Making bike-sharing work

Solving the "first-mile/last-mile" problem with a new optimization model

Peer-Reviewed Publication

NORWEGIAN UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

 

IMAGE: THERE'S PLENTY OF BIKES HERE FOR RIDERS, AND EVEN PLACES FOR PEOPLE TO RETURN BIKES. BUT WHAT'S THE BEST WAY TO JUGGLE THE BALANCE BETWEEN AVAILABLE BIKES AND AVAILABLE PARKING PLACES OVER THE COURSE OF A BUSY DAY? JENS GUNNAR H. ELLINGSEN, WHO WORKS FOR TRONDHEIM BYSYKKEL/UIP DRIFT, HAS TO THINK ABOUT THIS PROBLEM EVERY DAY AS HE SHIFTS BICYCLES AROUND THE CITY view more 

CREDIT: NANCY BAZILCHUK/NTNU

They’re everywhere, from Berlin to Beijing, brightly coloured bicycles you can borrow to move around the city without a car. These systems, along with e-scooters, offer people a quick and convenient way to travel around urban areas. And at a time when cities are scrambling to find ways to meet their climate goals, they’re a welcome tool for urban planners.

People want the bikes to be there when they want to use them, and they will only want to use the system if it’s a good service.

Making sure the bikes and e-scooters are on hand can be something of a challenge — but it’s also key to the success of the offer, says Steffen Bakker, a researcher at NTNU’s Department of Industrial Economic and Technology Management who studies ways to make transport greener and more efficient.

“If a system like this is going to be successful, then we need to have user satisfaction,” Bakker said. “People want the bikes to be there when they want to use them, and they will only want to use the system if it’s a good service.”

Bakker was a co-author on a recent paper that describes an optimization model to help cities and companies do a better job keeping their bike-sharing customers happy.

Like shooting a moving target

Consider the challenges of providing bikes or scooters where and when people will want them.

You don’t know when the customers will pick up the bikes and where they will put them.

Researchers describe the problem as being dynamic, because it is always changing, and stochastic, because it changes in random and often difficult-to-predict ways, Bakker said.

“Bike-sharing system users pick up bikes in one place, and they move it somewhere else. And then the state of the system changes because all of a sudden, the bikes are not where they started, which is the dynamic part,” he said. “But then on top of that, you don’t know when the customers will pick up the bikes and where they will put them.  That’s the stochastic part. So if you want to plan at the start of the day, you don’t know what is going to happen.”

Bakker and his colleagues can use the huge treasure trove of data collected by bikes and e-scooters when they are in use to make predictions. But there’s no guarantee that the way bikes were used last Tuesday, for example, will be the same the following Tuesday, he said.

“You have to adjust for things that occur during the day,” he said. “Maybe all of a sudden, there’s an event happening or the weather changes, and then people don’t use the service and the demand pattern changes, which impacts the planning.”

Putting the pieces together

What Bakker and his colleagues have developed is an optimization model that can give recommendations about what the service operators should do.

This includes what service vehicles should do at the station they’re currently at — whether they should drop off or pick up bikes, or swap out batteries for e-bikes and scooters — and where to go next. The underlying calculations are based on what has happened so far during the day, and what is expected to happen in the near future.

It’s very complex, because it’s a big system.

The group’s research is funded a part of a NOK 10 million project financed by the Research Council of Norway called the Future of Micro mobility (FOMO), with the company Urban Sharing AS as the lead business on the grant.

“Through Pilot-T, we plan to use existing city bike systems as test bases, and by developing new decision support tools, the aim is to increase the efficiency of the rebalancing teams by 30% and the lifetime of the bikes by 20%,” said Jasmina Vele, project manager at Urban Sharing. “This can be realized through better decisions related to rebalancing and preventive maintenance, and this will correspond to a large cost reduction in existing city bicycle systems.”

Moving bikes in the most efficient way

The process of collecting and moving bikes from one bike parking station to another is called “rebalancing.” Using the optimization model, which is still in its development phase, allows the drivers to be sent a new plan every time they arrive at a bicycle station.

