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In nineteenth-century Cuba, the increasing and uneven use of passports for maritime travel generated confusion about their authority and encouraged their falsification. This essay explores the forgery and misuse of travel papers alongside the fabrications of an official colonial record that concealed the illegal transatlantic slave trade as it implemented documentary procedures for legal travel. Cuban officials pursued individuals who traveled without passports, with other people's passports, or lacked other papers, with a disproportionate focus on the circulation of free people of African descent. At the same time, the limited reach of government decrees and policies complicated strict determinations of transgression. Rather than taking this as evidence of a broken system, recognizing how various actors created the conditions for a collective susceptibility both to the authority conferred by passports and to plausible falsehoods lets us view borders, individual identity, and Caribbean mobility in new light. The essay calls on historians to approach the archival record of passports and mobility by balancing our retrospective recognition of falsifications with an awareness of fluctuating estimations of documentary veracity in the past. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, a trend towards increasing inequality has been detected in both developed and developing countries. Most of these studies have been focusing on formal monetary variables, since capitalism is a socioeconomic system where monetary relations play a paramount role. However, the distribution of non-monetary assets is also very important, especially so in less developed countries. This paper applies a PCA methodology to analyse the distribution of non-monetary wealth in Cuba, a socialist country where the role of monetary relations is relatively minor. Utilizing the MICS-UNICEF 'microdata', the paper provides for the first time an estimation of wealth distribution for three years (2006, 2011, 2014), by area and region. The main results show a non-monotonic wealth inequality reduction. The initial worsening (2006–11) is more than counterbalanced by a recent improvement (2011–14). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cystic fibrosis (CF), an autosomal recessive disease, is caused by variants in both alleles of the CF transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) gene. A new assay based on allele-specific polymerase chain reaction and high-resolution melting analysis was developed for the detection of 18 CF-causing CFTR variants previously identified in Cuba and Latin America. The assay is also useful for zygosity determination of mutated alleles and includes internal controls. The reaction mixtures were normalized and evaluated using blood samples collected on filter paper. The evaluation of analytical parameters demonstrated the specificity and sensitivity of the method to detect the included CFTR variants. Internal and external validations yielded a 100% agreement between the new assay and the used reference tests. This assay can complement CF newborn screening not only in Cuba but also in Latin America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The West Indies can be considered as a laboratory of biogeography and evolution, and the Caribbean Islands constitute one of the planet's biodiversity hotspots. Within the region, Cuba is the largest island and is crucial to gaining an understanding of the origin and evolutionary history of Caribbean flora and fauna. This paper provides an introduction to a Special Issue of the Biological Journal of the Linnean Society on current Cuban plant and animal biodiversity, with an emphasis on evolutionary biology and biogeography. The present issue includes 10 contributions and addresses a wide diversity of species and taxonomic groups, study levels, and research tools. This collection of articles not only provides an integrative vision of Cuba's biodiversity and the potential patterns and processes involved in its evolutionary history, but could also provide food for future research on its biodiversity from an evolutionary perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An increasing number of emerging economies (among others China, India, Russia, South Africa, and Brazil) have recently introduced R&D tax credit schemes to support the innovative activities of their domestic firms. Drawing insights from these international experiences, this paper proposes a new R&D fiscal incentive system in Cuba. We argue that, to take the specific characteristics of a transition economy like that of Cuba into account, the new program should have a mixed character: it should be volume-based for large State-owned enterprises and incremental for the emerging group of smaller private companies. The fiscal incentive system should allow firms to receive relatively high super-deductions in order to provide an effective stimulus to their innovation and imitation activities. The new R&D policy would contribute to addressing the structural weaknesses which characterize the Cuban national innovation system, and thus enable firms to reap the opportunities provided by the changing international context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Surveys for intestinal parasitic infections (IPIs) often involve samples from three sampling dates analysed by various microscopy techniques. However, analysis of three samples per individual is a huge burden on time and resources. We compared the value