It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Wednesday, September 02, 2020
MMMM MEALWORM'S
Study finds insect shows promise as a good, sustainable food source
The yellow mealworm species Tenebrio molitor. An IUPUI-led study finds the insect could serve as a good alternate protein source in agriculture. Credit: Christine Picard, IUPUI
With global food demands rising at an alarming rate, a study led by IUPUI scientists has found new evidence that a previously overlooked insect shows promise as alternative protein source: the yellow mealworm.
The research is based upon a new analysis of the genome of the mealworm species Tenebrio molitor led by Christine Picard, associate professor of biology and director in Forensic and Investigative Sciences program at the School of Science at IUPUI.
The work was published in the Journal of Insects as Food and Feed on Aug. 31.
"Human populations are continuing to increase and the stress on protein production is increasing at an unsustainable rate, not even considering climate change," said Picard, whose lab focuses on the use of insects to address global food demand.
The research, conducted in partnership with Beta Hatch Inc., has found the yellow mealworm—historically a pest—can provide benefit in a wide range of agriculture applications. Not only can it can be used as an alternative source of protein for animals including fish, but its waste is also ideal as organic fertilizer.
Picard and her team sequenced the yellow mealworm's genome using 10X Chromium linked-read technology. The results will help those who now wish to utilize the DNA and optimize the yellow mealworm for mass production and consumption. This new technology integrates the best of two sequencing methods to produce a reliable genome sequence.
"Insect genomes are challenging, and the longer sequence of DNA you can generate, the better genome you can assemble," said Picard.
Picard added the mealworm has—and will have—a wide variety uses.
"Mealworms, being insects, are a part of the natural diet of many organisms," said Picard. "Fish enjoy mealworms, for example. They could also be really useful in the pet food industry as an alternative protein source. Chickens like insects—and maybe one day humans will, too, because it's an alternative source of protein."
Next, Picard said the researchers plan to look at what governs some of the biological processes of yellow mealworms in order to harness information useful for the commercialization of these insects.
More information: T. Eriksson et al, The yellow mealworm (Tenebrio molitor) genome: a resource for the emerging insects as food and feed industry, Journal of Insects as Food and Feed (2020). DOI: 10.3920/jiff2019.0057
Ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica whose melting rates are rapidly increasing have raised the global sea level by 1.8cm since the 1990s, and are matching the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's worst-case climate warming scenarios.
According to a new study from the University of Leeds and the Danish Meteorological Institute, if these rates continue, the ice sheets are expected to raise sea levels by a further 17cm and expose an additional 16 million people to annual coastal flooding by the end of the century.
Since the ice sheets were first monitored by satellite in the 1990s, melting from Antarctica has pushed global sea levels up by 7.2mm, while Greenland has contributed 10.6mm. And the latest measurements show that the world's oceans are now rising by 4mm each year.
"Although we anticipated the ice sheets would lose increasing amounts of ice in response to the warming of the oceans and atmosphere, the rate at which they are melting has accelerated faster than we could have imagined," said Dr. Tom Slater, lead author of the study and climate researcher at the Centre for Polar Observation and Modelling at the University of Leeds.
"The melting is overtaking the climate models we use to guide us, and we are in danger of being unprepared for the risks posed by sea level rise."
The results are published today in a study in the journal Nature Climate Change. It compares the latest results from satellite surveys from the Ice Sheet Mass Balance Intercomparison Exercise (IMBIE) with calculations from climate models. The authors warn that the ice sheets are losing ice at a rate predicted by the worst-case climate warming scenarios in the last large IPCC report.
Dr. Anna Hogg, study co-author and climate researcher in the School of Earth and Environment at Leeds, said: "If ice sheet losses continue to track our worst-case climate warming scenarios we should expect an additional 17cm of sea level rise from the ice sheets alone. That's enough to double the frequency of storm-surge flooding in many of the world's largest coastal cities."
So far, global sea levels have increased in the most part through a mechanism called thermal expansion, which means that volume of seawater expands as it gets warmer. But in the last five years, ice melt from the ice sheets and mountain glaciers has overtaken global warming as the main cause of rising sea levels.
