A variable proportion of finds from the Neolithic and Chalcolithic of ‘Old Europe’ has come from places outside settlements, cemeteries, production sites, ritual sites, or caves. Such finds tend to be described as ‘chance/isolated/single/stray’ finds or, when in groups, as ‘hoards’. The frequent, modernist cause invoked for these finds is that they were either ‘hidden’ in times of mortal danger, represented a ‘gift to the gods’, or simply ‘lost’. One reason for these explanatory shortcomings is the over-attention to the types of objects deposited in the landscape and the frequent lack of attention to the often-distinctive place of deposition. We believe that we have misnamed, overlooked, or not accurately characterised an entire class of sites, which we term ‘landscape deposition sites’, whose defining feature was the transformation of a place by the deposition of a significant object or group of objects to create a qualitatively different place. The creation of such landscape deposit sites varied in time and space throughout Old Europe, but all sites were affected by this new dimension of the extended cultural domain.

In this article, we consider the interpretations of metal deposition in North-west Europe and the light they shed on an earlier and geographically different region. The primary aim of this paper is an exploration of the variable relationships between landscape deposit sites and the coeval finds made in special deposits in settlements and cemeteries in the 5th and 4th millennia bc, which will lead to proposed new interpretations of landscape deposition sites.

The Trypillia megasites of the Ukrainian forest steppe formed the largest fourth-millennium bc sites in Eurasia and possibly the world. Discovered in the 1960s, the megasites have so far resisted all attempts at an understanding of their social structure and dynamics. Multi-disciplinary investigations of the Nebelivka megasite by an Anglo-Ukrainian research project brought a focus on three research questions: (1) what was the essence of megasite lifeways? (2) can we call the megasites early cities? and (3) what were their origins? The first question is approached through a summary of Project findings on Nebelivka and the subsequent modelling of three different scenarios for what transpired to be a different kind of site from our expectations. The second question uses a relational approach to urbanism to show that megasites were so different from other coeval settlements that they could justifiably be termed ‘cities'. The third question turns to the origins of sites that were indeed larger and earlier than the supposed first cities of Mesopotamia and whose development indicates that there were at least two pathways to early urbanism in Eurasia.

Using the recently developed techniques of electron tomography, we have explored the first stages of disfiguring formation of zinc soaps in modern oil paintings. The formation of complexes of zinc ions with fatty acids in paint layers is a major threat to the stability and appearance of many late 19th and early 20th century oil paintings. Moreover, the occurrence of zinc soaps in oil paintings leading to defects is disturbingly common, but the chemical reactions and migration mechanisms leading to large zinc soap aggregates or zones remain poorly understood. State-of-the-art scanning (SEM) and transmission (TEM) electron microscopy techniques, primarily developed for biological specimens, have enabled us to visualize the earliest stages of crystalline zinc soap growth in a reconstructed zinc white (ZnO) oil paint sample. In situ sectioning techniques and sequential imaging within the SEM allowed three-dimensional tomographic reconstruction of sample morphology. Improvements in the detection and discrimination of backscattered electrons enabled us to identify local precipitation processes with small atomic number contrast. The SEM images were correlated to low-dose and high-sensitivity TEM images, with high-resolution tomography providing unprecedented insight into the structure of nucleating zinc soaps at the molecular level. The correlative approach applied here to study phase separation, and crystallization processes specific to a problem in art conservation creates possibilities for visualization of phase formation in a wide range of soft materials.

The Varna I cemetery, on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast, is one of the most remarkable sites in European prehistory, with the world’s earliest large-scale assemblage of gold artifacts. Modeling of the first series of 14 accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) dates yielded a duration of occupation at the site of ca. 150 years, ~4600–4450 cal BC. However, there were insufficient paired human–animal dates for a full consideration of the question of the marine reservoir effect. Here, a fuller set of 71 dates from 53 graves is presented. We identify a small reservoir effect in a number of individuals based on 14C, as well as carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes. We test the effect of this by building a series of different Bayesian models. Our favored model, including a correction for some of the human determinations, shows activity at the cemetery starting at 4596–4516 cal BC and ending 4427–4341 cal BC (at 95.4% probability). The overall span of activity covers ~120–260 years (93.6% prob.). The modeling shows that Varna I falls toward the beginning of the Bulgarian Late Copper Age.

The aim of this work is to better understand fluid displacement mechanisms at the pore scale in relation to capillary-filling rules. Using specifically designed micro-models we investigate the role of pore body shape on fluid displacement during drainage and imbibition via quasi-static and spontaneous experiments at ambient conditions. The experimental results are directly compared to lattice Boltzmann (LB) simulations. The critical pore-filling pressures for the quasi-static experiments agree well with those predicted by the Young–Laplace equation and follow the expected filling events. However, the spontaneous imbibition experimental results differ from those predicted by the Young–Laplace equation; instead of entering the narrowest available downstream throat the wetting phase enters an adjacent throat first. Thus, pore geometry plays a vital role as it becomes the main deciding factor in the displacement pathways. Current pore network models used to predict displacement at the field scale may need to be revised as they currently use the filling rules proposed by Lenormand et al. (J. Fluid Mech., vol. 135, 1983, pp. 337–353). Energy balance arguments are particularly insightful in understanding the aspects affecting capillary-filling rules. Moreover, simulation results on spontaneous imbibition, in excellent agreement with theoretical predictions, reveal that the capillary number itself is not sufficient to characterise the two phase flow. The Ohnesorge number, which gives the relative importance of viscous forces over inertial and capillary forces, is required to fully describe the fluid flow, along with the viscosity ratio.

