EP-WXT pathfinder catches first wide-field snapshots of X-ray universe

Reports and Proceedings

CHINESE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES HEADQUARTERS

 

IMAGE: EP-WXT PATHFINDER TARGETS A REGION OF THE GALACTIC CENTER AT THE CORE OF THE MILKY WAY. INSET SHOWS THE 800-SECOND TIME-LAPSE PHOTOGRAPH FROM THE OBSERVATION. view more 

CREDIT: CAS/ESA/GAIA/DPAC

EP-WXT Pathfinder, the experimental version of a module that will eventually be part of the wide-field X-ray telescope (WXT) aboard the astronomical satellite Einstein Probe (EP), released its first results Aug. 27 from an earlier test flight. These include an 800-second X-ray time-lapse photograph of a region of the Galactic center, a dense area at the core of our home galaxy, the Milky Way. 

These mark the first wide-field X-ray snapshots of our universe available to the public so far, captured by the first truly wide-field X-ray focusing imaging telescope ever flown in space.

The results were reported by scientists from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) at the Second China Space Science Assembly held in Taiyuan, China.

Since the first detection of X-ray signals from the depths of the universe 60 years ago, no wide-field X-ray focusing telescope has been available for X-ray surveys and monitoring until Pathfinder.

The Pathfinder was sent into orbit to verify the module's in-orbit performance. The experimental journey is meant to pave the way for the future in-orbit science operation of EP as it makes observations in the soft X-ray waveband.

EP will explore open questions in time-domain astrophysics through observation of transients. The mission is sponsored by CAS in cooperation with the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics and is expected to fly by the end of 2023.

The WXT test module covers a field of view up to 340 square degrees (18.6°×18.6°) wide, which makes it the first truly wide-field X-ray focusing imaging telescope. X-ray imaging by bending light rays (focusing) is notoriously difficult due to the high energy of X-ray photons; and it is even more difficult to obtain clear images from a wide field of view. Thanks to a state-of-the-art technology called lobster-eye micropore optics, the test module boasts a field of view at least 100 times those of other focusing X-ray imagers. The complete WXT to fly aboard EP will be composed of 12 such identical modules, covering a field of view up to 3,600 square degrees wide.

During the test flight, Pathfinder conducted a total of four days of in-orbit experimental observations and obtained authentic X-ray spectra and images based on real measurements.

The key components of Pathfinder include the X-ray imaging mirror assembly, which features an array of 36 micropore lobster-eye plates and a focal-plane detector composed of four sets of large-format imaging sensors.

Even though these results are still preliminary and extensive data processing must be done, the test flight demonstrates that even a one-shot observation can cover X-ray sources from all directions within the observed patch of sky, including stellar-mass black holes and neutron stars. The observation also captured the brightening of X-rays from a binary system containing a neutron star. The data from these observations provide information about how X-ray radiation from such celestial bodies changes over time, as well as the X-ray spectra of these celestial bodies. The images and spectra resulting from the test observations are highly consistent with simulations.

The instrument also targeted a number of other X-ray sources, including the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), one of our neighboring galaxies. The results demonstrate that even a one-shot observation can cover the whole of this galaxy, detecting multiple X-ray sources, including black holes, neutron stars and supernova remnants. The instrument's clear imaging of a distant quasar, 3C 382, at a distance of 810 million light-years, reveals its capacity to detect relatively faint X-ray sources. In its future observations, the imager is expected to effectively monitor the X-ray variability of celestial bodies and discover new transient sources.

According to Dr. YUAN Weimin, principal investigator (PI) of the EP mission and researcher at the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (NAOC), initial results show that "the instrument operates smoothly" and meets EP WXT module requirements. "It's exciting to see the decade-long effort bearing its first fruit," he smiled.

Other researchers involved with the EP mission were also satisfied.

Dr. ZHANG Chen, PI of the WXT mirror assembly, said the results promise "abundant, high-quality data" after the probe is launched.

