Impure stone and the threat to decency: marble tints and veins

According to the classical tradition, marble sculptures were to be made of ‘pure’ white material. This remained an aesthetic ideal even after archaeological findings had revealed evidence of ancient polychromy. This article argues that tinting as well as natural staining on marble figures in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were not only aesthetically but also morally reprehensible, because they violated the ideal of homo clausus. This term, coined by the sociologist Norbert Elias, conceptualizes a subject that imposes ‘self-restraint’ to control its physical body and its emotions. Perfect control was seen embodied in the ancient images of the gods, which were assumed to have been made of immaculate white marble. Any colouring, whether of natural origin or deliberately produced, seemed to contaminate this concept. My investigation is focused on the historical justifications for John Gibson’s scandalous Tinted Venus, and figures of veined marble rejected in France on similar grounds in the late eighteenth century, such as Christoph-Gabriel Allegrain’s Venus and Jean-Antoine Houdon’s Frileuse. I examine how the coloured veins and tints of the stone gained semantic qualities in female figures, where a blush or a vein seemed to reveal emotions and desires and thus infringe the ideal.

The Association of “GOOP” on Gross Examination of Fine Needle Aspiration Samples and On-Site Adequacy

<b><i>Background:</i></b> Rapid on-site cytologic evaluation (ROSE) is not always available for fine needle aspiration (FNA) specimens. We have examined the relationships between the presence of “GOOP” (defined as gooey white material) on FNA aspirates, on-site adequacy (OSA), and diagnosis. <b><i>Methods:</i></b> Consecutive FNA samples obtained over the study interval were included. Samples were assessed macroscopically for the presence or absence of GOOP (GOOP+ or GOOP−). GOOP+ samples were further characterized as shiny (G+_S) or cheesy (G+_C). Gross descriptors were correlated with OSA and final diagnoses. <b><i>Results:</i></b> Of the 204 sites biopsied, 102 were malignant, 94 benign, and 8 nondiagnostic. The presence of GOOP was highly predictive for adequacy (positive predictive value 98%). While these correlations for GOOP positivity were significant, the absence of GOOP did not rule out adequacy or malignancy. The presence of GOOP was also significantly correlated with a malignant diagnosis. <b><i>Conclusions:</i></b> We have prospectively demonstrated that the presence of GOOP correlates strongly with adequacy. This may be of value for those for whom ROSE is not available and, when available, may help prioritize specimens for on-site review.

A Versatile Tripodal Ligand for Sensitizing Lanthanide (LnIII) Ions and Color Tuning

Lanthanide (LnIII) ions were successfully chelated and sensitized with a tripodal ligand. The absolute LnIII-centered emission efficiencies were ~3% for both the europium(III) (EuIII) and terbium (TbIII) complexes and up to 54% for the cerium(III) (CeIII) complex. The differences in emission quantum yields for the early lanthanides (CeIII) and the mid lanthanides (EuIII and TbIII) were attributed to their d–f and f–f nature, respectively. Despite the low quantum yield of the EuIII complex, the combination of the residual ligand fluorescence and the red EuIII emission resulted in a bluish-white material with the Commission Internationale de l’Eclairage (CIE) coordinates (0.258, 0.242). Thus, metal complexes of the ligand could be used in the generation of single-component white-light-emitting materials.

Political Gutting, Crushed Life and Poetic Justice

This chapter will return to Woolf’s Three Guineas and political agency and look at Butler’s Kindred and Parable of the Sower. Thechapter has three sections, each addresses different types of political horror. First there is a return to racial and colonial terror in Euzhan Palcy’s A Dry White Season (1989), Claire Denis’s Chocolat (1988) and White Material (2009). Then the chapter takes us to the outcasts and powerful lost souls in man-eat-men environments in The Bad Batch (Ana Lily Amirpour, 2016), Tigers are not Afraid (Issa Lopez, 2017) and Songs My Brothers Taught Me (Chloé Zhao, 2015). In Atlantics (Mati Diop 2019) the sea off the coast of Senegal raises many ghosts from the past and the present. The chapter concludes with a section of eco-horror through the eyes of female directors: Spoor (Agnieska Holland 2017) is an allegory of the feminist backlash in contemporary Poland, wrapped in a hunting tale. Little Joe (Jessica Hausner 2019) and Glass Garden (Shin Sue-won 2017) are contemporary Frankenstein stories with idiosyncratic female scientists.

