Mark Carney says climate work precludes running in fall election

Joan Bryden
The Canadian PressStaff

Tuesday, July 20, 2021 

OTTAWA -- Mark Carney won't be on the Liberal ticket if there's an election this fall.

The former governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England told The Canadian Press he's made commitments to help in the global fight against climate change and he can't walk away from them just a few months before a crucial United Nations conference.

“I thought long and hard on this because I believe strongly in public service and in the government's agenda, which I fully support,” Carney said in an interview Tuesday.


Related Stories
Mark Carney would add 'credibility' to Liberals in next federal election: Nanos
McKenna not running in next election, cites desire to spend time with kids, fight climate change
Liberal convention a political coming-out party for ex-central banker Mark Carney

“In the end, despite the temptation to running and the wrestling with it, a commitment's a commitment.”

Carney is the UN special envoy on climate action and finance and also chairs the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero, which aims to bring together banks and asset management firms worldwide to accelerate the transition to an economy based on net-zero carbon emissions.

His work will be crucial to the success of the UN climate conference, known as COP26, which is scheduled to run from Oct. 31 to Nov. 12 in Glasgow.

“It's a critical time in the COP26 process. I made commitments to the (UN) secretary-general and the U.K. prime minister to organize the private sector for net zero, for a net-zero economy and we have tremendous momentum and I don't want to break that momentum,” Carney said.

“I think this is the best contribution I can make right now for Canada, arguably the world, but also for Canada because this matters. This matters hugely to us and this is something I can do, I'm in the middle of and I need to see it through.”

Carney did not rule out running for the Liberals at another time.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is widely expected to call an election for this fall. If he does, Carney said he wanted to put an end to rampant speculation that he would run in a riding in Ottawa, where he lives.

Infrastructure Minister Catherine McKenna announced last month she would not seek re-election in Ottawa Centre. Her surprise decision opened up some prime political real estate that could have become a launching pad for Carney.

There had also been speculation that Ottawa South MP David McGuinty or Kanata-Carleton MP Karen McCrimmon might step aside to open up their Liberal ridings for Carney.

Carney promised in April, during his political debut at the Liberal party's virtual convention, to do whatever he can to support the party.

His name has been bandied about as a potential Liberal leader for at least 10 years.

While he was still Bank of Canada governor in 2012, Carney quietly flirted with the idea of a leadership run, courted by Liberals desperately searching for a new saviour after the 2011 election flame-out.

But amid criticism that even the smallest whiff of partisanship was undermining the independence crucial to a central banker, Carney eventually squelched the speculation by saying he'd just as soon become a “circus clown.” He left Canada shortly thereafter to take over the helm of the Bank of England.

He returned to Canada last summer and earlier this year released a book promoting his vision for a new kind of capitalism that combines the pursuit of profit with social purpose.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 20, 2021.

RELATED IMAGES


In this file photo dated Monday, Dec. 16, 2019, Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England speaks at a Bank of England Financial Stability Report Press Conference, in London. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth, FILE)

Mind and matter: Modeling the human brain with machine learning

Researchers from Japan construct a human brain model using a machine learning-based optimization of required user information

SHIBAURA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

 VIDEO: MODELING THE HUMAN BRAIN WITH MACHINE LEARNING view more 

CREDIT: SHIBAURA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

We all like to think that we know ourselves best, but, given that our brain activity is largely governed by our subconscious mind, it is probably our brain that knows us better! While this is only a hypothesis, researchers from Japan have already proposed a content recommendation system that assumes this to be true. Essentially, such a system makes use of its user's brain signals (acquired using, say, an MRI scan) when exposed to a particular content and eventually, by exploring various users and contents, builds up a general model of brain activity.

"Once we obtain the 'ultimate' brain model, we should be able to perfectly estimate the brain activity of a person exposed to a specific content," says Prof. Ryoichi Shinkuma from Shibaura Institute of Technology, Japan, who was a part of the team that came up with the idea. "This could provide powerful solutions in the commercial field, such as reduce the costs of targeted advertising."

However, a major drawback presents itself at the outset: acquiring MRI scans is expensive. A typical brain scan would involve deployment and maintenance costs of an MRI, the labor costs of specialists, and the recruitment costs of a large number of participants. Faced with this challenge, Prof. Shinkuma and his team has come up with an ingenious solution: using profile information of people to infer their brain model.

CAPTION

A team of researchers from Japan proposes a machine learning model for inferring a user's brain model from their profile with high accuracy while optimizing the required information content using a feature selection method.

