UK
Why do we need Black History Month? Because too many people still reject it

Rightwing push-back on the idea that British history should encompass the black experience makes it all the more urgent

Diane Abbott

Mon 19 Oct 2020 

Black History Month has never been more relevant than in 2020. The Black Lives Matter movement has swept blackness to the heart of the political discourse. For me, it brings back memories of the upsurge of black activism in the 1980s, when I first entered politics.

In the 1980s, black people took to the streets of the UK, which partly reflected the US civil rights movement, but was also about the emergence of a new generation of black activists in this country. “Here to stay, here to fight,” was one of our favourite slogans on demonstrations. Importantly, riots erupted in cities all over the country, sparked by decades of injustices suffered by black communities at the hands of the police and other institutions. The riots started in Brixton, south London, in 1981. And there were other related uprisings in Handsworth, Birmingham; Southall, west London; Toxteth, Liverpool; Hyson Green in Nottingham; and Moss Side in Manchester. Black people taking to the streets in the 80s was probably the single most important factor in moving the fight for racial justice up the political agenda, and led to the election of myself and three other people as the first black members of parliament. It also made initiatives such as Black History Month possible.


The story of the Mangrove Nine

The move to the left in Labour, particularly in London, was also significant. The leadership of the party may have regarded with horror the “black sections” campaign, which I and other black members of the party set up to address racism and promote ethnic minority candidates within Labour, but Black History Month came from the left of the party. It was no coincidence that Akyaaba Addai-Sebo, an officer of the Greater London Council (GLC), organised the very first Black History Month in Britain.

In a later interview, Addai-Sebo said that although he had initiated the idea, it was a collective effort, and it could not have been achieved without the London strategic policy unit, which was an organisation established after the Thatcher government abolished the GLC in 1986.

Among the many people involved in creating Black History Month, he mentions some of the first black MPs, Bernie Grant and Paul Boateng (now a Labour peer), and local politicians of the day, including Linda Bellos, Herman Ouseley and Ken Livingstone.

These were all big figures in the municipal socialism of the era. And there were many other council officers who were actively involved. In fact, it has been leftwing local authorities that have provided much of the funding for Black History Month over the decades.

In recent years there has been a lull in interest in Black History Month. It is still a mainstay of school curriculums, but there has been a backlash from both the right and the left. Black activists routinely described it as tokenistic. The usual argument was that every month should be Black History month. Now Black Lives Matter has brought issues about black people and history to centre stage once more.

Amazingly, institutions at the heart of the British establishment, from the Bank of England to the National Trust and the City of London, along with Oxbridge colleges and our leading museums, are now having unprecedented discussions about black people and British history.

But there has been a serious push-back by some rightwing pundits and politicians against the idea that British history should also encompass the black experience.

‘Black Lives Matter has brought issues about black people and history to centre stage once more.’ A postbox honouring black Britons. Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty

In Hackney, east London, we have the well-known Museum of the Home (until recently called the Geffrye museum), which was funded by the slave trader Robert Geffrye. His statue stands in pride of place. But in the wake of Black Lives Matter, the museum had a public consultation about whether the local community wanted a slave trader honoured in this way. Residents said that the statue should be taken down. However, on hearing this decision, the culture secretary, Oliver Dowden, took the trouble to write to the museum, reminding it that it was funded by the government, which was strongly opposed the statue being moved. Sadly, the museum caved in to government pressure. And the statue of a man who made his money out of trading in black Africans still looms over multicultural Hackney.

It’s not just Tory ministers such as Dowden, or the men who organise counter-demonstrations to Black Lives Matter events, ostensibly to “protect” statues, for whom it seems black lives emphatically don’t matter when it comes to how Britain frames it history. There are still too many people who resist the idea that black people and our history should be accepted as part of the sweep of British history.

This is why Black History Month remains extremely relevant, and is worth keeping and fighting for. The fight for racial justice must always have an appreciation of our culture and history at its heart.

• Diane Abbott is the Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington

• To buy the Guardian’s black history wallcharts, visit the Guardian bookshop and use code 15CHART for a 50% discount

Angels and artillery: a cathedral to Russia's new national identity

Cathedral of the Armed Forces blends militarism, patriotism and Orthodox Christianity to controversial effect

The Cathedral of the Armed forces, in Patriot Park, Kubinka. Photograph: Valery Sharifulin/TASS

Shaun Walker at Patriot Park
Tue 20 Oct 2020 

Angels hover above artillery, religious images are adorned with Kalashnikovs and the Virgin Mary strikes a pose reminiscent of a Soviet second world war poster. The imagery inside Russia’s vast Cathedral of the Armed Forces blends militarism, patriotism and Orthodox Christianity to breathtaking and highly controversial effect.

An hour’s drive from Moscow, the cathedral has a metallic, khaki-green exterior, topped with golden domes and crosses that rise to 95 metres (312ft). Inside is the largest amount of mosaic of any church in the world, with many of the work depicting battles from Russian history and the second world war in particular.

During Vladimir Putin’s two decades in charge of Russia, the Soviet victory in the Great Patriotic War, as the second world war is still called here, has gradually become the main building block of a new Russian national identity. Now, the war victory has its own religious shrine, and when future historians look back at the Putin era, they may well decide that this cathedral is its defining building.

