(59109,'Intergenerational educational trajectories and premature mortality from chronic diseases: A registry population-based study','intergenerational-educational-trajectories-and-premature-mortality-from-chronic-diseases-a-registry-population-based-study','2022-11-11 13:29:48.236671','<div class=\"Abstracts u-font-serif\" id=\"abstracts\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 18px; line-height: 26px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif !important;\"><div class=\"abstract author\" id=\"abs0010\" lang=\"en\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><div id=\"abssec0010\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"abspara0010\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The tracking of educational gradients in mortality across generations could create a long shadow of social inequality, but it remains understudied. We aimed to assess whether intergenerational educational trajectories shape inequalities in early premature mortality from chronic diseases. The study included 544&nbsp;743 participants of the Swiss National Cohort, a registry population-based study. Individuals were born between 1971–1980 and aged 10–19&nbsp;at the start of the study (1990). Sex-specific inequalities in mortality were quantified via standardized cumulative risk differences/ratios between ages 20 and 45. We triangulated findings with a negative outcome control. For women, inequalities were negligible. For men, while inequalities in cancer deaths were negligible, inequalities in CVD mortality were associated with low individual education regardless of parental education. Excess CVD deaths for Low–High was negligible while High–Low provided 234 (95% confidence intervals: 100 to 391) and Low–Low 185 (115 to 251) additional CVD deaths per 100&nbsp;000 men compared to High–High. That corresponded to risk ratios of 2.7 (1.6 to 4.5) and 2.3 (1.6 to 3.4), respectively. Gradients in substance use mortality were observed only when education changed across parent-offspring. Excess substance use deaths for Low–Low was negligible while High–Low provided 225 (88 to 341) additional and Low–High 80 (23 to 151) fewer substance use deaths per 100&nbsp;000 men compared to High–High. That corresponded to risk ratios of 1.8 (1.3 to 2.5) and 0.7 (0.5 to 0.9), respectively. Inequalities in premature mortality were driven by individual education and by parental education for some chronic diseases. This could justify the development of intergenerational prevention strategies.</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/0522b83b-5fde-42c3-85eb-66b963eeda5c.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"></p><ul><li><section id=\"sec1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0040\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Higher premature mortality rates have been consistently observed in individuals with lower educational attainment compared to those with higher education across Western societies.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;According to the theory of fundamental causes of inequalities in health and mortality</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, education provides material and non-material resources encompassing accrued knowledge, healthy behaviors, higher job market return, and beneficial social relations, which all act on health in a protective way. Additionally, the putative causal effect of education on mortality has been corroborated by natural experiments leveraging compulsory schooling laws, and by experimental and twin studies</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Notably, a review of all these studies </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">points to some differences by context and sex, suggesting that men experience larger educational inequalities in health than women.</span></p><p id=\"p0045\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">While the relationship between individual education and premature mortality has been extensively documented, little is known about how intergenerational educational trajectories, that is the sequence of both parental and individual attained education, may impact mortality. Socialization theory predicts that health-related behaviors, social norms, and beliefs are transmitted across generations whilst being also influenced by the schooling environment</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Thus, the familial environment may contribute to the amount of cultural and social capital a person has access to, and eventually to social inequalities in health</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. This hypothesis is particularly relevant for inequalities in chronic</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Consequently, by assessing the effect of both parental and individual educational exposure via intergenerational trajectories we may expand our knowledge about the processes underlying educational inequalities in mortality related to CDs and inform public health actions. While the education attained by an individual is partly affected by that of their parents</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, various social theories endow different predictions of how these two educational exposures may impact health. A theory of cumulative advantage or resource multiplication predicts that both parental and individual education drive inequalities</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">; a theory of resource substitution predicts that only individual education drives inequalities</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">; and finally a theory of social mobility predicts that only the direction of change – upward or downward – across the two matters</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Disentangling these alternative models with empirical data is important for public health, as each theory provides a set of different entry points – identification of groups at higher risk or prioritization of family and/or institution-related educational exposure – for informing actions to reduce educational inequalities in premature mortality due to CDs.</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/f3273b4b-6645-4ef7-9511-f78c54277c3c.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"></p><ul><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Three studies, two from Finland and one from Belgium, have explicitly investigated the parental/individual educational inequalities in premature mortality related to CDs</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Despite the heterogeneity in the examined CDs and birth cohorts, overall these studies broadly supported the resource substitution theory, with some exceptions. Specifically, Elo et al. </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">reported that among Finns born before 1950, inequalities in cardiovascular-related deaths were consistent with the resource multiplication theory. </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">To corroborate these findings, more research is needed in other contexts, that is in other countries and birth periods, while discerning among different categories of CDs. The study from De Grande et al.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;included Belgian young adults born after 1971 and examined only one category of CD-related mortality, which is cancer.</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In this study, we aimed to utilize population-based multi-generational registry data to assess the role of parental and individual educational attainment in driving inequalities in mortality due to specific categories of chronic diseases among contemporary Swiss young adult men and women.</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"> Importantly, the mortality of young adults may help to identify early-life risk factors to intervene upon for delaying or reducing the burden of mortality in older life, to which chronic diseases such as cancers and cardiovascular diseases are the largest contributors</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">We implemented a counterfactual-based framework to assess inequalities and ran a negative outcome control to triangulate findings.</span></li></ul><div><br></div></section><section id=\"sec2\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"></section></li></ul></div></div></div><ul id=\"issue-navigation\" class=\"issue-navigation u-margin-s-bottom u-bg-grey1\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; list-style: none; overflow: hidden; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSans, Arial, Helvetica, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, sans-serif; margin-bottom: 16px !important; background-color: rgb(245, 245, 245) !important;\"></ul>','2022-11-05 20:40:53.079219','uploads/news/logo.jpg',1,'SSM - Population Health','The tracking of educational gradients in mortality across generations could create a long shadow of social inequality, but it remains understudied. We aimed to assess whether intergenerational educational trajectories shape inequalities in early premature mortality from chronic diseases.',6,4,'Science direct'),(59126,'‘It\'s about what I\'m able to do’: Using the capabilities approach to understand the relationship between quality of life and vascular access in patients with end-stage kidney failure','its-about-what-im-able-to-do-using-the-capabilities-approach-to-understand-the-relationship-between-quality-of-life-and-vascular-access-in-patients-with-end-stage-kidney-failure','2022-11-07 16:35:36.386961','<div><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">End-Stage Kidney Failure occurs when kidney function can no longer sustain everyday life. ESKF is a rapidly increasing global health problem that carries a significant healthcare burden and is associated with increasing age. An estimated 2.6 million people received Kidney Replacement Therapy in 2010; however, 2–3 times that number was estimated to need KRT and died because of lack of access. This is also reflected in morbidity rates, with an estimated worldwide prevalence rate of 9.1% and a loss of 35.8 million Disability-Adjusted Life-Years</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">.</span><br></div><p id=\"p0015\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">KRT comprises three main modalities they are as... kidney transplantation, hemodialysis (HD; home or in-center), or peritoneal dialysis (PD). Globally, access to KRT is influenced by prevailing healthcare infrastructure and funding</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, and access to treatment varies; the proportion of people with ESKF not receiving KRT is significantly higher in low (96%), and lower-middle (90%) income countries compared to upper-middle (70%) and high-income countries (40%). An estimated 80% of those receiving KRT will undergo HD in-center, with regional variation observed in New Zealand.</span></p><p id=\"p0020\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In the UK, 68,111 adults and 832 children received KRT in 2019 </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;over half received a transplant (56.8%), while over one-third (35.8%) had HD in-center, 2% had home HD, and 5.4% received PD. Approximately 61% of this population are male, while in terms of ethnicity, three-quarters identify as White, 14.5% as Asian, and 8.9% as Black. . While this access is theoretically universal in the UK via the National Health Service, variation is observed and stratified by race, socioeconomic status, and underlying comorbidity.</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-07/b2cb48ea-0a72-4027-9800-9addb1544429.png\" style=\"width: 698.013px;\"></p><p id=\"p0025\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">While awaiting transplantation, most people opt for hemodialysis, where blood is removed and passed through a dialysis machine to remove waste, electrolytes, and excess fluid before being returned to the body. Patients typically dialyze in a dialysis unit for 4&nbsp;​hours, three times a week. To enable hemodialysis, patients must have a form of ‘vascular access (VA) with three options regularly used in the UK:</span></p><dl class=\"list\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 24px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\">i.</dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-weight: bolder;\">Arteriovenous fistula (AFV/fistula):</span>&nbsp;surgically created by joining a vein to an artery in the arm that enlarges over time. While offering the longest-lasting and lowest infection risk for dialysis, fistula operations have a success rate of only 50%, and often need several interventions.</p></dd><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\">ii.</dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0035\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-weight: bolder;\">Arteriovenous graft (AVG/graft):</span>&nbsp;synthetic tube surgically inserted in the arm or leg, joining an artery and vein, where needles can be inserted (cannulated) for dialysis. While nearly always successful, grafts require more intervention to maintain function and have more limited durability.</p></dd><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\">iii.</dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0040\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-weight: bolder;\">Central Venous Catheter (CVC/line):</span>&nbsp;plastic tubes inserted through the skin surface, tunneled under the skin, and then passed into a large vein in the neck. Although lines do not require needling to allow dialysis, 20–50% require replacement within the first six months, have the highest rate of serious infection, and can lead to long-term scarring of the central draining veins which is difficult to treat.</p></dd></dl><p></p><p id=\"p0045\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Whilst it is well recognized that significant underlying disease and the state of kidney failure can affect well-being, it is less understood how the widely varying modality of vascular access&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">specifically</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;impacts well-being. For most requiring KRT, treatment is supportive rather than curative, thus making the impact on quality of life an essential determinant in selecting vascular access modality.</span></p><ul><li><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">As...prevalence rates of End-Stage Kidney Failure (ESKF) have risen across the world in recent years, making it one of the most common chronic illnesses.</span></li><li><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">The main treatment for ESKF is hemodialysis, where one is ‘connected’ to a dialysis machine to clean and filter the blood via a surgically-created portal, which is also known as ‘vascular access. Without even functioning vascular access, dialysis is impossible.</span></li><li><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">People with ESKF have different experiences with their access modalities, but also universally describe their access point as a ‘lifeline’.</span></li><li><font face=\"Helvetica\">Previous research has emphasized&nbsp;its impact on well-being&nbsp;specifically on short- and long-term outcomes.</font></li><li><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">Capturing Quality of Life (QoL) within ESKF populations has traditionally focused on assessing well-being from an objective, normative, top-down stance, rather than appreciating the nuanced effect vascular access can have as experienced by those living with kidney failure.</span></li><li><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">In this article, we have argued current QoL measures used with ESKF groups are insufficient at capturing the impact of vascular access on wellbeing.</span></li></ul><p id=\"p0050\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">This research sought to explore the relationship between vascular access and the Quality of Life of patients with ESKF in the UK. In this paper, we make the case for&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">why</span></em><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;current&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/quality-of-life-measure\" title=\"Learn more about QoL measures from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">QoL measures</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;are insufficient and do not fully encapsulate the experience of living with ESKF. Evidence is used gathered through interviews to demonstrate the value of adopting Nussbaum\'s&nbsp;</span></span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Capabilities Approach</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;in formulating a better understanding of the quality of life for those with ESKF.</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-07/441943ea-1309-4c40-bb63-f6c37b1c0046.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"></p><section id=\"sec1.1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><ul><li style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Quality life:</b></span><br></li></ul><p id=\"p0055\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Quality of Life (QoL) refers to “individuals\' perceptions of their position in life in the context of the culture and value systems in which they live and about their goals, expectations, standards, and concerns”</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Health-Related</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Quality of Life (HR-QoL) focuses specifically on the role health has in determining QoL</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. There is a complex inter-relationship between objective and subjective indicators used to derive QoL/HR-QoL – including social, environmental, psychological, and physical factors, integral to a person\'s interpretation of their well-being</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></p><p id=\"p0060\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Objective indicators represent ‘normative functionings’ – actions most able-bodied people can perform, such as walking, dressing, and bathing.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">“… the “normal” also contains often opaque and unquestioned value judgments and is used to represent what is right, and desirable. Often, when normalcy is invoked, there is a blurring of the distinction between fact and value, confusing what is, with what should be.”&nbsp;</span></p><p></p><p id=\"p0065\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Consequently, the voices of ‘non-normative’ bodies – those falling out with the expected, healthy, functional ‘norm’ – are silenced and ignored.</span></p><p id=\"p0070\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">This study focuses on ‘non-normative’ bodies with ESKF, changed through the presence of a chronic, life-limiting illness. Non-normative bodies typically have their ability to attain abstract, culturally-defined norms required for the fulfillment of subjective markers integral to a ‘good’ QoL – e.g., having children or a ‘professional’ career – restricted by both bodily, corporeal limits&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">and</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;societal and structural barriers impeding their ability</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. We argue the incorporation of such normative markers within QoL measures further compounds the able-bodied/disabled dichotomy – in many cases, presenting an unattainable ‘ideal’ by which non-normative bodies are measured against, compounding the wider impact of ableism from something seemingly innocuous.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, emphasized the wider socioeconomic and political impact:&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">“Within a democratic notion of&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/citizenship\" title=\"Learn more about citizenship from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"font-size: 17.5px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">citizenship</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, each individual is assumed to possess the characteristics of self-reliance, efficiency and competitiveness. As a result, an idealized version of the “average person” has come to exist, while those who do not possess these privileged characteristics are considered abnormal—often because of the perception that they are not healthy. [… Disabled people] are seen as both political and medical challenges, and problems.”</span></p><p></p><p id=\"p0075\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">That\'s why reframing the ‘ESKF body’ within an impairment-inclusive QoL model was a central aim of this project.</span></p></section>','2022-11-05 20:41:17.945268','uploads/news/logo.jpg',1,'SSM - Qualitative Research in Health','Prevalence rates of End-Stage Kidney Failure (ESKF) have risen in across the world in recent years, making it one of the most common chronic illnesses. The main treatment for ESKF is haemodialysis, where one is ‘connected’ to a dialysis machine to clean and filter the blood via a surgically-created portal, also known as ‘vascular access’. Without functioning vascular access, dialysis is impossible. People with ESKF have different experiences with their access modalities, but universally describe their access point as a ‘lifeline’.',6,4,'Science direct'),(59251,'Exploring the sustained and divided attention of novice versus experienced drivers','exploring-the-sustained-and-divided-attention-of-novice-versus-experienced-drivers','2022-11-10 13:44:08.715082','<section id=\"s0005\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">﻿Driving is a complex task as it requires continuous information processing in a constantly changing environment. The dynamic nature of driving necessitates is at a high level of attention, accuracy, and vigilance for safe performance. Therefore, appropriate engagement, maintenance, and regulation of sustained attention are critical to driving safety. In addition, driving at times requires the simultaneous information processing of multiple tasks and, therefore, appropriate engagement in, and regulation of, divided attention is also necessary for safe driving.</font></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">Sustained attention is the ability to maintain concentration for a prolonged period. for achieving this, there must be intrinsic maintenance of an individual’s alert state, where there is no external input. This is ability to sustain attention and redeploy this attention flexibly in response to relevant environmental factors is necessary to avoid adverse driving events. Unfortunately, the ability of individuals to maintain a high sustained attention performance in repetitive and monotonous tasks such as driving is limited. The significance of this is the paramount because the failure to appropriately sustain and regulate attention can result in attention lapses (absent-minded behaviors resulting from transient reductions in the sustained attention of the driver;&nbsp; driving errors (inadvertent and inadequate actions resulting from observational failures due to lapses in sustained attention and consequently accidents.</span><br></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">While driving is considered to be a highly complex task (the following learning to drive), it can be perceived as second nature and an automatic process. Due to this it is perception and the repetitive and monotonous nature of driving, many drivers feel it is acceptable to perform a secondary task while driving, which may affect driving competence and safety. This is known as distracted driving, and it requires the utilization of divided attention.</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-10/e9632ec8-f83a-4a3b-87e8-e13224956805.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"><br></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">Divided attention involves processing and responding to specific information while at the same time engaging in multiple tasks. Driving under distracting conditions greatly relies on an individual’s executive attentional resources. The Yerkes-Dodson law states that performance and arousal have an inverted-U-shaped relationship. As arousal increases, performance will improve up to a certain threshold and then deteriorate. Secondary tasks or distractors may increase arousal and performance initially, but the performance may not be sustained. Additional distractors can further compete for the neural resources required for safety in driving. Although initially heightened arousal can improve performance, the added cognitive load may result in performance deterioration, which increases the risk of motor vehicle accidents.</span><br></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">Statistics have shown that VMAs can be committed by individuals of a wide variety of ages, which indicates that both novice young adult drivers and experienced adult drivers commit VMAs. Research has found that novice young adult drivers have a higher motor vehicle crash rate in motorized countries than in any other age category, which is an alarming statistic. For example, in Australia, the road mortality rate in 2019 for 18- to 20-year-olds was 9 in every 100,000 persons compared to an average of 4.7 for the entire population. Furthermore, the literature has reported that a substantial number of major VMAs are the result of momentary distractions or lapses in sustained attention (Dockree et al., 2005). Distracted driving – for example, using a mobile phone while driving – contributes to a significant percentage of drivers’ behaviors causing road safety issues&nbsp;</span><br></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">Distracted driving occurs in motorists of all ages. Increased task complexity is shown to delay appropriate responses and affect driving performance risks, and such influence would decrease with more experience. As such, a greater number of years of driving experience has been shown to correlate with better driving performance, where there are fewer errors and attention lapses. Selective attention is found to improve with age and is significantly associated with fewer driving risks. Increased cognitive control could potentially reduce risk-driving behavior in novice drivers. The higher rate of VMAs in young novice drivers could be related to less skilled use of sustained and divided attention that is necessary to avoid accidents arising from attention lapses and errors due to distracted driving or other reasons. A review of the literature revealed that research had been done on the factors affecting driving performance in novice young and experienced drivers, but less research reports a comparison of the sustained- and divided-attention function of novice young adult drivers with that of experienced adult drivers. Thus, it is apparent that there is a critical need for research on this topic to address this knowledge gap and to provide insight into driver education.</span></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">This research aimed to explore the sustained and divided attention of novice young adult drivers compared to that of experienced adult drivers. The Sustained Attention-to-Response Task (SART) was used as the main tool for assessing attention, with the addition of a secondary task with low and high levels of cognitive workload being introduced into SART for assessing divided attention. Participant attention function was also assessed by the Color Trails Test (CTT) and Digit Span test (DST). It was hypothesized that the sustained- and divided-attention performance of novice young adult drivers would be significantly lower than that of experienced adult drivers. It was further hypothesized that the low-load condition would result in a higher SART performance compared to the negligible-load condition. The high-load condition would produce performance deterioration due to a too-high arousal level in both groups.</font><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-10/a5902001-aae4-41cd-9358-eb50e44af110.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\"><b>Design and its&nbsp; procedure:</b></span><br></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">The participants were requested to have seven hours of sleep the night before the assessments to ensure they were fatigue-free. The data collection process was conducted in a quiet private room that provided a minimal distraction. The participants’ demographic and driving history information was collected, followed by the administration of the CTT and the DST.</font></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">The RSME was then administered, which was followed by the first block of the SART and the second RSME administration. A second SART block was then conducted, followed by the final RSME administration. The total time required was 60 to 90 min per participant. Each participant received an AUD$40 gift voucher as compensation for their time and travel expenses.</span><br></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\"><b>﻿Sustained attention to the sponse to the task:</b></span></p><ul><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">The SART is a task used frequently to examine sustained attention (Robertson et al., 1997). For this study and research, the conventional fixed SART design was adopted to examine sustained attention in terms of being a “negligible-load” (NL) condition.&nbsp;</font><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">The fixed SART design was modified to include two secondary tasks – the “low-load” (LL) and “high-load” (HL) conditions. </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">This modification allowed for the divided attention of participants to be examined.</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">A single block of trials consisted of 648 trials, allowing for 71 trials per digit. </font></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">Each block consisted of the conventional SART with NL demand and a modified SART with the LL and HL conditions.&nbsp;</font></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">The participants were used for required to complete two blocks each, which resulted in 1296 single digits. Blocks were randomly selected from a pool of six blocks by rolling a six-sided dice.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">Each block lasted 20 min and there was a short rest break as required mid-block. A break of five to 10 min was allocated between blocks.</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">The participants were instructed to respond as fast as possible in both blocks. </font></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">They were given time to familiarise themselves with the assessment before it commenced by completing a two-minute practice test.&nbsp;</font><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">The conventional SART for assessing sustained attention:&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">Having adopted the conventional fixed SART design, the digits one to nine appeared centrally on the laptop screen, one at a time, in ascending order.</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">Each digit was also presented for a period of 150 ms. The participants were instructed to click the left mouse button using their right forefinger for digits one to nine for go trials, excluding digit three.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">The participants were requested to inhibit a response when digit three appeared as these were no-go trials. This formed the NL condition.&nbsp;</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\"><br></span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">To prevent the participants from developing a habitual rhythmic response pattern and succumbing to a speed-accuracy trade-off, each digit was followed by an inter-stimulus interval that randomly varied between 1000 ms and 1500 ms. Five random digit sizes were presented: 100, 120, 140, 160, and 180 in Arial font.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">This was done to increase the processing demands and decrease the likelihood of the participants developing a personal search template for target trials.</span></li></ul><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\"><b>The modified SART to access divided attention:</b></font></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">The modified SART with the addition of secondary tasks was designed to study the participants’ divided attention.&nbsp;</span><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">The block components of the modified SART were separated into sub-blocks, the length of which was randomly selected from 27, 36, and 45 trials. Two cases of sub-blocks – the LL and the HL conditions – were included to study the participants’ divided attention. The LL and HL conditions represented the two levels of cognitive workload. The LL condition posed a low cognitive workload, which required memorizing a five-digit number composed of the same five digits – for example, 77777. The HL condition posed a high cognitive workload, which required memorizing a five-digit number consisting of random and unrepeated digits – for example, 31489.&nbsp;</font><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica;\">For both LL and HL conditions, the five-digit number was presented in the screen center at the start of each sub-block. The participants were required to memorize and rehearse the number presented during the sub-block. At the end of the sub-block, another five-digit number was presented, and the participants were required to indicate if this number was the same as the number previously presented. The participants were required to respond with a left mouse click if the number was the same and a right mouse click if the number was different.</span></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\"><br></font></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\"><br></font></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\"><br></font></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\"><br></font></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px; margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><br></p></section><section id=\"s0010\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"></section>','2022-11-05 20:46:27.541458','uploads/news/Total-fixation-count-by-AOI-at-all-the-intersections-combined_Q640.jpg',1,'Transportation Research Interdisciplinary Perspectives','The experienced drivers demonstrated better accuracy in sustained- and divided-attention tasks.  The novice drivers had faster reaction time and poorer accuracy in sustained attention.',6,168,'science direct'),(59283,'Study on failure mechanism of room and pillar with different shapes and configurations under uniaxial compression using experimental test and numerical simulation','study-on-failure-mechanism-of-room-and-pillar-with-different-shapes-and-configurations-under-uniaxial-compression-using-experimental-test-and-numerical-simulation','2022-11-10 13:36:19.232857','<p><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Experimental and discrete element methods were used to investigate the failure behavior of the room and pillar with different configurations under uniaxial loading. Concrete samples with a dimension of 15&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;15&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;5&nbsp;cm were prepared. Within the specimens, rooms and pillars with different configurations were provided. The room dimension was 1&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;1&nbsp;cm, and the pillar dimension was according to the room configuration. Twelve different configurations were chosen for rooms and pillars. The axial load was applied to the model at a rate of 0.05&nbsp;mm/min. The results show that the failure process was mostly governed by both the non-persistent joint angle and joint number. The compressive strength of the specimens was related to the fracture pattern and failure mechanism of the pillars. It was shown that the shear behavior of pillars was related to the number of induced tensile cracks, which increased by increasing the room angle. The compressive strength of samples increased with the increase of the room angle. The failure pattern and failure strength are similar in both methods, i.e., the experimental testing and the numerical simulation.</span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">When the room and pillar mining method is employed to extract the mineral resources, pillars are always retained to support the overburden.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Although a significant amount of research has been conducted to understand the loading and failure characteristics of pillars, it is still difficult to assess the stability of pillars or a pillar and roof support system, which is affected by many factors, such as in</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">situ stress and geological conditions&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">and pillar failure with roof collapse continues to occur.</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;In particular, when remnant pillars in the upper seam are disturbed by mining activity in the lower seam, pillars can progressively fail and additional subsidence can be induced</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Thus, it is critical to study the interaction between coal seams that can lead to the failure of pillars and the unsteady movement of the roof. In past decades, researchers have focused on the mechanical behavior of a single pillar</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Modeling of the room and pillar method is aimed at developing optimal methods of selecting a deposit while maintaining a high safety factor and obtaining minimal operational losses</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Many empirical formulas have been established to estimate the strength of a pillar</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;and the average pillar stress was calculated based on the tributary area or pressure arch method</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Then, a factor of safety (defined as the ratio of pillar strength to average pillar stress) is utilized to design the size of a pillar or assess the stability of a pillar</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. However, some pillars with a high factor of safety also fail without any precursor</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Cascading pillar failure is usually caused when one pillar fails and the additional load is transferred to overload the adjacent pillars</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. In some cases, only a few pillars fail; in the worst scenario, hundreds of pillars will fail and produce a large area of surface subsidence</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. A post-failure stability criterion was developed to assess whether the failure process occurred in a stable, nonviolent manner or unstable manner</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. </span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The criterion has been applied to optimize the pillar layout to prevent the occurrence of catastrophic domino-type pillar failure </span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">stands abolished a dynamic analysis method to investigate the cascading pillar collapse phenomenon using the Voronoi graph method, which considered the stress redistribution. A load transfer method was also developed to investigate the bearing characteristics of a pillar and roof system and has been utilized with the consideration of pillar interactions to successfully assess the subsidence risk of a decommissioned bord-and-pillar colliery in Australia&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">performed a series of experimental and numerical tests to analyze the stress redistribution and progressive failure characteristics of multiple pillars–roof system. Generally, new mining panels are designed below an existing mine to increase the recovery rate of the mineral resources as shallow resources are exhausted.</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;The effect of multiple seam interactions has caused roof caving, rib spalling, and bumps</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Especially in northeast China, some parts of shallow coal seams had been previously extracted by small mines using the room and pillar mining method, which generated a considerable number of coal pillars. Some of the coal pillars have collapsed, causing significant surface subsidence</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. When longwall mining was employed underneath the room and pillar mine in the Shengyu coal mine region to satisfy market demand, sudden roof-caving events occurred</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. These accidents pose a serious risk to underground projects and the environment with additional strata movement. In the previous works, there is an absence of the study of the behavior of multiple rooms with different shapes and configurations. In this paper, the failure behavior of multiple rooms with different shapes and configurations has been investigated under uniaxial compression loading.</span></p><h2 id=\"st020\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Uniaxial compression testing of rock-like samples containing rooms and pillars:</b></span></h2><div style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><p id=\"p0010\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">To simulate room and pillar, rock-like materials were used in the experiments. The materials blended well, and a weight ratio of 2 to 1 cement to water was prepared. There were no additives in the concrete mixture. The uniaxial compression strength of the sample was 7.4&nbsp;MPa. The specimen size (length&nbsp;×&nbsp;width&nbsp;×&nbsp;height) was 15&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;15&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;5&nbsp;cm. This dimension was chosen due to the limitation of machine space. To create the room and the pillar, cubic steel molds with dimensions of 1&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;1&nbsp;cm were pre-inserted into the material and removed after the initial hardening of the specimen (</span><a name=\"bf0005\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2467967422001003#f0005\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(12, 125, 187); word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Fig. 1</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">). The dimension of the holes was 1&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;1&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;5&nbsp;cm. To increase the reliability of the test and remove accidental errors, three similar prefabricated crack test blocks were provided for every set. Each model consisted of four rooms. The room dimensions were 1&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;1&nbsp;cm&nbsp;×&nbsp;5&nbsp;cm. Twelve different configurations were chosen for rooms and pillars (</span><a name=\"bf0010\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2467967422001003#f0010\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(12, 125, 187); word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Fig. 2</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">). The samples were preserved in a cool and ventilated condition for 28&nbsp;days. The electrohydraulic universal testing machine was employed to perform the uniaxial compression test on samples. The experimental system includes the test bed, control system, and data logger. In the experiment, the rate of loading displacement was set to 0.05&nbsp;mm/min (</span><a name=\"bf0015\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2467967422001003#f0015\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(12, 125, 187); word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Fig. 3</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">). In this condition, Rock mass was subjected to uniaxial compression.</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-10/2f7066de-0b2d-4128-a579-f4c44e31312e.png\" style=\"width: 372.991px;\"></p><p id=\"p0010\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\">(figure 1)</p></div><p><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-10/db8c75db-aa94-4454-a962-5c95700f6095.png\" style=\"width: 559.994px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">(Figure 2)</span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-10/6816c458-94f6-494d-ad69-df3a63b20cb1.png\" style=\"width: 271.997px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">(Figure 3)</font></p>','2022-11-05 20:48:22.053061','uploads/news/th_6.jpeg',1,'Underground Space','Experimental and discrete element methods were used to investigate the failure behavior of room and pillar with different configurations under uniaxial loading. Concrete samples with dimension of 15 cm × 15 cm × 5 cm were prepared. Within the specimens, rooms and pillars with different configurations were provided.',6,168,'science direct'),(59296,'A giant ureteric calculus successfully removed by mini-endoscopic combined intrarenal surgery: A case report','a-giant-ureteric-calculus-successfully-removed-by-mini-endoscopic-combined-intrarenal-surgery-a-case-report','2022-11-12 14:09:16.143082','<section id=\"sec1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><p id=\"p0010\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Giant&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/ureter-stone\" title=\"Learn more about ureteric calculi from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">ureteric calculi</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;are very extremely rare and typically diagnosed in stones greater than 5 cm in length or 50 g in weight. They may occur as a consequence of tuberculosis,&nbsp;</span></span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/ureterocele\" title=\"Learn more about ureteroceles from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">ureteroceles</span></a><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, an&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/ectopic-ureter\" title=\"Learn more about ectopic ureter from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">ectopic ureter</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, a benign&nbsp;</span></span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/ureter-polyp\" title=\"Learn more about ureteral polyp from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">ureteral polyp</span></a><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, or in the absence of any&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/clinical-deformity\" title=\"Learn more about anatomical abnormalities from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">anatomical abnormalities</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></span></span></span><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Traditional approaches to treating giant ureteral stones are based on the function of the affected kidney and may necessitate either active stone removal or a simple&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/nephroureterectomy\" title=\"Learn more about nephroureterectomy from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">nephroureterectomy</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></span></p><p id=\"p0015\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">As a consequence of breakthroughs in urologic interventional techniques and technologies, the ways to eradicate urolithiasis have increased. Miniaturized endoscopic combined intrarenal surgery (mini-ECIRS) is a novel therapeutic option that has become increasingly acceptable for the removal of large or complex&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/kidney-stone\" title=\"Learn more about nephrolithiasis from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">nephrolithiasis</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first clinical case reporting mini-ECIRS in a patient with a giant ureteric calculus.</span></p></section><section id=\"sec2\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><h2 id=\"sectitle0025\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;<b>Case report:</b></span></h2><div style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0020\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">A 58-year-old male was referred to our department with a large&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/ureter-stone\" title=\"Learn more about ureteral stone from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">ureteral stone</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;that was detected during a routine medical examination. He was in excellent mental and physical health.&nbsp;</span></span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/urinalysis\" title=\"Learn more about Urinalysis from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Urinalysis</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;showed modest&nbsp;</span></span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/pyuria\" title=\"Learn more about pyuria from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">pyuria</span></a><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;but negative&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/urine-culture\" title=\"Learn more about urine cultures from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">urine cultures</span></a><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The creatinine level in the blood was 1.1 mg/dL. A&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/computer-assisted-tomography\" title=\"Learn more about computed tomography scan from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">computed tomography scan</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;revealed a calculus that was 11&nbsp;×&nbsp;12&nbsp;×&nbsp;67 mm</span></span></span></span><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 0; position: relative; vertical-align: baseline; top: -0.5em; font-family: Helvetica;\">3</span><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;in size with a density of 680 Hounsfield units at the right proximal&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/ureter\" title=\"Learn more about ureter from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">ureter</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;as shown in9fig 1)</span></span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Excretion was mildly decreased in the right kidney, but normal excretion was observed on the left side. After all, discussing the various treatment options with the patient, we concluded together that mini-ECIRS would be preferred.</span></p><figure class=\"figure text-xs\" id=\"fig1\" style=\"margin-bottom: 20px; padding: 8px 0px 0px; font-size: 0.7rem; line-height: 1.57; border-top: 1px solid rgb(185, 185, 185); border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(185, 185, 185);\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><img src=\"https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S2214442022002820-gr1.jpg\" height=\"299\" alt=\"Fig. 1\" aria-describedby=\"cap0010\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; border-style: none; width: auto; max-width: 100%; height: auto;\"><ol class=\"links-for-figure\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 20px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; list-style: none;\"><br><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; display: inline-block; white-space: nowrap;\"></li></ol></span><span class=\"captions\" style=\"margin: 16px 24px; padding: 0px; line-height: 22px; font-size: 16px;\"><span id=\"cap0010\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Here, it is showing us the giant calculus; B,&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/fluoroscopy\" title=\"Learn more about fluoroscopy from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">fluoroscopy</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;showing the ureteric calculus that was relocated upward using a flexible ureteroscope.