Dr. Ruth Mottram, study co-author and climate researcher at the Danish Meteorological Institute, said: "It is not only Antarctica and Greenland that are causing the water to rise. In recent years, thousands of smaller glaciers have begun to melt or disappear altogether, as we saw with the glacier Ok in Iceland, which was declared "dead" in 2014. This means that melting of ice has now taken over as the main contributor of sea level rise. "
The study, "Ice-sheet losses track high-end sea-level rise projections," is published today (31 August) in Nature Climate Change.
A market in Nicaragua. Credit: International Center for Tropical Agriculture
"Food systems have the potential to nurture human health and support environmental sustainability; however, they are currently threatening both." This sentence, the opening statement of the EAT-Lancet Report published last year, reflects a growing consensus among global experts on food, nutrition and the environment: Our food system is broken and we need to fix it, fast.
To do so, the EAT-Lancet authors propose a "universal healthy reference diet" that is rich in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes and nuts; and low on red meat, sugar, and highly processed foods. Undertaken at a global scale, this diet would be both good for the planet and the 10 billion people predicted to live on it by 2050.
The good news is this massive food systems transformation is possible.
The bad news is that putting it into action will require an unprecedented level of global cooperation.
Operationalizing the EAT-Lancet diet will require research and bold action on at least five broad themes: economics, politics, cultural norms, equity and governance, according to a group of authors that includes members of the EAT-Lancet commission.
Their analysis was published in Nature Food in August and was led by Christophe Béné of the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT. The article will be open-access until early September.
"If we really want to enact this change we need to look beyond the technological advances that will contribute to food system transformation," said Béné. "There is a whole series of tricky and challenging changes that come along with it."
In outlining the five priorities, the authors not only point to knowledge gaps but also emphasize real-world actions, some of which are already happening, that will be integral to systemic change.
"To fully realize the recommendations laid out in the EAT Lancet report, policymakers will need to prioritize food systems as a top development agenda. Researchers have an important role in providing the evidence of what works and potential trade-offs to policymakers so they can adapt and prioritize to their own local context," said Jessica Fanzo, Professor at Johns Hopkins University, EAT-Lancet co-author and the Lead of the 2017 High Level Panel of Experts Report on Nutrition and Food System.
Co-authors included Lawrence Haddad, the Executive Director of the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) and recipient of the 2018 World Food Prize.
Economics
EAT-Lancet's reference diet works for people with access to, the money to buy, and the time to prepare healthier meals. But an estimated 1.6 billion people today do not have the money needed for a healthier diet, according to one study.
The costs of the transformation are unknown: changing land use and food production practices, and reducing food waste (which makes up about 30 percent of all food produced), and research is needed to estimate these costs.
For poor consumers, an already productive strategy has been the provision of discounts for healthy foods, perhaps rerouting production subsidies to the demand side of the economy. Land tenure rights, which incentivize productivity and are critical to conservation goals, could be guided by international technical guides.
Policy
The "global syndemic" of obesity, undernutrition and other health risks caused by poor diets—which together are the leading cause of poor health globally—require a thorough shakeup of the food system's status quo. This will require a complex combination of regulation and incentives to guide industrial food production toward healthier food products.
Often overlooked players in the food system, such as the world's 500 million smallholders, can contribute if there is scaled-up support to produce and consume a greater variety of healthy food.
More public research and development funding should be invested in non-staple, nutritious foods that can benefit small producers, the authors argue.
Other trends that must continue include increased public sentiment in favor of buying local and holding multinational food producers accountable for their role in unhealthy diets.
"The difficulties in implementing the required food transformations may therefore not be so much about the technicalities of the change, as they may be about the realpolitik of that change," the authors write.
Cultural norms
Consumers will be a key driver of the food system transformation. But increased wealth in middle-income countries is already driving transformation in the wrong direction—toward higher meat consumption and away from traditional, healthier foods that are deemed "foods of the poor."
"Unhealthy norms emerge all the time, as foods high in fat, sugar and salt become more widely available and marketed at lower prices throughout the world," write the authors. "Guiding cultural norms towards sustainability may also be challenging, more so because of the infinite diversity of diets from place to place, and the weak or incomplete evidence base on which to encourage these changes."
Equity
A 50 percent reduction in global red meat consumption is core to the EAT-Lancet diet. Such a dramatic shift would improve health and help conserve land that would be otherwise cleared for meat production.
