Ethnic diversity and disparities in access to genetic testing impact prostate cancer development and treatment, research shows

In concomitance with the forthcoming ESMO Asia Congress 2022 in Singapore, 2-4 December, two studies emphasize the need for ethnically diverse prostate cancer genomics data and accessible genetic testing.

Reports and Proceedings

EUROPEAN SOCIETY FOR MEDICAL ONCOLOGY

 

IMAGE: DR. RODRIGO DIENSTMANN, GRUPO ONCOCLÍNICAS, SAO PAULO, BRAZIL, AND VALL D’HEBRON INSTITUTE OF ONCOLOGY, BARCELONA, SPAIN view more 

CREDIT: ESMO - EUROPEAN SOCIETY FOR MEDICAL ONCOLOGY

Singapore, 28 November 2022 – More than 1.4 million men were diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2020 globally, (1) but the molecular characteristics of the disease remain unexplored for the majority of patients around the world. In the final days of the Movember campaign, which every year in November aims to raise awareness of men's health issues such as prostate cancer, testicular cancer and men's mental health, (2) in concomitance with the forthcoming ESMO Asia Congress 2022 in Singapore, 2-4 December, two studies emphasise the need for ethnically diverse prostate cancer genomics data and accessible genetic testing.

Prostate cancer is well-established as a BRCA-gene associated malignancy which can develop as a consequence of a hereditary cancer syndrome, and predisposition to the disease is known to vary across different ethnicities, with men of African and Caribbean descent being at increased risk. Only just beginning to be understood, however, is the impact of ancestry on the somatic mutations arising in the tumour, likely as a result of both genetic and non-genetic, societal-environmental factors linked to ethnicity. “Such race-related differences can condition the behaviour of the disease and its treatment, yet our current knowledge of prostate cancer genomics is largely limited to data from Europe and the USA, in which Asian and other non-Caucasian ethnicities are scarcely represented,” said Dr. Rodrigo Dienstmann, Grupo Oncoclínicas, Sao Paulo, Brazil, and Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology, Barcelona, Spain, an expert not involved in the research.

A study (3) has now confirmed the existence of variations in the genomic landscape of prostate cancer in Chinese men, by performing targeted genetic sequencing on the tumours of 1,016 Chinese patients and comparing the results with publicly available genomic data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), (4) Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Centre (5) and Stand Up to Cancer (SU2C) (6) cohorts representative of Caucasian men.

“The most important differences we observed were concentrated in castration-sensitive disease and included lower mutation rates in prostate cancer driver genes such as TP53 and PTEN among Chinese patients compared to the Western cohorts, which may partially account for the better prognosis observed in Asian men in this setting,” reported study author Dr. Yu Wei, Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Centre, China. According to Wei, this raises the question of whether the benefits demonstrated by current standard therapies in clinical trials with Western patients can be translated to the Asian population given the varying treatment responses induced by different driver mutations.  

In the castration-resistant setting, genetic testing for a group of 15 genes responsible for DNA damage and repair (DDR) including BRCA1 and BRCA2 entered clinical practice in 2020 with the approval of PARP inhibitor olaparib, which achieved a 30% reduction in the risk of death for patients with metastatic disease. (7) The Chinese study found mutation rates in genes predictive of response to these therapies to be similar across the races, regardless of disease stage. “This suggests that Chinese patients can equally benefit from PARP inhibitors provided they can obtain access to the treatment, which is why we propose that all Asian men with metastatic prostate cancer should receive genomic testing,” Wei stated.

Commenting on the results, Dienstmann observed: “The genomic heterogeneity we see in metastatic, refractory prostate cancer can be understood as the result of tumour evolution under the pressure of therapy over several years, but it is noteworthy that variation between ethnicities was also observed in the primary tumour, confirming the existence of baseline differences in cancer development across races. These findings are consistent with other recent research on Asian (8) and African (9) populations and underline the importance of increasing the diversity in prostate cancer genomics databases to better understand the molecular epidemiology and thus the testing strategies that need to be implemented in countries around the world.”

The ESMO Clinical Practice Guidelines for prostate cancer (10) recommend germline genetic testing for BRCA2 and other DDR genes in all patients with metastatic prostate cancer alongside or following tumour testing, but also in individuals with a family history of cancer to allow the early identification of mutation carriers and contribute to the prevention and early diagnosis of tumours in relatives. Far from being a reality, however, access to testing could become a factor in deepening health disparities in the future.