Prof. Paul O'Brien, ESA-appointed scientist for the EP mission and researcher at the University of Leicester, said the results are "really impressive."

"We have been waiting for a true wide-field, soft X-ray imager for many decades, so it is wonderful to see the WXT test module in flight on EP-WXT Pathfinder," said Prof. Richard Willingale, Prof. O'Brien's colleague at the University of Leicester.

The preliminary X-ray “time-lapse photograph” (right) in 0.5–4 keV band as the result from a 700-second one-shot observation on the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), our neighbor galaxy, in comparison with the DSS optical image of LMC.

CREDIT

CAS/DSS

CAPTION

X-ray image of the Cygnus Loop nebula (2.5-degree diameter) obtained with several observations totaling 2,400 seconds.

CREDIT

CAS

Climate anxiety an important driver for climate action – new study

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF BATH

The first-ever detailed study of climate anxiety among the UK adult population suggests that whilst rates are currently low, people’s fears about the future of the planet might be an important trigger for action when it comes to adapting our high-carbon lifestyles to become more environmentally friendly.

Interest in climate or eco-anxiety – characterised by the American Psychological Association as the chronic fear of environmental doom that comes from observing the impacts of climate change – has risen over recent years. A high-profile University of Bath study in 2021 found it to be particularly prevalent among young people right across the world. 

This latest study, led by a team from the Centre for Climate Change and Social Transformations, also based at the University of Bath, sought the views of 1,338 UK adults over two time points (in 2020 and 2022) to delve deeper into the prevalence of climate anxiety, factors that predict it, and whether it could predict individual behavioural changes and climate action.

Despite over three-quarters of the UK public saying they are worried about climate change, only 4.6% of the public reported experiencing climate anxiety in 2022 (only fractionally higher than in 2020, when 4% reported this). Younger people and those with higher generalised anxiety were more likely to experience eco-anxiety.

However, climate anxiety was not always a negative; for many it could be a motivating force for taking action to reduce emissions. This included saving energy, buying second-hand, borrowing, renting, or repurposing items. Lifestyle changes such as cutting down on red meat were not related to climate anxiety, despite being highly effective for reducing emissions.

Significantly, the study found that media exposure – for example TV images of raging storms or heatwaves - rather than direct, personal experiences of climate impacts predicted climate anxiety. The authors say there are important implications of these findings for organisations responsible for communicating climate change.

The study published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology coincides with a new briefing paper from the Centre for Climate Change & Social Transformations focused on UK public preferences for low-carbon lifestyles. Its analysis suggests that lifestyle changes (for example, reducing car use or eating less meat), are increasingly seen as both feasible and desirable.

Environmental psychologist at the University of Bath, Professor Lorraine Whitmarsh MBE, led the study. She explained: “With increasing media coverage of climate impacts, such as droughts and fires in the UK and devastating flooding in Pakistan, climate anxiety may well increase. Our findings suggest this can spur some people to take action to help tackle the issue – but we also know there are barriers to behaviour change that need to be addressed through more government action.”

In the paper, the authors emphasise the importance of the media as a motivating force for the lifestyle changes required as we decarbonise. They suggest that the media and public discourse about climate anxiety has the power to create a positive vision for a greener, cleaner future which is significantly less dependent on fossil fuels. 

Lois Player, co-author of the study also from the Department of Psychology at the University of Bath, explained: “Our results suggest that the media could play an important role in creating positive pro-environmental behaviour change, but only if they carefully communicate the reality of climate change without inducing a sense of hopelessness.”  

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JOURNAL

Journal of Environmental Psychology

DOI

10.1016/j.jenvp.2022.101866 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Survey

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Climate anxiety: What predicts it and how is it related to climate action?

Study raises red flags about corporatization of health care, OHSU investigator says

Changes in patient volume, billing after private equity firms acquire physician practices

Peer-Reviewed Publication

OREGON HEALTH & SCIENCE UNIVERSITY

New research reveals private equity firms that acquire physician-owned medical practices appear to be imposing measures to squeeze out more profits.

