Climate induced human demographic and cultural change in northern Europe during the mid-Holocene.

The transition from hunter-gatherer-fisher groups to agrarian societies is arguably the most significant change in human prehistory. In the European plain there is evidence for fully developed agrarian societies by 7,500 cal. yr BP, yet a well-established agrarian society does not appear in the north until 6,000 cal. yr BP for unknown reasons. Here we show a sudden increase in summer temperature at 6,000 cal. yr BP in northern Europe using a well-dated, high resolution record of sea surface temperature (SST) from the Baltic Sea. This temperature rise resulted in hypoxic conditions across the entire Baltic sea as revealed by multiple sedimentary records and supported by marine ecosystem modeling. Comparison with summed probability distributions of radiocarbon dates from archaeological sites indicate that this temperature rise coincided with both the introduction of farming, and a dramatic population increase. The evidence supports the hypothesis that the boundary of farming rapidly extended north at 6,000 cal. yr BP because terrestrial conditions in a previously marginal region improved.

A cDNA for adenylyl sulphate (APS)-kinase from Arabidopsis thaliana.

A cDNA clone with an open reading frame of 831 nucleotides was isolated from a lambda ZapII-library of Arabidopsis thaliana. The nucleotide sequence of the cDNA is homologous to the APS-kinase genes from enterobacteria, diazotrophic bacteria, and yeast: Escherichia coli (cys C: 53.2%), Rhizobium meliloti (nod Q: 52.6%), and Saccharomyces cerevisiae (met 14:57.1%). The polypeptide deduced from the plant APS-kinase cDNA is comprised of 276 amino acid residues with a molecular weight of 29,790. It contains an N-terminal extension of 77 amino acids. This extension includes a putative transit peptide of 37 residues separated from the core protein by a VRACV processing site for stromal peptidase; a molecular weight of 26,050 is predicted for the processed protein. The relatedness between bacterial, fungal and plant APS-kinase polypeptides ranges from 47.5% (E. coli), 55.4% (S. cerevisiae), 52.6% (R. meliloti), and 50.3% (Azospirillum brasilense). The plant polypeptide contains eight cysteine residues; two cysteines flank a conserved purine nucleotide binding domain: GxxxxGK. Also conserved are a serine-182 as a possible phosphate transferring group and a K/LARAGxxxxFTG motif described for PAPS dependent enzymes. The identity of the gene was confirmed by analyzing the function of the gene product. The putative transit peptide was deleted by PCR and the truncated gene was expressed in a pTac1 vector system. A polypeptide of MW 25761 could be induced by IPTG. The gene product was enzymatically active as APS-kinase. It produced PAPS from APS and ATP--the absence of ATP but supplemented with thiols, the APS-kinase reacted as APS-sulphotransferase. APS-sulphotransferase is not a separate enzyme but identical with APS-kinase.