From equal representation to equitable access to treatment

The recommended technology in prostate cancer molecular testing as per the ESMO Precision Medicine Working Group is multi-gene next-generation sequencing, (11) which is costly and requires high-quality testing and complex interpretation. As emerged in the preliminary results of a recent ESMO survey on the Availability and Accessibility of Biomolecular Technologies in Oncology in Europe, this is currently available only in selected academic cancer centres, and scarcely at all in low and middle-income countries. Developing the necessary infrastructure, which also includes resources and workflows for sample acquisition, preparation and storage, is a sizeable undertaking likely to require multi-stakeholder involvement.

“Support programmes from companies like the one exemplified in a survey of physician testing patterns in India (12) are a good and necessary starting point for increasing patient access to testing. Moving forward, insights from these programmes should be made public to allow better understanding of local gaps in access to testing, as well as the prevalence of driver mutations in different patient cohorts. However, these programmes are not sustainable in the long term, and the study authors themselves report that post-test implications, such as drug affordability and availability of genetic counsellors, remain major barriers in India,” said Dienstmann. “National testing programmes will need to be implemented to support access to the medicines, and companies must increasingly engage in public-private partnerships, not just to facilitate the analysis of samples abroad, but to help build the local laboratory ecosystems that can make testing affordable and available to entire patient populations.”

-END-

Notes to Editors 

Please make sure to use the official name of the meeting in your reports: ESMO Asia Congress 2022 

Official Congress Hashtag: #ESMOAsia22 

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Disclaimer

This press release contains information provided by the author of the highlighted abstract and reflects the content of this abstract. It does not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of ESMO who cannot be held responsible for the accuracy of the data. Commentators quoted in the press release are required to comply with the ESMO Declaration of Interests policy and the ESMO Code of Conduct.

 

References

1 https://www.wcrf.org/cancer-trends/prostate-cancer-statistics/

2 https://fr.movember.com/en/mens-health/prostate-cancer/  

3 Abstract 162MO ‘Genomic Characterization Revealed from Prospective Clinical Sequencing of 1016 Chinese Prostate Cancer Patients’ will be presented by Yu Wei during the Genitourinary Tumours Mini Oral Session on Friday 2 December, 16:15 - 17:45 SGT in Hall 407.

4 https://www.cbioportal.org/study/summary?id=prad_tcga

5 https://www.cbioportal.org/study/summary?id=prad_mcspc_mskcc_2020

6 https://www.cbioportal.org/study/summary?id=prad_su2c_2019

7 J S de Bono, J Mateo, K Fizazi, F Saad, N Shore, S Sandhu, K N Chi, O Sartor, N Agarwal, D Olmos, A Thiery-Vuillemin, P Twardowski, G Roubaud, M Ozguroglu, J Kang, J Burgents, C Gresty, C Corcoran, C A Adelman and M Hussain. Final overall survival (OS) analysis of PROfound: Olaparib vs physician’s choice of enzalutamide or abiraterone in patients (pts) with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) and homologous recombination repair (HRR) gene alterations. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annonc.2020.08.870

8 J Li, Xu Gao, Ting Wang, Yinghao Sun et al. A genomic and epigenomic atlas of prostate cancer in Asian populations. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-2135-x

9 W Jaratlerdsiri, J Jiang, T Gong, S M Patrick, C Willet, T Chew, R J Lyons, A-M Haynes, G Pasqualim, M Louw, J G Kench, R Campbell, L G Horvath, E K F Chan, D C Wedge, R Sadsad, I Simoni Brum, S B A Mutambirwa, P D Stricker, M S Riana Bornman and V M Hayes. African-specific molecular taxonomy of prostate cancer. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-022-05154-6

10 C Parker, E Castro, K Fizazi, A Heidenreich, P Ost, G Procopio, B Tombal and S Gillessen on behalf of the ESMO Guidelines Committee. Prostate cancer: ESMO Clinical Practice Guidelines for diagnosis, treatment and follow-up. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annonc.2020.06.011

11 F Mosele, J Remon, J Mateo, C B Westphalen, F Barlesi, M P Lolkema, N Normanno, A Scarpa, M Robson, F Meric-Bernstam, N Wagle, A Stenzinger, J Bonastre, A Bayle, S Michiels, I Bièche, E Rouleau, S Jezdic, J-Y Douillard, J S Reis-Filho, R Dienstmann and F André. Recommendations for the use of next-generation sequencing (NGS) for patients with metastatic cancers: a report from the ESMO Precision Medicine Working Group. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annonc.2020.07.014

12 Abstract 167P ‘Genetic Testing for Prostate Cancer: The Indian Scenario’ will be presented by Ganesh Bakshi during the Poster Viewing Session on Saturday 3 December, 18:00 – 19:00 SGT in the Exhibition Area.