from analysing three or fewer samples. Methods In this cross-sectional study, three faecal samples were collected every other day from 332 children from two locations in Guantanamo province, Cuba. Samples were analysed by wet mount with Lugol stain, Willis flotation method and Kato–Katz thick smear. Results Most parasites were detected by wet mount, although helminth eggs not found by wet smear were detected by the Willis flotation method (in particular) and Kato–Katz smear. Blastocystis spp. was the most commonly detected parasite (about 65%), then Giardia duodenalis and then Entamoeba spp. Although analysis of two stool samples significantly increased occurrence data for Blastocystis , this was not so for the other parasites. For none of the protozoan parasites were results from analysing three samples significantly higher than results from analysing just two samples. Conclusions Analysing two faecal samples by wet mount and the Willis flotation method provides useful data for estimating the prevalence of IPIs in relatively high prevalence settings. Analysing further samples provides limited additional information and adds an extra burden in terms of time and resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reconstructing deep-time biogeographic histories is limited by the comparatively recent diversification of most extant lineages. Ray-finned fishes, which include nearly half of all living vertebrates, are no exception. Although most lineages of ray-finned fishes radiated around the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary, a handful of ancient, species-poor clades still persist. These lineages can illuminate very old biogeographic trends, but their low species richness can also limit the reconstruction of these patterns. The seven extant species of gars distributed in freshwater habitats in North America and Cuba are an old clade with a fossil record spanning over 150 million years of Earth history. Using a genomic data set of DNA sequences of 1105 exons for the seven living species and an updated morphological matrix of all extant and extinct taxa, we infer the phylogenetic relationships of gars and test how divergence times and biogeographic reconstructions are influenced by sequential and joint estimation and the effect on these inferences when using different taxon sets based on fossil completeness. Our analyses consistently show that the two extant gar genera Atractosteus and Lepisosteus diverged approximately 105 million years ago and many of the inferred divergences in the gar time-calibrated phylogeny closely track major Mesozoic tectonic events, including the separation of the Americas, the expansion of the early Atlantic, and the Cretaceous reorganization of North American river systems. The crown clades Atractosteus and Lepisosteus originated in the Cenozoic of eastern North America, implying that this region has served as both the origin of extant gar diversity and the refugium of this iconic ancient lineage. These results exemplify how combining phylogenomics with the fossil record provides congruence around the evolutionary history of ancient clades like gars and can reveal long-lost biogeographic patterns. [Lepisosteidae; fossilized birth death; biogeography; phylogenomics; paleontology.] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 1 November 1989, when the third edition of la Bienal de la Habana opened its doors, the show included ink paintings from North Korea called chosŏnhwa (literally 'Korean paintings'). By that time, the Korean–Cuban friendship had lasted for more than three decades, following its formation after the 1959 Cuban Revolution, and based on the principle of Third World solidarity. But this encounter in 1989 illustrates that their contemporary art was out of sync with one another. The Korean presentation contrasted with the more installation‐oriented, inter‐media works submitted by Cuban artists who were part of the 'New Cuban art' wave. As an archeological study on these two starkly different visions of 'contemporary art', this essay sustains a bifurcated view onto Pyongyang and Havana as a method with which to reassess the culture of Third World politics and post‐coloniality at the Cold War's end, and to propose a translocational, South‐to‐South method of art history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the abolition of the transatlantic trade in African captives, slave traders from France, Spain and Cuba devised strategies of concealment to perpetuate and even expand their enterprise. A close reading of the unexpurgated logbooks and business correspondence of the Jeune Louis , a French ship that transported more than three hundred captives from the Bight of Biafra to Havana in 1825, identifies three decisive innovations in the Franco-Cuban branch of the illegal slave trade. Transnational business structure, risk management through honour-based marine insurance policies, and redacted record keeping transformed the wider Atlantic slave-trading sector into one capable of eluding attempts at international suppression. The clandestine techniques that this transnational slaving network developed to skirt the law also distorted the archival record of that traffic. Accounting for the resulting distortions and disappearances will enable future researchers to better navigate them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines Chinese-Afro-Cuban interaction in mid-nineteenth-century Cuba. Tens of thousands of Chinese indentured laborers arrived on the island during this period and labored next to and