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      The diffusion of maize to the southwestern United States and its impact

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          Farmers and their languages: the first expansions.

          The largest movements and replacements of human populations since the end of the Ice Ages resulted from the geographically uneven rise of food production around the world. The first farming societies thereby gained great advantages over hunter-gatherer societies. But most of those resulting shifts of populations and languages are complex, controversial, or both. We discuss the main complications and specific examples involving 15 language families. Further progress will depend on interdisciplinary research that combines archaeology, crop and livestock studies, physical anthropology, genetics, and linguistics.
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            Starch grain and phytolith evidence for early ninth millennium B.P. maize from the Central Balsas River Valley, Mexico.

            Questions that still surround the origin and early dispersals of maize (Zea mays L.) result in large part from the absence of information on its early history from the Balsas River Valley of tropical southwestern Mexico, where its wild ancestor is native. We report starch grain and phytolith data from the Xihuatoxtla shelter, located in the Central Balsas Valley, that indicate that maize was present by 8,700 calendrical years ago (cal. B.P.). Phytolith data also indicate an early preceramic presence of a domesticated species of squash, possibly Cucurbita argyrosperma. The starch and phytolith data also allow an evaluation of current hypotheses about how early maize was used, and provide evidence as to the tempo and timing of human selection pressure on 2 major domestication genes in Zea and Cucurbita. Our data confirm an early Holocene chronology for maize domestication that has been previously indicated by archaeological and paleoecological phytolith, starch grain, and pollen data from south of Mexico, and reshift the focus back to an origin in the seasonal tropical forest rather than in the semiarid highlands.
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              Development of vegetation and climate in the southwestern United States.

              Plant macrofossils in ancient packrat middens document the presence of woodland communities in most of the present Chihuahuan, Sonoran, and Mohave deserts in the southwestern United States during the late Wisconsinan (22,000 to 11,000 years before present by radiocarbon dating). Warm desert species were common in the woodlands at lower elevations and mixed conifer and subalpine forests were present at high elevations. Inferred mild, wet winters and cool summers produced unusual plant and animal associations compared to those of today. Montane communities acquired modern aspects and more mesophytic species disappeared from lower woodlands about 11,000 years ago. Early Holocene xeric woodlands and an inferred winter precipitation regime persisted until about 8000 years ago. The present circulation patterns, rainfall regimes, and biotic distributions probably formed as a result of the melting of the continental ice sheets. Southwestern communities appear to have responded quickly to climatic changes compared to the gradual responses of central and eastern United States forest communities.
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                Author and article information

                Journal
                Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
                PNAS
                Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
                0027-8424
                1091-6490
                December 15 2009
                December 15 2009
                : 106
                : 50
                : 21019-21026
                Article
                10.1073/pnas.0906075106
                19995985
                e74dfca7-dd17-4379-b4de-eef968902d20
                © 2009
                History

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