</span></span></span></figure></div><p id=\"p0025\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Intravenous prophylactic antibiotics (cefuroxime) were administered during the induction period of&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/general-anaesthesia\" title=\"Learn more about general anesthesia from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">general anesthesia</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The patient was placed in the Galdakao-modified supine Valdivia position, in which the right flank was raised, and the buttock and leg were set in an asymmetrical&nbsp;</span></span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/lithotomy-position\" title=\"Learn more about lithotomy position from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">lithotomy position</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Two operating instruments were used simultaneously by two urologists: one used a miniature nephroscope, while the other used a flexible ureteroscope (fURS).</span></p><div style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">First, a&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/cystoscopy\" title=\"Learn more about cystoscopy from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">cystoscopy</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;was carried out to gain retrograde access, and a retrograde&nbsp;</span></span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/pyelogram\" title=\"Learn more about pyelogram from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">pyelogram</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;was performed to delineate the ureter and pelvicalyceal system. for, Two-hybrid guidewires (Sensor™, Boston Scientific, Natick, MA) were then inserted into the ureteric orifice to reach the renal pelvis. A digital fURS, LithoVue™ (Boston Scientific, Marlborough, MA), was introduced over one guidewire until it made contact with the giant calculus. The stone pushed retrogradely into the renal pelvis by advancing the fURS without difficulty</span></span><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The second urologist performed an ultrasound-guided percutaneous puncture using an 18 G metallic needlepoint to the lower pole of the kidney. Tract dilatation was achieved over the guidewire to establish a 15 F working channel under direct visualization via the fURS.&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/laser-lithotripsy\" title=\"Learn more about Laser lithotripsy from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Laser lithotripsy</span></a><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;was performed using the fragmentation technique with a 120 W&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/holmium\" title=\"Learn more about holmium from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">holmium</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;laser (Lumenis, San Jose, CA) and a 550 μm core laser fiber with an energy of 1.5 J and a rate of 30 Hz as shown in fig2</span></span></span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Finally, all the pieces of stone were extracted with graspers through a 12 Fr nephroscope MIP-M system (Karl Storz, City, Germany) or by the Venturi effect. At the end of the procedure, a retrograde 6Fr double-J stent was placed. We obtained plain films of the abdomen to assess residual stones and confirm that the patient kept the double-J stent in the appropriate position (Fig 3)</span><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The patient made an uneventful&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/postoperative-recovery\" title=\"Learn more about postoperative recovery from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">postoperative recovery</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The stent was been removed cystoscopically at 6 weeks&nbsp;</span></span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/afterdischarge\" title=\"Learn more about after discharge from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">after discharge</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></span></p><figure class=\"figure text-xs\" id=\"fig2\" style=\"margin-bottom: 20px; padding: 8px 0px 0px; font-size: 0.7rem; line-height: 1.57; border-top: 1px solid rgb(185, 185, 185); border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(185, 185, 185);\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><img src=\"https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S2214442022002820-gr2.jpg\" height=\"308\" alt=\"Fig. 2\" aria-describedby=\"cap0015\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; border-style: none; width: auto; max-width: 100%; height: auto;\"><ol class=\"links-for-figure\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 20px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; list-style: none;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; display: inline-block; white-space: nowrap;\"></li></ol></span><span class=\"captions\" style=\"margin: 16px 24px; padding: 0px; line-height: 22px; font-size: 16px;\"><span id=\"cap0015\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"fspara0015\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span class=\"label\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Fig. 2</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.&nbsp;Miniature nephoscope view of the giant calculus.</span></p></span></span></figure><figure class=\"figure text-xs\" id=\"fig3\" style=\"margin-bottom: 20px; padding: 8px 0px 0px; font-size: 0.7rem; line-height: 1.57; border-top: 0px; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(185, 185, 185);\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><img src=\"https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S2214442022002820-gr3.jpg\" height=\"464\" alt=\"Fig. 3\" aria-describedby=\"cap0020\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; border-style: none; width: auto; max-width: 100%; height: auto;\"><ol class=\"links-for-figure\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 20px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; list-style: none;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; display: inline-block; white-space: nowrap;\"></li></ol></span><span class=\"captions\" style=\"margin: 16px 24px; padding: 0px; line-height: 22px; font-size: 16px;\"><span id=\"cap0020\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"fspara0020\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span class=\"label\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Fig. 3</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.&nbsp;Post-operative abdominal plain radiography showing no evidence of residual calculi.</span></p></span></span></figure></div></section><section id=\"sec3\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><h2 id=\"sectitle0030\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;<b>Discussion:</b></span></h2><ul><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Ureteral calculi are stones made up of crystals in the renal collecting system that then migrate down the&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/ureter\" title=\"Learn more about ureter from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">ureter</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. </span></span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">They are more likely to become stuck in locations where the ureter is at its narrowest. In general, stones that are less than 4 mm in size are small enough to pass spontaneously in most patients.</span></span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"> However, for stones greater than 7 mm in width, the probability of spontaneous passage is significantly lower.</span></span><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;The best solution for a giant ureteric calculus is controversial. </span></span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The open approach is the preferred choice for most surgeons; however, extracorporeal shock wave&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/lithotripsy\" title=\"Learn more about lithotripsy from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">lithotripsy</span></a><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, transurethral lithotripsy,&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/percutaneous-nephrolithotomy\" title=\"Learn more about percutaneous nephrolithotomy from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">percutaneous nephrolithotomy</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;(PCNL), and&nbsp;</span></span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/laparoscopic-surgery\" title=\"Learn more about laparoscopic surgery from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">laparoscopic surgery</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;have also been reported. Notwithstanding, there are no reports of mini-ECIRS for the management of this interesting calculus.</span></span></span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">ECIRS was the first described by Scoffone in 2008 to standardize the synergist procedure between retrograde intrarenal surgery and PCNL for large and/or complex urolithiasis to improve efficiency and safety.&nbsp;</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">This combination technique facilitates lithotripsy while keeping the patient in a single position and accessing the collecting system only once. </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The distinguishing benefits of performing the double scopes demonstrated in our case were the relocation of the giant stone upward into the renal pelvis, ureteroscopy-assisted puncture, and the retrieval of any fragments of broken stone that scattered in the different calyx that evades multiple tracts and may cause related bleeding. Moreover, we employed the small access sheath (15 Fr) of a miniature nephroscope, which has significant advantages in terms of reducing the likelihood of kidney injury, bleeding, and the requirement for transfusion.&nbsp;</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The nephrostomy-free or “tubeless” option was considered appropriate in this case as it helps reduce&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/postoperative-pain\" title=\"Learn more about postoperative pain from ScienceDirect\'s AI-generated Topic Pages\" class=\"topic-link\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-thickness: 1px; text-decoration-color: rgb(46, 46, 46); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); word-break: break-word; text-underline-offset: 1px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">postoperative pain</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, analgesia requirements, and hospital stay. We confirm the excellent results of the mini-ECIRS procedure by the absence of any pieces of residual stone in plain films of the abdomen administered post-surgery.</span></span></li></ul></section><section id=\"sec4\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><ul><li style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;<b>Conclusion</b></span></li></ul><p id=\"p0045\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Hence, We successfully treated a giant ureteric calculus using mini-ECIRS. This novel technique is safe and feasible, with low morbidity.</span></p></section>','2022-11-05 20:49:09.624909','uploads/news/A-Computerized-tomography-scan-showing-.jpg',1,'Urology Case Reports','A giant ureteric calculus successfully removed by mini-endoscopic combined intrarenal surgery: A case report',6,168,'Science direct'),(59303,'Healthcare Professionals’ views on access to vaccines in Nigeria: a cross sectional study','healthcare-professionals-views-on-access-to-vaccines-in-nigeria-a-cross-sectional-study','2022-11-11 13:43:52.888916','<div class=\"Abstracts u-font-serif\" id=\"abstracts\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 18px; line-height: 26px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif !important;\"><div class=\"abstract author\" id=\"ab005\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><div id=\"as005\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"sp0005\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Vaccines are important public health tools that are critical in preventing the spread of infectious diseases. Sustainable access to these products is critical to saving lives. This study aimed at assessing the views of healthcare professionals on challenges and strategies toward access to vaccines in Nigeria. A cross-sectional study was undertaken amongst healthcare practitioners that attended a conference targeted at improving access to vaccines. A questionnaire was used for data collection, and analysis was undertaken using Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 25. Questionnaires were administered to a total of 604 participants, the response rate was 87.1%, with male participants (54.4%) being slightly better represented than females (45.6%). A tenth of the participants (10.6%) was educated up to a doctorate level, and a considerable proportion of the participants (43.6%) work in the government sector. Slightly above three quarters (78.3%) of the participants were of the view that lack of production capacity is an obstacle preventing access to vaccines, whilst above two-thirds of the respondents (70.5%) thought that the current funding for research and development towards vaccines is inadequate.</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/3ae7b3ec-3a86-4f4b-9117-80e9fa9609a8.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"> </span></p><p id=\"sp0005\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Also, a total of 70.1% of the sample disagreed that the current policy environment was favorable to the development of vaccines, whilst more than half of the participants (56%) disagreed that philanthropists and similar foundations support vaccine development in Nigeria. Furthermore, three-quarters of the participants (73.7%) indicated that sustainable access to vaccines in Nigeria can be achieved by harnessing local research capacity. This study consequently identified several challenges preventing access to vaccines in Nigeria, a robust policy that can address these bottlenecks is therefore critical to improving access to this public health tool.</span></p></div></div></div><div class=\"Keywords u-font-serif\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 32px; padding: 0px 0px 32px; font-size: 18px; line-height: 28px; border-bottom: 2px solid rgb(235, 235, 235); color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif !important;\"><section id=\"s0005\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><ul><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Vaccines are biological products that can provide acquired immunity to a disease by inducing an immune response. </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">This group of pharmaceuticals represents an important public health intervention tool that has a significant impact on infectious disease reduction globally</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Immunization with effective vaccines brings immense value to families and communities by way of reducing the spread of infectious illnesses.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Over the years, public health strategies underpinned by vaccination, have contributed to the control of common child killer diseases such as measles, diphtheria, and diarrhea cases due to rotavirus</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Whilst significant progress has been made towards controlling and eradicating vaccine-preventable diseases, substantial gaps still exist in terms of access to vaccines. Available data suggest that immunization coverage in the African region is decreasing</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Also, it was reported that a quarter of children from middle-income countries in the African region did not receive their third dose of the DPT vaccine in 2016, and average immunization coverage dropped from 83% in 2015 to 77% in 2017.</span></li></ul><p id=\"p0015\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">According to World Health Organisation, it is expected that all communities have unhindered access to essential medicines and vaccines</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. However, this is not the case in Nigeria and other developing countries, where lack of Medicines Security is a major challenge to healthcare delivery. Improving local research capacity has been identified as one important strategy to improve access to vaccines</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. This approach can also help ensure the achievement of local production as well as reduce dependence on the importation of pharmaceutical products, especially those for which local firms have the capacity to produce.</span></p><p id=\"p0015\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/5f2917d5-6964-4593-805e-fcdf27e62614.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p id=\"p0020\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Access to new and effective therapeutics has long been a challenge for Nigeria and other African countries. Manufacturing of pharmaceutical products by developed countries is frequently geared towards profitability, leaving African nations behind.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Available evidence suggests Africa accounts for only 3% of global pharmaceutical production, and approximately 70 to 90% of pharmaceuticals consumed in the continent are imported.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Following the COVID-19 pandemic, Nigeria started addressing Medicines Security challenges by providing loans to local pharmaceutical firms to support manufacturing</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. However, local production of vaccines remains a critical challenge in the country, thereby leaving the nation to rely on the importation of all vaccines consumed in this setting. Because healthcare professionals are important stakeholders when it comes to the utilization of vaccines and other therapeutics, it is of critical importance to assess their views on access to these health commodities. This study therefore aimed at assessing the views of healthcare professionals on challenges and strategies towards improving access to vaccines in Nigeria.</span></p><div><br></div></section><section id=\"s0010\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"></section><div id=\"kg005\" class=\"keywords-section\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"></div></div>','2022-11-05 20:49:28.206151','uploads/news/Showing-professional-opinion-to-screening-in-pharmacy-.jpg',1,'Vaccine: X','Vaccines are important public health tools that are critical in preventing the spread of infectious diseases. Sustainable access to these products is critical in order to save lives. This study aimed at assessing views of healthcare professionals on challenges and strategies towards access to vaccines in Nigeria. A cross sectional study was undertaken amongst healthcare practitioners that attended a conference targeted at improving access to vaccines.',6,4,'Science direct'),(59321,'A Simple, Stroke-Based Method for Gesture Drawing','a-simple-stroke-based-method-for-gesture-drawing','2022-11-08 14:46:29.531082','<p><b>What is the meaning of gesture drawing?</b></p><ul><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Gesture drawing involves capturing the action, form, and pose of a subject.</span></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">If, you will draw a model who adopts&nbsp;timed poses ranging from 1 to&nbsp;5 minutes. The shorter the pose, the less information it will be able to capture. In the most&nbsp;primitive form, a gesture drawing could be nothing more than a couple of curved lines which&nbsp;indicate the&nbsp;gesture. For the longer poses, you can&nbsp;start adding more detail and tone.</span></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The purpose of gesture drawing is to primarily study human form and anatomy. It allows us to explore the way the body moves and is connected. </span></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Then, you will start to get a feel for the contractions, joints, twists, pulls, and curves demonstrated by the human body. As we do not have time to merely copy what we see, we must make quick and logical assumptions about how the body works. For example, instead of trying to draw&nbsp; lines and shapes which make up the model’s arm, you will need to ask yourself… these questions</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-08/cd5991e1-3c63-4be8-a5dd-844917487be6.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px;\">How is the arm connected to the rest of the body?</li></ul><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px;\"><b>Benefits of gesture drawing:</b></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px;\"><b><br></b></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-08/a70f7858-87f0-4eb3-94bb-20bb350d962d.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"><br></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">One area I have been interested in lately is gesture drawing. I have found it to be a fantastic way to improve how I e as an artist and train my understanding of form and anatomy.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Over the past few months,s I have spent about 10 to 20 minutes a day doing some simple gesture drawings in the morning. As a result, I have seen significant benefits to my overall development as an artist.&nbsp;I am still primarily interested in painting, but sometimes to continue improving in one area, you need to explore other areas.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">So in light of this, I put together&nbsp;a complete guide to gesture drawing for those of you who also want to practice it.</span></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(40, 40, 41); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 15px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Gesture drawing can be used to create more energetic lines and compositions. Lines in S and M shapes are considered esthetically beautiful and create a rhythm and speed in the drawing. Comic artists like Franquin used gesture drawing a lot to find the most comical pose for his character Gaston. He filled pages with gesture drawings and choose the one most suited for the scene</span>.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><h2 style=\"box-sizing: inherit; color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: &quot;source sans pro&quot;, &quot;helvetica neue&quot;, Arial, sans-serif; font-weight: 900; margin: 40px 0px 20px; font-size: 42px; letter-spacing: -0.02em;\"><span id=\"What_are_the_Art_Materials_required_for_Drawing_Gestures\" style=\"box-sizing: inherit;\">&nbsp;<span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The Art Materials required for Drawing Gestures?</span></span></h2><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 28px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; font-family: &quot;libre baskerville&quot;, Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The drawing tool required includes this:</span></p><span id=\"ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-158\" data-inserter-version=\"2\" style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-family: &quot;libre baskerville&quot;, Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px;\"></span><ul style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 28px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 35px; font-family: &quot;libre baskerville&quot;, Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px;\"><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; list-style-type: disc;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Charcoal Pencils</span></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; list-style-type: disc;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Sketchbooks</span></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; list-style-type: disc;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Paper</span></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; list-style-type: disc;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Brush or Stylus of some sort</span></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; list-style-type: disc;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">A Timer;</span></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; list-style-type: disc;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Reference Material, either Photographs or a Live Model.</span></li></ul><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span><b style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 18px;\">Some tip\'s for Gesture Drawing:</b></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><b style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 18px;\"><br></b><span style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: 700;\">Start with the head first:&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Everything flows from the head and it helps to develop a consistent&nbsp;starting point. With each pose, we will look for the head and quickly outline it before moving on to the rest of the pose. By doing this, there is no hesitation at the start of every pose as I know exactly how I want to start.&nbsp;Also, try to make a quick note of where the head is looking (up, down, left, right). After you have identified the head, then observe how the rest of the body is flowing from there. A great reference point is a spine. If I am ever lost, I just follow the spine and try to build a form around that.</span></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: 700;\">Always be thinking about the contour of the body:</span>&nbsp;<span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">It is the body leaning toward or away? Where are the pinches and changes in direction? You can then use simple contour lines to indicate this. Not every line needs to follow the contour, but it is useful to have a few major contour lines as reference points.</span></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: 700;\">Use simple and meaningful lines.</span>&nbsp;<span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Try to draw every line with some kind of purpose. Do not draw lines just for the sake of drawing lines. I usually make a few practice strokes in the air before committing to the paper. Kind of like how a golfer will make a few practice swings before connecting with the ball.</span></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: 700;\">Working quickly does not mean working recklessly.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Working quickly is more about making quick decisions rather than making quick strokes of your&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://drawpaintacademy.com/drawing-pencils/\" style=\"box-sizing: inherit; transition: color 0.1s ease-in-out 0s, background-color 0.1s ease-in-out 0s; text-decoration-line: underline; color: var(--accent);\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">pencil</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">/pen. If you watch some of the great drawers like Glenn Vilppu and Steve Huston, you should notice how slow they work, even when working with timed poses (there are videos of these two artists later in this post).</span></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: 700;\">Don</span>‘<span style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: 700;\">t just copy.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Try to get a feel for the pose and action. This is the purpose of gesture drawing.</span></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: 700;\">Embrace the curves.</span>&nbsp;<span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">You should be careful with straight lines. Most of the time, curved lines are much more effective for rendering the human form. So instead of drawing a straight line for an arm, think about the action and pose of that arm and use curves to render this.</span></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 1.5em; padding: 0px; border: 0px; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: -apple-system, system-ui, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, &quot;Apple Color Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Emoji&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;; font-size: 17px;\"><span style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: 700;\">Try to capture what you like most about the pose.<span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;</span></span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Usually, there will only be one or two things that you like about a certain pose. Focus on those aspects and try to emphasize them. It could be the pinch in the shoulder, the curve of the back, or the form of the chest. Sometimes you may even want to exaggerate the pose slightly to capture what you want out of the pose.</span></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px;\"><b><br></b></p><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-image: initial; background-position: 0px 0px; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-weight: 900; letter-spacing: -0.02em;\">Conclusion:</span><br></p><ul><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 28px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; font-family: &quot;libre baskerville&quot;, Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Gesture drawing improves your observational skills, understanding of the human form, line drawing skills, and hand-eye coordination.</span></li><li style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 28px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; font-family: &quot;libre baskerville&quot;, Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"> It’s also a lot of fun and can loosen you up before starting a detailed drawing. So why not give it a try? You will be truly amazed how much you can improve your overall drawing skills by incorporating gesture drawings into your practice routine</span></li></ul><p style=\"box-sizing: inherit; margin-bottom: 28px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; font-family: &quot;libre baskerville&quot;, Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;\"><br></span><a href=\"https://madhansart.com/benefits-of-gesture-drawing/#Warm-Up_before_Starting_a_Detailed_Drawing\" style=\"text-align: center; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; box-sizing: inherit; transition: background-color 0.25s ease-in 0s, border-color 0s ease-in 0s, transform 0.75s cubic-bezier(0.44, 0.51, 0.24, 0.99) 0s, box-shadow 1s cubic-bezier(0.44, 0.51, 0.24, 0.99) 0s; text-shadow: none;\"><font color=\"#000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">&nbsp;</span></font></a></p>','2022-11-05 20:50:15.726064','uploads/news/logo.jpg',1,'Virtual Reality & Intelligent Hardware','Gesture drawing is a type of fluid, fast sketch with loose and roughly drawn lines which capture the motion and feeling of a subject. While style transfer methods, which are able to learn a style from an input image and apply it to a secondary image, can reproduce many styles, they are currently unable to produce the flowing strokes of gesture drawings.',6,27,'Science direct'),(59327,'Indirect Effects of Covid-19 on Water Quality','indirect-effects-of-covid-19-on-water-quality','2022-11-11 13:11:23.402283','<p><font face=\"Helvetica\">The provision of safe water as well as its functioning waste management play key roles in preventing and combatting disease outbreaks such as the Covid-19 pandemic. Good water quality is needed for effective hygiene measures like washing hands as well as for lowering pathogen transmission. Almost according to research all over the world, especially in developing countries, water is vulnerable and at high risk and surging insecurity with time. Effective water management, sanitation, and hygiene help protect lives during the global COVID-19 pandemic. While sanitation and hygiene also disturb the quality and increase water consumption per capita to 40% comparatively and wastewater production in many developing countries. This rapid increase in water consumption puts direct pressure on water reservoirs and inadequate wastewater management is also a serious threat to waterways. Similarly, the quality of water bodies is significantly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, but the risk of its transmission of COVID-19 through sewerage systems is recorded as low. Hence, the current review paper is planned to highlight the main concerns directly linked with the frequent usage of detergents/soaps and also alcohol-based hand sanitizers on water quality and the post-pandemic handwashing habits to overcome the COVID-19 spread also threatening the water reserve by high consumption along with more wastewater production with less water reuse efficiency and collectively the pressure on drinking water facilities.&nbsp;</font></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Water quality is a major challenge for humankind in the twenty-first century. On one hand, water is viewed as the most fundamental of natural resources that is imperative for human existence, while on another hand, human activities present serious dangers to freshwater systems around the globe</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Currently, anthropogenic contamination of freshwater is a great concern for the world</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The unnecessary utilization of water for different activities like industrialization and urbanization amplifies human access to water but frequently hinders access to drinking water, with conceivably serious but un-quantified costs</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></p><p id=\"p0035\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The water quality concerns for under-developed countries are aggravated due to unplanned and vigorous urbanization. The unorganized development of major urban areas has huge pressure on groundwater. This causes unsanitary conditions which undermine the health of urban inhabitants (Rahman et al., 2018). Although the water quality is disturbed by several reasons, water shortage, pollution brought about by the utilization pattern and the absence of effective wastewater treatment systems are viewed as the fundamental driver of water pollution. As per United Nations proposals, the subsequent twenty years will bring serious challenges to water quality as well as quantity, especially in South Asian countries</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Different reports on a global level concluded that the water quality of urban areas specifically highly intense areas has serious consequences for living healthy.&nbsp;</span></p><p id=\"p0040\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Water pollutants occur due to two main sources i.e point or dispersed sources. A&nbsp;point source pollutant&nbsp;is due to a single and identifiable source, for example, an out-fall pipe or sewage discharge. Dispersed sources are wide, un-confined areas from which pollutants enter a waterway. Surface run-off from ranches is a dispersed source of contamination, adding manures, herbicides/pesticides, and sediments into nearby streams. Metropolitan water waste may convey sand and other lumpy materials, oil deposits from autos, and road synthetic compounds are considered dispersed source because it joins the neighboring lakes and rivers at various points. It is easier to control point source pollution than dispersed because the source of point pollutants is known where treatment protocols can be installed to avoid causing pollution. Such control measures are not generally applicable to dispersed source pollution.</span></p><p id=\"p0045\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Hand washing is a significant factor in preventing contact transmission of microbes and fecal-oral</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Hand hygiene is a significant helpful practice and it has been perceived to be an advantageous, successful, and practical method for forestalling contagious diseases</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. </span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The 2014-16 Ebola outbreak in West Africa also increased the demand for clean water for treatment and prevention. Keeping in view the COVID-19 outbreak, the practice of handwashing increased many times as compared to routine practice before the pandemic. During this COVID-19 outbreak, 20 to 30% of tap water used increased for handwashing in Inda</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Similarly, Jordan Water Sector officially mentioned that the 40 % water demand increased after the lockdown with the strict order to stay at home because handwashing activities suddenly enhanced the water used</span><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\">. A sum of 80% of the members washed their hands routinely after getting back from outside. About 57.27% of members for the most part did not turn off their tap when washing their hands. A single member, who keeps his tap on throughout the handwashing cycle, squandered roughly 1.7 L of water per hand-wash and 14.9 L of water daily. Handwashing increased thirteen-fold in freshwater locals during this pandemic.</font></p><div style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><p id=\"p0050\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\">The circular water economy is the business model that aims to reuse non-conventional water as an alternative water source for various purposes while extracting valuable resources from non-conventional water to realize sustainable production and consumption (Fig 1)</font></span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\">. From the perspective of integrated water resource management, the beneficial reuse of non-conventional water deserves attention as a route toward sustainable water supply</font></span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Non-conventional water(as shown in figure 2)</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;comes from seawater, stormwater, agricultural drainage, thermoelectric cooling water, hydraulic fracturing water, industrial processed (waste) water, domestic wastewater, and commercial discharges (e.g., hot spring discharge). The massive amount of non-conventional water provides a promising opportunity to meet the demand for water as we head toward a new era of urbanization.&nbsp;</span></p><p id=\"p0050\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/f7386bf1-c179-4208-82ae-5bc3807f0f4b.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;(figure 1)<span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p id=\"p0050\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/ff13feec-f4af-43f3-b4d4-93b2ef57455a.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;(figure 2)<span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p id=\"p0055\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Already, the water restores are under pressure due to the blind use of water which ultimately increased the water demand. Hand washing is one of the imperative civic health measures to forestall the COVID-19 pandemic from the spread. However, loss of water from extreme handwashing may squeeze the generally over-stretched groundwater resources and family units\' financial well-being. Additionally, the present circumstance of COVID-19 deteriorating and drying the water reservoir exponentially. Thus, excess water loss during the washing of hands during the pandemic of COVID-19 is a new hot issue, but no such evaluation studies, reports, or data are available that evaluate the relationship between loss of water during washing hands. Therefore, this investigation was planned to evaluate the loss of water during handwashing amid the COVID-19 pandemic with an accentuation on the misuse of groundwater from fundamental cleanliness activities at a homegrown scale. Thus, this study deliberates on the indirect effect of COVID-19 outbursts on water losses due to the specified practices of handwashing. Secondly, the main focus of the current study is the post-pandemic responses and environmental changes, which ultimately affected the personnel habits and proceedings after the COVID-19 pandemic so this article will critically address the unpredicted outcomes (i.e., high wastewater production, the wastewater composition, and limited natural reserves of water) along with their management practices from producer to policymakers and end users level.</span></p><section id=\"s0010\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h3 id=\"st030\" class=\"u-h4 u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Impact of adequate Quality Water on the COVID-19 pandemic:</b></span></h3><p id=\"p0060\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">To suppress and quell the spread of pandemics, Covid-19, a standard and continuous supply of satisfactory water quality is indispensable. Despite the fact, that water quality has rapidly deteriorated at the anticipated rate.&nbsp; The reasons behind the excessive contamination of both surface as well as groundwater are industrial wastes discharges, sewerage, agrochemicals, and human wastes. Because of excessive pollution human has lost many valuable freshwater resources most importantly the Nairobi River in Kenya. Studies have revealed that maximum pollution is caused by developing countries due to their high financial growth, industrialization, populace development, and poor wastewater administration system</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Climate change also adversely affects water quality in many ways. Besides that, the management of solid wastes is an important issue in developing countries. A study revealed that only 40% to 50% of waste is collected across South Africa (Grau Satorras 2017). The uncontrolled dumping sites and poor management of solid wastes are posing some serious biohazard dangers. These solid wastes hinder the wastewater treatment services and the self-refining capability of freshwater resources</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Proper attention should be paid to evaluating the impact of pharmaceutical and other medical wastes on water resources. Lack of access to infrastructure and poor sanitation services negatively affect public well-being</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Poor administration and management of sanitation services result in pollution of surface as well as groundwater (Satterthwaite et al. 2019). Similarly, a surge is also highly reported in waterways contamination after the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of patient treatments and safety measures of handwashing practices, which directly changes the nature of water pollution and threatens the biosafety hazards to these waterways. (So, we are attempting to be aware of the main causes and their management through this article).</span></p></section></div>','2022-11-05 20:50:42.909554','uploads/news/logo.jpg',1,'Water-Energy Nexus','The provision of safe water and functioning waste management play key roles in preventing and combatting disease outbreaks such as the Covid-19 pandemic. Good water quality is needed for effective hygiene measures like washing hands as well as for lowering pathogen transmission. Almost all over the world, especially in developing countries, water is vulnerable and at high risk and surging insecurity with time.',6,27,'science direct'),(59335,'How well do satellite and reanalysis precipitation products capture North American monsoon season in Arizona and New Mexico?','how-well-do-satellite-and-reanalysis-precipitation-products-capture-north-american-monsoon-season-in-arizona-and-new-mexico','2022-11-12 15:10:28.915629','<p id=\"p0015\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Precipitation is a critical component of the hydrological cycle </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">). As Earth\'s climate changes, the need for an accurate understanding of regional precipitation patterns and trends becomes ever more critical.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Precipitation data can be obtained through various sources including gauges, satellite remote sensing, ground radar, reanalysis, or a combination of them</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.&nbsp;</span></p><p id=\"p0020\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Due to the localized nature of precipitation events, especially those that are extreme, individual rain gauges and gauge networks provide the most accurate precipitation measurements</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. However, they are geographically sparse, especially in remote areas</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, and suffer from sample measurement, and under-catch errors</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Remote sensing precipitation products mitigate some of the shortcomings of the gauges by incorporating observations from thermal infrared sensors and passive microwave sounders</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">). However, remote sensing products may have significant biases due to systematic and random errors in their retrieval algorithms</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, inadequate temporal sampling</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, relatively poor performance over snow and ice surfaces</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, and relatively short data records</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></p><p id=\"p0025\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Reanalysis products benefit from data assimilation systems that incorporate available observations (in-situ and remotely sensed data) into numerical models</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Although reanalysis products have an extended temporal estimation (e.g., over 40 years) of precipitation</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, their reliability depends on observational constraints, which can vary significantly over space and time</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Ground-based precipitation radars provide near real-time coverage with a high spatiotemporal resolution</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. However, they have some limitations, including the attenuation of the signal</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;interference of the curvature of the earth with the beam at long distances</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, and the high cost of the equipment.</span></p><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The Southwest United States (U.S.) is a unique region as it frequently experiences multi-year and multi-decade episodes of severe drought, as well as frequent flooding events</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. This region also experiences changes in the magnitude, timing, and frequency of precipitation </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">which have been linked with changes in soil health,</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;ecosystem processes,</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;and vegetation across the desert Southwest</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Regional precipitation patterns in the Southwest U.S. are also of great importance since agricultural exports and ranching in the region are heavily dependent upon them.</span></p><p id=\"p0035\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">An important climatological phenomenon in the Southwest U.S. is the North American Monsoon (NAM) System, which on a synoptic scale is a change in upper-level (300–250&nbsp;hPa) circulation patterns that bring moisture flow into the Southwest region. Specifically, the upper-level patterns change from westerly to easterly over the region, causing the monsoon high and ridge to propagate northward, inducing cyclonic circulation, which facilities convection and promotes moisture flow into the area</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. There have been many discussions about the source of low-level moisture that contributes to NAM precipitation</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, but the literature generally agrees that the sources are the eastern tropical Pacific the</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Gulf of California, and the Gulf of Mexico</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. There is large interannual and annual variability of the NAM in the region due to shifts in the position of the monsoon ridge, which can help or hinder moisture flow</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Precipitation during the monsoon season (i.e., defined as June 15th through September 30th) is typically responsible for roughly 50% of annual precipitation in parts of Arizona and the surrounding region.</span></p><p id=\"p0040\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The NAM season of 2021 was one of the wettest in the region since 1895 </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;and contained several extreme precipitation events. In contrast, 2020 was the second driest on record in many parts of the Southwest U.S. </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Monsoon precipitation is already variable and the impact of climate change on precipitation extremes is largely uncertain</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Furthermore, the uncertainty associated with precipitation products can limit their applications, especially in high-elevation areas and complex terrains that are known to have higher uncertainty</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Shortcomings of these products are especially an issue in extreme precipitation situations that may lead to drought (over an extended period) or flooding and landslide events</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Therefore, access to accurate precipitation data in the Southwest U.S. is critical for documenting the changes, evaluating regional climate modeling, performing impact assessments, and developing mitigation plans and adaptation strategies.</span></p><p id=\"p0045\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Knowing that various precipitation products exist over the Southwest U.S., an important question is how consistent these products are in capturing the extreme precipitation patterns, trends, and accumulations. In other words, the choice of precipitation product may impact applications, evaluation of models, or assessing future projections. The performance of the precipitation products and datasets have been evaluated over monsoon-dominated regions in other parts of the world. For example, the monsoon season in India has been heavily investigated using gauge products</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, and reanalysis products</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The monsoon season in Eastern Asia has been similarly studied using reanalysis</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, and satellite-based </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">datasets. The East and West African monsoon seasons have also been studied using satellite-based&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">and reanalysis</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;datasets. However, and to the best of our knowledge, only a few studies&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">have evaluated satellite and reanalysis precipitation products for the NAM precipitation on a large scale over the Southwest U.S.</span></p><p id=\"p0050\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">This paper focused on the Southwestern states of Arizona and New Mexico, as they are the two states most affected by the monsoon precipitation phenomena.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Besides investigating precipitation patterns and times series for the entire period of study, this study focused on the last two years, 2020 and 2021, as they provide a unique opportunity to assess precipitation products under extreme dry and wet conditions and to investigate how consistent precipitation products are in capturing precipitation features (e.g., accumulation, spatiotemporal patterns, and extremes).