Dataset Information

The Mountain Meadows Massacre and "poisoned springs": scientific testing of the more recent, anthrax theory.

ABSTRACT: It has been recorded that one of the possible causes that eventually escalated into the 1857 manslaughter at Mountain Meadows in Southern Utah was the poisoning of an open spring by the Fancher-Baker party as they crossed the Utah territory on their way from Arkansas to California. Historical accounts report that a number of cattle died, followed by human casualties from those that came in contact with the dead animals. Even after the Arkansas party departed, animals continued to perish and people were still afflicted by some unknown plague. Proctor Hancock Robison, a local 14-year-old boy, died shortly after skinning one of the "poisoned" cows. A careful review of the historical records, along with the more recent scientific literature, seems to exclude the likelihood of actual poisoning in favor of a more recent theory that would point to the bacterium Bacillus anthracis as the possible cause of human and animal deaths. In order to test this hypothesis, Proctor's remains were exhumed, identified through mitochondrial DNA analysis, and tested for the presence of anthrax spores. Although preliminary testing of remains and soil was negative, description of the clinical conditions that affected Proctor and other individuals does not completely rule out the hypothesis of death by anthrax.

SUBMITTER: Perego UA

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3538018 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

The Mountain Meadows Massacre and "poisoned springs": scientific testing of the more recent, anthrax theory.

Perego Ugo A UA Achilli Alessandro A Ekins Jayne E JE Milani Lucio L Lari Martina M Pilli Elena E Brown Alexis A Price Erin P EP Wolken Spenser R SR Matthews Molly M Allen Christina A CA Pearson Talima R TR Angerhofer Norman N Caramelli David D Kupferschmid Tim T Keim Paul S PS Woodward Scott R SR

International journal of legal medicine 20120307 1

It has been recorded that one of the possible causes that eventually escalated into the 1857 manslaughter at Mountain Meadows in Southern Utah was the poisoning of an open spring by the Fancher-Baker party as they crossed the Utah territory on their way from Arkansas to California. Historical accounts report that a number of cattle died, followed by human casualties from those that came in contact with the dead animals. Even after the Arkansas party departed, animals continued to perish and peop ...[more]

PMID: 22395921

Similar Datasets

Project description:In addition to its primary regulatory role, the Office of Hematology and Oncology Products at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is engaged in many forms of scientific authorship. During the period of 2010 to 2018, FDA oncology staff contributed to 356 publications in the scientific literature. Here, we collaborated with analysts in the Office of Program Planning, Analysis, and Evaluation at the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, National Institutes of Health (NIH), to present a series of analyses aimed at quantifying the characteristics and potential impact of these contributions, as well as characterizing the areas of work addressed. We found that FDA oncology papers are enriched for high-impact publications and have about two times the number of citations as an average NIH-funded paper. Further impact of the publications was measured based on the presence of 65 publications that were cited by guidelines and 12 publications cited by publicly listed clinical trials. The results seen here are promising in determining the impact of FDA oncology publication work but prompt further investigation into longer-term impacts, such as the influence of this work on other regulatory activities at FDA. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: This article describes the first comprehensive study of scientific publications produced by U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) oncology staff. The analysis illustrates that staff are highly engaged in publishing in the scientific literature in addition to completing regulatory review work. Publications are generally in clinical medicine, consistent with the large number of medical oncologists working at the Office of Hematology and Oncology Products (OHOP). OHOP publications generally focus either on communicating important regulatory work (approval summaries) or highlighting regulatory science issues to encourage dialogue with the scientific community (commentaries, reviews, and expert working papers). The analysis also suggests that several FDA oncology publications may influence clinical guidelines, but further work is needed to evaluate impact.

Project description:Understanding how land-use changes affect different facets of plant biodiversity in seminatural European grasslands is of particular importance for biodiversity conservation. As conclusions of previous experimental or synchronic observational studies did not converge toward a general agreement, assessing the recent trends in vegetation change in various grassland systems using a diachronic approach is needed. In this resurvey study, we investigated the recent changes in grassland vegetation of the French Jura Mountains, a region with a long tradition of pastoralism. We compared the floristic composition of 150 grassland plots recorded between 1990 and 2000 with new relevés made in 2012 on the same plots. We considered taxonomic, phylogenetic and functional diversity as well as ecological characteristics of the plant communities derived from ecological indicator values and life strategies of the species. PCA of the floristic composition revealed a significant general trend linked to the sampling year. Wilcoxon paired tests showed that contemporary communities were generally more dominated by grass species and presented a higher tolerance to defoliation, a higher pastoral value, and a higher nutrient indicator value. Comparisons revealed a decrease in phylogenetic and functional diversity. By contrast, local species richness has slightly increased. The intensity of change in species composition, measured by Hellinger distance between pairs of relevés, was dependent on neither the time lag between the two surveys, the author of the first relevé nor its location or elevation. The most important changes were observed in grasslands that previously presented low pastoral value, low grass cover, low tolerance to defoliation, and high proportion of stress-tolerant species. This trend was likely linked to the intensification of grassland management reported in the region, with a parallel increase in mowing frequency, grazing pressure, and fertilization level. More restrictive specifications should be applied to agricultural practices to avoid overexploitation of mountain species-rich grasslands and its negative consequences on their biodiversity and resilience.

Dataset Information

The Mountain Meadows Massacre and "poisoned springs": scientific testing of the more recent, anthrax theory.

Publications

The Mountain Meadows Massacre and "poisoned springs": scientific testing of the more recent, anthrax theory.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets