A. G. Brown – författare

Geomorphology and Groundwater is an up-to-the-minute collection dealing with the overlap between geomorphology and hydrogeology. These two disciplines have much to offer each other in several fields such as river groundwater interactions, the location and evolution of aquifers, karst and landform evolution. There is increasing realisation that groundwater plays an important role in many geomorphological processes and of the utility of geomorphological techniques and ideas in the analysis of groundwater systems. The authors contributing to this volume are drawn from a wide variety of backgrounds and include research geomorphologists, engineers and consulting hydrogeologists. Much of the work reported here applies to or has immediate applications to such environmental problems as arid-zone water supply, groundwater pollution, wetland conservation, fisheries management and landscape protection. As such this book will be of value not only to researchers in the respective fields, but to all those interested in groundwater-related environmental issues.

This comprehensive manual is designed to give archaeologists the necessary background knowledge in environmental science required to excavate and analyse archaeological sites by rivers and on floodplains. Part I covers the techniques for studying alluvial environments, while Part II reviews the literature on the archaeology of alluvial environments and presents new information on alluviation and site formation in both the British Isles and Mediterranean. An important theme running through the book is the interaction between climatic and cultural forces and the transformation of riverine environments. Bringing together information on the evolution and exploitation of floodplain and river landscapes, it draws on examples from Britain, Europe, North America and Australasia. Alluvial Geoarchaeology will also interest physical geographers, geologists and environmental scientists.

The research described in this book arose, in large part, from a sense of frustration. For a number of years I had been studying the physiology of the spinocervical tract, a somatosensory pathway, in the cat's spinal cord. But I did not know, precisely, where the cells of origin of the tract were located and therefore did not know what they looked like or whether there were any correlations between structure and function. It was true that electrophysiolo­ gical experiments had indicated their probable situation in the dorsal horn, and anatomical work had described the morphology of cells that were likely to give rise to the axons of the tract; but this was not satisfactory. With the publication, by Stretton and Kravitz in 1968, of the Procion Yellow ionophoretic method for intracellular staining, a new tool became available for studying the morphology of physiologically identified neurones. We used the techniques and, although very pleased with the beautiful appearance of the dendritic trees of neurones seen in the fluorescence microscope, we were again frustrated, this time by the inability of Procion Yellow to stain axons for any considerable length. Therefore, P. K. Rose and P. J. Snow and I began to try to develop a method that would stain the axon, together with its collaterals, in addition to the soma and dendrites of an intracellularly re­ corded neurone.