</span></p><p id=\"p0050\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-12/efbd06b8-e0db-44bd-a329-867718f821d1.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><section id=\"sec1.1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><h3 id=\"sectitle0025\" class=\"u-h4 u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Datasets</b></span></h3><div style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0055\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Three satellite precipitation products [i.e., Integrated MultisatellitE Retrievals for Global Precipitation Measurement </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Late and Final runs, and Precipitation Estimation from Remotely Sensed Information using Artificial Neural Networks (</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, a reanalysis product [European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Reanalysis 5th Generation land component (</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;and one ground-based radar product&nbsp;</span></p></div></section>','2022-11-05 20:51:15.897479','uploads/news/1-s2.0-S2212094722001001-gr2.jpg',1,'Weather and Climate Extremes','Assessment of the precipitation products with ground-based data is essential to building confidence in these datasets. Precipitation products tend to have large errors in semi-arid regions such as the Southwest United States, where accurate precipitation quantification is critical for water resource management and flood mitigation measures. Therefore, this region, with its high density of ground-based data, is important for the evaluation of the products.',6,168,'Science direct'),(59336,'On the temporal clustering of European extreme precipitation events and its relationship to persistent and transient large-scale atmospheric drivers','on-the-temporal-clustering-of-european-extreme-precipitation-events-and-its-relationship-to-persistent-and-transient-large-scale-atmospheric-drivers','2022-11-12 14:59:05.252400','<section id=\"sec1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"d1e605\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Sub-seasonal temporal clustering of extreme precipitation events (EPEs) can have profound societal and economic repercussions. First, the close succession of rainfall events can increase the time for soil moisture, rivers, and lakes to return to climatological values in catchments with high-retention capacity and cause devastating floods</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Second, the short recovery time between events can overburden emergency services and prevent proper clean-up of damages and efficient repairing of damaged protective structures</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Third, the temporal clustering may generate unexpected financial implications for the insurance/reinsurance industry hence</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, a sequence of extreme rainfall events can amplify impacts when compared with a single hazard. It is therefore a temporally compounding event</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Process understanding of the temporal clustering of EPEs is needed to assess and mitigate associated risks and to improve predictability on sub-seasonal time scales.</span></p><p id=\"d1e628\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Extratropical modes of climate variability such as the Artic Oscillation (AO), the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), the East Atlantic pattern (EAP), and the Scandinavian pattern (SCA) capture predominant atmospheric circulation patterns on sub-seasonal time-scales. They have been shown to govern dry/wet conditions and heavy precipitation frequency across wide parts of Europe.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">These modes of climate variability are further related to the position and strength of the jet stream and thereby the temporal clustering of cyclones</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Modes of variability have been used to investigate if reanalyses&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">and global climate models&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">capture temporal clustering of heavy precipitation events across Europe. Building on the modes of variability, weather regimes (WRs) summarize regional climate variability on timescales of several weeks</span></p><p id=\"d1e661\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The recurrent nature of weather situations is potential relevance for the understanding of the temporal clustering of EPEs. For example, synoptic-scale transient recurrent Rossby wave packets termed as RRWPs</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, affect persistent wet spells over the European sector, increasing wet spell duration in western Europe and western Russia during summer, and over eastern Europe and the Mediterranean in winter</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. How recurrent Rossby wave packets modulate the temporal clustering of individual extreme events remains to be investigated. Besides recurrent weather situations, stationary blocking anticyclones can also lead to temporal clustering of heavy precipitation as demonstrated&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">on the Alpine south side and by&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">selected areas around the Northern Hemisphere. Currently, systematic quantification of the link between blocks and temporal clustering of heavy precipitation in Europe is still missing.</span></p><p id=\"d1e682\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Temporal clustering is typically analyzed using methods that assume point processes, such as the dispersion statistic&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Ripley’s K function&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">or count-based approaches</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. In agreement with this assumption, EPEs are here defined as events lasting from one to several days consisting of independent point events along the time axis. Independence is assured by grouping consecutive extreme precipitation days into single events.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">Previous studies have investigated the association between the sub-seasonal temporal clustering of EPEs and the time-varying effect of large-scale atmospheric drivers in the Euro-Atlantic sector</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">. In these studies, this association is modeled using a Cox regression model, i.e.&nbsp;a Poisson process with a randomly varying rate of occurrence</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">. Such a model has also been used to relate the temporal clustering of flood events&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">and EPEs across the central United States&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">to modes of climate variability. Several studies have relied on Poisson regression to model sub-seasonal temporal clustering of extratropical cyclones over Europe</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">, flood events in Austria</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">, and heavy precipitation in the North American Midwest</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">. However, these modeling approaches assume a linear combination of parameters and cannot parametrically account for the seasonal cycle of EPEs, which is omnipresent across Europe (</span><a name=\"bfig5\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212094722000974#fig5\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(12, 125, 187); word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">Fig.&nbsp;5</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">). In a Cox regression model, seasonality is implicitly accounted for in the model through the baseline hazard, though it is not parametrically specified</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">. In Poisson regression, seasonality can either be accounted for by including binary indicator variables for each month&nbsp;(</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">&nbsp;or by fitting a separate model for each season. A general additive model (GAM) lifts the linearity constraints; for example,&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">&nbsp;assesses the non-linear effects of the NAO on the rate of occurrence of yearly flood counts using a Poisson GAM.</span></p><p id=\"d1e764\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">A GAM is essentially a Generalized Linear Model&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">in which the relationships between the predictor variables and the response are specified by flexible smooth functions.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;The flexibility that such a model offers has many advantages over classical GLMs. A GAM does not impose any parametric form of the link between the response and the predictor variables. This flexibility allows non-linear relationships between the predictor variables, i.e.&nbsp;atmospheric drivers, and the response, i.e.&nbsp;EPE counts, to be modeled. In practical terms, it is possible to implicitly account for the seasonal cycle in EPE counts by modeling them as a smoothly varying cyclic function, e.g.&nbsp;a cyclic regression cubic spline, of time, i.e.&nbsp;the day of the year. As such, it is possible to use one parsimonious model instead of separate models for each season; parameters are better estimated and temporal discontinuities between seasons are avoided.</span></p><p id=\"d1e776\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In this study, we propose a novel approach to investigate the sub-seasonal temporal clustering of EPEs across Europe using 42&nbsp;years of daily precipitation data from ERA5</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. This sub-seasonal temporal clustering is defined as random spurts of activity beyond the seasonal cycle of EPE counts, which we capture through Poisson GAMs fitted using data from all seasons. Our model results provide insight into the clustering frequency over Europe, i.e.&nbsp;to quantify the significance of temporal clustering in EPEs and to identify unique clustering episodes. Moreover, we investigate potential links between atmospheric dynamics and temporal clustering of precipitation extremes by inspecting the effects of seven predominant year-round WRs</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, atmospheric blocks being implicitly captured by the WRs and RRWPs&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">in the Euro-Atlantic sector on the temporal clustering of EPEs on sub-seasonal time-scales. More specifically, we address the following questions: (1) where do we find significant sub-seasonal temporal clustering of EPEs in Europe beyond the seasonal cycle and how is it spatially distributed? (2) If temporal clustering is detected, where and when do the atmospheric predictors modulate temporal clustering of EPEs, i.e.&nbsp;explain positive deviations from the seasonal cycle in EPE counts?</span></p><p id=\"d1e794\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The paper is organized as follows: the data is introduced in Section 2</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Section 3&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">contains methodological aspects of the EPE definition, modeling the temporal clustering using a GAM, WRs definition, and quantification of the clustering. The results and discussion are presented in Sections.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Finally, general conclusions and future research avenues are presented in Section 6</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></p></section><section id=\"sec2\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h2 id=\"d1e819\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">2.&nbsp;ERA-5 data</span></h2><p id=\"d1e821\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">We use European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecast’s (ECMWF) latest reanalysis product, ERA-5. It is the fifth generation atmospheric reanalysis of the global climate from ECMWF and can be accessed publicly. We use precipitation fields from the ERA-5 reanalysis data set at 0.5°horizontal resolution from 1 January 1979 to 31 December 2020</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. ERA-5 precipitation data are available at an hourly resolution that we aggregate to daily precipitation. ERA-5 precipitation stems from short-term numerical model forecasts and is in good agreement with observational data&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">and captures temporal clustering of precipitation well</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. In this study, we model the temporal clustering of EPEs at 6140 gridpoint locations across Europe in the domain 30N-72N and 25W-40E. We use the ERA-5 land-sea mask to restrict the analysis only to land locations for computational efficiency and relevance in terms of impact. For convenience, we omit February 29 from all leap years contained in the 42&nbsp;years of data.</span></p><p id=\"d1e821\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-12/1409c74f-5c68-4a09-9267-ef70d64b4758.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p></section><section id=\"sec3\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h2 id=\"d1e842\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Methods</b></span></h2><section id=\"sec3.1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h3 id=\"d1e847\" class=\"u-h4 u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;<b>Modeling the temporal clustering of extreme precipitation events</b></span></h3><section id=\"sec3.1.1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h4 id=\"d1e852\" class=\"u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 1rem; line-height: 1.4; margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>&nbsp;Definition of extreme precipitation events</b></span></h4><p id=\"d1e854\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">We apply a Peak Over Threshold approach to select extreme rainfall days</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The threshold for extreme rainfall days is the all-day 98th percentile of the local daily precipitation accumulation at each gridpoint (</span><a name=\"bfig1\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212094722000974#fig1\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(12, 125, 187); word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Fig.&nbsp;1</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">a). This threshold is chosen based on a trade-off between a high enough precipitation level and retaining enough data. An extreme precipitation event is defined as an independent point or occurrence along the time axis and therefore runs of consecutive exceedances, i.e.&nbsp;extreme rainfall days, are declustered. We apply runs declustering with a run length of 2 days, i.e.&nbsp;exceedances separated by no more than one day belonging to the same event. A run length of 2 days has been determined based on objective statistical methods about the extremal index&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">and corresponds to the average time that the same mid-latitude weather system would generate extreme precipitation at a given location</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. For events lasting longer than one day, the date of occurrence of the event corresponds to the day of the precipitation maximum within the event. The total number of independent EPEs ranges from 202 to 301 across the study domain (</span><a name=\"bfig1\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212094722000974#fig1\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(12, 125, 187); word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Fig.&nbsp;1</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">b).</span></p><div><br></div><div style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"d1e882\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"></p></div></section></section></section>','2022-11-05 20:51:16.323858','uploads/news/1-s2.0-S2212094722000974-gr2.jpg',1,'Weather and Climate Extremes','Extreme precipitation events that occur in close succession can have important societal and economic repercussions. Here we use 42 years of reanalysis data (ERA-5) to investigate the link between Euro-Atlantic large-scale pattern of weather and climate variability and the temporal clustering of extreme rainfall events over Europe. We implicitly model the seasonal rate of extreme occurrences as part of a Poisson General Additive Model (GAM) using cyclic regression cubic splines. The smoothed seasonal rate of extreme rainfall occurrences is used to (i) infer the frequency of significant temporal clustering and (ii) implicitly serves as the baseline rate when modeling the effects of atmospheric drivers on extreme rainfall clustering.',6,27,'Science direct');
INSERT INTO `news_news` VALUES (59337,'At ease in the city: neighbourhood as an extension of the cosy Swedish home','at-ease-in-the-city-neighbourhood-as-an-extension-of-the-cosy-swedish-home','2022-11-07 16:19:39.777966','<p><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">This research paper contributes to deliberations about the well-being of home spaces by considering how professional expectations and everyday experiences of the neighbourhood, as an extension of the home, relate to the cultural situatedness of individuals in Sweden. To do that, it presents and discusses findings from a case-based investigation of two developments in Stockholm that represent the contemporary urban design and neighbourhood planning efforts influenced by New Urbanism. Building on the work of Lefebvre, Massey and others, our findings reveal a particularly Swedish construct of place that allows for and celebrates the interplay between an individual\'s cosy home environment extending into the public and communal spaces of their neighbourhood, with more complex or challenging urbanity beyond. Future research could examine neighbourhoods situated elsewhere to understand the extent to which similar experiences or social meanings exist outside of the Swedish context, and what impacts community formation and human well-being results.</span></p><p id=\"para0006\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Amongst the multiplicity of spaces that we think of and experience daily are those of the home. Home spaces are complex and contested&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">and varied experiences of these spaces influenced by social, political and cultural contexts lead to wide-ranging notions of home as a place “both lived and imagined, with material characteristics and symbolic significance”</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Furthermore and as evidenced by the research presented in this paper, notions of the home extend beyond the front door into “everyday experiences at the local scale”, so the “notion of home space” can be used “to embrace the idea of both housing and the neighbourhood” (ibid.).</span></p><p id=\"para0007\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">For quite some time, urban planners, designers and researchers have sought to understand how and why communities form about certain neighbourhoods and not others – and whether or not community formation at the local scale is necessary for the well-being of those who call that neighbourhood home.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;A legacy of New Urbanism</span><a name=\"bcit_1\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666558122000434#cit_1\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(12, 125, 187); word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 0; position: relative; vertical-align: baseline; top: -0.5em; font-family: Helvetica;\">1</span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;that has reverberated into mainstream, contemporary urban design and planning approaches is the championing of interrelationships between compact, walkable neighbourhood design and community formation at the neighbourhood scale.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Yet important social arrangements or meanings about neighbourhood environments may exist outside of communitarian ideals, including those that help illuminate lived and imagined experiences of the neighbourhood as an extension of the home. As&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;theorises, home cannot be “separated from public, political worlds but is constituted through them.” So, taking account of more nuanced, contextually-situated neighbourhood socialities beyond strict notions of the community may reveal insights about the “plastic tendency [of home] that enables its boundaries to expand and shrink” </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;and thereby offer lessons in the quest for human wellbeing – particularly when thinking about how more people might feel at home in their city.</span></p><h2 id=\"cesectitle0005\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.333 !important; margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 700;\">Relational multiplicities and place complexities:</span></span></h2><p id=\"para0011\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"></p><p></p><p></p><dl class=\"list\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 24px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"line-height: 1.42857; margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\">i)</dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"line-height: 1.42857; margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"para0014\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\">home is a site of constancy in the social and material environment (<em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\">security</em>)</p></dd><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"line-height: 1.42857; margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\">ii)</dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"line-height: 1.42857; margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"para0015\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\">home is a spatial context in which day-to-day routines of human existence are performed (<em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\">security</em>)</p></dd><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"line-height: 1.42857; margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\">iii)</dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"line-height: 1.42857; margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"para0016\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\">home is a site where people feel most in control of their lives (<em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\">stimulation</em>) because they feel free from the surveillance that is part of the contemporary world (<em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\">security</em>)</p></dd><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"line-height: 1.42857; margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\">iv)</dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"line-height: 1.42857; margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"para0017\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\">home is a secure base around which identities are constructed (<em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\">security and identity</em>)</p></dd></dl><p id=\"para0009\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In this paper, we examine previously overlooked design motivations for and lived experiences of, two neighbourhood developments in Stockholm. In these examinations, we pay particular attention to social meanings and notions of the community about neighbourhood form as an extension of the home environment. Both developments were influenced by protagonists associated with New Urbanism, and the construction of both began in the mid-to-late-1990s, a time when New Urbanism as a distinct movement was growing in popularity and influence. In 1996, the Charter of the New Urbanism was signed by the United States, and less than a decade later in 2003, the Charter of Stockholm was signed as part of the Council for European Urbanism, whose efforts to reform urban development parallel those of the Congress for New Urbanism.</span></p><p id=\"para0010\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In our investigation, the unique motivations and agency of individual designers and residents are given careful consideration, to understand better how they are navigating – and capable of influencing – the larger structures or discourses with which they are associated. For “ideas do not diffuse over a flat cultural plain. Rather, they are encountered in particular places” </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;by particular people with different backgrounds and worldviews. As a result of our approach, some important ways in which Stockholm designers, and lived experiences of their neighbourhood designs, diverge from the dominant discourse about New Urbanism and the contemporary role of neighbourhoods in engendering community are unveiled and discussed here. More importantly, the Swedish context reveals interesting considerations about the sociality of neighbourhood residents, and how that sociality reflects an understanding of home, neighbourly coexistence, and living life well within a contemporary metropolis.</span></p><p id=\"para0011\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In what follows, we give a brief overview of our conceptual approach and data collection methods (including the typological characteristics informing case selection criteria), then report on our key findings. Our data analysis is contextually grounded and reveals a particularly Swedish perspective of the neighbourhood as an extension of home and sociality, buffered yet fluid. We share findings about neighbourhoods as imagined and as lived from two developments.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;The findings point to people experiencing simultaneous connectivity and separateness with others living in their neighbourhood and the importance of these experiences for residents feeling at ease, thereby cultivating a sense of home extending outside of the individual dwelling. While these findings are particular to Stockholm, we encourage urban and housing researchers to consider their possible existence elsewhere and, thus, to undertake related studies of the formal and social arrangements of neighbourhoods in different contexts. Such investigations could help expand approaches to and expectations of neighbourhood planning about understanding extended home environments and cultivating social or well-being outcomes beyond </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">geographically delimited communities.</span></p><h3 id=\"cesectitle0009\" class=\"u-h4 u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><b><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Swedish situatedness and the concept of ‘mysig’</span></b></h3><div style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><p id=\"para0029\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><br></p><figure class=\"figure text-xs\" id=\"fig0001\" style=\"margin-bottom: 20px; padding: 8px 0px 0px; font-size: 0.7rem; line-height: 1.57; border-top: 1px solid rgb(185, 185, 185); border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(185, 185, 185);\"><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><img src=\"https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S2666558122000434-gr1.jpg\" height=\"998\" alt=\"Fig. 1\" aria-describedby=\"cap0001\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; border-style: none; width: auto; max-width: 100%; height: auto;\"></span></figure></div><p id=\"para0011\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 16px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;Sankt Erik</span></em><span style=\"font-size: 12px; font-family: Helvetica;\">\'s&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 16px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;\">Grubbensringen</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><h2 id=\"cesectitle0005\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><br></h2>','2022-11-05 20:51:23.061268','uploads/news/1-s2.0-S2666558122000434-gr2.jpg',1,'Wellbeing, Space and Society','This paper contributes to deliberations about wellbeing in relation to home spaces by considering how professional expectations and everyday experiences of the neighbourhood, as an extension of home, relate to the cultural situatedness of individuals in Sweden.',6,168,'Science direct'),(59353,'Recent research on AI vs Humans','recent-research-ai-vs-humans','2022-11-07 16:54:00.446475','<p>Artificial Intelligence has made advancements in all fields ranging from the military to the healthcare sector. It has provided an easy way for humans to handle the work efficiently without putting in hours and thousands of effort.</p><p>We are always curious to know if humans are more intelligent or AI. No doubt humans are the most intelligent as AI is developed by humans only. But as today\'s generation is technology-dependent, machines are considered to be more intelligent. Considering both scenarios, humans, and machines both are intelligent at their levels.&nbsp;</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: AI, humans, proteins, self-assemble, predict, machine-learning system</h3><p><br></p><p>A recent study has researched upon comparing AI and humans.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p><p>Proteins are made up of amino acids that are joined from end to end. The chains of proteins fold up to form three-dimensional molecules with complex shapes. The shape of protein along with amino acid determines the work done by protein.&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-07/b1c860dc-d0d5-4212-8604-5a919a6a39be.jpg\" style=\"width: 206.889px; height: 206.889px;\"><br></p><p>In this study, researchers focus on who can do a better job in predicting which protein sequences would combine most successfully are out. Basically, the scientists conducted an experiment involving a human - one with a profound and intuitive understating of protein design and self-assemble compared to artificially intelligent computers.</p><p>Scientists are always interested in protein self-assembly. According to them, understanding it better could help them in designing various products useful for medical and industrial uses such as Artificial human tissue for wounds and catalysts for new chemical products.</p><p>For conducting this research&nbsp;<font color=\"#000000\" style=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\">Vikas</span><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;</span></font>Nanda, a professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School was on the top of the list. He said, \"Despite our extensive expertise, the AI did as good or better on several data sets, showing the tremendous potential of machine learning to overcome human bias. Understanding protein self-assembly is fundamental to making advances in many fields, including medicine and industry\".&nbsp;</p><p>For this experiment, Nanda along with 5 other colleagues was given a list of proteins. They were asked to predict which ones were more likely to self-assemble. They made their observations based on protein behavior in experiments, including patterns of electrical charges and degree of aversion to water. After observations, they chose 11 proteins that would self-assemble. The computer program was based on an advanced machine-learning system. It chose nine proteins.</p><p>The humans were correct for six out of the 11 proteins and the computer program was correct for six out of the nine proteins. Thus, the computer program earned a higher percentage. It was observed that humans favored some amino acids which lead them to incorrect choices.&nbsp;</p><p>Expert Nanda said, \"We\'re working to get a fundamental understanding of the chemical nature of interactions that lead to self-assembly, so I worried that using these programs would prevent important insights. But what I\'m beginning to really understand is that machine learning is just another tool, like any other\".</p><p>This study has given us more proof to increase our belief in technology.&nbsp;</p>','2022-11-07 16:54:00.446525','uploads/news/ai11111111111.jpg',1,'Rutgers University','We are always curious to know if humans are more intelligent or AI. No doubt humans are the most intelligent as AI is developed by humans only. But as today\'s generation is technology-dependent, machines are considered to be more intelligent. Considering both scenarios, humans, and machines both are intelligent at their levels. A recent study has researched upon comparing AI and humans. In which, the computer program earned a higher percentage.',5,134,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Rohit Batra, Troy D. Loeffler, Henry Chan, Srilok Srinivasan, Honggang Cui, Ivan V. Korendovych, Vikas Nanda, Liam C. Palmer, Lee A. Solomon, H. Christopher Fry, Subramanian K. R. S. Sankaranarayanan.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Machine learning overcomes human bias in the discovery of self-assembling peptides</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Nature Chemistry</em>, 2022; DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41557-022-01055-3\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1038/s41557-022-01055-3</a></li></ol>'),(59354,'Wi-Peep - Discovery of new security loophole','wi-peep-discovery-new-security-loophole','2022-11-08 16:22:45.229353','<p>Everyday development in technology is achieving great heights. It is helping all the sectors for increasing efficiency in their work. Technology has applications in fields ranging from healthcare to security. Technology has made advancements all over the world.</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: technology, WiFi, Wi-Peep, network, messages, drone, loophole</h3><p><br></p><p>In a new research,<span style=\"font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;a&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\">research team based out of the University of Waterloo has developed a drone-powered device. The researchers have named this device as Wi-Peep. It can see through walls using WiFi networks. It can fly near a building and then use the WiFi network to identify and for locating all WiFi-enabled devices. It can locate the devices in a matter of seconds.</span></p><p>The Wi-Peep exploits a loophole called polite WiFi. Due to this device, smart devices will automatically respond to contact attempts from any device within the network even if the network is password protected. The Wi-Peep sends several messages to a device as it flies. It then measures the response time. It creates a way to identify the device\'s location within a meter.</p><p><br></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-08/92980270-a5bd-46f6-a063-2677d76d28e9.webp\" style=\"width: 349.889px; height: 241.306px;\"></p><p><br></p><p>Dr. Ali Abedi, an adjunct professor of computer science at Waterloo is the pioneer of this research. He said, \" The Wi-Peep devices are like lights in the visible spectrum, and the walls are like glass. Using similar technology, one could track the movements of security guards inside a bank by following the location of their phones or smartwatches. Likewise, a thief could identify the location and type of smart devices in a home, including security cameras, laptops, and smart TVs, to find a good candidate for a break-in. In addition, the device\'s operation via drone means that it can be used quickly and remotely without much chance of the user being detected\".</p><p>Earlier scientists have explored WiFi security vulnerability in the past that made use of bulky and expensive devices. But, Wi-Peep is easily accessible and transportable. The team of researchers built it using a store-bought drone. It required $20 for hardware.</p><p>The team of researchers built the Wi-Peep to test their theory. They realized that anyone with the right expertise can easily create a similar device. On this, Dr. Abedi said, \"As soon as the Polite WiFi loophole was discovered, we realized this kind of attack was possible. On a fundamental level, we need to fix the Polite WiFi loophole so that our devices do not respond to strangers. We hope our work will inform the design of next-generation protocols\".</p><p>The Wi-Peep is a great development in terms of network technology. It will surely help the current and future generations working with WiFi networks.&nbsp;</p>','2022-11-08 16:22:45.229405','uploads/news/wifi-1.webp',1,'University of Waterloo','In a new research, a research team based out of the University of Waterloo has developed a drone-powered device. The researchers have named this device as Wi-Peep. It can see through walls using WiFi networks. It can fly near a building and then use the WiFi network to identify and for locating all WiFi-enabled devices. It can locate the devices in a matter of seconds.',5,134,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Ali Abedi, Deepak Vasisht.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Non-cooperative wi-fi localization &amp; its privacy implications</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">MobiCom \'22: Proceedings of the 28th Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing And Networking</em>, October 2022: 570-582 DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/3495243.3560530\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1145/3495243.3560530</a></li></ol>'),(59355,'Shining new light on solar cell development','shining-new-light-solar-cell-development','2022-11-08 20:02:07.435185','<p>We are aware of the developments made in the field of using renewable energies. Renewable energies are available in abundant amounts and act as a great source of energy which has proved to be successful in replacing non-renewable energy resources. One such application of renewable energy is Solar cells.</p><p>Solar cells are devices that convert light energy into electrical energy. They are made up of semiconductor materials like silicon. There are various advantages of solar cells :</p><ul><li>Economy-friendly energy.</li><li>Long-term energy</li><li>Infinite energy</li><li>Innovative energy.</li></ul><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-08/77efafd4-569a-4878-9336-26f9b2affabb.jpg\" style=\"width: 387.889px; height: 254.601px;\"><br></p><p>ANU researchers have found a way for increasing the efficiency of silicon photovoltaic (PV) or solar cells.</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: solar cells, Photovoltaic cells, energy, silicon, renewable energy&nbsp;</h3><p><br></p><p>Mohamed Ismael, lead ANU researcher and PhD candidate was the pioneer of this research. He said, \"These findings will help push the performance of silicon solar cells closer to their theoretical limit. Each day, the sun produces significantly more energy than is needed to power the whole planet. The only limitation is our ability to economically convert it to electricity\".</p><p>Considering the current scenario, solar cells are not operating at their maximum capacity due to substantial electrical losses. These losses are generally associated with the direct contact of metals with silicon. The increased performance of solar cells can be achieved through the \'passivating contacts\' between the metal and silicon parts of the solar cell. This makes to make them more productive.</p><p>Dr. Lachlan Black said, \"Transition metal oxides such as titanium oxide have many qualities that make them ideal as passivating contact layers. This isn\'t a new idea, but the way in which we combined these layers has produced better results and higher operating voltages than anything previously reported. If successful, we could see our technology in almost all new solar panels installed on your roof or utility-scale solar plants\".</p><p>The PV market is a multi-billion-dollar industry. Silicon solar cells contribute 95 percent of all commercial solar cells to it. They are predicted to be on heights even in the future.&nbsp;</p><p>Researcher Ismael said, \"Improving the efficiency of solar cells guarantees more clean energy at a reduced cost. This not only helps to address climate change but opens up new economic opportunities for this low-cost clean energy\".</p><p>The research team is hoping to develop the technology that will prove to be useful to industrial solar cells on a large scale. The PV community is already working to resolve various current challenges so that the technology can be easily implemented.</p><p>This study definitely shows ways to increase the development in the field of solar cells. It has also provided a way for the enhancement of renewable energy resources.&nbsp;</p><p><br></p>','2022-11-08 20:02:07.435234','uploads/news/solar.jpg',1,'Australian National University','ANU researchers have found a way for increasing the efficiency of silicon photovoltaic (PV) or solar cells.',5,87,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Mohamed M. Shehata, Pheng Phang, Rabin Basnet, Yanting Yin, Felipe Kremer, Gabriel Bartholazzi, Gunther G. Andersson, Daniel H. Macdonald, Lachlan E. Black.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Outstanding Surface Passivation for Highly Efficient Silicon Solar Cells Enabled by Innovative Al y TiO x /TiO x&nbsp;</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Solar RRL</em>, 2022; 6 (10): 2200550 DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/solr.202200550\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1002/solr.202200550</a></li></ol>'),(59356,'Water is critical for success on climate action','water-critical-success-climate-action','2022-11-09 19:35:27.300707','<p>New research titled \"The essential drop to reach Net-Zero: Unpacking Freshwater\'s Role in Climate Change Mitigation,\" highlights the importance of water in climate mitigation. It is essential to look after global water shortages and scarcity and develop better plans for controlling the impacts of climate change. If not taken any measures, climate change may threaten water security and will also increase future adaption and mitigation burdens.</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: Climate change mitigation, water, sanitation management,&nbsp; environment, greenhouse gas</h3><p><br></p><p>The report describes why, where, and how freshwater should be integrated into climate change mitigation plans for avoiding unexpected consequences and costly policy mistakes. Even the steps taken towards overcoming the problem of climate change such as bioenergy or forest restoration can also have negative impacts if water supplies are not taken into consideration.&nbsp;</p><p>Dr. Lan Wang Erlandsson from Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University said, \"Most of the measures needed to reach net-zero carbon targets can have a big impact on already dwindling freshwater resources around the world. With better planning, such risks can be reduced or avoided. Done right, however, water-related and nature-based solutions can instead address both the climate crisis and other challenges\".</p><p>\"We have identified water risks, but also win-win solutions that are currently not used to their full potential. One example is restoration of forests and wetlands which bring social, ecological, and climate benefits all at once. Another example is that better wastewater treatment can reduce greenhouse gas emissions from untreated wastewater, while improving surface water and groundwater quality, and even provide renewable energy through biogas\".</p><p>The report mainly highlights five key messages on the linking between water and mitigation:</p><p>1. Climate mitigation measures usually depend on freshwater resources. Climate mitigation planning and action need to be taken into account for the availability of freshwater in present and future times.</p><p>2. Freshwater impacts i.e. positive and negative impacts need to be evaluated and must be included in climate mitigation planning and action.</p><p>3. Water and sanitation management can be effective in reducing emissions of greenhouse gases. Moreover, drinking water and sanitation services save precious freshwater resources and reduce emissions.</p><p>4. Nature-based solutions to mitigate climate change can be beneficial for people and the environment. Measures safeguarding freshwater resources, protecting biodiversity, and ensuring resilient livelihoods are crucial.</p><p>5. It is a need to coordinate joint water and climate governance. Mainstreaming freshwater in all climate mitigation planning and action requires polycentric and inclusive governance.</p><p>&nbsp;Marianne Kjellén, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) said, \"Climate change mitigation efforts will not succeed if failing to consider water needs. Water must be part of powerful solutions for enhancing ecosystem resilience, preserving biodiversity, and regenerative food and energy production systems. In short, water security needs to be factored into climate action\".</p><p>Professor Johan Rockström, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research said, \"To tackle the climate, food, nature, and energy crises, water availability is of the essence. It is urgent that the world focuses all attention on the double facts that water is the number one challenge for climate adaptation due to droughts and floods, and a key challenge for mitigation, as there is no safe climate future well below 2 degrees Celsius without a functioning hydrological cycle\".</p><p><b>Conclusion:</b></p><p>This research has definitely proven a key point of water to be considered important while climate change mitigation plans.&nbsp;</p>','2022-11-09 19:35:27.300765','uploads/news/water.jpg',1,'Stockholm University','New research titled \"The essential drop to reach Net-Zero: Unpacking Freshwater\'s Role in Climate Change Mitigation,\" highlights the importance of water in climate mitigation. It is essential to look after global water shortages and scarcity and develop better plans for controlling the impacts of climate change. If not taken any measures, climate change may threaten water security and will also increase future adaption and mitigation burdens.',5,17,'<p><div class=\"impact-unit-wrapper\" style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important; margin: 25px 5px 25px 0px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-color: initial;\"><div class=\"pgs-dpg-btn\" data-pgs-partner-id=\"sciencedaily\" data-loaded=\"true\" widget-loading=\"true\" style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important;\"></div></div></p><div id=\"text\" style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-color: initial;\"><p style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important; margin: 0px 0px 10px;\"><span>&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://siwi.org/publications/essential-drop-to-net-zero-unpacking-freshwaters-role-in-climate-change-mitigation-report/\" style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important; background-color: transparent; color: rgb(0, 66, 118); text-decoration: none;\">https://siwi.org/publications/essential-drop-to-net-zero-unpacking-freshwaters-role-in-climate-change-mitigation-report/</a></p></div>'),(59357,'Researchers develop a material that mimics how the brain stores information','researchers-develop-material-mimics-how-brain-stores-information','2022-11-11 04:26:59.799108','<p>Researchers at Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona have developed a magnetic material that has the capability of storing information like the brain. This research was led by researchers from the UAB Department of Physics Jordi Sort and Enric Menéndez, along with the ALBA Synchrotron, the Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (ICN2), and the ICMAB.&nbsp;</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: magnetic materials, Neuromorphic computing, neuronal plasticity, neuron synapses, cobalt mononitride (CoN), voltage, stimulus&nbsp;</h3><p><br></p><p>Neuromorphic computing is considered as a new computing paradigm. In this, the behavior of the brain is emulated by mimicking the main synaptic functions of neurons. Among the functions, neuronal plasticity is considered. Neuronal plasticity is referred to as the ability to store or forget information based on the duration and repetition of the electrical impulses that stimulate the brain.</p><p>Various materials mimic neuron synapses. They are: memresistive materials, ferroelectrics, phase change memory materials, topological insulators, and recently magneto-ionic materials stand out.&nbsp;</p><p>Changes in magnetic properties are generally induced by the displacement of ions within the material. This is caused by the application of an electric field. While applying the electric field, it is well known to modulate the magnetism in these materials. But when the voltage is stopped, the evolution of magnetic properties is difficult to control. This increases the complications of emulating some brain-inspired functions such as maintaining learning efficiency even while the brain is in a state of deep sleep.</p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/1102a9c2-25e7-4cfc-b411-b116c5b2a88c.jpg\" style=\"width: 451.707px; height: 146.823px;\"><br></p><p>But now, the researchers have developed a material based on a thin layer of cobalt mononitride (CoN). In this, by applying an electric field, the accumulation of N ions at the interface between the layer and a liquid electrolyte in which the layer has been placed is possible to be controlled.&nbsp;</p><p>ICREA research professor Jordi Sort and&nbsp;<span style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Serra Húnter</span>&nbsp;Tenure-track Professor Enric Menéndez said, \"The new material works with the movement of ions controlled by electrical voltage, in a manner analogous to our brain, and at speeds similar to those produced in neurons, of the order of milliseconds. We have developed an artificial synapse that in the future may be the basis of a new computing paradigm, alternative to the one used by current computers\".</p><p>By applying voltage pulses, it is possible to emulate various processes such as memory, information processing, information retrieval, the updating information without applied voltage. The emulation is possible in a controlled way. It is achieved by modifying the thickness of the cobalt mononitride layers which determines the speed of the motion of ions, and the frequency of the pulses.&nbsp;</p><p>The arrangement of material is in such a way that it allows the magnetic properties to be controlled when the voltage is applied and even when the voltage is removed. As the external voltage stimulus disappears, the magnetization of the system can be reduced or increased. This can be done by depending on the thickness of the material and considering the protocol of how was the voltage applied previously.</p><p>Jordi Sort and Enric Menendez said, \"When the thickness of the cobalt mononitride layer is below 50 nanometers and with a voltage applied at a frequency greater than 100 cycles per second, we have managed to emulate an additional logic function: once the voltage is applied, the device can be programmed to learn or to forget, without the need for any additional input of energy, mimicking the synaptic functions that take place in the brain during deep sleep, when information processing can continue without applying any external signal\".</p><p>The development of this material has opened a new range of opportunities for new neuromorphic computing functions.&nbsp;</p>','2022-11-11 04:26:59.799150','uploads/news/brain.webp',1,'Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona','Now, the researchers have developed a material based on a thin layer of cobalt mononitride (CoN). In this, by applying an electric field, the accumulation of N ions at the interface between the layer and a liquid electrolyte in which the layer has been placed is possible to be controlled. The arrangement of material is in such a way that it allows the magnetic properties to be controlled when the voltage is applied and even when the voltage is removed. As the external voltage stimulus disappears, the magnetization of the system can be reduced or increased. This can be done by depending on the thickness of the material and considering the protocol of how was the voltage applied previously.',5,24,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Zhengwei Tan, Julius de Rojas, Sofia Martins, Aitor Lopeandia, Alberto Quintana, Matteo Cialone, Javier Herrero-Martín, Johan Meersschaut, André Vantomme, José L. Costa-Krämer, Jordi Sort, Enric Menéndez.