But rural poor in many parts of the world would see their diets improved by consuming more animal-sourced protein, showing that any policies related to meat consumption need to be adapted to local contexts. Poorly nourished women and young children in low-income countries should increase their meat consumption, according to numerous studies.
"Beyond this specific example, the food transformation debate also needs to consider issues of social justice while averting promoting the message that changes involve only high-income countries," write the authors.
Women tend to represent a higher proportion of food system workers. They need additional protections, as do migrant laborers who are vital to harvest seasons worldwide. Child labor and slavery are not uncommon in the seafood industry.
Governance
Finally, the paper says that building the capacities of societies and decision-makers to navigate these different challenges may not be easy but it will be necessary. Grabbing the attention of governments that already need to focus on numerous, often competing priorities—including poverty, migration, security, natural disasters and pandemics—will not be easy.
"There is an urgent need to equip decision-makers at all levels with knowledge and skills to operate in this space," writes Béné.
The authors conclude: "The EAT-Lancet report did an excellent job of waking the world up to the interlinked issues of health and environment and showed that diets are the common denominator. But, at the crux of the great food transformation is the critical issue of science-policy interaction
More information: Christophe Béné et al, Five priorities to operationalize the EAT–Lancet Commission report, Nature Food (2020). DOI: 10.1038/s43016-020-0136-4
Shelby Hauck and Ryan Williams unload freshly harvested crawfish at the LSU AgCenter Aquaculture Research Station. Credit: LSU AgCenter
The life cycle of a crawfish can be fairly straight forward. In the summer months, crawfish reproduce in underground mud burrows with a plug of mud on top of the burrow to protect them from predators. In late summer and early fall, rain softens the mud plugs so the crawfish can push their way out of the burrows and enter ponds, where they feed, molt and grow throughout Louisiana's typically mild winters. Spring then brings crawfish harvest season.
However, temperature and seasonal weather changes can affect this life cycle. Variability can have a costly effect on the industry, which has experienced considerable growth over the past two decades. For example, the 2018-19 Louisiana crawfish season produced 151.8 million pounds of crawfish with an economic value of $209.5 million compared to 82 million pounds valued at about $45 million in the 2004-05 season, according to the LSU AgCenter. To help inform farmers, researchers at LSU are the first to quantify how rainfall and temperature affect crawfish harvest yields.
"Providing farmers and producers with more information on how their catch and livelihood may fluctuate due to environmental conditions can help make them more resilient in the future," said LSU Assistant Professor-Research and the Southern Climate Impacts Planning Program Climate Research Director Vincent Brown, who is the lead author on this study published in Climate Research.
Brown and his colleagues analyzed eight years of crawfish harvest data from six LSU Aquaculture Research Station ponds. They used a statistical model to identify the most significant temperature and weather variables that impact crawfish.
"The timing of precipitation is really important. The statistical model shows that if you have heavy rainfall in August or September, the crawfish harvest yields will be suppressed in the spring," Brown said.
Live crawfish at Riceland Crawfish in Eunice, Louisiana. Credit: LSU AgCenter
Heavy summer rains can trigger the crawfish to emerge from their burrows too early. When this happens, they enter ponds that could potentially have low oxygen due to decaying plant matter and high summer heat as well as a host of other things that could be harmful to their survival.
"We have seen how the low amount of dissolved oxygen in a pond can directly affect the survival rate of crawfish. This issue is something that we are continuing to study and develop best practices with the farmers to combat," said C. Gregory Lutz, LSU AgCenter Aquaculture Research Station professor, Louisiana Sea Grant College Program marine extension agent and study co-author.
Additionally, winter temperatures that drop below freezing can slow crawfish growth.
This information can benefit farmers. For example, if excessive precipitation occurs in August and September followed by a dry October and November plus freezing conditions in January, farmers may not need to set aside time and resources to harvest two to four days per week in February, which is generally prescribed. It is possible that only harvesting twice a week is sufficient, which can save farmers money on bait, labor, gas and other costs, write the researchers.
"This study can also serve as a template to investigate the impacts of weather on other farm-raised seafood products," said Mark Shirley, Louisiana Sea Grant College Program and LSU AgCenter marine extension agent and co-author of this study.