 

About the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO)

ESMO is the leading professional organisation for medical oncology. With approximately 25,000 members representing oncology professionals from over 160 countries worldwide, ESMO is the society of reference for oncology education and information. Driven by a shared determination to secure the best possible outcomes for patients, ESMO is committed to standing by those who care about cancer through addressing the diverse needs of #ONEoncologycommunity, offering #educationforLIFE, and advocating for #accessiblecancerCARE.  www.esmo.org 

 

 

162MO - Genomic Characterization Revealed from Prospective Clinical Sequencing of 1016 Chinese Prostate Cancer Patients

Y. Wei1, Y. Zhu1, D. Ye2
1Urology, Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center, Shanghai, China, 2Shanghai Cancer Centre, Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center, Shanghai, China

Background: Although disparities in prostate cancer (PCa) incidence and mortality among races have been well recognized, few biological factors driving disparities were identified, due to the lack of genomic data from minorities, including the Asian population.

Methods: A total of 1016 Chinese PCa patients, including 315 locoregional PCa, 313 metastatic castration-sensitive PCa (mCSPC) and 388 metastatic castration-resistant PCa (mCRPC), were prospectively enrolled and underwent targeted sequencing. Genomic data retrieved from the TCGA, MSKCC, and SU2C cohort was used as a comparator representing the White men. The genomic mutations were analyzed using an integrated bioinformatics strategy. The relationships between race and genomic mutations were evaluated using Fisher's exact test and multivariable logistic regression.

Results: Comparative analysis across disease stages revealed mutations in TP53, AR, FOXA1, and cell cycle pathway were enriched in mCRPC. Patients with visceral metastasis harbored more APC mutations compared with patients with bone metastasis. Genomic differences between races were mainly observed in castration-sensitive PCa, with tumors from Chinese men having more FOXA1 but less TP53 mutations in locoregional PCa and harboring fewer TP53, PTEN and APC mutations in mCSPC stage than those from White men. Unlike FOXA1 class-1 enriched in tumors from East Asian, FOXA1 class-2 was less common in East Asian patients and showed no enrichment in metastasis compared with primary cancer in East Asian cohort, in contrast to the findings in Western cohort.

Conclusions: The magnitude of difference in mutation prevalence between PCa from Chinese and White men varied across disease stages and was strongest in castration-sensitive disease. The lower frequency of FOXA1 class-2 mutations in Chinese PCa underscored the mechanistic difference in driving cancer progression between races. We call for more genomic data from minorities with rich clinical information to reduce widening racial disparity and accelerate our understanding of the interplay between germline and somatic mutations on PCa tumorigenesis and development.

Legal entity responsible for the study: Yao Zhu and Dingwei Ye

Funding: Has not received any funding

Disclosure: All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.

167P - Genetic Testing for Prostate Cancer: The Indian Scenario

G. Bakshi1, S. Addla2, A.P. Joshi3, S.J. Rajappa4, C.J. Desai5, H. Baxi6, V. Talwar7, P.N. Mohapatra8, S. Shingla9
1Uro Oncology, P. D. Hinduja National Hospital and Medical Research Centre, Mumbai, India, 2Uro Oncology, Apollo Cancer Institute - Hyderabad, Hyderabad, India, 3Medical Oncology Department, Tata Memorial Hospital - Tata Memorial Centre, Mumbai, India, 4Oncology department, Basavatarakam Indo American Cancer Hospital & Research Institute, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India, 5Medical Oncology, Daiichi Sankyo, Inc., Basking Ridge, Gujarat, USA, 6Uro Oncology, HCG Cancer Centre Ahmedabad, Ahmedabad, India, 7Medical Oncology, Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute and Research Centre, New Delhi, Rohini, India, 8Medical Oncology, Apollo Gleneagles Hospital, Kolkata, Kolkata, India, 9Medical Oncology Department, Medanta - The Medicity, Gurugram, Gurugram, India

Background: Prostate cancer (PrCa) incidence is on the rise and was the 12th commonest cancer in India (GLOBOCAN 2020). Genetic testing for PrCa has been widely advocated owing to its poor prognosis, familial risks associated with underlying mutations and therapeutic implication of these mutations. Data on genetic testing practices related to PrCa among Indian medical and uro-oncologists is meagre. With the availability of mutation-based targeted treatment for PrCa, there exists a need to assimilate the current practice patterns in genetic testing.

Methods: An online questionnaire comprising 12 objective questions was developed, validated by a panel of 9 experts, and distributed. Responses were collected over 2 months, at the end of which 103 medical and uro-oncologists responded. Results were descriptively analysed and concluding statements on current practice patterns and future trends were formulated.

