Geophilic Tinea Profunda after a Stay at a Swiss Lake: A Case Report

Cutaneous infections with <i>Nannizzia gypsea</i> in Switzerland are very rare (only about 0.2% of all dermatophyte infections). We present the case of an impressive tinea profunda on the upper arm of a 53-year-old woman. In our patient, the source of infection was probably the sand and soil at a Swiss lake. This case report shows the importance of a correct diagnostic workup, as the infection can mimic an inflammatory dermatosis like psoriasis or eczema and thus lead to a diagnostic and therapeutic delay.

Redox-dependent niche differentiation provides evidence for multiple bacterial sources of glycerol tetraether lipids in lakes

Terrestrial paleoclimate archives such as lake sediments are essential for our understanding of the continental climate system and for the modeling of future climate scenarios. However, quantitative proxies for the determination of paleotemperatures are sparse. The relative abundances of certain bacterial lipids, i.e., branched glycerol dialkyl glycerol tetraethers (brGDGTs), respond to changes in environmental temperature, and thus have great potential for climate reconstruction. Their application to lake deposits, however, is hampered by the lack of fundamental knowledge on the ecology of brGDGT-producing microbes in lakes. Here, we show that brGDGTs are synthesized by multiple groups of bacteria thriving under contrasting redox regimes in a deep meromictic Swiss lake (Lake Lugano). This niche partitioning is evidenced by highly distinct brGDGT inventories in oxic vs. anoxic water masses, and corresponding vertical patterns in bacterial 16S rRNA gene abundances, implying that sedimentary brGDGT records are affected by temperature-independent changes in the community composition of their microbial producers. Furthermore, the stable carbon isotope composition (δ13C) of brGDGTs in Lake Lugano and 34 other (peri-)Alpine lakes attests to the widespread heterotrophic incorporation of 13C-depleted, methane-derived biomass at the redox transition zone of mesotrophic to eutrophic lake systems. The brGDGTs produced under such hypoxic/methanotrophic conditions reflect near-bottom water temperatures, and are characterized by comparatively low δ13C values. Depending on climate zone and water depth, lake sediment archives predominated by deeper water/low-13C brGDGTs may provide more reliable records of climate variability than those where brGDGTs derive from terrestrial and/or aquatic sources with distinct temperature imprints.

Swiss Architectural Origins, Le Corbusier, and the Pātaka of Lake Horowhenua (1845)

In April, 1845, the Rev. Richard Taylor passed through the area of the North Island now marked by the town of Levin. At this time, he described Lake Horowhenua as being of singular appearance for the small storehouses built over the water on poles. As was his predilection, Taylor made a drawing of the lake huts, a version of which was belatedly included in the second edition of his most important literary contribution, Te Ika-a-Māui (1870). This image would have remained as little more than a questionable curiosity was it not for Messrs Black Bros who, in the course of exploring the lake bed for Māori artefacts in 1932, legitimised Taylor's observation with their discovery of the submerged architectural remains of an aquatic hut. Nonetheless, almost a century after Taylor's original diary entry, GL Adkin, writing for The Journal of the Polynesian Society, lamented the neglect shown toward these remarkable structures, and which he cited as just one example of the "tantalising gaps" in the recorded history of Māori custom and culture. Sadly, it is well beyond the scope of this research to properly redress the historical neglect shown toward lake pātaka. What I do wish to do is to link these structures to an event on the shores of the Lake of Zurich, Switzerland, when Dr Ferdinand Keller noticed some half-submerged piles in 1854. Upon these remains Keller made a great, if erroneous, case for primitive "pile-work habitations" in the Swiss lakes. The impact of this argument cannot be understated. It became the privileged model for architectural origins in the German and French parts of Switzerland, and by the 1890s it was a part of standard teaching texts in Swiss schools, where it was firmly inculcated into the curriculum at the time that Charles Edouard Jeanneret was a child. This in turn has led Vogt to suggest that, in Keller's "dwellings on the water," Le Corbusier found a Primitive Hut typology that underpinned all his architectural thinking, and which is made most explicit in his principled use of piloti. What makes this all the more involved is that Keller, in searching for examples to visualise the construction of the Swiss lake dwellings, turned to the Pacific (which he categorised as at a developmental stage of architectural evolution akin to early Europe). In this paper I identify the exact etching by Louis Auguste de Sainson that Keller took for direct influence. The problem, however, is that de Sainson depicted a conventional whare built on land, and Keller transposed it to the water. So we have on the one side of this paper an authentic lake whare that is all but forgotten, and a famed European lake-hut that is all but Māori, and between the two is the figure of Le Corbusier who may or may not have unknowingly based one on his major innovations on influences found in the pātaka of Lake Horowhenua.

Nature, Identity, and Disaster: Prehistoric Lake Dwelling in Central Europe

Exploring human–environment relations has been an area of great interest to archaeologists, especially for the purpose of reconstructing past environments and investigating methods of human adaptation in the face of changing climates. However, despite the great fruitfulness of such research, particularly in raising awareness of the diversity of human practices, archaeologists often do not account for the influence that preconceived notions of human– environment relationships have in such reconstructions. In fact, archaeology can play a part in constructing or reinforcing Western perceptions of the environment, and as such, sometimes tell us more about our own associations with the natural world rather than informing us about those in the past (see Stump, Chapter 10 and Armstrong Oma, Chapter 11 this volume for similar statements). Using the example of the prehistoric Swiss lake dwellings, this chapter argues that preconceived notions of human–environment relations affect how we interpret and present the archaeological record and past communities. As a consequence, these presentist preconceptions can influence interpretations of the past, creating research trajectories that are monopolized by influential historic debates and obscure the potential subtleties to human interactions with the natural world. This chapter maintains that the environment often shapes cultural and community identities, both now and in the past, with implications for how such communities deal with environmental change or disaster. In fact, environmental change and risk can itself become inscribed into the cultural identities of the communities that inhabit such landscapes (see Fiore et al., Chapter 4 and Chevalier, Chapter 5 this volume for further discussion of environment and identity). Archaeologists must therefore approach the question of past human–environment relations by considering the place of the environment in the construction of community identities through the daily process of ‘living with nature’. Cogent arguments have been made for the inextricable relationship between culture and the environment and particularly for the way in which the environment is perceived through the process of ‘dwelling’ within it (Ingold 2000). Such work has opened up new avenues of investigation particularly in relation to the mutually constituting association between an environment and its inhabitants.