaron Wachhaus

PurposeMyths matter. They are one of the ways by which we seek to make sense of the world; understanding myths helps us understand not only the world around us but ourselves as well. Governance myths – myths that we tell about the state and our relationship to it or about the structures and figures making up our government and our relationships to them – can serve as a valuable means of gaining insight into civil society and for illuminating the goals and values of good governance. Categorizing governance myths can aid in that process. The paper aims to discuss this issue.Design/methodology/approachThis paper develops a typology of governance myths, and then explores mythic types and their implications for governance.FindingsA typology of myths facilitates systematic examination of fundamental stories told to explain and illustrate governance. Characteristics of myths at each level of governance may be used to better understand implicit expectations and assumptions about particular aspects of governance.Originality/valueThis typology can be used by scholars and practitioners to deconstruct stories told about governance and more effectively respond to citizens’ perceptions of the public sector.


Author(s):  
W. L. Steffens ◽  
Nancy B. Roberts ◽  
J. M. Bowen

The canine heartworm is a common and serious nematode parasite of domestic dogs in many parts of the world. Although nematode neuroanatomy is fairly well documented, the emphasis has been on sensory anatomy and primarily in free-living soil species and ascarids. Lee and Miller reported on the muscular anatomy in the heartworm, but provided little insight into the peripheral nervous system or myoneural relationships. The classical fine-structural description of nematode muscle innervation is Rosenbluth's earlier work in Ascaris. Since the pharmacological effects of some nematacides currently being developed are neuromuscular in nature, a better understanding of heartworm myoneural anatomy, particularly in reference to the synaptic region is warranted.


2019 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 249-259
Author(s):  
Joseph Acquisto

This essay examines a polemic between two Baudelaire critics of the 1930s, Jean Cassou and Benjamin Fondane, which centered on the relationship of poetry to progressive politics and metaphysics. I argue that a return to Baudelaire's poetry can yield insight into what seems like an impasse in Cassou and Fondane. Baudelaire provides the possibility of realigning metaphysics and politics so that poetry has the potential to become the space in which we can begin to think the two of them together, as opposed to seeing them in unresolvable tension. Or rather, the tension that Baudelaire animates between the two allows us a new way of thinking about the role of esthetics in moments of political crisis. We can in some ways see Baudelaire as responding, avant la lettre, to two of his early twentieth-century readers who correctly perceived his work as the space that breathes a new urgency into the questions of how modern poetry relates to the world from which it springs and in which it intervenes.


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