Results: Genetic testing was advised by 64.1% of the oncologists for most PrCa patients. A majority chose to advise genetic testing at the stage of castration-resistant prostate cancer (58.3%). Patients with a positive family history of PrCa were most commonly referred for genetic testing (88.3%). Blood and primary tumor were the preferred specimens sent for testing. A 15-gene panel that play a crucial role in the homologous recombination repair (HRR) pathway was most commonly used (50.2%). Testing of the tumor followed by blood samples was the sequence most commonly followed (44.7%). The primary tumor provided maximum yield on testing for the mutations (42.7%). As per 64.1% of the oncologists, the positivity rate for prostate cancer was <5%. National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) guidelines were followed by 68.9% of oncologists. Major barriers to genetic testing were affordability (89.3%) and lack of genetic counsellors (70.9%).

Conclusions: Testing for genetic mutations in PrCa is a prevalent practice among oncologists in India. Making genetic testing more affordable through patient-assistance programs and increased awareness of the utility of genetic testing along with the availability of genetic counsellors would help improve access to drugs and facilitate better diagnosis and treatment of PrCa in India.

Editorial acknowledgement: Authors would like to thank AstraZeneca Pharma India Limited in collaboration with BioQuest Solutions PVT. Ltd. India for medical writing assistance.

Legal entity responsible for the study: AstraZeneca Pharma India Limited

Funding: AstraZeneca Pharma India Limited

Disclosure: All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.

 

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JOURNAL

Annals of Oncology

British intelligence influenced Finland’s President Kekkonen through his English teacher

Western powers took advantage of the secret communication with the Finnish President Urho Kekkonen and tried to influence his thoughts during the Cold War.

Reports and Proceedings

UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI

 

IMAGE: BRITISH PRIME MINISTER LORD MACMILLAN GREETS PRESIDENT KEKKONEN IN LONDON ON THE 8TH MAY IN 1961. TO THE LEFT MRS SYLVI KEKKONEN AND HER MAJESTY’S REPRESENTATIVE LORD HASTINGS. view more 

CREDIT: PHOTO: COURTESY BY THE ARCHIVES OF URHO KEKKONEN

Western powers took advantage of the secret communication with the Finnish President Urho Kekkonen and tried to influence his thoughts during the Cold War.
New research reveals that Finnish President Urho Kekkonen had a closer relationship with Western Intelligence than was previously known. This is evident from Mikko Virta’s doctoral research. It examines relations with the West and especially with the Western intelligence services during the Cold War. The investigation also reveals a secret information operation, called Operation Thread, targeted at President Kekkonen by the British. The operation was not previously known about.

Background of the era:
Finland’s geopolitical situation was delicate after the Second World war right up to the 1960:ies. Finland needed to balance in order not loose its independence with an imperialist superpower Russia as its neighbour. 
The 1958 Night Frost (The Night Frost Crisis) was a political crisis that occurred in 
Soviet–Finnish relations in the autumn of 1958) destroyed the trust of the leading 
Western powers, Britain and the United States, in Kekkonen.  In the eyes of the West, Kekkonen looked like a weak man who was too much under the influence of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev and believed that the Soviet Union was winning the Cold War. The situation looked so bad that the Western powers launched an extensive influence 
operation in which they tried to turn Kekkonen to the West. 
The President was kept in close contact through ambassadors, he was invited to western capitals
and high-ranking western guests were brought to Finland.

Results from the research:
-Western powers began to supply Kekkonen with confidential information 
through secret channels, Mikko Virta explains.
Based on the research, the efforts of the Western powers seem to have succeeded to some extent, as Kekkonen himself began to make openings in the direction of the West. 
Kekkonen was always thinking two steps ahead and he was aware of the possibility of Soviet moles in the Foreign Office and Secret Intelligence Service.
Virta’s research shows that the role of intelligence services in Kekkonen's relations with the West was in the forefront. In his youth, Kekkonen had worked for years in the Finnish Security Police (Fi. Etsivä keskuspoliisi, EK). He adopted the practices of the secret police so well that he used them throughout his long political career.

Operation Thread tried to influence leaders
The influence operation was connected to Operation Thread of the Information Research Department of the British Foreign Office. Targeted state leaders received personally tailored material from the British Foreign Office’s propaganda department. The goal was to build such a deep relationship of trust with the target persons that their thinking could be influenced if necessary. Kekkonen was one of the most important targets of this operation.
- Nothing was previously known about this operation. 
I half-accidentally found documents related to it in London, which have only been released for use by researchers a few years ago, says Mikko Virta, who has researched the topic for his Doctoral Thesis.

