Tuesday, July 21, 2020

HAPPINESS IS FOR PIGS

Recycling Japanese liquor leftovers as animal feed produces happier pigs and tastier pork

Diet of shochu distillation remnants is economical way to reduce animals' stress, improve meat quality

UNIVERSITY OF TOKYO

Tastier pork comes from pigs that eat the barley left over after making the Japanese liquor shochu. A team of professional brewers and academic farmers state that nutrients in the leftover fermented barley may reduce the animals' stress, resulting in better tasting sirloin and fillets.

"Kyushu, in Western Japan is well-known historically for making shochu and for its many pig farms. We hope collaborative research projects like ours can directly benefit the local community and global environment," said Yasuhisa Ano, the first author of the research paper published in Food Chemistry. Ano is affiliated with the Kirin Central Research Institute at Kirin Holdings Co., Ltd.

Currently, the mash of leftovers that remains after distilling out the alcohol is considered industrial waste and is often disposed of in ways that create more climate-changing carbon dioxide. Feeding distillation leftovers to farm animals can improve the animals' quality of life, lower farmers' and brewers' costs, appeal to discerning foodies, and benefit the environment by reducing food waste.

Japanese shochu can be made from barley, potatoes, rice or other starches first decomposed with mold, then fermented with yeast, and finally distilled to an alcohol content usually greater than 20 percent. Incidentally, Japanese sake is a fermented drink always made from rice with an alcohol content typically around 15 percent.

Leftovers lower stress

Researchers at the University of Tokyo fed six pigs a standard diet supplemented with shochu distillation remnants, the dried mixture of barley, mold and yeast left over after distilling out the shochu. Pigs fed shochu remnants from age 3 to 6 months had higher amounts of antibodies called IgA in their saliva, indicating that shochu remnants kept the pigs healthier than the standard diet. Additionally, pigs fed shochu remnants had lower stress levels than pigs fed the normal diet supplemented with fresh barley, as measured by the amount of cortisol, a common stress hormone, in their saliva.

Other studies have linked healthier responses to stress to two protein building blocks called leucine and histidine peptides, which barley shochu contains in abundance.

The UTokyo research team performed additional tests in mice to study the effect of barley shochu distillation remnants on stress. Mice that ate the distillation remnants just once directly before a stressful event returned to normal behavior faster than other mice. The mice who ate the shochu remnants also had normal levels of dopamine in their brains after the stressful event, indicating a better response to stress.

Diet of leftovers makes tastier pork

Researchers suspected that the lower stress and better health throughout the pigs' lives created higher quality meat, but they asked flavor experts from Kirin for a blind taste test.

According to the experts' palates, both sirloin and fillet cuts of pork from the shochu remnant-fed pigs were higher quality than meat from pigs that ate the standard diet: better umami, tenderness, juiciness and flavor.

"We saw no difference in the pigs' weight gain between the two diets and the pigs were slaughtered at the standard six months of age, meaning any difference in the quality of meat was not because of a difference in quantity of fat," said Associate Professor Junyou Li from the University of Tokyo, a co-author of the research publication.

That higher quality taste was likely due to chemical differences in the meat. Fat from the higher-quality meat melted at lower temperatures, which creates the delicious melt-in-your-mouth texture. That fat was also made up of a higher percentage of oleic acid, an unsaturated fatty acid linked by other studies to improved levels of "healthy" LDL cholesterol.

"We hope that identifying these benefits for the animals and creating a premium tasting product for consumers will increase farmers' motivation to try a new diet for their pigs," said Professor Masayoshi Kuwahara, director of the University of Tokyo Animal Resource Science Center and last author of the research publication.

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Research Article

Yasuhisa Ano, Jun You Li, Takahiro Jomoto, Daiji Kurihara, Ryohei Nishimura, Hiroyuki Nakayama, Masayoshi Kuwahara. 15 July 2020. Distillation remnants of shochu, a traditional Japanese liquor, improve pork meat quality by reducing stress.

Food Chemistry

Volume 318, DOI: 10.1016/j.foodchem.2020.126488.

Utilitarianism

philosophical.space › Mill

In their view, the principle of utility tells us to maximize the balance of pleasure over pain—in short, to maximize happiness. ... Thomas Carlyle had called Bentham's utilitarianism “a philosophy fit for swine,” contending that it encouraged people to live like pigs, pursuing pleasure by any means possible.

Utilitarianism - New World Encyclopedia

https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org › entry › utilitarianism

Mill's main response to the accusation that utilitarianism is "Pig Philosophy" is to distinguish between higher and lower pleasures. He writes: “…some kinds of ...

‎Classical utilitarianism · ‎Hedonism · ‎Consequentialism · ‎Utilitarian replies to ...

Mindfulness training helps men manage anger

Men who learned to control their anger were less violent towards their partners

NORWEGIAN UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

The last few months have been particularly difficult for people living in a violent relationship.

But a few glimmers of hope are finally emerging from the coronavirus nightmare.

"For a lot of people, the shutdown has been an extreme situation with a lot of stress. Those of us who work with people on anger management have felt really concerned about what might be going on within the four walls of their homes," says Merete Berg Nesset.

For many years Nesset has worked on treating angry people who beat, yell and threaten. Now she is on the flip side, working on a doctorate at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology on the same topic.

COVID-19 has taken a toll. People have lost their jobs. No one is quite sure what will happen with the economy. Many people are feeling uncertain about the future.

"We know that financial difficulties, unemployment and psychological challenges are linked to aggression and violence. The level of stress clearly increases further when parents also become responsible for teaching their children at home. Situations that are already difficult have escalated for a lot of people who have conflicts from before or a prior mental health problem, because there are fewer opportunities to get away," says Nesset.