CREDIT

Pixabay

In a new study published in the IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics: Systems, the team proposes a scheme that attempts to mitigate the trade-off between the performance associated with inferring the brain model from profile information and the cost of acquiring that information. "Our scheme utilizes machine learning (ML) to create a brain model based on inference of profile model," explains Prof. Shinkuma. "To reduce the cost of information collection, we make use of the feature selection capability of ML to narrow down the number of questionnaire items by estimating the extent to which each item contributes to the inference performance."

Specifically, the feature selection process quantified the contribution of a questionnaire item by attributing to it an "importance score" and then retained only those with top importance scores for the inference. This allowed the team to maintain a high inference performance while limiting the information cost at the same time.

To validate the effectiveness of their scheme, the team evaluated its performance accuracy using a brain model obtained experimentally and a profile model based on real profile information. They found that the scheme achieved nearly the same level of inference accuracy of the brain model as the case employing 209 questionnaires by using only 15-20 topmost items. This suggested that only the top 10% questionnaire items were enough for inferring the brain model.

"An important next step will be to determine the best combination of ML and feature selection method for optimizing the performance of our scheme," says an excited Prof. Shinkuma, contemplating future research directions of their work. "At the same time, we will need to reduce the total computation cost for real-world applications involving large number of users."

Looks like, in a not too distant future, our knowledge of who we are might come from the outside!

###

Reference

Title of original paper: Reduction of information collection cost for inferring brain model relations from profile information using machine learning

Journal: IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics: Systems

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1109/TSMC.2021.3074069

About Shibaura Institute of Technology (SIT), Japan

Shibaura Institute of Technology (SIT) is a private university with campuses in Tokyo and Saitama. Since the establishment of its predecessor, Tokyo Higher School of Industry and Commerce, in 1927, it has maintained "learning through practice" as its philosophy in the education of engineers. SIT was the only private science and engineering university selected for the Top Global University Project sponsored by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and will receive support from the ministry for 10 years starting from the 2014 academic year. Its motto, "Nurturing engineers who learn from society and contribute to society," reflects its mission of fostering scientists and engineers who can contribute to the sustainable growth of the world by exposing their over 8,000 students to culturally diverse environments, where they learn to cope, collaborate, and relate with fellow students from around the world.

Website: https://www.shibaura-it.ac.jp/en/

About Professor Ryoichi Shinkuma from SIT, Japan

Ryoichi Shinkuma is a professor at the Faculty of Engineering, Shibaura Institute of Technology, Japan, since 2021. He received his Ph.D. degree in communications from Osaka University, Japan, in 2003 and worked at Kyoto University as an assistant professor from 2003 to 2011 and as an associate professor from 2011 to 2021. His main research interest is cooperation in heterogeneous networks. He has published over 140 journal and conference articles and has been cited multiple times; he is also a recipient of several awards related to his work.

 

75% of sexual assault survivors have PTSD one month later

Researchers' meta-analysis yields timeline showing symptoms frequently diminish within three months, offering hope to survivors.

UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON SCHOOL OF MEDICINE/UW MEDICINE

Research News

Researchers want sexual assault survivors to know that it's normal to feel awful right after the assault, but that many will feel better within three months.

In a meta-analysis published in Trauma, Violence & Abuse, researchers found that 81% of sexual assault survivors had significant symptoms of post-traumatic stress (PTSD) one week after the assault. One month afterward - the first point in time that PTSD can be diagnosed - 75% of sexual assault survivors met criteria for the disorder. That figure dropped to 54% after three months and 41% after one year.

"One of the main takeaways is that the majority of recovery from post-traumatic stress happens in first three months," said lead author Emily Dworkin, assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the University of Washington School of Medicine. "We hope this will give survivors and clinicians a sense of what to expect and convey some hope."

The authors said this was the first meta-analysis of survivors' PTSD symptoms in the first year after a sexual assault. Their research underscored prior findings that PTSD is common and severe in the aftermath of sexual assault, and offered more details on the timeline for recovery.

The authors analyzed 22 studies that had assessed PTSD in sexual assault survivors over time, beginning soon after the traumatic event. The studies cumulatively involved 2,106 sexual assault survivors.

PTSD is characterized by symptoms such as reliving a traumatic event in nightmares, intrusive thoughts, or flashbacks; avoiding being reminded of the event; increases in negative emotions and decreases in positive emotions; self-blame; and feeling "keyed up" or on edge, Dworkin said.