 Kekkonen’s English teacher was a British agent
- At the beginning of 1961, Kekkonen started intensively studying English, which he barely knew before. Briton 
John Haycraft came to Finland as Kekkonen's language teacher, who moved to live with the presidential couple into their residence.
- At the same time, Haycraft acted in an intelligence role and reported his 
detailed findings about the president's life to London, says Virta.In 1961, Kekkonen visited Britain and personally met the UK leaders. The visits and close contacts improved Kekkonen's relations with the West. 
Then the Note Crisis between Finland and the Soviet Union, and also the KGB defector Anatoli Golitsyn's claims about Kekkonen as an influence agent of the Soviet Union, tore trust to pieces again.

Relations with intelligence services
Already in the 1940s, Urho Kekkonen had made connections with the British and American intelligence services.
- Old contacts were used when Western powers needed information 
about Finland directly from the highest level. As an old intelligence officer, Kekkonen himself was a player, making use of secret connections - both eastward and westward.
The most important contact seems to have been the British intelligence officer
Rex Bosley,with whom contact was maintained from the 1940s until the 70s. 
Bosley was also Kekkonen's good friend, Virta concludes.

Researcher, M.A. Mikko Virta will defend his doctoral dissertation at the University of Helsinki on the 3rd of December. 
More information:
The Doctoral dissertation is available in English:
https://helda.helsinki.fi/handle/10138/350341?locale-attribute=en
Contact: Mikko Virta is available for interviews in English

mikko.a.virta@gmail.com

 

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SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

3-Dec-2022

COI STATEMENT

Doctoral thesis at the University of Helsinki : https://helda.helsinki.fi/handle/10138/350341

Why steamed hay can lead to protein deficiency in horses

Peer-Reviewed Publication

MARTIN-LUTHER-UNIVERSITÄT HALLE-WITTENBERG

Hay treated with hot steam is safer for horses but provides them with less protein. The horse forage is treated with steam to rid it of potentially harmful microorganisms and to bind particles that could otherwise be inhaled. However, a team of scientists from Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) has discovered that this also causes a chemical reaction which damages the proteins in the hay and makes them harder for horses to digest. This can lead to signs of nutrient deficiency in the animals and, for example, impair growth or muscle development. The team reports on their scientific work in the journal Animals.

Hot steam is used to heat hay up to 100 degrees Celsius, which kills harmful microorganisms and binds fungal spores and dust to the hay. "Many horses suffer from lung problems such as equine asthma. The steaming process virtually eliminates all of the living microorganisms and particles in the hay that could be inhaled during feeding and damage the lungs. In theory, the end result is a very good forage," explains Professor Annette Zeyner from the Institute of Agricultural and Nutritional Sciences at MLU. 

However, her team discovered that the treatment also has its disadvantages as the steam damages the proteins in the hay. "A high proportion of the proteins, and the crucial amino acids contained in them, can no longer be digested by the small intestine - in other words the horse lacks these proteins as a result of the steam treatment. However, some of these protein components are essential for horses and they cannot be absorbed in the large intestine," Zeyner continues. The researchers demonstrated this by examining various hay samples. In the steamed hay, they found an increased number of products that are generated by the Maillard reaction, an indication that the proteins in the hay have been damaged. This is a reaction that also takes place when food is cooked, baked or fried and is responsible for browning or the development of flavours. "Proteins are composed of amino acids. The steaming damages them and they form new complexes with sugars in the hay," says the first author of the study, Caroline Pisch, from MLU. This makes them difficult for horses to digest. According to the researchers’ analyses, the treatment reduced the amount of protein that can be absorbed by the small intestine by almost half. 

According to Zeyner, this can lead to an undersupply of essential amino acids from the feed protein, which is problematic for growing horses or lactating mares; young horses need proteins to grow, and mares need them to produce milk. To make matters worse, protein deficiency causes very unspecific symptoms in the affected animals. These include impaired muscle development and a dull or shaggy coat with so-called "hunger hair" - long isolated hairs in the horse’s coat. Horse owners can counteract this risk by enriching the animals’ diet with protein-rich single feedstuffs such as yeast and soybean meal or high-quality protein-rich compound feeds. 

Study: Pisch C. et al. Effect of Hay Steaming on the Estimated Precaecal Digestibility of Crude Protein and Selected Amino Acids in Horses. Animals (2022). doi: 10.3390/ani12223092

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JOURNAL

Animals

DOI

10.3390/ani12223092 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Effect of Hay Steaming on the Estimated Precaecal Digestibility of Crude Protein and Selected Amino Acids in Horses

Fitting Advanced Driving Assistance Systems to all UK cars could prevent 24% of road crashes

The most frequent accident types in the UK can be reduced by 29% with a full deployment of ADAS

Peer-Reviewed Publication

LERO

Installing Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) on all cars in the United Kingdom could reduce car crashes by 24%, researchers in Ireland and Luxembourg have found.

