Objectives: The subsistence system of the first urban centers with monumental architecture from the North-Central Coast of Peru, the core area for the social complexity process of Central Andes, has been debated since the late 1960s. To shed light on this aspect, we report paleodietary data from the two most important sites of the Supe Valley: Caral (3000-200 BC), the major settlement of the middle valley, and Aspero (3000-1800 BC), a notable coastal settlement. Our main objective was to test the Maritime Foundations of Andean Civilization hypothesis. Materials and Methods: Stable isotope values (δ 13 C col , δ 13 C ap , and δ 15 N) from 52 individuals (70 samples: 44 bones and 26 teeth) were analyzed using conventional methods and Bayesian Mixing Models to address the role of marine products and plants in people's diet at both sites over time. Results: Our results suggest high C 3 carbohydrate consumption (55%-68% total calories in Aspero and >70% in Caral). The consumption of marine resources was stable for Aspero between 3300 and 1800 BC, but it decreased for Caral between 2550 and 200 BC. Discussion: Marine protein was more important in Aspero than in Caral over time. C 3 plants, possibly tubers, formed the foundation of the diet in both sites during the Formative period (~3000-200 BC). Maize was a marginal food (<12% of calories) at least until 800 BC (29% of calories). The Maritime Foundations hypothesis does not completely account for these findings. Our results suggest the predominance of crop-focused agriculture during the evaluated period.

The objective of this research is to determine the dietary relevance of the plants consumed by the inhabitants of Aspero, an urban center on the coast of the Supe Valley, Peru. For this purpose, starch grains trapped in the human dental calculus of eleven individuals were recovered. Additionally, the results of one individual recovered from the Sacred City of Caral, located in the interior of Supe Valley, are presented. The high number of starch grains recovered from sweet potato and squash possibly indicates a frequent consumption of these starchy plant foods by the inhabitants of Áspero. These results are consistent with previously published isotopic analyses indicating that C3 plants were an important part of the diet of the Áspero inhabitants. Although our results indicate that there was maize consumption at Áspero and Sacred City of Caral, our results and previous isotopic analyses performed on the same individuals, show that maize was not fundamental in the diet of the origins of the civilization. Finally, based on the damage patterns in starch grains, we report the first direct evidence of possible maize fermentation during the Initial Formative Period. Considering the economic and ritual importance of fermented beverage consumption in the ethnohistoric and archaeological record of later periods, this finding could have critical implications for understanding the process of social complexity in the region.

No abstract

The aim of the work was to develop rhein loaded polymeric nanoparticles (R-PNPs). Nanoparticles were prepared by three methods, solvent emulsion-evaporation, double emulsion, and nanoprecipitation, by means of experimental design. Additionally, the effects of the best formulation on in vitro cytotoxicity and inflammation were evaluated. The solvent emulsion-evaporation method presented the highest encapsulation efficiency of the three techniques (38.41%), as well as had a mean diameter of 189.33 nm and a polydispersity index of less than 0.1. Despite efforts to optimize the encapsulation of rhein, the drug release from nanoparticles was close to 50% during the first 5 min, followed by a continuous release within 60 min. It was observed that macrophages exposed to the highest concentration of R-PNPs showed cell viability about 80% and at the lowest nanoparticle concentrations was closed to 100%. IL-1β in cell culture supernatants was decreased in the presence of R-PNPs and TNFα concentrations were lower than the sensitivity of the assay. ROS production was only inhibited with R-PNPs at concentrations of 2.5 and 5 μM. In conclusion, the solvent emulsion-evaporation was the best method evaluated to obtain nanoparticles with the desired specifications. It was possible to assess R-PNPs with low cytotoxicity and anti-inflammatory properties showed by the inhibition of IL-1β production and a low decrease in ROS production.