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Frequency-dependent stimulated and post-stimulated voltage control of magnetism in transition metal nitrides: towards brain-inspired magneto-ionics</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Materials Horizons</em>, 2022; DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/D2MH01087A\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); text-decoration-line: underline; outline: 0px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1039/D2MH01087A</a></li></ol>'),(59358,'Earth-sun distance dramatically alters seasons in the equatorial Pacific in a 22,000-year cycle','earth-sun-distance-dramatically-alters-seasons-equatorial-pacific-22000-year-cycle','2022-11-11 16:01:45.918086','<p>At some times of the year, the earth is closer to the sun. The time of the closest approach shifts over 22,000 years. This change affects the climate of the earth. Now, scientists have discovered that it also affects the yearly weather pattern.&nbsp;</p><p>Currently, the earth is about 3 million miles closer to the sun than its farthest point. The closest approach is known as perihelion and the farthest is known as aphelion. As a result of the closest approach, sunlight is approximately 7% more intense at perihelion compared to aphelion. The distance between the earth-sun varies over the year. This is caused due to the earth\'s orbit as it is slightly elliptical.&nbsp;</p><p>New computer simulations have shown that one driver of yearly weather cycles in the equatorial Pacific, specifically in a cold tongue (Cold tongue is referred to as surface waters stretching westward along the equator from the coast of South America) influences the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). This impacts the weather in California and mostly in North America. It also affects global weather.</p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/598a70b8-6943-4d6a-8eda-36e3ab20865f.jpg\" style=\"width: 373.889px; height: 215.979px;\"></p><p><br></p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: the earth, the sun, distance, El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), equatorial Pacific, Cold tongue, El Niño, La Niña&nbsp;</h3><p><br></p><p>New research led by the University of California, Berkeley has demonstrated that the slight yearly change in the distance between the earth and the sun can largely impact the annual cycle of the cold tongue.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Lead researcher John Chiang, UC Berkeley professor of geography said, \"The curious thing is that the annual cycle from the distance effect is slightly longer than that for tilt -- around 25 minutes, currently -- so over a span of about 11,000 years, the two annual cycles go from being in phase to out of phase, and the net seasonality undergoes a remarkable change, as a result\".</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">The main cause of global weather changes is seasonal change. The Northern and Southern hemispheres are illuminated differently as the earth\'s equator is tilted to the orbit around the sun. When the sun shines overhead in the north, the northern region experiences a warmer climate and the south region experiences a colder climate and vice versa.</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">These yearly changes majorly affect Pacific equatorial trade winds that blow from southeast to northwest across the south and equatorial Pacific. They push surface water westwards. This causes the upwelling of cold water along the equator which creates a tongue of cold surface water that stretches from Ecuador across the Pacific. It occupies almost one-quarter the circumference of the planet. These changes also alter the strength of the trades which in turn, has a major influence on ENSO.&nbsp;</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/2b723156-b51d-4692-877a-aa5052ca6e3e.jpg\" style=\"width: 377.608px; height: 170.91px;\"><br></p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">The occurrence of El Niño or La Niña helps in determining the winter phase for California and the West Coast and rain or drought in the Midwest and parts of Asia. Broccoli, co-director of the Rutgers Climate Institute said, \"In studying past climates, much effort has been dedicated to trying to understand if variability in the tropical Pacific Ocean -- that is, the El Niño/La Niña cycle -- has changed in the past. We chose to focus instead on the yearly cycle of ocean temperatures in the eastern Pacific cold tongue. Our study found that the timing of perihelion -- that is, the point at which the earth is closest to the sun -- has an important influence on climate in the tropical Pacific\".</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Researcher Chiang said, \"The traditional way of thinking about monsoons is that the Northern Hemisphere warms up relative to the Southern Hemisphere, generating winds onto land that bring monsoon rains. But here, we\'re actually talking about east-west, not north-south, temperature differences that cause the winds. The distance effect is operating through the same mechanism as the seasonal monsoon rains, but the wind changes are coming from this east-west monsoon\".</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">The winds generated by the differential heating of the marine and continental hemispheres alter the yearly variation of the easterly trades in the western equatorial Pacific, and thereby the cold tongue. According to the researcher, the current effect of distance on the cold tongue is about one-third the strength of the tilt effect.&nbsp;</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">This research has surely added value to the past research based on the climate/ weather changes caused due to the distance between the sun-earth.</p>','2022-11-11 16:01:45.918135','uploads/news/earthsun.jpg',1,'University of California - Berkeley','New computer simulations have shown that one driver of yearly weather cycles in the equatorial Pacific, specifically in a cold tongue (Cold tongue is referred to as surface waters stretching westward along the equator from the coast of South America) influences the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). This impacts the weather in California and mostly in North America. It also affects global weather.',5,17,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">John C. H. Chiang, Alyssa R. Atwood, Daniel J. Vimont, Paul A. Nicknish, William H. G. Roberts, Clay R. Tabor, Anthony J. Broccoli.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Two annual cycles of the Pacific cold tongue under orbital precession</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Nature</em>, 2022; 611 (7935): 295 DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41586-022-05240-9\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1038/s41586-022-05240-9</a></li></ol>'),(59359,'New technology creates carbon neutral chemicals out of thin air','new-technology-creates-carbon-neutral-chemicals-out-thin-air','2022-11-11 20:10:36.277468','<p><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\">﻿</span>Technology is surprising us every day with new developments. These advancements are just like a miracle. One can never think of it. But today, the heights the technology has reached are unbelievable. As it is said, \"Every day comes with a new opportunity\", the same goes for the technological sector. Each day brings up a new opportunity of inventing unbelievable things.&nbsp;</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: Fossil fuels, carbon-neutral chemicals, CO<sub style=\"font-size: 10.5px;\">2</sub><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\">,&nbsp;</span>DFMs, ﻿﻿reactant</h3><p><br></p><p>In a new research published in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal Nanoscalewas led by the University of Surrey, scientists have developed a new technology that has made it possible to capture carbon dioxide (CO2) from the surrounding atmosphere. It also provides a way to repurpose it into useful chemicals generally made from fossil fuels.&nbsp;</p><p>Fossil fuels have a limited extent. Also, they are not environment-friendly. Considering, recent situations of the environment, it has become necessary to develop sustainable and environment-friendly methods. This new technology of creating carbon-neutral chemicals is one of them. As the creation of the chemicals doesn\'t involve any usage of fossil fuels that emit harmful gases.&nbsp; &nbsp;</p><p><br></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-11/af148def-aba7-4741-b5fb-99b6573c75dc.jpg\" style=\"width: 369.889px; height: 247.076px;\"></p><p><br></p><p>&nbsp;Dr. Melis Duyar, Senior Lecturer of Chemical Engineering at the University of Surrey said, \"Capturing CO<span style=\"font-size: 10.5px; line-height: 0; position: relative; vertical-align: baseline; bottom: -0.25em; border-radius: 0px !important;\">2</span>&nbsp;from the surrounding air and directly converting it into useful products is exactly what we need to approach carbon neutrality in the chemicals sector. This could very well be a milestone in the steps needed for the UK to reach its 2050 net-zero goals. We need to get away from our current thinking on how we produce chemicals, as current practices rely on fossil fuels which are not sustainable. With this technology, we can supply chemicals with a much lower carbon footprint and look at replacing fossil fuels with carbon dioxide and renewable hydrogen as the building blocks of other important chemicals\".<br></p><p>He continued, \"These outcomes are a testament to the research excellence at Surrey, with continuously improving facilities, internal funding schemes, and a collaborative culture\".</p><p>This technology allows scientists to capture CO<sub>2&nbsp;</sub>&nbsp;and transform it into useful chemicals such as carbon monoxide and synthetic natural gas. This can be done in one circular process.</p><p>This technology makes use of patent-pending switchable Dual Function Materials(DFMs). DFMs are referred to as materials composed of a sorbent and a catalytic active component. They offer renewable energy storage. They capture carbon dioxide on their surface and catalyze the conversion of carbon dioxide directly into chemicals. The nature of DFMs is \"switchable\" and it comes from their ability to produce multiple chemicals which depends on the operating conditions or the composition of the added reactant. Thus, it makes the technology answerable to variations in demand for chemicals. It also makes the availability of renewable hydrogen a reactant.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p><p>Loukia-Pantzechroula Merkouri, a Postgraduate student leading this research at the University of Surrey said, \"Not only does this research demonstrate a viable solution to the production of carbon neutral fuels and chemicals, but it also offers an innovative approach to combat the ever-increasing CO<span style=\"font-size: 10.5px; line-height: 0; position: relative; vertical-align: baseline; bottom: -0.25em; border-radius: 0px !important;\">2</span>&nbsp;emissions contributing to global warming\".</p><p>This study has surely added a new branch in the field of technology. It has discovered a new way of creating chemicals with the help of technology.</p>','2022-11-11 20:10:36.277538','uploads/news/co222.jpg',1,'University of Surrey','In a new research published in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal Nanoscalewas led by the University of Surrey, scientists have developed a new technology that has made it possible to capture carbon dioxide (CO2) from the surrounding atmosphere. It also provides a way to repurpose it into useful chemicals generally made from fossil fuels.',5,134,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Loukia-Pantzechroula Merkouri, Tomas Ramirez Reina, Melis S. Duyar.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Feasibility of switchable dual function materials as a flexible technology for CO2 capture and utilisation and evidence of passive direct air capture</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Nanoscale</em>, 2022; 14 (35): 12620 DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/D2NR02688K\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1039/D2NR02688K</a></li></ol>'),(63000,'Whole-brain computation of cognitive versus acoustic errors in music: A mismatch negativity study','whole-brain-computation-of-cognitive-versus-acoustic-errors-in-music-a-mismatch-negativity-study','2022-11-15 16:48:28.475992','<section id=\"sec1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">According to predictive coding theory, an audition is an active process where models of expectations for the incoming sounds are constantly updated based on expectations (also termed priors) when errors occur</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Recent neuroimaging studies provide empirical support for this theory with electroencephalography (EEG) or magnetoencephalography (MEG) recordings of the mismatch negativity (MMN), which indexes early predictive errors of acoustic features (i.e., deviations from prior expectations within the first 120–250&nbsp;ms from the onset of the deviant stimulation)</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. These studies also substantiate the existence of ascending, forward connections in the auditory cortex that convey these prediction errors to higher-order brain areas, signaling the ‘new’ information in external stimuli, and of backward connections from higher-order areas of the auditory cortex to predict the activity of lower-order areas.</span></p><p id=\"p0035\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">However, most studies that have measured the MMN do so for simple acoustic feature errors and analyze only the MEEG sensor signal and parameters: only a minority of MMN studies have provided a clear reconstruction of the neural sources. These studies returned a network of active brain areas that were mainly localized in the auditory cortex and especially in Heschl\'s gyrus and the superior and middle temporal gyri</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Additional, weaker generators of the MMN were localized in the inferior frontal cortex and cingulate gyrus</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies have further confirmed the involvement of the superior temporal gyrus and right inferior and middle frontal gyri in the generation of the MMN</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Taken together, the current literature supports the hypothesis that the auditory cortex is the main generator of the MMN elicited in response to errors of acoustic priors, with frontal generators also involved – perhaps in the process of involuntary “attention switching” and prior updating.</span></p><p id=\"p0040\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Yet the predictive coding theory holds that forward and backward connections should also convey and predict the cognitive features of stimuli beyond their low-level (e.g., acoustic) features</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Within this framework, music listening is a peculiar case, involving the prediction of both lower-level acoustic features using knowledge (priors) accumulated from life-long exposure to all kinds of sounds and, at the same time, music-specific priors based on exposure to a specific musical culture</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Together, these predictions allow us to detect changes and mistakes (e.g., in tonality, harmony, transposition, or rhythm) that make music either interesting and pleasurable or, conversely, boring, and dissonant. However, the brain areas that generate these cognitive prediction errors, and whether they differ from those underlying the MMNs for low-level acoustic features (i.e., by recruiting more frontal sources) are, thus far, open research questions.</span></p><p id=\"p0045\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Despite the rich cognitive information contained in musical sequences, most musical MMN experiments (including the fMRI ones) have used simple auditory oddball paradigms in which the acoustic features inserted in sequences of coherent sounds (e.g., pitch, rhythm, location, timbre) are broken by sudden, infrequent deviant sounds</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. These studies have revealed the automatic predictive processes for sounds that rely on feedforward and backward projects from and to the auditory cortex, but they bear little resemblance to the variety of sounds and features encountered in music. Accordingly, the newer “multi-feature” paradigm </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">introduces a deviation in a single feature into every second sound of a musical pattern, thus allowing for the recording of several prediction errors – including cognitive ones. In one version of this paradigm, six deviants were used (pitch, slide, duration, timbre, location, and intensity), obtaining reliable MMNs for each.&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Similarly, in the latest “MusMelo” version of this paradigm, six deviants are inserted in a loop of one elaborated musical melody</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, crucially including two distinct categories of deviants: cognitive or high-level deviants and acoustic or low-level ones. Cognitive deviants refer to changes in the melodic line (melodic contour) of the melody, altering the meaning of the music since they give rise to a varied version of the original melody. Conversely, acoustic deviants sound merely like “mistakes” during the musical performance without producing any actual change in the melodic line. Hence, the MusMelo paradigm offers a unique possibility of measuring the neural indexes of cognitive versus acoustic priors and their related prediction error signals and locating the subservient neural sources.</span></p><p id=\"p0050\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">To summarize, much is known about the MMN prediction error signal and its neural substrate in the auditory cortex for acoustic features. However, research on the role of frontal MMN generators is still scarce and inhomogeneous. This is particularly true about music perception, which draws so heavily on both acoustic and cognitive features and is dependent on the fast, automatic predictive processes that are indexed by MMN. Related work has been conducted on the early right-anterior negativity (ERAN) which is typically elicited when participants attentively listen and detect chords violating the conventions of Western harmony</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, and which relies on the right homolog of inferno-frontal Broca\'s area and parietal regions. However, such attentive processes would not explain how we can very promptly grasp even abstract, culture-dependent violations of musical conventions without the need of focusing on listening and how an understanding of musical sounds automatically unfolds over time without any conscious effort.</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-15/a4a97047-df01-486a-9596-58424e992d64.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"></p><p id=\"p0055\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In this study, we, therefore, wished to localize the automatic predictive processes throughout the whole brain that are responsible for the fast (120–250&nbsp;ms from the deviant stimulation) generation of error signals during music listening and to determine whether these signals differ when the error is computed against acoustic versus cognitive priors. To this goal, we investigated in a large sample of over 100 participants the neural sources of acoustic versus cognitive errors of musical melodies, as indexed by MMN. We hypothesized to observe stronger frontal MMN generators for cognitive deviants, and increased responses in the auditory cortex to MMNs elicited by acoustic deviants.</span></p><p id=\"p0060\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">We also assessed how the activity in MMN generators was modulated by musical expertise, for both acoustic and cognitive errors. The MMN has been repeatedly connected to cognitive abilities</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, musicianship, musical learning, and musical cognitive abilities</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. For instance, Putkinen and colleagues</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;showed enhanced MMNs in children exposed to musical training, especially for melody modulation, mistuning, and timbre that was not existent before exposure to the musical training. Similarly, Kliuchko and colleagues</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;discovered an overall stronger MMN to timbre, pitch, and slide for jazz compared to classical musicians, non-musicians, and amateurs. Tervaniemi and colleagues&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">showed that MMNs were enhanced for tuning deviants in classical musicians, for timing deviants in classical and jazz musicians, and transposition deviant in jazz musicians</span><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-weight: bolder; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;Moreover, fMRI evidence has consistently demonstrated how musical expertise refines cognitive priors, for instance, allowing musicians to notice subtle harmonic changes and their action-observation areas and higher-order frontal areas to become more activated during mere music listening</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. For all of these reasons, we hypothesized that musical expertise would increase both acoustic and cognitive MMNs at the sites of their generators.</span></p><div><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-15/b039aef7-6c00-4073-94fc-e2501a7e1969.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"><br></div></section><section id=\"sec2\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"></section>','2022-11-15 00:59:56.345130','uploads/news/Mismatch-negativity-MMN-as-a-function-of-.jpg',1,'Neuroimage: Reports','Previous studies have evidenced how the local prediction of physical stimulus features may affect the neural processing of incoming stimuli. Less known are the effects of cognitive priors on predictive processes, and how the brain computes local versus cognitive predictions and their errors. Here, we determined the differential brain mechanisms underlying prediction errors related to high-level, cognitive priors for melody (rhythm, contour) versus low-level, local acoustic priors (tuning, timbre).',6,168,'Science direct'),(64514,'Human-Machine Collaboration in Intelligence Analysis: An Expert Evaluation','human-machine-collaboration-in-intelligence-analysis-an-expert-evaluation','2022-11-15 16:26:34.447399','<p id=\"p0007\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">An intelligence analyst’s job is to construct coherent hypotheses despite significant gaps and inconsistencies in gathering evidence, and present them clearly to decision-makers to inform their interventions</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></p><p id=\"p0008\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Current automated systems to support the day-to-day practice of analysts are (almost) exclusively focused on two aspects of the problem. The first is data collection, aggregation, and visualization</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Such tools help analysts collate, inspect and interact with a large dataset, and support the identification of relationships, for example through link analysis</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Recently, crowdsourcing tools that enable the public to contribute information have also been introduced to integrate more traditional intelligence collection approaches.</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;The second problem on which tools focus involves listing and weighing up alternative hypotheses</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, through automated analysis of competing hypotheses</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. This analysis requires that all alternative hypotheses be identified from available evidence, and, if aided by automated inferential reasoners such as Bayesian networks</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, the tools also require that each (aggregated) piece of evidence is given a weight or a degree of certainty.</span></p><p id=\"p0009\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#2e2e2e\" face=\"Helvetica\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">We observe, however, that there is a gap in technology that supports the process that analysts perform after inspecting the data, and before the identification of hypotheses. The task of the analyst here consistently involves the structuring of evidence&nbsp;to select plausible hypotheses. This is currently done manually, supported only by generic spreadsheets and text-processing tools. The challenge we seek to address in this research is to understand how automated reasoning can best complement human expertise in this evidential reasoning process.</span></font></p><p id=\"p0010\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Experienced analysts currently identify plausible hypotheses using a combination of manual approaches to assess available evidence, establish what information is credible, and understand what additional evidence may be required or what questions to ask to determine plausibility. This activity may be time critical to enable effective situational understanding, which poses significant challenges for individual analysts. The volume and variety of information that analysts must consider are significant, and, evidence may be unreliable or conflicting, with important information missing. Collaboration may be used to provide peer review, share the burden of analysis, and help in the validation of conclusions</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Such collaboration, however, requires analysts to work with a common model and a consistent worldview, which is hard to achieve in the real world.</span></p><p id=\"p0011\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">When data is diverse and comes from different sources, analysts must reason about the reliability of the evidence leading to claims from information such as how, where, when, and by whom the evidence was gathered and analyzed. Cognitive biases may inadvertently be introduced in the process, preventing an analyst from drawing accurate conclusions. This process of interpreting evidence relies heavily on the expertise and training of analysts, and there is a distinct lack of methods to ease the high cognitive burden involved in forming hypotheses. Furthermore, there is a general lack of understanding of how the hypothesis formation process works, as it is not normally recorded, making it difficult for senior analysts to pass on their analytical skills to trainees. The analytical process is also resistant to automation due to the significant knowledge engineering effort required to process data and express reasoning patterns</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></p><p id=\"p0012\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In this paper, we have illustrated how novel AI methods, based on a combination of argumentation theory, crowdsourcing, and provenance reasoning can contribute to improved performance in intelligence analysis. While existing systems care mostly about information presentation and collection</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;we co-designed our software tool — CISpaces — with intelligence analysts to focus on the sensemaking activities around forming hypotheses from available evidence using patterns of defeasible inferences, or&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">argumentation schemes</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Our formal evaluation of CISpaces using the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM)&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;provides evidence that intelligence analysts benefit from the support they receive from the tool in their sensemaking activities.</span></p><p id=\"p0013\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>The contributions of this paper are thus manyfold:</b></span></p><dl class=\"list\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 24px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">•</span></dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0014\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In 3rd section</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, we provide a blueprint for further co-design of artificial intelligence-driven tools, by showing how to govern the process for a successful outcome.</span></p></dd><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">•</span></dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0015\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In&nbsp;</span><a name=\"bsec0010\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667305322000886#sec0010\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Section&nbsp;4</font></span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, we expand on our preliminary conference paper&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">to illustrate the delicate interconnection between the various artificial intelligence techniques utilized and extended to achieve the co-designed objectives. In particular:</span></p><dl class=\"list\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 24px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">•</span></dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0016\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">we advance the engineering of&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">argumentation-based reasoning</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;to identify plausible hypotheses as sets of acceptable arguments;</span></p></dd><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">•</span></dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0017\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">we show how to argue with, and about,&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">crowd-sourced</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;information&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;pre-analyzed using&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Bayesian analysis</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">;</span></p></dd><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">•</span></dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0018\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">we embed&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">provenance</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;analysis&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">in the argumentative process to establish the credibility of hypotheses.</span></p></dd></dl><p></p></dd><dt class=\"list-label\" style=\"margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; float: left; clear: left;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">•</span></dt><dd class=\"list-description\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 0px 24px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0019\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In&nbsp;</span><a name=\"bsec0021\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667305322000886#sec0021\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Section&nbsp;5</font></span></a><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;</span></font><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">we provide empirical evidence that intelligence analysts benefit from the unique mixture of formal argumentation theory, crowdsourcing support, and provenance recording provided in spaces, for the first time, using the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM)&nbsp;</span></span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;in an argumentation-based system.</span></p></dd></dl><p></p><p id=\"p0020\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Our results suggest that the novel, principled AI methods implemented in CISpaces may advance performance in intelligence analysis. Despite having designed CISpaces as a basic research prototype (TRL 3), during their evaluation, analysts benchmarked the quality of its features against commercial systems they use every day: we compare them in Section 6.</span></p><p id=\"p0021\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">We collected evidence suggesting that the AI methods implemented in CISpaces can have a behavioral effect on end users\' intention to adopt spaces. The analysts’ evaluation highlights drawbacks in CISpaces that predominantly result from the interface between the tool and data sources and aspects of the user interface (rather than the underlying AI methods). We, therefore, conclude that for successful adoption by the intelligence analysis community, CISpaces will need data integration with existing organizational standards both for the input and the output of information. These and other engineering and usability aspects, while being essential for commercialization, are beyond the scope of this paper.</span></p><h2 id=\"sctt0004\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Challenges of Intelligence Analysis:</b></span></h2><p id=\"p0022\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Intelligence analysis is the application of individual and collective cognitive methods to evaluate, integrate, and interpret information about situations and events, aiming to provide a warning regarding potential threats or to identify opportunities</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Various types of intelligence can be distinguished based on the source. HUMINT (human intelligence), for example, is intelligence gathered from human sources. IMINT (imagery intelligence) is derived from image or video sources. OSINT (open source intelligence) is acquired from sources such as social media&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">and more recent types of intelligence include for example crowdsourced intelligence, made up of structured information acquired from or volunteered by the general public</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Analysts often specialize in a specific type of intelligence and may be focused on particular objectives (e.g., tracking activities of a criminal organization). In the military context, strategic analysts focus on studying the long-term objectives and intentions of foreign actors, while operational and tactical analysts are focused on supporting specific actions or providing timely responses to emerging situations.&nbsp;</span></p><p id=\"p0022\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">model of intelligence analysis is one of the most influential in training and practice. It consists of two high-level iterative loops:&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">foraging</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;for&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">information</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;which is collected, filtered, and collated into&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">evidence files</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">; and&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">sensemaking</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, where the evidence files are interpreted through logical reasoning by drawing inferences and identifying&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">hypotheses</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, which are then brought together to form a coherent explanation of the situation. A sketch of this process is shown within the box at the top of below figure no.1</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The top row represents general features that characterize or influence the reasoning process during analysis. The other rows in this figure&nbsp;represent concepts related to different dimensions of intelligence analysis corresponding to a specific phase of analysis represented by the curly bracket in the column. More generally, this figure&nbsp;provides a reference for the components and challenges which inform the remainder of our discussion and are ordered according to the topics covered in this Section.</span></p><p id=\"p0022\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-15/b0e4535f-d926-4de2-aac6-9f0c9ad54fb7.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p>','2022-11-15 20:49:21.835482','uploads/news/logo.jpg',1,'Intelligent Systems with Applications','In this paper we illustrate how novel AI methods can improve the performance of intelligence analysts. These analysts aim to make sense of — often conflicting or incomplete — information, weighing up competing hypotheses which serve to explain an observed situation. Analysts have access to numerous visual analytic tools which support the temporal and/or conceptual structuring of information and collection, and support the evaluation of alternative hypotheses. We believe however that there are currently no tools or methods which allow analysts to combine the recording and interpretation of information, and that there is little understanding about how software tools can facilitate the hypothesis formation process',6,168,'Science direct'),(64521,'Climate change strikes: Lightning patterns change with global warming','climate-change-strikes-lightning-patterns-change-global-warming','2022-11-15 15:24:09.525974','<p>Nowadays, the environment is dealing with numerous issues. These issues are adversely affecting our environment. Now, new research has shown that climate change could change lightning patterns across Europe.</p><p><br></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-15/5df55b2f-776d-4c4e-be35-eb602bdad4ef.jpg\" style=\"width: 409.37px; height: 230.059px;\">&nbsp; &nbsp;</p><p><br></p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>:&nbsp; environment, changing weather, climate change, lightning patterns&nbsp;</h3><p><br></p><p>This study was led by Newcastle University and Met Office and is published in the journal Environmental Research Letters. This study finds that there could be a picture of changing weather patterns which includes:</p><ul><li>Frequent storms with more energy, but locally less lightning. It is mainly due to less cloud ice and frozen particles in storm clouds, with warming<br></li><li>More lightning at high altitudes&nbsp; also including over the Alps</li><li>Less lightning on lower terrain in central Europe and over the sea- subject to less certain circulation changes.</li></ul><p>The researchers found that these changes could increase the risk of wildfires over the mountains and in Northern Europe.</p><p>Lead author of the study, Dr. Abdullah Kahraman, Senior Researcher in Severe Weather and Climate Change, School of Engineering, Newcastle University and Visiting Scientist -- Understanding Regional Climate Change (URCC), Met Office Hadley Centre, said, \"While more frequent lightning strikes over mountains and in Northern Europe might trigger more wildfires in higher level forests, we are going to see relatively fewer lightning hazards over more populated areas of Central Europe\".</p><p>The latest Met Office climate simulations with the highest local details in meteorological and topographical features are down to 2km. Unlike previous studies, it detailed individual thunderstorms and their crucial processes that resulted in lightning being simulated across Europe.&nbsp;</p><p>Professor Lizzie Kendon, Met Office Science Fellow, and co-author on the paper said, \"These new very high-resolution climate projections, which have a resolution on a par with weather forecast models, are providing new insights into future changes in convective storms and their associated hazards -- such as heavy downpours, lightning, hail and wind gusts. Changes in lighting in this study are in contrast with previous studies. This shows us that representing the fundamental physical processes within storms themselves is important and can lead to future changes that are even of the opposite sign\".</p><p>Study co-author, Professor Hayley Fowler, Professor of Climate Change Impacts, Newcastle University School of Engineering said, \"This is just more bad news for critical national infrastructure in northern Europe, after the damning report \'Readiness for storms ahead? Critical national infrastructure in an age of climate change by the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy last week. Our paper has highlighted new risks from increases in lightning, previously unknown, which will require increased investment in climate adaptation measures. Further analysis is needed of the potential impact of these increases in lightning on energy and other critical infrastructure systems to enable policies and measures to be produced that are locally- and sector-relevant for adaptation planning\".</p><p>This research is one possible realization of an unmitigated future climate i.e. RCP8.5 scenario. It also shows that uncertainties exist especially in terms of circulation changes.</p><p><br></p>','2022-11-15 15:24:09.526020','uploads/news/lightning1.jpg',1,'Newcastle University','Nowadays, the environment is dealing with numerous issues. These issues are adversely affecting our environment. Now, new research has shown that climate change could change lightning patterns across Europe.',5,17,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Abdullah Kahraman, Elizabeth J Kendon, Hayley J Fowler, Jonathan M Wilkinson.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Contrasting future lightning stories across Europe</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Environmental Research Letters</em>, 2022; 17 (11): 114023 DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac9b78\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1088/1748-9326/ac9b78</a></li></ol>'),(64916,'Cracking the chemical code on how iodine helps in forming clouds','cracking-chemical-code-how-iodine-helps-forming-clouds','2022-11-15 16:50:30.871292','<p>Iodine is a highly reactive element. It forms radial species that undergo rapid chemical reactions in the atmosphere. Most of the iodine found in the atmosphere comes from the ocean. It exists as iodide in the oceans, also present in table salt. Atmospheric iodine is increasing on a global level. The current levels have reached three times more than those were in past 70 years.&nbsp;</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: Iodine, CLOUD, atmosphere, iodide, sea ice, cloud cover</h3><p>New research published in the journal Nature Chemistry was conducted at the world\'s largest particle physics laboratory, the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) was the first time that any experiment demonstrated the gas-phase form of iodine that is known as iodic acid. The research also suggests the catalytic role of iodine in atmospheric particle formation.</p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-15/dcad45be-e0e7-4f51-ae25-6e6d0f239b8a.webp\" style=\"width: 346.28px; height: 194.924px;\"><br></p><p>Researchers hope that this new knowledge on iodine\'s atmospheric interactions can apply to global atmospheric and climate models to help scientists for a better understanding of its environmental impacts such as increased cloud cover, which could exacerbate global warming-related thinning of Arctic sea ice.</p><p>An experiment known as&nbsp; CLOUD (Cosmics Leaving Outdoor Droplets) has become the world\'s leading laboratory experiment for studying the remaining poorly understood aspects of aerosol and cloud formation.</p><p>Rainer Volkamer, co-lead author on the paper, professor of chemistry at CU Boulder, and fellow at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) said, \"This is the only such experiment that exists in the world. It\'s an honor to be part of the collaboration and to be leading it in the context of a study like this one\".</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">In the CLOUD chamber at CERN, the researchers accessed a laboratory environment with perfect control over conditions like temperature, pressure, humidity, ozone concentration, and iodine concentration. They also accessed different light sources resembling different aspects of the solar spectrum. By setting up this artificial, indoor atmosphere that has the possibility of certain reactions to happen or not. Through this, scientists could accurately gather data on iodine chemical reactions that lead to forming and growth of particles.</p><p>Theo Kurten, co-lead author of the study and professor of chemistry at the University of Helsinki said, \"This is a great example of experiments and computations coming together to answer a question that neither of them could have answered on their own\".</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Iodine doesn\'t need the help of other molecules (known as \"bases\") to form atmospheric particles like other elements such as sulfur (or sulfuric acid). Researchers also found that it is quite efficient at this process compared to other elements. Thus, the formation of particles from iodic acid is not only limited to coastal iodine hot spots or locations where the chemical bases are available but also can occur throughout the atmosphere.</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Henning Finkenzeller, the first author of the study, a part of his dissertation at CU Boulder said, \"It\'s a global phenomenon, and the global significance of iodine in particle formation may be bigger than currently thought\".</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\"></p><div class=\"impact-unit-wrapper\" style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important; margin: 25px 5px 25px 0px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-color: initial;\"><div class=\"pgs-dpg-card\" data-pgs-partner-id=\"sciencedaily\" data-loaded=\"true\" widget-loading=\"true\" style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important;\"></div></div><p></p><div id=\"text\" style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-color: initial;\"><p style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important; margin: 0px 0px 10px;\">Human activities increase the availability of iodine in the atmosphere. Due to the negative impacts on air quality, the impacts of these short-lived elements may be long-lasting. As sea ice melts in the Arctic, more iodine enters the atmosphere. This leads to increase cloud cover and enhance warming effects on the region. In tropic regions, storms can send iodine high into the atmosphere, impacting the protective ozone layer.</p><p style=\"box-sizing: border-box; border-radius: 0px !important; margin: 0px 0px 10px;\">Researcher Volkamer said, \"We still need to better understand iodine recycling chemistry. But now that we understand the source mechanism, we are one step closer to understanding how excess iodine impacts particle formation, clouds, and ozone recovery in our planet\'s atmosphere\".</p></div>','2022-11-15 16:50:30.871339','uploads/news/cloud1.jpg',1,'University of Colorado at Boulder','New research published in the journal Nature Chemistry was conducted at the world\'s largest particle physics laboratory, the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) was the first time that any experiment demonstrated the gas-phase form of iodine that is known as iodic acid. The research also suggests the catalytic role of iodine in atmospheric particle formation.',5,24,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Henning Finkenzeller, Siddharth Iyer, Xu-Cheng He, Mario Simon, Theodore K. Koenig, Christopher F. Lee, Rashid Valiev, Victoria Hofbauer, Antonio Amorim, Rima Baalbaki, Andrea Baccarini, Lisa Beck, David M. Bell, Lucía Caudillo, Dexian Chen, Randall Chiu, Biwu Chu, Lubna Dada, Jonathan Duplissy, Martin Heinritzi, Deniz Kemppainen, Changhyuk Kim, Jordan Krechmer, Andreas Kürten, Alexandr Kvashnin, Houssni Lamkaddam, Chuan Ping Lee, Katrianne Lehtipalo, Zijun Li, Vladimir Makhmutov, Hanna E. Manninen, Guillaume Marie, Ruby Marten, Roy L. Mauldin, Bernhard Mentler, Tatjana Müller, Tuukka Petäjä, Maxim Philippov, Ananth Ranjithkumar, Birte Rörup, Jiali Shen, Dominik Stolzenburg, Christian Tauber, Yee Jun Tham, António Tomé, Miguel Vazquez-Pufleau, Andrea C. Wagner, Dongyu S. Wang, Mingyi Wang, Yonghong Wang, Stefan K. Weber, Wei Nie, Yusheng Wu, Mao Xiao, Qing Ye, Marcel Zauner-Wieczorek, Armin Hansel, Urs Baltensperger, Jérome Brioude, Joachim Curtius, Neil M. Donahue, Imad El Haddad, Richard C. Flagan, Markku Kulmala, Jasper Kirkby, Mikko Sipilä, Douglas R. Worsnop, Theo Kurten, Matti Rissanen, Rainer Volkamer.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">The gas-phase formation mechanism of iodic acid as an atmospheric aerosol source</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Nature Chemistry</em>, 2022; DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41557-022-01067-z\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1038/s41557-022-01067-z</a></li></ol>'),(65099,'The efficacy of today\'s American political culture in closing the achievement gap','the-efficacy-of-todays-american-political-culture-in-closing-the-achievement-gap','2022-11-16 13:14:28.939362','<p><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">More than a half-century ago, Daniel Elazar advanced a typology of three types of American political culture by linking historical migrations and religious preferences of people to distinctive locations in the United States. The current study presents an alternative empirical measure of a political culture based on county-level Presidential election voting results and explores its potential to distinguish local education systems effectively closing the achievement gap between students economically disadvantaged and their more affluent peers. The results support the theoretical premise that today\'s American political culture, defined by county-level voters sharing a distinct political ideology, becomes expressed in local educational policies and practices and thereby, affects students\' academic success. Implications of the findings and directions for future research are discussed.</span><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-16/8f8f7ad4-9e3a-43e3-bbf2-7a56b24de14f.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"></p><p id=\"p0010\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">More than a half-century ago, Daniel&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">advanced a typology of three types of American political culture by linking historical migrations and religious preferences of people to distinctive locations in the United States. These three political cultures were individualistic, moralistic, and traditionalistic. According to Elazar, the individualistic political culture extended the concept of the marketplace into the public sphere as the most effective mechanism to respond to diverse public demands. As a result, it limited the role of government in improving the economy to keep the marketplace available for private use. This businesslike conception of politics placed a premium on limiting community intervention in private activities and restricted government action to only those areas encouraging private initiative</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The individualistic political culture regions consisted of the middle-Atlantic states, the Midwest, and the Mountain States. the&nbsp;</span></p><p id=\"p0015\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In the moralistic political culture, the government was viewed as isolated from typical influence and thereby served the common good, dying the virtues of the society and committed to the welfare of the citizens</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. In doing so, the main role of the government was to promote the public\'s welfare with an emphasis on equity, especially at the local level in areas of social issues, economics, and politics</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The common citizen was regarded as the primary political actor and wide political participation was encouraged as a duty to perform</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The moralistic political culture regions consisted of New England, the Great Lakes region, and the West Coast.