2008 Alwyn Gentry Awards

Outstanding student presentations are recognized at the annual meetings of the Association of Tropical Biology and Conservation, with the prestigious Alwyn Gentry Award. This year in Suriname we judged 47 oral presentations and 12 poster presentations. Mailyn Adriana Gonzalez , received the award for her oral presentation, entitled “Towards large‐scale inventories of tropical trees using DNA‐barcoding techniques”. The judges would also like to honor two finalists for best oral presentation: Adriana Bravo (Lousiana State University) and Alexandra Pardow (University of Kaiserslautern). The 2008 winner for her outstanding poster was Elodie Courtois , for “Emission of plant volatiles in the vegetative parts of 31 tropical tree species in French Guiana”. Susan G. Laurance (Chair, Alwyn Gentry Award Committee)     

The Machete and the Cross: Campesino Rebellion in Yucatan: The Conquest of the Last Maya Kingdom: Río Azul: An Ancient Maya City

The Machete and the Cross: Campesino Rebellion in Yucatan. Don E. Dumond. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997.571pp.
The Conquest of the Last Maya Kingdom. Grant D. Jones. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998.568 pp.
Río Azul: An Ancient Maya City. Richard E. W. Adams. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1999. 238 pp.     

Cell division in a species of Erwinia. IX. Electron microscopy of normally dividing cells

Grula, E. A. (Oklahoma State University, Stillwater), and Gerald L. Smith. Cell division in a species of Erwinia. IX. Electron microscopy of normally dividing cells. J. Bacteriol. 90:1054-1058. 1965.-Cells of an Erwinia species (an Enterobacteriaceae) divide by concomitant invagination of the cell wall and membrane. It is concluded that the process is initiated and sustained by the cell membrane.     

Culture and Progress. DISTINGUISHED LECTURE-1975

This paper is the text of the sixth Distinguished Lecture, delivered in San Francisco at the 74th annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association, December 1975. The Lectureship was established in 1969 to honor outstanding scholars in the profession. Colson, a social anthropologist and ethnographer of wide experience, has worked in both the New and the Old Worlds, with American Indian and central African cultures. She is currently Fairchild Fellow, California Institute of Technology, on leave from her professorship at the University of California, Berkeley. Her interest in both the history and the future of our profession is reflected in her talk. The first five Distinguished Lectures—by Joseph H. Greenberg, Robert J. Braidwood, Georges Condominas, John W. M. Whiting, and Miguel León-Portilla—were published in the Association's Annual Reports (1970–74). The Lecture will now appear each year in the American Anthropologist.     

Searching for the Secrets of Nature: The Life and Works of Dr. Francisco Hernández

Searching for the Secrets of Nature: The Life and Works of Dr. Francisco Hernández. Simon Varey. Rafael Chabrán. and Dora B. Weiner. eds. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000. xvi. 229 pp.
The Mexican Treasury: The Writings of Dr. Francisco Hernández. Simon Varey. ed. Rafael Chabrán. Cynthia L. Chamberlin. and Simon Varey. trans. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000. xix. 281 pp.     

Teaching and learning in the interactive classroom

The Claude Bernard Distinguished Lectureship of the Teaching of Physiology Section is presented annually at the Experimental Biology meeting. The lectureship is named for Prof. Claude Bernard, the experimental physiologist who is credited with introducing the concept of homeostasis. The 2006 Claude Bernard Distinguished Lecture was given by Dr. Dee U. Silverthorn from the University of Texas at Austin, TX.     

Cultural Politics in Colonial Tehuantepec: Community and State among the Isthmus Zapotec, 1500–1750

Cultural Politics in Colonial Tehuantepec: Community and State among the Isthmus Zapotec, 1500–1750. Judith Francis Zeitlin. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005. 323 pp.     

IVth International Symposium on Quantitative Luminescence Spectrometry in Biomedical Sciences

This meeting (Chairman, W. R. G. Baeyens) was held on 27—31 May 1991 at the State University of Ghent, Belgium. Abstracts of papers and posters from this meeting on the topics of bioluminescence and chemiluminescence are reproduced in the following sections. The abstracts have been classified under the main topic headings used in the ‘Bioluminescence and Chemiluminescence Literature’ section of this journal, and are listed alphabetically by first author.     

