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Fundchronik: Ausgrabungen und Funde im Jahr 2022
Full text linkBerichte zu den archäologischen Untersuchungen der Archäologischen Bodenforschung Basel-Stadt im Jahr 2022
Koloniale Wissensproduktion und postkoloniale Neubestimmung: Die Dekolonisierung der Soziologie in Marokko
Full text linkIn Marokko gab es keine radikale Abkehr vom intellektuellen Erbe der Kolonialzeit. Stattdessen prägte ein kritischer und ambivalenter Annäherungsprozess die postkolonialen Debatten über die «Dekolonisierung» der Soziologie. Das hat auch viel mit dem Selbstbild Marokkos als Land am Knotenpunkt zwischen Afrika und Europa, zwischen Orient und Okzident, zu tun.
Au Maroc, il n’y a pas eu d’abandon radical del’héritage intellectuel de la période coloniale. Au lieu de cela, les débats postcoloniaux sur la«décolonisation» de la sociologie ont été marqués par une critique complexe et parfois ambivalente. Cela a aussi beaucoup à voir avec l'image que le Maroc se fait de lui-même en tant que carrefour entre Afrique et Europe, Orient et Occident
Improving procedures for obtaining Sanger sequences from old herbarium specimens
Full text linkBecause DNA degrades over time, extracting DNA of sufficient quality for sequencing is presumed to be more difficult from older than younger herbarium specimens. Although massive parallel sequencing techniques have clear advantages when it comes to sequencing ancient DNA, Sanger sequencing is still in frequent use, prompting us to test and improve its application on herbarium specimens. During molecular phylogenetic investigations of the subfamily Lamioideae (Lamiaceae) and subgroups, we extracted DNA from 651 herbarium specimens collected between 1826 and 2006 using regular mini-prep methods. The aim was to obtain DNA of sufficient quality for Sanger sequencing of various plastid and nuclear genetic markers. Here, we report successful Sanger sequencing of the commonly used plastid marker, rps16, as a conservative measure of DNA quality, and logistic regression to investigate the relationship between age of the material and DNA quality. Our result indicates that the upper age limit for obtaining DNA suitable for Sanger,sequencing from herbarium specimens using regular mini-prep DNA extraction methods has not been reached. After simple modifications to the regular DNA miniprep and PCR procedures, at least one genetic marker was successfully sequenced for about 90 % of the specimens tested, the oldest being 168 years old. Jointly, despite the technique’s drawbacks, these results demonstrate a high success rate of Sanger sequencing of herbarium specimens
The impact of climate change on plant distribution and niche dynamics over the past 250 years in Switzerland
Full text linkHerbarium specimens provide an irreplaceable source of historical plant distribution data, enabling analysis of changes in plant distribution spanning centuries. Most studies on plant distribution shifts focus on recent decades and rare species, especially along elevational gradients. We examined about 2000 historical herbarium specimens from the Botanical Garden of the University of Bern, representing 30 plant species from five Swiss lowland habitats (six species per habitat) dating back to 1768 and covering all Swiss cantons. All historical data were transcribed, georeferenced and then combined with current data resulting in about 170 000 plant records over 250 years. Combined with climatic data from the same period, we found that all habitats increased their potential distribution area with a significant gain in the semi-arid grasslands (+8.15 %, p-value = 0.031). On species level, 75 % of the selected species expanded their distribution, while 25 % of the species retracted. Despite these shifts, 90–99.6 % niche stability was observed between historical and current climatic niches across all species. Shifts in co-occurring species were specific to the species, not to the habitat. The consistent overlap in historical and current climatic niches suggest that distribution expansion is due to the growth of areas with suitable climates, pointing to climate change as a driving factor for plant distribution changes over the past 250 years
A plant’s path to publication – Caspar Bauhin (1560–1624) and Johann Theodor de Bry (1561–1623)
Full text linkThe Basel botanist Caspar Bauhin is justly famed for bringing order to late Renaissance botany. Through his Phytopinax (Basel, 1596), Prodromos Theatri Botanici (Frankfurt, 1620), and, above all, Pinax Theatri Botanici (Basel, 1623), Bauhin prepared the way for his Theatrum Botanicum. He envisioned this as a comprehensive, systematic, illustrated account of all six thousandplus plants known to him. His contemporaries had high regard for these works; a century later, Linnaeus found them indispensable. Today, they remain our key to pre-Linnaean botanical literature
Judging Climate Change: A Comparative Legal and Political Analysis of the KlimaSeniorinnen Schweiz and the Urgenda Cases
Full text linkSince global and national political efforts to tackle climate change are failing, climate change litigation is on the rise worldwide. In climate change litigation, claimants try to legally advance climate protection in manifold ways. In particular, strategic, rights-based climate change litigation is becoming more common in which claimants use a human rights-based approach in their attempt to advance social change. While a rights-based claim filed by Urgenda in the Netherlands succeeded, a similar Swiss case brought by KlimaSeniorinnen Schweiz, failed. Why did the two cases have different outcomes despite the similarity of the cases and the countries? This paper seeks an answer by comparing the legal and political systems of the countries as well as by conducting expert interviews. In sum, the Urgenda and KlimaSeniorinnen cases differed because Dutch law has more generous procedural rules about the admissibility of claims than Swiss law. Furthermore, the Swiss highest court is more hesitant to engage in politically controversial questions compared to the Dutch highest court.Since global and national political efforts to tackle climate change are failing, climate change litigation is on the rise worldwide. In climate change litigation, claimants try to legally advance climate protection in manifold ways. In particular, strategic, rights-based climate change litigation is becoming more common in which claimants use a human rights-based approach in their attempt to advance social change. While a rights-based claim filed by Urgenda in the Netherlands succeeded, a similar Swiss case brought by KlimaSeniorinnen Schweiz, failed. Why did the two cases have different outcomes despite the similarity of the cases and the countries? This paper seeks an answer by comparing the legal and political systems of the countries as well as by conducting expert interviews. In sum, the Urgenda and KlimaSeniorinnen cases differed because Dutch law has more generous procedural rules about the admissibility of claims than Swiss law. Furthermore, the Swiss highest court is more hesitant to engage in politically controversial questions compared to the Dutch highest court
Schiiten in Saudi-Arabien: Zwischen Ausgrenzung, Opposition und saudischem Nationalismus
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A Country that Seeks its Future in the Past: the Islamic Republic of Iran in the Face of the Protest Movements
Full text linkIran’s protest movement “Woman – Life – Liberty” has turned into calls to end the Islamic Republic itself. In seeking new ways forward, some of Iranian civil society are considering returning to monarchy and the constitutional movement of 1906