But there is hope.

Nesset has just published a study showing that treatment can work very well. What she did was to divide 125 men who applied for help with anger management into two groups.

One group received cognitive-behavioural group therapy using what is called the Brøset model.

The other group participated in a stress management course based on mindfulness. Partners in both groups participated through several surveys conducted before, during and after treatment.

The results following treatment were equally good for both groups:

Prior to treatment, 60 per cent of the men had committed sexual violence against their relationship partners. That is, they demanded sex or threatened sex with a partner. Almost no one reported such violent episodes after treatment.

Prior to treatment, 85 per cent of the men reported physical violence. A large percentage had committed violence that resulted in harm to their partner. After treatment, this percentage dropped to ten per cent.

Prior to treatment, 87 per cent of participants reported psychological or emotional violence, such as threats and derogatory comments. This number declined by 25 per cent but was not as dramatic a drop as for the other types of violence. Nesset says it takes a long time to experience feeling safe.

"There was a high level of both sexual and physical violence before treatment began. It was more than we'd imagined beforehand. When we checked what the partners experienced, we got a slightly different picture of what was actually going on. We know that a lot of angry men hit their partners, but we were surprised that so many committed sexual assaults. At this point the agreement between the husband and partner was low - that is, the partner reported more cases than the man did," says Nesset.

The backdrop for the study was to check whether treating mood disorders using the Brøset model has an effect. In a lot of studies, the control group receives a placebo, or no treatment.

"Unfortunately, about 25 per cent of all killings in Norway are partner killings. Because domestic violence is a public health problem with major health consequences for those exposed to the violence, we found it unethical not to offer treatment. So what we studied was the effectiveness of two types of treatment. Both worked," says Nesset.

One treatment involved eight group sessions in a type of mindfulness training called MBSR, which stands for mindfulness-based stress management. The course was led by psychologist Nina Flor Thunold who at that time worked at St. Olavs Hospital, Østmarka division, in a district east of Trondheim.

The course was not designed specifically for anger management but for illness in general, and the content was defined in advance - regardless of why any individual was in the course.

The second treatment involved 15 sessions of cognitive-behavioural group therapy. The program was developed at St. Olavs Hospital and is called the Brøset model. The therapy has different stages, with the first phase being to stop the violence. According to Nesset, you can do that without understanding why you become violent.

After this phase you explore patterns of violence and map the situations that trigger violence for you, what thoughts and feelings arise and what actions repeat themselves.

"Some people who are violent are offended easily. During treatment, participants find out what makes them feel offended, what thoughts and feelings they should pay particular attention to, and we create action plans for how the they can handle negative emotions without using violence. A lot of the treatment is about understanding yourself," says Nesset.

She says the decline in violence was greater than she had anticipated.

"I didn't expect the decline to be so big. It's really promising that the treatment works," says Nesset.

To clarify: In the past, smaller studies have been conducted of people who were on a waiting list for treatment and comparing them with people already receiving treatment. Those who received treatment experienced a greater reduction in violence than those on the waiting list.

Treatment that uses the Brøset model is offered throughout Norway. Each year, about 400 men get help to become a better version of themselves. Those who need help will receive individual support until a group course is available.

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Reference: Nesset MB, Lara-Cabrera ML, Bjørngaard JH, Whittington R, Palmstierna T. Cognitive behavioural group therapy versus mindfulness-based stress reduction group therapy for intimate partner violence: a randomized controlled trial. BMC Psychiatry. 2020;20(1):178. Published 2020 Apr 19. doi:10.1186/s12888-020-02582-4

How to get good at disagreeing

NOT MY PROBLEM I AM AN ENTJ A MASTER OF THE ART

NORWEGIAN UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

You may recognize yourself. You're part of a group where everyone seems to agree more or less all the time. You may disagree, but you'd rather not speak up, and the others aren't voicing any disagreement either.

These meetings are dominated by a few individuals, or maybe just one person. Everyone else nods and smiles at the chairperson, at least until you talk to them one-on-one. Then it turns out that you weren't the only one who had unspoken objections.

"Basically, voicing disagreement is difficult. People in groups often have a tendency or desire to align with others, either certain group members or someone who is clearly the leader. Sometimes this tendency becomes so strong that people are afraid to stand out," says Frode Heldal, an associate professor of technology management at NTNU Business School.

But maybe you don't think you need to speak up? This is how things your group operates, you say, and it's working - sort of.

"It's working" can be destructive

"We have to have respect for things that work, but sometimes that by itself can be destructive" for how a group works together, says Heldal. "It can be just fine as long as the reality remains stable. But it doesn't always do that," he says.

The need for uncomfortable and challenging questions also varies depending on the task. If you play football, the need is different than if you are coming up with a strategic plan, Heldal says.

Occasionally, ambiguity and misunderstandings can cause small disagreements to balloon and feel large and unmanageable. In these corona times with so many digital encounters, picking up on body language and disagreements becomes even more challenging than usual. Voicing concerns or disagreement early is especially important in these situations.

Different jobs also have different cultures. In some places, expressing disagreement is seen as completely natural and necessary for good results. In other places, disagreement can be perceived as disrespectful and perhaps even unfair to a colleague, manager or the company.

For your group to find the best solutions, especially when the reality is changing, it can be crucial to have a culture where you feel empowered to speak up when you disagree.

"For your group to find the best solutions, especially when the reality is changing, it can be crucial that you have a culture where you feel empowered to speak up when you disagree."

