It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Sunday, December 04, 2022
Toxic air in Bangladesh claimed 88,000 lives in 2019, says World Bank
Dhaka remains among top global polluted cities; air pollution cost about 3.9% to 4.4% of country’s GDP in same year
SM Najmus Sakib |04.12.2022
DHAKA, Bangladesh
The toxic breathing environment developed due to the unabated air pollution in Bangladesh claimed about 78,145-88,229 lives in 2019, according to a World Bank report published in Dhaka on Sunday.
The ambient air pollution puts everyone at risk, from a child to the elderly, said the World Bank, adding that air pollution cost about 3.9% to 4.4% of the country’s GDP in the same year.
Bangladesh’s capital Dhaka was ranked as the second most polluted city in the world from 2018 to 2021, with rising breathing difficulties, cough, lower respiratory tract infections, as well as depression and other health conditions.
The major construction and persistent traffic in Dhaka have the highest level of air pollution, on average 150% above the WHO air quality guidelines, according to the report.
The report titled “Breathing Heavy: New Evidence on Air Pollution and Health in Bangladesh” also assessed the impacts of outdoor air pollution on physical and mental health.
“A 1% increase in exposure to PM2.5 (particulate matter) above the WHO air quality guidelines (AQG) is associated with a 20% higher probability of being depressed,” the report found. Worsening situation
Abdus Salam, a professor at Dhaka University's Chemistry Department, who has been working and studying the country’s air pollution for the last two decades, believed the number of deaths due to air pollution could be much more than mentioned by the UN lender.
“About a decade ago Bangladesh had taken some measures and cut the air pollution, but now the situation has worsened,” he told Anadolu Agency.
The government agencies are not taking effective and visible actions to improve the situation, he added.
“Brick kilns contribute 12-13% to the air pollution while gas emission from vehicles, uncovered construction activities, and transboundary air pollution are among the major causes of the worst air in Dhaka and other parts of the country,” he continued.
Air pollutants are also transported to Dhaka city through different routes from countries like India and Nepal, Salam said, suggesting the use of well-refined fuels in vehicles, and diplomatic efforts to curb transboundary air pollution.
“Addressing air pollution is critical for the country’s sustainable and green growth and development,” said Dandan Chen, acting World Bank country director for Bangladesh and Bhutan.
“Air pollution causes the climate to change, and climate change worsens the air quality. Over time, climate change and urbanization will further intensify air pollution,” said lead author of the report and World Bank health specialist, Wameq Azfar Raza.
The health sector needs to be well prepared to deal with the imminent health crisis arising from air pollution and climate change, Raza suggested.
On Friday, the World Bank approved a $250 million financing to assist Bangladesh in strengthening its environmental management and encouraging the private sector’s participation in green investment.
Elnaz Rekabi: Family home destroyed of Iranian climber who competed without hijab
The family home of Elnaz Rekabi, the Iranian climber who faced criticism from the government after competing without a headscarf, has been demolished.
A woman looks at a screen displaying a video of an international climbing competition is Seoul, South Korea, during which Iranian climber Elnaz Rekabi competes without a hijab.
Iranian state media has claimed that the demolition took place before Ms Rekabi's competition in South Korea, saying it was because the family did not have a permit to build on the land.
Protests against Iran's government began last month when 22-year-old Mahsa Amini died in hospital after being arrested by Iran’s “morality police” and held in a re-education centre”, allegedly on grounds her hijab was not being worn correctly. The Iranian authorities have insisted that she died of a heart attack, however, video footage circulated on social media has claimed that she was beaten by officers during her arrest.
Demonstrations have called for the resignation of Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has ruled the country since 1989. It is believed more than 300 people have been killed in the protests, including more than 40 children.
Anti-government activists have denounced the destroying of Ms Rebaki’s house as an act of revenge against the climber, although it has not been confirmed when the event took place.
After her competition, concerns were raised over Ms Rebaki’s whereabouts, once she returned to Iran. At Tehran airport, she was met by crowds who called her a “heroine”. She then appeared the next day, wearing the same clothes she had arrived in at at the airport, with Iran’s sports minister.
In an Instagram post immediately after her climb, Ms Rekabi apologised for competing without her hijab.