The researchers from Lero, the Science Foundation Ireland Research Centre for Software at University of Limerick (UL), Ireland and Motion-S, Luxembourg, also found Automatic Emergency Braking (AEB) is the most impactful technology, reducing three out of the four most frequent accident categories – intersection (by 28%), rear-end (by 27.7%), and pedestrian accidents (by 28.4%). This research is funded by the Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR) under their academic-industrial partnership programme.

Based on publicly-available road safety reports from the United Kingdom (UK) for 2019, the research team estimates that a full deployment of ADAS would reduce accident frequency in the UK by 23.8%, representing an annual decrease of 18,925 accidents.

Dr Barry Sheehan of Lero at UL said: “Our research suggests that introducing ADAS across all vehicles would lower the number of road crashes by almost one quarter (23.8%). Furthermore, accidents happening in the two most frequent contexts can be reduced by 29%. That means a reduction of 7,020 accidents on urban roads with clear weather and daylight conditions and 3,472 on rural roads with clear weather and daylight conditions.”

Existing research shows that connected and automated vehicles (CAV) are expected to improve road safety substantially, including reducing accident frequency and severity. According to the American Automobile Association, as of May 2018, 92.7% of new vehicles in the United States have at least one ADAS.

In the UK and the EU, vehicles with ADAS, including Automatic Emergency Braking (AEB), are becoming more common. Although these systems provide considerable societal benefits, this research, published by the journal of Transportation Research Interdisciplinary Perspectives (TRIP), has revealed their potential impact on accident numbers across various driving contexts.

Lead author Leandro Masello, Data Scientist at Motion-S and PhD Candidate at the Emerging Risk Group, UL, said that although ADAS provides considerable road safety benefits, its performance is often constrained by challenging conditions, like adverse weather.

“The driving environment affects vehicle dynamics and sensor capabilities. A system that suddenly brakes to avoid a crash will perform better in dry weather conditions than in adverse conditions like heavy rain and ice, which reduce tyre traction and can cause the vehicle to skid.

“Similarly, inclement weather also impairs the sensors’ ability to perceive the environment accurately. For example, a snowstorm could obstruct the camera vision system or cover lane boundaries,” added Mr Masello.

Dr German Castignani, co-author and CEO of Motion-S S.A., said road safety reports are a fundamental source of information for the continuous development of the car industry as they help study the distribution of the accidents’ environmental conditions.

“They provide information about the vehicles and casualties involved and the accident circumstances (e.g., geographical, temporal, and road information). Our work leverages such data to estimate the potential reductions in accidents that ADAS can mitigate,” he added.

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JOURNAL

Transportation Research Interdisciplinary Perspectives

DOI

10.1016/j.trip.2022.100670 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

On the road safety benefits of advanced driver assistance systems in different driving contexts

QUANTUM MAGICK

How to fire projectiles through materials without breaking anything

When charged particles are being shot through ultra-thin layers of material, sometimes spectacular micro-explosions occur, sometimes the material remains almost intact. This has now been explained at the TU Wien.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

VIENNA UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY

 

IMAGE: THE AUTHORS OF THE TU WIEN STUDY: FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: FRIEDRICH AUMAYR, CHRISTOPH LEMELL, ANNA NIGGAS, ALEXANDER SAGAR GROSSEK, RICHARD A. WILHELM view more 

CREDIT: DAVID RATH, TU WIEN

It sounds a bit like a magic trick: Some materials can be shot through with fast, electrically charged ions without exhibiting holes afterwards. What would be impossible at the macroscopic level is allowed at the level of individual particles. However, not all materials behave the same in such situations - in recent years, different research groups have conducted experiments with very different results.

At the TU Wien (Vienna, Austria), it has now been possible to find a detailed explanation of why some materials are perforated and others are not. This is interesting, for example, for the processing of thin membranes, which are supposed to have tailor-made nano-pores in order to trap, hold or let through very specific atoms or molecules there.

Ultra-thin materials - graphene and its peers

"Today, there is a whole range of ultrathin materials that consist of only one or a few atomic layers," says Prof. Christoph Lemell of the Institute of Theoretical Physics at TU Wien. "Probably the best known of these is graphene, a material made of a single layer of carbon atoms. But research is also being done on other ultrathin materials around the world today, such as molybdenum disulfide."