Things work - until you meet the unexpected

Heldal is part of the Innovative Teams project at NTNU and recently had an article published in the Team Performance Management journal. He and his colleagues investigated the collaboration between Norwegian and Korean workers. The researchers found that the employees worked fine together on a daily basis, even though they did not understand each other.

Heldal summarized some of their findings in a Norwegian article inSPGR Innovative Teams:

"As a rule, the teams collaborated just fine, except when they had to detect and manage things that went wrong or were unexpected. Because the teams had not learned to understand each other - basically to discuss and reflect together - these situations mushroomed and were more time consuming and costly than they needed to be. Their collaborative techniques, which normally facilitated things working smoothly, actually masked the fact that they were not really that coordinated after all,"the article states.

Of course, it is quite possible for a group to function together just by everyone working independently and implicitly adapting the work to each other. Constantly disagreeing is not helpful, and long discussions can often be perceived as hampering progress. But when something unexpected happens, alternative understandings are often needed.

"This means that as a group people need to be able to challenge internal agreements. Often this is more about personal relationships in the group than the issue itself. Groups that are used to disagreeing openly generally handle changes better than groups that focus on agreement," Heldal says.

Practise challenging each other

It is possible to practise and improve your ability to disagree. The basis for this skill is being able to challenge others and to be challenged.

Professor Endre Sjøvold at NTNU's Department of Industrial Economics and Technology Management calls this approach "constructive confrontation."

"In this context, this training concept may be a little unfamiliar. But the underlying reflections have to do with practising a skill," says Heldal:

Set aside a set time for exercise.
Be disciplined in the carrying out the training.
Set goals.
Exercise a little and often rather than a lot and seldom.
Put the training into practice. You become good at what you do. This means that every time you don't bother to speak up when you disagree, you're getting better at letting things go.

"What we're really practising for when we challenge each other is to become better at accepting and recognizing divergent views," says Heldal.

"What we're really training for when we challenge each other is to become better at accepting and recognizing divergent views."

Ten training tips

First, you have to agree on the time and place to practise disagreeing. This can be before or after meetings you already have scheduled. Heldal has compiled a list for how to practise the skill.

"A list like this is a bit suffocating - it's long and extensive. But here's the trick to picking out a few training points, maybe down to one per workout: work on it a lot until it sticks," says Heldal.

Below are the ten training points. (For more details, see the fact box at the end of the article.)

Ask for the behaviour you want more of, not less of, from others.
When you get criticized - listen and don't defend yourself. Show that you are grateful.
Make decisions and acknowledge others' decisions.
Appoint a person who challenges the decisions made (devil's advocate). Take turns being in this role.
Challenge routines and habits.
Dare to challenge the expert.
Ask why. Request explanations.
Practise arguing for the views of others.
Be honest and clear. Don't package messages. But be constructive.
"Step on toes."

Where you start depends on the team's task and the current dynamic of the group.

Wait a minute - "Step on toes"?

"That last point, 'Step on toes', could be tough for some people and sounds a bit backwards for good teamwork," says Heldal.

The background is that many teams have a lot going on, especially about this point - people on the team are basically afraid to step on each other's toes. The result is that teams work at reduced power then.

"The most common argument against practising these tips is that people don't have time. But you don't usually need much time. Half an hour a week will help you and your team move forward, often in connection with your day-to-day work," says Heldal.

Remember that the ultimate goal is for you to become better at working together and finding the best solutions.

Training tips in detail

Ask for the behaviour you want more of, not less of, from others. Practise: Challenge the person next to you for behaviour you want more of.

When you get criticized - listen and don't defend yourself. Show that you are grateful. Practise: Receive feedback, including unpleasant feedback, with a thank you.

Make decisions and acknowledge others people's decisions. Practise: Take turns being in the leader role. For example, let the person who normally speaks least lead a meeting.

Appoint a person who challenges decisions (devil's advocate). Practise: Dedicate roles to play devil's advocate. Take turns in this role. The main task is to challenge decisions and come up with alternative views. The group is obliged to take these seriously.

Challenge routines and habits. Practise: Try something new, like changing the meeting room you always sit in. Bring in outsiders. Practise working on increasing curiosity, not uncertainty.

Dare to challenge the expert. Practise: Avoid expert roles, where one person owns certain areas of knowledge - even if the team consists of experts. Everyone should be able to challenge. Practise daring to challenge the expert. Experts can practise letting themselves and their knowledge be challenged by those who are not experts.

Ask why, ask for an explanation. Practise: Work on doing this so that it is perceived as constructive.

Practise arguing for the views of others. Practise: Change roles and positions.

Be honest and clear. Don't sugarcoat messages. But be constructive. Practise: Be concrete and straightforward about your own views, avoid packaging them.

"Step on toes". Practise: Challenge others in areas that may seem personal. Work on not taking things personally. The boundary is when suggestions do not contribute constructively to solving or performing the team's task. Speak up immediately if something seems unreasonable, and avoid bringing up old annoyances.