A number of proven interventions, such as Prolonged Exposure Therapy and Cognitive Processing Therapy, help people recover from sexual assault and other traumas. Dworkin said it's important for people to seek help if PTSD symptoms interfere with their functioning, no matter how much time has passed since the traumatic event.

Dworkin and Michele Bedard-Gilligan, a co-author on this study, are currently testing ways to speed the recovery process for recent survivors. One is a smartphone app that teaches evidence-based coping skills. Survivors of recent sexual assault can learn more about this and other studies by visiting thriveappstudy.com.

###

Co-authors included Bedard-Gilligan, a UW assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences; Anna Jaffe, director of the Translational Health Risks and Interpersonal Violence Lab at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln; and Skye Fitzpatrick, an assistant professor of psychology at York University and part of the Treating and Understanding Life-threatening Behavior and Post-Traumatic Stress Lab.

 

COVID-19 shutdowns reveal racial disparities in exposure to air pollution

Disenfranchised, minority neighborhoods still exposed to disproportionately high levels of health harming nitrogen dioxide

GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

IMAGE: A NEW GW STUDY OF COVID-19 SHUTDOWNS IN THE UNITED STATES REVEALS PRONOUNCED DISPARITIES IN AIR POLLUTION -- WITH DISENFRANCHISED, MINORITY NEIGHBORHOODS STILL EXPERIENCING MORE EXPOSURE TO A HARMFUL AIR... view more 

CREDIT: GW

WASHINGTON (July 20, 2021)--A new study of COVID-19 shutdowns in the United States reveals pronounced disparities in air pollution -- with disenfranchised, minority neighborhoods still experiencing more exposure to a harmful air pollutant compared to wealthier, white communities. This first-of-a-kind study published today by researchers at the George Washington University looks at how air pollution changed after schools and businesses shut down in March 2020 in attempts to curb the spread of COVID-19.

"New York and other major urban areas had cleaner air as many commuters and others stayed off the roads," Gaige Kerr, the lead researcher on the study and a research scientist at the GW Milken Institute School of Public Health, said. "At the same time, our study shows that an air pollutant called nitrogen dioxide was still disproportionately higher in marginalized, mostly Latino and Black neighborhoods."

Nitrogen dioxide is formed when fossil fuels such as coal, oil, gas or diesel are burned at high temperatures. Cars, trucks and buses are the largest source of nitrogen dioxide emissions in urban areas followed by stationary sources, including power plants and factories.

With support from NASA, the researchers used data from a recently launched satellite orbiting the earth called the TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument, along with ground measurements of pollution, to estimate nitrogen dioxide levels both before and after COVID-19 shutdowns. This method allowed the researchers to zoom in and compare one neighborhood's pollution level to another in urban areas throughout the U.S. They then used demographic data to compare how nitrogen dioxide levels changed for different population sub-groups.

While previous studies have documented the inequity in air pollution exposure using models or spatially limited networks of ground monitors, this study relied on both observational and spatially complete satellite data to reveal how these inequities persisted during the unparalleled changes in human activity during COVID-19, the authors said.

The team found that changes in human activity during the COVID-19 pandemic, largely less passenger vehicle traffic, resulted in lower nitrogen dioxide levels among the vast majority of urban areas.

Yet even that sharp decrease was not large enough to eliminate the racial, ethnic and socioeconomic disparities in exposure to this traffic-related pollutant. Marginalized, minority communities still experienced nitrogen dioxide levels during the shutdowns that, in some cities, were 50% higher than pre-pandemic levels in the nearby highest income and mostly white communities, Kerr said.

The researchers linked the biggest drops in nitrogen dioxide pollution during COVID-19 shutdowns to a community's proximity to highways and interstates. Kerr says that marginalized urban areas are also more likely to be located near interstates, where traffic is responsible for a large portion of urban nitrogen dioxide pollution and other forms of pollution.

For example, in New York, the largest reductions in nitrogen dioxide were found near the convergence of the George Washington Bridge and Major Deegan Expressway, an area that also has a heavy concentration of industries. The largest drops in Atlanta were located in the southwest part of the city near the airport and several major roadways. In Detroit, the biggest reduction in nitrogen dioxide occurred on the west shores of the Detroit River, where several interstates and the Ambassador Bridge, a busy U.S.-Canadian border crossing, come together. While passenger vehicle traffic dropped on these highways, heavy-duty trucking was less affected by the pandemic, and, along with other emission sources, continued contributing to high pollution levels in nearby communities.

Previous research by the senior author of the paper, Susan C. Anenberg, an associate professor of environmental and occupational health at GW, shows that nitrogen dioxide triggers millions of serious asthma attacks worldwide and may cause children to develop asthma for the first time.

