Researchers devise, test food-safety training program for farmers market vendors

Peer-Reviewed Publication

PENN STATE

 

IMAGE: A TEAM OF PENN STATE RESEARCHERS DEVELOPED AND PILOT-TESTED A CUSTOMIZED FOOD SAFETY TRAINING PROGRAM FOR FARMER’S MARKET VENDORS. AS A RESULT OF THE TRAINING, PARTICIPANTS UNDERSTAND THE IMPORTANCE OF HYGIENE, HAND WASHING, CROSS CONTAMINATION, THERMOMETER USE AND FOOD SAFETY HAZARDS AT FARMERS MARKETS. view more 

CREDIT: JOSHUA SCHEINBERG/PENN STATE

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Responding to a need revealed in their earlier studies, a team of Penn State researchers developed and pilot-tested a customized food safety training program for farmer’s market vendors.

The training caps several years of research and addresses a problem in Pennsylvania and other states related to inadequate food safety practices among farmers market vendors, noted team leader Catherine Cutter, professor of Food Science and assistant director of Food Safety and Quality Programs for Penn State Extension.

Cutter said the training and research are especially relevant because the farmers market movement is thriving, with the sale of locally grown agricultural products direct-to-consumers becoming commonplace and extremely popular.

According to 2017 U.S. Department of Agriculture statistics, the number of farmers markets in the U.S. has increased to more than 8,600, amounting to approximately $2.8 billion in agricultural sales. While direct-to-consumer sales still account for less than 1% of total agricultural sales in the U.S., the impact is significant for the 130,056 farms that participated in direct-to-consumer marketing in 2017, in addition to the millions of consumers who purchased those agricultural products.

But despite these benefits, many in public health have begun to realize the inherent food safety risks associated with this relatively under-regulated food industry, Cutter pointed out. “In most states, farmers market vendors and their food products may not be inspected by local, state or federal public health inspectors, so the safety of foods sold at farmers markets may be unknown,” she said. “Farmers market vendors may be uncertified or untrained in food processing and food safety concepts.”

Research team member Joshua Scheinberg, a former doctoral degree student in Cutter’s research group in the College of Agricultural Sciences, spearheaded the research, which was part of his doctoral thesis research; he was assisted in the work by Penn State Extension educators.

The Farmers Market Food Safety training program includes a PowerPoint presentation and a resource guide. The PowerPoint presentation slide collection and associated training activities were designed by Penn State Extension educators experienced in retail food safety education.

The topics covered for the training program were researched thoroughly and specifically selected to address the gaps identified in the comprehensive farmers market food safety needs assessment performed by Scheinberg and colleagues in a previous study, while also covering major areas of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Food Code and applicable Pennsylvania state food safety regulations.

In that earlier study, researchers performed a needs assessment that utilized retail food safety vendor observational analysis, vendor and health inspector surveys, and farmers market manager structured group interviews to determine gaps, needs, the knowledge and attitudinal base of farmers market vendors, and training preferences. Based on responses from vendor surveys and market manager group interviews, researchers determined that a three-hour, in-person, semi-interactive program in a classroom setting would be appropriate for training farmers market vendors.

The results of the current study, recently published in the Journal of Extension, also demonstrated that a combination of a training resource guide with traditional slide-presentation training methods resulted in a significant gain in knowledge and change in attitudes among farmers market vendor participants. The results also revealed that participants understand the importance of hygiene, hand washing, cross contamination, thermometer use and food safety hazards at the farmers markets.

Additional results suggest that demographic and even educational background differences among participants had little bearing on their knowledge, and that the training was effective in reaching participants of varied backgrounds.

As a result of the success of this pilot study, a four-hour online version of the training developed from this study is currently offered by Penn State Extension.

Rama Radhakrishna, former professor of agricultural and extension education in the Department of Agricultural Economics, Sociology and Education, contributed to the research.