</span></p><p id=\"p0020\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Based on the unique history of the South, the traditionalistic political culture was distinctly elitist where government activism took place to protect existing power structures and maintain the prevailing social order</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. To do so, mass democratic participation was discouraged, and bureaucracies held little indecent dent power. This resulted in limiting the government to maintaining traditional social patterns and minimally accommodating those patterns to changing times. Thus, elites primarily determined public policies and actions, and political participation was very narrow with restricted grassroots-level governance</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The traditionalistic political culture regions were isolated mainly to the South and Southwest states of the US.</span></p><p id=\"p0025\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Due to the advent of large-scale data collections over the last two decades, the current study advances an alternative model of political culture more aligned with changes in Am1960s society and politics since the 1960s when Elazar first proposed his political culture typology.</span></p><section id=\"sec1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px;\"><h2 id=\"sectitle0020\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Background</b></span></h2><p id=\"p0030\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">After its initial publication, Ira</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;closely examined Elazar\'s political culture theory and concluded the theoretical construct was suitable for exploring the variety of public policies and practices found in American state and local government. Soon after, a generation of new research began suggesting Elazar\'s regional political cultures resulted in consequences for political behavior and governance across the United States</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Within the context of public education, for example, researchers found differences by Elazar\'s typology in terms of state rules over control of local schools,</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;curricular programs and types of student testing</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, state per pupil spending</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, support for school choice</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, and setting teacher certification standards.</span></p><p id=\"p0035\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In these and other studies at the time, researchers demonstrated Elazar\'s typology was useful in understanding the specific policy mechanisms stakeholders employed to pursue select education policies</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The findings also added to the durability of Elazar\'s landmark insights because—despite the apparent efficacy of Elazar\'s typology in research—it also drew criticism. Mainly, he did not base the proposed political culture theory on any rigorous statistical procedures or empirical data, but rather on ideas from personal impressionistic observations.</span></p><p id=\"p0040\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Even so, Elazar\'s typology may now be questionable for other reasons. Culture is not static but evolves as participants encounter others from diverse 1960ses</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Since the 1960s—when Elazar first presented his theory—America has become increasingly private, mobile, Hispanic, fundamentalist Protestant, racial/ethnic integrated, and worldwide way of information on the worldwide net</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. This implies Elazar\'s political culture typology—based on historical migrations and religious preferences of people linked to distinctive regions in the United States—may be less applicable in today\'s American society due to these changes in social capital, media and communication, mobility, immigration, and religion.</span></p><section id=\"sec1.1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h3 id=\"sectitle0025\" class=\"u-h4 u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Current study</b></span></h3><p id=\"p0045\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Rather than using Elazar\'s topology for the reasons given, the current study presents s an alternative empirical measure of a political culture based on county-level Presidential election voting results and explores its potential to distinguish local education systems effectively closing the achievement gap between students who economically disadvantaged, and their more affluent peers.</span></p><p id=\"p0050\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Imagine political culture on a continuum representing the dominant ideologies of the two major American political parties—Democrats and Republicans (hereinafter referred to as “GOP”, an abbreviation for “Grand Old Party”). While political culture refers to the sred political beliefs common across society about how government should function and its guiding principles,&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;describe political ideology is a set of beliefs among members in a group about the proper order of society, and how to achieve the expected social order. In other words, political culture is something we share, while political ideology is something we use to define ourselves and make political decisions.</span></p><p id=\"p0055\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">In the current study, I define political culture within the context of political ideology because among the most important narratives to emerge within American politics in the last twenty years is partisan-ideological sorting—a process whereby ideology increasingly aligns with political identoward Conservatives have gravitated towards the GOP, liberals towards the Democratic Party, resulting in political parties where partisans are now more ideologically aligned with each other than in prior decades.</span></p><p id=\"p0060\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">American political ideology varies on a left-to-right continuum, liberal-to-conservative, respectively</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. My political culture continuum also varies on the left-to-right continuum, based on county-level Presidential election voting results for Democrats and GOP candidates. People\'s thoughts, attitudes, and behaviors are strongly influenced by the ideological groups they identify with</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Likewise, the theoretical premise proposed in the current study is that today\'s American political culture, defined by county-level voters sharing a distinct political ideology, becomes expressed in local educational policies and practices and thereby, affects students\' academic success.</span></p><p id=\"p0065\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><a name=\"bbib33\" href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590291122001218#bib33\" class=\"workspace-trigger\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Valant and Newark\'s 2016</font></span></a><font color=\"#0c7dbb\">&nbsp;</font><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">research findings indicated Americans are more concerned about and supportive of initiatives for closing poor-wealthy achievement gaps than race- or ethnicity-based gaps, i.e., Black-White or Hispanic-White, res, respectively. Thus, for the current study, the achievement of and between students economically disadvantaged and their more affluent peers are the outcomes of the main effects for analysis. The next sections outline the method and results from the analysis, followed by a discussion of the findings and conclusions.</span></p><p id=\"p0065\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><br></p><h2 id=\"sectitle0030\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>&nbsp;Method</b></span></h2><p id=\"p0065\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"></p><section id=\"sec2.2\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"></section><p style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46);\"></p><section id=\"sec2.1\" style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; display: block; font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-color: initial;\"><h3 id=\"sectitle0035\" class=\"u-h4 u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"box-sizing: border-box; margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><b><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Data sources</span></b></h3><p id=\"p0070\" style=\"font-weight: 400; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">A primary data source for the current study was the County Presidential Election Returns 2000–2020 file available from </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;MIT</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The data file record layout included the following per election year: the county\'s name, state, candidate name and party affiliation (e.g., Democrat), and the certified number of votes cast in the county for the candidate. Thus, each county per election year consisted of multiple records, one per candidate.</span></p><p id=\"p0075\" style=\"font-weight: 400; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The Stanford Education Data Archive 4.0 (SEDA) was another primary data source for the current study</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Maintained by Stanford University\'s Center for Education Policy Analysis, the SEDA provided achievement measures in math and reading language arts (RLA) from 2009 to 2018 for students in grades 3 through 8 for almost all schools in the United States</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The school data came from the annual tests administered by each state and commonly reported as numbers of students in each school or district meeting various performance levels on a state\'s standardized tests. SEDA researchers converted these frequencies to means and standard deviations for the scores in each school or district using a Heteroskedastic Ordered Probit model</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. They then linked the means and standard deviations from the model to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) to standardize the average achievement estimates on a common scale within each grade–year–subject. Their scaling implies all the estimates produced were in standard deviation units relative to the NAEP national average</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Thus, a positive estimate defined an achievement score above the national average while a negative estimate defined an achievement score below the national average.</span></p><p id=\"p0080\" style=\"font-weight: 400; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Another SEDA data file I used in the current study consisted of covariate measures aggregated at the county level. The data included the percentage of schools in rural, town, suburban, and urban city settings, the percentage of students economically disadvantaged, and the percentage of students on free and reduced lunch. Based on American Community Survey data, SEDA researchers also provided a county-level measure of social-economic status (SES) constructed from median family income, the proportion of adults with a bachelor\'s degree or higher, the proportion of adults unemployed, the household poverty rate, the proportion of households receiving Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, and the proportion of households with children headed by a single mother</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">.</span></p></section></section></section>','2022-11-15 22:41:22.186788','uploads/news/th_10.jpeg',1,'Social Sciences & Humanities Open','More than a half century ago, Daniel Elazar advanced a typology of three types of American political culture by linking historical migrations and religious preferences of people to distinctive locations in the United States. The current study presents an alternative empirical measure of political culture based on county-level Presidential election voting results and explores its potential to distinguish local education systems effectively closing the achievement gap between students economically disadvantaged and their more affluent peers. The results support the theoretical premise that today\'s American political culture, defined by county-level voters sharing a distinct political ideology, becomes expressed in local educational policies and practices and thereby, affects students\' academic success.',6,168,'<p>science direct</p><p><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590291122001218\" target=\"_blank\">https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590291122001218</a></p>'),(65169,'Exploring the routine vaccination experience of Australian autistic children and their families: A qualitative study','exploring-the-routine-vaccination-experience-of-australian-autistic-children-and-their-families-a-qualitative-study','2022-11-16 03:31:13.580976','<section id=\"sec1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0035\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Childhood vaccines reduce mortality and morbidity rates and decrease healthcare costs through the prevention of vaccine-preventable diseases</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. However, research suggests that children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), hereafter referred to as ‘autism’, a neurodevelopmental condition affecting between 1 and 4% of the population in Australia</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, are less likely to be fully vaccinated than children without an autism diagnosis</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Vaccine uptake in younger siblings of autistic children has also been shown to be lower than amongst the general population.</span></p><p id=\"p0040\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Vaccine hesitancy may be one potential reason for lower vaccine coverage in this population. A key contributor has been the perceived link between autism and the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccination which has been falsely propagated since Wakefield\'s flawed and subsequently retracted study in the&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Lancet</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Despite no supportive evidence of a causative link, Wakefield\'s study has continued to impact caregivers\' vaccine decision-making through fear of causing autism. Two studies, conducted around the time the&nbsp;</span><em style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Lancet</span></em><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;study was retracted in 2010, found that belief in a vaccine-autism link was a strongly influential factor in caregivers\' decisions to delay or not vaccinate their autistic child or their child\'s siblings, once the autism diagnosis was made</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. In a more recent study, caregivers of autistic children were more likely to be influenced by the idea of a vaccine-autism link compared to caregivers of children without an autism diagnosis, despite conveying knowledge of a lack of evidence to support a link</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Recent research from Australia found that caregivers\' perceptions of a vaccine-autism link no longer impacted vaccine compliance in the general population</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. However, whether or not this shift extends to caregivers of autistic children in an Australian context has not yet been studied. Because most autistic children are diagnosed with autism at around 4 years of age</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, well after their 12- and 18-month MMR vaccines are due in Australia, this concern may be more reflected in caregivers\' decisions about vaccinating their autistic child\'s younger siblings. It may also affect their decisions about adolescent, influenza, or COVID-19 vaccines for their autistic child.</span></p><p id=\"p0045\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Apart from vaccine hesitancy, under- or non-vaccination of autistic children may be due to other personal or environmental factors. Challenges include autistic social communication and sensory processing differences compounded by unfamiliar expectations, strong sensory stimuli, and potentially painful experiences in healthcare settings</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. Autistic children and adolescents also present with a high prevalence of anxiety disorders</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, particularly specific phobias and medically related fears&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">likely to influence the vaccination experience. Caregivers\' concerns relating to their child\'s distress when receiving vaccinations in the general population have been documented before</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">, as well as behavioral and emotional challenges faced by children with disabilities in special schools</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. However, there is currently a limited understanding of the impact of autistic children\'s sensory challenges, behavior, distress, and anxiety on caregivers\' decisions to vaccinate their autistic children.</span></p><p id=\"p0050\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Our study aimed to explore the views and experiences regarding childhood and adolescent vaccination among caregivers of autistic children in Australia using a qualitative research approach. These data will (a) improve the understanding of the factors that impact vaccine decision-making and the vaccination experiences for autistic children and their families and (b) identify child- and family-centered strategies to improve vaccine uptake in this population.</span></p></section><section id=\"sec2\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h2 id=\"sectitle0025\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;<b>Methods</b></span></h2><section id=\"sec2.1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h3 id=\"sectitle0030\" class=\"u-h4 u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Study setting and participants</b></span></h3><ul><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">This study is part of a larger mixed methods study called Measuring Immunisation in NeuroDiverse populations (MIND). </span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The MIND study aimed to assess vaccine hesitancy and uptake in families of children with autism, Down syndrome, and children in the general population with no developmental concerns. Participants were recruited between May 2020 and May 2021 through social media and online autism and Down syndrome support networks.</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">All participants were eligible to take part in the MIND study if they were caregivers of an autistic child or a child with Down syndrome under 18 years and lived in Australia. Interested participants were invited to complete an online survey to assess their views on vaccination and factors that may affect their decisions about vaccinating their children.</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Participants for this study were selected from a subsample of 65 caregivers who completed the MIND survey in the autism cohort and provided optional consent to be contacted to take part in a qualitative interview to further explore their vaccine decision-making and experiences. The 65 participants were sampled according to the age of the eldest autistic child, the child\'s autism severity (mild, moderate, or severe, according to caregiver self-report in the survey), sibling composition, caregiver socio-economic status and childhood vaccination practices (i.e. whether caregivers chose to vaccinate, delay or not vaccinate their child).</span></li><li style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"> We applied a purposive maximum variation sampling technique&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">to support the heterogeneity of the sample and an understanding of vaccination experiences among a range of families. Recruitment continued until no new relevant information was arising during subsequent participant interviews.</span></li></ul><p style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><b><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span>&nbsp;Procedure</b></p></section><section id=\"sec2.2\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><p id=\"p0065\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The first author (KL, female autistic research assistant, BSc GradDipPsych, with a background in psychology research) and last author (JK, female research fellow, Ph.D. public health with a background in vaccine acceptance and communication research) completed recruitment and data collection remotely in July and August 2021. Initial recruitment phone calls were made to introduce the study and invite participants to take part in the interview. Participants who agreed to take part were emailed a Plain Language Statement and Consent Form and provided their written consent before the interview. Participant demographic information was obtained from the MIND survey data once written consent was obtained. Interviews took place via phone call or video conference call according to participant preference and lasted approximately 30–45&nbsp;​min. Remote interviews afforded the capture of rich data from the inclusion of participants from a national sample, as well as increased flexibility to schedule and reschedule interviews.</span></p><p id=\"p0070\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The first author and last author developed and applied a semi-structured interview guide&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">that steered participants to speak about key topics of research interest while also allowing participants the space to explore their personal experiences and generate novel insights about the research topic</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. To begin the interview, participants were asked to provide additional demographic information not captured in the original MIND survey, including state of residence, the child\'s sibling composition, and the child\'s current educational setting. To prompt discussion, participants were asked to describe their journey to obtaining a diagnosis of autism for their child. Participants were then asked questions about their perceptions of childhood vaccinations, their prior experiences vaccinating their autistic child as well as their considerations for future vaccinations and for vaccinating their child\'s siblings. For participants who had more than one autistic child (n&nbsp;​=&nbsp;​7), participants were provided the opportunity to share the vaccination experiences of their other autistic children. All participants received a $10 gift card as a recognition of their time. Interviews were audio-recorded and interviewers wrote notes following each interview to reflect on salient ideas.</span></p></section><section id=\"sec2.3\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h3 id=\"sectitle0040\" class=\"u-h4 u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>&nbsp;Data analysis</b></span></h3><p id=\"p0075\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">All interviews were deidentified and professionally transcribed. A reflexive approach was applied throughout the study whereby the first author and last author regularly met to discuss their own experience, attitudes, and knowledge about autism. These discussions occurred in the context of planning the study, discussing the interview process, coding, and analysis, and acknowledging the active role of researchers in interpreting the data</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">. The interview data were analyzed in an inductive way&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">to capture new and current local knowledge through participants’ exploration and elaboration of key concepts relevant to their unique views and experiences vaccinating their autistic children.</span></p><p id=\"p0080\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The first author checked the accuracy of all transcripts by comparing them with audio-recorded interviews. Transcripts were imported into the software program NVivo 12 </span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">for storage and organization. Thematic analysis was conducted using the&nbsp;</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">six-phase framework to identify key patterns in the data. During phases one and two, the first author read and re-read transcripts and coded data in NVivo 12. During phase three, the first author organised all codes into initial themes and sub-themes. In phases four and five, the first and last authors met to review and refine the initial themes and sub-themes, then defined and named themes representing a unique and discrete aspect of the data while relating to, but not overlapping with, other themes. In phase six, the first author wrote up and reviewed the final themes to check for logical connection. Final themes and sub-themes were reviewed by all authors. Quotes from participants, corrected for grammar, are included to illustrate sub-themes. The symbol ^ on participant numbers indicates caregivers who had more than one autistic child.</span></p></section><section id=\"sec2.4\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px;\"><h3 id=\"sectitle0045\" class=\"u-h4 u-margin-m-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); margin-top: 24px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1rem !important; line-height: 1.4 !important;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><b>Ethical considerations</b></span></h3><p id=\"p0085\" style=\"margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">The study received ethical approval from the Royal Children\'s Hospital Ethics Committee (reference number HREC59840).</span></p><h2 id=\"sectitle0050\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><b><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Results:</span></b></h2><h2 id=\"sectitle0050\" class=\"u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; margin-top: 32px !important; margin-bottom: 8px !important; font-size: 1.2rem !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-16/548dce0b-cb59-4e7c-9fc3-031cc44ea8fa.png\" style=\"width: 100%;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px;\">&nbsp;(</span><span style=\"color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-size: 12px; font-family: Helvetica;\">Key themes and subthemes related to the routine vaccination experience of autistic children and their families.)</span><b><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></b></h2></section></section>','2022-11-15 22:43:40.826662','uploads/news/logo.jpg',1,'SSM - Qualitative Research in Health','According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Survey of Disability, Ageing and Carers (SDAC), an estimated 164,000 Australians had autism in 2015 (see also Box 1). This represented an overall prevalence rate of 0.7%, or about 1 in 150 people. The number of people with autism in Australia has increased considerably in recent years.....',6,168,'Science direct'),(65735,'Dams could play a big role in feeding the world more sustainability','dams-could-play-big-role-feeding-world-more-sustainability','2022-11-16 17:00:33.476019','<p>Water is a basic need of humans. It ensures the proper survival of humans. The future has no predictions. So, it is very necessary to preserve water so that future generations will not suffer from the problems of water scarcity.</p><p><br></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-16/0a6d5b2b-3a2c-406a-9308-1267de80d5a3.jpg\" style=\"width: 301.632px; height: 201.882px;\">&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;</p><p><br></p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: water storage, irrigation, dams, hydrological cycles, sustainable irrigation</h3><p><br></p><p>The study published in PNAS shows what would be the requirements of water storage for maximizing crop irrigation. It ensures this without depleting water stocks or encroaching on nature. It also shows how many people could feed by this approach. According to researchers, the dam reservoirs could be used for storing more than 50% of the water required for irrigation. They also recommended alternatives for building new dams considering the damaging impacts on river ecosystems.</p><p>Lead author Rafael Schmitt, a research engineer with the Stanford Natural Capital Project said, \"There is an urgent need to explore alternative water storage solutions, but we have to acknowledge that many dams are already in place. Our research illuminates their crucial role in ensuring food security in the future\".</p><p>In many parts of the world, typical irrigation practices result in various issues such as</p><ul><li>Depletion and pollution of water resources.</li><li>Damaging natural landscapes.</li><li>Generating one-fourth of total greenhouse gas emissions.&nbsp;</li></ul><p>Two-thirds of the total cropland depends upon rainfall. Thus, they make use of non-sustainable resources such as non-renewable groundwater for making up for the absence of rainfall.</p><p>In this research, the researchers analyzed the amount of freshwater generated in surface and groundwater bodies and renewed by natural hydrological cycles. They also analyzed the water demands of current crop mixes on irrigated and rainfed lands. According to the estimation made by the researchers, the full potential of storage-fed irrigation is capable to feed about 1.15 billion people. Considering that all the 3,700 potential dams that have been mapped for their hydropower potential were partially used for irrigation.&nbsp;</p><p>The world\'s dams are capable of supplying enough water storage to irrigate crops for about 641 million people or 55% of the total. Apart from the potential of the dams, researchers caution against relying upon them as an approach to a sustainable irrigation solution. Adverse impacts of dams on the river ecosystem include:</p><ul><li>Fragmentation of rivers</li><li>&nbsp;Impacts on fish migration and sediment transport</li><li>Displacement of people</li><li>Water loss</li><li>Expense</li><li>Ecological damage</li><li>Higher levels of evaporation</li></ul><p>Alternative solutions for this include:</p><ul><li>Water harvesting with small dams</li><li>Recharging groundwater systems with excess surface water from winter storms or spring snowmelt</li><li>Better management of soil moisture on farm fields<br></li></ul><p>These alternatives require less conveyance infrastructure. Also, they lose less water in the evaporation process. They also create co-benefits for local communities and wildlife. Researchers also highlight that the demand for stored water can be reduced by using better irrigation techniques or adopting crops that are better aligned with water availability.</p><p>Study senior author Gretchen Daily, co-founder and faculty director of the Stanford Natural Capital Project said, \"Nutritional security is a core challenge for sustainable human development. Our study highlights the urgent need and opportunity for nature-positive investments into irrigation and water management to reduce harmful impacts of agriculture while supporting other vital benefits of farmland and freshwater ecosystems\".</p>','2022-11-16 17:00:33.476063','uploads/news/dam1.jpg',1,'Stanford University','The study published in PNAS shows what would be the requirements of water storage for maximizing crop irrigation. It ensures this without depleting water stocks or encroaching on nature. It also shows how many people could feed by this approach. According to researchers, the dam reservoirs could be used for storing more than 50% of the water required for irrigation. They also recommended alternatives for building new dams considering the damaging impacts on river ecosystems.',5,18,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Rafael J. P. Schmitt, Lorenzo Rosa, Gretchen C. Daily.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Global expansion of sustainable irrigation limited by water storage</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</em>, 2022; 119 (47) DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2214291119\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1073/pnas.2214291119</a></li></ol>'),(65736,'AI transforms smartwatch ECG signals into a diagnostic tool for heart failure','ai-transforms-smartwatch-ecg-signals-diagnostic-tool-heart-failure','2022-11-16 20:23:10.218969','<p>Technology is at new heights each day. A study published in&nbsp;<span style=\"font-size: 14px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Nature Medicine showed the ability of a smartwatch ECG to detect accurate heart failure specifically in the non-clinical environment.&nbsp;</span></p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: AI, ECG, heart pump, diagnosis, single-lead ECGs, low ejection fraction</h3><p><br></p><p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Researchers applied AI to Apple watch ECG recordings for identifying patients with weak heart pumps. The participants involved in the study recorded their smartwatch ECGs wherever and whenever they wanted. Periodically, the participants uploaded the ECGs to their health records securely via a smartphone app by Mayo Clinic for Digital Health.</span></p><p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Dr. Paul Friedman the senior author of the study, M.D., chair of the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine at Mayo Clinic in Rochester said, \"Currently, we diagnose ventricular dysfunction -- a weak heart pump -- through an echocardiogram, CT scan or an MRI, but these are expensive, time-consuming and at times inaccessible. The ability to diagnose a weak heart pump remotely, from an ECG that a person records using a consumer device, such as a smartwatch, allows a timely identification of this potentially life-threatening disease at massive scale\".</span></p><p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">It is not necessary that people with a weak heart pump may be symptomatic. But this common heart disease affects about 2% of the population and 9% of the people over 60. When the heart is unable to pump oxygen-rich blood, then the symptoms such as&nbsp;</span>shortness of breath, a rapid heart rate, and swelling in the legs may develop. For curing the disease early diagnosis is always the key. The same is the case with the diagnosis of heart disease. Early diagnosis helps in increasing the quality of life by providing numerous treatments thereby reducing the risk of death.&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-16/1c677ec4-7784-4e90-a9b6-d52a76c58815.jpg\" style=\"width: 292.484px; height: 204.542px;\"><br></p><p>The 12-lead algorithm for low ventricular ejection fraction is licensed to Anumana Inc., an AI-driven health technology company, co-created by nference and Mayo Clinic. This algorithm is now modified and used by the Mayo researchers to interpret Apple Watch single-lead ECGs. The modified AI algorithm using single-lead ECG data had an area under the curve of 0.88 for detecting a weak heart pump. Compared to the medical treadmill diagnostic test, it is more accurate.</p><p>&nbsp;The first author of the study, Zachi Attia, Ph.D., the lead AI scientist in the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine at Mayo Clinic said, \"These data are encouraging because they show that digital tools allow convenient, inexpensive, scalable screening for important conditions. Through technology, we can remotely gather useful information about a patient\'s heart in an accessible way that can meet the needs of people where they are\".</p><p>Bradley Leibovich, M.D., the medical director for the Mayo Clinic Center for Digital Health, and co-author of the study said, \"Building the capability to ingest data from wearable consumer electronics and provide analytic capabilities to prevent disease or improve health remotely in the manner demonstrated by this study can revolutionize health care. Solutions like this not only enable prediction and prevention of problems but also will eventually help diminish health disparities and the burden on health systems and clinicians\".</p><p>The study involved 2,454 participants. The participants were Mayo patients from across the U.S. and 11 other countries. Between&nbsp; August 2021 and February 2022, more than 125,000 participants logged previous and new Apple Watch ECGs to their electronic health records. Clinicians had access to view all the ECG data on an AI dashboard that was built into the electronic health record. It also included the day and time it was recorded.</p><p>The study showed that approximately 420 participants had an echocardiogram (a standard test that uses sound waves to produce images of the heart ). They had this test within 30 days of logging an Apple Watch ECG in the app. The echocardiogram confirmed that 16 patients out of 420 had low ejection fraction. This provided a comparison for accuracy.&nbsp;</p>','2022-11-16 20:23:10.219016','uploads/news/smartwatch1.jpg',1,'Mayo Clinic','Technology is at new heights each day. A study published in Nature Medicine showed the ability of a smartwatch ECG to detect accurate heart failure specifically in the non-clinical environment.',5,134,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Zachi I. Attia, David M. Harmon, Jennifer Dugan, Lukas Manka, Francisco Lopez-Jimenez, Amir Lerman, Konstantinos C. Siontis, Peter A. Noseworthy, Xiaoxi Yao, Eric W. Klavetter, John D. Halamka, Samuel J. Asirvatham, Rita Khan, Rickey E. Carter, Bradley C. Leibovich, Paul A. Friedman.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Prospective evaluation of smartwatch-enabled detection of left ventricular dysfunction</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Nature Medicine</em>, 2022; DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41591-022-02053-1\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1038/s41591-022-02053-1</a></li></ol>'),(66403,'A low-cost robot ready for any obstacle','low-cost-robot-ready-any-obstacle','2022-11-17 17:01:57.695654','<p>Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University\'s School of Computer Science and the University of California, Berkeley have developed a new robotic system. This new robotic system enables a relatively small-legged robot at low-cost. This robotic system can do the following tasks:</p><ul><li>Climb and descend stairs nearly its height.</li><li>Traverse rocky, slippery, uneven, steep, and varied terrain</li><li>Walk across gaps; scale rocks and curbs</li><li>Operate in the dark</li></ul><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-17/3fd8f9ac-78e7-40c0-93e2-5550daf76f00.jpg\" style=\"width: 304.889px; height: 228.504px;\"></p><p><br></p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: robotic system, small-legged robot, simulator,&nbsp; motor skills, hand-engineering, Machine learning</h3><p><br></p><p>Deepak Pathak, an assistant professor at the Robotics Institute said, \"Empowering small robots to climb stairs and handle a variety of environments is crucial to developing robots that will be useful in people\'s homes as well as search-and-rescue operations. This system creates a robust and adaptable robot that could perform many everyday tasks\".&nbsp;</p><p>The team of researchers put the robot through various phases. They tested it on uneven stairs and hillsides at public parks. They challenged it to walk across stepping stones and over slippery surfaces. They analyzed this system by asking the robot to climb stairs at a height that is similar to leaping over a hurdle for a human. This robot is quickly adaptive and masters challenging terrain through its vision and a small onboard computer.</p><p>The team of researchers trained this robot with 4,000 clones of it in a simulator. They practiced walking and climbing on challenging terrain. The simulator\'s speed helped the robot in gaining six years of experience in a single day. The simulator also helped in storing the motor skills that the robot learned during its training. They stored it in a neural network and then copied it to the real robot. Compared to the traditional methods, this approach didn\'t require any hand-engineering of the robot\'s movements.</p><p>This new robotic system bypasses the mapping and planning phases and it directly routes the vision inputs for controlling the robot. The movement of the robot is determined based on what it sees. This technique helps the robot to react to the sudden oncoming terrain and move through it effectively. As there is no mapping and planning involved in this system and also it is trained using Machine learning, it is a low-cost system. The robot used by the team was at least 25 times cheaper than the available alternatives.&nbsp;</p><p>Ashish Kumar a Ph.D. student at Berkeley said, \"Since there\'s no map, no planning, our system remembers the terrain and how it moved the front leg and translates this to the rear leg, doing so quickly and flawlessly\".<br></p><p>Ananya Agarwal, an SCS Ph.D. student in machine learning said, \"This system uses vision and feedback from the body directly as input to output commands to the robot\'s motors. This technique allows the system to be very robust in the real world. If it slips on stairs, it can recover. It can go into unknown environments and adapt.\"</p><p>The team was also inspired by the movement of hind legs by four-legged animals. Researcher Pathak said, \"Four-legged animals have a memory that enables their hind legs to track the front legs. Our system works in a similar fashion\".</p><p>The development of this robotic system adds a new achievement in the field of robotics. It is a large step towards solving challenges faced by existing legged robots and bringing them to people\'s homes.&nbsp;</p>','2022-11-17 17:01:57.695704','uploads/news/robot1.jpg',1,'Carnegie Mellon University','Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University\'s School of Computer Science and the University of California, Berkeley have developed a new robotic system. This new robotic system enables a relatively small-legged robot at low-cost. This robotic system can do the following tasks:\r\n\r\n1. Climb and descend stairs nearly its height.\r\n2. Traverse rocky, slippery, uneven, steep, and varied terrain\r\n3. Walk across gaps; scale rocks and curbs\r\n4. Operate in the dark',5,140,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Ananye Agarwal, Ashish Kumar, Jitendra Malik, Deepak Pathak.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Legged Locomotion in Challenging Terrains using Egocentric Vision</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">arXiv.org</em>, 2022; DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2211.07638\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.48550/arXiv.2211.07638</a></li></ol>'),(66546,'Which weather characteristics affect agricultural and food trade the most?','which-weather-characteristics-affect-agricultural-and-food-trade-most','2022-11-17 19:43:04.701034','<p>A new paper from the University of Illinois shows that changing weather patterns have profound impacts on agricultural production around the world. The effects of higher temperatures, severe drought, and other events are often volatile and unpredictable. These events lead to a decrease in output of the agricultural activities. Yet, many countries are dependent on agricultural and food trade to help alleviate the consequences of weather-induced production shifts.</p><p>For instance, the 2008 drought in Middle Eastern and Central Asian countries led to a 22% decrease in the production of wheat compared to 2007. As a result, the import of wheat increased. The value of wheat imports increased by 224% compared to 2007. Most of the imports were coming from U.S., Canada, Russia, and Ukraine.</p><p><br></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-17/d3c1fc3a-9cb5-49a6-bb68-7ea0ece63fb8.jpg\" style=\"width: 358.889px; height: 239.259px;\"></p><p><br></p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: weather patterns, agricultural, food trade, meta-analysis</h3><p><br></p><p>The research team conducted a statistical analysis that was known as a meta-analysis. It was based on academic studies that investigated the relationships between weather and the trade of agricultural and food commodities. The main aim was to find out which weather characteristics matter most for exports versus imports.</p><p>Study co-author Sandy Dall\'erba, professor in the Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics (ACE) and co-director of the Center for Climate, Regional, Environmental, and Trade Economics (CREATE) at the U of I said, \"Our main finding is that the key driver of trade, whether at the domestic or international level, is temperature in the place of origin. An increase in temperatures negatively affects a country\'s ability to export agricultural goods, because it reduces yield and decreases agricultural labor productivity\".</p><p>As per researchers, the increase in the temperature in the place of destination should lead to more imports but the effect is not statistically significant. On the other hand, the role of precipitation turns out to be fuzzier both in the place of origin and destination.&nbsp;</p><p>William Ridley, assistant professor in ACE, co-director of CREATE, and corresponding author on the paper said, \"Trade is one of the key tools with which to mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change, particularly in agriculture. If a country is affected by adverse growing conditions, such as drought, the ability to rely on foreign sources for food and agricultural products is a key element of the ability to buffer those sorts of shocks\".</p><p>The researchers analyzed a total of 235&nbsp; individual estimates of the relationship between weather and agricultural trade. Some studies focused on multiple commodities and multiple countries. While other studies focused on specific regions like the Middle East and North Africa (MENA); trade between the Philippines and the rest of the world; or domestic trade. It also included a study by Dall\'erba that is based on interstate flows of crops, fruits, and vegetables in the United States.</p><p>&nbsp;Lead author Tauã Magalhães Vital, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora, Brazil, said, \"The results of the original studies vary due to study area, the methodology, and the quality of the data. Yet, they all seem to agree about a clear negative impact of temperature on the export of commodities. This effect is particularly acute in developing countries as they have less capacity to adapt through irrigation\".&nbsp;</p><p>Researcher Dall\'erba said, \"Trade of agricultural commodities is driven by differences in specialization and natural resources between origin and destination places. Human beings have a taste for variety when it comes to food so agricultural goods are quite certainly the first commodities that were ever traded. However, over the most recent years, we have seen several disruptions in the global food supply chain such as COVID-19 and the war in Ukraine\".</p><p>\"Climate change and the increase in extreme weather events that comes with it is a more serious, longer lasting, and more widespread threat as it has the capacity to affect the natural resources in the places of production and to abruptly decrease yield all the while the world population -- hence demand for food -- keeps growing. As a result, it is important to understand the role of weather and climate on trade, to forecast their impact, and to assess how resilient the food supply chain is\".</p><p><br></p>','2022-11-17 19:43:04.701080','uploads/news/wheat1.jpg',1,'University of Illinois College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences','A new paper from the University of Illinois shows that changing weather patterns have profound impacts on agricultural production around the world. The effects of higher temperatures, severe drought, and other events are often volatile and unpredictable. These events lead to a decrease in output of the agricultural activities. Yet, many countries are dependent on agricultural and food trade to help alleviate the consequences of weather-induced production shifts.',5,17,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Tauã Magalhães Vital, Sandy Dall\'erba, William Ridley, Xianning Wang.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">What do the 235 estimates from the literature tell us about the impact of weather on agricultural and food trade flows?</strong>&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Global Food Security</em>, 2022; 35: 100654 DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gfs.2022.100654\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1016/j.gfs.2022.100654</a></li></ol>'),(66585,'Scientists combine existing technologies to build new ultrafast electron microscope','scientists-combine-existing-technologies-build-new-ultrafast-electron-microscope','2022-11-18 20:29:03.566791','<p>A team of researchers from Nagoya University in Japan analyzed the mechanisms of the light-matter interaction in the nanomaterials at the smallest and fastest levels.</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: Nanomaterials, Nanometrology, photoexcitation, Negative Electron Affinity, plasmons, light-matter interactions</h3><p><br></p><p>Nanomaterials are materials that are sized at the nanoscale between 1 and 100 nm. They play a necessary role in both industry and everyday living. The small size of nanoparticles gives them unique properties compared to larger materials. The properties of nanoparticles are also specific to the nature and environment of the material.</p><p><br></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-18/6d86bbba-4323-433d-987b-70a2e2d400d7.jpg\" style=\"width: 288.889px; height: 240.63px;\"></p><p><br></p><p>To measure nanomaterials, nanometrology is used by scientists. Nanometrology is a subfield of metrology. It measures length scales at the nanoscale. When the size of the particles is small, it is essential for scientists to also measure events that occur within a fraction of a second.&nbsp; For an instance, photoexcitation is a phenomenon that normally takes place in picoseconds or one trillionth of a second. Thus keeping a track of these events is necessary. Specialized devices are necessary to measure these instantaneous events.&nbsp;</p><p>A research group that was led by Nagoya University faculty members, Associate Professor Makoto Kuwahara from the Institute of Materials and Systems for Sustainability (IMaSS), and Lira Mizuno, Rina Yokoi, and Hideo Morishita of the Graduate School of Engineering, investigated on whether it is possible to study such photoexcitation processes occurring on single nanoparticles.</p><p> In collaboration with senior researchers at Hitachi Hightech Ltd., the researchers developed an ultrafast electron microscope. This microscope was developed by combining a semiconductor photocathode with a \'Negative Electron Affinity\' surface, pioneered by Nagoya University, with a general-purpose electron microscope. Thus by combining these technologies, the researchers were able to observe events at the nanoscale.&nbsp;</p><p>In the context of nanoparticles, the team of researchers used chemically synthesized gold nanotriangles. Gold is stable under a range of conditions. It is considered a noble metal. Thus, it is best suited for such experiments. \'Plasmon resonance\' is the phenomenon exhibited by the electrons in gold nanoparticles. When a gold nanoparticle undergoes photo excitation with a specific wavelength of light, the electrons in the nanoparticle experience movements such as moving or oscillating. This turns the gold nanoparticle into a bright antenna.