Recent Studies in Chinese Kinship

Chinese Family and Kinship . Hugh Baker.
The Politics of Marriage in Contemporary China . Elisabeth Croll.
Marriage and Adoption in China, 1845–1945 . Arthur P. Wolf and Chieh-shan Huang.     

Uralic genes in Europe

We have analysed data of three European populations speaking non-Indoeuropean languages: Hungarians, Lapps, and Finns. Principal coordinate analysis shows that Lapps are almost exactly intermediate between people located geographically near the Ural mountains and speaking Uralic languages, and central and northern Europeans. Hungarians and Finns are definitely closer to Europeans. An analysis of genetic admixture between Uralic and European ancestors shows that Lapps are slightly more than 50% European, Hungarians are 87% European, and Finns are 90% European. There is basic agreement between these conclusions and historical data on Hungary. Less is known about Finns and very little about Lapps.     

Distribution of the blood groups of the Norwegian lapps

Blood groups have been determined in samples from 423 Norwegian Lapps. The findings in the ABO, MNSs, P, Rh, Lewis, Duffy and Kidd systems are presented and compared with previous observations in various Lapp populations. Rather marked differences were observed between Lapps living in different geographical locations.     

The depth of the lingual fossa in permanent maxillary incisors of Norwegian Lapps

The depth of the lingual fossa in permanent maxillary incisors of three groups of Norwegian Lapps was measured. No statistically significant sex differences or group differences were found. The assembled weighted estimates for lingual fossa depth of three groups of Norwegian Lapps were for I₁ sup: 0.44 mm and I₂ sup: 0.30 mm. Mean lingual fossae depths in Norwegian Lapps clearly fall within the Caucasoid range.     

ESD polymorphism in Norway

Summary ESD phenotype distribution and allele frequencies in 217 Norwegians and 196 Norwegian Lapps are presented. There is good accordance with Hardy-Weinberg distribution, ESD ¹ allele frequencies are 0.887 in the Norwegians and 0.872 in the Lapps.     

The distribution of wood-ants (Formica lugubris Zetterstedt) in a northern English forest

Abstract. 1. A survey of 202 ha of planted forest in Langdale Forest, North Yorkshire, in 1972 discovered 326 occupied and thirty-eight deserted nests of Formica lugubris Zetterstedt. The average density of occupied nests was therefore 1.61 ha^-1.
2. Nests were associated with most crop trees and wild trees present, but were most abundant near to plantation margins and regenerating natural scrub.
3. In planted areas 76% of nests were found 5 m or less from the plantation boundary. More nests were found on the south and west border of plantations than on the north and east respectively, and most nests were not shaded from the south or southeast.
4. An analysis of nearest neighbour measurements showed that the dispersion of nests was not random but contagious (clumped). Nest mounds were higher in shaded situations than in unshaded.
5. The diameter of nest mounds was greater in areas planted with trees before 1945 than in areas planted since 1945.
6. The present population of F.lugubris appears to have spread into planted areas from nests present in marginal natural woodland which escaped the disturbance of the area at the time of planting.     

Gc subtypes in Finns, Swedes and Swedish Lapps

The group-specific component (Gc) subtypes were determined by isoelectric focusing and immunoblotting. The gene frequencies in the Swedish Lapps were Gc1F = 0.412, Gc1S = 0.367 and Gc2 = 0.221, which was significantly different from the frequencies found in Finns and in the populations of northern and central Sweden (p less than 0.001). The gene frequencies in the Swedish Lapps, although similar to those in Asiatic populations, are probably not reflecting an Asiatic influence, since the accumulated genetic information on the Swedish Lapps suggests that founder effect and genetic drift are to a large extent responsible for the peculiar gene pool of the original Lapp population.     

BOOK REVIEWS

Book reviewed in this article:
Textes ethiopiens magico-religieux . D éborah L ifchitz
La Géomancie à l'ancienne Côte des Esclaves . B ernard M aupoil . ( Ibid ., XLII. xxvii, 690 pp. Paris, 1943.)
Raças do Império . M endes C orrêa . (625 pp. Porto, 1943.)
Customary Law of the Haya Tribe . H ans C ory and M. M. H artnoll . (iii, 299 pp. Published for the International African Institute. London, 1945.)
The Anatomy of Lango Religion and Groups . T. T. S. H ayley . (xii, 200 pp. Cambridge and New York, 1947.)     