The research was funded by Penn State Experiment Station and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agricultures.

---

JOURNAL

Journal of Extension

DOI

10.34068/joe.60.04.18 

ARTICLE TITLE

Development and assessment of a food safety training program for farmers’ market vendors

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

19-Jan-2023

A double-edged sword: How close a spinout should remain to the parent’s market

Bayes Business School study finds that employee start-ups must balance competing forces to ensure they don’t fail.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

CITY UNIVERSITY LONDON

A new study, led by Bayes Business School, found that there are sizeable costs and benefits for spinouts – stand-alone new firms founded by former employees of established firms – as they try to establish themselves in the market.

The research, which looked at 117 spinouts, from 103 established firms, finds that the degree to which spinouts’ operating markets overlap with their parent companies has positive, but diminishing effects on their likelihood of survival.

Findings reveal that staying close to the parent company is beneficial to spinouts because it allows them to benefit from know-how and resources gained by founders through their prior experience. However, a high level of overlap with the market domains of the parent companies may spark some hostile actions, thereby creating disruptive competition that, in turn, may lower the spinouts' chances of survival.

Additionally, the research explains that the survival of employee start-ups could be dependent on the previous rank of their founders when employed in established firms. Examples of successful spinouts include US tech giants Intel and AMD.

On the upside, spinouts launched by high-ranked employees benefit from a more substantial level of knowledge and resources inherited from the parent companies. Moreover, high-ranked employees possess greater bargaining power, which allows them to negotiate more favorable exit conditions at the time of departure. On the downside, these spinouts may face a higher risk of falling into competency traps, which locks them into the old logic, thus hindering their ability to acquire new resources or develop new routines that are more suitable for their targeted markets.

The report was led by Dr Aliasghar Bahoo-Torodi, Lecturer in Entrepreneurship at Bayes, who said employees thinking about starting their own companies need to be aware of the contrasting forces at work in searching for the right balance between the uncertainty entailed by entering new market domains and the risk of dealing with the parents’ hostile actions

“From the parent companies’ perspective, employees’ transition to entrepreneurship can be cause for serious concern,” said Dr Bahoo-Torodi. “This is because, in addition to the loss of important human capital, spinouts may pose a serious competitive threat. To protect their competitive position in the market, parent companies are likely to retaliate and adopt a hostile attitude toward employee start-ups that attack their vital markets.

“Our study suggests that by minimizing the degree of market commonality, spinouts can obscure their visibility and mitigate their competitive threat in the eyes of the parent firms. This could play a big role in reducing the parents’ motivation to undertake aggressive actions.”

 

When do spinouts benefit from market overlap with parent firms? by Dr Aliasghar Bahoo-Torodi, Lecturer in Entrepreneurship at Bayes Business School, and Professor Salvatore Torrisi, Professor of Strategic Management at the University of Milano-Bicocca is published in the Journal of Business Venturing.

Ends

---

JOURNAL

Journal of Business Venturing

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

When do spinouts benefit from market overlap with parent firms?

Can you trust your quantum simulator?

A new technique helps verify the accuracy of experiments that probe the strange behavior of atomic-scale systems.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

At the scale of individual atoms, physics gets weird. Researchers are working to reveal, harness, and control these strange quantum effects using quantum analog simulators — laboratory experiments that involve super-cooling tens to hundreds of atoms and probing them with finely tuned lasers and magnets.

Scientists hope that any new understanding gained from quantum simulators will provide blueprints for designing new exotic materials, smarter and more efficient electronics, and practical quantum computers. But in order to reap the insights from quantum simulators, scientists first have to trust them.

That is, they have to be sure that their quantum device has “high fidelity” and accurately reflects quantum behavior. For instance, if a system of atoms is easily influenced by external noise, researchers could assume a quantum effect where there is none. But there has been no reliable way to characterize the fidelity of quantum analog simulators, until now.