&nbsp;</p><p>Considering this, surface plasmons on gold are regularly used for sensing applications and are of great interest in energy conversion. The team of researchers investigated two different plasmon phenomena. The researchers first observed the relaxation of the plasmons on the surface. The new technique of researchers has revealed the relaxation process of these plasmons inside the gold nanoparticles. It has also revealed important implications for the preparation of light-harvesting materials for energy conversion.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p><p>Researcher Kuwahara said, \"By understanding phenomena such as photoexcitation and relaxation processes and energy transport, we can improve photoresponsive properties and increase efficiency. In particular, it can be a powerful tool to capture individual time changes in small structural materials with spatial resolution (such as those that exceed sub-micrometers). This has been difficult to achieve with conventional analytical methods using pulsed lasers as probes. We expect this achievement to enable the analysis of photoelectric and thermoelectric conversion materials and their applied devices that contribute to energy conservation. Our research should be useful for the development of light energy conversion, biosensors, and thermoelectric conversion devices\".</p><p>This newly developed technique will help in analyzing potential materials by exposing ultrafast light-matter interactions.</p>','2022-11-18 20:29:03.566845','uploads/news/microscope.jpg',1,'Nagoya University','A team of researchers from Nagoya University in Japan analyzed the mechanisms of the light-matter interaction in the nanomaterials at the smallest and fastest levels.',5,134,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Makoto Kuwahara, Lira Mizuno, Rina Yokoi, Hideo Morishita, Takafumi Ishida, Koh Saitoh, Nobuo Tanaka, Shota Kuwahara, Toshihide Agemura.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Transient electron energy-loss spectroscopy of optically stimulated gold nanoparticles using picosecond pulsed electron beam</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Applied Physics Letters</em>, 2022; 121 (14): 143503 DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/5.0108266\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1063/5.0108266</a></li></ol>'),(66586,'Skin-like electronics could monitor your health continuously','skin-electronics-could-monitor-your-health-continuously','2022-11-18 21:20:17.209245','<p>There are a lot of advancements each day in the field of technology ranging from daily living to the healthcare sector. Now, a team of researchers has developed new wearable&nbsp;<span style=\"font-size: 14px;\">electronics paired with artificial intelligence. It provides screening for health problems.</span></p><p><h3 class=\"\">&nbsp;<b><u>Keywords</u></b>:&nbsp;<span style=\"font-size: 24px;\">electronics, artificial intelligence, neuromorphic computing, gold nanowire electrodes, APS&nbsp;</span></h3></p><div><br></div><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-18/0170bed2-9df2-4036-9e23-7c29927ae124.jpg\" style=\"width: 405.146px; height: 227.726px;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p>Flexible, wearable electronics are currently making rapid growth in everyday use. It is like having a high-tech medical center at your instant beck and call. When these are worn routinely, they could help in detecting health problems such as heart disease, cancer, or multiple sclerosis even before the human is symptomatic. The device could also be useful to do a personalized analysis of the tracked health data. This will minimize its need for wireless transmission.&nbsp;<span style=\"font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p><p>&nbsp;Sihong Wang, assistant professor at UChicago PME said, \"The diagnosis for the same health measurements could differ depending on the person\'s age, medical history, and other factors. Such a diagnosis, with health information being continuously gathered over an extended period, is very data intensive.\"</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">The device has to collect and process a vast amount of data. For this purpose, it would have to do the data collection with very low power consumption in a very tiny space. Thus, considering this issue, the researchers called upon neuromorphic computing. This AI technology is based upon operating the brain based on past data sets and learning from experience. Advantages of this AI technology include:</p><ul><li style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Compatibility with stretchable material.</li><li style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Lower energy consumption.</li><li style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Faster speed than other types of AI.</li></ul><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">This device consists of a neuromorphic \"chip\" made up of a thin film of a plastic semiconductor combined with stretchable gold nanowire electrodes. Even after stretching it twice to its normal size, the device executed and functioned the way it was planned.&nbsp;</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">As a part of testing, the team of researchers trained the AI device to distinguish healthy electrocardiogram (ECG) signals from four different signals indicating health problems. The results showed that the device was more than 95% effective at correctly identifying the ECG signals. The plastic semiconductor in the device also underwent analysis on beamline 8-ID-E at the Advanced Photon Source (APS), a DOE Office of Science user facility at Argonne. The making up of molecules that are the skin-like device material reorganize upon doubling in length was revealed by exposure to an intense X-ray beam. These results provided molecular-level information for a better understanding of the material properties.</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Joe Strzalka, an Argonne physicist said, \"The planned upgrade of the APS will increase the brightness of its X-ray beams by up to 500 times. We look forward to studying the device material under its regular operating conditions, interacting with charged particles, and changing electrical potential in its environment. Instead of a snapshot, we\'ll have more of a movie of the structural response of the material at the molecular level\".</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">The softness and hardness of the materials in response to environmental influences can be measured through greater beamline brightness and better detectors.&nbsp;</p><p style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Researcher Wang said, \"While still requiring further development on several fronts, our device could one day be a game changer in which everyone can get their health status in a much more effective and frequent way\".</p><p><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></p>','2022-11-18 21:20:17.209290','uploads/news/wearable.jpg',1,'DOE/Argonne National Laboratory','There are a lot of advancements each day in the field of technology ranging from daily living to the healthcare sector. Now, a team of researchers has developed new wearable electronics paired with artificial intelligence. It provides screening for health problems.',5,134,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Shilei Dai, Yahao Dai, Zixuan Zhao, Fangfang Xia, Yang Li, Youdi Liu, Ping Cheng, Joseph Strzalka, Songsong Li, Nan Li, Qi Su, Shinya Wai, Wei Liu, Cheng Zhang, Ruoyu Zhao, J. Joshua Yang, Rick Stevens, Jie Xu, Jia Huang, Sihong Wang.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Intrinsically stretchable neuromorphic devices for on-body processing of health data with artificial intelligence</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Matter</em>, 2022; 5 (10): 3375 DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.matt.2022.07.016\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1016/j.matt.2022.07.016</a></li></ol>'),(66908,'Awareness and Utilization of Genetic Testing among Hispanic/Latino Adults Living in the US: The Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos','awareness-and-utilization-of-genetic-testing-among-hispanic-latino-adults-living-in-the-us-the-hispanic-community-health-study-study-of-latinos','2022-11-21 09:24:34.215029','<p>Awareness, perceived utility and use of genetic testing among Hispanic/Latino adults living in the US. This study investigated awareness, perceived utility, and utilization of genetic testing among Hispanic and Latino individuals. The annual follow-up surveys for the Hispanic Community Health Study / Study of Latinos (HCHS/SOL) from 2019 to April 2020 assessed participants’ level of awareness and usage of genetic tests to determine disease risks, likelihood of passing disease to children, disease treatment or drug selection. They also were asked to rate the usefulness of these tests \"for managing a person\'s health\" on a 1 (“not at all useful”) to 10 ( “extremely useful”) scale. 5,769 HCHS/SOL participants completed at least one survey question. 55% of the target population was aware of at least one type of genetic test.</p><p><br></p><p>They investigated awareness, perceived utility, and utilization of genetic testing among Hispanic and Latino individuals. Annual follow-up surveys for the Hispanic Community Health Study / Study of Latinos (HCHS/SOL) from 2019 to April 2020 assessed participants’ level of awareness and usage of genetic tests to determine disease risks, likelihood of passing disease to children, disease treatment, or drug selection. They also were asked to rate the usefulness of the tests on a 1 (“not at all useful”) to 10 (“extremely useful”) scale.</p><p><br></p><p>Genetic testing is an emerging technology in the US, with rising rates of use across the population. We measured awareness, perceived utility, and utilization of genetic tests among Hispanic/Latinos living in the US. Annual follow-up surveys for the Hispanic Community Health Study / Study of Latinos (HCHS/SOL) from 2019 to April 2020 assessed awareness, usage and utility of genetic tests among Hispanics and Latinos living in the US. The findings have implications for health policy and research.<br></p>','2022-11-21 14:35:38.511642','uploads/news/images_6TS94Wi.jpg',1,'CELL - American Society of Human Genetics - HGG Advances - Inpress','Awareness and Utilization of Genetic Testing among Hispanic/Latino Adults Living in the US: The Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos',1,123,'<ul><li><span style=\"color: rgb(33, 33, 33); font-family: Roboto, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Arial, Tahoma; font-size: 17px;\">Hamilton JG, Shuk E, Arniella G, González CJ, Gold GS, Gany F, Robson ME, Hay JL. Genetic Testing Awareness and Attitudes among Latinos: Exploring Shared Perceptions and Gender-Based Differences. Public Health Genomics. 2016;19(1):34-46. doi: 10.1159/000441552. Epub 2015 Nov 11. PMID: 26555145; PMCID: PMC4706768.</span><br></li></ul>'),(67130,'Impact on ESG performance in profitability and firm value','impact-on-esg-performance-in-profitability-and-firm-value','2023-03-14 13:11:34.642294','<span id=\"docs-internal-guid-8c5a4fdb-7fff-032d-b94c-c20f46fc8771\"><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Investors are now interested in non-financial factors and environmental aspects such as proper governance and social responsibility where the priority of non-financial factors are enforced in a financial environment. A wide variety of professional people now need to report effectively and take the necessary mitigation measures. Firms now report their performance on risks through a trending topic known as Environmental and Social Governance (ESG) but through a firm or financial perspective.</span></p><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">What is ESG?</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><br></span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">According to <a href=\"https://www.blackrock.com/za/individual/themes/sustainable-investing?siteEntryPassthrough=true&amp;cid=ppc:blk_LU:sustainable:Google:generic:en&amp;gclid=Cj0KCQjwtsCgBhDEARIsAE7RYh2uiyEjEE7pSGrwYqFmOzBg88sc8Ftr9iD2CxKqU4J6ndqV5I4sZxsaAu-QEALw_wcB&amp;gclsrc=aw.ds\" target=\"_blank\">Blackrock</a>, one of the most successful global investment and risk management advisory firms mentions that ESG is&nbsp; through analysing a company’s Environmental, Social and Governance risk by practising sustainable investing. Further, there are sustainable metrics which a firm has to abide by in order to achieve sustainable investing. The confusion in analysing non-financial indicators is that it makes financial sense. The <a href=\"https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S221484502200103X?token=6DCCE6A8A7E65CA455CB7EAB4D38D41E236DB95D84C44D4C1EE1706EAB9872747ACC79DD607043C3EB64953BBDD641FB&amp;originRegion=eu-west-1&amp;originCreation=20230314105534\" target=\"_blank\">research by Mahmut Aydoğmuş, Güzhan Gülay, and Korkmaz Ergun</a> tries to fill in the objective if Environmental and Social Governance&nbsp; performance can be attached to the financial return for a firm. There is a stakeholder theory that is put forward where successful firms are able to gather the interests of all stakeholders which is known to be more sustainable. Therefore, the focus is not only on maximising profits but also taking into account the interests of other stakeholders. A business that has their stakeholders at best interest is Business Roundtable. Further, to see ESG performance the ESG metrics need to be applied in the firms, which brings forward important issues to the stakeholders of the company. ESG has become of preference in recent years as stakeholders are included in the discussions. By applying ESG, you are also applying sustainability practices and are applied in decision-making. Whether ESG increases a firm value and its profitability is a question that still needs to be unpacked.</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><br></span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">ESG performance and a firms profitability</span></p><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Today, researchers are investigating the impact between ESG performance and financial performance in a firm. The research unpacked the following: “We start the analysis by selecting the largest 5000 publicly listed firms in the world from Bloomberg database spanning 9 years from 2013 to 2021. We match and filter for Refinitiv ESG score and end up with 1720 companies. Our final panel data entails 14043 firm year observations.” The results show that ESG has a positive effect on financial performance whereby ESG needs to be implemented in a firm to increase their profitability.&nbsp;</span></p><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The topics covered in the literature review</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">&nbsp;</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The following topics were unpacked in the literature review:</span></p><br><ol style=\"margin-bottom: 0px; padding-inline-start: 48px;\"><li dir=\"ltr\" style=\"list-style-type: decimal; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); background-color: transparent; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;\" aria-level=\"1\"><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" role=\"presentation\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">“Papers with findings of positive relationship between ESG performance and firm value - profitability”</span></p></li><li dir=\"ltr\" style=\"list-style-type: decimal; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); background-color: transparent; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;\" aria-level=\"1\"><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" role=\"presentation\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Papers with findings of negative relationship between ESG performance and firm value - profitability</span></p></li><li dir=\"ltr\" style=\"list-style-type: decimal; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); background-color: transparent; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;\" aria-level=\"1\"><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" role=\"presentation\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">“Papers with findings of mixed relationship between ESG performance and firm value - profitability”</span></p></li></ol><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Further there were two hypotheses in the study:</span></p><br><ol style=\"margin-bottom: 0px; padding-inline-start: 48px;\"><li dir=\"ltr\" style=\"list-style-type: decimal; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); background-color: transparent; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;\" aria-level=\"1\"><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" role=\"presentation\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">“ESG scores have positive and significant impact on firm value”</span></p></li><li dir=\"ltr\" style=\"list-style-type: decimal; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); background-color: transparent; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;\" aria-level=\"1\"><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" role=\"presentation\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">“ESG scores have positive and significant impact on profitability”</span></p></li></ol><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">There were dependant and independent variables in the study</span></p><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Dependant variable - Tobin\'s Q&nbsp; and Return on Assets (ROA) to view prfitability</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Independent variable - All ESG scores are from Refinitiv which are ESG combined score, Social Score Environment score, and Governance score.&nbsp;</span></p><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The concluding statements of the research</span></p><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The purpose of the paper is to analyse the impact of ESG performance of the firm\'s profitability. The sample in the study varies from 2013 to 2021 over 1720 firms. It has been noticed that the environmental aspects take longer to produce results than the social and governance aspects in ESG. The results showed the following: “Based on the results of the four models where profitability was the dependent variable; we find that ESG combined score (ESG_CS) has a positive and highly significant relationship with profitability. Environment (ENV), Social (SOC) and Governance (GOV) all have highly significant positive relationships with profitability as well. From a theoretical point of view, these results support the stakeholder theory, in line with the findings of several researchers in the extant literature.” The research helps corporate managers look into ESG and for policy makers to incorporate ESG in the policies.</span></p><div><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(46, 46, 46); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><br></span></div></span>','2022-11-21 14:52:28.600798','uploads/news/ESG.png',1,'Borsa Istanbul Review','Investors are now interested in non-financial factors and environmental aspects such as proper governance and social responsibility where the priority of non-financial factors are enforced in a financial environment. A wide variety of professional people now need to report effectively and take the necessary mitigation measures. Firms now report their performance on risks through a trending topic known as Environmental and Social Governance (ESG) but through a firm or financial perspective. The purpose of the paper is to analyse the impact of ESG performance of the firm\'s profitability. The sample in the study varies from 2013 to 2021 over 1720 firms. It has been noticed that the environmental aspects take longer to produce results than the social and governance aspects in ESG. The results showed the following: “Based on the results of the four models where profitability was the dependent variable; we find that ESG combined score (ESG_CS) has a positive and highly significant relationship with profitability. Environment (ENV), Social (SOC) and Governance (GOV) all have highly significant positive relationships with profitability as well. From a theoretical point of view, these results support the stakeholder theory, in line with the findings of several researchers in the extant literature.” The research helps corporate managers look into ESG and for policy makers to incorporate ESG.',13,196,'<ul><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Author links open overlay panelMahmut Aydoğmuş and study, A.I.this (2022) <i>Impact of ESG performance on firm value and profitability</i>, <i>Borsa Istanbul Review</i>. Elsevier. Available at: https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S221484502200103X?token=6DCCE6A8A7E65CA455CB7EAB4D38D41E236DB95D84C44D4C1EE1706EAB9872747ACC79DD607043C3EB64953BBDD641FB&amp;originRegion=eu-west-1&amp;originCreation=20230314105534 (Accessed: March 14, 2023).&nbsp;</li><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;Image created on Canva and using Canva photos.</li></ul><div></div><p></p>'),(67183,'Influence of the lamination process on the mechanical properties of a PA6 electronspun membrane filter and its filtration capability','influence-of-the-lamination-process-on-the-mechanical-properties-of-a-pa6-electronspun-membrane-filter-and-its-filtration-capability','2022-11-21 09:41:22.734103','<p>Polyamide 6 (PA6) nanofiber hybrid membranes have demonstrated excellent filtering capability. Recently, increasing attention has been given to hydrophilic membranes such as PA6 in applications. Unfortunately, PA6 has not found any real application due to its poor mechanical strength under high pressure. In this study, PA6 nanofiber layer has been prepared using wire electrospinning method. Three supporting materials with different adhesion methods have been used to improve the mechanical properties of the membranes.</p><p><br></p><p>The fibers were electrospun by using a continuous rotary wire extrusion (CRE) method. Three supporting materials with different adhesion method has been used to improve the mechanical properties of the membranes. Mechanical properties of PA6 nanofiber membrane was tested by tensile test and broken film method on glass slide under uniaxial compression, transverse expansion and extension at various angle. The filtration capability of PA6 nanofiber hybrids in various applications such as microfiltration, reverse osmosis was also investigated. The results showed that PA6 nanofiber hybrid membranes had better mechanical strength compared with its parent material</p><p><br></p><p>The development of electrospun nanofiber synthetic membrane allows synthesis of high surface area and high pore density. It also has a strong character. Therefore, it is an attractive alternative to other synthetic membranes suitable for applications such as reverse osmosis and ultrafiltration.</p><p><br></p><p>We have studied the impact of lamination process on the properties of a PA6 nanofiber membrane and its filtration capability. According to literature, the electrospinning principle is used in this study. We prepared 12 % wt. of PA6 (BASF-Ultramid B24, Germany) solution by dissolving polymer pellets in acetic acid/formic acid (2/1 % wt.) solvent mixture over night. All the solvents were purchased from Penta s.r.o (Prague, Czech Republic). The PA6 nanofiber layers were prepared using lab-scale wire electrospinning system. The principle of wire electrospinning system has been introduced to literature several times. In brief, the solution is placed in a solution tank which is closed system connected to solution bath with positive charge electrode 60 kV passing along metal orifice in middle of bath (Figure 1). There is adjacent solution bath with speed 240 mm/s which moved back and forward and fed surface of wire electrode with polymer solution</p><p><br></p><p><br></p><p>The use of PA6 nanofiber as membrane filter (MEF) has been widely studied in recent years. The design of membrane is the most important step for developing the MEFs with high content of functional groups and strong electrolytes, suitable for accurate water quality control. The current work focuses on investigating the influence of the lamination process on the mechanical properties of a PA6 electronspun membrane filter and its filtration capability.</p><p><br></p><p>The effects of the lamination process on the mechanical properties and filtration capability of PA6 nanofiber membranes were investigated by means of hardness, tensile strength and elongation at break tests. The samples prepared by using the non-lamination method exhibited slightly higher values for the Young’s moduli than those prepared using the lamination process. A combined effect of water content, extra surface hydrophilicity and lamination processes can be observed: The average values (in Water) of elastic modulus and loss tangent are significantly lower in PA6 nanofiber membrane prepared by solvent evaporation method compared to those prepared by electrospinning</p><p><br></p><p>The influence of the processing conditions on the electrospun polyamide nanofiber membrane\'s mechanical properties has been investigated. The polydispersed membranes were prepared at different weight percentages and a number of mechanical parameters as well as electrical conductance and filtration capability were recorded. The established process can be used to produce high quality nanofibrous membranes with a high percent of different functional groups and applications in various fields including material characterization, energy harvesting and filtration applications.</p><p><br></p><p>The influence of the lamination process on the mechanical properties of a PA6 electronspun membrane filter was studied. For this purpose, 12 % wt. of the polymer pellets in acetic acid/formic acid (2/1 % wt.) solvent mixture was prepared over the night by dissolving the polymer pellets in acetic acid/formic acid (2/1 % wt.) solvent mixture over the night. The resulting solution was filtered using microporous electrodes, which were prepared using a lab-scale wire electrospinning system. The principle of wire electrospinning system has been introduced to literature several times In brief, the solution is placed in a solution tank which is a closed system and connected to a solution bath. The positively charged wire electrode passes along a metal orifice that feeds back and forth across the solution bath. There is also a solution bath with a speed of 240 mm/s which is moved back and forth so as to feed back across off an area weight of 2 g/m2 plasticizer solution</p><p><br></p><p>The influence of the lamination process on the mechanical property and filtration quality of a PA6 nanofiber was investigated. The bromination process in polymer production led to the appearance of (3-bromo) propionic acid and its derivatives. Based on these results, it was suggested that bromide ions could be associated with PA6 fibers due to electrostatic forces between cations and electrons on the surface. The goal of this paper is to study the influence of a number of parameters on both mechanical properties and filtration quality</p><p><br></p><p>The influence of the lamination process on the mechanical properties of a PA6 electronspun membrane filter and its filtration capability. Nomenclature&nbsp; ALP-nameplate derivation: Alumina phase (1), Aluminum oxide phase (2), Carbon black polymer rich phase (3), Chromium oxide phase (4) Clay phase (5) Ferrite phase (6), Graphite oxide phase(7), Hydroxyl ionomer material (8), Magnetite phase(9) Mica phase (10), Magnesium oxidephase (11), Silicon carbide phase(12) Titanium diboride ceramic model material(13).</p><p><br></p><p>Here, we demonstrate the influence of the lamination process on the mechanical properties of a PA6 electronspun membrane filter and its filtration capability by comparing it with control samples prepared by only a single treatment. We also introduce two new methods to increase the mechanical strength of electron-sputtered nanofibers through their different approaches.</p>','2022-11-21 14:56:15.101213','uploads/news/nanomaterials-08-00272-g001.png',1,'Case Studies in Chemical and Environmental Engineering','Influence of the lamination process on the mechanical properties of a PA6 electronspun membrane filter and its filtration capability',1,134,'<ul><li>Yalcinkaya, F., Yalcinkaya, B., &amp; Hruza, J. (2019). Electrospun Polyamide-6 Nanofiber Hybrid Membranes for Wastewater Treatment. Fibers and Polymers, 20(1), 93–99. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12221-019-8820-4<br></li></ul>'),(67340,'Deriving a minimum set of indicators to assess network component importance','deriving-a-minimum-set-of-indicators-to-assess-network-component-importance','2022-11-21 09:57:51.832536','<div>This paper proposes a new resilience-based component importance ranking measure for multi-state networks from the perspective of a post-disaster restoration process. Considering the stochastic nature of disruptive events, the importance measure of each component is evaluated by finding the minimal recovery paths for various disruptive events, and it can be represented by a probability distribution.</div><div><br></div><div>The paper introduces a novel resilience-based component importance ranking measure for multi-state networks from the perspective of a post-disaster restoration process. Considering the stochastic nature of disruptive events, the importance measure of each component is evaluated by finding the minimal recovery paths for various disruptive events, and it can be represented by a probability distribution.</div><div><br></div><div>This paper takes inspiration from the resilience community literature, which has established a number of measures for component importance. Using these measures as building blocks, this paper proposes a resilience-based component importance ranking measure for multi-state networks from the perspective of post-disaster restoration processes. The proposed measure evaluates each component by finding the minimal recovery paths for various disruptive events, and it can be represented by a probability distribution.</div><div><br></div><div>The resilience of a network has always been a key factor in the Internet community. Inspired by the concept of component importance ranking used widely in reliability community, we derive a minimum set of indicators to assess network component importance. It considers both disruptive events and its recovery paths, allowing us to evaluate the importance of each component through finding minimal recovery path sequences for various disruptive events. By using this approach, we show that it yields better results than previous approaches used across several networks.</div><div><br></div><div>This paper is concerned with evaluating resilience using multi-state networks. The resilience of a multi-state network is defined as its ability to timely recover the maximum flow capacity to an acceptable level. This study considers developing a new resilience based component importance measure for network components, by quantifying their importance in terms of both capability and recovery time in the event of disruptions. In this work, we developed a connection space model for assessing network roles, which is capable of grouping nodes and links into different groups depending on their required capacities in order to ensure smooth operation of the entire network as well as preventing system downtime during an outage.<br></div>','2022-11-21 15:15:03.456174','uploads/news/download_1.png',1,'Decision Analytics Journal','Deriving a minimum set of indicators to assess network component importance',1,217,'No Proper Journal Reference Found.'),(67674,'New research on catastrophic forgetting of AI neural networks','new-research-catastrophic-forgetting-ai-neural-networks','2022-11-21 15:34:57.407234','<p>As humans, we are aware of our sleeping patterns. On average, we humans need to take at least 7 hours of sleep every day. During our sleeping activity, our body experiences various changes such as a change in the heart rate or breathing, a change in metabolism flow, a change in hormone levels, etc.&nbsp;</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: catastrophic forgetting, artificial neural networks, rational memory, spiking neural networks&nbsp;</h3><p><br></p><p>In new research, researchers have discussed helping to mitigate the threat of catastrophic forgetting by mimicking the sleep patterns of the human brain in artificial neural networks. In previous studies, the team of researchers has reported on the importance of sleep in building rational memory, the ability to remember arbitrary or indirect associations between objects, people, or events, and protecting against forgetting old memories.</p><p>Maxim Bazhenov, Ph.D., professor of medicine and a sleep researcher at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine said, \"The brain is very busy when we sleep, repeating what we have learned during the day. Sleep helps reorganize memories and presents them in the most efficient way\".</p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Artificial intelligent neural networks make use of nervous science as their foundations. They achieve accurate monitoring of targets, providing effective information for staff decisions through three-dimensional monitoring and calculation, with unit nodes as computational modules.&nbsp;&nbsp;</span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">For more information on&nbsp;</span><span style=\"color: rgb(68, 68, 68); font-family: Helvetica;\">Artificial intelligent neural networks read this article:&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://educracypedia.com/news/category_news/application-analysis-of-artificial-intelligent-neural-network-based-on-intelligent-diagnosis/\" target=\"_blank\">Application Analysis of Artificial Intelligent Neural Network Based on Intelligent Diagnosis</a></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-21/cf3a0be8-4edb-4cff-986c-df68eb8a550c.jpg\" style=\"width: 401.889px; height: 225.895px;\"></p><p><br></p><p>Artificial neural networks have surely achieved superhuman performance such as computational speed. But the only drawback of this network is catastrophic forgetting. Catastrophic forgetting is referred to as when artificial neural networks learn sequentially, new information overwrites previous information.&nbsp;</p><p>Researcher Bazhenov said, \"In contrast, the human brain learns continuously and incorporates new data into existing knowledge and it typically learns best when new training is interleaved with periods of sleep for memory consolidation\".</p><p>In this research, scientists made use of spiking neural networks that artificially mimic natural neural systems. In these systems, the information is not being communicated continuously. Rather, it is at certain time points as discrete events i.e. spikes. During this research, scientists observed that when the spiking networks were trained on a new task but were trained with off-line periods that mimicked sleep, the problem of catastrophic forgetting was mitigated. </p><p>In the human brain, memories are represented by patterns of synaptic weight. According to the researchers, like the human brain, \"sleep\" allowed the networks to replay old memories without depending on or explicitly using old training data.&nbsp;</p><p>Researcher Bazhenov said, \"When we learn new information, neurons fire in specific order and this increases synapses between them. During sleep, the spiking patterns learned during our awake state are repeated spontaneously. It\'s called reactivation or replay. Synaptic plasticity, the capacity to be altered or molded, is still in place during sleep and it can further enhance synaptic weight patterns that represent the memory, helping to prevent forgetting or to enable transfer of knowledge from old to new tasks\".</p><p>He added, \"It meant that these networks could learn continuously, like humans or animals. Understanding how human brain processes information during sleep can help to augment memory in human subjects. Augmenting sleep rhythms can lead to better memory. In other projects, we use computer models to develop optimal strategies to apply stimulation during sleep, such as auditory tones, that enhance sleep rhythms and improve learning. This may be particularly important when memory is non-optimal, such as when memory declines in aging or in some conditions like Alzheimer\'s disease\"</p>','2022-11-21 15:34:57.407279','uploads/news/catastrophic_forgetting.jpg',1,'University of California - San Diego','In new research, researchers have discussed helping to mitigate the threat of catastrophic forgetting by mimicking the sleep patterns of the human brain in artificial neural networks. In previous studies, the team of researchers has reported on the importance of sleep in building rational memory, the ability to remember arbitrary or indirect associations between objects, people, or events, and protecting against forgetting old memories.',5,134,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Ryan Golden, Jean Erik Delanois, Pavel Sanda, Maxim Bazhenov.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Sleep prevents catastrophic forgetting in spiking neural networks by forming a joint synaptic weight representation</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">PLOS Computational Biology</em>, 2022; 18 (11): e1010628 DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1010628\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1371/journal.pcbi.1010628</a></li></ol>'),(67675,'Asphaltene changed into graphene for composites','asphaltene-changed-graphene-composites','2022-11-21 17:56:42.969611','<p>Asphaltenes are a byproduct of crude oil production. They are a waste material with potential. In new research, researchers from Rice University have tried to find it by converting the carbon-rich resource into useful graphene.</p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: Asphaltenes, flash Joule heating process, graphene, jolt, environment</h3><p><br></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-21/573fa523-8975-48c3-9825-848dad67cfca.jpg\" style=\"width: 356.206px; height: 235.726px;\">&nbsp;</p><p><br></p><p>Muhammad Rahman, an assistant research professor of materials science and nanoengineering is the pioneer of this research. He used Rice\'s unique flash Joule heating process for converting asphaltenes instantly into turbostratic i.e. loosely aligned graphene and then mixing it into composites for thermal, anti-corrosion, and 3D-printing applications.</p><p>This process makes good use of the material. Otherwise, asphaltene is usually burned for reusing it as fuel. Else it is discarded into tailing ponds and landfills. Thus, this is harmful to the environment. It adversely impacts the environment. This new way will make a way to use some of the world\'s reserves of more than 1 trillion barrels of asphaltene as a feedstock for graphene. This will also prove to be good for the environment.</p><p>Researcher Rahman said, \"Asphaltene is a big headache for the oil industry, and I think there will be a lot of interest in this\". He characterized the process as both a scalable and sustainable way of reducing carbon emissions from burning asphaltene.</p><p>Generally, asphaltenes are 70% to 80% carbon. The team of researchers combined it with about 20% of carbon black to add conductivity. Then they flashed it with a jolt of electricity. This turns asphaltenes into graphene. Other elements such as hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, and sulfur are vented away as gases in this process.</p><p>Researcher Rahman said, \"We try to keep the carbon black content as low as possible because we want to maximize the utilization of asphaltene\".</p><p>Rice graduate student and co-lead author M.A.S.R. Saadi said, \"The government has been putting pressure on the petroleum industries to take care of this. There are billions of barrels of asphaltene available, so we began working on this project primarily to see if we could make carbon fiber. That led us to think maybe we should try making graphene with flash Joule heating\".</p><p>The research assured that the process worked well on asphaltene as it did on various other feedstocks such as plastic, electronic waste, tires, coal fly ash, and even car parts. Researcher Saadi said, \"We\'ve optimized the ink rheology to show that it is printable,\" he said, noting the inks have no more than 10% of graphene mixed in. Mechanical testing of printed objects is forthcoming\".</p><p>This research has made a way for researchers for making things with this graphene.&nbsp;</p>','2022-11-21 17:56:42.969653','uploads/news/graphene.jpg',1,'Rice University','Asphaltenes are a byproduct of crude oil production. They are a waste material with potential. In new research, researchers from Rice University have tried to find it by converting the carbon-rich resource into useful graphene.',5,24,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">M.A.S.R. Saadi, Paul A. Advincula, Md Shajedul Hoque Thakur, Ali Zein Khater, Shabab Saad, Ali Shayesteh Zeraati, Shariful Kibria Nabil, Aasha Zinke, Soumyabrata Roy, Minghe Lou, Sravani N. Bheemasetti, Md Abdullah Al Bari, Yiwen Zheng, Jacob L. Beckham, Venkataramana Gadhamshetty, Aniruddh Vashisth, Md Golam Kibria, James M. Tour, Pulickel M. Ajayan, Muhammad M. Rahman.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Sustainable valorization of asphaltenes via flash joule heating</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Science Advances</em>, 2022; 8 (46) DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.add3555\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1126/sciadv.add3555</a></li></ol>'),(67676,'Plants use their epigenetic memories to adapt to climate change','plants-use-their-epigenetic-memories-adapt-climate-change','2022-11-22 15:01:07.123950','<p>Climate change is a major problem faced by the environment. Climate change affects every living organism in some or the other way. Animals are capable enough to quickly adapt to climate change. Now, a new article shows how plants adapt to these climate change. A paper published in the&nbsp;journal&nbsp;<span style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Trends in Plant Science detailed how plants are rapidly adopting the adverse effects of climate change. It also reported on how they are passing these adaptations to their offspring.</span></p><p><span style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\"><br></span></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-22/4019273a-044a-4a2b-abe0-bb649e7a3c3a.jpg\" style=\"width: 294.889px; height: 196.593px;\"><span style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\"><br></span></p><p><span style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\"><br></span></p><h3 class=\"\"><span style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>:&nbsp;</span>Climate change, plants, environment, somatic memory, epigenetics</h3><p><br></p><p><span style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Federico Martinelli, a plant geneticist at the University of Florence said, \"One day I thought how the living style and experience of a person can affect his or her gametes transmitting molecular marks of their life into their children. Immediately I thought that even more epigenetic marks must be transmitted in plants, being that plants are sessile organisms that are subjected to many more environmental stresses than animals during their life\".</span></p><p><span style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Plants are facing more environmental stressors due to sudden climate change. For an instance, due to climate change winters are becoming short and less severe in many locations. According to researchers, many plants require a minimum period of cold for setting up their environmental clock to fulfill their flowering time. As cold seasons are shortening, plants have adapted to require fewer periods of cold to delay flowering. These mechanisms allow plants to avoid flowering in periods that are less suitable for their reproduction.<br></span></p><p><span style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Plants don\'t have any neural networks for memory circumstances. Their memory is completely based on cellular, molecular, and biochemical networks. These networks make up the somatic memory as termed by researchers. Researcher&nbsp;</span>Martinelli said, \"These mechanisms allow plants to recognize the occurrence of a previous environmental condition and to react more promptly in presence of the same consequential condition\".&nbsp;</p><p>Then, these somatic memories can be passed to the plant\'s progeny via epigenetics. Epigenetics is the study that defines how gene activity is controlled by cells without altering the DNA sequence. Researcher Martinelli said, \"We have highlighted key genes, proteins, and small oligonucleotides, which previous studies have shown play a key role in the memory of abiotic stresses such as drought, salinity, cold, heat, and heavy metals and pathogen attacks. In this peer-reviewed opinion piece, we provide several examples that demonstrate the existence of molecular mechanisms modulating plant memory to environmental stresses and affecting the adaptation of offspring to these stresses\".</p><p>He added, \"We are particularly interested in decoding the epigenetic alphabet underlying all the modifications of the genetic material caused by the environment, without changes in DNA sequence. This is especially important when we consider the rapid climate change we observe today that every living organism, including plants, needs to quickly adapt to in order to survive\".</p><p>This research has made a way for scientists to make observations based on climate changes related to plants adapting capability. It will be also further useful in considering the impacts of climate change on plants. It will also help in dealing with the adverse effects of climate change considering plants.&nbsp;</p>','2022-11-22 15:01:07.123996','uploads/news/climatechange.jpg',1,'Cell Press','Climate change is a major problem faced by the environment. Climate change affects every living organism in some or the other way. Animals are capable enough to quickly adapt to climate change. Now, a new article shows how plants adapt to these climate change. A paper published in the journal Trends in Plant Science detailed how plants are rapidly adopting the adverse effects of climate change. It also reported on how they are passing these adaptations to their offspring.',5,17,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Philippe Gallusci, Dolores R. Agius, Panagiotis N. Moschou, Judit Dobránszki, Eirini Kaiserli, Federico Martinelli.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Deep inside the epigenetic memories of stressed plants</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Trends in Plant Science</em>, 2022; DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tplants.2022.09.004\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1016/j.tplants.2022.09.004</a></li></ol>'),(67771,'New quantum tool developed in groundbreaking experimental achievement','new-quantum-tool-developed-groundbreaking-experimental-achievement','2022-11-22 16:54:51.969089','<p>Each day comes up with a new milestone in technology. Technology is advancing every day and easing human efforts. Researchers at the Institute of Quantum Computing(IQC) have developed a device that generates twisted neutrons with well-defined orbital angular momentum. This type of development is for the first time in experimental history.&nbsp;</p><p><br></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-22/fee866d4-e791-47a5-9fd5-0da031c6a49c.jpg\" style=\"width: 395.886px; height: 222.521px;\"></p><p><br></p><h3 class=\"\"><b><u>Keywords</u></b>: Quantum Computing, neutrons, silicon grating structures, orbital angular momentum</h3><p><br></p><p>Dr. Dusan Sarenac is a research associate with IQC and technical lead of Transformative Quantum Technologies at the University of Waterloo. He said, \"Neutrons are a powerful probe for the characterization of emerging quantum materials because they have several unique features. They have nanometer-sized wavelengths, electrical neutrality, and a relatively large mass. These features mean neutrons can pass through materials that X-rays and light cannot\".</p><p>Methods for the experimental production and analysis of orbital angular momentum in photons and electrons are well-studied. But a device design using neutrons has never been demonstrated to date. Because of the distinct characteristics of neutrons, the researchers had to construct new devices and create novel methods with the aim of working with neutrons.<br></p><p>For the development of this device, Dr. Dmitry Pushin, IQC and Department of Physics and Astronomy faculty member at Waterloo with his team constructed microscopic fork-like silicon grating structures. These devices are very minuscule. They are such minuscule that in an area of only 0.5cm by 0.5cm, there are over six million individual fork dislocation phase gratings. The individual neutrons begin winding in a corkscrew pattern as soon as a beam of single neutrons passes through this device. For about traveling 19 years after, an image of the neutrons was captured. The image was captured using a special neutron camera.</p><p>The team of researchers observed that every neutron had expanded 10cm wide. It was expanded to a wide donut-like signature. The donut pattern of the propagated neutrons indicated that they have been put in a special helical state. It also indicated the grating devices developed by the team of researchers have generated neutron beams with quantized orbital angular momentum.&nbsp;</p><p>Researcher Pushin said, \"Neutrons have been popular in the experimental verification of fundamental physics, using the three easily accessible degrees of freedom: spin, path, and energy. In these experiments, our group has enabled the use of orbital angular momentum in neutron beams, which will essentially provide an additional quantized degree of freedom. In doing so, we are developing a toolbox to characterize and examine complicated materials needed for the next generation of quantum devices such as quantum simulators and quantum computers\".</p><p>This type of development was once considered to be impossible. But the groundbreaking accomplishment of this research has made a new way for researchers to study the development of next-generation quantum materials. The applications of these quantum materials range from quantum computing to identifying and solving new problems in fundamental physics.&nbsp;</p><p><br></p>','2022-11-22 16:54:51.969125','uploads/news/quantum111.jpg',1,'University of Waterloo','Each day comes up with a new milestone in technology. Technology is advancing every day and easing human efforts. Researchers at the Institute of Quantum Computing(IQC) have developed a device that generates twisted neutrons with well-defined orbital angular momentum. This type of development is for the first time in experimental history.',5,193,'<ol class=\"journal\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 20px; border-radius: 0px !important;\"><li style=\"margin: 0px; padding-left: 5px; border-radius: 0px !important;\">Dusan Sarenac, Melissa E. Henderson, Huseyin Ekinci, Charles W. Clark, David G. Cory, Lisa DeBeer-Schmitt, Michael G. Huber, Connor Kapahi, Dmitry A. Pushin.&nbsp;<strong style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Experimental realization of neutron helical waves</strong>.