More information: VM Brown et al, Effect of meteorological variables on crawfish harvest in Louisiana, USA, Climate Research (2020). DOI: 10.3354/cr01608
The evidence is in: Nice guys and gals don't finish last, and being a selfish jerk doesn't get you ahead.
That's the clear conclusion from research that tracked disagreeable people from college or graduate school to where they landed in their careers about 14 years later.
"I was surprised by the consistency of the findings. No matter the individual or the context, disagreeableness did not give people an advantage in the competition for power—even in more cutthroat, 'dog-eat-dog' organizational cultures," said Berkeley Haas Prof. Cameron Anderson, who co-authored the study with Berkeley Psychology Prof. Oliver P. John, doctoral student Daron L. Sharps, and Assoc. Prof. Christopher J. Soto of Colby College.
The paper was published August 31 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The researchers conducted two studies of people who had completed personality assessments as undergraduates or MBA students at three universities. They surveyed the same people more than a decade later, asking about their power and rank in their workplaces, as well as the culture of their organizations. They also asked their co-workers to rate the study participants' rank and workplace behavior. Across the board, they found those with selfish, deceitful, and aggressive personality traits were not more likely to have attained power than those who were generous, trustworthy, and generally nice.
That's not to say that jerks don't reach positions of power. It's just that they didn't get ahead faster than others, and being a jerk simply didn't help, Anderson said. That's because any power boost they get from being intimidating is offset by their poor interpersonal relationships, the researchers found. In contrast, the researchers found that extroverts were the most likely to have advanced in their organizations, based on their sociability, energy, and assertiveness—backing up prior research.
"The bad news here is that organizations do place disagreeable individuals in charge just as often as agreeable people," Anderson said. "In other words, they allow jerks to gain power at the same rate as anyone else, even though jerks in power can do serious damage to the organization."
The age-old question of whether being aggressively Machiavellian helps people get ahead has long interested Anderson, who studies social status. It's a critical question for managers, because ample research has shown that jerks in positions of power are abusive, prioritize their own self-interest, create corrupt cultures, and ultimately cause their organizations to fail. They also serve as toxic role models for society at large.
For example, people who read former-Apple CEO Steve Jobs' biography might think, "Maybe if I become an even bigger asshole I'll be successful like Steve," the authors note in their paper. "My advice to managers would be to pay attention to agreeableness as an important qualification for positions of power and leadership," Anderson said. "Prior research is clear: agreeable people in power produce better outcomes."
While there's clearly no shortage of jerks in power, there's been little empirical research to settle the question of whether being disagreeable actually helped them get there, or is simply incidental to their success. Anderson and his co-authors set out to create a research design that would clear up the debate. (They pre-registered their analysis for both studies on aspredicted.org.)
What defines a jerk? The participants had all completed the Big Five Inventory (BFI), an assessment based on general consensus among psychologists of the five fundamental personality dimensions: openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, neuroticism, and agreeableness. It was developed by Anderson's co-author John, who directs the Berkeley Personality Lab. In addition, some of the participants also completed a second personality assessment, the NEO Personality Inventory-Revised (NEO PI-R).
"Disagreeableness is a relatively stable aspect of personality that involves the tendency to behave in quarrelsome, cold, callous, and selfish ways," the researchers explained. "...Disagreeable people tend to be hostile and abusive to others, deceive and manipulate others for their own gain, and ignore others' concerns or welfare."
In the first study, which involved 457 participants, the researchers found no relationship between power and disagreeableness, no matter whether the person had scored high or low on those traits. That was true regardless of gender, race or ethnicity, industry, or the cultural norms in the organization.
The second study went deeper, looking at the four main ways people attain power: through dominant-aggressive behavior, or using fear and intimidation; political behavior, or building alliances with influential people; communal behavior, or helping others; and competent behavior, or being good at one's job. They also asked the subjects' co-workers to rate their place in the hierarchy, as well as their workplace behavior (interestingly, the co-workers' ratings largely matched the subjects' self-assessments).
This allowed the researchers to better understand why disagreeable people do not get ahead faster than others. Even though jerks tend to engage in dominant behavior, their lack of communal behavior cancels out any advantage their aggressiveness gives them, they concluded.