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Sources:

Team Performance Management. Shared cognition in intercultural teams: collaborating without understanding each other.Frode Heldal, Endre Sjøvold, Kenneth Stålset.https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/TPM-06-2019-0051/full/html

'Lost' world's rediscovery is step towards finding habitable planets

The rediscovery of a lost planet could pave the way for the detection of a world within the habitable 'Goldilocks zone' in a distant solar system

UNIVERSITY OF WARWICK

Discovery of cooler planet brings astronomers closer to finding more worlds in the habitable 'Goldilocks zone'
Found thanks to new method pioneered by University of Warwick team designed to spot planets orbiting further out from their star
NGTS-11b is among hundreds of 'lost' worlds that can now be rediscovered with the NGTS telescopes using this novel technique

The rediscovery of a lost planet could pave the way for the detection of a world within the habitable 'Goldilocks zone' in a distant solar system.
The planet, the size and mass of Saturn with an orbit of thirty-five days, is among hundreds of 'lost' worlds that University of Warwick astronomers are pioneering a new method to track down and characterise in the hope of finding cooler planets like those in our solar system, and even potentially habitable planets.
Reported in Astrophysical Journal Letters, the planet named NGTS-11b orbits a star 620 light years away and is located five times closer to its sun than Earth is to our own.
The planet was originally found in a search for planets in 2018 by the Warwick-led team using data from NASA's TESS telescope. This uses the transit method to spot planets, scanning for the telltale dip in light from the star that indicates that an object has passed between the telescope and the star. However, TESS only scans most sections of the sky for 27 days. This means many of the longer period planets only transit once in the TESS data. And without a second observation the planet is effectively lost. The University of Warwick led team followed up one of these 'lost' planets using the telescopes at the Next-Generation Transit Survey (NGTS) in Chile and observed the star for seventy-nine nights, eventually catching the planet transiting for a second time nearly a year after the first detected transit.
Dr Samuel Gill from the Department of Physics at the University of Warwick said: "By chasing that second transit down we've found a longer period planet. It's the first of hopefully many such finds pushing to longer periods.
"These discoveries are rare but important, since they allow us to find longer period planets than other astronomers are finding. Longer period planets are cooler, more like the planets in our own Solar System.
"NGTS-11b has a temperature of only 160°C - cooler than Mercury and Venus. Although this is still too hot to support life as we know it, it is closer to the Goldilocks zone than many previously discovered planets which typically have temperatures above 1000°C."
The Goldilocks zone refers to a range of orbits that would allow a planet or moon to support liquid water: too close to its star and it will be too hot, but too far away and it will be too cold.
Co-author Dr Daniel Bayliss from the University of Warwick said: "This planet is out at a thirty-five days orbit, which is a much longer period than we usually find them. It is exciting to see the Goldilocks zone within our sights."
Co-author Professor Pete Wheatley from the University of Warwick said: "The original transit appeared just once in the TESS data, and it was our team's painstaking detective work that allowed us to find it again a year later with NGTS.
"NGTS has twelve state-of-the-art telescopes, which means that we can monitor multiple stars for months on end, searching for lost planets. The dip in light from the transit is only 1% deep and occurs only once every 35 days, putting it out of reach of other telescopes. "
Dr Gill adds: "There are hundreds of single transits detected by TESS that we will be monitoring using this method. This will allow us to discover cooler exoplanets of all sizes, including planets more like those in our own Solar System. Some of these will be small rocky planets in the Goldilocks zone that are cool enough to host liquid water oceans and potentially extraterrestrial life."
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'NGTS-11 b / TOI-1847 b: A transiting warm Saturn recovered from a TESS single-transit event' will be published in Astrophysical Journal Letters, DOI: 10.3847/2041-8213/ab9eb9
The research, including the operation of NGTS, received funding and support from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), part of UK Research and Innovation.
The involvement of Dr David Armstrong from the University of Warwick in the research was supported by STFC, through an Ernest Rutherford Fellowship.

Notes to editors:
For interviews or a copy of the paper contact:
Peter Thorley
Media Relations Manager (Warwick Medical School and Department of Physics) | Press & Media Relations | University of Warwick
Email: peter.thorley@warwick.ac.uk
Mob: +44 (0) 7824 540863
The Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) is part of UK Research and Innovation - the UK body which works in partnership with universities, research organisations, businesses, charities, and government to create the best possible environment for research and innovation to flourish. For more information visit UK Research and Innovation.
STFC funds and supports research in particle and nuclear physics, astronomy, gravitational research and astrophysics, and space science and also operates a network of five national laboratories, including the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory and the Daresbury Laboratory, as well as supporting UK research at a number of international research facilities including CERN, FERMILAB, the ESO telescopes in Chile and many more. Visit https://stfc.ukri.org/ for more information. @STFC_Matters

The Venus 'ring of fire'

ETH ZURICH

IMAGE: THE CIRCULAR MOUNTAIN IN THE FOREGROUND IS A 500 KILOMETRE CORONA IN THE GALINDO REGION OF VENUS. THE DARK RECTANGLES ARE AN ARTIFACT. view more

CREDIT: PICTURE: NASA/JPL/USGS

Years ago, planetary researchers discovered unusual circular structures on the surface of Venus when observing high-?resolution images from NASA's Magellan mission. Such structures are known as coronae (from the Latin meaning "crowns"; singular: corona). A few years ago, a team of ETH researchers led by Taras Gerya, Professor of Geophysics at the Department of Earth Sciences, used computer models to investigate how these structures may have formed.

Most researchers assume that these odd circular surface features are formed by mantle plumes from deep within the planet.

A mantle plume is an upwelling of hot, molten rock that is transported by convection currents from the lower mantle to the crust in a column that widens in a mushroom-?shape at the top. The heat it carries melts the surface of the crust in a circular form. Continuous material rising from greater depths widens the plume head and expands the ring structure on the surface to form a corona. The solid crust surrounding the mantle plume may crack and ultimately sink below the edge of the corona, triggering local tectonic processes.

Computer simulations of structural variations of coronae

However, the topography of coronae is by no means homogeneous or easy to describe. "These structures exist in a large variety of shapes and dimensions on the Venusian surface," says Anna Gülcher, a doctoral student in Gerya's research group.

