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Ndiaye M, Lespez L, Tribolo C, Rasse M, Hadjas I, Davidoux S, Huysecom É, Douze K. Two new Later Stone Age sites from the Final Pleistocene in the Falémé Valley, eastern Senegal. PLoS One 2024; 19:e0294346. [PMID: 38547134 PMCID: PMC10977785 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0294346] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/17/2023] [Accepted: 10/31/2023] [Indexed: 04/02/2024] Open
Abstract
The understanding of cultural dynamics at work at the end of the Final Pleistocene in West Africa suffers from a significant lack of excavated and dated sites, particularly in the Sahelian and Sudanian ecozones. While the Later Stone Age shows varied behavioral developments in different parts of the continent, the chrono-cultural framework of this period remains largely unknown in West Africa. We report on archaeological, geomorphological, and chronological research on two Final Pleistocene Later Stone Age sites in the Falémé Valley, eastern Senegal. Optically stimulated luminescence ages place the site of Toumboura I-2017 between 17 ± 1 and 16 ± 1 ka and the Ravin de Sansandé site between 13 ± 1 ka and 12 ± 1.1 ka. The excavated lithics show typical Later Stone Age industries, characterized by chaînes opératoires of core reduction mainly producing flakes and bladelets as well as blades and laminar flakes. Segments dominate the toolkits but a few backed bladelets and end-scrapers on flake blanks were recognized. Local raw materials were used, with a preference for chert and quartz, as well as greywacke. These Later Stone Age lithic assemblages are the oldest known in Senegal so far and add to the small number of sites known in West Africa for this period, which are mainly located farther south, in sub-tropical ecozones. The Later Stone Age sites of the Falémé Valley are contemporaneous with typical Middle Stone Age technologies in Senegal dated to at least the Pleistocene/Holocene transition. Our results thus provide new archaeological evidence highlighting the complex cultural processes at work during the Final Pleistocene in West Africa.
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Affiliation(s)
- Matar Ndiaye
- Department of Human Sciences, Laboratory of Prehistory and Protohistory, Institut Fondamental d’Afrique Noire (IFAN), University of Cheikh Anta Diop, Dakar, Senegal
| | - Laurent Lespez
- Department of Geography, Laboratory of Physical Geography (LGP), CNRS-UMR 8591, University Paris-Est Creteil, Meudon, France
| | - Chantal Tribolo
- Department of Archaeosciences Bordeaux, University Bordeaux-Montaigne, Pessac, France
| | - Michel Rasse
- Department of Geography, Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée (ARCHÉORIENT), University Lumière - Lyon II, Lyon, France
| | - Irka Hadjas
- Laboratory of Ion Beam Physics (LIP), ETH-Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland
| | - Sarah Davidoux
- Department of Geography, Laboratory of Physical Geography (LGP), CNRS-UMR 8591, University Paris-Est Creteil, Meudon, France
| | - Éric Huysecom
- Laboratory of Archaeology of Africa & Anthropology (ARCAN), University of Geneva, Genève, Switzerland
| | - Katja Douze
- Laboratory of Archaeology of Africa & Anthropology (ARCAN), University of Geneva, Genève, Switzerland
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Villalba-Mouco V, van de Loosdrecht MS, Rohrlach AB, Fewlass H, Talamo S, Yu H, Aron F, Lalueza-Fox C, Cabello L, Cantalejo Duarte P, Ramos-Muñoz J, Posth C, Krause J, Weniger GC, Haak W. A 23,000-year-old southern Iberian individual links human groups that lived in Western Europe before and after the Last Glacial Maximum. Nat Ecol Evol 2023; 7:597-609. [PMID: 36859553 PMCID: PMC10089921 DOI: 10.1038/s41559-023-01987-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/30/2022] [Accepted: 01/03/2023] [Indexed: 03/03/2023]
Abstract
Human populations underwent range contractions during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) which had lasting and dramatic effects on their genetic variation. The genetic ancestry of individuals associated with the post-LGM Magdalenian technocomplex has been interpreted as being derived from groups associated with the pre-LGM Aurignacian. However, both these ancestries differ from that of central European individuals associated with the chronologically intermediate Gravettian. Thus, the genomic transition from pre- to post-LGM remains unclear also in western Europe, where we lack genomic data associated with the intermediate Solutrean, which spans the height of the LGM. Here we present genome-wide data from sites in Andalusia in southern Spain, including from a Solutrean-associated individual from Cueva del Malalmuerzo, directly dated to ~23,000 cal yr BP. The Malalmuerzo individual carried genetic ancestry that directly connects earlier Aurignacian-associated individuals with post-LGM Magdalenian-associated ancestry in western Europe. This scenario differs from Italy, where individuals associated with the transition from pre- and post-LGM carry different genetic ancestries. This suggests different dynamics in the proposed southern refugia of Ice Age Europe and posits Iberia as a potential refugium for western European pre-LGM ancestry. More, individuals from Cueva Ardales, which were thought to be of Palaeolithic origin, date younger than expected and, together with individuals from the Andalusian sites Caserones and Aguilillas, fall within the genetic variation of the Neolithic, Chalcolithic and Bronze Age individuals from southern Iberia.