After they were acquired by private equity firms, the clinics saw more patients and billed more for visits among a large, commercially insured population, according to a study published today in JAMA Health Forum by researchers at Oregon Health & Science University and other institutions.

Researchers examined a total of 578 physician practices specializing in dermatology, gastroenterology and ophthalmology that were acquired by private equity firms across the U.S. from 2016 to 2020.

“The reason this is of concern to patients and policymakers is that private equity is often driven by profit margins of 20% or more,” said senior author Jane M. Zhu, M.D., assistant professor of medicine (general internal medicine and geriatrics) in the OHSU School of Medicine. “To do that, they have to generate higher revenues or reduce costs. Increasing private equity in these physician practices may be a symptom of the continuing corporatization of health care.”

It’s not clear whether these practices hurt clinical outcomes for patients. However, the findings raise concerning parallels with the rapid growth of private equity acquisition of nursing homes and hospital systems.

“Private equity investment in nursing homes has been associated with an increase in short-term mortality and changes to staffing,” the authors write, citing previous research.

In the new study, researchers found an increase in the overall number of patients seen in these clinics. The study also reviewed commercial insurance claims data that showed an increased share of visits longer than 30 minutes, even though the complexity of cases remained similar to cases before acquisition.

“These billing patterns could mean more efficient documentation of services provided, or it could mean upcoding or up-charging insurance companies to make more money,” Zhu said.

She believes more evidence is needed about how private equity impacts practice patterns.

Policymakers are taking note of these trends.

In Oregon, for example, lawmakers have established a Health Care Market Oversight program to review proposed mergers, acquisitions and other business deals to ensure they meet the state’s goals around health equity, lower consumer costs, increased access and better care.

A recent estimate by the same study team found that approximately 5% of physicians are currently employed by private equity-owned practices. Researchers cited quality of care and patient satisfaction as key areas for future research as this trend continues.

“Private equity ownership of physician practices has added a distinctly private and market-driven influence to the broader trends in corporate consolidation of physicians by health systems and insurers,” they concluded. “This study contributes evidence for potential overutilization and higher spending of care that will be important for policymakers to monitor.”

In addition to Zhu, co-authors include Yashaswini Singh, M.P.A., and Daniel Polsky, Ph.D., M.P.P., of Johns Hopkins University; and Zirui Song, M.D., Ph.D., and Joseph D. Bruch, Ph.D., of Harvard Medical School.

The study was supported by the National Institute for Healthcare Management Foundation and the NIH Director’s Early Independence Award, DPS-ODO24564. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.

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JOURNAL

JAMA Health Forum

DOI

10.1001/jamahealthforum.2022.2886 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Association of Private Equity Acquisition of Physician Practices With Changes in Health Care Spending and Utilization

Research unlocks secrets of native rodents' rat race to new lands

Peer-Reviewed Publication

AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: A SMOKY MOUSE (PSEUDOMYS FUMEUS) IN THE GRAMPIANS-GARIWERD NATIONAL PARK, VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA. view more 

CREDIT: DAVID PAUL/MUSEUMS VICTORIA

New research from The Australian National University (ANU) has mapped the DNA from more than 150 species of native rodents from across Australia, New Guinea and Melanesian islands, painting a clearer picture of how they’re related and how they ended up spreading across the Pacific.  

Lead author Dr Emily Roycroft said native rodents are a fascinating but often under-appreciated evolutionary group. 

“There are over 150 species in Australia and New Guinea that aren’t found anywhere else in the world, like the rakali – or ‘water rat’ - that’s often seen swimming around Canberra’s lakes,” Dr Roycroft said. 

“Until now, we’ve known very little about the evolution and origin of native rodents, especially species in New Guinea.” 

The team used a new approach to get DNA from museum specimens up to 180 years old, including many extinct and elusive species. 

