Archaeologists frequently use probability distributions and null hypothesis significance testing (NHST) to assess how well survey, excavation, or experimental data align with their hypotheses about the past. Bayesian inference is increasingly used as an alternative to NHST and, in archaeology, is most commonly applied to radiocarbon date estimation and chronology building. This article demonstrates that Bayesian statistics has broader applications. It begins by contrasting NHST and Bayesian statistical frameworks, before introducing and applying Bayes's theorem. In order to guide the reader through an elementary step-by-step Bayesian analysis, this article uses a fictional archaeological faunal assemblage from a single site. The fictional example is then expanded to demonstrate how Bayesian analyses can be applied to data with a range of properties, formally incorporating expert prior knowledge into the hypothesis evaluation process.

Paleoindian archaeology on the Great Plains is often characterized by the investigation of large mammal kill/butchery bonebeds with relatively high archaeological visibility. Extensively documented aspects of Paleoindian behavioral variability include the form and composition of weaponry systems, hunting strategies, carcass exploitation, and hunter mobility. Non-hunting oriented aspects of settlement and subsistence behavior are less documented. Information from Component 2 at the O.V. Clary site, in Ash Hollow, western Nebraska, lessens this imbalance of knowledge. It provides a fine-grained, spatially extensive record of Late Paleoindian (Allen Complex) activities at a winter base camp occupied for 5-7 months. This paper highlights elements of site structure and activity organization, emphasizing domestic behaviors including hearth use, site maintenance, and hide working. ArcGIS 9.3.1 (ESRI) and GeoDa 0.9.5-1 (Anselin 2003; Anselin et al. 2006) are employed in conjunction with middle-range observations and expectations to document and interpret spatial patterning in the distribution of over 57,000 artifacts, ecofacts, and red ochre nodules. More broadly, results are related to two models of Paleoindian residential mobility: the place-oriented model and the high-tech forager model. Rather than mutually exclusive scenarios, Component 2 indicates that these models reflect complementary structural poses within the overall behavioral system.

The Jim Pitts site is a multicomponent Paleoindian locality in the Black Hills of South Dakota, with a rare Goshen residential occupation. All Paleoindian components were comprised in the Leonard paleosol. The deepest component at the site is a Goshen level dated to 10,185 ± 25 B.P. It correlates with a late fall-early winter camp site. Over the course of its use parts of at least five bison were procured and introduced to the site. Above this level an array of point styles, including Goshen, Folsom, Agate Basin, several Fishtail points, James Allen, Cody, and Alberta, have also been found. The following study provides a typological and technological description of the point assemblage and weighs the implications of the chrono-cultural stratigraphy for reconstructing the Paleoindian cultural landscape. It questions the validity of some types, particularly Goshen, as cultural and chronological markers. Ultimately, the evidence presented here reinforces a model in which multiple Paleoindian point types occur simultaneously on the central and northern Great Plains. This in turn challenges a unilineal view of Paleoindian culture history.

Plotting defect locations in insulating SiC presents a challenge because the total number of locations on a wafer is so large. We scan the wafer with visible light at an appropriate resolution and sort out transmissions appropriate for the defects we are looking for. Under these conditions, we find that voids and micropipes reduce the pixel transmission to 0.3 to 0.5. Sorting for this transmission reduces the number of pixels of interest to a manageable number, especially with recent progress in growing lower defect SiC. Now a commercial plotting program can easily display defect locations within a circle representing the wafer boundary. We verify the defect locations by scanning electron microscope secondary electron images and scanning optical microscope visible-light images at several resolutions.

The discovery of catalysts that can selectively couple unprotected peptide fragments would revolutionize protein chemistry by allowing convergent polypeptide synthesis. Proteolytic enzymes have the capability to perform this chemistry because the protein can specifically recognize and bind to C-terminal and N-terminal peptide sequences, activate the C-terminal peptide sequence by forming an acyl-enzyme intermediate, and couple the two peptide fragments together. However, barriers that limit the use of proteases as catalysts for convergent peptide synthesis include (i) the stability of proteolytic enzymes in organic solvent systems; (ii) a simple and effective C-erminal and N-terminal protecting group strategy; and (iii) the isolation of the polypeptide product from the reaction mixture. In the previous paper we reported the stabilization of enzymes by the covalent attachment of proteins through their ο-lysine residues to a series of carbohydrate-based macromolecules. In this paper we report the use of carbohydrate protein conjugates of proteases [CPC(proteases)] as catalysts for peptide bond synthesis and a general strategy for convergent oligopeptide synthesis.

Intense efforts have been directed at the stabilization of proteins because of their potential uses in organic synthesis, diagnostics, and the pharmaceutical industry. These efforts have resulted in a number of methods to stabilize enzymes including adsorbtion on inert supports or ion exchange resins, entrapment within a gel (with or without crosslinking of the gel or protein), covalent attachment to beads or polymeric supports, inclusion in micelles, chemical derivatization of the protein and mutagenesis. However, these methods do not provide a general approach to solving the problem of protein stability. We believed that the multi-site attachment of a carbohydrate-based macromolecule to the surface of a protein would provide structural stability and a water-like microenvironment for the protein under harsh reaction conditions.

The polymerization of a series of new monomers composed of carbohydrates functionalized with polymerizable side-groups gave high molecular weight water-soluble materials. The preparation of the monomers using both chemical and enzymatic methods allowed complete stereo- and regiochemical control of the composition of the monomers.