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Affiliation(s)
- Vanessa Villalba-Mouco
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany.
- Instituto Universitario de Investigación en Ciencias Ambientales de Aragón, IUCA-Aragosaurus, Zaragoza, Spain.
- Institute of Evolutionary Biology, CSIC-Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain.
| | - Marieke S van de Loosdrecht
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
- Biosystematics Group, Wageningen University, Wageningen, the Netherlands
| | - Adam B Rohrlach
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- School of Mathematical Sciences, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
| | - Helen Fewlass
- Department of Human Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | - Sahra Talamo
- Department of Human Evolution, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Department of Chemistry G. Ciamician, Alma Mater Studiorum, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy
| | - He Yu
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- State Key Laboratory of Protein and Plant Gene Research, School of Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China
| | - Franziska Aron
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany
| | - Carles Lalueza-Fox
- Institute of Evolutionary Biology, CSIC-Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain
- Natural Sciences Museum of Barcelona (MCNB), Barcelona, Spain
| | - Lidia Cabello
- University of Málaga and Grupo HUM-440 University of Cádiz, Cádiz, Spain
| | | | - José Ramos-Muñoz
- Departamento de Historia, Geografía y Filosofía, Universidad de Cádiz, Cádiz, Spain
| | - Cosimo Posth
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
- Institute for Archaeological Sciences, Archaeo- and Palaeogenetics, University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany
- Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment, University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany
| | - Johannes Krause
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
| | | | - Wolfgang Haak
- Department of Archaeogenetics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany.
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Mas B, Riera S, Allué E. Modelling Mediterranean oak palaeolandscapes using the MaxEnt model algorithm: The case of the NE Iberia under Middle Holocene climatic scenario. ECOL INFORM 2023. [DOI: 10.1016/j.ecoinf.2023.101984] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/20/2023]
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4
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Rafiqi M, Jelonek L, Diouf AM, Mbaye A, Rep M, Diarra A. Profile of the in silico secretome of the palm dieback pathogen, Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. albedinis, a fungus that puts natural oases at risk. PLoS One 2022; 17:e0260830. [PMID: 35617325 PMCID: PMC9135196 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0260830] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/15/2021] [Accepted: 04/28/2022] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Understanding biotic changes that occur alongside climate change constitute a research priority of global significance. Here, we address a plant pathogen that poses a serious threat to life on natural oases, where climate change is already taking a toll and severely impacting human subsistence. Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. albedinis is a pathogen that causes dieback disease on date palms, a tree that provides several critical ecosystem services in natural oases; and consequently, of major importance in this vulnerable habitat. Here, we assess the current state of global pathogen spread, we annotate the genome of a sequenced pathogen strain isolated from the native range and we analyse its in silico secretome. The palm dieback pathogen secretes a large arsenal of effector candidates including a variety of toxins, a distinguished profile of secreted in xylem proteins (SIX) as well as an expanded protein family with an N-terminal conserved motif [SG]PC[KR]P that could be involved in interactions with host membranes. Using agrobiodiversity as a strategy to decrease pathogen infectivity, while providing short term resilient solutions, seems to be widely overcome by the pathogen. Hence, the urgent need for future mechanistic research on the palm dieback disease and a better understanding of pathogen genetic diversity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Maryam Rafiqi
- Plant Pathology Program, Agrobiosciences, Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P), Ben Guerir, Morocco
- * E-mail:
| | - Lukas Jelonek
- Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Giessen, Germany
| | - Aliou Moussa Diouf
- Plant Pathology Program, Agrobiosciences, Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P), Ben Guerir, Morocco
| | - AbdouLahat Mbaye
- Plant Pathology Program, Agrobiosciences, Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P), Ben Guerir, Morocco
| | - Martijn Rep
- Swammerdam Institute for Life Sciences, Faculty of Science, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Alhousseine Diarra
- Digital 4 Research Labs, Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P), Ben Guerir, Morocco
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Alcaraz-Castaño M, Alcolea-González JJ, de Andrés-Herrero M, Castillo-Jiménez S, Cuartero F, Cuenca-Bescós G, Kehl M, López-Sáez JA, Luque L, Pérez-Díaz S, Piqué R, Ruiz-Alonso M, Weniger GC, Yravedra J. First modern human settlement recorded in the Iberian hinterland occurred during Heinrich Stadial 2 within harsh environmental conditions. Sci Rep 2021; 11:15161. [PMID: 34312431 PMCID: PMC8313528 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-94408-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/16/2021] [Accepted: 07/09/2021] [Indexed: 11/09/2022] Open
Abstract