Other evidence indicates that exposure to air pollution, including nitrogen dioxide, may increase the likelihood of people getting very sick or dying from COVID-19. Researchers also know that COVID-19 disproportionately strikes minority communities.

"With new satellite data, we can actually observe how pollution levels differ between neighborhoods within cities and track changes over time," Anenberg said. "Our research shows how individual behavior change won't solve environmental injustice. We need long-term policy solutions to reduce emissions and help keep people healthy, especially those living in disadvantaged neighborhoods."

Policies aimed at reducing traffic related emissions -- such as public transportation and widespread use of electric cars -- may not be enough to reduce the nitrogen dioxide pollution in disenfranchised, minority neighborhoods, the authors note. Policymakers who want to reduce the disparities in air pollution across demographic subgroups should also target other sources of pollution that are found in disadvantaged neighborhoods, such as heavy-duty trucking.

"This study shows that an unparalleled pandemic and an unprecedented drop in emissions were not large enough to clean the air for poor, minority neighborhoods," Kerr said. "Urgent action is need to reduce or eliminate these disparities, protect public health, and advance environmental justice."

###

The study, "COVID-19 Pandemic Reveals Persistent Disparities in Nitrogen Dioxide Pollution," was published online July, 20, 2021 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. In addition to Kerr and Anenberg, the research team included Daniel L. Goldberg, an air quality scientist also at GW.

PRIVATIZED MEDICINE USA

Patients billed up to $219 million in total for preventive services that should be free

Experts say these unexpected healthcare costs may discourage people from seeking recommended preventive care

BOSTON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE

Research News

Experts say these unexpected healthcare costs may discourage people from seeking recommended preventive care.

Despite a sharp reduction in out-of-pocket (OOP) costs for preventive care since the Affordable Care Act was enacted in 2010, patients are still receiving unexpected bills for preventive services that should be free, according to a new study co-authored by a Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH) researcher.

Published in the journal Preventive Medicine, study found that total out-of-pocket costs billed for preventive services to Americans with employer-sponsored insurance (ESI) in 2018 ranged from $75.6 million to $219 million, with 1 in 4 patients who used preventive care incurring these charges.

"The ACA enabled great strides in making preventive care free to patients, but the job is not done," says Dr. Paul Shafer, senior author of the study and an assistant professor of health law, policy & management at BUSPH. "As with any benefit that has to be implemented by thousands of different health insurance plans that are subject to the ACA, it won't always be perfect. We found that a majority of patients are receiving preventive care for free and those who were charged only paid about $20 or less. This is great news in light of the next legal attack on the ACA with Kelly v. Becerra, but too many people are still footing the bill for care that most likely should be covered by their insurance plan."

Shafer and study lead author Alexander Hoagland, PhD student in economics at Boston University College of Arts & Sciences, calculated these estimates by analyzing national health insurance claims data from 2018 for adults and children covered by ESI. To accommodate for variations in the way insurance plans cover preventive care, the researchers categorized preventive care ranging from "least restrictive" (including all preventive services) to "most restrictive" (including cheapest in-network claim for each type of preventive service during the year).

The researchers found that the likelihood of a patient being charged an OOP cost for any covered preventive service that they used ranged from 19.2 percent for the most restrictive measure, to 32.1 percent for the least restrictive, with a median cost of $20-$23 per person each year.

They also found that OOP charges varied widely depending on the type of preventive service patients received, as well as the patients' geographic location. Annual wellness visits accounted for a majority of the costs, at more than 35 percent. Unexpected charges were also common for routine screenings for cancer, diabetes, cholesterol, depression, obesity, and sexually transmitted infections as well as pregnancy-related services, with OOP costs for these services ranging from $3.63 to $293.28 per person.

The findings also revealed that patients in the South and rural areas were more likely to be billed for preventive services. On average, less than 10 percent of patients in Massachusetts and Colorado were charged for OOP costs, compared to more than 20 percent of patients in Mississippi and Alabama. Covered preventive care may also be more difficult to access in rural areas with fewer in-network providers.

This wide range of OOP costs may be driven by inadvertent errors and inconsistencies in coding by providers or practices, the researchers say. There are no federal standards for what combinations of diagnosis and procedure codes--these are filed in insurance claims by doctors for reimbursement--related to preventive services should be free so insurers set up their own guidelines, which creates unnecessary complexity.

These OOP charges for preventive care can cause direct and indirect effects that ultimately discourage patients from receiving recommended care, says Hoagland.