&nbsp;<em style=\"border-radius: 0px !important;\">Science Advances</em>, 2022; 8 (46) DOI:&nbsp;<a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.add2002\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" style=\"color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-radius: 0px !important;\">10.1126/sciadv.add2002</a></li></ol>'),(67875,'Perianal and scrotal porokeratosis ptychotropica. Case report of an unusual condition, and review of the literature','perianal-and-scrotal-porokeratosis-ptychotropica-case-report-of-an-unusual-condition-and-review-of-the-literature','2022-11-22 17:26:09.291062','<p style=\"text-align: justify; \">We gift a case of a 64-yr-antique uncircumcised male who first of all offered to the issuer with a 1 yr records of a solitary lesion at the glans penis that become clinically identified as porokeratosis of Mabelli. Based on constrained case reviews on genital porokeratosis, clinical network become aware about the hazard of malignant degeneration however earlier than this example file it become doubtful approximately adjustments that those lesions underwent. </p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">A 64-yr-antique Caucasian male with out a non-public records of pores and skin most cancers offered with a 1 yr records of an asymptomatic solitary lesion at the glans penis. Upon referral to dermatology, affected person offered with a 6 mm, solitary, erythematous annular macule with a circumferential collaret of scale and a valuable barely atrophic location. Highlighting the complete lesion with a pores and skin marking pen and wiping away with an alcohol pad brought about selective accentuation of the collaret of scale. Based on examination, issuer identified the affected person with a solitary porokeratosis and provided to deal with with cryotherapy. After 12 months, affected person again to the issuer with now a 1. zero cm, solitary, erythematous annular macule with a greater distinguished valuable erythema and atrophy </p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">Clinical versions consist of porokeratosis of Mabelli, linear porokeratosis, disseminated superficial actinic porokeratosis, and punctuate palmoplantar porokeratosis; however a lot of these percentage the not unusualplace characteristic of cornoid lamella on histologic examination. A much less acknowledged medical version consists of porokeratosis ptychotropica (PP) which become first defined via way of means of Lucker et al. , in 1995. Stone et al. , in 1999 defined a 2d case in which he used a greater descriptive term “bilateral perianal inflammatory verrucous porokeratosis”.Features that distinguish PP from genital porokeratosis consist of more than one cornoid lamellae on histologic examination, a massive pruritic verrucous plaque withinside the perianal location with satellite tv for pc lesions.</p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">Although subadjacent dermal amyloid has been defined in some of PP instances, it has additionally been referred to in different instances of porokeratosis and can simply constitute a characteristic of continual irritation. Porokeratosis of Mabelli, aleven though the maximum not unusualplace version, is a as a substitute uncommon incidence withinside the genital location. A thorough assessment of the literature to simplest consist of instances that cons,,[9] 3 instances in person females,and a unmarried case of linear porokeratosis in a teenager male.&nbsp; Robinson et al. , said a case of a 39-yr-antique nulliparous Caucasian girl with a 30 yr records of perianal lesions beginning at eight yr of age and spreading to perineum, medial thighs, and plantar floor of toes via way of means of age 23.&nbsp;</p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \"> Other comparable case reviews in which authors said lesions aside from genital place have been additionally excluded. We opted to exclude this example due to involvement of regions aside from perineum, plus primarily based totally on description of perianal lesions creator suspects that this could in reality have represented a case of Porokeratosis ptychotropica which each clinically and histologically mimic genital porokeratosis. Based on assessment of literature </p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">, it\'s miles obtrusive that vast majority of sufferers affected are middle-elderly adult males (90%) with on common over a yr lengthy records earlier than providing to the dermatologist. No clean propensity closer to a solitary or more than one lesions become obtrusive primarily based totally at the data. Progression to nonmelanoma pores and skin most cancers (mainly Bowen\'s ailment and squamous mobileular carcinoma) is well-documented and estimates variety from 6. nine to 30%. Risk elements consist of records of present process radiation therapy, continual lesions, lesions on extremities, older age, and linear version.</p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">Based on medical examination, differential analysis in our affected person additionally protected annular lichen planus, Bowen\'s ailment, candidiasis, irritant/allergic touch dermatitis, and Zoon\'s balanitis. Kluger et al. , describes a case of genital porokeratosis that disseminated after a 20 yr duration in which the affected person said symptomatic comfort after being dealt with with 3% topical diclofenac. </p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">Shave elimination become healing in our affected person and at 6 month follow-up affected person become referred to to be ailment free. This case and assessment of literature demonstrates the medical presentation of genital porokeratosis, it highlights unique remedy options, and a better propensity of adult males being suffering from this condition. </p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">The approach includes the usage of a C18 inertsil ODS-3 (250 mm × 4. 6 mm i. d, five μm particle size) column and the subsequent additives with this gradient: A aggregate of water containing zero. 1 % H3PO4 (pH 2. 25) and methanol withinside the gradient series indexed below. Deriving a minimal set of signs to evaluate community aspect importance - For TLC approach: Camag Linomat IV applicator become used to use samples at the TLC plates. Mobile gadget composed of methanol: acetone (nine: 1, v/v) become delivered to a tumbler jar and allowed to be saturated for 15 min. The used utility quantity of pattern answers become 10 uL.</p>','2022-11-22 22:36:20.554340','uploads/news/download_PfGTHCX.jpg',1,'Actas Dermo-Sifiliográficas','Perianal and scrotal porokeratosis ptychotropica. Case report of an unusual condition, and review of the literature',1,130,'<ul><li>Ahmed A, Hivnor C. A case of genital porokeratosis and review of literature. Indian J Dermatol. 2015;60(2):217. doi:10.4103/0019-5154.152587<br></li></ul>'),(68679,'Renewable energy present status and future potentials in India: An overview','renewable-energy-present-status-and-future-potentials-in-india-an-overview','2022-11-23 17:32:19.007365','<p>The World Energy Forum has predicted that fossil-based oil, coal, and gas reserves are likely to get exhausted in less than 10 decades. 79% of the primary energy consumed in the world is accounted by fossil fuels. Whereas 57.7% of this energy is used in the transport sector. These energy resources are diminishing rapidly. Renewable energy is energy derived from regenerative resources. The regenerative resources do not deplete over time.</p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 700;\">Advantages of renewable include:</span></p><ol><li>It offers our planet to reduce carbon emissions in the atmosphere.</li><li>Cleans the air.</li><li>Puts civilization on a more sustainable footing.</li><li>Improves energy security.</li><li>Spur Economic development.</li></ol><p><br></p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<img src=\"/media/django-summernote/2022-11-23/9be33c9a-0741-4adf-985c-379efab855cd.webp\" style=\"width: 603.889px; height: 189.752px;\"></p><p><br></p><h3 class=\"\" style=\"font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);\"><span style=\"font-weight: 700;\"><u>Keywords</u></span>: renewable energy, fossil fuels, energy security, producers</h3><p><br></p><p>About 70% of total greenhouse emissions are related to energy. The main cause is the burning of fossil fuels. This leads to various impacts on the environment such as climate change. Renewable energy resources may also help in mitigating climate change.</p><p><br></p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 700;\">Sources of renewable energies include:</span></p><ul><li>Biomass</li><li>Wind energy</li><li>Solar energy</li><li>Hydropower</li><li>Geothermal energy</li></ul><p><span style=\"font-weight: 700;\"><u>Renewable energy in India:</u></span></p><p>India\'s population is more than 1028 million and it is growing at an annual rate of 1.58%. As the fossil fuel reserves are depleting, India will face energy shortages in near future. This will lead to high energy prices and will threaten energy security. For the proper sustainable development of India, the use of RES and technologies is becoming vital.</p><p>India is determined to be one of the world\'s leading clean energy producers. The government of India has made several provisions and established several agencies for achieving this goal.&nbsp;</p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 700;\"><u>Future of renewable energy in India:</u></span></p><p>Various government and private organizations such as MNRE, Centre for Wind Energy Technology, Universities, IITs, NITs, Indian Oil Corporation Ltd. (IOCL), and The Energy Resource Institute(TERI) are involved in the R and D of renewable energy sources.&nbsp;</p><p>It is expected that the contribution of power generation from renewable energy alone will be to the extent of 60,000 MW by the year 2031-2032. By this year, renewables will act as the key driver in the social inclusion of the poor in the development process. Over the next 25 years, the modest assessment of investments in the renewable energy sector will be about Rs. 300,000 crores.</p><p><span style=\"font-weight: 700;\"><u>Current energy policies:</u></span></p><ol><li>National Electricity policy,2005.</li><li>The Electricity Act 2003</li><li>Tariff Policy, 2006</li><li>National Rural Electrification Policies,2006</li><li>Integrated Energy Policy Report 2006</li></ol><p><span style=\"font-weight: 700;\"><u>Initiatives and steps for delivery and outreach:</u></span></p><ol><li>District Advisory Committees(DACs)</li><li>Akshay Urja Shops</li><li>Energy parks</li><li>Rajiv Gandhi Akshay Urja Divas</li><li>Akshay Urja Newsletter</li><li>Renewable energy clubs</li></ol>','2022-11-23 00:13:23.188504','uploads/news/renewable1.webp',1,'Innovation and Green Development','Renewable energy present status and future potentials in India: An overview',5,87,'<h2 class=\"section-title u-h3 u-margin-l-top u-margin-xs-bottom\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 16px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 24px; color: rgb(80, 80, 80); font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; margin-top: 32px !important; line-height: 1.333 !important;\"><br></h2><section class=\"bibliography-sec\" id=\"cebibsec0010\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: NexusSerif, Georgia, &quot;Times New Roman&quot;, Times, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, serif; font-size: 16px;\"><dl class=\"references\" id=\"reference-links-cebibsec0010\" style=\"margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><dt class=\"label\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px 10px 0px 0px; float: left;\"><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949753122000066#bbib1\" id=\"ref-id-bib1\" data-aa-button=\"sd:product:journal:article:location=references:type=anchor:name=citation-name\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word; cursor: pointer;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Abbasi et&nbsp;al., 2011</font></span></a></dt><dd class=\"reference\" id=\"sref1\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 16px 48px; padding: 0px;\"><div class=\"contribution\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">T.&nbsp;Abbasi,&nbsp;M.&nbsp;Premalatha,&nbsp;S.&nbsp;Abbasi</font></span><div id=\"ref-id-sref1\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span class=\"title\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-weight: bolder; display: block; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">The return to renewables: Will it help in global warming control?</font></span></div></div><div class=\"host\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><font color=\"#000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews,&nbsp;15&nbsp;(2011), pp.&nbsp;891-894,&nbsp;</span><a href=\"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2010.09.048\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">10.1016/j.rser.2010.09.048</span></a></font></div><div class=\"ReferenceLinks u-font-sans\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: NexusSans, Arial, Helvetica, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, sans-serif !important;\"><br></div></dd><dt class=\"label\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px 10px 0px 0px; float: left;\"><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949753122000066#bbib2\" id=\"ref-id-bib2\" data-aa-button=\"sd:product:journal:article:location=references:type=anchor:name=citation-name\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word; cursor: pointer;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Adedoyin et&nbsp;al., 2020</font></span></a></dt><dd class=\"reference\" id=\"sref2\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 16px 48px; padding: 0px;\"><div class=\"contribution\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">F.F.&nbsp;Adedoyin,&nbsp;M.I.&nbsp;Gumede,&nbsp;F.V.&nbsp;Bekun,&nbsp;M.U.&nbsp;Etokakpan,&nbsp;D.&nbsp;Balsalobre-lorente</font></span><div id=\"ref-id-sref2\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span class=\"title\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-weight: bolder; display: block;\"><font color=\"#000000\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">Modelling coal rent, economic growth and CO</span><span style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 0; position: relative; vertical-align: baseline; bottom: -0.25em; font-family: Helvetica;\">2</span><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\">&nbsp;emissions: Does regulatory quality matter in BRICS economies?</span></font></span></div></div><div class=\"host\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Science of The Total Environment,&nbsp;710&nbsp;(2020), Article&nbsp;136284</font></span></div><div class=\"ReferenceLinks u-font-sans\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: NexusSans, Arial, Helvetica, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, sans-serif !important;\"><br></div></dd><dt class=\"label\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px 10px 0px 0px; float: left;\"><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949753122000066#bbib3\" id=\"ref-id-bib3\" data-aa-button=\"sd:product:journal:article:location=references:type=anchor:name=citation-name\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word; cursor: pointer;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Alper and Oguz, 2016</font></span></a></dt><dd class=\"reference\" id=\"sref3\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 16px 48px; padding: 0px;\"><div class=\"contribution\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">A.&nbsp;Alper,&nbsp;O.&nbsp;Oguz</font></span><div id=\"ref-id-sref3\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span class=\"title\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-weight: bolder; display: block; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">The role of renewable energy consumption in economic growth: Evidence from asymmetric causality</font></span></div></div><div class=\"host\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews,&nbsp;60&nbsp;(2016), pp.&nbsp;953-959</font></span></div><div class=\"ReferenceLinks u-font-sans\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: NexusSans, Arial, Helvetica, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, sans-serif !important;\"><br></div></dd><dt class=\"label\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px 10px 0px 0px; float: left;\"><a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949753122000066#bbib4\" id=\"ref-id-bib4\" data-aa-button=\"sd:product:journal:article:location=references:type=anchor:name=citation-name\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; word-break: break-word; cursor: pointer;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Amjith and Bavanish, 2022</font></span></a></dt><dd class=\"reference\" id=\"sref4\" style=\"margin: 0px 0px 16px 48px; padding: 0px;\"><div class=\"contribution\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">L.R.&nbsp;Amjith,&nbsp;B.&nbsp;Bavanish</font></span><div id=\"ref-id-sref4\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span class=\"title\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-weight: bolder; display: block; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">A&nbsp;review on biomass and wind as renewable energy for sustainable environment</font></span></div></div><div class=\"host\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px;\"><font color=\"#000000\">Chemosphere,&nbsp;293&nbsp;(2022), Article&nbsp;133579</font></span></div><div class=\"ReferenceLinks u-font-sans\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-family: NexusSans, Arial, Helvetica, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, &quot;Microsoft Sans Serif&quot;, &quot;Segoe UI Symbol&quot;, STIXGeneral, &quot;Cambria Math&quot;, &quot;Arial Unicode MS&quot;, sans-serif !important;\"><br></div></dd></dl></section>'),(69296,'The burning topic of COP27 - Climate Finance','the-burning-topic-of-cop27-climate-finance','2022-12-16 21:33:25.605242','<span id=\"docs-internal-guid-683640e8-7fff-c752-6c39-d6e9bca85b1e\"><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Have you researched the title, “</span><a href=\"https://educracypedia.com/admin/news/news/69296/change/?_changelist_filters=q%3Dclimate\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Why climate finance is a political hot potato</span></a><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">” on Google search results yet? If not, you will be amazed by how many times this heading has been used for articles and is a burning topic during and after the COP27 event was held in Egypt.&nbsp;</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Arial;\"><br></span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Arial;\">Our current climate situation</span><br></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Climate change is happening right at our footsteps and has become a burning topic in COP27. More specifically, the topic that sits next to climate change is climate finance, which speaks to loss and damage. Humans are taking over nature through urban expansion, genetically modifying a seed, deforestation and over-fishing, just to list a few of our human-induced actions. The act of taking over nature has led to climate finance, as our environment is now in turmoil and has to be fixed in the form of paying a price. Yes, humans are paying the price of their own actions and the youth are the ones that are putting their foot down in conferences such as COP27 to support climate finance.</span></p></span><h2 style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap; color: inherit;\">The re<span style=\"font-size: 11pt;\">ason behin</span></span><span style=\"font-size: 11pt;\">d COP27</span></h2><span><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">COP27 is a climate summit held by the United Nations (UN) every year for governments and other stakeholders to address and take action on the global rising temperatures. This year, COP27 was held in</span><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"> Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt on the 20th of November 2022. </span><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">These stakeholders are known as COPS, which are “Conference of the Parties” and are formed by those who signed the UN Agreement related to climate in 1992. On 27th of November 2022, BBC News stated that COP27 is important as it addresses three main issues, which include: 1) helping countries prepare for climate change, 2) securing funding and technical support for developing countries and 3) to reduce emissions. This year specifically climate finance has been the burning topic.</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><br></span><span style=\"font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap; color: inherit;\">The highlights on climate finance by Nature</span></p></span><span><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">According to Nature on the 22nd of November 2022, during COP27 the commitment of the delegates have been reaffirmed to their goal from 2015 in the Paris climate agreement stated, ‘</span><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">to limit global warming to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial temperatures — while making no further commitments to phase out fossil fuels.” In order to achieve this goal, “emissions need to fall by 45% from 2010 levels by 2030.” The latest UNFCCC report states that emissions are bound to increase over the 10% benchmark and there is no set plan on the way forward to turn these figures around. In 2022’s COP27, 45,000 people were registered to attend the event in Egypt but believed that having a planetary emergency to tackle emissions is something to question in such a short space of time.</span></p><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">In the COP27 discussions, however, a planetary emergency formed through a “loss and damage” fund. This fund has been planned to aid countries that are being severely affected by climate change. This includes businesses destroyed by the floods and the rebuilding of homes. This type of fund is needed in order to mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change. Further, there is a barrier on who can support this fund between the rich and the poor countries, as the rich countries will eventually have to partner with the poor countries to support them during their climate crisis. This topic is however to be continued in COP28 which will be held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.</span></p><h2 style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The entrance of “loss and damage”</span></h2><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Since loss and damage is a new topic attached to climate change, a group of climate vulnerable countries will be asking the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to come to a conclusion to define the term in an individual country specific context. A synthesis on climate finance should be drafted out as evidence and support to loss and damage funds. The more research that is done around the topic will help to make more clearer decisions and will answer any remaining questions. These questions are mostly political and need to be answered in COP by government negotiators. Further, if researchers can give two sides of the page, by having agreements and disagreements around climate finance through research, this will help the government negotiators come to a conclusion much faster. For instance, the IPCC has given solid research in 1995, 1996 and 1998 proving that greenhouse-gases and humans are contributing to climate change. Further, a binding agreement by scientists and the governments have led to the Kyoto Protocol, which is aimed to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. Moreover, an article by Researchgate mentions that there needs to be more climate interpreters who can integrate the divide between field application and science in order to understand the implications to make more precise decisions when planning.</span></p><h2 style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;\">A personal viewpoint on climate finance and “loss and damage”</span><br></h2><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Personally, I do believe that climate change is here to stay and it is caused by human-induced actions on the environment. Hence, we need to pay up on what we have harmed and destroyed in nature through the “loss and damage” fund. This can be seen as our only escape route to assist affected businesses and the rebuilding of homes that have been destroyed by floods. Since the world is transitioning to the western culture, I feel that traditional and indigenous knowledge is being lost and this knowledge can actually help combat climate change naturally.</span></p><br><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The question still remains - are we going to wait for COP28 to move forward with climate finance or can we not take action now to help communities and each other on a local scale to combat climate change? It is now or never, let us do our bit to reduce the effects of climate change today!</span></p><div><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Arial; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><br></span></div></span>','2022-11-28 15:09:56.627780','uploads/news/pexels-markus-spiske-2990617_1_ubSngzr.jpg',1,'Nature','Climate finance is a topic that has showered upon COP27 in Egypt on the 20th November 2022 bringing out a new term called \"loss and damage\". Since, both these terms are quite new and are pressing topics that need urgent attention, researchers and scientists are being asked to dive into research with regards to agreements and disagreements around climate finance. This research will aid governments and other stakeholders to make faster and clearer decisions on \"loss and damage\" funds. This is, however,  a challenge between rich and poor nations. This means that the rich countries will have to contribute to the fund to assist the poor countries during their climate crisis. The “loss and damage fund” is an action taken to help combat those in the climate crisis as a result of human-induced actions that have harmed or destroyed our natural environment. The question lies - if climate change is happening right now, are we going to wait for COP28 for the government to act? or can we gather in our local communities to take action against the climate crisis? It is now or never, we need to take action on climate change today!',13,164,'<ul><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; From academic science to political hot potato: Climatic change, risk ... (n.d.). Retrieved December 16, 2022, from <a href=\"https://www.researchgate.net/publication/225205109_From_academic_science_to_political_hot_potato_Climatic_change_risk_and_policy_relevance\" target=\"_blank\">https://www.researchgate.net/publication/225205109_From_academic_science_to_political_hot_potato_Climatic_change_risk_and_policy_relevance</a><a href=\"https://www.researchgate.net/publication/225205109_From_academic_science_to_political_hot_potato_Climatic_change_risk_and_policy_relevance\" target=\"_blank\"></a></li><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Stallard, E. (2022, November 07). What is COP27 and why is it important? Retrieved December 16, 2022, from <a href=\"https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-63316362\" target=\"_blank\">https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-63316362</a></li><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Why climate finance is a political hot potato - and what to do about it. (2022, November 22). Retrieved December 16, 2022, from <a href=\"https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03790-6\" target=\"_blank\">https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03790-6</a></li></ul><p style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\"><br></p>'),(69322,'A Strategy to Control Yield and Selectivity of Carbon-Based Reactions in Reaction Chemistry on Cu','olefin-cyclization-on-cu-driven-by-subsurface-carbon-and-ultraviolet-irradiation','2022-11-29 08:15:25.300242','<p style=\"text-align: justify; \">Although the reaction mechanism of olefin cyclization has been extensively studied, the control of this process using basic experimental techniques remains an unresolved challenge in chemistry. School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Scienctist introduce carbon into the subsurface of Cu(111) (C-Cuδ+) and UV irradiation on OSS. The total olefin coupling rate increases to 10.1- and 5.3-fold higher than that on pristine Cu(111) at 298 and 323 K, respectively. The initial cyclization temperature reduces by 55 K on C-Cuδ+. UV irradiation further promotes the cyclization ratio from 22% to 40.3%.</p><p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></p><p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The TVT compound changed into sublimated at 450 K from an evaporator and deposited onto a clean, pristine Cu(111) floor saved at 298 K. Without post-treatment, extended, ordered 2D domain names had been fashioned at the floor, as had been determined in scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) images (Figure 2A). Each three-blade motif withinside the area corresponds to an person TVT molecule. The molecules are carefully packed alongside the three equiv &lt;1&gt; guidelines of Cu(111) indicated through the blue arrows. The community periodicity is a = b = 15.2 ± 0.2 Å, and the perspective among the 2 vectors is 60° ± 0.5° (indicated through a blue rhombus). The molecules are remoted from each other and display a clean interspace among the neighbors, indicating no polymerization of TVT on this case.</p><p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></p><p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The merchandising of olefin cyclization upon irradiation will be attributed to the subsequent&nbsp; aspects:</p><ol><li style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;TVT compound is an ordinary triazine-kind UV absorber which could effectively harvest photons withinside the UV region, and the absorbed photons could excite the molecules and growth their inner strength at some point of next de-excitation thru the electron-vibration coupling relaxation,forty three or </li><li style=\"text-align: justify;\">The advent of C atoms to the subsurface can alter the band shape of Cu(111) and beautify the optical absorption in a extensive variety from the UV to the near-infrared region&nbsp; the image absorption should set off nearby plasmon resonance to generate warm electrons and in addition gain the on-floor response of the molecules.</li></ol><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Reaction control, particularly the yield and selectivity, is a critical problem in on-surface synthesis. In this manuscript, after the introduction of surface carbonaceous layer, the cyclization reaction between olefins and allenes was optimized by controlling various parameters. The yields and selectivities of cyclizations could be greatly improved by the C-Cuδ+ catalyst, and new functionalized products were produced on its surface via UV irradiation. These results suggested that the strategy we have developed can be widely applied to other surface reaction systems.<br></p><p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></p><p><br></p>','2022-11-28 15:24:00.548085','uploads/news/download_1_9f0AEvd.jpg',1,'CELL - Cell Reports Physical Science- Inpress','Olefin cyclization on Cu(111) driven by subsurface carbon and ultraviolet irradiation',1,30,'Li. (2022, November 25). Olefin cyclization on Cu(111) driven by subsurface carbon and ultraviolet irradiation. Olefin Cyclization on Cu(111) Driven by Subsurface Carbon and Ultraviolet Irradiation - ScienceDirect. Retrieved November 29, 2022, from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666386422004830#sec2'),(70214,'Proinflammatory activity of VEGF-targeted therapy via tumour endothelial cell anergy reversal','proinflammatory-activity-of-vegf-targeted-therapy-via-tumour-endothelial-cell-anergy-reversal','2022-12-02 15:52:53.598070','<p style=\"text-align: justify; \">Ongoing angiogenesis renders the tumour endothelium resistant to inflammatory cytokines and interferes with leukocyte adherence, resulting in immune escape. Tumor endothelial cell anergy is the name given to this phenomenon. We wanted to see if anti-angiogenic drugs might overcome endothelial cell anergy and create pro-inflammatory circumstances.</p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">RNAseq and immunohistochemistry characterization of the leukocyte infiltration were performed on tissues from renal cell cancer (RCC) patients treated with VEGF pathway-targeted medicines and control tissues. The modulation of adhesion molecules in cultured endothelial cells, a preclinical model, and human tissues was studied and linked with leukocyte infiltration.</p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">It has been demonstrated that treating RCC patients with sunitinib or bevacizumab overcomes tumour endothelial cell anergy. This therapy caused the tumour to become more inflammatory, as evidenced by increased infiltration of all major leukocyte subsets, including T cells, regulatory T cells, M1- and M2-like macrophages, and activated dendritic cells. In vitro, anti-angiogenic medicines restored ICAM-1 expression in angiogenic endothelial cells. A panel of tyrosine kinase inhibitors was also demonstrated to promote transendothelial migration of non-adherent and monocytic leukocytes.</p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">ICAM-1 expression was observed to be considerably enhanced in both the sunitinib and bevacizumab-treated groups of RCC patients\' initial tumours. Following VEGF-targeted therapy, genomic research showed the link between enhanced immune cell infiltration and ICAM-1 expression.</p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></p><p style=\"text-align: justify; \">The findings back up the increasing idea that anti-angiogenic treatment might increase immunity and demonstrate how immunotherapy techniques can benefit from being combined with anti-angiogenic drugs.</p>','2022-12-02 20:45:23.258170','uploads/news/download_2_UNS3Drl.jpg',1,'Springer - Biomedicine','Proinflammatory activity of VEGF-targeted treatment through reversal of tumor endothelial cell anergy',1,89,'<span style=\"font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">Nowak-Sliwinska, P., van Beijnum, J.R., Griffioen, C.J.&nbsp;</span><i style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">et al.</i><span style=\"font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">&nbsp;Proinflammatory activity of VEGF-targeted treatment through reversal of tumor endothelial cell anergy.&nbsp;</span><i style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">Angiogenesis</i><span style=\"font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">&nbsp;(2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10456-022-09863-4</span>'),(70486,'Bioenergy is being prioritised over biodiversity and carbon storage in the EU climate plan','bioenergy-is-being-prioritised-over-biodiversity-and-carbon-storage-in-the-eu-climate-plan','2022-12-16 07:07:08.011048','<p><span style=\"color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 11pt; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;\">In order to preserve biodiversity and meet the European Union (EU) climate targets there is a need for agricultural land to be reduced or maintained at the current levels. How is this going to be possible when the world’s population is increasing and land degradation is occurring at an accelerating rate? - We need to feed a growing population. Is this a way of looking into other methods of technology in agriculture, such as vertical farming that uses hydroponics or aquaponics?</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">An article written by Nature on the 28th of November 2022 by Searchinger and other researchers highlights that the incoming EU policies will regulate the one-fifth of agricultural land that will be used for bioenergy and agricultural expansion needs to be discontinued, as wood will be harvested more by the EU.</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><br></span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 11pt; font-weight: 700; white-space: pre-wrap; text-align: justify;\">The EU’s Climate Plan</span><br></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Currently, the EU’s climate legislation has laid out a </span><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">\"Fit for 55\" climate legislation plan which aims to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by 2030 by 55%. In order to achieve this goal, the EU plans to focus on increasing their renewable energy sources by 45% in 2030 compared to an average of 22% in 2020.&nbsp;</span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 11pt; font-weight: 700; white-space: pre-wrap; text-align: justify;\">The term bioenergy explained in the EU context</span><br></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Bioenergy is one of the renewable energy sources that the EU wants to expand on, which includes sourcing energy from organic matter such as agrofuels, anaerobic digestion and wood fuel, just to name a few sources. According to the EU, bioenergy is a mixture of biofuels, biomethane and biomass which contribute to reducing greenhouse-gas emissions and assists the EU in being energy independent. According to Revolve on 21st June 2022,&nbsp; the reason the EU wants to be energy independent is due to two main points: 1) to stop dependence on Russian fossil fuels and 2) to combat the climate crisis. Journalists and researchers from Nature and Le Monde, however, analyse the risks associated with increasing renewable energy sources and discarding biodiversity and carbon storage.</span></p><h2 style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 700; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The key points&nbsp;from Nature and Le Monde on bioenergy</span></h2><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The viewpoint of Nature about the risks associated with fully implementing bioenergy is that the world needs to reduce “land carbon footprint” which means amounts of carbon lost from deforestation in supplying agricultural products such as wood and crops. Additionally, a growing population means that we need to have more agricultural land to feed the increased population. Statistics from Nature show that “40–60% more crops and 70% more milk and meat in 2050 is needed than in 2010”. On the other hand, Le Monde states that the solutions are double-edged when wanting to combat climate change and protecting biodiversity. The article highlights that prioritising bioenergy will fall into the risk of increasing deforestation as land will be occupied in producing biofuels and wood fuel. Timothy Searchinger also notes that, “Bioenergy will rarely reduce greenhouse-gas emissions.” The article further explains that bioenergy does not reduce greenhouse-gases efficiently as the process still involves burning the plants, which still releases carbon emissions into the atmosphere. Further, no additional carbon is being removed from the atmosphere but rather increases the current carbon emission levels. The article highlights its viewpoint in the quote, “When the expense is food or agricultural land, the effect is poorer nutrition. When the expense is forests or woody savannas, the effect is less stored carbon.\" The debate stands, do we need energy or do we need food for our growing population?</span></p><h2 style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 700; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The risk of sacrificing carbon storage and biodiversity</span></h2><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">According to the United Nations (UN) Energy, carbon storage areas such as forests or areas with high conservation value containing biodiversity are being demolished due to land-grabbing for the rapid expansion of bioenergy production. This method of bioenergy production has negative consequences for climate change and for carbon storage. Since, land is a contested and a scarce resource - it should be used wisely, as it is a place of habitat for humans and animals. Land also has value, which is being used for different economic sectors such as transportation, agriculture and&nbsp; tourism, just to list a few. Simultaneously, ecosystem services need to be available for human activity, especially for livelihoods. According to UN Energy, an ecosystem service is what the environment can provide, which benefits a human, for instance, a savannah or a forest. Further, biodiversity needs to be preserved by reducing deforestation and where our forests can act as carbon sinks to combat climate change. Further, UN Energy suggests that every country should go through an environmental assessment first to assess whether the country has a potential for bioenergy production based on suitability and availability of land resources.</span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 10.5pt; font-weight: 700; white-space: pre-wrap; text-align: justify;\">The viewpoint and opinions from the research above</span><br></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10.5pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Nature states that Europe can plan for a more environmentally-friendly land future by, </span><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">“</span><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(34, 34, 34); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Preserving older forests from harvest is another priority for both carbon and biodiversity. P</span><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">lanting fast-growing trees on agricultural lands could replace the foregone wood supply.” Equivalently, in Le Monde, a researcher states that, \"The authors of this analysis are right to show that we are not going to decarbonize the European Union\'s economic system by simply pushing biomass,\" said Pierre-Marie Aubert, a researcher in agricultural policies at the Institute for sustainable development and international relations, who was not involved in this work. But above all, we will have to develop energy sobriety and change our diets to reduce our consumption of animal products.\" Both articles oppose the idea that bioenergy should be prioritised over biodiversity and carbon storage.</span></p><h2 class=\"\"><span style=\"color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 11pt; font-weight: 700; white-space: pre-wrap; text-align: justify;\">A way forward with bioenergy based on personal viewpoint</span></h2><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"line-height:1.38;text-align: justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 11pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Personally, bioenergy should n</span><span style=\"font-size: 10.5pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">ot be the main focu</span><span style=\"font-size: 10.5pt; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">s when transitioning to renewable energy, as there are other types of renewable energy that can be prioritised, such as hydropower, solar and wind energy. These energy production and consumption methods are less harmful to our environment without causing deforestation and reducing agricultural land. Further, land degradation has already occurred due to urban expansion for human use and this same land has lost its value both for agricultural and biofuel production. This is why the EU now wants to remove the remaining non-degraded agricultural land to prioritise biofuels as we are globally running out of land space.&nbsp;</span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 10.5pt; white-space: pre-wrap; text-align: justify;\"><br></span></p><p><span style=\"color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 10.5pt; white-space: pre-wrap; text-align: justify;\">Where are we going to grow our food? Is vertical farming, which requires no soil going to be replaced for the lost land, but then would this method be an efficient carbon sink? The European Union can also move towards hydropower, solar and wind energy and not just biofuels. We need to produce energy that speaks to environmental justice and sustainable development.</span></p>','2022-12-02 21:54:19.083318','uploads/news/pexels-quang-nguyen-vinh-14035856.jpg',1,'Nature','Bioenergy is being prioritised over biodiversity and carbon storage in the European Union (EU) climate plan. The reason bioenergy is being prioritised is due to there being a push to expand on renewable energy sources. In the case of the EU, however, there is a focus on bioenergy and not other renewable energy sources such as solar or wind power. The two research sources, Nature and Le Monde oppose this statement and believe that a growing population will not allow for bioenergy to be priortised. Secondly, biofuels are not so \"clean\" and \"environmentally-friendly\" as it seems, due to burning plants, which is still releasing greenhouse-gases. In summary, there are other ways of producing energy such as hydropower, wind and solar power. One does not need to stick to one method in energy production when there are other alternatives, especially when you are sacrificing carbon storage, which will contribute to climate change immensely and sacrificing biodiversity, which is an integral part of our environment.',13,17,'<ul><li><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">Bioenergy. (n.d.). Retrieved December 15, 2022, from https://energy.ec.europa.eu/topics/renewable-energy/bioenergy_en</span></li><li><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">Gérard, M. (2022, December 02). EU climate plan: Researchers warn of the risks of \"sacrificing\" land for Bioenergy. Retrieved December 15, 2022, from https://www.lemonde.fr/en/environment/article/2022/12/02/eu-climate-plan-researchers-warn-about-risk-of-sacrificing-land-for-bioenergy_6006339_114.html#:~:text=To%20meet%20this%20target%2C%20the,%2C%20agrofuels%2C%20and%20so%20on.</span></li><li><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">Raul. (2022, June 21). The price of EU Energy Independence. Retrieved December 15, 2022, from https://revolve.media/the-price-of-eu-energy-independence/#:~:text=The%20plan%20aims%20to%20address,2)%20tackling%20the%20climate%20crisis.</span></li><li><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">A decision support tool for Sustainable Bioenergy. (n.d.). Retrieved December 15, 2022, from https://www.fao.org/3/am237e/am237e.pdf</span></li></ul>'),(70932,'Does the intensity of use of social media influence the economic sustainability of the university?','does-the-intensity-of-use-of-social-media-influence-the-economic-sustainability-of-the-university','2022-12-09 04:33:35.136731','<div style=\"text-align: justify; \">Social media is playing a vital impact on the learning behaviour of university students to obtain sustainable education. The influence of social media on sustainable education is becoming a vital and impelling component. The globe has shrunk to the size of a hamlet as a result of social media and technological advancements in education.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">This unique study is one of the few to conduct a focused analysis of the association between good and negative social media traits and university students\' learning attitudes for long-term education. However, the purpose of this study is to investigate the positive and negative variables that have an influence on students\' brains and how they have assisted students in sharing good and bad characteristics with others. It is becoming increasingly clear that social networking sites and their apps provide huge benefits as well as threats to university students, and the effects on students\' psychological adjustment or learning practises are not well recognised.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">The cluster sampling approach was used in this study, and respondents came from five different areas. Researchers submitted 1013 questionnaires to a targeted sample of university students aged 16 to 35, and they received 831 complete/valid replies.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">The social pleasure theory was used in this study to investigate students\' behaviour when using social media. From the prior research, this study precisely identified 18 hostile and constructive social media characteristics. The data demonstrated that social media use had a detrimental affect on a student\'s conduct in Pakistan, as opposed to a favourable influence. Because the findings are unique to the respondents, they cannot be extrapolated to the whole student body. This study demonstrates a link between antagonistic and creative qualities of social media and opens up possibilities for future research by providing a better understanding of web-based social network use.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">This study claims to be a new contribution to scientific knowledge since there is no prior existing literature evidence that bridges and combines students\' perspectives on the use of social media as a supportive tool in higher education. Students and educators are regarded as the most important educational stakeholders because they use social media apps to promote learning environments and knowledge co-creation.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">The beneficial characteristics of social media include its technological contribution to educational institutions and numerous businesses, such as health, services, tourism, and communities. The sharing of opinions with others, awareness-raising, knowledge-sharing, relationships, identity, reputation, and connections building, social impact improvement, and the development of other communication skills are examples of the positive features.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">Teenagers, student communities, and other groups are joining social media platforms in greater numbers throughout the world to engage with friends, family, and strangers. Technology improvements have helped to technically enhance learning and social interactions, information exchange, and the ability to receive updates through social networks. Social media impacts human behaviour. Applications of social media are helpful in businesses, medical research, and educational institutions. Over the past ten years, social media has drastically changed how individuals, social networks, and other organisations produce, distribute, and use information.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">Social media\'s development has changed the world in numerous ways and has had an impact on individuals from all walks of life. The negative effects of social media—examined in this study—have an impact on Pakistani student groups. These negative effects include despair, stress, anxiety, and other health issues. Social media was favoured by students at the chosen colleges for spreading awareness, relieving stress, learning practical knowledge, and establishing new connections. On the other hand, some students squander a lot of time on social media by using it excessively.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">&nbsp;One negative outcome of the dependence on online technology is that some unscrupulous colleges have supplied a phoney degree through online study, and students fall into their trap. Moreover, some students employ online language when completing schoolwork and writing tests and papers, demonstrating that social media and social networks have blurred the gap between professional and casual writing. The excessive use of social media makes pupils emotionally and physically unstable and results in dull or irritated conduct. Given the benefits and drawbacks of social media, parents of students should set limits on their children\'s usage of it because the latter might have a detrimental influence on a student\'s academic performance.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">Given that excessive use of social media is bad for teenagers, these findings can help parents be more vigilant with their kids. This balanced strategy is helpful since it allows kids to profit from utilising social media while they are learning. However, the unfavourable impacts of social media could cause health harm with excessive use [33]. Students often prefer to speak with friends and classmates in person. Students may suffer fraud or scams via the usage of social media, since social networks are utilised from time to time to take advantage of other users. Due to its tendency to create stressful conditions and unreasonable expectations, social media has had a significant detrimental impact on pupils.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">Such negative effects, such as anxiety, stress, and depression illnesses, brainwashing, the consumption of fake news, marriage breakdowns, trolling, cyberbullying, privacy abuses, online witch hunts, and time waste, may result from excessive social media use.