The event in which she competed did not have any rules on requiring female athletes wearing or not wearing headscarves. However, Iranian women competing abroad under the Iranian flag are expected to wear the hijab.
She said: “I apologise about what I did to make you worry.
"Due to bad timing, and the unanticipated call for me to climb the wall, my head covering inadvertently came off.”
In recent days, there has been a suggestion of some reform. Iran's attorney general has said he is reviewing the law that requires women to cover their heads. It has also been reported that the morality police, which is responsible for enforcing the dress code, had been reportedly "closed".
Quoted by the ISNA news agency, Mohammad Jafar Montazeri said: "We are working quickly on the issue of hijab and we are doing our best to use a wise solution to deal with this phenomenon that hurts everyone's heart."
He added that a meeting has been held with the parliament's cultural commission and results will be seen "within the next week or two".
Oklahoma fossil of new diapsid reptile which lived an estimated 289 million years ago shows evidence of dental pathology
IMAGE: THE TOOTH BEARING ELEMENTS OF THE LOWER JAW SHOWING THE STRONGLY RECURVED PREDATORY DENTITION OF MAIOTHISAVROS. ON THE RIGHT LOWER JAW THE PATHOLOGY IS SHOWN, WITH TEETH MISSING FROM THE MIDDLE AND BONE HAVING CLOSED THE TOOTH SOCKETS.view more
Article Title: An intriguing new diapsid reptile with evidence of mandibulo-dental pathology from the early Permian of Oklahoma revealed by neutron tomography
Author Countries: Canada, Australia
Funding: Supported by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) scholarship to T.M., and NSERC grant to R.R.R., and the Jilin University, China. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
An intriguing new diapsid reptile with evidence of mandibulo-dental pathology from the early Permian of Oklahoma revealed by neutron tomography
This animation highlights the skeletal and dental anatomy of Maiothisavros, including the pathology, for better visualization of this unique fossil. The new diapsid reptile was studied using neutron computed tomography (ANSTO, Australia), revealing extensive internal data that were otherwise hidden by the encasing rock. Mechanical or chemical preparation of the fossil was impossible for study of the internal structures because of the small size and delicate condition of this unique specimen.
IMAGE: TIN FROM THE MUŠISTON MINE IN CENTRAL ASIA’S UZBEKISTAN TRAVELED MORE THAN 2,000 MILES TO HAIFA, WHERE THE ILL-FATED SHIP LOADED ITS CARGO BEFORE CRASHING OFF THE EASTERN SHORES OF ULUBURUN IN PRESENT-DAY TURKEY.view more
CREDIT: MAP PROVIDED BY MICHAEL FRACHETTI/WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY IN ST. LOUIS
More than 3,000 years before the Titanic sunk in the North Atlantic Ocean, another famous ship wrecked in the Mediterranean Sea off the eastern shores of Uluburun — in present-day Turkey — carrying tons of rare metal. Since its discovery in 1982, scientists have been studying the contents of the Uluburun shipwreck to gain a better understanding of the people and political organizations that dominated the time period known as the Late Bronze Age.
Now, a team of scientists, including Michael Frachetti, professor of archaeology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, have uncovered a surprising finding: small communities of highland pastoralists living in present-day Uzbekistan in Central Asia produced and supplied roughly one-third of the tin found aboard the ship — tin that was en route to markets around the Mediterranean to be made into coveted bronze metal.
The research, published on November 30 in Science Advances, was made possible by advances in geochemical analyses that enabled researchers to determine with high-level certainty that some of the tin originated from a prehistoric mine in Uzbekistan, more than 2,000 miles from Haifa, where the ill-fated ship loaded its cargo.
But how could that be? During this period, the mining regions of Central Asia were occupied by small communities of highlander pastoralists — far from a major industrial center or empire. And the terrain between the two locations — which passes through Iran and Mesopotamia — was rugged, which would have made it extremely difficult to pass tons of heavy metal.
Frachetti and other archaeologists and historians were enlisted to help put the puzzle pieces together. Their findings unveiled a shockingly complex supply chain that involved multiple steps to get the tin from the small mining community to the Mediterranean marketplace.