In a study appearing in Nature, physicists from MIT and Caltech report a new quantum phenomenon: They found that there is a certain randomness in the quantum fluctuations of atoms and that this random behavior exhibits a universal, predictable pattern. Behavior that is both random and predictable may sound like a contradiction. But the team confirmed that certain random fluctuations can indeed follow a predictable, statistical pattern.

What’s more, the researchers have used this quantum randomness as a tool to characterize the fidelity of a quantum analog simulator. They showed through theory and experiments that they could determine the accuracy of a quantum simulator by analyzing its random fluctuations.

The team developed a new benchmarking protocol that can be applied to existing quantum analog simulators to gauge their fidelity based on their pattern of quantum fluctuations. The protocol could help to speed the development of new exotic materials and quantum computing systems.

“This work would allow characterizing many existing quantum devices with very high precision,” says study co-author Soonwon Choi, assistant professor of physics at MIT. “It also suggests there are deeper theoretical structures behind the randomness in chaotic quantum systems than we have previously thought about.”

The study’s authors include MIT graduate student Daniel Mark and collaborators at Caltech, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Harvard University, and the University of California at Berkeley.

Random evolution

The new study was motivated by an advance in 2019 by Google, where researchers had built a digital quantum computer, dubbed “Sycamore,” that could carry out a specific computation more quickly than a classical computer.

Whereas the computing units in a classical computer are “bits” that exist as either a 0 or a 1, the units in a quantum computer, known as “qubits,” can exist in a superposition of multiple states. When multiple qubits interact, they can in theory run special algorithms that solve difficult problems in far shorter time than any classical computers.

The Google researchers engineered a system of superconducting loops to behave as 53 qubits, and showed that the “computer” could carry out a specific calculation that would normally be too thorny for even the fastest supercomputer in the world to solve.

Google also happened to show that it could quantify the system’s fidelity. By randomly changing the state of individual qubits and comparing the resulting states of all 53 qubits with what the principles of quantum mechanics predict, they were able to measure the system’s accuracy.

Choi and his colleagues wondered whether they could use a similar, randomized approach to gauge the fidelity of quantum analog simulators. But there was one hurdle they would have to clear: Unlike Google’s digital quantum system, individual atoms and other qubits in analog simulators are incredibly difficult to manipulate and therefore randomly control.

But through some theoretical modeling, Choi realized that the collective effect of individually manipulating qubits in Google’s system could be reproduced in an analog quantum simulator by simply letting the qubits naturally evolve.

“We figured out that we don’t have to engineer this random behavior,” Choi says. “With no fine-tuning, we can just let the natural dynamics of quantum simulators evolve, and the outcome would lead to a similar pattern of randomness due to chaos.”

Building trust

As an extremely simplified example, imagine a system of five qubits. Each qubit can exist simultaneously as a 0 or a 1, until a measurement is made, whereupon the qubits settle into one or the other state. With any one measurement, the qubits can take on one of 32 different combinations: 0-0-0-0-0, 0-0-0-0-1, and so on.

“These 32 configurations will occur with a certain probability distribution, which people believe should be similar to predictions of statistical physics,” Choi explains. “We show they agree on average, but there are deviations and fluctuations that exhibit a universal randomness that we did not know. And that randomness looks the same as if you ran those random operations that Google did.”

The researchers hypothesized that if they could develop a numerical simulation that precisely represents the dynamics and universal random fluctuations of a quantum simulator, they could compare the predicted outcomes with the simulator’s actual outcomes. The closer the two are, the more accurate the quantum simulator must be.

To test this idea, Choi teamed up with experimentalists at Caltech, who engineered a quantum analog simulator comprising 25 atoms. The physicists shone a laser on the experiment to collectively excite the atoms, then let the qubits naturally interact and evolve over time. They measured the state of each qubit over multiple runs, gathering 10,000 measurements in all.