“You don’t make just one plan at the start of the day, but what we do is we make a new plan every time a vehicle arrives at a bicycle station,” he said.  “And when the car arrives at the station we’ll tell them, ‘Okay, pick up this many bikes or drop off this many bikes’.”

But here’s where the tricky part comes in. It’s important not to be too myopic by just focusing on the current state of the system, Bakker says, especially if it’s expected that certain stations will have more demand within the next hour or so.

“It’s very complex, because it’s a big system,” he said.  “Maybe there’s going to be a lot of demand at the station in one hour. So you already want to bring some bicycles there. But at the same time, there may be stations now that are almost empty, and they need some bicycles. So you need to figure out this trade off.”

It’s also important to coordinate pickups and drop-offs between the different vehicles that are servicing the bike-sharing network, he said.

Digital twins and computational time

Bakker and his colleagues are working with NTNU’s Department of Computer Science to create a “digital twin”, or a computer simulation, of the systems they are modelling, so they can try out different approaches without actually having to test them in the real world.

Initial tests showed that the model the group generated can reduce the number of problems (meaning either not enough bikes where the user wants one, or too many bikes so the user can’t park the bike)  by 41 per cent compared to not doing any rebalancing at all.

Compared to the current rebalancing practices of Oslo City Bikes, which is also a collaborator in the NFR grant, the number of problems was reduced by 24 per cent.  Bakker says newer versions of the model show even more potential.

Simpler approaches possible too

Not surprisingly, the kinds of calculations needed to make the model work are complex,  and researchers need to fine-tune the different parameters affecting the performance of the model.

Bakker and his colleagues have also worked on one component of the optimization model called criticality scores, which is a little simpler and can be used independently of the larger optimization model.

A criticality score is basically a score given to different bike sharing parking areas based on the number of bikes it currently contains or needs. These scores are relatively simple to calculate and can be provided to drivers as they travel around the city to rebalance the number of bikes at each station.

“It’s a score that tells the driver which station is most critical to visit,” Bakker said. “If you can present that to the person driving the car and say these are the stations with the highest criticality score, we can provide something that is not the best, but it’s probably good, and much better than what bike-sharing companies do now.”

Urban Sharing’s Vele says using these kinds of optimization models can help make bike-sharing an important component in urban transport.

“Urban Sharing’s vision for future mobility is a transport system that is responsive and adaptive. By using data and machine learning/optimization algorithms, we can combine the best of both traditional and modern transport systems, and create a resource-efficient system that responds to demand and adapts to users’ individual needs,” she said.

Reference:
Marte D. Gleditsch, Kristine Hagen, Henrik Andersson, Steffen J. Bakker, Kjetil Fagerholt. A column generation heuristic for the dynamic bicycle rebalancing problem. European Journal of Operational Research. 2022, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejor.2022.07.004.

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JOURNAL

European Journal of Operational Research

DOI

10.1016/j.ejor.2022.07.004 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Computational simulation/modeling

ARTICLE TITLE

A column generation heuristic for the dynamic bicycle rebalancing problem

New report highlights opportunities for conservation of ladybirds globally

Experts reveal threats that these important insects face and make recommendations for their recovery

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UK CENTRE FOR ECOLOGY & HYDROLOGY

 

IMAGE: A 7-SPOT LADYBIRD TAKES SHELTER IN A GARDEN. view more 

CREDIT: DENISE PALLETT

A report into the global status of ladybirds reveals the threats they face and lays out a roadmap for conservation. These vital pest controllers for farmers and gardeners are considered to be in decline globally due to human activities, and species are poorly understood.  

The survey’s authors call for greater citizen science efforts to encourage more people to record ladybirds around the world. They also urge conservation efforts to protect habitats, in particular the sites that ladybirds rely on to survive the adverse conditions of winters.  

The research was compiled by an international group of experts, including ecologists at the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, the University of the Azores and Ghent University, as well as all members of the IUCN SSC Ladybird Specialist Group. It identifies gaps in knowledge about how ladybirds are responding to environmental changes affecting global biodiversity while suggesting actions to protect ladybirds and other insects.