As the south-westernmost region of Europe, the Iberian Peninsula stands as a key area for understanding the process of modern human dispersal into Eurasia. However, the precise timing, ecological setting and cultural context of this process remains controversial concerning its spatiotemporal distribution within the different regions of the peninsula. While traditional models assumed that the whole Iberian hinterland was avoided by modern humans due to ecological factors until the retreat of the Last Glacial Maximum, recent research has demonstrated that hunter-gatherers entered the Iberian interior at least during Solutrean times. We provide a multi-proxy geoarchaeological, chronometric and paleoecological study on human–environment interactions based on the key site of Peña Capón (Guadalajara, Spain). Results show (1) that this site hosts the oldest modern human presence recorded to date in central Iberia, associated to pre-Solutrean cultural traditions around 26,000 years ago, and (2) that this presence occurred during Heinrich Stadial 2 within harsh environmental conditions. These findings demonstrate that this area of the Iberian hinterland was recurrently occupied regardless of climate and environmental variability, thus challenging the widely accepted hypothesis that ecological risk hampered the human settlement of the Iberian interior highlands since the first arrival of modern humans to Southwest Europe.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | | | | | | | - G Cuenca-Bescós
- Aragosaurus-IUCA, Department of Geosciences, University of Zaragoza, Zaragoza, Spain
| | - M Kehl
- Institute of Geography, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany
| | - J A López-Sáez
- Environmental Archeology Research Group, Institute of History, CCHS CSIC, Madrid, Spain
| | - L Luque
- Prehistory Area, University of Alcalá, Alcalá de Henares, Spain
| | - S Pérez-Díaz
- Department of Geography, Urban and Regional Planning, University of Cantabria, Santander, Spain
| | - R Piqué
- Department of Prehistory, Autonomous University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
| | - M Ruiz-Alonso
- Environmental Archeology Research Group, Institute of History, CCHS CSIC, Madrid, Spain
| | | | - J Yravedra
- Department of Prehistory, Complutense University of Madrid, Madrid, Spain
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The Relict Ecosystem of Maytenus senegalensis subsp. europaea in an Agricultural Landscape: Past, Present and Future Scenarios. LAND 2020. [DOI: 10.3390/land10010001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
Abstract
Maytenus senegalensis subsp. europaea is a shrub belonging to the Celastraceae family, whose only European populations are distributed discontinuously along the south-eastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula, forming plant communities with great ecological value, unique in Europe. As it is an endangered species that makes up plant communities with great palaeoecological significance, the development of species distribution models is of major interest under different climatic scenarios, past, present and future, based on the fact that the climate could play a relevant role in the distribution of this species, as well as in the conformation of the communities in which it is integrated. Palaeoecological models were generated for the Maximum Interglacial, Last Maximum Glacial and Middle Holocene periods. The results obtained showed that the widest distribution of this species, and the maximum suitability of its habitat, occurred during the Last Glacial Maximum, when the temperatures of the peninsular southeast were not as contrasting as those of the rest of the European continent and were favored by higher rainfall. Under these conditions, large territories could act as shelters during the glacial period, a hypothesis reflected in the model’s results for this period, which exhibit a further expansion of M. europaea’s ecological niche. The future projection of models in around 2070, for four Representative Concentration Pathways according to the fifth report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, showed that the most favorable areas for this species would be Campo de Dalías (southern portion of Almería province) as it presents the bioclimatic characteristics of greater adjustment to M. europaea’s ecological niche model. Currently, some of the largest specimens of the species survive in the agricultural landscapes in the southern Spain. These areas are almost totally destroyed and heavily altered by intensive agriculture greenhouses, also causing a severe fragmentation of the habitat, which implies a prospective extinction scenario in the near future.
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State of the Art in Paleoenvironment Mapping for Modeling Applications in Archeology—Summary, Conclusions, and Future Directions from the PaleoMaps Workshop. QUATERNARY 2020. [DOI: 10.3390/quat3020013] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
Abstract
In this report, we present the contributions, outcomes, ideas, discussions and conclusions obtained at the PaleoMaps Workshop 2019, that took place at the Institute of Geography of the University of Cologne on 23 and 24 September 2019. The twofold aim of the workshop was: (1) to provide an overview of approaches and methods that are presently used to incorporate paleoenvironmental information in human–environment interaction modeling applications, and building thereon; (2) to devise new approaches and solutions that might be used to enhance the reconstruction of past human–environmental interconnections. This report first outlines the presented papers, and then provides a joint protocol of the often extensive discussions that came up following the presentations or else during the refreshment intervals. It concludes by adressing the open points to be resolved in future research avenues, e.g., implementation of open science practices, new procedures for reviewing of publications, and future concepts for quality assurance of the often complex paleoenvironmental data. This report may serve as an overview of the state of the art in paleoenvironment mapping and modeling. It includes an extensive compilation of the basic literature, as provided by the workshop attendants, which will itself facilitate the necessary future research.
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