Choi and colleagues also developed a numerical model to represent the experiment’s quantum dynamics, and incorporated an equation that they derived to predict the universal, random fluctuations that should arise. The researchers then compared their experimental measurements with the model’s predicted outcomes and observed a very close match — strong evidence that this particular simulator can be trusted as reflecting pure, quantum mechanical behavior.

More broadly, the results demonstrate a new way to characterize almost any existing quantum analog simulator.

“The ability to characterize quantum devices forms a very basic technical tool to build increasingly larger, more precise and complex quantum systems,” Choi says. “With our tool, people can know whether they are working with a trustable system.”

This research was funded, in part, by the U.S. National Science Foundation, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Army Research Office, and the Department of Energy.

###

Written by Jennifer Chu, MIT News Office

---

JOURNAL

Nature

ARTICLE TITLE

“Emergent quantum randomness and benchmarking from Hamiltonian many-body dynamics”

QUANTUM PHILOSOPHY OLD SCHOOL

Video games, a safe space for acquiring ethical competencies by experimenting with moral dilemmas

Social media are one type of technological development that has been transformed by its users

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITAT OBERTA DE CATALUNYA (UOC)

Video games could be a tool for teaching ethical competencies in fields where people may encounter moral dilemmas. This is one of the principles behind the research being carried out at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) by Joan Casas-Roma, Jordi Conesa and Prof. Santi Caballé, researchers belonging to the SmartLearn group in the Faculty of Computer Science, Multimedia and Telecommunications. The researchers are working on the use of digital games for improving the learning of ethical competencies in teaching, specifically in the field of technology, but their research can also be extrapolated to other areas.

The digital world often sees debate around data analysts and their ability to manipulate data. Casas-Roma remarked that those designing technology might be reproducing "a specific way of understanding the world" by, for example, permitting certain interactions but not others. This is not a limitation imposed by the technology itself: rather, its designers have made a specific decision. These decisions often end up having an impact on society, either positive or negative.

 

The effects of technology

Casas-Roma's research examines the extent to which data engineers and analysts take into account "the good or bad effects that technology" can have. His work is aimed at "foreseeing" these effects and fostering further work to ensure that technologists have the tools to be able to consider the impact the technology they are working on will have on the world.

To give an example, Casas-Roma spoke of social media, which were originally created for a specific purpose, but have ended up being transformed by the use people put them to. Instagram, Facebook and Twitter first saw the light of day with a particular use in mind, but users have sometimes appropriated them in a way that might end up causing harm. This is the case of Instagram and its effects on adolescents' mental health and self-image, as some reports have indicated. "This has led to the redesign of some of the social media platform's features", noted Casas-Roma.

The UOC researcher's work is based on the idea that, although it is right that there are regulations on the use of artificial intelligence, which is particularly useful in the field of data, "there is another part that has to come from the design of technology". Technologists need to have tools to help them "understand how the technology [they are working on] might change the world". This is by no means an easy task: "it's not that easy to boil all this down into a set of rules", because "we're often dealing with technologies that have not existed before, meaning we don't know how they'll affect the world, thus calling for an exercise in foresight".

 

Learning ethics through codes or play?

The researcher believes that learning about ethical competencies through codes of ethics "wouldn't work". The design phase of technology needs "a holistic vision" of both itself and "of the users that will be utilizing it". This, he noted, could be done through examples allowing users to become spectators, able to observe the complexities of cases presented to them and have empathy for the decisions made.

However, Casas-Roma wants to go a step further and suggests making use of interactivity for teaching ethical competencies to students, presenting them with a virtual adventure which makes them the protagonists. Interactivity, he said, "opens up the door to moral emotions, subjective elements, to genuine engagement, to feeling responsible". Indeed, he has already designed a prototype game of this kind.