A member of the armed forces attends a service in the cathedral. Photograph: Valery Sharifulin/TASS

Soviet war medals are rendered in stained glass on the ceilings, while mosaics show various key battles. Symbolic numbers have been coded into the dimensions – the diameter of the main dome, for example, is 19.45 metres. Trophy weapons and tanks seized from the Wehrmacht were melted down and used in the creation of the cathedral’s metal floors.

“Think of this as you step into the cathedral. As you walk across the floors, you are symbolically delivering a blow to the fascist enemy,” a guide told a tour group of older women in headscarves as they entered the building earlier this month.

The cathedral was the brainchild of Russia’s defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, and the opening was originally planned for the 75th anniversary of victory over the Nazis, in May. In the end, owing to the coronavirus pandemic, the ceremonial opening was delayed until June. Shoigu, Putin, and the Patriarch Kirill of Moscow attended the opening, on 22 June, the anniversary of the Nazi attack on the Soviet Union in 1941.

Performers dressed in Soviet era military uniforms dance in front of the cathedral. 

Photograph: Sergei Ilnitsky/EPA

“Only a nation that loves God could build such a grand cathedral,” said Bishop Stefan of Klin, who heads the Russian Orthodox church’s department for cooperation with the army and regularly holds services at the cathedral, where he is the patriarch’s designated representative.



The 59-year-old bishop, who was an officer in the Soviet and Russian missile defence forces before becoming a priest, defended the use of Soviet symbols, saying the cathedral depicted “all the epochs of our state, Holy Rus” and it would be wrong to leave out the second world war, given how many Soviet soldiers were religious.

But the imagery has proved controversial. “For many priests, who were young in the 1970s and 1980s and personally came up against the repressive Soviet machine, which targeted the church, they are in shock and they can’t get over it,” said Sergei Chapnin, a religious scholar in Moscow. “This is not really an Orthodox cathedral, it’s a cathedral of our new post-Soviet civil religion,” he added.

A Soviet hammer and sickle is visible in the stained glass of the cathedral.

 Photograph: Mikhail Metzel/TASS

Some minor changes have been made after the original outcry earlier this year, most notably the removal of a mosaic about the Kremlin’s 2014 seizure of Crimea that featured images of Putin and Shoigu.

“It was the wish of our president, who is so modest that he thought it wasn’t right for him to be represented on the mosaic, to remove it,” said Stefan. The mosaic detailing the Crimea events now has no Putin, but does depict the infamous “little green men” – Russian special forces, without insignia, who ran the annexation of the peninsula and whose presence in Crimea was initially denied by the Kremlin.



In a large mosaic devoted to the Soviet and Russian armies since the second world war, two angels look down at a group of soldiers carrying modern weapons, and there is a list of commemorated conflicts, ending with “forcing peace on Georgia” in 2008, “the return of Crimea” in 2014 and the “fight against international terrorism” in Syria. There is space for future conflicts to be added.

Russian Orthodox Christian light candles near a mosaic depicting more recent conflicts. 

Photograph: Maxim Shipenkov/EPA

The panel also lists the two Russian wars in Chechnya, as well as Soviet military interventions to crush the Hungarian revolution in 1956 and the Prague spring in 1968, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Asked if the church really wanted to suggest that all these interventions were sacred, Stefan said it was wrong to focus on particular conflicts.

“We are not talking about the geopolitical background at any particular time, we are talking about the fact that our armed forces have sacred help from above, from God and from the heavenly saints. That’s what the cathedral is about.”

A Russian military band march in front of the cathedral during a military music festival in September. Photograph: Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images

The cathedral is located at Patriot Park, a “military Disneyland” that was opened by Putin five years ago. Three years ago, Shoigu was among 5,000 spectators who watched a re-enactment of the 1945 storming of the Reichstag at the park, involving tanks, planes and a giant model of the Berlin parliamentary building.

With the opening of the cathedral, there are even more options for a family day out. About 20,000 visitors a day have visited on recent weekends, and even on a Tuesday afternoon this week there were hundreds of people inside the cathedral, and many taking excursions.

Dancers and musicians of the paratroopers band perform during the military music festival in September. Photograph: Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images

Wrapped around the cathedral’s perimeter, in a mile-long horseshoe, is a bombastic, interactive museum called 1418 Steps to Victory – one step for each day of the Soviet war effort – that opened at the same time as the cathedral. Many of the rooms have computer-game-style recreations of episodes from the war playing out on huge screens, and some also have temperature and “smell” elements. Children can pose for photographs with a mannequin of a surrendering Nazi soldier, and there are jigsaw puzzles, souvenir mugs and toy missile launchers for sale in the gift shop.

An aerial view of the cathedral. Photograph: Mikhail Japaridze/TASS

But while there are plenty of war museums in Russia the cathedral is something altogether new, making explicit the quasi-religious subtext of the way the war is remembered in Russia.

Dmitry, a 28-year-old altar server working at the cathedral, claimed that the military and religious images on its mosaics, far from being a jarring combination, are in fact a perfect fit: “In the war, our soldiers martyred themselves so that we could be free and independent. Only Russians are capable of sacrificing themselves to save humanity, just like Jesus

I'm the one': Philippines president takes responsibility for drug killings

In televised address, Rodrigo Duterte says he would ‘gladly’ go to jail over drugs killings carried out during drug war

Thousands of people have been killed in the Philippines during Rodrigo Duterte’s campaign against drugs. Photograph: Dondi Tawatao/Reuters

Associated Press
Tue 20 Oct 2020 

Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte has said he has no problem with being held responsible for the thousands of killings under his government’s war on drugs, adding that he was ready to face charges that could land him in jail, though not charges of crimes against humanity.