"The direct effect arises from patients who unexpectedly had to pay for a preventive service, and who are now less likely to return for repeated screenings," Hoagland says. "Indirectly, other potential patients who hear about these negative experiences may be less likely to seek out any screenings for fear of getting stuck with a bill."

Standardizing and simplifying how preventive care is delivered would solve a lot of problems, Shafer says.

"Instead of having insurer-specific coding criteria for wellness visits or to determine whether a particular screening is preventive or no, what if the first office visit or cancer screening was fully covered each year?" says Shafer. "That would be take a lot of the guesswork and frustration out of the equation for patients. If that is a step too far, we could at least standardize the coding criteria across insurers so that patients aren't left footing the bill when the practice gets it wrong."

###

About Boston University School of Public Health

Founded in 1976, the Boston University School of Public Health is one of the top five ranked private schools of public health in the world. It offers master's- and doctoral-level education in public health. The faculty in six departments conduct policy-changing public health research around the world, with the mission of improving the health of populations--especially the disadvantaged, underserved, and vulnerable--locally and globally.

Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accur

 

Research shows employer-based weight management program with access to anti-obesity medications results in greater weight loss

Clinical trial was conducted in the real-world setting of a workplace health plan

CLEVELAND CLINIC

Research News

Tuesday, July 20, 2021, CLEVELAND: A Cleveland Clinic study demonstrates that adults with obesity lost significantly more weight when they had access to medications for chronic weight management in conjunction with their employer-based weight management program, compared to adults who did not have access to the medications. The study was published in JAMA Network Open.

Obesity is a complex disease that is caused by multiple factors, including genetic, environmental, and biological. A lifestyle intervention with a focus on nutrition and exercise is often not enough to treat obesity, which is a chronic disease that requires long-term therapy. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved several prescription medications for weight loss and chronic weight management, also called anti-obesity medications. However, they have limited health insurance coverage.

"The research results support the need to treat patients with a multidisciplinary weight management program that incorporates safe and effective medications to lose weight and maintain weight loss," said Bartolome Burguera, M.D., Ph.D., chair of Cleveland Clinic's Endocrinology & Metabolism Institute and primary investigator of the study. "Doctors prescribe medications to treat some of the health consequences associated with obesity, such as hypertension and type 2 diabetes. However, medications for weight loss and chronic weight management are underutilized."

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that more than 42% of U.S. adults have obesity. In addition to the serious health conditions associated with obesity – such as type 2 diabetes, obstructive sleep apnea, high-blood pressure, heart disease and stroke – the CDC also reported the economic impact of obesity on the U.S. healthcare system. The estimated medical care costs of the disease in the United States represented $147 billion (in 2008 dollars).

The objective of this study was to determine the effect of combining anti-obesity medications with a multidisciplinary employer-based weight management program.

The one-year, single-center, pragmatic clinical trial was conducted in the real-world setting of a workplace health plan. The study included 200 adults with obesity (body mass index of 30 or greater) who were enrolled in the Cleveland Clinic Employee Health Plan between January 2019 and May 2020. As part of the health plan, participants had access to a comprehensive weight management program.

In this real-world setting, eligible participants were randomized 1:1 to either a weight management program with FDA-approved anti-obesity medications or a weight management program alone. The weight management program was administered through monthly shared medical appointments (SMAs) that offered a multidisciplinary approach, including nutrition education. The monthly SMA visits focused on adopting a healthier lifestyle and addressed the five components of the weight management program: nutrition, physical activity, appetite control, sleep, and mental health. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, some of the SMAs were conducted virtually.

The 100 study participants, randomized to the weight management program combined with access to the medications, received their prescriptions at the time of their monthly SMAs, based on recommended clinical practice.

Patients were prescribed one of five FDA-approved medications for chronic weight management - orlistat, lorcaserin, phentermine/topiramate, naltrexone/bupropion, liraglutide 3.0 mg. The medication selected for each patient was at the discretion of the treating provider, and was determined after a thorough assessment and discussion with the participants. (Lorcaserin was withdrawn from the market in February 2020. The eight patients taking lorcaserin at the time were notified immediately and either switched medications or discontinued medication due to proximity to the end of the study.)

Research results showed that the participants who had access to the anti-obesity medications averaged significantly greater weight loss at 12 months (-7.7%), compared to the participants who were in the weight management program alone (-4.2%). In the group who had access to the medications, 62.5% of the participants lost at least 5% of their weight, compared to 44.8% of the participants in the group with the weight management program alone. SMA attendance was higher among the participants who had access to the weight loss medications.