The project is based on the creation of a virtual narrative designed for engineering students, placing them in situations involving moral dilemmas. For example, they can be invited to take on the role of a developer who at some point discovers that a program that's just been launched by their company "might have some undesirable ethical consequences". "The great thing is that the narrative is not designed to teach what is or isn't right, as the real world doesn't often give enough information for us to make a decision. The game constantly makes players choose between decisions that do or do not provide support for certain ethical principles, perhaps in detriment to other requirements raised by the given situation", explained Casas-Roma.

 

Video games, a safe environment for dealing with dilemmas

The researcher is thus exploring how video games could become "a safe environment for dealing with ethical dilemmas and decisions that could be difficult" to resolve. Video games become a "platform for each player/student to have a space for reflection, creating an environment for considering what the ethical consequences of a decision might be", he added.

The research team has designed a prototype, adaptable to different professional fields that may encounter ethical dilemmas. Casas-Roma gave the example of the world of biomedicine. Using this prototype, the participant has to make a series of decisions that affect the storyline and its characters in different ways. These decisions may affect the player's relations with other story characters, impact the goals set for the story and be associated with the principles of professional ethics taken from codes of conduct.

The video game raises questions to which there is not always a "right" answer, or there is a lack of information to indicate which is the best decision to make. “We're not looking for participants to learn specific codes of conduct, but rather to understand and try to foresee the possible consequences of their decisions, getting them used to considering the ethical side of their actions in different professional contexts", said Casas-Roma.

The UOC researchers' prototype offers some spaces for reflection for developing participants' ethical competencies, so that they can transfer them to the decision-making processes of their everyday professional work.

 

This research fosters Sustainable Development Goals 4, Quality Education, and 9, Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure.

 

UOC R&I

The UOC's research and innovation (R&I) is helping overcome pressing challenges faced by global societies in the 21st century by studying interactions between technology and human & social sciences with a specific focus on the network society, e-learning and e-health.

Over 500 researchers and 51 research groups work in the UOC's seven faculties, its eLearning Research programme and its two research centres: the Internet Interdisciplinary Institute (IN3) and the eHealth Center (eHC).

The university also develops online learning innovations at its eLearning Innovation Center (eLinC), as well as UOC community entrepreneurship and knowledge transfer via the Hubbik platform.

Open knowledge and the goals of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development serve as strategic pillars for the UOC's teaching, research and innovation. More information: research.uoc.edu.

---

DOI

10.1007/978-3-031-21569-8_47 

SEE

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for EMOTIONAL PLAGUE 

WE GROW THEM IN CANADA;LEGUMES

What the heck are pulses? European unawareness stands in the way of this “green” superfood

European consumption of pulses doesn’t stack up against national dietary recommendations – with Denmark in last place. According to researchers, the low consumption is mainly due to a lack of awareness and tradition.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN - FACULTY OF SCIENCE

 

IMAGE: KATHARINA HENN FOUND THAT EUROPEANS LACK KNOWLEDGE AND TRADITIONS FOR EATING PULSES view more 

CREDIT: COPENHAGEN UNIVERSITY

European consumption of pulses doesn’t stack up against national dietary recommendations – with Denmark in last place. This is the finding of a new EU-funded study by the University of Copenhagen as part of the “FOODENGINE” programme. According to the researchers, the low consumption is mainly due to a lack of awareness and tradition.

It has become common knowledge that meat consumption is among the greatest climate challenges –and that reducing this consumption is a key to lowering greenhouse gas emissions. If only there was a healthy food that could replace meat protein while being sustainable and climate friendly.

There is.

PhD Katharina Henn from the Department of Food Science has just completed her research on such a food. Pulses are the dried and edible seeds of legume plants. They are a nutritious and healthy superfood - but they are also climate and environmentally friendly and often grow where not much else can. We are most familiar with them as beans, peas and lentils, but there are actually 11 types and several hundred cultivated varieties you can eat.