Anderson noted that the findings don't directly speak to whether disagreeableness helps or hurts people attain power in the realm of electoral politics, where the power dynamics are different than in organizations. But there are some likely parallels. "Having a strong set of alliances is generally important to power in all areas of life," he said. "Disagreeable politicians might have more difficulty maintaining necessary alliances because of their toxic behavior.Office jerks beware—your good ideas may not always be welcomed by colleagues
More information: Cameron Anderson el al., "People with disagreeable personalities (selfish, combative, and manipulative) do not have an advantage in pursuing power at work," PNAS (2020). www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2005088117
Trump eyes aquaculture boom, but environmentalists dig in
by Patrick Whittle
President Donald Trump wants to dramatically expand aquaculture production in the United States, but a coalition of environmentalists believes his plan would be bad for the oceans, unnecessary for food security and difficult to implement.
Trump's bid to grow fish farming is designed to address the so-called "seafood deficit," which refers to the fact that nine-tenths of the seafood Americans eat comes from overseas. The seafood trade gap with other countries approached $17 billion in 2017, according to one federal government report.
The president issued an executive order in May that promised broad changes in how the U.S. regulates fish farming. It included provisions to expedite the development of offshore aquaculture in deep federal waters. That sector of the industry has yet to emerge in the U.S., where most aquaculture takes place near shore where farmers grow salmon, oysters and other popular seafood items.
The Trump administration and the aquaculture industry said the order, which is being implemented now, represents common sense steps to ease the burden of rules on fish farmers. But environmental groups said it threatens to increase pollution and over-development in the ocean at a time when many consumers aren't buying seafood.
"They're trying to somehow connect open-water aquaculture with the need for domestic food. But it just doesn't make sense," said Marianne Cufone, executive director of the Recirculating Farms Coalition, one of several environmental groups that oppose the move. "Why we're seeing it during a pandemic, I don't know, I'm shaking my head."
The executive order gives the nation's regional fishery management councils, which regulate fisheries, six months to recommend "actions to reduce burdens on domestic fishing." One of the order's stated goals is "more effective permitting related to offshore aquaculture and additional streamlining of fishery regulations," with "the potential to revolutionize American seafood production."
The order aims to bring seafood production to the U.S. instead of keeping the nation dependent on other countries, said Paul Doremus, deputy assistant administrator for operations at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Marine Fisheries Service.
"We're a major seafood consuming country and we could be producing more of that seafood internally," Doremus said. "That's the driving force behind the executive order as a whole."
Aquaculture in federal waters has support from some major fish farmers, including Cooke Aquaculture, a Canada-based seafood giant. Cooke spokesman Joel Richardson said the order shows Trump's administration knows "the world needs more aquaculture to feed the world." The company's operations include salmon farms in the nearshore waters of Maine.
Hallie Templeton, senior oceans campaigner at Friends of the Earth, said it's not the right time to grow fish farming. Seafood is popular in restaurants, and the coronavirus pandemic has caused many to shutter, at least temporarily. Seafood sales to restaurants fell 90% in the early weeks of the pandemic. The industry has since seen an infusion of CARES Act money to help it recover, but continues to struggle.
Templeton called offshore aquaculture "floating factory farms" and said they are more likely to cause pollution in the marine environment than provide sustainable food.
A recent court ruling dealt a blow to the prospects for offshore fish farming. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said in a decision Aug. 3 that federal law granting NOAA authority over fisheries does not also let the agency set rules for offshore fish farms. That scuttled rules that could have regulated fish farms in the Gulf of Mexico.
Environmental groups heralded the court's ruling because it likely makes it more difficult for farmers to start large offshore operations that would raise species such as tuna, salmon and seabass.
"Allowing net-pen aquaculture and its environmental harms in the Gulf of Mexico is a grave threat, and the court properly held the government cannot do so without new and proper Congressional authority," said George Kimbrell, Center for Food Safety legal director and a lead counsel in the case.
The prospect of offshore aquaculture has been contentious for years. President Barack Obama also took steps to permit deep water fish farming during his tenure.