Pioneering Alberta cardiac surgeons walked into uncharted territory 40 years ago

When Dr. John Callaghan performed Canada''s first successful open-heart surgery in Edmonton in 1956, the operation took 10 hours and the heart-lung pump he used looked like it had come from the shelves at Canadian Tire. Today the operation takes a couple of hours and the heart-lung pumps used cost $150,000. This article discusses Calaghan''s pioneering work, which was recently honoured by University Hospital in Edmonton.     

Inhibition of growth of Sclerotinia minor and other pathogens by citrinin in the filtrate of Penicillium citrinum

Penicillium citrinum Thom, isolated from the sclerotia of Sderotinia minor, was cultured in a broth of Czapek-Dox for 4 to 8 weeks. The filtrate obtained was incorporated into potato dextrose agar or Czapek-Dox agar at different concentrations (v/v). The amended media were tested for mycelial growth of S. minor and other pathogens. Mycelial growth of S. minor was completely inhibited on media amended with 20% (v/v) filtrate of P. citrinum, and considerable inhibition of S. minor occurred at 10 and 15% concentrations. Mycelial growth of S. major, Sclerotium rolfsii, Rhizoctonia solani (AG-4) was inhibited by similar concentrations of filtrate of P. citrinum. Inhibitor(s) in the filtrate were extracted with ethyl acetate and tentatively identified as citrinin. Citrinin was shown to be an active component in the filtrate against mycelial growth of S. minor, S. major and Sclerotium rolfsii.Cooperative investigation of U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agriculture Research Service and Oklahoma State University. Journal Article No. 4989, Oklahoma Agricultural Experiment Station, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater.Mention of a trademark, proprietary product, or vendor does not constitute a guarantee or warranty of the product by USDA or by Oklahoma State University, or imply their approval to the exclusion of other products or vendors that may also be suitable.     

Inbreeding, Incest, and the Incest Taboo: The State of Knowledge at the Turn of the Century

Inbreeding, Incest, and the Incest Taboo: The State of Knowledge at the Turn of the Century . Arthur P. Wolf and William H. Durham, eds. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004. 228 pp.     

World Picture, Anthropological Frame: DISTINGUISHED LECTURE—1976

This is the text of the seventh Distinguished Lecture of the American Anthropological Association, presented at its 75th Anniversary Meeting in Washington, D.C., November 1976. The Lectureship was established in 1969 to honor outstanding scholars in the profession and the lecture is now published each year in the American Anthropologist. Adams is an archaeologist and comparative anthropologist whose research interests have centered on the ecologically oriented study of prehistoric patterns of land use, settlement, and urbanization. His fieldwork has been in the Middle East, particularly in Iraq. He has served on the faculty of the University of Chicago since 1955, receiving his Ph.D. there in 1956. Besides appointments in the departments of Anthropology and Near Eastern Languages and Civilization, he has been Director of the Oriental Institute and Dean of the Division of Social Sciences at Chicago. He was Chairman of the Division of Behavioral Sciences of the National Research Council and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Adams' major publications include City Invincible (coeditor, 1960), Land Behind Baghdad (1965), The Evolution of Urban Society (1966, the Lewis Henry Morgan Lectures), and The Uruk Countryside (1972, with Hans J. Nissen).     

Reflections on a Life in Biomedicine: Leading Change

Dr. Elizabeth Nabel delivered the following presentation as the Lee E. Farr Lecturer on May 7, 2013, which served as the culmination of the annual Student Research Day at Yale School of Medicine. Dr. Nabel is President of the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, and Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Her lecture to Yale medical students portrayed her own personal and professional journey through medicine as a series of opportunities. Dr. Nabel focused on the roles and responsibilities of physicians to recognize need and to make change through focused advocacy.     

