Post-Cranial Traumatic Injury Patterns in Two Medieval Polish Populations: The Effects of Lifestyle Differences.

Traumatic injuries can be used as general indicators of activity patterns in past populations. This study tests the hypothesis that contemporaneous (10th-12th century) rural and urban populations in medieval Poland will have a significantly different prevalence of non-violent fractures. Traumatic injuries to the post-cranial skeleton were recorded for 180 adults from rural Giecz and for 96 adults from urban Poznań-Śródka.

Exploring the multidimensionality of stature variation in the past through comparisons of archaeological and living populations.

Adult stature variation is commonly attributed to differential stress-levels during development. However, due to selective mortality and heterogeneous frailty, a population's tall stature may be more indicative of high selective pressures than of positive life conditions. This article examines stature in a biocultural context and draws parallels between bioarchaeological and living populations to explore the multidimensionality of stature variation in the past.

Stature estimation in an early medieval (XI-XII c.) Polish population: testing the accuracy of regression equations in a bioarcheological sample.

Accurate stature estimation from skeletal remains can foster useful information on health and microevolutionary trends in past human populations. Stature can be estimated through the anatomical method and regression equations. The anatomical method (Fully: Ann Med Leg 36 [1956] 266-273; Raxter et al.

Ropivacaine abdominal wound infiltration and peritoneal spraying at cesarean delivery for preemptive analgesia.

Objective: To determine whether ropivacaine infiltration into all layers of the abdominal cesarean wound and spraying of the peritoneum decreases postoperative pain.

Methods: A randomized controlled trial of women undergoing cesarean delivery under general anesthetic allocated to receive either 30 mL of 0.75% ropivacaine or 30 mL of saline into the wound, including spraying of the peritoneum.

Quantitative analysis of N-phenylpropenoyl-L-amino acids in roasted coffee and cocoa powder by means of a stable isotope dilution assay.

Since recent reports on the role of N-phenylpropenoyl-L-amino acids as powerful antioxidants and key contributors to the astringent taste of cocoa nibs, there is an increasing interest in the concentrations of these phytochemicals in plant-derived foods. A versatile analytical method for the accurate quantitative analysis of N-phenylpropenoyl-L-amino acids in plant-derived foods by means of HPLC-MS/MS and synthetic stable isotope labeled N-phenylpropenoyl-L-amino acids as internal standards was developed. By means of the developed stable isotope dilution assay (SIDA), showing recovery rates of 95-102%, 14 N-phenylpropenoyl-L-amino acids were quantified for the first time in cocoa and coffee samples.