“One specimen of Guadalcanal rat from the Solomon Islands dates back to the 1880s, and the species hasn’t been seen since. It’s listed as critically endangered, and very possibly already extinct. We were curious to revisit these old specimens using modern technology,” Dr Roycroft said.  

The research shows that mountain formation in New Guinea five million years ago was the trigger for the spread of native rodents across the region. The expansion of New Guinea opened up new environments for rodents to adapt to, including through increased connectivity with Australia, Solomon Islands and Maluku Islands.  

“We’ve known for some time that Australia’s native rodents originated in Asia and arrived in our region via water – possibly a single pregnant animal floating across on a piece of driftwood. Now we have an accurate timeline for this, and an explanation for why we see so many species today,” Dr Roycroft said. 

“Our study shows native rodents are exceptional at colonising new areas. When they first arrived in Australia they adapted to a lot of new environments – including the arid desert.  

According to Dr Roycroft, having extra information about native rodents’ history could prove vital to the future of these species. 

“Native rodents have a deep intrinsic value in our ecosystems. They’re ecosystem engineers; they aerate soil via burrowing and foraging and they help to disperse seeds and fungal spores,” she said. 

“They also play a role in food webs as an important source for native predators, and in turn they feed on plants, fungi and smaller animals themselves. 

“But they also have the highest extinction rate of any Australian mammal group, due to extreme habitat loss and introduced predators. If we lose even one native species, it can throw off the balance in an ecosystem.  

“Understanding how our native rodents evolved and adapted will help us to conserve those we have left.” 

The research was supported by funding from Bioplatforms Australia through the Australian Government National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS). \

The study has been published in Current Biology. 

 

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JOURNAL

Current Biology

DOI

10.1016/j.cub.2022.08.021 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animal tissue samples

ARTICLE TITLE

New Guinea uplift opens ecological opportunity across a continent

New study confirms ‘rippled sheet’ protein structure predicted in 1953

UCSC scientists reported three crystal structures of periodic rippled beta sheets, a novel protein structure with potential applications in biomedicine and materials science

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - SANTA CRUZ

 

IMAGE: THE RIPPLED BETA SHEET IS A VARIATION ON THE PLEATED BETA SHEET, A WELL-KNOWN STRUCTURAL MOTIF FOUND IN THOUSANDS OF PROTEINS. LINUS PAULING AND ROBERT COREY DESCRIBED THE RIPPLED BETA SHEET IN 1953, BUT IT REMAINED A LARGELY THEORETICAL STRUCTURE FOR DECADES. SCIENTISTS HAVE NOW CREATED RIPPLED SHEETS IN THE LABORATORY AND CHARACTERIZED THE STRUCTURE USING X-RAY CRYSTALLOGRAPHY. view more 

CREDIT: IMAGE CREDIT: J. RASKATOV

An unusual protein structure known as a “rippled beta sheet,” first predicted in 1953, has now been created in the laboratory and characterized in detail using x-ray crystallography.

The new findings, published in July in Chemical Science, may enable the rational design of unique materials based on the rippled sheet architecture.

“Our study establishes the rippled beta sheet layer configuration as a motif with general features and opens the road to structure-based design of unique molecular architectures, with potential for materials development and biomedical applications,” said Jevgenij Raskatov, associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UC Santa Cruz and corresponding author of the paper.

Proteins come in an enormous range of shapes and sizes to carry out their myriad structural and functional roles in living cells. Certain common structural motifs, such as the alpha helix, are found in many protein structures.

The rippled sheet is a variation on the pleated beta sheet, a well-known structural motif found in thousands of proteins. Linus Pauling and Robert Corey described the rippled beta sheet in 1953, two years after introducing the concept of the pleated beta sheet. While the pleated beta sheet is well known and often called simply the beta sheet, the rippled sheet remained a largely theoretical structure for decades.

In a previous study published in 2021, Raskatov's team reported obtaining a rippled beta sheet structure by mixing a small peptide with equal amounts of its mirror image. The researchers used mirror-image forms of triphenylalanine, a short peptide consisting of three phenylalanine amino acids. The mirror-image peptides joined in pairs to form "dimers" with the predicted structure, but they did not form the extended, periodic rippled beta-sheet layer topography hypothesized by Pauling and Corey.