The aquaculture industry remains hopeful that Trump's executive order can help pave the way for more fish farming, both nearshore and offshore. Paul Zajicek, executive director of the National Aquaculture Association, said the order isn't about eliminating regulations but rather "removing barriers to aquaculture permitting" for farmers.
Some fishing groups have also come out in support of the order. Scot Mackey, director of government affairs for the Garden State Seafood Association, which advocates for fishermen as well as farmers, said the order "will help the industry weather the current crisis and come back stronger."
Neville Crabbe, spokesman for the Atlantic Salmon Federation, a conservation group, said the federal permitting process should be creating land-based aquaculture rather than fish farms in the ocean, let alone offshore.
"It's not clear how locating that production just further away from the coasts would help with things like diseases and parasites and other problems that plague the industry today," he said.
True holographic movies are within grasp by Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology
Credit: CC0 Public Domain
Holographic movies, like the one R2D2 projected of Princess Leia in "Star Wars: A New Hope," have long been the province of science fiction, but for most of us, the extent of our experience with holograms may be the dime-sized stamps on our passports and credit cards. By using 'metasurface' materials that can manipulate light in ways that natural materials cannot, researchers reckon they have finally seen the light at the end of the tunnel for creating true holographic movies.
The findings, by a team at the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology (TUAT), were published on August 3rd in Optics Express.
Static holograms are all around us these days on our money, credit cards, and passports.
These 'surface-relief holograms,' stamped onto plastic in a similar way to how vinyl records are embossed, can be useful as a security device or to make wrapping paper twinkle, but they are known for their low image quality, still imagery, and limited viewing angle. In the third decade of the 21st Century, we don't yet have true holographic movies, despite their ubiquity in popular culture.
Even the 'holograms' of pop stars that are increasingly common spectacles at concerts aren't true holograms, but an updated version of a very old theatrical trick deceiving the eye with mirrors and light—an illusion that is easily revealed as such if the viewer moves just slightly to the side of the set-up.
But researchers at Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology have demonstrated a genuine holographic movie, whose concept is inspired by the sequential playback of the very first cinematographic projectors of the 19th century.
PlayResearchers demonstrated a genuine holographic movie, whose concept is inspired by the sequential playback of the very first cinematographic projectors of the 19th Century. Credit: Kentaro Iwami/ TUAT
The proof of concept depends on what is called a metasurface, a thin film material just nanometers thick whose microstructure is artificially crafted in a way to deliver characteristics, such as clever manipulation of light, that are not found in naturally occurring materials. Metasurfaces involve very tiny repeating patterns at scales smaller than the wavelength of light. It is their shape and particular arrangement, rather than, as with conventional materials, their chemical composition, that allows metasurfaces to alter the path of light.
The researchers 'printed' an array of 48 rectangular frames of a metasurface made primarily of gold and which diffracts laser light shone at it in such a way as to produce a true holographic three-dimensional image appearing mid-air (just like Princess Leia), viewable from most angles in the room.
Each of the metasurface frames is slightly different—as with a reel of celluloid film—using 48 images of the Earth rotating. The holographic movie was played back by sequentially reconstructing each frame at a rate of 30 frames per second—the frame rate used in most live TV.
"We're using a helium-neon laser as the light source, which produces a reddish holographic image," said Kentaro Iwami, one of the engineers who developed the system, "so the aim is to develop this to produce full color eventually. And we want it to be viewable from any angle: a 'whole hemisphere' 3-D projection."
It also took an electron-beam lithography printer six and a half hours to draw the 48 frames—an extremely short film run on a loop. A six-minute holographic movie would take just over 800 hours to draw, the researchers reckon.
More information: Ryota Izumi et al, Metasurface holographic movie: a cinematographic approach, Optics Express (2020). DOI: 10.1364/OE.399369 Journal information: Optics Express
Provided by Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology
Smoke from wildfire blackens prehistoric Greek city walls
Smoke raises during a wildfire over the ancient site of Mycenae, Greece, some 140 kilometers (90 miles) south of Athens, on Sunday, Aug. 30, 2020. The fire that broke out at the Mycenae, one of the most popular archaeological sites in Greece, has not caused any damage to antiquities at first inspection, according the Culture Ministry. (Vangelis Bougiotis/InTime News via AP)
Monuments at the archaeological site of Mycenae have not been damaged by a wildfire that swept through the area, despite blackening from smoke on the iconic entrance to the ancient citadel, Greece's culture minister said Monday.