The president’s televised remarks on Monday night were among his clearest acknowledgement of the prospects that he could face a deluge of criminal charges for the bloody campaign he launched after taking office in mid-2016.

The killing of nearly 6,000 drug suspects have been reported by police but rights watchdogs suspect the death toll is far higher.


UN accused over failure to investigate 'war on drugs' killings in the Philippines

“If there’s killing there, I’m saying I’m the one ... you can hold me responsible for anything, any death that has occurred in the execution of the drug war,” Duterte said.

“If you get killed it’s because I’m enraged by drugs,” the president said. “If that’s what I’m saying, bring me to court to be imprisoned. Fine, I have no problem. If I serve my country by going to jail, gladly.”

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte. Photograph: Robinson Ninal Jr./AP

At least two complaints for crimes against humanity and mass murder in connection with Duterte’s campaign are being examined by an international criminal court (ICC) prosecutor, who will determine whether there is enough evidence to open a full investigation.

Duterte responded to the complaints by withdrawing the Philippines from the court two years ago in a move that human rights groups said was a major setback in the country’s battle against impunity. The ICC prosecutor has said the examination into the drug killings would continue despite the Philippine withdrawal.

Duterte framed his remarks by portraying the drug menace as a national security and public threat like the decades-long communist insurgency that the government is obligated to quell.

“If this is allowed to go on and on and if no decisive action is taken against them, it will endanger the security of the state,” said Duterte, a former government prosecutor.

“When you save your country from the perdition of the people like the NPAs and drugs, you are doing a sacred duty,” he said, referring to communist New People’s Army insurgents.

There are 1.6 million drug addicts in the Philippines, Duterte said, citing statistics from an anti-narcotics agency. The figure is much smaller than the 4 million addicts that he cited the police as reporting early in his presidency to justify his crackdown.

Police have reported at least 5,856 drug suspects have been killed in raids and more than 256,000 others arrested since the start of the crackdown. Human rights groups have accused authorities of considerably under reporting the deaths.


'If it’s drugs, you shoot and kill,' Duterte orders Philippine custom chief

Duterte said drug killings that did not happen during police operations should not be blamed on him, adding those deaths may have been set off by gang rivalries or settling of scores.

There have been widespread suspicions of extrajudicial killings in the crackdown, allegations that Duterte and the police deny.

In 2018, a court convicted three police officers of murdering a 17-year-old student after witnesses and a security video disproved their claim that the suspect was shot after violently resisting, a common reason cited by police officers after drug suspects are killed.

 

Rethinking the link between cannabinoids and learning

CHAMPALIMAUD CENTRE FOR THE UNKNOWN

Research News

 

IMAGE: FLUORESCENT IMAGE OF A MOUSE BRAIN WITH THE CEREBELLUM HIGHLIGHTED IN THE SHAPE OF A MARIJUANA LEAF. view more 

CREDIT: ILLUSTRATION BY RITA FÉLIX, PHD.

Cannabinoids have a strong influence on how our brains work and how we behave. Many people are only aware of the recreational aspect of cannabinoids. But in fact these molecules naturally exist in our brains where they participate in various intrinsic processes.

Altered cannabinoid signalling, for instance due to chronic use of marijuana, results in a range of impairments. Similarly, mice lacking cannabinoid receptors exhibit reduced activity levels, as well as deficits in learning and memory.

How do cannabinoids exact their effect on learning? A team led by Megan Carey, a principal investigator at the Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown in Portugal, and Catarina Albergaria, a postdoctoral researcher in the lab, decided to tap into this question by investigating the brain mechanisms involved in a classical learning task called eyeblink conditioning.

The immediate suspect

In eyeblink conditioning, subjects learn to associate the appearance of a sensory stimulus, for example a flash of light, with a subsequent delivery of an airpuff to the eye. Once learned, the subject - in this case a mouse - closes its eyes when the light appears to avoid the airpuff. "It's just like Pavlov's dog and the bell," says Albergaria.

Previous studies had established that this form of learning takes place in a brain structure called the cerebellum, and that it was impaired by altered cannabinoid signaling in both humans and mice. To study the role of cannabinoids in learning, the team used mutant mice lacking cannabinoid receptors, which show impaired eyeblink conditioning.

Why are these mice impaired? When they started, the researchers had an immediate suspect in mind. "Many studies support the idea that cannabinoids mediate neural plasticity, or experience-dependent changes in the connections between neurons," Carey explains. "We therefore first hypothesized that interfering with this process was what was driving the impairments in learning."

But like a good mystery novel, the immediate suspect turned out to be the wrong one. What was the real culprit? "In a study we published two years ago, we found that the more mice ran, the better they learned", Albergaria explains. The team began to suspect that the difference in learning might instead be due to the reduced activity levels of the mutant mice.

Spotlight on behavioural state

"We wondered whether the mutant mice weren't learning as well simply because they weren't active enough," Albergaria recalls. Today in the journal eLife, the team reports that the altered behavioral state of the mutants fully accounts for their impaired eyeblink conditioning. When the researchers placed the mice on a motorised treadmill that ensured that the mutants walked as much as normal mice, the results were striking: learning was completely restored.

The team also found that other cerebellar behaviors, locomotor coordination and learning, were normal in the cannabinoid mutants. Further, eyeblink conditioning was fully intact in mice that lacked cannabinoid receptors specifically within the cerebellum. "These experiments further supported our hypothesis that disrupted cannabinoid signaling was impairing learning by altering behavioral state, and not through direct effects on neural plasticity in the cerebellum," says Carey.