"The dimers packed together into herringbone layer structures, which raised doubt as to whether the periodic rippled beta-sheet layer configuration was viable," Raskatov said.

In the new study, the researchers substituted other amino acids for one of the triphenylalanines to create slightly different tripeptides and their mirror-images. Using these new tripeptides, they were able to create three different aggregating peptide systems that formed extended antiparallel rippled beta sheet layers, in which mirror-image peptide strands were arranged in alternating fashion. The results of x-ray crystallography showed that the crystal structures are in excellent overall agreement with the predictions made by Pauling and Corey.

The co-first authors of the paper are Amaruka Hazari, a staff scientist in Raskatov’s lab, and Michael Sawaya at UCLA. Other coauthors include Timothy Johnstone at UC Santa Cruz and Niko Vlahakis, David Boyer, Jose Rodriguez, and David Eisenberg at UCLA. This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

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JOURNAL

Chemical Science

DOI

10.1039/d2sc02531k 

ARTICLE TITLE

The rippled b-sheet layer configuration—a novel supramolecular architecture based on predictions by Pauling and Corey

nTIDE August 2022 Jobs Report: Employment indicators virtually unchanged for people with disabilities despite concerns about recession

National Trends in Disability Employment (nTIDE) – Issued semi-monthly by Kessler Foundation and the University of New Hampshire

Reports and Proceedings

KESSLER FOUNDATION

 

IMAGE: THIS GRAPHIC COMPARES THE LABOR MARKET INDICATORS FOR JULY 2022 AND AUGUST 2022, SHOWING SLIGHT INCREASES IN THE EMPLOYMENT-TO-POPULATION RATIO AND LABOR FORCE PARTICIPATION RATE FOR PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES, WHILE THESE INDICATORS DECLINED SLIGHTLY FOR PEOPLE WITHOUT DISABILITIES. view more 

CREDIT: KESSLER FOUNDATION

East Hanover, NJ – September 2, 2022 – Despite concerns about the impact of inflation, employment indicators remained virtually unchanged, according to today’s National Trends in Disability Employment – Monthly Update (nTIDE), issued by Kessler Foundation and the University of New Hampshire’s Institute on Disability (UNH-IOD). NTIDE experts observed that this lack of movement may reflect the early impact of countermeasures aimed at slowing the pace of inflation.  

Month-to-Month nTIDE Numbers (comparing July 2022 to August 2022)

In the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Jobs Report released today, the employment-to-population ratio for people with disabilities (ages 16-64) increased slightly from 34.4 percent in July to 34.6 percent in August (up 0.6 percent or 0.2 percentage points). For people without disabilities (ages 16-64), the employment-to-population ratio decreased slightly from 75.0 percent in July to 74.6 percent in August (down 0.5 percent or 0.4 percentage points). The employment-to-population ratio, a key indicator, reflects the percentage of people who are working relative to the total population (the number of people working divided by the number of people in the total population multiplied by 100).

“The employment-to-population ratio for people with disabilities has remained steadily above historic highs for the past twelve months,” said John O’Neill, PhD, director of the Center for Employment and Disability Research at Kessler Foundation. “This is encouraging for now,” he added, “considering the growing concerns about recession.”

Findings were similar for August’s labor force participation rate. For people with disabilities (ages 16-64), the labor force participation rate increased slightly from 37.3 percent in July to 37.6 percent in August (up 0.8 percent or 0.3 percentage points). For people without disabilities (ages 16-64), the labor force participation rate decreased slightly from 77.8 percent in July to 77.5 percent in August (down 0.4 percent or 0.3 percentage points). The labor force participation rate is the percentage of the population that is working, not working, and on temporary layoff, or not working and actively looking for work.