The partial sequence of the first 30 residues from the amino-terminus of hemoglobin B in the hagfish,Eptatretus stoutii: Homology with lamprey hemoglobin

Summary The partial sequence of the first 30 residues from the amino-terminus of hemoglobin B in the hagfish,Eptatretus stoutii, has been determined. Considerable homology was found between this sequence and the corresponding sequence of lamprey hemoglobin. Both hagfish and lamprey hemoglobins have an additional segment of 9 residues at the amino-terminus as compared with mammalian hemoglobins.This work was initiated at the University of Texas at Austin, and continued in Dr. Charles Yanofskey's laboratory at Stanford University.     

The evolutionary problem of genetic disease

Overpopulation and Family Planning: Report of the Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Planned Parenthood, October 24–29, 1955. Tokyo, Japan. Editor, Dr. L. N. Jackson. English and Japanese editions published by the International Planned Parenthood Federation, 69 Eccleston Square, London, S. W. I., England. Price: Sterling £1.1s.; Indian Rs. 7/‐; U.S. $3.00.

The Hazards to Man of Nuclear and Allied Radiations: Medical Research Council, Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London, 1956, 128 pp., price 5s. 6d.

Mental Disorders in Later Life (Second Edition) : Oscar J. Kaplan (ed.), Stanford University Press, Stanford, California, 1956, 508 pp., $7.50.

Zwillingstuberkulose III —Nachuntersuchung nach 20 Jahren an der Serie tuberkuloser Zwillinge: Helmut Mitsch‐rich, Gustav Fischer Verlag, Stuttgart, 1956, 78 pp.

Land of the Moon‐Children—The Primitive San Blas Culture in Flux: Clyde E. Keeler (Georgia State College for Women, Milledgeville, Ga.) University of Georgia Press, 1956, 207 pp., $4.50.

Warbasse History—A Study in the Sociology of Heredity: James Peter Warbasse, Kendall Press, Falmouth, Mass., 1954, 226 pp. $8.00.     

Evolutionary biology and feminism

Evolutionary biology and feminism share a variety of philosophical and practical concerns. I have tried to describe how a perspective from both evolutionary biology and feminism can accelerate the achievement of goals for both feminists and evolutionary biologists. In an early section of this paper I discuss the importance of variation to the disciplines of evolutionary biology and feminism. In the section entitled “Control of Female Reproduction” I demonstrate how insight provided by participation in life as woman and also as a feminist suggests testable hypotheses about the evolution of social behavior—hypotheses that are applicable to our investigations of the evolution of social behavior in nonhuman animals. In the section on “Deceit, Self-deception, and Patriarchal Reversals” I have overtly conceded that evolutionary biology, a scientific discipline, also represents a human cultural practice that, like other human cultural practices, may in parts and at times be characterized by deceit and self-deception. In the section on “Femininity” I have indicated how questions cast and answered and hypotheses tested from an evolutionary perspective can serve women and men struggling with sexist oppression. Patricia Adair Gowaty studies the evolution of social behavior, particularly mating systems and sex allocation, primarily in birds. She is most well-known for her long-term studies of eastern bluebirds, which began in 1977 and are on-going. She was an undergraduate at H. Sophie Newcomb College of Tulane University (1963–1967). In the late sixties and early seventies, while employed at the Bronx Zoo (New York Zoological Society), she belonged to a feminist “consciousness-raising” group. She started graduate school in 1974 at the University of Georgia and received her Ph.D. from Clemson University (1980). She had a postdoctoral position at the University of Oklahoma (1982–1983) and a visiting faculty position at Cornell University through the Visiting Professorships for Women NSF program (1983–1984) before returning to her bluebird study sites at Clemson in 1985. She has supported herself and her research efforts throughout her academic career on a series of awards and grants. She is currently (1990–1995) supported by a Research Scientist Development Award from The National Institute of Mental Health.     

Hemoglobin polymorphism in the encinal mouse,Peromyscus pectoralis

Horizontal starch gel electrophoresis revealed five hemoglobin phenotypes in natural populations of the encinal mouse, Peromyscus pectoralis, from northeastern Mexico. Populations of the encinal mouse from Texas, Oklahoma, and northwestern and north central Mexico were monomorphic for multiple-band phenotypes. Analysis of the hemoglobin polymorphism indicates that two loci control this variation.This research was supported by Faculty Research Grant 35053 from North Texas State University.