In Prof. Friedrich Aumayr's research group at the Institute of Applied Physics at TU Wien, such materials are bombarded with very special projectiles - highly charged ions. They take atoms, typically noble gases such as xenon, and strip them of a large number of electrons. This creates ions with 30 to 40 times the electrical charge. These ions are accelerated and then hit the thin layer of material with high energy.

"This results in completely different effects depending on the material," says Anna Niggas, an experimental physicist at the Institute of Applied Physics "Sometimes the projectile penetrates the material layer without any noticeable change in the material as a result. Sometimes the material layer around the impact site is also completely destroyed, numerous atoms are dislodged and a hole with a diameter of a few nanometers is formed."

The velocity of the electrons

These astonishing differences can be explained by the fact that it is not the momentum of the projectile that is mainly responsible for the holes, but its electric charge. When an ion with multiple positive charge hits the material layer, it attracts a larger amount of electrons and takes them with it. This leaves a positively charged region in the material layer.

What effect this has depends on how fast electrons can move in this material. "Graphene has an extremely high electron mobility. So this local positive charge can be balanced there in a short time. Electrons simply flow in from elsewhere," Christoph Lemell explains.

In other materials such as molybdenum disulfide, however, things are different: There, the electrons are slower, they cannot be supplied in time from outside to the impact site. And so a mini-explosion occurs at the impact site: The positively charged atoms, from which the projectile has taken their electrons, repel each other, they fly away - and this creates a nano-sized pore.

"We have now been able to develop a model that allows us to estimate very well in which situations holes are formed and in which they are not - and this depends on the electron mobility in the material and the charge state of the projectile," says Alexander Sagar Grossek, first author of the publication in the journal Nano Letters.

The model also explains the surprising fact that the atoms knocked out of the material move relatively slowly: The high speed of the projectile does not matter to them; they are removed from the material by electrical repulsion only after the projectile has already passed through the material layer. And in this process, not all the energy of the electric repulsion is transferred to the sputtered atoms - a large part of the energy is absorbed in the remaining material in the form of vibrations or heat.

Both the experiments and the simulations were performed at TU Wien. The resulting deeper understanding of atomic surface processes can be used, for example, to specifically equip membranes with tailored "nanopores". For example, one could build a "molecular sieve" or hold certain atoms in a controlled manner. There are even thoughts of using such materials to filter CO2 from the air. "Through our findings, we now have precise control over the manipulation of materials at the nanoscale. This provides a whole new tool for manipulating ultrathin films in a precisely calculable way for the first time," says Alexander Sagar Grossek.

The model developed at TU Wien explains why tiny holes - only a few nanometers in size - are formed in some two-dimensional materials when they are bombarded with highly charged ions, but not in others. The effect of nano-hole formation can be exploited to produce novel sieves for certain molecules.

CREDIT

TU Wien

JOURNAL

Nano Letters

DOI

10.1021/acs.nanolett.2c03894 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Model for Nanopore Formation in Two-Dimensional Materials by Impact of Highly Charged Ions

Ancient Iowan superpredator got big by front-loading its growth in its youth

Fossils found only at the Field Museum reveal the growth history of Whatcheeria

Peer-Reviewed Publication

FIELD MUSEUM

 

IMAGE: CO-AUTHOR BEN OTOO STANDING BY A LIFE-SIZE ILLUSTRATION OF A LARGE WHATCHEERIA SPECIMEN AT THE FIELD MUSEUM. view more 

CREDIT: COURTESY OF BEN OTOO

The Field Museum in Chicago is home to the best, most-complete fossils of a prehistoric superpredator-- but one that lived hundreds of millions of years before SUE the T. rex. Whatcheeria was a six-foot-long lake-dwelling creature with a salamander-like body and a long, narrow head; its fossils were discovered in a limestone quarry near the town of What Cheer, Iowa. There are around 350 Whatcheeria specimens, ranging from single bones to complete skeletons, that have been unearthed, and every last one of them resides in the Field Museum’s collections. In a new study in Communications Biology, these specimens helped reveal how Whatcheeria grew big enough to menace its fishy prey: instead of growing “slow and steady” the way that many modern reptiles and amphibians do, it grew rapidly in its youth.

“If you saw Whatcheeria in life, it would probably look like a big crocodile-shaped salamander, with a narrow head and lots of teeth,” says Ben Otoo, a co-author of the study and a PhD student at the University of Chicago and the Field Museum. “If it really curled up, probably to an uncomfortable extent, it could fit in your bathtub, but neither you nor it would want it to be there.” 

That’s because Whatcheeria was a top predator. Bony grooves in its skull for sensory organs shared by fish and aquatic amphibians reveal that it lived underwater, and its sturdy leg bones could have helped it hunker down in one spot and wait for prey to swim by. “It probably would have spent a lot of time near the bottoms of rivers and lakes, lunging out and eating whatever it liked,” says Otoo. “You definitely could call this thing ‘the T. rex of its time.’”