However, Henn's studies show that Europeans aren’t all that familiar with pulses. In her studies, she investigates public awareness, consumption and attitudes towards pulses in 5 European countries: Germany, Denmark, Spain, Poland and the United Kingdom. The result? We don't eat as many pulses as we should – with Danes consuming the least of all. However, our lack of awareness is also the key to change. Because if we knew better, potential abounds.

"Pulses offer numerous benefits to both humans and planet. Unfortunately, there are also a few obstacles for consumers to overcome before the potential of pulses can be fully exploited," says Katharina Henn.

Pulses are healthy, nutritious and climate-friendly – and can be grown anywhere. Nevertheless, the overall conclusion is that Europeans eat significantly fewer pulses than their national recommendations indicate or those of the UN, which designated February 10 as World Pulses Day in 2019 to showcase the food.

"In Europe, pulses are primarily cultivated as animal feed. As a food for humans, their potential is underutilized. This is mainly due to a lack of awareness and culinary tradition. My studies demonstrate that Europeans are unaware of the benefits offered by pulses, especially with regards to sustainability and climate friendliness," says the researcher.

Denmark at the very bottom

In her studies, Henn tried to get an overview of pulse consumption across Europe, and in doing so, identify the obstacles that challenge consumers.

Denmark is in the middle of the pack when it comes to consumer awareness about pulses, but in last place among the five nations with regards to exploiting their potential as a sustainable and healthy food source.

Conversely, while pulse awareness among the British is at the low end, consumption is midway to the top, below Poland and Spain. Whether this is because baked beans are widely consumed in the United Kingdom was not explained by the results. However, UK health authorities do include baked beans among their daily fruit and vegetable intake recommendations – known in Denmark as “6 a day”.

This may cause Danes to chuckle, but the Brits are onto something.

According to Henn, “there’s nothing wrong with canned beans. It’s a common misconception among consumers that canned foods are unhealthy. They may come in a sugary sauce, but the beans are fine.” 

Spain is at the top of the class when it comes to awareness, the variation of pulses used and total consumption. The country’s historic interaction with Middle Eastern culinary traditions could be the reason. Whatever the case, pulses are a natural part of Spain’s Mediterranean diet, notes Katharina Henn. In Germany, her own country, the traditions have been forgotten.  

“In Germany, there were once many traditional dishes that included pulses – such as lentil and sausage stew. But they’ve gone out of fashion. This partly explains why Germans know so much about pulses, but don’t have a matching appetite for them,” explains Henn. 

Causes and solutions

Henn thinks that the solution to the low consumption is to build European traditions instead of focusing on meat-like substitutes.

“There is a lot of interest in meat substitutes because the industry thinks that consumers need products which resemble familiar foods, like burger patties. But from a nutritional perspective, we don’t need these imitation products. In fact, our studies show that consumers would often prefer pulses just as they are,” says Katharina Henn, who continues:

“Pulses have been a traditional foodstuff for a long time, so including them in a wider variety of products would be welcome. But there’s no need for loads of adaptation and innovation. Not to the extent needed with regards to insects or lab-grown meat for example. What is really needed is knowledge and inspiration to prepare them, so that people begin to consider pulses when planning meals,” says the researcher.

A climate-friendly superfood

The studies also included a life cycle assessment for pulses which lays out their greenhouse gas footprints from production to consumption - start to finish. This underscored the huge potential of pulses, particularly at a time when our planet demands it.

“Our global population has just reached eight billion and we are amid a climate crisis. This calls for three things that pulses can deliver: Food production that can nourish a growing population; that can be climate friendly without significant greenhouse gas emissions; and do so in a future with more difficult growing conditions that includes drought, among other things.” She adds:

“Now may be the time for a conversation about pulses in Europe – a cheap food that is nutritious and benefits climate and environment. There is nothing bad to say about them," says the researcher.
 

 

Pulse awareness and consumption in five European countries

	Denmark	Poland	Spain	Germany	UK
Awareness	14.0	13.4	16.7	17.1	12.0
Variation	2.6	3.8	4.7	2.9	3.1
Frequency	2.3	2.5	5.6	2.3	2.9

Awareness: Average score based on a correct recognition of pulse types.

