Paleo-Sculpture Photo Addendum

Writing about Neanderthals and toothpicks for last Friday’s Tooth Sleuths, I remembered the photo shoot my daughter did in 2009 for an Ithaca, N.Y., newspaper article on paleo-artist John Gurche.

Although Gurche’s Neanderthal was hidden and he sculpted neither teeth nor toothpicks, I thought you might like to see him at work and Rachel’s photos (www.rachelphilipson.com).

Paleo-artist John Gurche working in an improvised studio in the lobby of Ithaca’s Museum of the Earth.

This sculpture characterizes a Homo heidelbergensis, a likely ancestor of both Neanderthals and modern humans.

Gurche told the interviewer that he spends about two months sculpting the head, taking special care of the expression.

Gurche explained that the figure’s extended arm, holding a to-be-determined dead animal part, represented an age of stone tools and the beginning of the concept of sharing.

The three figures Gurche was working on were for the Smithsonian. The standing figure characterized a female Homo erectus, who would be carrying an antelope carcass. Hidden from view behind her is our Homo neanderthalensis.

P.S.

-Ithaca Times article on John Gurche:
http://www.ithaca.com/news/local_news/natural-history/article_300268f9-1700-5103-8c75-4dbd698e6e4d.html
-Gurche’s website: www.gurche.com.
-Article on Gurche in Smithsonian Magazine:
www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/a-closer-look-at-evolutionary-faces-8369070/?c=y%3Fno-ist
-Excerpt from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Gurche
Gurche's works have been on display at the American Museum of Natural History, the Field Museum of Natural History, and the Smithsonian Institution. He has created illustrations for National Geographic, and designed a set of four dinosaur-themed stamps that were released by the US Postal Service in 1989.

Tooth Sleuths

Welcome back. As much as I admire and respect each and every dentist, I am convinced that the ADA (American Dental Association) is in cahoots with popcorn producers. I chipped another tooth on an unpopped kernel. Actually, it might be the same tooth I chipped when I described the ordeals of having teeth before fluoride, floss and present-day dentistry in Dental Check-Up Time.

Knowing this day would come, I’ve been saving accounts of dental-related research. I’ll highlight three studies to give you something to chew on while I’m at my dentist. All fall under the archaeological umbrella.

Modern man and Neanderthal skull props.
(www.bjwinslow.com/gallery/skulls)

I’ve been tuned into dental anthropology since I was a grad student with a neighbor who was finishing his doctorate in anthropology. His major professor and sometimes my neighbor traveled the world to perform assessments of teeth--sort of an ADA-produced version of the TV show, Bones. Stay alert and you may see why I chose these three studies.

Neanderthals and Toothpicks

I’ve written about the shocking Georgia Toothpick Theft, when 374,400 plastic toothpicks were stolen from a toothpick manufacturer, but this toothpick news didn’t make the front page.

Researchers from Spain’s Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and two other institutions examined three, upper jaw, Neanderthal teeth found at the archaeological site of Cova Foradà in Valencia, Spain.

Grooves between the teeth showed signs of pulling a hard, narrow object, such as a toothpick, between adjacent teeth. Cool! I thought, but I was applauding a concert at the wrong moment. It turns out the use of toothpicks has been documented from the beginning of the genus Homo. Interproximal grooves on Neanderthal teeth are common.

Although the investigators’ morphological analyses found no evidence of dental caries or calculus (tartar), abscesses or bone perforation related to a cyst, there were indications of periodontal (gum) disease. They had documented the oldest case of using toothpicks to ease the pain caused by dental disease.

Strontium Measure of Migration

Not far from St. Louis, Missouri, is a UNESCO World Heritage site: the Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site, the largest and earliest pre-Columbian settlement north of Mexico. The site, over 6 square miles, dates from the Mississippian period (800-1350), has some 120 mounds, and is estimated to have had a peak population of 10,000 to 20,000.

Mound at Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site.
(townplannerstl.com/Attractions/place/cahokia-mounds-state-historic-site/)

To better understand the settlement’s regional and cultural interactions and population history and diversity, researchers from the University of Illinois analyzed strontium isotope ratios of teeth.

Different isotopes of the chemical element strontium are found in most rocks, and the ratio of two of those isotopes, strontium-87 to strontium-86, varies with the geology. By consuming plants and water, humans and animals absorb strontium, thus collecting a signature of the local rock.

Because the strontium ratios found in teeth and bones reflect absorption at different life stages--tooth enamel ratios from infancy and childhood and bone ratios from the most recent 7 to 10 years--the different ratios are often compared in archaeological investigations.

For the Cahokia investigation, however, the researchers measured ratios from the teeth of individuals buried at different locations within the settlement, and compared those to ratios from the teeth of small animals found at the site, the assumption being that the animals had never left the site.