"There is a growing body of evidence that behavioural state profoundly influences brain function," says Carey. "Our study highlights the need to consider behavioral state as a powerful independent means through which individual genes contribute to complex behaviors."

"We were able to overcome a learning deficit associated with a genetic mutation with a purely behavioral intervention," adds Albergaria, suggesting a potential real-world consequence for these findings.

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How is STEM children's programming prioritizing diversity?

MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

IMAGE:  "CHILDREN SOAK UP SUBTLETIES AND ARE LEARNING AND TAKING CUES FROM EVERYTHING; BY AGE 5, YOU CAN SEE THAT THEY UNDERSTAND IMPLICIT BIASES, " SAYS FASHINA ALADÉ, LEAD AUTHOR OF THE... view more 

CREDIT: ROYALTY-FREE FROM PXHERE

EAST LANSING, Mich. - Children's television programming not only shapes opinions and preferences, its characters can have positive or negative impacts on childhood aspiration, says a new study from Michigan State University.

The study is the first large-scale analysis of characters featured in science, technology, engineering and math-related educational programming. It was published in the fall 2020 edition of Journal of Children and Media. Results revealed that of the characters appearing in STEM television programming for kids ages 3 to 6, Latinx and females are left behind.

"Children soak up subtleties and are learning and taking cues from everything; by age 5, you can see that they understand implicit biases," said Fashina Aladé, lead author of the study and assistant professor in the College of Communication Arts and Sciences. "With the recent proliferation of STEM television over the past five years or so, I wanted to see who was showing kids how to solve problems, who is teaching STEM foundations and who is modeling what it looks like to engage in STEM."

To get a picture of the entire landscape of STEM programming available to children, Aladé and colleagues -- Alexis Lauricella of Erikson Institute, Yannik Kumar from University of Chicago and Ellen Wartella of Northwestern University -- looked to Nielsen, Netflix, Amazon and Hulu for a list of children's shows that mentioned keywords like science, math, technology or problem-solving in their descriptions.

The researchers looked at 30 shows with target audiences between 3- and 6-year-olds, all claiming to teach some aspect of STEM. Coders watched 90 episodes total -- three episodes from each show's most recent season -- and coded over 1,000 characters who appeared on the shows for physical attributes, gender, race and ethnicity.

"Surprisingly, when it came to the centrality of their role and on-screen STEM engagement, characters were portrayed relatively equally regardless of their race or gender," Aladé said. "But, female and minority characters were underrepresented in these programs compared to population statistics."

An interesting finding, Aladé said, was that racially ambiguous characters -- including non-human skin tones, like pink or purple -- comprised 13% of the characters, which she suggests illustrates producers' attempts to show racial diversity. "The jury's still out on whether those subtle cues are effective," Aladé said. Additionally, the study also found that only 14% of the shows showed occupations related to STEM.

"Animation presents such an opportunity for representation. Ideally, we'd see authentic representation -- not representative stereotypes," Aladé said. "I hope we move in a direction where kids see what scientists really look like in today's world, where doctors, engineers and computer scientists come from all ethnicities and genders."

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(Note for media: Please include the following link to the study in all online media coverage: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17482798.2020.1810087?journalCode=rchm20)

Michigan State University has been working to advance the common good in uncommon ways for 160 years. One of the top research universities in the world, MSU focuses its vast resources on creating solutions to some of the world's most pressing challenges, while providing life-changing opportunities to a diverse and inclusive academic community through more than 200 programs of study in 17 degree-granting colleges.

For MSU news on the Web, go to MSUToday. Follow MSU News on Twitter at twitter.com/MSUnews.

 

Utilizing telemedicine in the ER can reduce wait times and patient length of stay

INSTITUTE FOR OPERATIONS RESEARCH AND THE MANAGEMENT SCIENCES

Research News

 

INFORMS Journal Information Systems Research New Study Key Takeaways:

• Increasing telemedicine availability in the emergency room (ER) significantly reduces the average patients' hospital stay.
• Using telemedicine if there is a demand surge or supply shortage rapidly decreases ER hospital stays.
• Using telemedicine to reduce a patient's length of stay is a result of the reduction of wait times.

CATONSVILLE, MD, October 16, 2020 - Telemedicine has become more common given the current global pandemic. COVID-19 has limited doctor's office and hospital visits to ensure safety for everyone. But rather than diminish the quality of care, new research in the INFORMS journal Information Systems Research finds that increasing wider use of telemedicine in the emergency room (ER) can yield positive results for patients and providers alike.

The study, "Does Telemedicine Reduce Emergency Room Congestion? Evidence from New York State," looks at all emergency room visits in New York from 2010 to 2014. The researchers found, on average, telemedicine availability in the ER significantly reduces average patients' length of stay (LOS), which is partially driven by the flexible resource allocation.

Overcrowding in ERs is a common and nagging problem. It not only is costly for hospitals, but also compromises care quality and patient experience. Study authors Susan Lu of Purdue University, Shujing Sun of the University of Texas at Dallas and Huaxia Rui of the University of Rochester say finding ways to improve ER care delivery is important, as long as it actually works.

"The adoption of telemedicine leads to a larger reduction in ER length of stay when there is a demand surge or supply shortage," said Lu, a professor in the Krannert School of Management at Purdue. "This improvement does not come at the expense of care quality or patient cost."