The ladybird family – Coccinellidae – includes more than 6,000 species globally with 47 found in the UK. Many species of ladybird play an important role in protecting plants – including crops – from the ravages of pest insects including aphids. There is considerable concern that insects, including ladybirds, globally may be in decline, but information is lacking to assess the magnitude of the problems caused by threats such as changes in climate, land use and pollution, and invasive non-native species.

Dr António Onofre Soares, a lead author and a researcher at University of the Azores says: “This paper brings together a global community to consider the status of ladybirds and how they fit into the bigger insect picture around the world. We hope the result will be that ladybirds become a larger part of the conservation agenda by highlighting areas where there is a need for data and what can be done in terms of tangible actions.”

Dr Danny Haelewaters, a lead author and a researcher at Ghent University says: "Ladybirds have many functions within our ecosystems but at present suffer from a lack of global collaborative research. Alongside ecologists, the ladybird conservation community is still awaiting the first Red List assessments to help inform conservation strategies. I hope we can enthuse more researchers to become involved in studying ladybirds and assessing the ecological threats that impact their diversity and abundance.”

In recent years people have taken actions to manage their gardens to provide habitats for bees through bee homes and campaigns such as “no mow May” to increase the abundance of flowering plants which provide an important resource for pollinators. These benefit other insects such as ladybirds, but there are simple measures that people can also implement to further increase the value of their gardens for a diverse range of insects. Actions include ensuring there are flowers to provide nectar throughout insects’ active period, in spring and summer, and leaving pest species on roses and vegetables as a food source for predatory ladybirds. Leaves left on the ground in autumn provide overwintering habitat.

Professor Helen Roy, an ecologist at the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology and one of the paper’s authors, says: “Over the last few decades we have seen more and more people getting involved with ladybird surveys contributing their sightings of ladybirds through citizen science initiatives around the world. In this exciting new paper we explore ways that everyone can make a difference and contribute to the conservation of ladybirds and other insects.”

As well as public involvement, the research highlights how environmental change is impacting ladybirds and focuses on addressing ways to counter the ongoing threats faced by ladybirds.

In the paper, published in Conservation Biology, the team has laid out a roadmap with short-, medium- and long-term actions that are needed for ladybird conservation and recovery. These actions include:

• Recruiting citizen scientists for data collection and observations, education programmes and conservation efforts
• Enhancing agricultural landscapes by creating insect-friendly habitats
• Education programmes to target different audiences
• Introducing machine learning to support long-term monitoring, for example using cameras coupled with deep learning software to monitor insects
• Bringing together national monitoring systems globally

Professor Roy adds: “Ladybirds are well-loved, charismatic insects but we know so little about them. This paper brings together a global team and sets out ways that we can safeguard the future of these amazing beetles. It is critical that we consider the multiple drivers of environmental change together and increase our understanding of the ways in which climate change, land-use change and biological invasions interact with one another. We need to act fast and act together.”

–ENDS–

 

Notes to editors

 

A roadmap for ladybird conservation and recovery is published in Conservation Biology. Open access. DOI: 10.1111/cobi.13965

The authors’ institutions are listed below:

• Center for Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Changes / Azorean Biodiversity Group (cE3c–ABG) / CHANGE – Global Change and Sustainability Institute, University of the Azores, Portugal
• IUCN SSC Ladybird Specialist Group
• Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium
• University of South Bohemia, Czech Republic
• Czech Academy of Sciences, Czech Republic
• University of Aveiro, Portugal
• Anglia Ruskin University, UK
• Finnish Museum of Natural History, University of Helsinki, Finland
• Research Institute for Nature and Forest (INBO), Belgium
• Utah State University, USA
• Universidad de Chile, Chile
• Trier University, Germany
• IUCN SSC Invertebrate Conservation Committee
• Comenius University, Slovak Republic
• Crop Research Institute, Czech Republic
• Slovak Academy of Sciences, Slovak Republic
• Kansas State University, USA
• University of Lucknow, India
• UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, UK
• National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment (INRAE) & Aix-Marseille University, France
• Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Chile
• Cornell University, USA

Media enquiries
Photos are available on request. For interviews and further information, please contact Simon Williams, Media Relations Officer at UKCEH, via simwil@ceh.ac.uk or +44 (0)7920 295384.