The analysis estimates that at least one third of the Cahokia’s residents came to the settlement from multiple places outside of the area.

Plaque Window to the Past

The last study illustrates how your teeth can become the center of attention. Don’t care for them and don’t visit your friendly dental hygienist to remove plaque, the biofilm that sticks to your teeth and causes decay and periodontal disease. Let that soft plaque build and harden to dental calculus (tartar), mentioned above.

After, say, 1000 years, the calculus on any teeth left in your skeleton may be selected for analysis, such as that led by the University of Zurich, Switzerland, and Denmark’s University of Copenhagen.

Plaque is loaded with microorganisms; the fossilized dental calculus preserves the microbiome. The study’s large group of collaborators (over 25 from 21 institutions in 4 countries!) applied genetic and protein-assessing (proteonomic) technologies to determine the DNA and proteins in ancient dental calculus.

They characterized the microbiome in a diseased state, opportunistic pathogens, ancient antibiotic-resistance genes, a genome reconstruction of a periodontal pathogen, numerous bacterial and human proteins, and DNA sequences matching dietary sources.

The analysis and those to follow permit the investigation of pathogen activity, host immunity and diet, and thereby extend direct investigation of common diseases into the human evolutionary past.

Wrap Up

And there you have it. Three studies that employed different approaches: morphological analyses, strontium determinations, and the latest genetic and protein-assessing technologies. All sought to gain insight into our past and perhaps our future. Thanks for stopping by.

P.S.

-Toothpick paper in PLOS One:
www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0076852
-Article on toothpick paper on Science Daily website:
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/10/131017080300.htm

-Cahokia Mounds paper in Journal of Archaeological Science:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305440314000302
- National Geographic article on Cahokia Mounds research:
news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/03/140307-cahokia-native-american-archaeology-mississippian/
-Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site website: cahokiamounds.org/
-World Heritage Site description of Cahokia Mounds site: whc.unesco.org/en/list/198
-Handbook of Environmental Isotope Geochemistry (Chap 35: Applications of Sr Isotopes in Archaeology):  www.springer.com/978-3-642-10636-1

-Plaque analysis paper in Nature Genetics, Feb 2014:
www.nature.com/ng/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ng.2906.html
-The Times of India article on plaque analysis paper:
timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/science/1000-years-old-microbial-Pompeii-unlocked/articleshow/30957394.cms
-Video presentation (5:31 min) of plaque work by lead author at March 2012 TED: www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZB29iq_Zd8#t=78

TV Shows Photo Addendum

Picking which TV show to watch in the 1940s and ‘50s was so much easier than today. Unlike the 290 channels in last Friday’s TV Tribulations, in Upstate New York, we had one channel, which eventually grew to three.

The first show I ever saw was a hand puppet--only a puppet, but I can’t remember the show’s or puppet’s name. Here’s a sample of shows from those years, whose names I can remember, some because they were on radio before TV.

Do you remember them? Any of them? Not even Ed Sullivan? His Sunday evening variety show hosted every talent, from comedians to jugglers to opera stars to Elvis (from the waist up), not to mention Señor Wences (1950s and ‘60s), the Beatles (1960s) and, of course, Topo Gigio, another puppet (1960s).

Kukla, Fran and Ollie, 1947-57. (kukla.tv/kfo7.html)

Buffalo Bob Smith, Howdy Doody and Clarabell the Clown on the Howdy Doody Show, 1947-60. (broadcastarchive-umd.tumblr.com)

Ed Sullivan with June Taylor Dancers on The Ed Sullivan Show (Toast of the Town), 1948-1971. (broadcastarchive-umd.tumblr.com/post/25513550411/the-ed-sullivan-show-then-known-as-toast-of)

Milton Berle Show (Texaco Star Theater), 1948-56. (www.pbs.org/wnet/pioneers-of-television/photo-galleries/variety-shows/)

Sid Caesar (clown) with Howard Morris, Carl Reiner and Imogene Coca on Your Show of Shows, 1950-54. (www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20712079_20711820_21225093,00.html)

George Burns and Gracie Allen Show, 1950-58.
(tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/GeorgeBurns)

Groucho Marx with George Fenneman on
You Bet Your Life, 1950-1961.
 (www.radiospirits.info/2012/10/27/the-secret-word-is-anniversary/)

Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance and William Frawley
on I Love Lucy, 1951-57.
(ilovelucyandricky.wikia.com/wiki/I_Love_Lucy_Wiki)

Ozzie, Harriet, David and Ricky Nelson on
Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, 1952-66.
(americanprofile.com/articles/quotes-famous-tv-dads/)

TV Tribulations

Welcome back. I once blogged about our unused televisions and limited TV viewing (Television Time). That was in a previous incarnation. Everything has changed radically.