The authors replicated their findings using annual U.S. hospital data and found that ER telemedicine adoption also significantly reduced average patients' waiting time, which suggests that the LOS reduction partially comes from the reduction of waiting time.

According to the National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey, from 2000 to 2015, the number of ER visits in the United States increased by more than 25%. This congestion in the ER can have a number of negative implications from unhappy patients, decreased productivity by doctors because they're overworked, and increased financial costs because of unnecessary tests.

According to information published in February 2019 by the American Hospital Association, 76% of U.S. hospitals use various telemedicine technologies to connect patients and providers.

This research article shows more specifically the impact telemedicine can have in reducing ER congestion and provides positive implications.

"The current pandemic has shown hospitals the great promise of telemedicine application and hopefully the unexpected enrollment of such policies alongside this research can help get the process underway to help more healthcare facilities utilize this technology in ERs and elsewhere," said Lu. "Policymakers can play a role as well by reducing regulatory barriers that inhibit more expansive use of telemedicine and by creating incentives that encourage hospitals to more broadly adopt telemedicine in emergency rooms."

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About INFORMS and Information Systems Research

Information Systems Research is a premier peer-reviewed scholarly journal focused on research using theory and intellectual developments to study the effects and utilization of information technology. It is published by INFORMS, the leading international association for operations research and analytics professionals. More information is available at http://www.informs.org or @informs.

Contact:

Ashley Smith
443-757-3578
asmith@informs.org

 

Is sitting always bad for your mind? A new study suggests maybe not

COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY

Research News 

IMAGE: PERSON WALKING view more 

CREDIT: COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY

It's generally accepted health advice that adults of all ages should sit less, move more, and engage in regular exercise to feel better and reduce the risk of chronic diseases. However, when it comes to the brain and cognition, a new study of older adults from Colorado State University suggests that some sedentariness isn't all bad, so long as basic physical activity benchmarks are being met.

The research, from Assistant Professor Aga Burzynska in the CSU Department of Human Development and Family Studies, examined the association between sensor-measured physical activity and cognitive performance in a sample of 228 healthy older adults, aged 60 to 80.

Published in Psychology and Aging, the results showed that, as expected, adults who engaged in more moderate-to-vigorous activity had better speed, memory, and reasoning abilities. However, the data also revealed that adults who spent more time sedentary performed better on vocabulary and reasoning tasks.

The study could be a bit of good news for a population of Americans who spend a significant amount of time sitting for work and for leisure.

SENSITIVE MEASUREMENTS

The association between increased physical activity and improved cardiovascular and metabolic health is one that's well documented, according to Burzynska. But the link between different intensities of daily physical activity and cognitive health is less understood, especially in older adults.

"We know that as we grow older, even if we do not have any cognitive impairments, people aged 60 and up already show some decreases in speed, executive functioning, and memory. Those decreases are totally within a normal range, but this study was looking to understand how our behaviors and habits may correlate with cognitive outcomes in older age," Burzynska said.

What differentiates this study from others is the way the researchers measured daily physical activity, using scientifically validated sensors that are more accurate than your average, consumer-based activity tracker. Other studies rely on self-reported data to measure physical activity, "and we already know that people like to overestimate their daily movement and underestimate the time they spend sitting," Burzynska said.

"If you ask, 'How long did you sit today?' people will perhaps say 2 to 3 hours when the reality is more like 6 to 8 hours," she added.

Further, where other studies might use only one or two measures of cognition and a general definition of physical activity, Burzynska's study employed a broad assessment that tested 16 cognitive tasks. In addition, they measured and controlled for socioeconomic and health factors, such as employment status, income level, aerobic fitness, blood pressure, and mobility issues.

"Our study has pretty high-quality measures that cannot be done 'quick and dirty'," Burzynska said.

Older adults who participated in the study wore the sensor on their hip for a span of seven days, during which the sensor captured the daily time they spent sitting or in light versus moderate-to-vigorous physical activity.

FLUID VS. CRYSTALLIZED COGNITION

The cognitive assessment prompted participants to select patterns, fill-in-the-blanks, and identify shapes, among other tasks -- the results of which helped researchers gauge if there was a correlation between physical activity and fluid vs. crystallized cognition.

So-called "fluid" abilities, such as speed and memory, problem solving, and reasoning skills, tend to decline throughout adulthood; yet, participants in the study who engaged in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity performed better on fluid tasks, suggesting that exercise might stave off some of the typical effects of brain aging.

However, most participants in the study did not spend a significant amount of time in physical activity; in fact, data showed that, on average, most participants spent less than 2.7% of their time engaged in moderate-to-vigorous activities. Those older adults who instead sat more hours each day performed better on knowledge-based activities, like vocabulary tests or reading comprehension. These "crystallized" abilities tend to strengthen with age as adults acquire more knowledge and experience.

Interestingly, the researchers observed no associations between light physical activities -- such as doing laundry, cooking, or other household chores -- and cognition. Although replacing sedentariness with light physical activity has been recommended for better metabolic health, there is no evidence of such a relationship at the cognitive level.

While the results are purely correlations and have no clear causes, the researchers speculate that when people are sedentary, they're likely to be engaging in educational, stimulating activities, like reading, playing games or puzzles, or attending plays, which might serve to boost crystallized cognition.

"There's this big push within health and wellness that sitting is always bad for your body, that being a couch potato is not good," Burzynska said, "and although our earlier studies indicated that the brains of those who spend more time sitting may age faster, it seems that on the cognitive level, sitting time may also be meaningful."