Variation: Average number of different pulses eaten over a year.

Frequency: Days per month where pulses were consumed.
 

Facts: What the heck is a pulse

Pulses are a type of leguminous crop harvested solely for the dry seed – is the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) definition. Harvested green and unripened, they are considered vegetables. Nor do they count as pulses if used for oil (e.g., soy and peanuts).

There are several hundred edible varieties divided into 11 types. They are nutritious, with 2-3 times as much protein as cereals. These hardy plants can grow in nearly any soil type and are highly drought resistant, among other things.

Pulses have a unique ability to capture nitrogen from the air and fix it to soil to create fertilizer – which benefits other plants as well. This makes the need for additional fertilizer negligible, as well as the crop’s greenhouse gas emissions.

Flatulence and other digestive problems from pulses are seen as the greatest obstacles by consumers. However, this can largely be avoided with habituation and proper preparation

Facts: Pulses in Denmark

Though knowledge about pulses was roughly on par with the averages of the five countries in the studies, Danes came in last place with regards to the quantity and variation of pulses eaten.

According to the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration, Danes eat about 2 grams of pulses a day. This accounts for only 2% of the 100 grams recommended by the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration, which has campaigned for more pulses in the Danish diet for a number of years. Among other efforts, through this viral video.

Facts: Pulses are climate-friendly

Average greenhouse gas emissions (in CO2) for various pulses:

• Dried - 11 kg CO2 / kg protein
• Canned – 23 kg CO2 / kg protein

For comparison:

• Beef cattle - 499 kg CO2 / kg protein
• Lamb – 198.5 kg CO2/kg protein
• Protein – 190 kg CO2/kg protein
• Cheese - 108 kg CO2 / kg protein

About the study

Katharina Henn's research into pulses consists of a large online survey, with about 1000 participants per country. A so-called quota-based survey was used – i.e., the area of residence, age and gender of participants were comparable across the five countries.

Links to 3 studies:

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodqual.2021.104455
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodres.2022.111403
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fufo.2022.100202

As the final aspect of the investigation, Katharina Henn and her colleagues at the Future Consumer Lab have conducted a second study that examines how our knowledge and expectations of pulses affect whether we like products based on them. The research article for this study is awaiting publication.

The work was financially supported by the European Union Framework Program for Research and Innovation Horizon 2020 under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Training Network “FOODENGINE”

---

JOURNAL

Future Foods

DOI

10.1016/j.fufo.2022.100202 

ARTICLE TITLE

The versatility of pulses: Are consumption and consumer perception in different European countries related to the actual climate impact of different pulse types?

Harnessing solar energy: new method improves readings of double-sided panels

University of Ottawa SUNLAB study provides improved means for accurate measurements of bifacial solar panels – a key long-term renewable energy source – by taking ground cover into account

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF OTTAWA

 

IMAGE: ERIN TONITA, LEAD AUTHOR AND A PHYSICS PHD STUDENT INVOLVED WITH SUNLAB AT THE UNIVERSITY OF OTTAWA, THE PREMIER CANADIAN MODELLING AND CHARACTERIZATION LABORATORY FOR NEXT GENERATION BIFACIAL, MULTI-JUNCTION, AND CONCENTRATOR SOLAR DEVICES. view more 

CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF OTTAWA

A leading laboratory in photonics and renewable energy at the University of Ottawa has developed a new method for measuring the solar energy produced by bifacial solar panels, the double-sided solar technology which is expected to meet increased global energy demands moving forward.

Published in the journal Joule, this study from the SUNLAB team in the Faculties of Engineering and Science proposes a characterization method that will improve the measurement of bifacial panels indoors by considering external effects of ground cover such as snow, grass and soil. This will provide a way to consistently test bifacial solar panel performance indoors that accurately represents how the panels will perform outdoors.

