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Clovis Culture
The Clovis culture is a prehistoric Paleoamerican culture, named for distinct stone and bone tools found in close association with Pleistocene fauna, particularly two mammoths, at Blackwater Locality No. 1 near Clovis, New Mexico, in 1936 and 1937 (though Paleoindian artifacts had been found at the site since the 1920s). It appears around 11,500–11,000 uncalibrated years before present (YBP)"Clovis Culture" entry in the ''Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology'': "9,500–9,000 BC". at the end of the last glacial period and is characterized by the manufacture of " Clovis points" and distinctive bone and ivory tools. Archaeologists' most precise determinations at present suggest this radiocarbon age is equal to roughly 13,200 to 12,900 calendar years ago. The only human burial that has been directly associated with tools from the Clovis culture included the remains of an infant boy researchers named Anzick-1. Paleogenetic analyses of Anzick-1's ancient nuclear, mitoc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Plains
The Great Plains (french: Grandes Plaines), sometimes simply "the Plains", is a broad expanse of flatland in North America. It is located west of the Mississippi River and east of the Rocky Mountains, much of it covered in prairie, steppe, and grassland. It is the southern and main part of the Interior Plains, which also include the tallgrass prairie between the Great Lakes and Appalachian Plateau, and the Taiga Plains and Boreal Plains ecozones in Northern Canada. The term Western Plains is used to describe the ecoregion of the Great Plains, or alternatively the western portion of the Great Plains. The Great Plains lies across both Central United States and Western Canada, encompassing: * The entirety of the U.S. states of Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota; * Parts of the U.S. states of Colorado, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas and Wyoming; * The southern portions of the Canadian provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mitochondrial DNA
Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA or mDNA) is the DNA located in mitochondria, cellular organelles within eukaryotic cells that convert chemical energy from food into a form that cells can use, such as adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Mitochondrial DNA is only a small portion of the DNA in a eukaryotic cell; most of the DNA can be found in the cell nucleus and, in plants and algae, also in plastids such as chloroplasts. Human mitochondrial DNA was the first significant part of the human genome to be sequenced. This sequencing revealed that the human mtDNA includes 16,569 base pairs and encodes 13 proteins. Since animal mtDNA evolves faster than nuclear genetic markers, it represents a mainstay of phylogenetics and evolutionary biology. It also permits an examination of the relatedness of populations, and so has become important in anthropology and biogeography. Origin Nuclear and mitochondrial DNA are thought to be of separate evolutionary origin, with the mtDNA being derived ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Summer Lake (Oregon)
Summer Lake is a large, shallow, alkali lake in Lake County, Oregon, United States located south of the small, unincorporated community of Summer Lake, Oregon. At high water it is about long and wide, and supports a wide variety of birds and other wildlife in its marshes. The lake was named by explorer John C. Fremont on his expedition into Central Oregon in 1843. Ancient Lake Chewaucan The arid lands around Summer Lake were once lush. During the Pleistocene Epoch, vast areas of this region of south central Oregon were covered by lakes and wetlands. As the last ice age was ending, rain and runoff from melting snow filled the lowlands throughout this region of the Great Basin, creating an immense, freshwater lake called Lake Chewaucan. The lake covered at depths of up to ."Ancient Lakes", Oregon Historical Marker, Summer Lake, Oregon. Lake Chewaucan covered the Summer Lake basin and drainage system much of the late Pleistocene. The last high water period is thought ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paisley Caves
The Paisley Caves or the Paisley Five Mile Point Caves complex is a system of eight caves in an arid, desolate region of south-central Oregon, United States north of the present-day city of Paisley, Oregon. The caves are located in the Summer Lake basin at elevation and face west, carved into a ridge of Miocene and Pliocene era basalts mixed with soft volcanic tuffs and breccias by Pleistocene-era waves from Summer Lake. One of the caves may contain archaeological evidence of the oldest definitively-dated human presence in North America. The site was first studied by Luther Cressman in the 1930s. Scientific excavations and analysis in the Paisley Caves since 2002 have uncovered substantial new discoveries, including subfossil human coprolites with the oldest DNA evidence of human habitation in North America, various artifacts, and animal remains. The DNA was radiocarbon dated to 14,300 BP or roughly 12,000 BCE. The caves were added to the National Register of Historic Places in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cactus Hill
Cactus Hill is an archaeological site in southeastern Virginia, United States, located on sand dunes above the Nottoway River about 45 miles south of Richmond, Virginia, Richmond. The site receives its name from the prickly pear cacti that can be found growing abundantly on-site in the sandy soil. Cactus Hill may be one of the oldest archaeological sites in the Americas. If proven to have been inhabited 16,000 to 20,000 years ago, it would provide supporting evidence for pre-Clovis occupation of the Americas. The site has yielded multiple levels of prehistoric inhabitance with two discrete levels of early Paleoindian activity. Significance According to some archaeologists, including Dennis Stanford and Joseph and Lynn McAvoy, the Cactus Hill site furnishes evidence of a pre-Clovis culture, Clovis population in North America. They consider Cactus Hill significant because it challenges established models of Paleo-Indian, Paleoindian migration. The Clovis culture#Clovis First / Sin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Indigenous Peoples Of The Americas