WAYS TO SPEND OUR SITTING TIME

However, future studies are needed to determine how exactly the participants spent their time sitting before any definitive conclusions can be made about sedentary activity and cognitive health.

Burzynska says the study reinforces the recommendation that regular exercise is good for general health, but for those older adults who might not be able to be physically active, engaging in more cognitively demanding activities may also be an option.

"I don't think I would in any way suggest that we should engage in more sitting, but I think trying to be as physically active as possible and making sure that you get stimulated in your sedentary time -- that it's not just spent staring at the TV -- that this combination might be the best way to take care of your brain," she said. "I hope it sends some positive message for those of us who have had limited opportunities to exercise during the pandemic."

In the quest for long-term brain health, it seems balance is the answer.

"When you exercise, enjoy your exercise. Maybe sometimes think, 'Yeah I'm going to go sit now and enjoy a really good book," Burzynska added.

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The Department of Human Development and Family Studies is part of CSU's College of Health and Human Sciences. Burzynska is also an affiliate faculty member in the Columbine Health Systems Center for Healthy Aging at CSU.

 

The future of krill

Experts recommend new management strategies to protect ecologically important krill in the Southern Ocean from overfishing

ALFRED WEGENER INSTITUTE, HELMHOLTZ CENTRE FOR POLAR AND MARINE RESEARCH

Research News

 

Krill is rapidly gaining popularity. The small shrimp-like organism from the Antarctic is used as fish food in aquaculture and increasingly in dietary supplements and healing ointments. Although the krill catch is regulated, caution is required to avoid endangering the population itself and the species that depend on it, warns a group of krill experts headed by Prof. Dr. Bettina Meyer from the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) in the journal Communications Earth & Environment - Nature.

Antarctic Krill, Euphausia superba, is a five-centimetre-long, reddish, shrimp-like animal which at first glance, may not appear as an impressive inhabitant of the Southern Ocean. But krill make up for their small individual sizes with the sheer number of their entire population. There is an estimated 300-500 billion Mt of krill in the Southern Ocean comprised of some hundreds of trillions of individuals. This massive biomass makes krill a key component of the local ecosystem. It is the main food source for many predators from fish, penguins and seabirds to seals and whales.

Humans have also developed an interest in krill over the past decades. Norway, along with Korea, China, Chile, the Ukraine and Japan trawl for krill in the Southern Ocean. But the fishing industry has become more efficient at catching krill using not only traditional fishing nets, but new continuous pumping systems. The demand for krill will likely increase, driven by at least two industries. First the increasing production of carnivorous fish through aquaculture, such as salmon, and the subsequent increase in demand for fish meals and marine byproducts. Second, the increasing demand for high value pharma- and nutraceutical products from krill oil and krill meals, such as wound ointment and krill oil capsules for human use and pet food.

The krill fishery is managed by the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR), which was founded in 1982. This body uses surveys and model calculations to determine how much krill may be caught and where it may be caught. The Atlantic sector of the Southern Ocean has the highest concentration of both krill stocks and fishing fleets. This region alone has a maximum allowable catch of 620,000 tons per year distributed over different fishing areas.

This is only a fraction of krill that are estimated to live in the ocean around Antarctica. CCAMLR had long assumed that the established catch limits would not cause serious damage, but krill experts like Bettina Meyer now see things differently. "The problem is that the catch regulations have, so far, been aimed primarily at protecting the krill eaters," explains the researcher. "Too little attention, has been paid to possible risks for the krill stocks themselves.

This is due to the fact that relatively little is still known about some aspects of the biology of these small crustaceans." Financed by the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL), Bettina Meyer, her colleague Dr. Ryan Driscoll and her research group are trying to shed more light on this issue. In a new publication, krill experts from around the globe summarize why there are several reasons to worry about the future of this key species.

In brief, krill abundances in some regions fluctuate greatly from year to year. However, the causes of these fluctuations are not yet clear and the current management of krill does not adjust the catch accordingly. Furthermore, it is likely that only a small part of the population, limited to a relatively small area, provide the offspring for the entire Atlantic part of the Southern Ocean. Finally, little is known about where the new generation migrate to in their first year. This means that it is possible that the most important parts of the population, the future parents and their offspring, will be overfished.

In 2019 CCAMLR decided to develop a new krill management system to address these issues. The committee is advised by the "Krill Action Group" under the umbrella of the Scientific Committee of Antarctic Research (SCAR), which was founded in 2018. It currently consists of 46 international members, half of which are established and half early career scientist. "Our goal is to provide CCAMLR with the latest knowledge on the size, distribution and dynamics of krill stocks." explains Bettina Meyer, who heads this expert group.

The future of krill management will require answering lingering question in key areas of krill biology. For example, understanding how krill populations in different regions are connected and how adults and juveniles differ in their location and movement. Also unknown are the environmental conditions responsible for determining good or bad krill years. The Atlantic sector of the Southern Ocean is warming rapidly and so understanding how krill will adapt to climate change is crucial. As for the latter, "CCAMLR's previous models do not take this plasticity into account," explains Bettina Meyer, "But we need to know more about this if we are to be able to predict future changes in the ecosystem."

Bettina Meyer and her colleagues have some concrete ideas about how the missing data can be collected. Since space and availability for scientific expeditions aboard research ships are limited, scientists could rely on the support of the fishing fleets. Together, these fishing vessels have the potential to collect a substantial amount of krill data which can help close critical knowledge gaps.