Four water-dropping planes and two helicopters helped dozens of firefighters contain the blaze Sunday after it reached the fringes of one of Greece's most important archaeological sites, some 120 kilometers (75 miles) southwest of Athens.
The Bronze Age fortified city, whose rulers were key figures in ancient Greek legend, including the Trojan War, flourished centuries before the major Acropolis temples were built in Athens and was a major center of Mediterranean civilization.
Smoke from the flames blackened the 3,250-year-old Lion Gate, named after the monumental relief sculpture of two heraldic lions flanking a pillar that crowns the entrance to the ancient citadel.
"The damage caused by yesterday's fire was the least possible," Culture Minister Lina Mendoni said during a visit to the site Monday, adding that none of the site's monuments or the Mycenae museum had suffered any damage. Photos released by the ministry Monday showed no traces of burning inside the site.
"Smoke blackened some walls," Mendoni added. "The problem is (only) aesthetic."
A plane drops water during a wildfire in the ancient site of Mycenae, Greece, some 140 kilometers (90 miles) south of Athens, on Sunday, Aug. 30, 2020. The fire that broke out at the Mycenae, one of the most popular archaeological sites in Greece, has not caused any damage to antiquities at first inspection, according the Culture Ministry. (Vangelis Bougiotis/InTime News via AP)
Smoke raises during a wildfire over the ancient site of Mycenae, Greece, some 140 kilometers (90 miles) south of Athens, on Sunday, Aug. 30, 2020. The fire that broke out at the Mycenae, one of the most popular archaeological sites in Greece, has not caused any damage to antiquities at first inspection, according the Culture Ministry. (Vangelis Bougiotis/InTime News via AP)
A helicopter operates during a wildfire over the ancient site of Mycenae, Greece, some 140 kilometers (90 miles) south of Athens, on Sunday, Aug. 30, 2020. The fire that broke out at the Mycenae, one of the most popular archaeological sites in Greece, has not caused any damage to antiquities at first inspection, according the Culture Ministry. (Vangelis Bougiotis/InTime News via AP)
"The Fire Service acted swiftly ... and prevention measures worked: Dry vegetation had all been cleared away," Mendoni said. "That's what saved the monuments,."
A spokesman for Greece's main political opposition, the left-wing Syriza party, questioned the speed of the response by the Fire Service, noting that the fire had entered the site.
The party said it was carrying out a separate inspection Monday, and called on the minister to issue a public apology for downplaying the damage.
Mycenae has been closed to visitors but the Culture Ministry said it will be reopened Tuesday.
Two recent studies were unable to rule out that H1N1 ("swine flu") vaccination (Pandemrix) and seasonal influenza vaccination given to pregnant women might be associated with autism-spectrum disorder in the offspring. Now, a large study by researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden, published in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine, refutes any such association.
Autism spectrum disorder is a severe neurodevelopmental childhood disorder characterized by impaired communication, lack of social skills and repetitive behavior. The disease has its onset in childhood.
While some studies indicate that influenza vaccination during pregnancy protects against morbidity in both the woman and her offspring, the long-term risks of H1N1 vaccination during fetal life have not been examined in detail. However two recent studies were unable to rule out that offspring to women undergoing influenza or H1N1 influenza vaccination during pregnancy, and especially during the first trimester, were at increased risk of autism-spectrum disorder.
Researchers from Karolinska Institutet, linked vaccination data in pregnant women from seven Swedish healthcare regions in 2009-2010 to the Swedish Medical Birth Register and the Swedish National Patient Register to identify autism-spectrum disorder in the offspring.
The importance of vaccination research
Of the 39,726 vaccine-exposed children, 394 (cumulative incidence, 1.0%) had a diagnosis of autism-spectrum disorder during the six-year follow-up compared with 330 (1.1%) among 29,293 unexposed children. Adjusting for potential confounders, H1N1 vaccine exposure during fetal life was not associated with a later childhood diagnosis of autism-spectrum disorder (adjusted hazard ratio=0.95; 95%CI=0.81-1.12). Results were similar for vaccinations in the first pregnancy trimester.