“It appears these local miners had access to vast international networks and — through overland trade and other forms of connectivity — were able to pass this all-important commodity all the way to the Mediterranean,” Frachetti said.
“It’s quite amazing to learn that a culturally diverse, multiregional and multivector system of trade underpinned Eurasian tin exchange during the Late Bronze Age.”
“To put it into perspective, this would be the trade equivalent of the entire United States sourcing its energy needs from small backyard oil rigs in central Kansas.”
Michael Frachetti
Adding to the mystique is the fact that the mining industry appears to have been run by small-scale local communities or free laborers who negotiated this marketplace outside of the control of kings, emperors or other political organizations, Frachetti said.
“To put it into perspective, this would be the trade equivalent of the entire United States sourcing its energy needs from small backyard oil rigs in central Kansas,” he said.
The idea of using tin isotopes to determine where metal in archaeological artifacts originates dates to the mid-1990s, according to Wayne Powell, professor of earth and environmental sciences at Brooklyn College and a lead author on the study. However, the technologies and methods for analysis were not precise enough to provide clear answers. Only in the last few years have scientists begun using tin isotopes to directly correlate mining sites to assemblages of metal artifacts, he said.
“Over the past couple of decades, scientists have collected information about the isotopic composition of tin ore deposits around the world, their ranges and overlaps, and the natural mechanisms by which isotopic compositions were imparted to cassiterite when it formed,” Powell said. “We remain in the early stages of such study. I expect that in future years, this ore deposit database will become quite robust, like that of Pb isotopes today, and the method will be used routinely.”
Aslihan K. Yener, a research affiliate at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World at New York University and a professor emerita of archaeology at the University of Chicago, was one of the early researchers who conducted lead isotope analyses. In the 1990s, Yener was part of a research team that conducted the first lead isotope analysis of the Uluburun tin. That analysis suggested that the Uluburun tin may have come from two sources — the Kestel Mine in Turkey’s Taurus Mountains and some unspecified location in central Asia.
“But this was shrugged off since the analysis was measuring trace lead and not targeting the origin of the tin,” said Yener, who is a co-author of the present study.
Yener also was the first to discover tin in Turkey in the 1980s. At the time, she said the entire scholarly community was surprised that it existed there, right under their noses, where the earliest tin bronzes occurred.
Some 30 years later, researchers finally have a more definitive answer thanks to the advanced tin isotope analysis techniques: One-third of the tin aboard the Uluburun shipwreck was sourced from the Mušiston mine in Uzbekistan. The remaining two-thirds of the tin derived from the Kestel mine in ancient Anatolia, which is in present-day Turkey.
Findings offer glimpse into life 2,000-plus years ago
By 1500 B.C., bronze was the “high technology” of Eurasia, used for everything from weaponry to luxury items, tools and utensils. Bronze is primarily made from copper and tin. While copper is fairly common and can be found throughout Eurasia, tin is much rarer and only found in specific kinds of geological deposits, Frachetti said.
“Finding tin was a big problem for prehistoric states. And thus, the big question was how these major Bronze Age empires were fueling their vast demand for bronze given the lengths and pains to acquire tin as such a rare commodity. Researchers have tried to explain this for decades,” Frachetti said.
The Uluburun ship yielded the world’s largest Bronze Age collection of raw metals ever found — enough copper and tin to produce 11 metric tons of bronze of the highest quality. Had it not been lost to sea, that metal would have been enough to outfit a force of almost 5,000 Bronze Age soldiers with swords, “not to mention a lot of wine jugs,” Frachetti said.
“The current findings illustrate a sophisticated international trade operation that included regional operatives and socially diverse participants who produced and traded essential hard-earth commodities throughout the late Bronze Age political economy from Central Asia to the Mediterranean,” Frachetti said.
Unlike the mines in Uzbekistan, which were set within a network of small-scale villages and mobile pastoralists, the mines in ancient Anatolia during the Late Bronze Age were under the control of the Hittites, an imperial global power of great threat to Ramses the Great of Egypt, Yener explained.
The findings also show that life 2,000-plus years ago was not that different from what it is today.