Following up on this observation, Gülcher used a larger set of improved 3D simulations to re-?examine the coronae as she sought to establish a link between the variation in surface topography and the processes at work beneath. Her study was recently published in the journal Nature Geoscience.

The new simulations show that a corona's topography depends on the thickness and strength of the crust where the mantle plume strikes it and, above all, that their topographies are directly related to how active the column of magma beneath the surface is.

Active plumes form a ring of fire around Venus

This salient observation enabled Gülcher and her colleagues to classify over a hundred of large coronae on Venus into two main groups: those that have formed above an active plume that is currently rising and carrying molten material, and those above a plume that has cooled and become inactive. "Every corona structure has a specific signature that indicates what is going on beneath it," Gülcher says.

On a map of Venus, she plotted all the coronae according to how their activity was classified. To her surprise, most of the coronae overlying active mantle plumes form a belt in Venus' southern hemisphere. Only a handful of active plumes are located outside this band. "We called this band the 'Ring of Fire' on Venus in reference to the 'Ring of Fire' on Earth," Gülcher says. She assumes that the belt coincides with a zone that expels high levels of rising plume material.

It is important to note, however, that the position and dynamics of Earth's ring of fire are the result of plate tectonics, she explains. On Venus, the cause is vertical hotspot volcanism", a phenomenon that occurs in only a few places on Earth, such as below the Hawaiian Islands.

Exactly why the mantle plumes on Venus are arranged in such a belt, and what this means for deep interior processes on Venus, is an important question to address in future studies, Gülcher says. This may be done with large-?scale computer simulations.

Huge computing capacity required

In their models, the researchers simulate only the very top few hundred kilometers of the mantle plume. In reality, however, the plume conduits could be over 1,000 kilometres long: "Simulating the total length the plumes could reach is out of the question because of the huge computing capacity it would require," Gülcher says. The current simulations, performed using the Euler cluster at ETH, are already eight times larger than previous ones.

The planetary scientists hope that their findings will also provide fresh insights into how mantle plumes function below the surface of the Earth. They are likely to be what causes hotspot volcanism, as seen in the Hawaiian Islands. Mantle plumes may have been a trigger for plate tectonics observed on Earth as well, as Gerya's research group was also able to simulate. As mentioned at the time, Venus could serve as a model for the processes that may have taken place in Earth's early history.

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Reference

Gülcher A, et al. Corona structures driven by plume 'lithosphere interactions and evidence for ongoing plume activity on Venus. Nature Geoscience, published online July 20th 2020. DOI: 10.1038/s41561-020-0606-1

Youtube video

https://youtu.be/Qo-6ySOb6UQ

Microplastics in shrimp harmless to animal health and no effects on consumption quality

UNIVERSITAT AUTONOMA DE BARCELONA

IMAGE: A STUDY CONDUCTED BY THE UAB CERTIFIES THAT DESPITE THE PRESENCE OF MICROPLASTICS IN DEEP-SEA SHRIMP, THE AMOUNTS DETECTED DO NOT CAUSE ANY TYPES OF HEALTH PROBLEMS. THE RESEARCH COINCIDES... view more

CREDIT: CREDITS: SEAAQ/UAB

A research team from the SEAaq group at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona conducted analyses to determine whether the microplastics contaminating the Mediterranean Sea can also be found inside the organism of the deep-sea shrimp (Aristeus antennatus), and what effects these could have on the animal's health and on human consumption. The study was conducted in three fishing zones off the coasts of Girona, Barcelona and Delta de l'Ebre in Tarragona, during the years 2017 and 2018. Some of these samples, such as the ones from Barcelona, were compared to others from more than 10 years ago, in order to establish the changes in microplastics concentrations within a ten-year period.

The results are clear, three out of every four shrimp analysed contained anthropogenic fibers in their digestive tract. Of these, almost half of them had a good part of the fibers tangled into a ball inside their stomach. In one specific sampling, the shrimp taken from in front of the coast of Barcelona presented up to 30 times as many synthetic fibres than those taken from other fishing zones. However, when the results of 2007 were compared with those of 2017 and 2018, there was no clear increase in the abundance of these fibers. What was found was that the composition had changed, with a reduction in the presence of acrylic polymers and an increase in polyester, similar to the changes seen in consumption habits during the same period.

With regard to the effects these fibers may have on the health of these shrimp, the study shows that even animals with a considerably sized ball of fibers maintain their health condition and no tissular histopathological alterations were observed in the organs analysed, not even in the cuticle or digestive epithelium in direct contact with the artificial fibers. The study did not detect any consistent effect or correlation of these fibers with the health condition of the shrimp, which were considered to be in good health. "The shrimp probably get rid of all of the fibers they ingest and accumulate thanks to the shedding of their exoskeleton which takes place every so often, and this could explain why although an abundance of these fibers have been found in some shrimp, they continue to show signs of being healthy", explains UAB lecturer of the Department of Animal Biology, Plant Biology and Ecology Ester Carreras, one of the researchers participating in the study.

Effects on Human Health

In relation to human health, researchers consider that "the consumption of shrimp is in no way a contaminating agent that should concern us. Other studies show that ingesting micropastics through shrimp is minimal in comparison to the amount of fibers entering our bodies through other means, such as the use of plastic packagings or environmental contamination, or through the synthetic fibers in clothes and also those found in dust and which inevitably also end up in our plates", researcher Carreras highlights. In a study conducted in the United Kingdom, it was estimated that a person could ingest some 14,000 to 68,000 particles of microplastics found in the dust and air each year. This is far superior to the average 22 fibers identified in shrimp, and even more so when considering that more than 90% of the fibers are found in the animal's stomach, a part which is not eaten if we do not eat the shrimp's "head".

