The spread of agriculture in south-eastern Europe: new data from North Macedonia

North Macedonia is a crucial region for understanding the spread of agriculture into the Mediterranean and Central Europe. To date, however, the area has been subject to relatively limited archaeological research. Here, the authors present use-wear and archaeobotanical analyses on material from two Neolithic sites, Govrelevo and Vrbjanska Čuka, to investigate practices that were previously unstudied in this part of the Balkans, such as sowing, cultivation and harvesting techniques. The results suggest the presence of permanent crop fields located in wetlands, with autumn and spring sowing, and harvesting using curved sickles. The study illuminates early agricultural practices in North Macedonia and adds to our knowledge of the spread of the Neolithic package across Europe.

Designing a Framework of Ethnomedicinal Plant Knowledge Integration Using OSS

Indigenous knowledge refers to the knowledge, innovations, and practices of indigenous communities. Ethnic groups are repository knowledge of herbal medicine. Many indigenous people use several plants for medicinal preparations, and these medicines are known as ethnomedicine. It has developed from experience gained over centuries. Species of ethnomedicinal plants are threatened in most of nations due to overexploitation, habitat loss, destructive harvesting techniques, unsustainable trade, and deforestation. Documented indigenous knowledge on ethnomedicine forms part of the documentary heritage of the nation. The chapter will provide a framework for design an information retrieval system for ethnomedicine or knowledge on medicinal plants that are used to manage human ailments. The framework will be prepared, established on the open source software (OSS), and is appropriate not only for documentation but also beneficial for retrieving domain-specific knowledge. The model provides a framework for resource integration digitally using Greenstone Digital Library (GSDL) software.

Internet of Bio-Nano Things: A review of applications, enabling technologies and key challenges

Internet of Bio-Nano Things (IoBNT) is envisioned to be a heterogeneous network of nanoscale and biological devices, so called Bio-Nano Things (BNTs), communicating via non-conventional means, e.g., molecular communications (MC), in non-conventional environments, e.g., inside human body. The main objective of this emerging networking framework is to enable direct and seamless interaction with biological systems for accurate sensing and control of their dynamics in real time. This close interaction between bio and cyber domains with unprecedentedly high spatio-temporal resolution is expected to open up vast opportunities to devise novel applications, especially in healthcare area, such as intrabody continuous health monitoring. There are, however, substantial challenges to be overcome if the enormous potential of the IoBNT is to be realized. These range from developing feasible nanocommunication and energy harvesting techniques for BNTs to handling the big data generated by IoBNT. In this survey, we attempt to provide a comprehensive overview of the IoBNT framework along with its main components and applications. An investigation of key technological challenges is presented together with a detailed review of the state-of-the-art approaches and a discussion of future research directions.