"Our null findings are important since some people have suspected that vaccinations could cause autism, and the anti-vaccine movement seems to be growing in the Western world," says lead author, Professor Jonas F Ludvigsson, pediatrician at Örebro University Hospital and professor at the Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet. "H1N1 vaccination has previously been linked to an increased risk of narcolepsy in young people, but vaccinating pregnant women does not seem to influence the risk of autism-spectrum disorder in the offspring,"
He continues: "Vaccination research has never been more important. Anticipating a vaccine against COVID-19, millions of pregnant women are likely to be offered such a vaccination. While our research group did not study COVID-19 vaccine effects, our research on H1N1 vaccination adds to the current knowledge about vaccines, pregnancy and offspring disease in general."
Adjusted for other factors
The researchers adjusted their analyses for such confounders as maternal smoking, height-weight, maternal age and comorbidity in order to minimize the influence of other factors that might explain any association between vaccination and autism.
"Without taking such factors into consideration, so-called confounding may create spurious associations that do not reflect a true association," adds co-author, Ass. Prof. Bjorn Pasternak, Department of Medicine, Karolinska Institutet (Solna).
Aquaculture farms in the coast of China's northeast province of Liaonin. Credit: NASA Earth Observatory.
In a world-first, the extent of human development in oceans has been mapped. An area totalling approximately 30,000 square kilometres—the equivalent of 0.008 percent of the ocean—has been modified by human construction, a study led by Dr. Ana Bugnot from the University of Sydney School of Life and Environmental Sciences and the Sydney Institute of Marine Science has found.
The extent of ocean modified by human construction is, proportion-wise, comparable to the extent of urbanised land, and greater than the global area of some natural marine habitats, such as mangrove forests and seagrass beds.
When calculated as the area modified inclusive of flow-on effects to surrounding areas, for example, due to changes in water flow and pollution, the footprint is actually two million square kilometres, or over 0.5 percent of the ocean.
The oceanic modification includes areas affected by tunnels and bridges; infrastructure for energy extraction (for example, oil and gas rigs, wind farms); shipping (ports and marinas); aquaculture infrastructure; and artificial reefs.
Dr. Bugnot said that ocean development is nothing new, yet, in recent times, it has rapidly changed. "It has been ongoing since before 2000 BC," she said. "Then, it supported maritime traffic through the construction of commercial ports and protected low-lying coasts with the creation of structures similar to breakwaters.
"Since the mid-20th century, however, ocean development has ramped up, and produced both positive and negative results.
"For example, while artificial reefs have been used as 'sacrificial habitat' to drive tourism and deter fishing, this infrastructure can also impact sensitive natural habitats like seagrasses, mudflats and saltmarshes, consequently affecting water quality.
"Marine development mostly occurs in coastal areas—the most biodiverse and biologically productive ocean environments."
A map showing the physical footprint of marine construction globally, in square kilometres. Credit: Bugnot et al., 'Current and projected global extent of marine built structures', Nature Sustainability.
Future expansion 'alarming'
Dr. Bugnot, joined by co-researchers from multiple local and international universities, also projected the rate of future ocean footprint expansion.
"The numbers are alarming," Dr. Bugnot said. "For example, infrastructure for power and aquaculture, including cables and tunnels, is projected to increase by 50 to 70 percent by 2028.
"Yet this is an underestimate: there is a dearth of information on ocean development, due to poor regulation of this in many parts of the world.
"There is an urgent need for improved management of marine environments. We hope our study spurs national and international initiatives, such as the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive, to greater action."
The researchers attributed the projected expansion on people's increasing need for defences against coastal erosion and inundation due to sea level rise and climate change, as well as their transportation, energy extraction, and recreation needs.
Journal Nature Sustainability published their research. It was undertaken in 2018, when Dr Bugnot was employed by
A plane drops water during a wildfire in the ancient site of Mycenae, Greece, some 140 kilometers (90 miles) south of Athens, on Sunday, Aug. 30, 2020. The fire that broke out at the Mycenae, one of the most popular archaeological sites in Greece, has not caused any damage to antiquities at first inspection, according the Culture Ministry. (Vangelis Bougiotis/InTime News via AP)