The Indigenous peoples of the Americas are the inhabitants of the Americas before the arrival of the European settlers in the 15th century, and the ethnic groups who now identify themselves with those peoples. Many Indigenous peoples of the Americas were traditionally hunter-gatherers and many, especially in the Amazon basin, still are, but many groups practiced aquaculture and agriculture. While some societies depended heavily on agriculture, others practiced a mix of farming, hunting, and gathering. In some regions, the Indigenous peoples created monumental architecture, large-scale organized cities, city-states, chiefdoms, states, kingdoms, republics, confederacies, and empires. Some had varying degrees of knowledge of engineering, architecture, mathematics, astronomy, writing, physics, medicine, planting and irrigation, geology, mining, metallurgy, sculpture, and gold smithing. Many parts of the Americas are still populated by Indigenous peoples; some countries have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
North America
North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Caribbean Sea, and to the west and south by the Pacific Ocean. Because it is on the North American Plate, North American Tectonic Plate, Greenland is included as a part of North America geographically. North America covers an area of about , about 16.5% of Earth's land area and about 4.8% of its total surface. North America is the third-largest continent by area, following Asia and Africa, and the list of continents and continental subregions by population, fourth by population after Asia, Africa, and Europe. In 2013, its population was estimated at nearly 579 million people in List of sovereign states and dependent territories in North America, 23 independent states, or about 7.5% of the world's population. In Americas (terminology)#Human ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quaternary Extinction
The Quaternary period (from 2.588 ± 0.005 million years ago to the present) has seen the extinctions of numerous predominantly megafaunal species, which have resulted in a collapse in faunal density and diversity and the extinction of key ecological strata across the globe. The most prominent event in the Late Pleistocene is differentiated from previous Quaternary pulse extinctions by the widespread absence of ecological succession to replace these extinct species, and the regime shift of previously established faunal relationships and habitats as a consequence. The earliest casualties were incurred at 130,000 BCE (the start of the Late Pleistocene), in Australia ~ 60,000 years ago, in Americas ~ 15,000 years ago, coinciding in time with the early human migrations. However, the great majority of extinctions in Afro-Eurasia and the Americas occurred during the transition from the Pleistocene to the Holocene epoch (13,000 BCE to 8,000 BCE). This extinction w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Climate Variability And Change
Climate variability includes all the variations in the climate that last longer than individual weather events, whereas the term climate change only refers to those variations that persist for a longer period of time, typically decades or more. ''Climate change'' may refer to any time in Earth's history, but the term is now commonly used to describe contemporary climate change. Since the Industrial Revolution, the climate has increasingly been affected by human activities. The climate system receives nearly all of its energy from the sun and radiates energy to outer space. The balance of incoming and outgoing energy and the passage of the energy through the climate system is Earth's energy budget. When the incoming energy is greater than the outgoing energy, Earth's energy budget is positive and the climate system is warming. If more energy goes out, the energy budget is negative and Earth experiences cooling. The energy moving through Earth's climate system finds expression ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Goshen Complex
The Goshen point is a medium-sized, lanceolate-shaped, Paleo-Indian projectile point with a straight or concave base. It exhibits characteristic fine flaking. The point was named in 1988 by George C. Frison after the discovery of specimens at the Hell Gap complex site in southeastern Wyoming. The projectile is so-named after the nearby Goshen Country. Mill Iron Site The Mill Iron Site, located in Carter County, Montana and discovered in 1979, is a site belonging to the Goshen Complex. The site was excavated from 1984 to 1988. The excavation was also led by George C. Frison. 31 complete and broken Goshen points were found. 11 of these points were found in the campsite area, 12 were in the meat processing bed, and 7 were on the surface. This meat processing bed is thought to be a meat processing site rather than a kill site because it was a stack (4.5 meters in diameter) of single bison bones and other organized carcass parts. A large goshen point found in this meat processing bed i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plainview Complex
In the classification of Archaeological cultures of North America, the term Plainview points refer to Paleoindian projectile points dated between 10,000 and 9,000 Before Present. The point was named in 1947 after the discovery of a large cache of unfluted, lanceolate spear tips with concave bases that were found in a ''Bison antiquus'' kill site along the Running Water Draw river, near the town of Plainview in Texas, United States. The point is found primarily throughout the South Plains, however, this range may sometimes be misidentified, as "Plainview" was previously used as a general term to describe unfluted lanceolate points throughout the entirety of the Plains, as well as the eastern Upper Mississippi Valley. Classification The classification of the Plainview point was made in 1947 by Glen Evans, G. E. Meade and E. H. Sellards for a cache of unfluted, lanceolate spear tips with concave bases found at an archaeological site along the Running Water Draw river near the town ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Younger Dryas
The Younger Dryas (c. 12,900 to 11,700 years BP) was a return to glacial conditions which temporarily reversed the gradual climatic warming after the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM, c. 27,000 to 20,000 years BP). The Younger Dryas was the last stage of the Pleistocene epoch (c. 2,580,000 to 11,700 years BP) and it preceded the current, warmer Holocene epoch. The Younger Dryas was the most severe and long lasting of several interruptions to the warming of the Earth's climate, and it was preceded by the Late Glacial Interstadial (c. 14,670 to 12,900 BP). The change was relatively sudden, taking place in decades, and it resulted in a decline of temperatures in Greenland by 4~10 °C (7.2~18 °F), and advances of glaciers and drier conditions over much of the temperate Northern Hemisphere. A number of theories have been put forward about the cause, and the most widely supported by scientists is that the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, which transports warm water fro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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