"Many patients see improvement in their health when they lose 5% of their weight," said Kevin M. Pantalone, D.O., first author of the study and an endocrinologist at Cleveland Clinic. "Based on our study results, access to anti-obesity medications combined with a multidisciplinary weight management program provides a more effective treatment compared to a weight management program without access to these medications."

More long-term research is needed in real-world, employer-based settings to evaluate the costs and benefits of anti-obesity medications and their use in conjunction with workplace wellness plans.

###

This study was funded by Novo Nordisk. Representatives of Novo Nordisk (the sponsor) were involved in the design and conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis, and interpretation of the data; preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript. Dr. Burguera reported receiving consulting honorarium as a member of the U.S. National Expert Panel for the SELECT trial, a steering committee member for the study being reported, and research support from Novo Nordisk. Dr. Pantalone reported receiving consulting and speaking honorarium, as well as research support from Novo Nordisk, and currently serves as the principal investigator at Cleveland Clinic for the Novo Nordisk sponsored SOUL trial.

About Cleveland Clinic
Cleveland Clinic - now in its centennial year - is a nonprofit multispecialty academic medical center that integrates clinical and hospital care with research and education. Located in Cleveland, Ohio, it was founded in 1921 by four renowned physicians with a vision of providing outstanding patient care based upon the principles of cooperation, compassion and innovation. Cleveland Clinic has pioneered many medical breakthroughs, including coronary artery bypass surgery and the first face transplant in the United States. U.S. News & World Report consistently names Cleveland Clinic as one of the nation's best hospitals in its annual "America's Best Hospitals" survey. Among Cleveland Clinic's 70,800 employees worldwide are more than 4,660 salaried physicians and researchers, and 18,500 registered nurses and advanced practice providers, representing 140 medical specialties and subspecialties. Cleveland Clinic is a 6,500-bed health system that includes a 173-acre main campus near downtown Cleveland, 19 hospitals, more than 220 outpatient facilities, and locations in southeast Florida; Las Vegas, Nevada; Toronto, Canada; Abu Dhabi, UAE; and London, England. In 2020, there were 8.7 million total outpatient visits, 273,000 hospital admissions and observations, and 217,000 surgical cases throughout Cleveland Clinic's health system. Patients came for treatment from every state and 185 countries. Visit us at clevelandclinic.org. Follow us at twitter.com/ClevelandClinic. News and resources available at newsroom.clevelandclinic.org.

Editor's Note: Cleveland Clinic News Service is available to provide broadcast-quality interviews and B-roll upon request.

 

Is bacterial acidity a key to tackle antimicrobial resistance?

UNIVERSITY OF EXETER

Research News

 

Decreasing bacterial acidity could help reduce antimicrobial resistance by eliminating bacteria that can survive being treated with antibiotics.

Scientists at the University of Exeter have developed a novel method, which allows users to measure the pH of individual bacteria before, during and after treatment with antibiotics.

The research, published in the journal mBio, lays the foundation for understanding the special properties of bacteria that survive being treated with antibiotics, so that new ways of targeting them can be developed.

The Exeter University research team found that even before antibiotic treatment, common infection causing Escherichia coli cells that can survive treatment have a more acidic intracellular pH compared to clonal cells that are eliminated by the antibiotic treatment. These surviving cells are called persisters because they are responsible for persistent bacterial infections and contribute to antibiotic resistance.

Antibiotic resistance is one of the most pressing public health challenges and threatens the ability to effectively fight infectious diseases, with around 10 million people predicted to die annually of infections by 2050.

The University of Exeter research team has discovered the mechanisms that permit persisters to have an acidic pH. By measuring the genetic properties of these cells, they found that two cellular processes, namely tryptophan metabolism and carboxylic acid catabolism, are responsible for the low pH measured in persister bacteria.

Dr Stefano Pagliara, a biophysicist in the Living Systems Institute, leading this research at the University of Exeter, said: "Our findings indicate that the manipulation of the intracellular pH represents a bacterial strategy for surviving antibiotic treatment. Our new data suggest a strategy for developing antibiotics that interfere with key cellular components of persisters and decrease their acidity."

The team is now working on expanding this research to find out whether cell acidity is key for antibiotic resistance in other critical bacterial pathogens such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Burkholderia pseudomallei and to identify drug molecules that can alter the pH of persister cells before antibiotic treatment.