About the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (UKCEH)
The UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology is a centre for excellence in environmental science across water, land and air. Our 500-plus scientists work to understand the environment, how it sustains life and the human impact on it – so that together, people and nature can prosper.
We have a long history of investigating, monitoring and modelling environmental change, and our science makes a positive difference in the world.
The UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology is a strategic delivery partner for the Natural Environment Research Council, part of UK Research and Innovation.
www.ceh.ac.uk / @UK_CEH / LinkedIn: UK Centre For Ecology & Hydrology

About the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)
IUCN is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Its Red List is a critical indicator of the health of the world’s biodiversity. IUCN provides information about range, population size, habitat and ecology, use and/or trade, threats, and conservation actions that will help inform necessary conservation decisions.
www.iucn.org / @IUCN

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JOURNAL

Conservation Biology

DOI

10.1111/cobi.13965 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Systematic review

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

A roadmap for ladybird conservation and recovery

Simple rubber band fix improves surgical mask seal to N-95 levels, study shows

This easy, cheap fix could help people when and where N95 respirators are in short supply

Peer-Reviewed Publication

MICHIGAN MEDICINE - UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic and when maximum protection is needed against air-born infections, the N95 respirator has remained the gold standard of personal protective equipment. However, it is also much more difficult to produce and obtain than a standard surgical mask.

But a recent study published in PLOS ONE demonstrates that a simple modification to a surgical mask using rubber bands can improve its protective seal against particle exposure to the level of an N95 respirator.

To achieve N95-level protection, the respirators should demonstrate a minimum score of 100 on a standardized battery of tests – the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s passing threshold – against the passage of particles that would potentially expose an individual to disease. Standard surgical masks are not as protective because they don’t seal around the wearer’s face, allowing particles to bypass the filter peripherally.

A research team led by a Michigan Medicine surgeon worked with 40 health care workers to test standard surgical masks modified with two 8-inch rubber bands over the crown of the subject’s head, bridge of the nose, around the cheeks and under the chin within the boundaries of the mask.

Thirty-one of the subjects, or 78%, had modified masks that passed a fit test with a score of greater than 100. The passing masks scored an average of 151, a significantly better fit than an unmodified surgical mask score of 3.8 but lower than a properly fitted N95 mask’s score of 199.  By the last day of investigation, all of the modified masks passed the N95 threshold, suggesting that greater experience with the banding improved fit and performance.

This easy modification could address N95 respirator shortages worldwide and provide health care workers and individuals in under-resourced regions – or even in a resourced area like the U.S. when production demands can’t properly meet needs in a pandemic – a practical means for increased personal protection, said Jaimo Ahn, M.D., Ph.D., FACS, senior author of the paper and professor of orthopaedic surgery at University of Michigan Medical School.

“While not a vaccine, this approach emphasizes prevention rather than treatment,” Ahn said. “While not sophisticated, it has the potential to save lives and preserve wellness. Its effect will last as long as there are respiratory diseases and PPE demand exceeds supply. It is immediately impactful and sustainable, yet simple and cheap.”

Additional authors include Agnes Z. Dardas, M.D., Viviana M. Serra Lopez, M.D., Lauren M. Boden, M.D., Taras Grosh, M.D., Daniel J. Gittings, M.D., Kevin Heym, and Emily Koerber, all of the University of Pennsylvania at the time the study was performed.