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">After a thorough examination of technology acceptability, technology addiction, and discussions with student groups at certain colleges, a conceptual model was empirically validated in this study by surveying actual social media users. The results show that students\' decisions to utilise social media are strongly influenced by their acceptance of technology, its usability, and their perceptions of its advantages. These findings imply that maintaining a balanced approach to social media might help prevent the harmful health repercussions of excessive social media use.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">&nbsp;Government authorities may also profit from these results, and they can take necessary actions to protect the health of students and others in society from the excessive use of social media. Student groups briefly summarised their observations of internet posts or material that inspired them to adopt practises to avoid unfavourable emotional reactions. Future research should analyse other aspects to build on the elements previously employed in this study to acquire more insight into students’ perspectives regarding the sustainable usage of social media. Additional research should examine the effects of certain social networking sites, such as Facebook, WeChat, What\'s App, and Twitter. Moreover, comparable research may be undertaken by considering other age groups than university students or by analysing other locations in Pakistan.</div>','2022-12-09 09:03:02.783010','uploads/news/download_3_im17HvT.jpg',1,'Springer - Business and Management','The influence of social media on sustainable education is becoming a vital and impelling component. The globe has shrunk to the size of a hamlet as a result of social media and technological advancements in education.',1,220,'<span style=\"font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">Ha, L.T. Socioeconomic and resource efficiency impacts of digital public services.&nbsp;</span><i style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">Environ Sci Pollut Res</i><span style=\"font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">&nbsp;</span><span style=\"box-sizing: inherit; font-weight: bolder; font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">29</span><span style=\"font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; background-color: rgb(252, 252, 252);\">, 83839–83859 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-21408-2</span>'),(71544,'Nature-based climate solutions need the support of governance and socioeconomic attributes','nature-based-climate-solutions-need-the-support-of-governance-and-socioeconomic-attributes','2023-01-05 11:43:35.577246','<div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-size: 18px; font-family: Helvetica;\">In reducing climate change, natural-based climate solutions (NCS) play a vital role. There is however a lack of understanding in natural based climate solutions around social, political and biophysical contexts. These three contexts slow down the implementation of nature-based climate solutions.</span></div><h3 class=\"\"><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: inherit; font-family: inherit;\">About Nature-based climate solutions</span></div></h3><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">The research by Maina and Asamoah estimates carbon sink potential to identify socioeconomic and ecological factors that may stimulate NCS implementation in developing economies. There were eight NCS that were identified, which were the following: peatland restoration, improved rice cultivation, avoided peatland impacts, optimal grazing intensity, the grazing of legumes, natural forest management,&nbsp; avoided coastal impacts and reforestation. Further, the concept of NCS is not understood fully in food insecurity hotspots which have the assistance when it comes to development. There will be poor implementation of NCS projects at a country level when it comes down to food insecurity and poor governance structures.&nbsp;&nbsp;</span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">There are multiple benefits to people and nature with protecting, semi-natural, managing and restoring ecosystems. These multiple benefits come from an approach called NCS, which are cost effective, critical transitions for resilient and sustainable land-use systems to control climate change. Maina and Asamoah&nbsp; mention that “if properly implemented, NCS can contribute over 30% (by 2030) to carbon uptake globally,4,5 and could reduce the global peak temperature by 0.3C under a 2C warming trajectory by 2085 (or by 0.1C by 2055 under a 1.5C rise).7 Along with climate change mitigation, NCS offers benefits for biodiversity, human well-being, water purification and soil protection.”&nbsp;</span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">Currently, NCS is garnering local and global attention to combat biodiversity loss and climate change. At local, national and global scales there have been recent studies that have drafted and identified opportunities with regard to NCS for restoring, forest protection and forest cover. Although the accrued benefits have been highlighted in NCS there is a lack of effectiveness in political, social and biophysical uptakes which is all a part of a systematic analysis. Financial constraints can also reduce the climate mitigation potential of NCS, for example, “in Southeast Asia by 55% (low estimate) to 17% (high estimate)”. Harnessing nature and reducing climate impacts can cause other environmental issues such as the exacerbation of food insecurity, land allocation issues which widens social inequities strained by wars and climate change. Keeping up to date with climate change mitigation and biodiversity measures requires local and global actions as well as institutional capacity, public participation and contingent on knowledge. In order to achieve carbon storage, flourishing biodiversity and forest cover, long-term&nbsp; measures are important, which includes the factors that promote NCS.</span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">The research taken by Maina and Asamoah “aims to provide this understanding by testing for the association between contemporary socioeconomic factors and the potential carbon sink from management, restoration and protection efforts (hereafter NCS) across 126 nations with ‘developing economies’ status”. Further, there are positive and negative associations that are linked to NCS are governance readiness, threatened species, challenged soil conditions, development aid, population density, social adaptive readiness, food insecurity, economic readiness and protected areas.&nbsp;</span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><h3 class=\"\" style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">Sustainable nature-based solutions have implications</span></h3><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">The Paris Agreement goals of getting the global climate below 2 degrees celsius&nbsp; will require the adaptation of natural methods such as protected area, land management and restoration. Further the article mentions that “evolving global policy frameworks, including the CBD’s proposed post-2020 draft biodiversity framework, underscore the need to concurrently mitigate climate change, conserve biodiversity and enhance human well-being.45 NCS provides a roadmap to sustainability and benefit-sharing at multiple spatial scales, which likely will strengthen the first three Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs 1, 2, 3)—No Poverty, Zero Hunger, and Good Health and Wellbeing—especially in developing nations.” Moreover, sustainable funding is an issue worldwide, “a lack of sufficient and sustainable funding and incentives is one of the main barriers to implementing and monitoring NCS worldwide.” The findings by&nbsp; Maina and Asamoah had shown different methods, “our findings indicate additional pathways for NCS allocation and design, elucidating the interplay of policies aimed at emission reduction and those targeting biodiversity conservation. For instance, it is essential to approach and prioritize regions for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation plus (REDD + targeting) under budget constraints”.&nbsp;</span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><h3 class=\"\" style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">The studies conclusion</span></h3><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: Helvetica;\">The study identified that ecological and socio economic correlates with the design and uptake of NCS. The NCS pathways include management, protection and restoration which enables decision making around land-use at national and local levels. In there being multiple interventions there are observed direct and indirect associations that will aid this process.&nbsp; Maina and Asamoah findings concluded that “our findings underpin NCS pathways as strategies to achieve numerous goals beyond climate mitigation, including biodiversity conservation, socioeconomic benefits, food security and ecosystem services”.</span></div><div><br></div>','2022-12-09 11:31:50.898396','uploads/news/pexels-akil-mazumder-1072824.jpg',1,'CELL - iScience- Inpress','In reducing climate change, natural-based climate solutions (NCS) play a vital role. There is however a lack of understanding in natural based climate solutions around social, political and biophysical contexts. These three contexts slow down the implementation of nature-based climate solutions. The research by Maina and Asamoah estimates carbon sink potential to identify socioeconomic and ecological factors that may stimulate NCS implementation in developing economies. There were eight NCS that were identified, which were the following: peatland restoration, improved rice cultivation, avoided peatland impacts, optimal grazing intensity, the grazing of legumes, natural forest management,  avoided coastal impacts and reforestation. Further, the concept of NCS is not understood fully in food insecurity hotspots which have the assistance when it comes to development. There will be poor implementation of NCS projects at a country level when it comes down to food insecurity and poor governance structures.',13,164,'<ul><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Author links open overlay panelErnest F.Asamoah12PersonEnvelopeJoseph M.Maina1PersonEnvelope, F.Asamoah12PersonEnvelope, E., 1, 2, M.Maina1PersonEnvelope, J., Highlights•Harnessing nature’s potential can bolster climate mitigation efforts•Food insecurity and poor governance can constrain these benefits•Sustainable financing and food security safeguards can boost NCS adoption, &amp; SummaryNature-based climate solutions (NCS) can play a crucial role in reducing climate change. There is. (2022, November 30). Nature-based climate solutions require a mix of socioeconomic and governance attributes. Retrieved January 5, 2023, from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004222019721</li></ul>'),(73049,'Unraveling the mystery of viroid nuclear import','unraveling-the-mystery-of-viroid-nuclear-import','2022-12-14 19:03:02.338739','<p>The current consensus regarding intracellular RNA trafficking in eukaryotic cells is that RNAs transcribed in the nucleus either remain in the nucleus or cross the nuclear envelope, entering the cytoplasm for function. However, new evidence suggests that many functional RNAs move in the opposite direction, from the cytoplasm to the nucleus. The process behind RNA nuclear import is not well understood. Viroids are plant-infecting single-stranded circular noncoding RNAs. We demonstrated that cellular IMPORTIN ALPHA-4 (IMPa-4) is likely involved in viroid RNA nuclear import using Nicotiana benthamiana, tomato (Solanum lycopersicum), and nuclear-replicating viroids as a model, empirically supporting the involvement of Importin-based cellular pathway in RNA nuclear import.</p><p><br></p><p><br></p>','2022-12-15 00:12:30.579193','uploads/news/pexels-edward-jenner-4031321.jpg',1,'CELL - Trends In BioChemical Sciences - Microbiology- Inpress','Unraveling the mystery of viroid nuclear import',1,51,'<ul><li>Ma, J., Dissanayaka Mudiyanselage, S. D., Park, W. J., Wang, M., Takeda, R., Liu, B., &amp; Wang, Y. (2022). A nuclear import pathway exploited by pathogenic noncoding RNAs. The Plant cell, 34(10), 3543–3556. https://doi.org/10.1093/plcell/koac210</li></ul>'),(74182,'Have you heard of a created living shoreline that is able to combat climate change?','have-you-heard-of-a-created-living-shoreline-that-is-able-to-combat-climate-change','2023-01-04 09:53:45.681156','<div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-size: 18px;\">In today’s age and time, we have the knowledge and resources to combat climate change and natural disasters. One such method of combating climate change according to Kendall Powell is by building a living shoreline to combat climate change.</span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\">Powell mentions that Eileen Mahe, a conservationist uses sand, cement and large amounts of shells to attract oysters and prevent erosion. This process has been able to control or manage the tidelands around a South California port in America. Powell writes about Eileen Mahe’s journey in building a living shoreline on the coast of South California.</span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-size: 14px;\"><br></span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: inherit; font-family: inherit; font-size: 24px;\">Eileen Mahe’s journey</span><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">Eileen Mahe is based on the Port of San Diego in California and is a conservationist land manager. Her team and herself manages about 4,850 hectares of tidelands, three-quarters of which is covered by water at high tide around the San Diego Bay. The team is also participating in the San Diego Bay Native Oyster Living Shoreline project, which helps to restore wetlands and prevent the erosion of the adjacent natural shorelines. In the San Diego Bay Native Oyster Living Shoreline project, Eileen Mahe and her team had put 360 reef balls out on the coastline in September. The implementation of the reef balls were put on the shoreline of a native-oyster reef in the South Bay.&nbsp;</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><h3 class=\"\" style=\"text-align: justify; \">What is a reef ball?</h3><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">The element that makes up a reef ball is “baycrete” which is created with local sand to form a concrete mixture and the shells of farmed oysters is also used in this process. This process also attracts wild oysters which makes this new place their habitat. Eileen Mahe has a target of 190 litres of water per day which can be filtered by the Olympia Oysters. Behind the reef balls there is sediment that is predicted to form, which allows for the growth of eelgrass, which then becomes a part of the food chain on the Bay.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">&nbsp;</div><h3 class=\"\"><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: inherit; font-family: inherit;\">A future prediction of the living shoreline</span></div></h3><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">In the years to come, the native oysters will take the place of the reef balls and cover the reef balls, where an artificial reef shore will be formed. The advantages of the artificial reef shore is that the storm waves will be able to break further away from the shoreline and the salt marsh will be protected. There is also a Wetland habitat refuge inland from South Bay where birds are coming along to the shoreline and are eating the reef balls that are placed on the sand.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><h3 style=\"text-align: justify;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"color: inherit; font-family: inherit; font-size: 24px;\">Climate Hub’s view on living shorelines</span></h3><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">Living shorelines according to Climate Hub mentions that natural calamities are destroying the coastlines of our beaches. Many are trying to find ways to preserve and protect the natural integrity of a coastline. The Climate Hub has put forward “Living Shoreline” to be the answer in protecting our coastlines. This method can help maintain the shorelines from destroying its natural form from storm damage and regular flooding. The resources and materials to form the living shoreline according to Climate Hub is “By using wetland plants, natural structures, and shellfish breakwaters, wave energy is absorbed and erosion is reduced.” Further, Climate Hub States, “the goal is to make the coast more resilient so that upland areas are protected while maintaining the ecological function of the shoreline. Money Island and Gandy’s Beach are located along the New Jersey coast of Delaware Bay. This important area for fisherman, oyster farmers, and wildlife is being impacted by climate change. In response, Rutgers University and its partners are working to create a living shoreline here to reduce damage from future storms, provide habitat for wildlife, and improve water quality.”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><h3 class=\"\"><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: inherit; font-family: inherit;\">The importance of a living shoreline</span><br></div></h3><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">The article mentions that a living shoreline is important because it helps to combat climate change by sequestering carbon. Sequestering carbon is vital as both oysters and eelgrass store a lot of carbon in them. Eileen Mahe ends by saying, “ The reef balls are win–win–win. I often joke that we’re trying to save the planet one acre (0.4 hectares) at a time.”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div>','2022-12-18 16:57:41.448956','uploads/news/pexels-pablo-penades-10188035.jpg',1,'Nature','In today’s age and time, we have the knowledge and resources to combat climate change and natural disasters. One such method of combating climate change according to Kendall Powell is by building a living shoreline to combat climate change. There are two articles that support living shorelines, which will be outlined in the article. Powell mentions that Eileen Mahe, a conservationist uses sand, cement and large amounts of shells to attract oysters and prevent erosion. This process has been able to control or manage the tidelands around a South California port in America. Powell writes about Eileen Mahe’s journey in building a living shoreline on the coast of South California. Eileen Mahe is based on the Port of San Diego in California and is a conservationist land manager. Her team and herself manages about 4,850 hectares of tidelands, three-quarters of which is covered by water at high tide around the San Diego Bay. The team is also participating in the San Diego Bay Native Oyster Living Shoreline project, which helps to restore wetlands and prevent the erosion of the adjacent natural shorelines. The article mentions that a living shoreline is important because it helps to combat climate change by sequestering carbon. Sequestering carbon is vital as both oysters and eelgrass store a lot of carbon in them. Eileen Mahe ends by saying, “ The reef balls are win–win–win. I often joke that we’re trying to save the planet one acre (0.4 hectares) at a time.”',13,164,'<ul><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;Living shorelines. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.climatehubs.usda.gov/hubs/northeast/project/living-shorelines</li><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Powell, Kendall. “Building a Living Shoreline to Help Combat Climate Change.” <i>Nature News</i>, Nature Publishing Group, 16 Dec. 2022, <a href=\"http://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-04468-9.\" target=\"_blank\">www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-04468-9.</a></li><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\"><i>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;Shoreline Photos, Download Free Shoreline Stock Photos &amp; HD Images - Pexels</i>. <a href=\"http://www.pexels.com/search/shoreline/.\" target=\"_blank\">www.pexels.com/search/shoreline/.</a></li></ul><div></div><p></p><p style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp;</p><div></div><p></p>'),(74380,'How do we reach Paris Agreement Targets with different perspectives?','how-do-we-reach-the-paris-agreement-climate-mitigation-targets-with-different-perspectives','2023-01-03 22:20:07.241527','<span id=\"docs-internal-guid-8084bc4e-7fff-d239-ea9e-287baba22d35\"><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Helvetica; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">There is a focus on reducing carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in most of the climate change mitigation strategies. However, there are climate warmers that are even more powerful than CO2 such as other anthropogenic drivers and non-CO2 greenhouse gases. Eight voices have contributed to the following question: ‘‘What are the important actions to reduce non-CO2 warming forcers to help the world reach Paris Agreement targets?’’</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><b><br></b></span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><b>The question to the respondents</b></span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The article answers the question, “What are the important actions to reduce non-CO2 warming forcers to help the world reach Paris Agreement targets?’’. There were eight respondents to the question.</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 1 - Catherine Dieleman from University of Guelph&nbsp;</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Answer: “Conserving permafrost-protective ecosystems for climate mitigation”</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 2: Durwood Zaelke and Amelia Murphy&nbsp;</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Answer: “A global methane agreement can prevent climate chaos”</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 3: Kushal Tibrewal</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Answer” Prioritize actions targeting warmer forcers&nbsp;</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 4: Felix Llovel</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Answer: “ Mitigation strategies to reduce F-gas emissions”</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 5: Arvind Ravikumar</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Answer: “Measurement are key to cut oil and gas methane emissions”</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 6: Simon Svane</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Answer: “Reduction of methane emissions from animal manure”</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 7: Arti Bhatia</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Answer: “Reducing greenhouse gas intensity of paddy cultivation”</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><h3 style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-weight: 700; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 1: Catherine Dieleman&nbsp;</span></h3><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The first voice is Catherine Dieleman from University of Guelph, and she believes the mitigation actions to reduce non-CO2 warming forcers is to conserve permafrost ecosystems for climate mitigation.</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Catherine Dieleman states, “As climate conditions continue to warm, ecological systems that protect permafrost will become increasingly important to limit enhanced thermo-karst formation. As part of a cohesive climate change mitigation strategy, a paradigm shift is needed in how we value and manage northern ecosystems moving forward. Increased recognition of the long-term climate mitigation benefits from conservation and restoration of many northern ecosystems, including systems that protect perma-frost, is an important first step to limiting natural sources of non-CO2 greenhouse gas emissions in the coming century”.&nbsp;</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><br></span></p></span><h3 style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-weight: 700; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 2: Durwood Zaelke and Amelia Murphy&nbsp;</span></h3><span><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The second voices is </span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Durwood Zaelke and Amelia Murphy </span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">and they both believe the mitigation actions to reduce non-CO2 warming forcers is to have a&nbsp; global methane agreement can prevent climate chaos.The first statement mentioned that COP27 is not doing its bit or importance in climate change as the conversation is happening outside of COP27. An example of this is the Global Methane Pledge which 150 countries are committed to “aiming to reduce global methane emissions 30% below 2020 levels by 2030”. Further, “Because cutting methane emissions is the only known way to slow self-reinforcing feedback loops and avoid irreversible tipping points lurking beyond 1.5C, the effort belongs at head-of-state level. At upcoming G7 and G20 meetings, countries representing 75% of global emissions and 80% of global GDP can get a head start to keep the 1.5C target alive by committing to a Global Methane Agreement.”</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><h3 style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-weight: 700; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 3: Kushal Tibrewal</span></h3><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The third voice is </span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Kushal Tibrewal</span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"> and he believes that the mitigation actions to reduce non-CO2 warming forcers is to “Prioritize actions targeting warmer forcers”</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Kaushal Tibrewal provides a solution being black carbon, “Black carbon mitigation actions must precede, or at least be implemented in conjunction with, CO2-targeted climate actions in formal sectors to avoid counter-productively increasing warming by reducing the emissions of cooling forcers. One challenge is these mitigation efforts mostly fall under the governance umbrella of air-quality, which is more of a regional issue than a global one and thus lacks stringent international monitoring. It is imperative that climate policy makers identify activities”.</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">&nbsp;</span></p><h3 style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-weight: 700; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 4: Felix Llovel</span></h3><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The fourth voice is </span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Felix Llovell</span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"> and he believes in “Mitigation strategies to reduce F-gas emissions”. Felix mentions, “Among them, fluorinated gases (F-gases), such as hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), are common substances used in home and industry refrigeration, with a global warming potential (GWP) that may be several orders of magnitude higher than that of CO2, with an expected contribution of around 0.25–0.4C increase of the Earth global temperature by 2050. Further, Felix mentions The unique value of these techniques will not only avoid the massive production of new HFCs but also maintain the refrigeration needs. The combination of these technologies, along with the design of a new generation of sustainable refrigerants, seem to be the most realistic path that contributes to stopping the devastating consequences of global warming caused by non-CO2 F-gas emissions.”</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><h3 style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-weight: 700; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 5: Arvind Ravikumar</span></h3><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The fifth voice is </span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Arvind Ravikumar </span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">and he believes in “Measurements are key to cut oil and gas methane emissions”. Arvind states, “The oil and gas sector is responsible for 25% of global methane emissions and represents a key opportunity for near-term climate action. Global interest in methane mitigation has led to a rise in voluntary initiatives on low-leakage or responsible gas certifications for companies that demonstrate emissions reductions”. A solution stated, “Voluntary initiatives can result in a beneficial race-to-the-bottom on methane, helping achieve the Global Methane Pledge mitigation targets, but it will only work in a world guided by the best available science and sector-wide transparency.”</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><h3 style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-weight: 700; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 6: Simon Svane</span></h3><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The sixth voice is Simon Svane</span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-weight: 700; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"> </span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">and he believes in “Reduction of methane emissions from animal manure”. Simon states, “When developing new solutions, it is important to ensure that existing as well as new technologies within manure treatment are effectively adopted by the farmers. Technologies need to be cheap and easily implemented in already existing animal productions with clear advantages to the individual farmer. Utilizing manure for biogas production is an example of a technology that adds value to the manure as farmers are paid for the produced biogas and that is easily implemented in existing productions. However, a substantial investment is required to build the needed biogas plants, and solutions are needed to address methane emissions prior to biogas production. Inhibiting methane formation in manure already at the livestock-housing level using cheap, safe, and biogas-compatible plant waste materials from other industries could be a possible way forward.</span></p><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><h3 style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-weight: 700; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Respondent 7: Arti Bhatia</span></h3><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">The seventh voice is </span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">Arti Bhatia </span><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">and she believes in “Reducing greenhouse gas intensity of paddy cultivation”. Arti states, “A leaf color chart, a cost-effective tool for nitrogen fertilizer application in rice cultivation can further help to mitigate N2O and also reduce ammonia volatilization. Application of natural nitrification inhibitors such as neem oil coated over urea fertilizer can also lessen both N2O and CH4 emissions. A strategic deployment of these approaches will reduce greenhouse gas intensity of paddy cultivation, further helping to achieve the targets of net-zero emissions and alleviate the global warming potential.</span></p><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><br></span></p></span><h3 style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\" class=\"\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><b>Conclusion to the respondents statements</b></span></h3><span><p dir=\"ltr\" style=\"text-align: justify; line-height: 1.38; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\">There was one question and each respondent gave a different answer and perspective to the answer. Each respondent also provided a way forward or a solution to the question “What are the important actions to reduce non-CO2 warming forcers to help the world reach Paris Agreement targets?’. All respondents views can make a difference in the long run, in reaching the Paris Agreement Targets.</span></p><div><span style=\"font-size: 12pt; font-family: Arial; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;\"><br></span></div></span>','2022-12-19 12:06:11.555903','uploads/news/pexels-markus-spiske-3039036.jpg',1,'CELL - One Earth- Current','There is a focus on reducing carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in most of the climate change mitigation strategies. However, there are climate warmers that are even more powerful than CO2 such as other anthropogenic drivers and non-CO2 greenhouse gases. Eight voices have contributed to the following question: ‘‘What are the important actions to reduce non-CO2 warming forcers to help the world reach Paris Agreement targets?’’ The article answers the question, “What are the important actions to reduce non-CO2 warming forcers to help the world reach Paris Agreement targets?’’. Respondent 1 - Catherine Dieleman from University of Guelph  Answer: “Conserving permafrost-protective ecosystems for climate mitigation” Respondent 2: Durwood Zaelke and Amelia Murphy. Answer: “A global methane agreement can prevent climate chaos” Respondent 3: Kushal Tibrewal, Answer” Prioritize actions targeting warmer forcers  Respondent 4: Felix Llovel- Answer: “ Mitigation strategies to reduce F-gas emissions”. Respondent 5: Arvind Ravikumar- Answer: “Measurement are key to cut oil and gas methane emissions” Respondent 6: Simon Svane- Answer: “Reduction of methane emissions from animal manure”. Respondent 7: Arti Bhatia- Answer: “Reducing greenhouse gas intensity of paddy cultivation”',13,164,'<ul><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;Climate%20change photos, download free climate%20change stock photos ... (n.d.). Retrieved January 3, 2023, from <a href=\"https://www.pexels.com/search/climate%2520change/\" target=\"_blank\">https://www.pexels.com/search/climate%2520change/</a><a href=\"https://www.pexels.com/search/climate%2520change/\" target=\"_blank\"></a></li><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\"><p style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">PanelCatherineDielemanArtiBhatiaArvindRavikumarFelixLlovellSimonSvaneKushalTibrewalDurwoodZaelkeAmeliaMurphy, A., CatherineDieleman, ArtiBhatia, ArvindRavikumar, FelixLlovell, SimonSvane, . . . Most climate change mitigation strategies focus on reducing CO2 emissions. However. (2022, December 16). Opportunities beyond CO2 for climate mitigation. Retrieved January 4, 2023, from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590332222005930</p></li></ul><p style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\"><br></p>'),(74388,'Teal and blue wetlands are not an ideal process in claiming climate benefits due to nitrous oxide and methane','teal-and-blue-wetlands-are-not-an-ideal-process-in-claiming-climate-benefits-due-to-nitrous-oxide-and-methane','2023-01-04 22:29:35.702657','<div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-size: 18px;\">There are known carbon ecosystems such as inland wetlands that are known as teal and coastal wetlands that are known as blue. These two carbon ecosystems are known as essential natural climate solutions and are long-term carbon sinks. Further, there are two potent greenhouse gases nitrous oxide and methane, which are complicating the benefits of blue and teal carbon wetlands.&nbsp;</span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div><h3 style=\"text-align: justify;\" class=\"\">The significance of wetlands</h3><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">An essential global component of nitrogen and carbon cycles are inland and wetlands and vegetated coastal wetlands. The reason why wetlands are significant is because this natural element can preserve and store atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) in sediments at densities and high rates for millennia and centuries. Blue carbon is the long-term storage of inorganic and organic carbon in coastal wetlands such as seagrasses, mangroves and tidal marshes. While teal carbon is where carbon is stored in inland wetlands such as swamps, marshes and ponds. The article mentions that “protecting and restoring wetlands is an increasingly popular natural climate solution to mitigate climate change while supporting other sustainable development goals, such as contributing to cleaner water, coastal protection, sustainable livelihoods, and higher biodiversity”.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><h3 style=\"text-align: justify;\" class=\"\">How wetlands are carbon sinks?</h3><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">At an ecosystem scale, wetlands are known to be as efficient as a carbon sink especially in the mitigation of climate change. Further, Malerba and other researchers state that there is a complication in the assessment of wetlands acting as a carbon sink. The reason is that wetlands emit greenhouse gases into the atmosphere in various forms such as nitrous oxide, methane, and carbon dioxide and these fluxes are varied and not stable. In sum, there are numerous factors that influence greenhouse gas fluxes in wetlands. The article gives a case, “for example, low dissolved oxygen concentrations in sediments can boost methane production, or nitrogen pollution can generate N2O, a greenhouse gas nearly 300 times more potent than CO2. These processes are highly variable over spatial and temporal scales and challenging to predict but can have profound implications on wetlands’ warming and cooling effects on the atmosphere.”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">There is a growing enthusiasm for teal and blue carbon, however, greenhouse gas emissions can reduce their true potential in acting as a natural climate solution. This brings about challenges in the wetland ecosystem. Further, the article states a way forward, “by reducing the uncertainties of wetlands’ cooling and warming effects on the atmosphere, it will be possible to calculate their climate change mitigation potential more accurately. This is particularly important with increasing interest in developing financial mechanisms (through carbon credits) to reward the protection and restoration of wetlands as “Nationally Determined Contributions” under the Paris Agreement or in the voluntary carbon market for private companies to offset their carbon footprint.”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">The article by Malerba and other scholars state the different variations in wetlands:</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">(1) “the drivers of the CH4 and N2O in wetlands”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">(2) “how management actions can affect carbon and nitrogen fluxes”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">(3) “the benefits of preserving and restoring wetlands for climate change”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">4) “the sources of uncertainty about the role of wetlands in climate change mitigation”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;(5) “policy actions for cost-effective management of wetlands as a natural climate solution.”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">Important facts from the above statements are “Teal carbon ecosystems generally emit 10–100 times higher CH4 and N2O fluxes than blue carbon ecosystems to preserve the same amount of carbon in their soil. The main driver of these differences is salinity, which causes greater osmotic stress and reduced efficiency of microbial communities involved in CH4 and N2O production in coastal environments.”&nbsp; The type of vegetation that is used in the wetland is also important. The methane emissions essential driver dissolved oxygen.&nbsp; Teal and blue carbon absorb and release greenhouse gases at the same time which is a complex process making the climate mitigation process a challenge. Moreover, “another source of uncertainty is that CO2, CH4, and N2O have different heat-trapping potentials, and comparing CH4 and N2O to radiative forcing effects relative to CO2 is non-trivial.” The article identifies the problem and the solution, “the lack of empirical data combined with incompatible statistical analysis contributes to higher uncertainties. Establishing an accepted methodology would facilitate the development of a global database and improve our confidence in GHG fluxes in wetlands.”</div><h3 style=\"text-align: justify;\" class=\"\"><br>Improvements in understanding wetlands</h3><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">The article mentions that it is important to understand methane and nitrous oxide carbon sink and emissions dynamics but the datasets need to be improved.&nbsp; The data also needs to be compiled in global datasets. The second improvement that needs to happen is that there needs to be an improvement in technology in collecting data from the field. The article mentions that “wetland emissions are highly variable in time and space, and capturing the appropriate temporal and spatial resolution is difficult.” The message the article brought forward is “deciphering the magnitudes and origins of these emissions worldwide is the first step to reducing them with effective climate policies, along with generating other co-benefits.”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div>','2022-12-19 12:06:24.405013','uploads/news/pexels-lisa-11663078.jpg',1,'CELL - One Earth- Current','There are known carbon ecosystems such as inland wetlands that are known as teal and coastal wetlands that are known as blue. These two carbon ecosystems are known as essential natural climate solutions and are long-term carbon sinks. Further, there are two potent greenhouse gases nitrous oxide and methane, which are complicating the benefits of blue and teal carbon wetlands. An essential global component of nitrogen and carbon cycles are inland and wetlands and vegetated coastal wetlands. The reason why wetlands are significant is because this natural element can preserve and store atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) in sediments at densities and high rates for millennia and centuries. Blue carbon is the long-term storage of inorganic and organic carbon in coastal wetlands such as seagrasses, mangroves and tidal marshes. While teal carbon is where carbon is stored in inland wetlands such as swamps, marshes and ponds. The article mentions that it is important to understand methane and nitrous oxide carbon sink and emissions dynamics but the datasets need to be improved.  The data also needs to be compiled in global datasets.',13,164,'<ul><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Author links open overlay panelMartino E.Malerba1PersonEnvelopeDaniel A.Friess23MikePeacock45AlistairGrinham6PierreTaillardat7Judith A.Rosentreter8JackieWebb9NaimaIram1011Alia N.Al-Haj12Peter I.Macreadie1, E.Malerba1PersonEnvelope, M., 1, A.Friess23, D., 2, 3, . . . SummaryBlue (coastal wetlands) and teal (inland wetlands) carbon ecosystems are long-term carbon sinks and are regarded as essential natural climate solutions. Yet. (2022, December 16). Methane and nitrous oxide emissions complicate the climate benefits of teal and Blue Carbon Wetlands. Retrieved January 5, 2023, from <a href=\"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590332222005796\" target=\"_blank\">https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590332222005796</a></li><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;https://www.pexels.com/search/wetland/<br></li></ul>'),(76023,'The battle of the loss and damage fund in COP27','the-battle-of-the-loss-and-damage-fund-in-cop27','2023-01-02 21:52:23.180917','<div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-size: 18px;\">A climate fund called the loss and damage fund is now required due to human cost to climate change which has come up in the discussion in the United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP27. Whereby, countries who are responsible for high carbon emissions will compensate for those countries who are suffering from climate impacts.</span></div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><span style=\"font-size: 18px;\"><br></span></div><h3 class=\"\" style=\"text-align: justify; \">Research by Lancet Planet Health</h3><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">The loss and damage fund is a crucial step in moving forward with the damages caused by climate change. Further, in the global justice movement, the fund is a crucial step, mentioned by a COP27 negotiator in the Island State of Palau. Natural disasters do not occur in one place, as Pakistan is affected by floods and Africa is suffering from drought. Secretary General of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), Jagan Chapagain mentioned that promises are being broken as families are suffering from extreme climate events. Further, “Chapagain added that, in the period COP27 took place, the IFRC has had to respond to 74 floods globally, four named tropical storms, wildfires in ten countries, the displacement of 185 000 people in Ethiopia, and continuing food insecurity in Afghanistan and across Africa” (Lancet Planet Health, 2022). Moreover, a Landmark Report of 2020 states that if there is no action now then there is going to be a double in the amount of people who require humanitarian assistance by 2050. These natural extremities are going to create a large financial cost, statistics show, “from 3.5 – 12 billion US dollars today to US$20 billion per year by 2030.” Further, Patricia Schwerdtle, a Climate Advisor to Doctors Without Borders said, “What can’t be mitigated or adapted to, will be suffered”. Moreover, “This suffering will be endured disproportionately by people living in poverty, excluded from health care, and those living in fragile and conflict affected states. Humanitarians, like health professionals, have a key role to play in witnessing, documenting, and communicating the risks, loss, and damage due to climate change.”</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">After climate disasters there are homes that need to be rebuilt, governments will need funds to also rebuild homes, roads and hospitals. Further, communities will require social protection which all be possible with a climate fund stated by Teresa Anderson, the Global Lead on Climate Justice for ActionAid International. What is more sad is that the countries who hardly contribute to climate change through greenhouse gases for instance are being affected by climate change. Meena Raman, Head of Programmes at Third World Network defined what the loss and damage fund is “Loss and damage has always been an orphan issue in the multilateral climate regime, and there can be no further delay in addressing the ravages of climate disasters”.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">Surprisingly, the loss and damage fund was actually proposed three decades ago by the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS). The loss and damage fund is also included in the Paris Agreement but was worded in a way to avoid compensation and liability, which is what has been stated by the US when discussed. In 2019, COP25, China and G77 contributed to loss and damage in two ways: “(1) the creation of a technical body for carrying out research and providing technical support on loss and damage and (2) the creation of a fund through which rich polluting countries will pay poorer developing countries suffering from climate change impacts.”&nbsp; The first proposal was accepted but then rejected by high demand parties such as the USA and the EU. The topic then arose in 2021 at COP26 when the G77 wanted to create a finance facility. In 2022 with the G77 the loss and damage had been put forward with Pakistan vouching for the group, Dr Saleemul Huq, Director of the International Centre for Climate Change and Development mentioned “This unity of the G77 at COP27 was an important factor in persuading the developed countries”. Countries who are vulnerable need to be heard the most and a space for multilateral conversations as added by Raman.&nbsp;</div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><h3 class=\"\" style=\"text-align: justify; \">An insight into the loss and damage fund</h3><div style=\"text-align: justify; \">There are still lots of questions around the loss and damage fund such as how is the fund going to be managed, who is going to add to the fund and many more questions that still need to be clarified and answered. The article mentions that these questions will only be answered in COP28, “These questions will be addressed by a 24-member Transitional Committee, tasked to come up with a proposal by COP28 in December, 2023.” It is expected that the fund will be operational in COP28 but promises will not be fulfilled. Lancelot Planet Health mentions, “the establishment of a fund does not necessarily translate in climate finance commitments, with the poor progress to deliver the promised US$100 billion in annual climate funding from wealthy nations at COP27 a case in point.” Shinde mentions that in order for the fund to be progressive and work, motivation will be the key driver. Raman also mentions that, “We need direct access, with rapid reaction times and minimal bureaucracy, to respond as soon as possible to extreme weather events, slow onset events, or non-economic losses”. The adaptation fund and the Green Climate fund are not so reliable and responsive as the funding would take years to come. The article mentions that, “They often struggle to reach local communities and the most vulnerable. Therefore, a loss and damage fund should have a greater emphasis on last mile delivery of support to communities in need.” Another mentions that fossil fuel companies need to pay up for their damage to the environment.&nbsp;</div><h3 class=\"\"><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><br></div><div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: inherit; font-family: inherit;\">The result of COP27</span></div></h3><div style=\"text-align: justify;\">It is believed that COP27 did not address the causes of climate change with the burning of fossil fuels and the constant anthropogenic actions on nature. What has been discussed and tackled was the climate change consequences. Alok Sharma mentions, “We needed to clearly acknowledge that limiting warming to 1·5°C is the only way to prevent climate chaos, so countries’ emissions reduction efforts need to be scaled up dramatically so that global emissions halve by 2030,” said Madeleine Diouf, Chair of the Least Developed Countries Group. World Health Organization, Director General, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus reacted to the omission by saying “lives will continue to be lost until fossil fuel addiction is taken care of”.</div><div style=\"text-align: justify; \"><br></div>','2022-12-19 16:35:13.302161','uploads/news/pexels-markus-spiske-2990610.jpg',1,'The Lancet Planetary Health','The loss and damage fund is a crucial step in moving forward with the damages caused by climate change. Further, in the global justice movement, the fund is a crucial step, mentioned by a COP27 negotiator in the Island State of Palau.Surprisingly, the loss and damage fund was actually proposed three decades ago by the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS). The loss and damage fund is also included in the Paris Agreement but was worded in a way to avoid compensation and liability, which is what has been stated by the US when discussed. There are still lots of questions around the loss and damage fund such as how is the fund going to be managed, who is going to add to the fund and many more questions that still need to be clarified and answered. The article mentions that these questions will only be answered in COP28, “These questions will be addressed by a 24-member Transitional Committee, tasked to come up with a proposal by COP28 in December, 2023.” It is expected that the fund will be operational in COP28 but promises will not be fulfilled.',13,164,'<ul><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\"><i>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Climate%20change photos, download free climate%20change stock photos ...</i> (no date). Available at: https://www.pexels.com/search/climate%2520change/ (Accessed: January 2, 2023).&nbsp;</li><li style=\"margin-left: 1cm; text-indent: -1cm;\">&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;<i style=\"text-indent: -1cm;\">The lancet | the best science for better lives</i><span style=\"text-indent: -1cm;\"> (no date). Available at: https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf (Accessed: January 2, 2023).</span></li></ul><div></div><p></p>'),