Kinship-based social inequality in Bronze Age Europe.

Revealing and understanding the mechanisms behind social inequality in prehistoric societies is a major challenge. By combining genome-wide data, isotopic evidence, and anthropological and archaeological data, we have gone beyond the dominating supraregional approaches in archaeogenetics to shed light on the complexity of social status, inheritance rules, and mobility during the Bronze Age. We applied a deep microregional approach and analyzed genome-wide data of 104 human individuals deriving from farmstead-related cemeteries from the Late Neolithic to the Middle Bronze Age in southern Germany. Our results reveal individual households, lasting several generations, that consisted of a high-status core family and unrelated low-status individuals; a social organization accompanied by patrilocality and female exogamy; and the stability of this system over 700 years.

Female exogamy and gene pool diversification at the transition from the Final Neolithic to the Early Bronze Age in central Europe.

Human mobility has been vigorously debated as a key factor for the spread of bronze technology and profound changes in burial practices as well as material culture in central Europe at the transition from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age. However, the relevance of individual residential changes and their importance among specific age and sex groups are still poorly understood. Here, we present ancient DNA analysis, stable isotope data of oxygen, and radiogenic isotope ratios of strontium for 84 radiocarbon-dated skeletons from seven archaeological sites of the Late Neolithic Bell Beaker Complex and the Early Bronze Age from the Lech River valley in southern Bavaria, Germany. Complete mitochondrial genomes documented a diversification of maternal lineages over time. The isotope ratios disclosed the majority of the females to be nonlocal, while this is the case for only a few males and subadults. Most nonlocal females arrived in the study area as adults, but we do not detect their offspring among the sampled individuals. The striking patterns of patrilocality and female exogamy prevailed over at least 800 y between about 2500 and 1700 BC. The persisting residential rules and even a direct kinship relation across the transition from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age add to the archaeological evidence of continuing traditions from the Bell Beaker Complex to the Early Bronze Age. The results also attest to female mobility as a driving force for regional and supraregional communication and exchange at the dawn of the European metal ages.

Effect of chloride ion on dissolution of different salt forms of haloperidol, a model basic drug.

The effect of chloride ion (Cl-) on dissolution rates of hydrochloride, mesylate (methanesulfonate) and phosphate salt forms of a model drug, haloperidol, was investigated. The dissolution rates of the salts in 0.01 M HCl from rotating disks followed the order of mesylate>>phosphate>hydrochloride. With additional chloride ion, a decrease in dissolution rate of the hydrochloride salt was observed due to the common ion effect. Dissolution rates of mesylate and phosphate salts also decreased due to their conversion to the HCl salt form on the surfaces of dissolving disks, however, the dissolution rates of mesylate and phosphate salts under identical chloride ion concentrations were still higher than that of the HCl salt. In powder dissolution studies, it was observed that kinetics of nonhydrochloride-to-hydrochloride salt conversion play a major role in dissolution; the mesylate dissolved completely (<5 min) before its dissolution rate could be impeded by its conversion to the hydrochloride salt form. Therefore, despite the potential for conversion to a hydrochloride salt form, certain nonhydrochloride salt forms may still be preferred for dosage form development due to kinetic advantages during dissolution, such as higher apparent dissolution rate of a nonhydrochloride salt before it could completely convert to the hydrochloride form.