Researchers agree that domesticated plants were introduced into southeast Europe from southwest Asia as a part of a Neolithic "package," which included domesticated animals and artifacts typical of farming communities. It is commonly believed that this package reached inland areas of the Balkans by ∼6200 calibrated (cal.) BC or later. Our analysis of the starch record entrapped in dental calcul...

Iran is known as the most complex and varied country in southwest Asia, in terms of geography, vegetation, climate and consequently biological diversity. The rather high number of recorded endemic species of Fulgoromorpha in Iran indicates a high potential for speciation in some areas. In this study, in order to identify the endemic zones for Fulgoromorpha of Iran, three main biogeographic regi...

Colorectal cancer is one of the three most common cancers in the world and also one of the four leading causes of death among cancerous patients with global prevalence [1,2]. This cancer is associated with a high incidence and mortality among developed countries [3]. In Iran, which is located in southwest Asia, colorectal cancer is one of the five most common cancers in both genders and in the ...

In planning for future contingencies, current problems often crowd out historical perspective and planners often turn to technological solutions to bridge gaps between desired outcomes and the reality of recent experience. The US Military, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and other allies are collectively taking stock of 10-plus years of medical discovery and rediscovery of combat casualty c...

The mitochondrial DNA haplogroups and hypervariable segment I (HVSI) sequences of 1,612 and 395 Native North Americans, respectively, were analyzed to identify major prehistoric population events in North America. Gene maps and spatial autocorrelation analyses suggest that populations with high frequencies of haplogroups A, B, and X experienced prehistoric population expansions in the North, So...

The global prevalence of celiac disease is of one person per 250 inhabitants. The disease is induced by gluten, a peptide contained in wheat, rye and barley that during small intestinal digestion generates smaller peptides. Some of these are resistant to hydrolysis and cross through the epithelium into the mucosa, inducing a cascade of immune reactions leading to the appearance of the disease i...

The introduction of livestock species in Europe has been followed by various genetic events, which created a complex spatial pattern of genetic differentiation. Spatial principal component (sPCA) analysis and spatial metric multidimensional scaling (sMDS) incorporate geography in multivariate analysis. This method was applied to three microsatellite data sets for 45 goat breeds, 46 sheep breeds...

A deodorizing substance in black cumin (Nigella sativa L.), a spice for curry and vegetable foods in Southwest Asia, was examined. The essential oil prepared from the seeds of this plant exhibited strong deodorizing activity against methyl mercaptan, which is a main factor in oral malodor. After purification with silica gel column chromatography, the active substance in black cumin seed oil was...

The PNAS article by Stiner et al. (1), “A forager–herder trade-off, from broad-spectrum hunting to sheep management at Aşıklı Höyük, Turkey,” adds a major new element to our evidence for—and understanding of— the appearance of the first animal herding in southwest Asia, involving the earliest management of caprines (managed caprines including sheep and goat), as well as an important methodologi...

Abstract We present a species distribution model (SDM) of Fagopyrum esculentum (buckwheat) in China using data and estimates for the past based on palaeoclimatic reconstructions. Our potential area suitable buckwheat cultivation over last 8,000 years, with northeast consistently showing highest suitability, providing insights discrepancy between location earliest archaeobotanical records its or...