Paper cited: “A simple surgical mask modification to pass N95 respirator-equivalent fit testing standards during the COVID-19 pandemic,” PLOS ONE. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0272834

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JOURNAL

PLoS ONE

DOI

10.1371/journal.pone.0272834 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

A simple surgical mask modification to pass N95 respirator-equivalent fit testing standards during the COVID-19 pandemic

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

24-Aug-2022

Climate extremes: The energy required for adaptation calls for stronger mitigation efforts

Peer-Reviewed Publication

CMCC FOUNDATION - EURO-MEDITERRANEAN CENTER ON CLIMATE CHANGE

 

IMAGE: ENERGY USE VARIATION FOR ADAPTATION TILL 2100 WITH CURRENT CLIMATE POLICIES view more 

CREDIT: WWW.ENERGY-A.EU

A new study published today in Nature Communications by researchers from the Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, the European Institute on Economics and the Environment and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine finds that adapting to climate change will require more energy than previously estimated, leading to higher energy investments and costs. Avoiding this additional energy burden is another important benefit of ambitious mitigation that so far has remained neglected in the academia, the public debate and the international negotiations.

This new study sheds light on a blind spot of the energy transition and of the implementation of climate policies: adaptation needs will reduce the effectiveness of climate mitigation policy, and it is therefore necessary to revise those policies accounting for the evident changes in climatic conditions. The researchers involved examined how responses to climate change will affect energy systems, and therefore the achievement of mitigation goals, including their economic costs. Estimating the size of future energy needs for adaptation to climate change has important implications for the transition towards sustainability and decarbonized economies.

Francesco Pietro Colelli, lead author of the study, points out that “adapting to climate change by means of adjustments in energy habits, as we did in the past, will increase the global demand for electricity by 7% by 2050 and by 18% in 2100. Since a lot of our energy still comes from coal, gas, and oil, there is a risk such an increase will lead to more physical capital being locked into fossil fuels, corresponding to around 30-35 new large gas-fired plants and 10-15 new large coal- and oil-fired plants each year between now and 2050.”

In Europe, the increase in electricity demand for cooling will be more than compensated by the decrease in fuels demand for heating, leading to a 6% reduction in the final energy demand by the end of the century. Still, between now and 2050, under current climate policies, an additional €235 billion of investments and operational expenses in power generation and transmission are needed to provide the additional electricity needed for cooling.

Enrica De Cian, co-author of the study, and leader of a European ERC project dedicated to the cooling crisis, ENERGYA, explains that “adaptation through air conditioning would also require more resources for grid investments and power generation. Overall electricity generation costs, including investments in capacity, grids, fuel, operation & maintenance costs,  will rise by 21% throughout the century. The additional supply-side costs will be passed on to consumers through increases in the price of electricity around 2%-6% due to the adaptation-energy feedback in different regions. Ambitious mitigation policies can cut by more than half the increase in the costs of the energy system induced by adaptation, depending on the stringency of the climate target. Because of the benefits in terms of reduced adaptation needs, the costs to decarbonize the power system in ambitious mitigation scenarios would be lower than previous estimates, and they would turn negative in well-below-2-degree scenarios, pointing at net gains in terms of power system costs.”

Colelli stresses lastly that “adaptation induces variations in the energy markets that ultimately result in a shift in global and regional greenhouse gas emissions of about 7% cumulatively from 2020 to 2100. As a consequence of the variation in emissions, ambitious mitigation pathways see an increase in the global carbon price between 5% and 30%.” This aspect can and should have important implications for the international negotiations on climate change.

Technical details

By integrating the “adaptation-energy feedback loop” into the World Induced Technical Change Hybrid model – WITCH, the study is one of the first to fully integrate the energy needs for adaptation endogenously into mitigation pathways, so that climate policy design is directly influenced by adaptation energy needs. The findings indicate that climate adaptation can lead to higher energy demand, power system costs and carbon prices, with mitigation’s benefits compensating decarbonization costs.

Link to the scientific article:

Colelli, F.P., Emmerling, J., Marangoni, G. et al. Increased energy use for adaptation significantly impacts mitigation pathways. Nat Commun 13, 4964 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-32471-1

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JOURNAL

Nature Communications

DOI

10.1038/s41467-022-32471-1 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Computational simulation/modeling

ARTICLE TITLE

Increased energy use for adaptation significantly impacts mitigation pathways

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

25-Aug-2022

China’s cities leading the way on carbon reduction - Study

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM

Thirty-eight Chinese cities have reduced their emissions of planet-warming carbon dioxide (CO2) despite growing economies and populations for at least five years - defined as proactively peaked cities, a new study reveals.