While Whatcheeria looks like a giant salamander, it isn’t one-- it’s a “stem tetrapod,” an early four-legged critter that’s part of the lineage that eventually evolved into the four-limbed animals alive today. “Whatcheeria is more closely related to living tetrapods like amphibians and reptiles and mammals than it is to anything else, but it falls outside of those modern groups,” says Ken Angielczyk, a curator at the Field Museum and co-author of the study. “That means that it can help us learn about how tetrapods, including us, evolved.”

Since the Field has so many Whatcheeria specimens, scientists are able to use them to study the animal at different phases of its life. “Most early tetrapods are known from just one skeleton, if you're lucky-- in a lot of cases just a fragment of a single bone,” says Angielczyk. But with so many individuals at the Field, researchers have been able to spot variation within the species: some Whatcheeria are six and a half feet long, while others are much smaller. That means there was an opportunity to study how they grew.

“Examining these fossils is like reading a storybook, and we are trying to read as many chapters as possible by looking at how juveniles grow building up to adulthood,” said Megan Whitney, the study’s lead author, a professor at Loyola University in Chicago who began working on the project at Harvard University. “Because of where Whatcheeria sits in the early tetrapod family tree, we wanted to target this animal and look at its storybook at different stages of life.”

To see how Whatcheeria grew, Otoo and Angielczyk offered up thigh bones from nine Whatcheeria individuals ranging from juvenile to adult. Whitney and her advisor, Harvard University’s Stephanie Pierce, took thin slices of bone and examined them under a microscope. When an animal is growing, it creates new layers of bone every growing season, says Otoo. “You might see a seasonal pattern where the animal is growing a lot during the spring and summer and then stopping in winter and resuming the next spring,” they explain. “By examining how thick the growth rings are over the course of an animal’s life, you can figure out if the animal’s growing continuously throughout its lifetime, perhaps with some temporary interruptions, or basically growing to an adult size, then stopping.”

In modern tetrapods, some animals grow a lot as juveniles and then stop when they reach adulthood-- birds and mammals, including us, are like that. However, other animals like crocodiles and many amphibians keep growing bit by bit their whole lives. The researchers expected that Whatcheeria would be more like reptiles and amphibians, growing “slow and steady.” But in examining the bone slices, Whitney found evidence that Whatcheeria grew rapidly when it was young, and then leveled off over time. She even found evidence of fibrolamellar bone, which is primary bone tissue associated with fast growth.

“I have a very distinct memory of jumping on Slack with Stephanie Pierce and saying, this breaks all of the rules that we thought of for how growth is evolving in these early tetrapods,” said Whitney.

The discovery helps illuminate what some elements of Whatcheeria’s life were like. “If you’re going to be a top predator, a very large animal, it can be a competitive advantage to get big quickly as it makes it easier to hunt other animals, and harder for other predators to hunt you,” said Pierce. “It can also be a beneficial survival strategy when living in unpredictable environments, such as the lake system Whatcheeria inhabited, which went through seasonal dying periods.” 

However, there’s a trade-off: growing really big really fast takes an enormous amount of energy, which can be a problem if there’s not enough food and resources for the growing animal. It’s easier to get just enough food to get a little bit bigger, the same way it’s easier to make smaller monthly rental payments than it is to save up for a big downpayment on a house.

In addition to helping give us a better sense of the evolutionary pressures on early tetrapods, researchers say the findings are a reminder that evolution isn’t a neat stepwise process: it’s a series of experiments.

 “Evolution is about trying out different lifestyles and combinations of features,” says Angielczyk. “And so you get an animal like Whatcheeria that’s an early tetrapod, but it's also a pretty fast-growing one. It's a really big one for its time. It has this weird skeleton that's potentially letting it do some things that some of its contemporaries weren't. It’s an experiment in how to be a big predator, and it shows how diverse life on Earth was and still is.”

  

A Whatcheeria skull in the collections of the Field Museum, with its many sharp teeth visible

Co-author Ken Angielczyk with a drawer of Whatcheeria specimens behind the scenes at the Field Museum

CREDIT

By Kate Golembiewski, Field Museum

Some of the many drawers containing Whatcheeria specimens and other fossils from the Iowan quarry where the animal was discovered

CREDIT

Kate Golembiewski, Field Museum

JOURNAL

Communications Biology

DOI

10.1038/s42003-022-04079-0 

ARTICLE TITLE

Fossil bone histology reveals ancient origins for rapid juvenile growth in tetrapods

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

28-Nov-2022