This study reports findings from the administration of a social problem-solving training (SPST) intervention to juvenile detainees in the Connecticut Youth Detainee Program. SPST is a cognitive behavioral intervention that teaches children and youth how to more effectively cope with interpersonal stress and conflict. In the current study, we tested whether SPST could decrease depressive symptoms in a sample of detained adolescent offenders. The study used a randomized-control design with detention staff administering the intervention. The results showed that SPST, as a main effect, was not more effective in reducing depressive symptoms than treatment as usual. However, the effectiveness of SPST was moderated by fluid intelligence. Juvenile detainees with high intelligence scores were most likely to benefit from SPST compared to treatment as usual. It was surprising that, for those with lower intelligence scores, SPST increased depressive symptoms relative to treatment as usual. These results help fill a critical need for intervention effectiveness data on juvenile detainees and indicate that SPST may not be useful for reducing outcomes such as depression.

We report on the analysis of virtual powder-diffraction patterns from serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) data collected at an X-ray free-electron laser. Different approaches to binning and normalizing these patterns are discussed with respect to the microstructural characteristics which each highlights. Analysis of SFX data from a powder of Pr0.5Ca0.5MnO3 in this way finds evidence of other trace phases in its microstructure which was not detectable in a standard powder-diffraction measurement. Furthermore, a comparison between two virtual powder pattern integration strategies is shown to yield different diffraction peak broadening, indicating sensitivity to different types of microstrain. This paper is a first step in developing new data analysis methods for microstructure characterization from serial crystallography data.

Monumental ditches and Bell Beakers are two key phenomena in later prehistoric Europe involved in the study of El Ventorro, near Madrid. In this article, we discuss and develop an analytical protocol for a thorough characterisation of the patterns of breakage, abrasion, and representation of ceramics. The procedure is tested with a large ceramic sample from ‘Pithouse 013’, an unusually rich context which challenges stereotypical accounts of the domestic sphere, feasting, and prestige goods deposition. This sunken feature was filled with a heterogeneous mixture of recently broken remains and secondary residues, and is reinterpreted here as a ditch segment instead of everyday fossilised occupation surfaces. The paper sheds important new light on depositional practices, the social biographies of Beaker pottery, and the infilling of ditched enclosures. It also allows the assessment of the potential of this integrated re-fitting and taphonomic strategy to illuminate poorly understood aspects of pottery in a range of time–place contexts.

The first phase of the Trypillia mega-sites' methodological revolution began in 1971 with aerial photography, magnetic prospection, and archaeological excavations of huge settlements of hundreds of hectares belonging to the Trypillia culture in Ukraine. Since 2009, we have created a second phase of the methodological revolution in studies of Trypillia mega-sites, which has provided more significant advances in our understanding of these large sites than any other single research development in the last three decades, thanks partly to the participation of joint Ukrainian-foreign teams. In this paper, we outline the main aspects of the second phase, using examples from the Anglo-Ukrainian project ‘Early urbanism in prehistoric Europe: the case of the Trypillia mega-sites', working at Nebelivka (also spelled ‘Nebilivka’), and the Ukrainian-German project ‘Economy, demography and social space of Trypillia mega-sites', working at Taljanky (‘Talianki’), Maydanetske (‘Maydanetskoe’), and Dobrovody, as well as the smaller site at Apolianka.

Miconia (Miconia calvescens DC.) is a tropical tree species from South and Central America that is a highly invasive colonizer of Hawaii's forested watersheds. Elimination of satellite populations is critical to an effective containment strategy, but extreme topography limits accessibility to remote populations by helicopter operations only. Herbicide Ballistic Technology (HBT) is a novel weed control tool designed to pneumatically deliver encapsulated herbicide projectiles. It is capable of accurately treating miconia satellites within a 30 m range in either horizontal or vertical trajectories. Efficacy was examined for the encapsulated herbicide projectiles, each containing 199.4 mg ae triclopyr, when applied to miconia in 5-unit increments. Experimental calibrations of the HBT platform were recorded on a Hughes 500-D helicopter while conducting surveillance operations from November 2010 through October 2011 on the islands of Maui and Kauai. Search efficiency (min ha−1; n = 13, R2 = 0.933, P< 0.001) and target acquisition rate (plants hr−1, n = 13, R2 = 0.926, P< 0.001) displayed positive linear and logarithmic relationships, respectively, to plant target density. The search efficiency equation estimated target acquisition time at 25.1 sec and a minimum surveillance rate of 67.8 s ha−1 when no targets were detected. The maximum target acquisition rate for the HBT platform was estimated at 143 targets hr−1. An average mortality factor of 0.542 was derived from the product of detection efficacy (0.560) and operational treatment efficacy (0.972) in overlapping buffer areas generated from repeated flight segments (n = 5). This population reduction value was used in simulation models to estimate the expected costs for one- and multi-year satellite population control strategies for qualifying options in cost optimization and risk aversion. This is a first report on the performance of an HBT helicopter platform demonstrating the capability for immediate, rapid-response control of new satellite plant detections, while conducting aerial surveillance of incipient miconia populations.

It is a pleasure to be invited to contribute to a debate on the nature of ‘structured deposition’, even though I do not have the expertise to comment on much of the detailed discussion of British prehistoric material presented in this excellent paper. The way in which my commentary approaches structured deposition is by posing two questions relating to the field of deliberate object fragmentation – an important aspect of many sites where structured deposition has been claimed (such as Kilverstone, Etton or Windmill Hill) – (a) can the identification of deliberate object fragmentation contribute to the understanding of specific deposits, sites or landscapes? (b) To what extent does the agency of humans and objects relate to structured deposition and deliberate object fragmentation?