A further 21 cities have cut CO2 emissions as their economies or populations have ‘declined’ over the same period - defined as passively emission declined cities.

The experts discovered that ‘emission peaked’ cities, such as Beijing and Taizhou (Zhejiang province), achieved emission decline mainly due to efficiency improvements and structural changes in energy use, whilst ‘declining’ cities, such as Fuxin (Liaoning province) and Shenyang (Liaoning province), are likely to have reduced emissions due to economic recession or population loss.

They recommend that instead of using a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach, emission targets of cities need to be set individually considering cities’ resources, industrialisation levels, socio-economic characteristics, and development goals.

Super-emitting cities with outdated technologies and lower production efficiency should develop stringent policies and targets for emissions reduction, while less developed regions could have more emission space for economic development.

Publishing their findings in Science Bulletin, an international team of scientists, led by the Universities of Birmingham (UK), Groningen (Netherlands), and Tsinghua University (China) analyses comprehensive CO2 emission inventories of 287 Chinese cities from 2001 to 2019. The authors thank the data contribution from over 190 participants to the Summer School organised by the Carbon Emission Accounts and Datasets for Emerging Economies (CEADs) at Nanjing Normal University (2017) and Tsinghua University (2018 & 2019).

All the emission inventories of cities can be downloaded free-of-charge from CEADs–Carbon Emission Accounts and Datasets for emerging economies (www.ceads.net). CEADs gathers experts from the UK, USA, and China to work on China and other emerging economies’ emission accounting methods and applications. The resource provides accurate and up-to-date carbon emission, socio-economic and trade data for academics, policy stakeholders, and public.

The first author Dr. Yuli Shan, Associate Professor in Sustainable Transitions at the University of Birmingham and subject leader of CEADs team, commented: “The experiences and lessons learned from those 59 Chinese cities which have reduced their CO2 emissions cities can be used as benchmarks for other cities. The achievements of these cities are notable for countries around the globe, as China is the world’s most significant emitter of CO2.

“The impact of emission drivers varies among these cities. Growing cities which have reduced emissions should lead in setting precedents for China to reach the Dual-Carbon goals of achieving carbon emission peak before 2030 and carbon neutrality before 2060.”

The scientists recommend that ‘declining’ cities with reduced emissions face the fact that the drop in emissions is mainly caused by a recessive economy, exhausted natural resources, insufficient competitiveness of industry or even shrinking population, rather than vigorously promoting low-carbon actions.

Prof. Klaus Hubacek, one of the co-authors from the University of Groningen comments: “Cities often struggle with economic decline and dwindling resources but at the same time need to keep an eye on mitigation goals and look for synergies to achieve the energy and resource transition.”

Corresponding author and founder of CEADs dataset Professor Dabo Guan from Tsinghua University comments: “It is not easy to reduce every ton of emissions and the reduction strategy must be individualized. China is playing an increasing role in global climate change mitigation, and local authorities need more city-specific information on the emissions trends and patterns when designing low-carbon policies.”

The researchers note that cities are at the heart of climate change mitigation - emission and development hotspots with urban economic activity accounting for 80% of global GDP, 60-80% of energy consumption, and 75% of carbon emissions. However, cities have the administrative capacity to carry out targeted emission reduction measures.

Although more than 500 cities world-wide have committed to low-carbon and carbon neutrality goals, agreement is still lacking on how to best account for emissions and achieve decarbonisation at the city level.