REVIEWS

Endosymbiose der Tiere mit pflanzlichen Mikroorganismen. By P aul B uchner.
Symposia of the Society for Experimental Biology. VII. Evolution. Ed. by R. B rown and J. F. D anielli. Pp. xix + 448. Cambridge University Press. 1953. 45s.
Tea Pests and Diseases and their Control: with Special Reference to North East India. By E rnest hainsworth.
Wine Growing in England. By G eorge O rdish.
Bibliographie der Pflanzenschutz-Litteratur 1940–1945. Edited by J. B ärner.
How Animals Move. By J ames G ray.
Nature and Structure of Collagen. Papers presented for a discussion convened by the Colloid and Biophysics Committee of the Faraday Society. Edited by J. T. R andall , F.R.S., assisted by S. F itton J ackson .     

Biostatics of the tibial shaft.

In all, 56 tibiae from Lapps and 56 tibiae from Norwegians have been studied. These ethnic groups represent different weight bearing situations. Only measurements referring to the diaphysis are presented. The bones are studied in the AP and ML planes and at different transverse sections. The material is analyzed statistically. The distribution form is examined. Chiefly positive skewness occurs. Platykurtosis is found twice as often as leptokurtosis. A differentiated pattern of distribution seems to be the case regarding measurements in the lower extremities. This corresponds to the influence of variable hereditary and external factors. Divergencies from standard normal distribution is compared with differences between groups. In some cases differences are influenced by platykurtosis and skewness. Divergence from standard normal distribution could not be traced back to measuring errors, special features of the bone or special sex characteristics. The divergencies are not supposed to affect the results to any noteworthy extent. Female Lapps show small variances, female Norwegians great variances. In linear variables Lapps generally show smaller values than Norwegians, females smaller values than males. Regarding linear measurements, sex differences are a little more marked than differences between the two ethnic groups. The opposite is the case regarding the angular measurements and the indices. The sex differences in linear measurements are smaller in Lapps than in Norwegians. The opposite is the case regarding the length of the bone. In Lapps, angular measurements and indices show no significant sex differences. Regarding linear measurements, differences between the ethnic groups are mostly due to differences between the males. The opposite may be said about the indicnes. The variations of the tibia recorded and discussed in the present paper are the results of mechanical factors influencing the basic processes in functional bone remodelling. The periosteal ossification is particularly involved in the dimensions of the shaft, the epiphyseal cartilage in the length dimensions. Particularly important is the relation between the weight bearing line and the diaphysial axis of the bone, and the muscles activated by variation is this relation.     

Pseudocholinesterase polymorphism among Lapp populations in Finland

Summary Frequencies of the dibucaine resistant variant of pseudocholinesterase and of the electrophoretic C₅ ⁺ component have been investigated in a sample of 992 Finnish Lapps and 317 Finns. Skolt Lapps show distinctly higher values than the other Lapps and Finns of this area. The lowest frequency of the C₅ ⁺ component has been found in Finns. The frequencies found in the various population groups of this study fit well into the range reported for the human populations studied so far.Direktor: Prof. Dr. W. LehmannDirektor: Prof. Dr. H. W. GoeddeSupported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft.A part of this paper was read at the International Biological Programme Seminar Man in the Arctic, 21–24 May 1970 at Christian Albrecht-University at Kiel, West-Germany.     

Book Reviews

Book reviewed in this article:
General and Ethnology: Samekulturen. Ørnulv Vorren and Ernst Manker
General and Ethnology: The Lapps. Roberto Bosi     

Long-term change in an unmanaged population of wych elm subjected to Dutch elm disease

1 Changes in a population of Ulmus glabra in Lady Park Wood (UK), a mixed deciduous native woodland, were studied by means of permanent transects. All individuals reaching 1.3 m height were recorded at irregular intervals from 1945 to 1993.
2 Dutch elm disease struck this population in about 1972. Most of the canopy and subcanopy stems were killed, but a few, slow-growing, subcanopy individuals survived unscathed.
3 Subsequent seedling regeneration and growth of sprouts from rootstocks of infected trees was substantial and vigorous. Twenty-three years after the outbreak of disease the number of elm individuals had increased by about 40%. Disease has, however, continued to afflict vigorous, exposed individuals.
4 The large-scale distribution of elm has been unaffected, but the small-scale pattern has changed due to the concentration of seedling regeneration in gaps.
5 The elm population appears to be differentiating into (i) a large high-turnover subpopulation of fast-growing, but repeatedly diseased maiden individuals and sprouts, and (ii) a small, low-turnover subpopulation of slow-growing individuals rooted in suboptimally dry, secluded sites.     

Utilization of lichens in the arctic and subarctic

Economic Botany - The principal economic importance of lichens lies in their providing sustenance for hundreds of thousands of reindeer in circumpolar regions, animals upon which the Eskimos, Lapps...     