In addition, new technology may help scientists advance their understanding of krill stocks and their distribution. For example, autonomous underwater gliders, which look like mini gliders with a wingspan of about 1.50 metres, can be equipped with cameras, sensors, and echosounders to search for krill. They can roam the ocean from the surface down to 1000 metres for several months, collecting data on the density and distribution of krill.

Another promising technology are advanced moorings, equipped with arrays of sensors to measure water properties and krill density. These stationary devices can provide important information almost year-round in areas critical to the management of the krill fishery. Even krill predators, the whales, seals or penguins, can be recruited to help using attached camera systems and probes equipped with GPS.

"All of this can provide us with valuable new information for better krill management," says Bettina Meyer who is convinced by this approach. But in order to cover large areas of the Southern Ocean it is important to coordinate these research efforts internationally: "As a lone warrior, nobody can answer the complex questions of krill research."

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Original publication:

Bettina Meyer et al.: „ Successful ecosystem-based management of Antarctic krill should address uncertainties in krill recruitment, behaviour and ecological adaptation". Communications Earth & Environment - Nature, DOI 10.1038/s43247-020-00026-1

World's greatest mass extinction triggered switch to warm-bloodedness

UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL

Research News

IMAGE: THE ORIGIN OF ENDOTHERMY IN SYNAPSIDS, INCLUDING THE ANCESTORS OF MAMMALS. THE DIAGRAM SHOWS THE EVOLUTION OF MAIN GROUPS THROUGH THE TRIASSIC, AND THE SCALE FROM BLUE TO RED IS... view more 

CREDIT: CREDIT: MIKE BENTON, UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL. ANIMAL IMAGES ARE BY NOBU TAMURA, WIKIMEDIA.

Mammals and birds today are warm-blooded, and this is often taken as the reason for their great success.

University of Bristol palaeontologist Professor Mike Benton, identifies in the journal Gondwana Research that the ancestors of both mammals and birds became warm-blooded at the same time, some 250 million years ago, in the time when life was recovering from the greatest mass extinction of all time.

The Permian-Triassic mass extinction killed as much as 95 per cent of life, and the very few survivors faced a turbulent world, repeatedly hit by global warming and ocean acidification crises. Two main groups of tetrapods survived, the synapsids and archosaurs, including ancestors of mammals and birds respectively.

Palaeontologists had identified indications of warm-bloodedness, or technically endothermy, in these Triassic survivors, including evidence for a diaphragm and possible whiskers in the synapsids.

More recently, similar evidence for early origin of feathers in dinosaur and bird ancestors has come to light. In both synapsids and archosaurs of the Triassic, the bone structure shows characteristics of warm-bloodedness. The evidence that mammal ancestors had hair from the beginning of the Triassic has been suspected for a long time, but the suggestion that archosaurs had feathers from 250 million years ago is new.

But a strong hint for this sudden origin of warm-bloodedness in both synapsids and archosaurs at exactly the time of the Permian-Triassic mass extinction was found in 2009. Tai Kubo, then a student studying the Masters in Palaeobiology degree at Bristol and Professor Benton identified that all medium-sized and large tetrapods switched from sprawling to erect posture right at the Permian-Triassic boundary.

Their study was based on fossilised footprints. They looked at a sample of hundreds of fossil trackways, and Kubo and Benton were surprised to see the posture shift happened instantly, not strung out over tens of millions of years, as had been suggested. It also happened in all groups, not just the mammal ancestors or bird ancestors.

Professor Benton said: "Modern amphibians and reptiles are sprawlers, holding their limbs partly sideways.

"Birds and mammals have erect postures, with the limbs immediately below their bodies. This allows them to run faster, and especially further. There are great advantages in erect posture and warm-bloodedness, but the cost is that endotherms have to eat much more than cold-blooded animals just to fuel their inner temperature control."

The evidence from posture change and from early origin of hair and feathers, all happening at the same time, suggested this was the beginning of a kind of 'arms race'. In ecology, arms races occur when predators and prey have to compete with each other, and where there may be an escalation of adaptations. The lion evolves to run faster, but the wildebeest also evolves to run faster or twist and turn to escape.

Something like this happened in the Triassic, from 250 to 200 million years ago. Today, warm-blooded animals can live all over the Earth, even in cold areas, and they remain active at night. They also show intensive parental care, feeding their babies and teaching them complex and smart behaviour. These adaptations gave birds and mammals the edge over amphibians and reptiles and in the present cool world allowed them to dominate in more parts of the world.

Professor Benton added: "The Triassic was a remarkable time in the history of life on Earth. You see birds and mammals everywhere on land today, whereas amphibians and reptiles are often quite hidden.

"This revolution in ecosystems was triggered by the independent origins of endothermy in birds and mammals, but until recently we didn't realise that these two events might have been coordinated.

"That happened because only a tiny number of species survived the Permian-Triassic mass extinction - who survived depended on intense competition in a tough world. Because a few of the survivors were already endothermic in a primitive way, all the others had to become endothermic to survive in the new fast-paced world."