###

"Persister Escherichia coli Cells Have a Lower Intracellular pH than Susceptible Cells but Maintain Their pH in Response to Antibiotic Treatment" is published on Tuesday, July 20th 2021. The DOI is https://doi.org/10.1128/mBio.00909-21

The Living Systems Institute is the University of Exeter flagship for fundamental research. The Institute combines biological and physical sciences to make discoveries that will transform future healthcare Living Systems Institute | Living Systems Institute | University of Exeter.

 

Small-scale worker resistance impacts food delivery economy in China

CORNELL UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

ITHACA, N.Y. - Small-scale. Short-lived. All digital. Out of public view. That's how a new form of collective worker resistance is unfolding in China's app-based food delivery economy, new Cornell University research finds.

Though highly fragmented and not always successful, "mini-strikes" by small groups of food couriers - conducted via WeChat - reflect a new form of leverage, suggest Chuxuan "Victoria" Liu and Eli Friedman, associate professor in the ILR School.

Food couriers are able to maintain complete physical invisibility, and each individual worker can 'strike' from anywhere, they write.

The scholars interviewed couriers, in-person and online, who delivered food for Ele.me, an Alibaba-owned company that controlled nearly half the nation's food-delivery market.

Platform-based delivery work has grown exponentially over the past decade. In 2020, Ele.me and Meituan, a slightly larger competitor, together had more than 8 million registered food-delivery couriers, the result of rapid growth achieved in part through exploitative working conditions, according to the researchers.

Friedman said scholars have wondered whether high levels of worker dissatisfaction seen in manufacturing would appear in this new sector. Their research determined it has - if you know where to look.

In addition to crowd sourced freelance couriers who work individually, Ele.me relies on a network of subcontractors that operate "stations" within city districts to provide restaurants with more reliable delivery services.

Like the workers themselves, the app rewards or punishes stations financially based on metrics including numbers of deliveries, worker attendance, on-time performance and customer ratings. That pressure on stations creates bargaining power for couriers who may choose to stay offline during peak lunch and dinner times.

"Simply by refusing to login to the system," they wrote, "a handful of couriers can cause considerable damage to the station's statistics."

Significantly, the government is either unable to monitor such small-scale labor resistance or tolerates it, since it causes minimal social disruption and appears apolitical.

"We've seen in the last few years that any kind of collective, coordinated action in China - for all kinds of activists - is really dangerous," Friedman said. "This refines our understanding of the way public protest can work in light of that new, highly repressive environment, and the role digital media can play in fomenting that kind of action, even on a small scale."

Strikes by food couriers are distinctive for their very small numbers, short duration and concealed nature, the authors wrote, revealing "one of the ways that labor unrest has evolved alongside shifting political, economic and technological conditions."

###

The study "Resistance Under the Radar: Organization of Work and Collective Action in China's Food Delivery Industry," was published in the July issue of The China Journal.

For additional information, see this Cornell Chronicle story.

Philosophical Football Match MONTY PYTHON

The Philosophers' Football Match is a Monty Python sketch originally featured in the second Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus episode and later included in Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl (1982). The sketch depicted a football match in the Olympiastadion at the 1972 Munich Olympics, between philosophers representing Greece and Germany, including Plato, Socrates and Aristotle on the Greek team, and Heidegger, Marx and Nietzsche on the German team. Instead of playing, the philosophers competed by thinking while walking on the pitch in circles. This left Franz Beckenbauer, the sole genuine footballer on the pitch (and a "surprise inclusion" in the German team, according to the commentary), more than a little confused. Confucius was the referee and Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine (sporting haloes) were the linesmen. The German manager was Martin Luther.

 From Wikipedia

MAGICKAL THINKING

Can consciousness be explained by quantum physics? 

My research takes us a step closer to finding out

July 19, 2021 

Some scientists believe consciousness is generated by quantum processes, but the theory is yet to be empirically tested. vitstudio/Shutterstock


One of the most important open questions in science is how our consciousness is established. In the 1990s, long before winning the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics for his prediction of black holes, physicist Roger Penrose teamed up with anaesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff to propose an ambitious answer.

They claimed that the brain’s neuronal system forms an intricate network and that the consciousness this produces should obey the rules of quantum mechanics – the theory that determines how tiny particles like electrons move around. This, they argue, could explain the mysterious complexity of human consciousness.

Penrose and Hameroff were met with incredulity. Quantum mechanical laws are usually only found to apply at very low temperatures. Quantum computers, for example, currently operate at around -272°C. At higher temperatures, classical mechanics takes over. Since our body works at room temperature, you would expect it to be governed by the classical laws of physics. For this reason, the quantum consciousness theory has been dismissed outright by many scientists – though others are persuaded supporters.