much like African slaves. Thousands of Chinese gained their freedom, but they too experienced oppression similar to that of free people of color. Although Chinese and Afro-Cubans had similar experiences of exploitation and marginalization, it is clear that they developed an equivocal relationship in which disunity (including violence) was just as common, if not more common, than unity. This article contends that the dual nature of this relationship was rooted in the contradictory nature of Chinese indentured labor itself. On the one hand, cultural differences and the ambivalent racialization of Chinese produced division and hostility because it encouraged both groups to assert difference and attempt to actualize superiority over the other. On the other hand, similar experiences of oppression could produce collaboration and solidarity in terms of family, business, and resistance. Examining this ambivalent relationship reveals the centrality of Asians to the durability and weakness of slavery and forced labor, racial hierarchy, and colonialism in Cuba during the second half of the nineteenth century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ghost orchid, Dendrophylax lindenii, is a rare, leafless epiphyte native to southern Florida and Cuba. Populations of D. lindenii in southern Florida and Cuba are separated by c. 600 km and occur in different habitats. We describe D. lindenii in its natural habitats in the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge and Guanahacabibes National Park, Cuba. Population size, fungal endophytes and seedling recruitment are also discussed. In total, 116 individuals of D. lindenii were recorded in Florida during July 2015, whereas only 16 specimens were known to occur there previously. In Cuba, 241 individuals were counted, nearly one-third (30.3%) of which were seedlings (nearly double the percentage of seedlings documented in Florida; 16.4%). In Florida, D. lindenii grew on just two host tree species, Fraxinus caroliniana and Annona glabra, most (69%) on the former, whereas in Cuba 18 tree species acted as hosts, primarily Maba crassinervis (16.2%), Erythroxylum aerolatum (15.4%) and Comocladia dentata (14.9%). More than half (55.2%) of D. lindenii individuals in Florida (55.2%) and Cuba (52.7%) were documented on the north-facing (NW, N, NE) bark of host trees. Significant differences (P = 0.035) were detected in directional orientation between the two sites, with Cuban orchids preferring NE, N and E and those in Florida preferring NW, NE and SW surfaces. Roots from mature D. lindenii in Florida yielded an endophyte identified as a strain of Ceratobasidium. We propose that D. lindenii colonizes host trees with moist, corrugated or semi-corrugated bark harbouring Ceratobasidium for seed germination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Fractional-dose administration of inactivated poliovirus vaccine (fIPV) could increase IPV affordability and stretch limited supplies. We assessed immune responses following fIPV administered intradermally, compared with full-dose IPV administered intramuscularly, among adults with a history of oral poliovirus vaccine (OPV) receipt.Methods: We conducted a randomized, controlled noninferiority trial in Cuba. fIPV or IPV were administered on days 0 and 28; serum was collected on days 0, 7, 28, and 56 for analysis by a neutralization assay. The primary end point was seroconversion or a ≥4-fold rise in antibody titer. The noninferiority limit was 10%. The secondary end point was safety, assessed by the number and intensity of adverse reactions.Results: A total of 503 of 534 enrolled participants (94.2%) completed all study requirements. Twenty-eight days after the first dose, 94.8%, 98.0%, and 98.0% of fIPV recipients had an immune response to poliovirus types 1, 2, and 3, respectively, compared with 98.1% (P = .06), 98.0% (P = 1.00), and 99.2% (P = .45) in the IPV arm. Noninferiority was achieved on days 7, 28, and 56 for all serotypes. No serious adverse events were reported.Conclusion: fIPV induced similar boosting immune responses, compared with full-dose IPV. This suggests that fIPV would be an effective strategy to boost population immunity in an outbreak situation.Clinical Trials Registration: ACTRN12615000305527. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Between 1959 and 1962, children played a highly visible role in the dramatic realignment of revolutionary Cuba’s diplomatic relations. This article demonstrates that Fidel Castro’s government consistently deployed discourses and images of childhood as well as actual children within a broader campaign to liberate themselves from U.S. domination even as it sought to strengthen ties between Cuba, the U.S.S.R. and the socialist world. At the same time, the Castro regime also made use child-centered images, texts and speeches in order to negotiate the contradictions between the Revolution’s claims to have fulfilled the islands’ long-frustrated aspirations towards national sovereignty even as it sought to justify its reinvention as “la niña adorada del mundo socialista,” dependent for its survival on the protection and largesse of the Soviet Union. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides news briefs on church-state affairs. The Belgium Council of State has ruled that a student of Indian descent can wear a turban to school. The first Catholic church in Cuba since 1959 is being built in the town of Sandino. A terrorist attack took place in Paris, France, on January 7, 2015 at the office of the magazine "Charlie Hebdo."