ENDS

For further information, please contact Tony Moran, International Communications Manager, University of Birmingham on +44 (0)782 783 2312 or t.moran@bham.ac.uk. Out-of-hours, please call +44 (0) 7789 921 165. Dr. Shan can also be contacted on y.shan@bham.ac.uk

 

Notes for editors

• The University of Birmingham is ranked amongst the world’s top 100 institutions. Its work brings people from across the world to Birmingham, including researchers, teachers and more than 9,000 international students from over 150 countries.
• ‘City-level emission peak and drivers in China’ - Yuli Shan, Yuru Guan, Ye Hang, Heran Zheng, Yanxian Li, Dabo Guan, Jiashuo Li, Ya Zhou, Li Li, Klaus Hubacek is published in Science Bulletin.
• Participating institutions include:
  • University of Birmingham, UK
  • University of Groningen, Netherlands
  • Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics
  • Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim
  • University College London, UK
  • Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
  • Shandong University, Weihai, China
  • Guangdong University of Technology, Guangzhou, China

China University of Geosciences, Beijing, China

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JOURNAL

Science Bulletin

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Meta-analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

24-Aug-2022

Long-term relationship with owner reduces horses’ stress reactions in new situations

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF TURKU

 

IMAGE: OCÉANE LIEHRMANN GUIDES A HORSE TO A SOFT, UNFAMILIAR SURFACE, ON WHICH THIS HORSE HAS NEVER WALKED ON. view more 

CREDIT: VEERA RIIHONEN

A new study shows that horses can be more reluctant in new situations if they have multiple riders, have had several owners or the horse has been with its current owner only for a short period of time. The results of the international research group that studied the interaction between horses and humans also indicate that it takes time to build a good interactive relationship with a horse. 

Horses have been living with humans for thousands of years. Following this long co-evolution, horses today demonstrate impressive social skills during their interactions with humans: they are receptive to human emotions and are very good at understanding human demands.

“Domestic horses may spend several hours daily in close contact with humans, which can affect horse welfare, physiology, and behaviour. Therefore, it is important to understand which factors can influence the horses’ emotions during interactions with humans and what shapes their relationship – particularly in novel situations that can be very stressful to the animals”, says the lead author of the study, Doctoral Researcher Océane Liehrmann from the Department of Biology at the University of Turku, Finland.  

An international research team from the University of Turku and the University of Helsinki in Finland, and the INRAE of Nouzilly in France, studied interaction between horses and humans as well as how horses react in new situations. The researchers recruited 76 privately owned leisure horses from the Turku area (Finland) to perform two behavioural tests.

In these tests, the researchers observed and analysed the horses’ reactions to novel objects. In addition, the researchers studied whether the horse reacted differently when if faces the new object with a familiar owner or with a stranger, i.e. the researcher.

In the research situation, the horses were led to walk on two surfaces that were new to them, a white tarp, and a fluffy blanket.  They were led to one of the surfaces by their owner and to the other one by an unfamiliar researcher. Second, the horses were presented with a fluffy stuffed toy either by their owner or by an unfamiliar researcher. The horse had one minute to freely come and interact with the toy and then the person approached the horse and tried to touch its neck with the toy.

“Interestingly, horses with an exclusive relationship with their owner were the calmest when approaching the novel surfaces and easily agreed to be touched with the toy. Horses that are regularly ridden or trained by different persons showed more stress behaviours in the test situations,” describes Océane Liehrmann.

Horses that had spent their whole life with their owner agreed more often to be touched with the new toy than horses that had had several owners during their life. These horses presented more stress behaviours and refused more often to be touched with the toy.

“Horses often have to change ownership, which restricts their ability to make a long-term bond with specific humans.  We were particularly interested in studying how the length of the relationship between the horse and the owner affects the horse’s behaviour in new, potentially stressful situations,” says Océane Liehrmann.

The results showed that horses with shorter relationships with their owner were more reluctant in novel situations and presented more stress behaviours when asked to interact with novel objects and surfaces. On the contrary, horses that had at least 6 to 8 years of relationship with their owner, were mostly very calm when introduced to the surfaces or the stuffed toy. 

Horses older than 17 years old refused more often to step on the tarp or the blanket when they were led by a stranger, while they almost all agreed to do it when they were led by their owner. 