Transferrin C subtypes and ethnic heterogeneity in Sweden

Transferrin (TF) C subtypes were studied in Swedish Lapps (Saami) and in Swedes from northern, central and southern Sweden, and the allele frequencies were compared with those in other European populations. The Swedish Lapps were found to have the lowest frequency of the TF*C3 allele (1-2%) so far observed in Europe. Most European populations have TF*C3 allele frequencies between 5 and 7%. Finns differ by having high TF*C3 frequencies (13-14%). The relatively high TF*C3 frequencies found in northeastern Sweden (13%) and in central Sweden (9%) are most likely due to eastern influence. Unlike other genetic markers of eastern influence (e.g. TF*DCHI), which are of Asiatic Mongoloid origin, TF*C3 appears to originate from Finno-Ugric populations.     

Plasma alpha 1B-glycoprotein allele frequencies in Finns and Swedish Lapps: evidence for a new alpha 1B allele

A new allele (A1B*5) of human plasma alpha 1B-glycoprotein (alpha 1B) was reported. alpha 1B phenotyping was done by two-dimensional agarose gel (pH 5.4)-horizontal polyacrylamide gel (pH 9.0) electrophoresis followed by protein staining. The alpha 1B phenotypes 1-1, 1-2, 1-5 and 2-2 were observed in Finns and phenotypes 1-1, 1-2, 1-5 and 2-5 in Swedish Lapps. The respective frequencies of A1B*1, A1B*2 and A1B*5 were 0.9575, 0.0350, 0.0075 in Finns and 0.8922, 0.0653, 0.0425 in Swedish Lapps. The Swedish Lapps showed a higher degree of alpha 1B polymorphism (polymorphism information content = 0.19) than other Caucasian populations that have been studied.     

Book Reviews

Book reviewed in this article:
REVIEW ARTICLE: Les Lapons des Montagues Suédoises . E rnst M anker .
REVIEW ARTICLE: Changing Lapps: A Study in Culture Relations in Northernmost Norway . G utorm G jessing .
REVIEW ARTICLE: Social Relations in a Nomadic Lappish Community . I an W hitaker . Preface by S ibjorn N esheim .     

Adenylate kinase polymorphism in populations in Finland (Swedes,Finns, Lapps), in Maris,and in Greenland Eskimos

Summary Starch-gel electrophoresis for adenylate kinase (AK) was performed on 2519 haemolysates from 6 population samples of unrelated males in Finland, 4 Finnish Lapp populations, the Maris (Cheremisses) in the USSR, and an Eskimo population in NW Greenland. Between the Finland Swedes and Finns no significant difference in AK polymorphism was observed and the allele frequency estimates of AK were comparable with those found in other Europeans. The indigenous pure Skolt Lapps showed absence of the AK² gene, which was also extremely low in the Fisher and Mountain Lapps. All the Lapp populations so far studied show an extremely low frequency of the AK² gene. The rarity of AK² in Lapps may offer a better approach to the estimation of intermixture than certain other genes which vary in frequency in different Lapp populations. Among the Maris AK² frequencies are lower (0.017) than among other Europeans. The AK² was also very low (0.016) in the Greenland Eskimo population on Augpilagtok Island.The results obtained for the AK phenotypes in 149 Lapp families and in 84 mothers and their children are in agreement with the hypothesis that AK¹ and AK² are alleles at one and the same autosomal locus. The present family and mother-child studies add further evidence for the acceptance of the AK system as a valuable tool in cases of disputed paternity.Supported by the Finnish National Research Council for Medical Sciences, the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters, the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft. Preparations were partly obtained as a gift from Boehringer GmbH, Mannheim, Germany.     

Subtypes of transferrin C.

Subtypes of transferrin C were studied by means of isoelectric focusing after complete desialylation of transferrin. Family data were consistent with an autosomal co-dominant mode of inheritance. Studies of serum samples from 75 individuals heterozygous for C and another (B or D) variant showed that the genes (C1 and C2) controlling the C subtypes are allelic to the B and D genes. The C2 gene frequency in Swedes and Swedish Lapps was similar to that found previously in Danes and Germans.     

Crown size and hypodontia in the permanent dentition of moderl Skolt Lapps

The teeth of modern Skolt Lapps from northern Finland are considerably larger than those of their ancestors of the Eighteenth Century. The increase is probably attributable to improved nutrition. One or more teeth, excluding the third molars, were congenitally missing in 18.8% of the population aged 5 to 20 years. Relative to a standard the anterior teeth are larger than the posterior teeth, particularly the premolars. This accords well with the hypodontia pattern which is dominated by premolar agenesis.