“The lack of movement in these labor market indicators may be an early sign of the impact of anti-inflationary measures taken by the U.S. Federal Reserve to slow the economy,” remarked Andrew Houtenville, PhD, professor of economics and the research director of the UNH-IOD. “Historically, impacts on the labor market lag behind movements in economic growth such as movement in gross domestic product (GDP). We would not expect to see large changes in employment and labor force participation until after we see declines in economic growth,” explained Dr. Houtenville.

Year-to-Year nTIDE Numbers (Comparing August 2021 to August 2022)

The employment-to-population ratio for working-age people with disabilities increased from 31.5 percent in August to 34.6 percent in August (up 9.8 percent or 3.1 percentage points). For working-age people without disabilities, the employment-to-population ratio also increased from 72.9 percent in August to 74.6 percent in August (up 2.3 percent or 1.7 percentage points).

Similarly, for people with disabilities (16-64), the labor force participation rate increased from 35.6 percent in August to 37.6 percent in August (up 5.6 percent or 2 percentage points). For people without disabilities (ages 16-64), the labor force participation rate also increased from 76.8 percent in August to 77.5 percent in August (up 0.9 percent or 0.7 percentage points).                                                                 

In August, among workers ages 16-64, the 5,583,000 workers with disabilities represented 3.8 percent of the total 148,206,000 workers in the U.S.                                                                                                         

Ask Questions about Disability and Employment

Each nTIDE release is followed by an nTIDE Lunch & Learn online webinar. This live broadcast, hosted via Zoom Webinar, offers attendees Q&A on the latest nTIDE findings, provides news and updates from the field, as well as invited panelists to discuss current disability-related findings and events. On September 2 at 12:00 pm Eastern, Jutta Treviranus, PhD, director, Inclusive Design Research Centre, OCAD University, Toronto, Ontario, joins Drs. Houtenville and O’Neill, and Denise Rozell, Policy Strategist at Association of University Centers on Disabilities (AUCD). Join our Lunch & Learns live or visit the nTIDE archives at: ResearchonDisability.org/nTIDE.

nTIDE COVID Update

Join us on September 23, at 12:00 pm Eastern for the mid-month COVID update – an in-depth comparison of the latest unemployment numbers for people with and without disabilities. Register at: COVID-19 Updates - 2022 | Center for Research on Disability.

NOTE: The statistics in the nTIDE are based on Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers but are not identical. They are customized by UNH to combine the statistics for men and women of working age (16 to 64). nTIDE is funded, in part, by grants from the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR) (90RT5037) and Kessler Foundation.

About the Institute on Disability at the University of New Hampshire

The Institute on Disability (IOD) at the University of New Hampshire (UNH) was established in 1987 to provide a university-based focus for the improvement of knowledge, policies, and practices related to the lives of persons with disabilities and their families. For information on the NIDILRR-funded Research and Training Center on Disability Statistics, visit ResearchOnDisability.org.

About Kessler Foundation

Kessler Foundation, a major nonprofit organization in the field of disability, is a global leader in rehabilitation research that seeks to improve cognition, mobility, and long-term outcomes – including employment – for people with neurological disabilities caused by diseases and injuries of the brain and

spinal cord. Kessler Foundation leads the nation in funding innovative programs that expand opportunities for employment for people with disabilities. For more information, visit KesslerFoundation.org.

CAPTION

This graphic compares the labor market indicators for August 2021 and August 2022, showing increases for people with and without disabilities.

CREDIT

Kessler Foundation

Stay Connected with Kessler Foundation

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To interview an expert, contact:

Deborah Hauss, DHauss@kesslerfoundation.org;

Carolann Murphy, CMurphy@KesslerFoundation.org.

Graphics:

Title: nTIDE Month-to-Month Comparison of Labor Market Indicators for People with and without Disabilities

Caption: This graphic compares the labor market indicators for July 2022 and August 2022, showing slight increases in the employment-to-population ratio and labor force participation rate for people with disabilities, while these indicators declined slightly for people without disabilities.