Warren’s future home entertainment
center. (www.home-designing.com)

I could just announce: We now have high definition TV (HDTV) and a streaming device! But that’s a tad misleading; and if I stop there, you’ll never know about my wife Vicki’s struggles, her father Muns’s loss or TV service providers’ weather reports.

Weather Channel

The change starter’s gun sounded when Muns’s TV service provider, which also feeds our TV, dropped The Weather Channel (TWC). Though Muns couldn’t give a hoot, I was distressed. Lacking a local 24-hour news and weather radio station, I turn on the TV before my predawn jogging. If I tuned to TWC and pushed the correct button on the remote, I would get the current weather and forecast for our zip code.

Losing TWC was my tipping point for:
Action 1: Buying a tablet computer. I couldn’t see turning on the desktop computer for a weather report, and I’d been thinking about a tablet for some time (Going Digital).
Action 2: Buying a video streaming device and dropping DVDs. I can’t think of a link with losing TWC, but you see where this is going.

TV Blip

Shortly thereafter, Muns’s TV began taking at least five minutes to realize it was turned on. Vicki telephoned a trusted repair shop, described the problem and was told to bring the set in. After describing the problem on site presumably to a different employee, she was told, Oh that’s the TV’s internal power source. It’s failing and the set isn’t worth fixing. Vicki schlepped the set back and tried unsuccessfully to replace it with one then another older TV.

1st Bottom Line: Muns needed a new TV.

Even with my superior ability to read Consumer Reports, there was a hitch. The failing TV is an older HDTV that was not hooked up to receive high definition. The recommended HDTVs and others Vicki inspected do not allow for many connections and receive only high definition video.

2nd Bottom Line: For Muns to use the new HDTV, the TV service provider would have to install a new receiver and raise the level of service.

TV Service Providers

Hmmm, Vicki wondered. Is it time to change TV service providers? I was delegated to determine which TV package we would need if we switched to the service provider that still offered TWC.

To receive the 5 or 6 channels I watch, we would need the 290-plus channel package--funny how that works. Though I didn’t have comprehensive information on Muns’s viewing habits, it seemed that package should do the job.

After obtaining the current provider’s charges for the upgrade and comparing notes with other subscribers, Vicki contacted the second provider and discovered the cost would be substantially lower for the contract period with no installation charge. She switched.

Switchers’ Remorse

Installation went smoothly and the cost will be lower, yet doubts persist.

The original provider offered a small, last gasp price reduction when Vicki called to cancel service. Perhaps negotiation instead of waving good-bye would have saved time and effort.

But what about TWC? Well, before the new service was installed, I observed the original service provider was showing its own weather channel with essentially the same push-a-button-get-a-zip-code forecast. The new service provider’s TWC—the real thing--not only doesn’t offer real-time conditions, its Local Forecast isn’t local.

Most disappointing, Muns sifted through the 290 channels and still can’t find some programs he’s watched for years.

Wrap Up
 

Exactly one week after the new provider’s service installation, our 10-year old non-HDTV stopped working. 

The failed TV (left) en route to
a recycler and the failing TV.

Rather than rush out to buy a new TV, we replaced it with Muns’s failing HDTV. As the set culminates its death throes, we are becoming adept at turning it on now 6 or 7 minutes before we’re ready to watch.

High definition is great! Streaming would be great, too, if what’s available weren’t so limited. I’ll have to check out those 290 channels. Thanks for stopping by.

Elephant Hair Addendum

In addition to the three items in last Friday’s Elephant News, I had one other that didn’t fit with elephant behavior and intelligence. I’m offering it as today’s addendum.

Princeton University investigators modeled the heat transfer from elephants’ rough skin using theoretical and empirical approaches. They found that an elephant’s sparse hair contributes to cooling the animal.

A baby elephant (multiple websites). Asian elephants have higher
hair densities than African elephants, and juvenile elephants have
higher hair densities than adults.

Although you and I would think hair insulates, their modeling indicated that a crossover occurred around 0.3 million hairs per square meter (194 hairs per square inch) for thick hair covers: warming at higher hair densities and cooling at lower densities.

Sampling from photographs of elephants provided an estimated hair density of 1500 hairs per square meter (1 hair per square inch), far below the crossover point. For comparison, the density of our head of hair is about 2 million hairs per square meter (1290 hairs per square inch). Speaking for myself, I should say “used to be.”

The researchers calculated that the hair cover enhances the elephants’ thermoregulation ability by over 5 percent under all scenarios they considered and by up to 23 percent at low wind speeds. Extrapolating, they postulated that a low-density hair cover could have served an evolutionary purpose.

P.S.

Elephant hair study in PLOS ONE:
www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0047018
LiveScience article on study:
www.livescience.com/23874-elephant-hair-keeps-cool.html