Dental Prosthesis: Postmortem Treatment of Oral Reconstruction during the Mummification Process

During excavations carried out in 2014 at Tell Tebilla, Egypt, three tombs were discovered inside a mud-brick mastaba, each one with an individual interment. The occupant of the second tomb was of great interest. It was a partially mummified man about 60 years old, named Wah ib Ra, a priest of Sekhmet. The detailed study of his skull and jaw revealed that this man had lost most of his teeth in life, long before his death. However, we discovered that new false teeth were carefully embedded during the mummification process in the gaps caused by antemortem teeth loss. To perform this maneuver, a white material was used as glue. Chemical analysis performed on this white material confirmed that it was anhydrite (CaSO4), which is the dehydrated form of plaster. Although the final result was successful, the embalmers made several errors in both the placement and the type of new teeth used. This performance of the embalmers can be framed within the actions already described as “prosthesis for the afterlife,” in which mummification would not only be a process to avoid putrefaction but also a moment in which the embalmers would try to rebuild, or improve the body in order for the individual to enjoy an eternal life without the problems or illnesses suffered in earthly life.

Physical Incompatibility between Vancomycin and Viscoelastic Mimicking Acute Endophthalmitis: The First Report

This is the first documentation of vancomycin precipitation with viscoelastic in the anterior chamber of the eye. A 34-year-old white male underwent uneventful penetrating keratoplasty. Intracameral instillation of 1 mg/0.1 mL of vancomycin followed no attempts of meticulous viscoelastic irrigation. Six hours later thick white material in the anterior chamber was sedimented. The following criteria excluded the diagnosis of endophthalmitis and TASS: clear and transparent anterior chamber and vitreous body, the absence of ciliary injection and corneal oedema, and unremarkable laboratory tests’ results. This iatrogenic complication mimicking endophthalmitis does not require any specific management and should be acknowledged in guidelines for prevention and treatment of endophthalmitis. The objective of this paper is to alert colleagues to this iatrogenic complication of vancomycin mimicking endophthalmitis. Whether this condition should be labelled as positive or negative demands further investigation. As vancomycin is a time-dependent antibiotic, it is possible that this precipitate could serve as a slowly releasing drug depot and viscoelastic as a vehicle for precipitation. This being the case, investigation is needed to analyse its potential to precipitate with another dispersive and cohesive viscoelasticity.

Gross efficiency of protein and metabolisable energy utilization of sugarcane press residue incorporated in layer diets

Sugarcane press residue (SPR), a nonconventional feed ingredient is a soft, spongy, amorphous, dark brown to white material was fed to 32-week-old white-leghorn-layer at 0, 5, 10 and 15 per cent either in the soya-based or fish-based diets to form T1 to T8 diets, respectively. Each diet so formulated was offered to five-replicates of four laying-hens each constituting a total of one-sixty birds reared for 84-days. Results revealed that the cumulative efficiency of protein utilization values of layers fed different experimental diets were 29.36, 28.62, 27.20, 29.11, 27.90, 28.21, 28.02 and 25.95 in T1 through T8 groups, respectively. Likewise, efficiency of energy utilization values ranged non-significantly from 28.18 (T1) to 24.84 (T8). Whereas, average EPU and EEU values due to main factors were found to be statistically non-significant. It was concluded that SPR can be included up to 15% in soya and fish based layer diets for energy and protein utilization apart from inorganic-matter.