"Soon it will be time to discover whether common commercial fish from our coastal waters such as red mullet, surmullet or striped mullet (Mullus barbatus), and anchovy (Engraulis encrasicolus), follow the same path", Ester Carreras predicts.

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The research was funded by the projects SOMPESCA (from the Catalan Ministry for Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Food) and the project "PLASMAR" (R&D&i "Research Challenges" project from the Spanish Ministry for Science, Innovation and Universities). The study was coordinated by Maite Carrassón and participating in the study were researchers Ester Carreras, Anna Soler and María Constenla from the SEAaq Group at the UAB Department of Animal Biology, Plant Biology and Ecology, as well as Mireia Baeza, from the UAB Department of Chemistry, and Joan E. Cartes from the Institute of Marine Sciences (ICM-CSIC).

New material can generate hydrogen from salt and polluted water

Developed a new 2D material to produce hydrogen, which is the basis of alternative energy; the material efficiently generates hydrogen molecules from fresh, salt, and polluted water by exposure to sunlight

TOMSK POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY

"Hydrogen is an alternative source of energy. Thus, the development of hydrogen technologies can become a solution to the global energy challenge. However, there are a number of issues to solve. In particular, scientists are still searching for efficient and green methods to produce hydrogen. One of the main methods is to decompose water by exposure to sunlight. There is a lot of water on our planet, but only a few methods suitable for salt or polluted water. In addition, few use the infrared spectrum, which is 43% of all sunlight," Olga Guselnikova, one of the authors and a researcher of the TPU Research School of Chemistry & Applied Biomedical Sciences, notes.

The developed material is a three-layer structure with a 1-micrometer thickness. The lower layer is a thin film of gold, the second one is made of 10-nanometer platinum, and the third is a film of metal-organic frameworks of chromium compounds and organic molecules.

"During the experiments, we watered material and sealed the container to take periodic gas samples to determine the amount of hydrogen. Infrared light caused the excitation of plasmon resonance on the sample surface. Hot electrons generated on the gold film were transferred to the platinum layer. These electrons initiated the reduction of protons at the interface with the organic layer. If electrons reach the catalytic centers of metal-organic frameworks, the latter were also used to reduce protons and obtain hydrogen," Olga explains.

Experiments have demonstrated that 100 square centimeters of the material can generate 0.5 liters of hydrogen in an hour. It is one of the highest rates recorded for 2D materials.

"I this case, the metal-organic frame also acted as a filter. It filtered impurities and passed already purified water without impurities to the metal layer. It is very important, because, although there is a lot of water on Earth, its main volume is either salt or polluted water. Thereby, we should be ready to work with this kind of water," she notes.

In the future, scientists improve material to make it efficient for both infrared and visible spectra.

"The material already demonstrates a certain absorption in the visible light spectrum, but its efficiency is slightly lower than in the infrared spectrum. After improvement, it will be possible to say that the material works with 93% of the spectral volume of sunlight," Olga adds.

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The studies are carried out in collaboration with the University of Chemistry and Technology, Prague and Jan Evangelista Purkyn? University in Ústí nad Labem. This research project became was used in an application, supported by the TPU Competitiveness Enhancement Program (VIU-ISHKHBMT-194/2020, the scientific supervisor is Assoc. Prof. Pavel Postnikov, TPU Research School of Chemistry & Applied Biomedical Sciences

How does ridesourcing substitute for public transit network?

New research by SMART finds that one third of ridesourcing substitutes public transit

SINGAPORE-MIT ALLIANCE FOR RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY (SMART)

IMAGE: N/A view more

CREDIT: SINGAPORE-MIT ALLIANCE FOR RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY

Study uses ridesourcing data to investigate the relationship between ridesourcing and public transit
It seeks to answer whether ridesourcing substitutes or complements public transit, and how the substitution effect changes over time and space
Study shows that the substitution effect is more common in the city center while complementary effect is more pronounced in the suburban areas

Singapore, 21 July 2020 - Ridesourcing apps like Uber, Grab, and DiDi have become ubiquitous in cities around the world but have also attracted much backlash from established taxi companies. Despite its adoption worldwide, regulation of ridesourcing services still varies greatly in different parts of the world - as policy makers struggle to assess its impact on the economy and society, with limited information and yet unidentified risks involved. One major consideration to improve mobility and sustainability in cities is whether ridesourcing apps serve as a substitute or complement for public transits. In an ideal situation, ridesourcing could complement transit service and help to reduce private car usage. However, as an alternative travel mode, it may also substitute for the transit.

To understand more about this and the impact upon cities, Hui Kong, Xiaohu Zhang, Jinhua Zhao from SMART Future Urban Mobility IRG and MIT JTL Urban Mobility Lab recently conducted a study that investigates the relationship between ridesourcing and public transit using ridesourcing data. Their findings were published in a research paper "How does Ridesourcing Substitute for Public Transit? A geospatial perspective in Chengdu, China" in the Journal of Transport Geography, and with a visualization of the study available here. Future Urban Mobility (FM) is an interdisciplinary research group (IRG) of Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART), MIT's research enterprise in Singapore.

Complement or Substitute

In the first such study undertaken by any researcher around the world to look into the substitution effect of each individual trip at the disaggregated level, SMART researchers used DiDi data in Chengdu, China, a major urban centre with a population of over 16 million people. They developed a three-level structure to recognize the potential substitution or complementary relationship between ridesourcing and public transit, while also investigating the impacts through exploratory spatiotemporal data analysis, and examining the factors influencing the degree of substitution via linear, spatial autoregressive, and zero-inflated beta regression models.