“With the disruptions due to COVID-19 and the war in Ukraine, we have become aware of how we are reliant on complex supply chains to maintain our economy, military and standard of living,” Powell said. “This is true in prehistory as well. Kingdoms rose and fell, climatic conditions shifted and new peoples migrated across Eurasia, potentially disrupting or redistributing access to tin, which was essential for both weapons and agricultural tools.
“Using tin isotopes, we can look across each of these archaeologically evident disruptions in society and see connections were severed, maintained or redefined. We already have DNA analysis to show relational connections. Pottery, funerary practices, etc., illustrate the transmission and connectivity of ideas. Now with tin isotopes, we can document the connectivity of long-distance trade networks and their sustainability.”
Uluburun excavation i
CREDIT
Cemal Pulak/Texas A&M University
More clues to explore
The current research findings settle decades-old debates about the origins of the metal on the Uluburun shipwreck and Eurasian tin exchange during the Late Bronze Age. But there are still more clues to explore.
After they were mined, the metals were processed for shipping and ultimately melted into standardized shapes — known as ingots — for transporting. The distinct shapes of the ingots served as calling cards for traders to know from where they originated, Frachetti said.
Many of the ingots aboard the Uluburun ship were in the “oxhide” shape, which was previously believed to have originated in Cyprus. However, the current findings suggest the oxhide shape could have originated farther east. Frachetti said he and other researchers plan to continue studying the unique shapes of the ingots and how they were used in trade.
In addition to Frachetti, Powell and Yener, the following researchers contributed to the present study: Cemal Pulakat at Texas A&M University, H. Arthur Bankoff at Brooklyn College, Gojko Barjamovic at Harvard University, Michael Johnson at Stell Environmental Enterprises, Ryan Mathur at Juniata College, Vincent C. Pigott at the University of Pennsylvania Museum and Michael Price at the Santa Fe Institute.
The study was funded in part by a Professional Staff Congress-City University of New York Research Award, in addition to a research grant from the Institute for Aegean Prehistory.
IMAGE: CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK SHOWING HOW DROUGHT-INDUCED COMMUNITY STRUCTURE CHANGE AND SUBSEQUENT-YEAR PRECIPITATION PATTERN INTERACTIVELY DRIVE A POSITIVE LEGACY EFFECTview more
CREDIT: PAN QINGMIN
Global change-induced extreme droughts are increasing in grasslands worldwide. Severe droughts not only reduce current-year grassland productivity substantially, but also have a legacy effect on productivity in subsequent years. Such drought legacies can greatly affect the response of grassland ecosystems to climate change. In general, severe droughts tend to have a negative legacy effect on grassland productivity due to losses of meristematic tissues or plant mortality.
However, combining a four-year precipitation manipulation experiment with a 40-year observational study in the Inner Mongolia grassland, researchers from the Institute of Botany of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) found that previous-year extreme droughts could create strong positive legacies for current-year community productivity when drought treatments were stopped.
This result was quite different from previous findings that drought years usually had negative legacy effects on community productivity.
In this study, the researchers led by Prof. PAN Qingmin and Prof. HAN Xingguo discovered that the mechanism driving positive drought legacies was the coupled effect of a drought-induced increase in annuals in the previous year and an "early less, middle more" precipitation pattern that facilitated the flourishing of annuals in the current year.
If such a pattern continues for several years, so will the positive legacy effect.
In view of this, the researchers provided experimental and observational evidence that extreme drought-induced change in community structure in the previous year, as indicated by an increase in the annuals/perennials ratio, coupled with a favorable precipitation pattern for the flourishing of annuals in subsequent years, could have strong positive legacy effects on community productivity.
In this study, positive legacy effects on grassland productivity were found in more than one-third of the past 40 years. Since global climate models predict more frequent drought extremes in grasslands worldwide, these findings may have implications for understanding the impact of extreme drought on ecosystem functioning and services in grasslands.
Considering that annuals are becoming more abundant in a large number of grazing grasslands worldwide, drought-induced positive legacies in these systems are expected to be more evident. Thus, models forecasting ecosystem feedbacks in response to climate change should consider positive drought legacies in grasslands.
This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China and the Strategic Priority Research Program of CAS.