Title: nTIDE Year-to-Year Comparison of Labor Market Indicators for People with and without Disabilities

Caption: This graphic compares the labor market indicators for August 2021 and August 2022, showing increases for people with and without disabilities.

How historical precedents impeded recognition of airborne COVID-19 transmission

Reviewing over 2,000 years of history, a new study explains why it took so long to recognize airborne transmission of the coronavirus, and how we can do better next time

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO AT BOULDER

Millions of people have died of coronavirus infection since 2020 because influential institutions took too long to recognize that it is primarily airborne, and a new University of Colorado Boulder-led historical analysis sheds light on the delay. The authors trace this deadly resistance one hundred years back in history, to the rejection of sickly air called “miasma,” the rise of germ theory and our own stubborn tendency to retain beliefs in spite of accumulating evidence to the contrary.

While the SARS-CoV-2 virus was invisibly infecting people in 2020 through the air in hospitals, churches, workplaces and restaurants, people across the world were focused on disinfecting surfaces and washing their hands. Many governments and businesses installed plexiglass barriers that actually increased coronavirus spread, said Jose-Luis Jimenez, lead author of a new comprehensive historical assessment of major medical mistakes involving disease transmission, now published in the journal Indoor Air.

“History set us up for a poor response to the pandemic,” said Jimenez, fellow at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) and distinguished professor of chemistry at CU Boulder. “We might have had millions of fewer deaths, hundreds of millions fewer cases, if we’d taken appropriate, effective action from the start.”

The overview, written with colleagues from 10 countries, illuminates the often deadly impact of “belief perseverance,” in which it can take years or decades to challenge a set of beliefs—especially when the consequence of changing a set of beliefs is costly. It’s less expensive to ask people to wash hands or disinfect surfaces than it is to update a ventilation system, for example, or to re-engineer school classrooms, city buses and corporate boardrooms.

The authors, who include physicians, virologists, public health specialists, aerosol scientists, engineers, historians, a sociologist and an architect, spin through numerous examples of fatal mistakes in the history of research on infectious diseases. In 1847, for example, a scientist working in Austria showed that handwashing by medical doctors reduced deadly puerperal fever in a clinic. His work was dismissed because at the time, established medical and scientific beliefs blamed “a miasma in the air.” Handwashing made no sense to the establishment, and the suggestion that physicians, themselves, might be spreading disease, offended many.

Half a century later, another prominent researcher, Charles Chapin, ridiculed the idea of spooky miasmas or infected air. Chapin’s own work on infection had suggested to him that “contact infection” was the predominant way most infections spread. But he also knew how difficult it was to persuade people to wash their hands and disinfect surfaces if they thought some diseases might spread through the air, and how difficult it would be to figure out how to clean the air itself. So he argued his “contact infection” theory without evidence and managed to effectively label airborne disease transmission as superstition.

Jimenez and his co-authors trace disease transmission history from Chapin to 2020, when the World Health Organization (WHO), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and other institutions expressed deep skepticism or outright denial that SARS-CoV-2 might spread through the air, despite increasing evidence it was doing just that.

Jimenez said he thinks that most people at WHO and CDC were honest in their skepticism in early 2020, just struggling to get their minds around the fact that the conventional way of thinking about respiratory infection transmission—spreading through heavy droplets falling on surfaces—might be inadequate to explain the pandemic.

“They were stuck on the theory, distorting the interpretation of the observations to match their pre-existing beliefs,” said Jimenez.

Others have suggested that economics have also been at play, much as with climate change.

It’s convenient to ask individuals to take small, individual actions like handwashing and driving less, Jimenez noted. It’s more expensive for institutions to make structural changes, such as increasing ventilation everywhere, or replacing fossil fuel infrastructure with renewable energy.

So in preparation for facing the next pandemic intelligently, Jimenez and his colleagues are first working to find allies, especially in the hardworking medical and public health professions where many people have been too busy saving lives to enter the discussion about disease transmission, but have direct experience.