Through this, the researchers found that one third of DiDi trips potentially substitute for public transit, with a ridesourcing trip considered potentially a substitute for public transit if the trip can be effectively served by public transit.

The time of the day and the location does matter as well. The researchers found that the substitution rate is higher during the daytime (8am to 6pm) and more significant in the city center. Also, substitution trips appear more in the areas with higher building density and land use mixture. During the day, around 40% of DiDi trips have the potential to substitute for public transit, but the researchers found that this substitution rate decreases as the supply of transit decreases.

The researchers also found that the substitution effect is also more significant in the city centre and in more developed areas covered by subway lines, while peripheral and suburban areas were dominated by complementary trips. However they also note that house prices were positively correlated with the substitution rate, highlighting the importance of public transit to ensure less wealthy populations are served.

"High substitution rate implies the necessity of implementing ridesourcing regulations (e.g. spatial quotas, strategic pricing) or optimizing public transit service (e.g. shorten travel time, lower fee, improve crowdedness) in that area," said Dr Hui KONG, SMART FM Investigator and Postdoctoral Associate at JTL Urban Mobility Lab and MIT Transit Lab. "The lower substitution in suburban areas can highlight areas where the current public transit service is inadequate and would help regulators decide on where to implement new bus or train lines."

This research shows that ridesharing substitutes a large proportion of public transit. Therefore, it also amplifies the issue of digital divide. Afterall, most of the ridesourcing services rely on smartphone apps and credit card fare-paying. As a result, the unbanked population and the population that do not own a smartphone may not have access to ridesourcing services. Policymakers may have to rethink digitalisation efforts.

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About Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART)

Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART) is MIT's Research Enterprise in Singapore, established by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in partnership with the National Research Foundation of Singapore (NRF) since 2007. SMART is the first entity in the Campus for Research Excellence and Technological Enterprise (CREATE) developed by NRF. SMART serves as an intellectual and innovation hub for research interactions between MIT and Singapore. Cutting-edge research projects in areas of interest to both Singapore and MIT are undertaken at SMART. SMART currently comprises an Innovation Centre and six Interdisciplinary Research Groups (IRGs): Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR), BioSystems and Micromechanics (BioSyM), Critical Analytics for Manufacturing Personalized-Medicine (CAMP), Disruptive & Sustainable Technologies for Agricultural Precision (DiSTAP), Future Urban Mobility (FM) and Low Energy Electronic Systems (LEES).

SMART research is funded by the National Research Foundation Singapore under the CREATE programme.

For more information, please visit: http://smart.mit.edu

About the Future Urban Mobility (FM) Interdisciplinary Research Group (IRG)

The Future Urban Mobility (FM) Interdisciplinary Research Group (IRG) is one of five IRGs in the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology Centre (SMART). FM harnesses new technological and institutional innovations to create the next generation of urban mobility systems to increase accessibility, equity, safety and environmental performance for the citizens and businesses of Singapore and other metropolitan areas, worldwide. SMART-FM is supported by the National Research Foundation (NRF) Singapore and situated in the Campus for Research Excellence and Technological Enterprise (CREATE).

For more information, please log on to: https://fm.smart.mit.edu

Antarctica more widely impacted by humans than previously thought

Only 16% of the continent's Important Bird Areas are located within negligibly impacted areas

UNIVERSITY OF THE WITWATERSRAND

IMAGE: A WEDDEL SEAL (LEPTONYCHOTES WEDDELLII), A LARGE AND ABUNDANT SEAL SPECIES, IS SEEN SUNBATHING IN ANTARCTICA. ANTARCTICA HOSTS A DIVERSITY OF ORGANISMS, WHICH MAY BE SENSITIVE TO EVEN PASSING DISTURBANCE. view more

CREDIT: STEVEN CHOWN

Antarctica is considered one of the Earth's largest, most pristine remaining wildernesses. Yet since its formal discovery 200 years ago, the continent has seen accelerating and potentially impactful human activity.

How widespread this activity is across the continent has never been quantified. We know Antarctica has no cities, agriculture or industry. But we have never had a good idea of where humans have been, how much of the continent remains untouched or largely unimpacted, and to what extent these largely unimpacted areas serve to protect biodiversity.

A team of researchers led by Monash University, including Dr Bernard Coetzee from the Global Change Institute at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg (Wits University), has changed all of that. Using a data set of 2.7 million human activity records, the team showed just how extensive human use of Antarctica has been over the last 200 years. The research was published in the journal Nature.

With the exception of some large areas mostly in the central parts of the continent, humans have set foot almost everywhere.

Although many of these visited areas have only been negligibly affected by people, biodiversity is not as well represented within them as it should be.

"We mapped 2.7 million human activity records from 1819 to 2018 across the Antarctic continent to assess the extent of wilderness areas remaining and its overlap with the continent's biodiversity," says Coetzee, a conservation scientist at Wits University. Based in Skukuza in the Kruger National Park in South Africa, Coetzee helped conceptualise the study and collated a spatial database from multiple sources to map the extent of human activity in Antarctica.

"In a region often thought of as remote, we showed that in fact human activity has been extensive, especially in ice-free and coastal areas where most of its biodiversity is found. This means that "wilderness" areas do not capture many of the continent's important biodiversity sites, but that an opportunity exists to conserve the last of the wild."

A tourist is seen visiting Hardy Cove in Antarctica. Hardy Cove forms part of the South Shetland Islands on the Antarctic Peninsula.

The study found that only 16% of the continent's Important Bird Areas, areas identified internationally as critical for bird conservation, are located within negligibly impacted areas, and little of the total negligibly impacted area is represented in Antarctica's Specially Protected Area network.