“Geriatric horses often suffer from poorer eyesight, and it has been shown that they may feel more anxiety towards new situations than younger horses. Therefore, older horses may perceive someone familiar as a secure base, feeling safer to walk over an unknown material when led by a familiar person.”

The study shows that having a shorter relationship with the owner, multiple handlers and numerous owner-changes can increase the horse’s reluctance to novel objects and surfaces and therefore may negatively impact the horse-human interactions in new situations. 

“Our findings suggest that a positive horse-human relationship may take time to develop as it is shaped by multiple factors, such as the horse’s previous interactions with humans. Overall, the results show that animals’ relationships with their human caretakers should be better considered in animal welfare and its research,” Liehrmann concludes.

CAPTION

Océane Liehrmann observes the horse’s reaction when it is touched with an unfamiliar stuffed toy.

CREDIT

Veera Riihonen

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JOURNAL

Applied Animal Behaviour Science

DOI

10.1016/j.applanim.2022.105709 

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Multiple handlers, several owner changes and short relationship lengths affect horses’ responses to novel object tests

The talking dead: burials inform migrations in Indonesia

New light shed on burial practices and migration of the earliest humans in island Southeast Asia by researchers from the Australian National University

Peer-Reviewed Publication

AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: DR SOFIA SAMPER CARRO FROM THE ANU SCHOOL OF CULTURE, HISTORY AND LANGUAGE WITH BONES FROM ALOR ISLAND, INDONESIA. view more 

CREDIT: TRACEY NEARMY/ANU

The discovery by researchers from The Australian National University (ANU) of three bodies on Indonesia’s Alor Island, dating from 7,500 to 13,000 years ago, sheds new light on burial practices and migration of the earliest humans in island Southeast Asia. 

Author of a new paper published by PLOS ONE, Dr Sofia Samper Carro, said the three burials are significant because the positioning of each body shows a different mortuary practice.

Dr Samper Carro said this might relate to multiple migratory routes through the area from thousands of years ago.

“Burials are a unique cultural manifestation to investigate waves of migration through the terminal Pleistocene to the Holocene period in Southeast Asia,” Dr Samper Carro said.

“Our results provide significant new data for understanding the evolution and diversification of burial practices in mainland and island Southeast Asia, contributing to a growing body of literature describing prehistoric socio-cultural behaviour in this region.”

Dr Samper Carro and the international team of researchers from ANU and the Gadjah Mada University in Indonesia uncovered more than 50,000 bones. This included the three bodies, one with extremities that were intentionally removed before burial, and two more individuals placed in a seated, and flexed (on side) positions.

“Our first excavations in 2014 revealed fish hooks and a human skull that was more than 12,000 years old,” Dr Samper Carro said.

“When the Australia-Indonesian team returned in 2018 to excavate the original burial, they found two more bodies buried in different positions above each other.

“The three quite unusual and interesting burials show different mortuary practices, which might relate to recent discoveries of multiple migratory routes through the islands of Wallacea from thousands of years ago.”

Dr Samper Carro said while the process of studying every item included delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the wait has been worthwhile.

“Once we realised we had uncovered such unique findings, I had a very long process of studying each and every piece. We called this paper The Talking Dead because of the stories each pieces tells,” Dr Samper Carro said.

“We’re very pleased to present a paper that shows how burial practices can complement data on genetic diversity from one of the current research hotspots in Southeast Asia.”

Dr Samper Carro completed her research on the Tron Bon Lei burials through a Gerda Henkel research scholarship. Fieldwork in Alor was funded by the ARC Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage.

Read the researchers’ paper in full: Talking Dead. New burials from Tron Bon Lei (Alor Island, Indonesia) inform on the evolution of mortuary practices from the terminal Pleistocene to the Holocene in Southeast Asia.

 

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JOURNAL

PLoS ONE

DOI

10.1371/journal.pone.0267635 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Human tissue samples

ARTICLE TITLE

The talking dead: burials inform migrations in Indonesia

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

25-Aug-2022

COI STATEMENT

Research funded by a Gerda Henkel research scholarship and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage.