After more than 3500 years of occupation in the Neolithic and Bronze Age, the many lake-dwellings’ around the Circum-Alpine region ‘suddenly’ came to an end. Throughout that period alternating phases of occupation and abandonment illustrate how resilient lacustrine populations were against change: cultural/environmental factors might have forced them to relocate temporarily, but they always returned to the lakes. So why were the lake-dwellings finally abandoned and what exactly happened towards the end of the Late Bronze Age that made the lake-dwellers change their way of life so drastically? The new research presented here draws upon the results of a four-year-long project dedicated to shedding light on this intriguing conundrum. Placing a particular emphasis upon the Bronze Age, a multidisciplinary team of researchers has studied the lake-dwelling phenomenon inside out, leaving no stones unturned, enabling identification of all possible interactive socio-economic and environmental factors that can be subsequently tested against each other to prove (or disprove) their validity. By re-fitting the various pieces of the jigsaw a plausible, but also rather unexpected, picture emerges.

A method for measuring the evaporation kinetics of pure solvents and solutions containing Cd3P2 quantum dots (QDs) in SiO/SiO2 rolled-up microtube (RUT) resonators is reported. The QDs serve as wavelength-tunable fluorescent sources for the RUT resonator. The first-order kinetic constant (295 K) of the evaporation of toluene embedded in a RUT (D = 9.10 μm) is evaluated (0.055 min−1).

Uranyl complexes of a large, compartmental N8-macrocycle adopt a rigid, “Pacman” geometry that stabilizes the UV oxidation state and promotes chemistry at a single uranyl oxo-group. We present here new and straightforward routes to singly reduced and oxo-silylated uranyl Pacman complexes and propose mechanisms that account for the product formation, and the byproduct distributions that are formed using alternative reagents. Uranyl(VI) Pacman complexes in which one oxo-group is functionalized by a single metal cation are activated toward single-electron reduction. As such, the addition of a second equivalent of a Lewis acidic metal complex such as MgN″2 (N″ = N(SiMe3)2) forms a uranyl(V) complex in which both oxo-groups are Mg functionalized as a result of Mg−N bond homolysis. In contrast, reactions with the less Lewis acidic complex [Zn(N″)Cl] favor the formation of weaker U−O−Zn dative interactions, leading to reductive silylation of the uranyl oxo-group in preference to metalation. Spectroscopic, crystallographic, and computational analysis of these reactions and of oxo-metalated products isolated by other routes have allowed us to propose mechanisms that account for pathways to metalation or silylation of the exo-oxogroup.

Cyanobacteria have established dominant aquatic populations around the world, generally in aggressive environments and under severe stress conditions, e.g., intense solar radiation. Several marine strains make use of compounds such as the polyenic molecules for their damage protection justifying the range of colours observed for these species. The peridinin/chlorophyll-a/protein complex is an excellent example of essential structures used for self-prevention; their systems allow to them surviving under aggressive environments. In our simulations, few protective dyes are required to the initial specimen defense; this is an important data concern the synthetic priority in order to supply adequate damage protection. Raman measurements obtained with 1064 and 514.5 nm excitations for Cylindrospermopsis raciborskii and Microcystis aeruginosa strains shows bands assignable to the carotenoid peridinin. It was characterized by bands at 1940, 1650, 1515, 1449, 1185, 1155 and 1000 cm−1 assigned to ν(Cdouble bond; length as m-dashCdouble bond; length as m-dashC) (allenic vibration), ν(Cdouble bond; length as m-dashC/CO), ν(Cdouble bond; length as m-dashC), δ(Csingle bondH, C-18/19), δ(Csingle bondH), ν(Csingle bondC), and ρ(Csingle bondCH3), respectively. Recognition by Raman spectroscopy proved to be an important tool for preliminaries detections and characterization of polyene molecules in several algae, besides initiate an interesting discussion about their synthetic priority.

Despite being widely utilized in the production of cultural objects, keratinous hard tissues, such as horn, baleen, and tortoiseshell, rarely survive in archaeological contexts unless factors combine to inhibit biodeterioration. Even when these materials do survive, working, use, and diagenetic changes combine to make identification difficult. This paper reviews the chemistry and deterioration of keratin and past approaches to the identification of keratinous archaeological remains. It describes the formation of horn, hoof, baleen, and tortoiseshell and demonstrates how identification can be achieved by combining visual observation under low-power magnification with an understanding of the structure and characteristic deterioration of these materials. It also demonstrates how peptide mass fingerprinting of the keratin can be used to identify keratinous tissues, often to species, even when recognizable structural information has not survived.

Candidiasis is one of the most frequent opportunistic infections in individuals with severe immunosupression and further development of resistance against the available antifungal drugs has created an alarming situation. This requires intensive drug discovery to develop new, more effective, affordable and accessible antifungal agents possessing novel modes of action. Albizia anthelmintica, which is ethno medically used to treat vaginal candidiasis in the Morogoro and coastal regions of Tanzania, on activity guided fractionation and subsequent purification resulted in the isolation and characterization of an isomer of methyl cyclitol (1) and six echinocystic acid saponins (2–7). Saponins 6 and 7 are new and being reported for the first time from nature. Among all the isolated compounds, 3-O-[α-L-arabinopyranosyl (1[RIGHTWARDS ARROW]2)][α-L-arabinopyranosyl (1[RIGHTWARDS ARROW]6)]-2-acetamido-2-deoxy-β-D-glucopyranosyl echinocystic acid (4), 3-O-[α-L-arabinopyranosyl (1[RIGHTWARDS ARROW]2)] [α-L-arabinopyranosyl (1[RIGHTWARDS ARROW]6)]-2-amino-2-deoxy-β-D-glucopyranosyl echinocystic acid (6) and 3-O-[β-D-glucopyranosyl (1[RIGHTWARDS ARROW]3)] [α-L-arabinopyranosyl (1[RIGHTWARDS ARROW]2)] [α-L-arabinopyranosyl (1[RIGHTWARDS ARROW]6)]-2-amino-2-deoxy-β-D-glucopyranosyl echinocystic acid (7) and their combinations were active against the various strains of C. albicans with MICs ranging from 12.5 to 125 μg/ml.