“And confrontation is also needed when major institutions refuse to accept the science and to communicate it clearly,” Jimenez added. “Maybe we have to badger the establishment a little, like Florence Nightingale did.”

Nightingale “lobbied” the British government for decades to support her reforms at hospitals, increasing hygiene, ventilation and distance between beds at a time when it was still seen as unnecessary.

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JOURNAL

Indoor Air

DOI

10.1111/ina.13070 

ARTICLE TITLE

What were the historical reasons for the resistance to recognizing airborne transmission during the COVID-19 pandemic? 

Cannabis legalization decreases the stock market value of major pharmaceutical firms

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF NEW MEXICO

 

IMAGE: RESEARCHERS FIND CANNABIS LEGALIZATION WILL REDUCE CONVENTIONAL PHARMACEUTICAL SALES BY BILLIONS OF DOLLARS. view more 

CREDIT: UNM STOCK IMAGE

Researchers from California Polytechnic State University and The University of New Mexico find that stock market investors predict cannabis legalization will reduce conventional pharmaceutical sales by billions of dollars.

In their recent study, “U.S. Cannabis Laws Projected to Cost Generic and Brand Pharmaceutical Firms Billions,” published in PLOS One, Ziemowit Bednarek from the Finance department at California Polytechnic State University, Sarah Stith from the University of New Mexico’s Economics department, and a co-author studied how the stock market returns of publicly traded pharmaceutical firms responded to medical and recreational cannabis legalization events. They found that stock market returns were 1.5-2% lower at 10 days following a cannabis legalization event and that the implications of the annual sale from this reduction were in the billions.

Other studies have determined that cannabis access reduces the consumption of specific types of medications, such as opioids, or in certain patient populations like Medicaid patients, but this is the first study to analyze the overall effect of cannabis on pharmaceutical firms across all products and types of patients. Unlike other drugs, which are designed to target and are approved for specific conditions, cannabis is used to treat an astonishing range of conditions including physical symptoms such as headaches and muscle spasms as well as mental conditions such as depression and anxiety.

The cost of pharmaceutical drugs remains a major barrier to healthcare for many Americans and a significant financial burden to state and federal governments – cannabis may be part of the solution. The current study concludes that cannabis acts as a new competitor in drug markets. Extrapolating the results to full federal legalization, the authors estimate a reduction in conventional pharmaceutical sales of almost 11%. Substitution away from conventional drugs towards cannabis appears to be occurring even without standardization, clear dosing instructions, or health insurance coverage.

Co-author Sarah Stith continues, “Currently, cannabis patients and their providers have little information to guide them towards the most effective treatment for their condition. The future of cannabis medicine lies in understanding the prevalence and effects of the plants’ components beyond THC and CBD and identifying ways to categorize cannabis by measurable characteristics that are known to yield specific effects. Mimicking conventional pharmaceuticals through standardization may not be the optimal endpoint for cannabis, as the variability inherent in the cannabis plant is likely driving its ability to treat so many conditions.”

In addition to their overall findings that cannabis legalization decreases the stock market value of publicly traded pharmaceutical firms, the authors found that recreational legalization had more than twice the impact of medical legalization, presumably because of the much larger affected population as medical cannabis access is typically restricted to those with severe, debilitating conditions. Branded drug manufacturers were more affected than generic manufacturers, perhaps due to a greater competitive impact from cannabis entry on drugs without any existing competitors.

The study concludes that conventional pharmaceutical manufacturers may benefit from investing in cannabis markets rather than lobbying against them and that regulatory policy should facilitate further research into the risks and benefits of using cannabis for both medical and recreational reasons. The magnitude of the negative effect of cannabis legalization on the stock market returns from investing in conventional pharmaceutical firms suggests that cannabis is likely to be a permanent and growing player in pharmaceutical markets worldwide.

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JOURNAL

PLoS ONE

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

U.S. Cannabis Laws Projected to Cost Generic and Brand Pharmaceutical Firms Billions