- Ancient oral microbiomes support gradual Neolithic dietary shifts towards agriculture. The adoption of agriculture was gradual.
- Triangulation supports agricultural spread of the Transeurasian languages. The ancestors of the speakers of 98 related languages — including Japanese, Korean, Tungusic, Mongolic and Turkic — were the first millet farmers gradually spreading across Northeast Asia.
- Modelling the chronology and dynamics of the spread of Asian rice from ca. 8000 BCE to 1000 CE. Deep breath. Rice domestication originated in eastern China (7430 BCE) and northeastern South Asia (6460 BCE). Then gradually spread in 2 waves: (1) in the 4th-3rd millennia BCE to the rest of China and SE Asia, associated with millet cultivation (Transeurasian speakers?), and (2) in 1st BCE-1st CE to Liao River region, Central Asia, and Africa.
- Plant foods consumed at the Neolithic site of Qujialing (ca. 5800-4200 BP) in Jianghan Plain of the middle catchment of Yangtze River, China. Not just rice and millets but also job’s tears, lotus roots, yam, acorns and beans.
- Indo-European cereal terminology suggests a Northwest Pontic homeland for the core Indo-European languages. The speakers of Proto-Indo-European, on the other hand, gradually making their way from the steppes, were not farmers.
- Revealing invisible stews: new results of organic residue analyses of Beveled Rim Bowls from the Late Chalcolithic site of Shakhi Kora, Kurdistan Region of Iraq. Not by bread alone… Iconic, hastily-made, throw-away pottery bowls from 3500 BCE were not bread moulds but rather held tasty stews. No job’s tears and lotus roots, alas, though.
- Phytoliths as indicators of plant water availability: The case of millets cultivation in the Indus Valley civilization. Sorghum and millets were growing under water stress at several Mature Harappan (2500–1900 BCE) sites. But they could take it.
- Opium trade and use during the Late Bronze Age: Organic residue analysis of ceramic vessels from the burials of Tel Yehud, Israel. People were getting high in the 14th century BCE. And who can blame them, after millennia of domesticating plants and gradually spreading around the world.
- Adaptations of Pre-Columbian Manioc Storage Techniques as Strategies to Adapt to Extreme Climatic Events in Amazonian Floodplains. Some current agricultural practices can be seen in the archaeological record. And not just getting high on opium.
- See you in the new year, everyone!
Brainfood: Silkworm, Donkey, Cat, Chicken, Neolithic, Shamans, Locusts
- High-resolution silkworm pan-genome provides genetic insights into artificial selection and ecological adaptation. The silkworm was domesticated 5000 years ago in the middle Yellow River (along with millets?), but was improved independently and in different directions in China and Japan.
- The genomic history and global expansion of domestic donkeys. The donkey was domesticated in the Horn of Africa 7000 years ago and then developed in different directions in Africa and Eurasia. Covered in the NY Times, no less.
- Your horse is a donkey! Identifying domesticated equids from Western Iberia using collagen fingerprinting. Turns out you can tell horses and donkeys apart easily and cheaply from ancient collagen in archaeological remains.
- Genetics of randomly bred cats support the cradle of cat domestication being in the Near East. Humans were domesticated by cats in the eastern Mediterranean basin about 12,000 years ago.
- The history of the domestic cat in Central Europe. Wait, the Near Eastern wildcat, from which all domestic cats are derived, could have been in central Europe before the Neolithic.
- Missing puzzle piece for the origins of domestic chickens. Recent dating of chicken domestication from archaeological remains in Thailand at 1650–1250 BC underestimates the timescale. By a lot.
- Was the Fishing Village of Lepenski Vir Built by Europe’s First Farmers? And did they have cats?
- Shamanism at the transition from foraging to farming in Southwest Asia: sacra, ritual, and performance at Neolithic WF16 (southern Jordan). You need shamans to help you cope with all that animal domestication.
- Contributions of black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia L.) to livelihoods of peri-urban dwellers in the Free State Province of South Africa. Wait, black locusts are not animals? Hmm, they do seem to have some things in common with cats though.
Brainfood: Genetic erosion, Ecosystem services, Cereal mixtures, Natural enemies, Soil microbiome double
- Genetic diversity loss in the Anthropocene. Don’t get excited, I don’t think the method translates to cultivated species, but fancy maths says we’ve lost on average 10% of the genetic diversity within species.
- A graphical causal model for resolving species identity effects and biodiversity–ecosystem function correlations. Yeah, but don’t forget that species level diversity is important too. Or rather, diversity of functional traits among species.
- Cereal species mixtures: an ancient practice with potential for climate resilience. A review. Species level diversity in the same farmer’s field is being forgotten, and that’s bad.
- Microbiomes in agroecosystem: Diversity, function and assembly mechanisms. Even soil microbial diversity is important…
- Association analyses of host genetics, root-colonizing microbes, and plant phenotypes under different nitrogen conditions in maize. …but the effects of soil microbial diversity can get quite complicated, and interact with the genetic diversity of crop plants. Which we may or may not have lost an average 10% of.
- Direct and indirect effects of management and landscape on biological pest control and crop pest infestation in apple orchards. Yeah, but species diversity can be bad too.
Brainfood: Coconut in vitro, Clean cryo, Chickpea & lentil collections, Genebank data history, Eurisco update, Mining genebank data, TIK, Sampling strategy, Drones, GIS, Mexican CWR, Post-2020 biodiversity framework
- Thiamine improves in vitro propagation of sweetpotato [Ipomoea batatas (L.) Lam.] – confirmed with a wide range of genotypes. Getting there, keep tweaking…
- Minimizing the deleterious effects of endophytes in plant shoot tip cryopreservation. Something else to tweak.
- Ex Situ Conservation of Plant Genetic Resources: An Overview of Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) and Lentil (Lens culinaris Medik.) Worldwide Collections. Thankfully not much in vitro and cryo involved. The main tweak necessary is to share more characterization data with breeders.
- Data, Duplication, and Decentralisation: Gene Bank Management in the 1980s and 1990s. Ah, but do calls for more data also reflect attempts to cut costs and build political bridges? And would that be so bad?
- EURISCO update 2023: the European Search Catalogue for Plant Genetic Resources, a pillar for documentation of genebank material. Arguably, Eurisco tries to do all of the above, and pretty well.
- Bioinformatic Extraction of Functional Genetic Diversity from Heterogeneous Germplasm Collections for Crop Improvement. You need fancy maths to make sense of all that data. And use it.
- Research Status and Trends of Agrobiodiversity and Traditional Knowledge Based on Bibliometric Analysis (1992–Mid-2022). Not much traditional knowledge in those databases, though, eh? That would be one hell of a tweak.
- Species-tailored sampling guidelines remain an efficient method to conserve genetic diversity ex situ: A study on threatened oaks. Meanwhile, some people are still trying to figure out the best way to tweak sampling strategies to add diversity to genebanks. Spoiler alert: you need data on individual species.
- Collecting critically endangered cliff plants using a drone-based sampling manipulator. You also need drones.
- Application of Geographical Information System for PGR Management. One thing you can do with all that data is map stuff. So at least the drones know where to go.
- Incorporating evolutionary and threat processes into crop wild relatives conservation. The only thing that’s missing from this is traditional knowledge. And maybe drones.
- Conserving species’ evolutionary potential and history: opportunities under the new post-2020 global biodiversity framework. All these data will allow us to measure how well we’re doing. And whether we can ask for cryotanks, drones, and better databases.
Brainfood: Indigenous crops, Indian vegetables, Local breeds, Wheat identity, Date names, Food security & heritage, Peruvian cuisine, Food sovereignty, Palestinian seeds, Tea culture, Sacred groves, Food system transformation, Diverse landscapes
- Renaming Indigenous crops and addressing colonial bias in scientific language. Orphan is out, Indigenous is in.
- Vegetable Genetic Resources to Mitigate Nutritional Insecurity in India. How many of these Indian vegetables are Indigenous as opposed to indigenous though?
- Farmers using local livestock biodiversity share more than animal genetic resources: Indications from a workshop with farmers who use local breeds. Farmers using local breeds don’t share colonial bias, I suspect. Or do they? Has anyone checked?
- Because error has a price: A systematic review of the applications of DNA fingerprinting for crop varietal identification. Nobody’s perfect, even the colonially unbiased.
- What lies behind a fruit crop variety name? A case study of the barnī date palm from al-‘Ulā oasis, Saudi Arabia. Local variety names are complicated, no wonder mistakes happen.
- Food security and the cultural heritage missing link. Want to preserve cultural heritage AND boost productivity? Then support (1) preservation of genetic resources, (2) value addition, (3) traditional food processing, (4) preference matching, and (5) agritourism. What, no fighting colonial bias?
- Analysis of Innovation in Peru’s Gastronomic Industry. All of the above?
- Food sovereignty in sub-Saharan Africa: Reality, relevance, and practicality. All of the above are well and good, but not enough. You also need modern varieties. Just get their names right, eh?
- Baladi Seeds in the oPt: Populations as Objects of Preservation and Units of Analysis. Whatever you do, don’t reduce cultural heritage to data.
- Reinventing a Tradition: East Asian Tea Cultures in the Contemporary World. No danger of reducing tea to data, judging by this collection of papers.
- Factors driving the tree species richness in sacred groves in Indian subcontinent: a review. Not religion, apparently, according to the data. Go figure.
- The role of traditional knowledge and food biodiversity to transform modern food systems. There is plenty of evidence out there that bringing greater biodiversity into food systems results in multiple socio-cultural benefits. As this Brainfood, as well as the case studies in this paper, tries to show.
- Complex agricultural landscapes host more biodiversity than simple ones: A global meta-analysis. Had enough?