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Paper:

'The origin of endothermy in synapsids and archosaurs and arms races in the Triassic' by M. J. Benton in Gondwana Research

 

Energy System 2050: solutions for the energy transition

Research initiative of the Helmholtz Association presents strategies, technologies, and open-source tools

KARLSRUHER INSTITUT FÜR TECHNOLOGIE (KIT)

Research News

 

IMAGE: ENERGY SYSTEM 2050 " IS AN INITIATIVE OF THE RESEARCH FIELD ENERGY OF THE HELMHOLTZ ASSOCIATION AIMED AT DEVELOPING TANGIBLE AND USABLE FINDINGS AND TECHNICAL SOLUTIONS. view more 

CREDIT: PASCAL ARMBRUSTER, KIT

To contribute to global climate protection, Germany has to rapidly and comprehensively minimize the use of fossil energy sources and to transform the energy system accordingly. The Helmholtz Association's research initiative "Energy System 2050" has studied how and by which means this can be achieved. One of the partners is Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). At the final conference in Berlin, scientists of the participating research centers presented their results.

Having decided to achieve climate neutrality by 2050, Germany as an industrialized country is facing a tremendous challenge: Organizing a comprehensive and sustainable transformation of the energy system while ensuring stable energy supply for our everyday life, for industry, and for the operation of central communication and transport infrastructures. Within the framework of the research initiative "Energy System 2050" (ES2050), scientists of the Helmholtz Association have developed concrete strategies and technical approaches to both improving climate protection and enhancing supply security. These have already been picked up by politics and industry.

"Climate-friendly transformation of the energy system requires adequate technologies and clear systemic solutions. Within 'Energy System 2050,' we have not only succeeded in developing them. We have also tested them in real operation and elaborated flexible strategies for their use," says Professor Holger Hanselka, coordinator of the research initiative, Research Field Coordinator Energy of the Helmholtz Association, and President of KIT. "Our research initiative pools the competencies of eight research centers to make the energy transition a success."

Professor Otmar D. Wiestler, President of the Helmholtz Association, says: "Local, national, and international energy systems have to be switched to renewable energy sources as quickly as possible. This not only is an important step to cope with climate change and increasing degradation of the environment. With the help of regenerative energy systems, we can also produce energy at low costs without being dependent on imports. The 'Energy System 2050' initiative clearly shows which fundamental contributions can be made by the Helmholtz Association in line with its mission to conduct cutting-edge research for solving grand challenges facing society."

Strategies, Technologies, and Open-source Tools for the Energy Transition

The research initiative was launched in 2015 to make a relevant and forward-looking contribution to the transformation of the energy system. 170 scientists conducted research in teams that focused on a piece of the energy transition puzzle each. Based on a systemic analysis of the German energy supply system, they developed economically efficient and climate-friendly transformation paths until 2050. This work was complemented by research into the architecture and security of the future power grid and integration of hydrogen and biogenic energy sources in the energy system. Moreover, power grid components, such as redox flow storage systems, biogas facilities, or gas turbines for the reconversion of synthesis gas and biogas were subjects of studies. Researchers tested the technologies in detail and systemically analyzed their interaction. As a result, the best "team players" for sector coupling were found, including technologies to combine heat and power supply. In addition, lifecycle-oriented sustainability analyses were made. Apart from costs and CO2 emissions, such analyses consider other ecological and social factors when producing fuel from biogenic residues, for instance.

To carry out dynamic experiments on the system level, the researchers of ES2050 established a large-scale network of research infrastructures, including the Energy Lab 2.0 on the campus of KIT and the Living Lab Energy Campus of Forschungszentrum Jülich (FZJ). These detailed models of the energy system have meanwhile been equipped with own grid infrastructures and power-to-x facilities, residential buildings, and transport system components. The physical models are closely interlinked with virtual structures for the smart extension of the energy system. With the help of "digital twins," it is possible to integrate system components in experiments, although they do not yet exist - for instance, the future hydrogen infrastructure. The research initiative understands its modeling tools, datasets, and benchmarks as parts of an open ecosystem and makes them available as open sources. This "toolkit for the energy transition" is used by large transmission grid operators already.

Sustainable Contribution to the Energy Transition

It is still a long way to go to climate neutrality in the energy sector, but change has started: In 2019, for instance, the share of renewable energy sources in gross power consumption was 42.1 percent, in the year before 37.8 percent, according to the Federal Environment Agency. The results of the research initiative "Energy System 2050" can enhance this dynamic trend and extend it to cover the housing, transport, and industry sectors. The research initiative "Energy System 2050" was launched by the research field Energy of the Helmholtz Association. The partners are the KIT, the German Aerospace Center (DLR), Forschungszentrum Jülich (FZJ), the Helmholtz Centre Potsdam (GFZ), the Helmholtz Centre Berlin (HZB), the Helmholtz Centre Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR), the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (IPP - associated), and the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ).

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More Information:
https://www.helmholtz.de/en/research/energy/energy_system_2050/

More about the KIT Energy Center:
http://www.energy.kit.edu

Press contact:
Dr. Martin Heidelberger
Press Officer
Phone: +49 721 608-41169
Email: martin.heidelberger@kit.edu

Being "The Research University in the Helmholtz Association", KIT creates and imparts knowledge for the society and the environment. It is the objective to make significant contributions to the global challenges in the fields of energy, mobility, and information. For this, about 9,300 employees cooperate in a broad range of disciplines in natural sciences, engineering sciences, economics, and the humanities and social sciences. KIT prepares its 24,400 students for responsible tasks in society, industry, and science by offering research-based study programs. Innovation efforts at KIT build a bridge between important scientific findings and their application for the benefit of society, economic prosperity, and the preservation of our natural basis of life. KIT is one of the German universities of excellence.