Instead of entering into this debate, I decided to join forces with colleagues from China, led by Professor Xian-Min Jin at Shanghai Jiaotong University, to test some of the principles underpinning the quantum theory of consciousness.

In our new paper, we’ve investigated how quantum particles could move in a complex structure like the brain – but in a lab setting. If our findings can one day be compared with activity measured in the brain, we may come one step closer to validating or dismissing Penrose and Hameroff’s controversial theory.
Brains and fractals

Our brains are composed of cells called neurons, and their combined activity is believed to generate consciousness. Each neuron contains microtubules, which transport substances to different parts of the cell. The Penrose-Hameroff theory of quantum consciousness argues that microtubules are structured in a fractal pattern which would enable quantum processes to occur.

Fractals are structures that are neither two-dimensional nor three-dimensional, but are instead some fractional value in between. In mathematics, fractals emerge as beautiful patterns that repeat themselves infinitely, generating what is seemingly impossible: a structure that has a finite area, but an infinite perimeter.


Read more: Explainer: what are fractals?

This might sound impossible to visualise, but fractals actually occur frequently in nature. If you look closely at the florets of a cauliflower or the branches of a fern, you’ll see that they’re both made up of the same basic shape repeating itself over and over again, but at smaller and smaller scales. That’s a key characteristic of fractals.

The same happens if you look inside your own body: the structure of your lungs, for instance, is fractal, as are the blood vessels in your circulatory system. Fractals also feature in the enchanting repeating artworks of MC Escher and Jackson Pollock, and they’ve been used for decades in technology, such as in the design of antennas. These are all examples of classical fractals – fractals that abide by the laws of classical physics rather than quantum physics.

This extension of Escher’s Circle Limit III shows its fractal, repeating nature. Vladimir-Bulatov/Deviantart, CC BY-NC-SA

It’s easy to see why fractals have been used to explain the complexity of human consciousness. Because they’re infinitely intricate, allowing complexity to emerge from simple repeated patterns, they could be the structures that support the mysterious depths of our minds.

But if this is the case, it could only be happening on the quantum level, with tiny particles moving in fractal patterns within the brain’s neurons. That’s why Penrose and Hameroff’s proposal is called a theory of “quantum consciousness”.

Quantum consciousness

We’re not yet able to measure the behaviour of quantum fractals in the brain – if they exist at all. But advanced technology means we can now measure quantum fractals in the lab. In recent research involving a scanning tunnelling microscope (STM), my colleagues at Utrecht and I carefully arranged electrons in a fractal pattern, creating a quantum fractal.

When we then measured the wave function of the electrons, which describes their quantum state, we found that they too lived at the fractal dimension dictated by the physical pattern we’d made. In this case, the pattern we used on the quantum scale was the Sierpiński triangle, which is a shape that’s somewhere between one-dimensional and two-dimensional.

This was an exciting finding, but STM techniques cannot probe how quantum particles move – which would tell us more about how quantum processes might occur in the brain. So in our latest research, my colleagues at Shanghai Jiaotong University and I went one step further. Using state-of-the-art photonics experiments, we were able to reveal the quantum motion that takes place within fractals in unprecedented detail.

We achieved this by injecting photons (particles of light) into an artificial chip that was painstakingly engineered into a tiny Sierpiński triangle. We injected photons at the tip of the triangle and watched how they spread throughout its fractal structure in a process called quantum transport. We then repeated this experiment on two different fractal structures, both shaped as squares rather than triangles. And in each of these structures we conducted hundreds of experiments.  

We also conducted experiments on a square-shaped fractal called the Sierpiński carpet. Johannes Rössel/wikimedia

Our observations from these experiments reveal that quantum fractals actually behave in a different way to classical ones. Specifically, we found that the spread of light across a fractal is governed by different laws in the quantum case compared to the classical case.

This new knowledge of quantum fractals could provide the foundations for scientists to experimentally test the theory of quantum consciousness. If quantum measurements are one day taken from the human brain, they could be compared against our results to definitely decide whether consciousness is a classical or a quantum phenomenon.

Our work could also have profound implications across scientific fields. By investigating quantum transport in our artificially designed fractal structures, we may have taken the first tiny steps towards the unification of physics, mathematics and biology, which could greatly enrich our understanding of the world around us as well as the world that exists in our heads.

1. Cristiane de Morais Smith

   Professor, Theoretical Physics, Utrecht University

Disclosure statement

Cristiane de Morais Smith receives funding from NWO.

Partners

Utrecht University provides funding as a member of The Conversation UK.