High human impact areas, for example some areas where people build research stations or visit for tourism, often overlap with areas important for biodiversity.

Lead author, Rachel Leihy, a PhD student in the Monash School of Biological Sciences, points out that "While the situation does not look promising initially, the outcomes show that much opportunity exists to take swift action to declare new protected areas for the conservation of both wilderness and biodiversity."

"Informatics approaches using large data sets are providing new quantitative insights into questions that have long proven thorny for environmental policymakers," says Steven Chown, the corresponding author based at Monash University.

"This work offers innovative ways to help the Antarctic Treaty Parties take forward measures to secure Antarctica's Wilderness."

The transdisciplinary team delivering this work includes researchers from Australia, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and South Africa.

NEWS RELEASE 17-JUL-2020

St Petersburg University scientists count all the tiny snails in the Arctic

The information gathered will help to learn more about marine ecosystem pollution and climate change.

ST. PETERSBURG STATE UNIVERSITY

IMAGE: 1 - SKENEA TROCHOIDES (SKENEIDAE); 2 - ANATOMA CRISPATA (ANATOMIDAE); 3 - MOELLERIA COSTULATA (COLONIDAE); 4 - LEPTOGYRA BUJNITZKII (MELANODRYMIIDAE); 5 - NEPOTILLA AMOENA (RAPHITOMIDAE); 6 - ALVANIA VERRILLI (RISSOIDAE);... view more

CREDIT: SPBU

Shell-bearing microgastropods are snails whose size is less than five millimetres. They represent one of the least studied groups of metazoan living organisms in the oceans. Ivan Nekhaev is a senior research associate at the Department of Applied Ecology at St Petersburg University, and Ekaterina Krol is a doctoral student. They have summarised and analysed the currently known information on the species composition and lifestyle of these animals in the eastern sector of the Arctic.

In total, at least 66 species of microgastropods, belonging to four subclasses, live in the region. Two of the species have already been described during recent studies by the authors of the present review. Also, descriptions of two more species are being prepared for publication. More than half of the species have had only the external appearance of the shell studied. Important details of the internal structure and sequence of genes, traditionally used in the classification of animals, remain unknown in microgastropods, as a rule.

'Starting from the 18th century, snails were classified according to their shell - each species was believed to have its own shape. Later molluscs began to be dissected and only at the current stage scientists have started studying their DNA. These studies have shown inconsistency in the classification by shell,' explained Ivan Nekhaev, the first author of the article. 'Studying these animals is not easy. Imagine a two-millimetre mollusc in front of you. From it, you need to extract its reproductive system, which is already tenths of a millimetre. This is a very delicate, laborious and meticulous work.'

According to Ivan Nekhaev, the biological diversity of the Arctic has been studied extremely unevenly. There is a relatively large amount of data on large animals that are easy to see. However, there is very little information on other groups such as micromolluscs, which include shell microgastropods. Scientists need this information in order to understand: what the Arctic is like; how its fauna was formed; and how ecosystems respond to climate changes associated with human activities.

Arctic molluscs regularly become central figures in publications on climate change. This is usually due to the fact that snails living in more southern areas are found in the northern territories. However, such conclusions do not often have enough scientific background, since researchers do not have comprehensive data on the types of micromolluscs. Theoretically, a migrant snail from the south may turn out to be a little-known 'northerner'.

'Despite the formal resemblance, the physiology and requirements for living conditions of these animals can vary significantly. The shape of the shell of some species is typical of the more southern areas. When they are found, it is often written that this is due to climate change. Such publications raise information noise, which makes it difficult to capture real changes in ecosystems,' said Ivan Nekhaev.

Arctic snails can tell scientists not only about the effects of climate warming, but also about the level of environmental pollution. The large numbers and relatively simple identification of some common species make them very useful objects for such studies. For example, it has been found that snails Boreocingula martyni and Onoba aculeus, have iposex - an anomaly in the development caused by organotin compounds. It is characterised by the fact that male reproductive organs appear in female snails. Until 2008, organotin compounds were used as a part of paints to protect ships and port facilities from being encrusted with the marine growth. However, the negative effects of the use of these toxic substances are still recorded.

Additionally, microgastropods perform many functions in marine ecosystems. They vary greatly in type of diet and lifestyle. Some of them feed on algae or plant detritus. Many species eat unicellular animals - foraminifera, or even smaller metazoans. Some species are parasites and symbionts of echinoderms and polychaete worms. Despite their small size, in some cases, especially in coastal regions, micromolluscs can make up a significant part of the biomass of marine communities.

The Barents Sea, and especially its southwestern part, is the habitat for most species -- 51 out of 66. In other seas of the eastern Arctic, only 10-20 species are known, and only nine species are found in the deep-water Arctic basin. This distribution is largely due to insufficient knowledge of most of the Arctic regions. However, an analysis of the similarity of species composition in different regions has also revealed a connection between the distribution of species complexes and hydrological conditions.

Unlike other animal groups, interest in the study of microgastropods has not increased with the advent of new methods for studying the morphology of small organisms. According to Ivan Nekhaev, this can be explained by two factors: 'Firstly, despite the development of electron microscopy, the methods of collecting samples have not changed since the middle of the last century. We cannot properly collect this fauna during major marine expeditions in the Arctic, because the use of electron microscopy requires the prompt fixation of samples. Doing this on board the ship is problematic. Secondly, negative feedback works - the less is known about the animals, the less specialists are interested in them. This is bad if we are talking about assessing biological diversity and the data that such studies can bring. However, for modern zoology, this is a normal situation. The fact is that there are a lot of animals, and there are few people who study them.'

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