With bifacial photovoltaics expected to provide over 16% of global energy demand by 2050, the SUNLAB’s methodology will improve international device measurement standards which currently do not distinguish between ground cover.

“Our proposed characterization method, the scaled rear irradiance method, is an improved method for indoor-measuring and modelling of bifacial devices that is representative of outdoor environmental conditions,” explains Erin Tonita, lead author and a Physics PhD student studying under Professor Karin Hinzer, whose research group develops new ways to harness the sun’s energy.

“Incorporating this new method into future bifacial standards would provide a consistent methodology for testing bifacial panel performance under ground conditions including snow, grass, and soil, corresponding to globally varying illumination conditions.”

Photovoltaics is the study of converting solar energy into electricity through semiconducting materials, such as silicon. In bifacial solar panels, the semiconducting material is wedged between two sheets of glass to allow for sunlight collection on both sides, with one side typically angled towards the sun and the other side angled towards the ground. The additional light collected by bifacial solar panels on the rear-side offers an advantage over traditional solar panels, with manufacturers touting up to a 30% increase in production compared to traditional solar panels. Bifacial solar panels are also more durable than traditional panels and can produce power for over 30 years.

"Implementation of this method into international standards for such panels can enable predictions of outdoor bifacial panel performance to within 2% absolute”, says Tonita, who expects the benefits of this methodology to include:

• Allowing comparisons between existing and emerging bifacial technologies.
• Enhancing performance via ground cover specific design optimization.
• Increasing solar panel deployments in non-traditional markets.
• Reducing investment risk in bifacial panel deployments.
• Improving bifacial panel manufacture datasheets.
   

“This method is of particular importance as renewable energy penetration increases towards a net-zero world, with bifacial photovoltaics projected to contribute over 16% of the global energy supply by 2050, or around 30,000 TWh annually,” says Hinzer, founder of SUNLAB and the University Research Chair in Photonic Devices for Energy and a Professor at the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

“This will extend current International Electrochemical Commission standards for bifacial solar panel measurements, enabling accurate comparisons of bifacial panel technologies, application-specific optimization, and the standardization of bifacial panel power ratings,” adds Hinzer, whose SUNLAB researchers worked in collaboration with Arizona State University for the study.

Housed at the University of Ottawa’s Centre for Research in Photonics, SUNLAB is the premier Canadian modelling and characterization laboratory for next generation bifacial, multi-junction, and concentrator solar devices.

Graph abstract from 'A General Illumination Method to Predict Bifacial Photovoltaic System Performance' published in Joule.

CREDIT

Erin Tonita / University of Ottawa

Professor Karin Hinzer, founder of SUNLAB and the University Research Chair in Photonic Devices for Energy and a Professor at the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Ottawa.

CREDIT

University of Ottawa

---

JOURNAL

Joule

DOI

10.1016/j.joule.2022.12.005 

ARTICLE TITLE

A general illumination method to predict bifacial photovoltaic system performance

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

18-Jan-2023

UToledo archaeologist awarded NSF grant to study prehistoric city creation

The NSF awarded UToledo archaeologist Dr. Melissa Baltus a five-year grant to study prehistoric city creation going back nearly nine centuries in the ancient Native American city of Cahokia, located near modern-day St. Louis.

Grant and Award Announcement

UNIVERSITY OF TOLEDO

 

IMAGE: DR. MELISSA BALTUS, AN ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF ANTHROPOLOGY AT UTOLEDO, RECENTLY RECEIVED A FIVE-YEAR, $185,779 GRANT TO STUDY THE ANCIENT NATIVE AMERICAN CITY OF CAHOKIA, LOCATED NEAR MODERN-DAY ST. LOUIS. view more 

CREDIT: DANIEL MILLER, THE UNIVERSITY OF TOLEDO

The ancient Native American city of Cahokia is located near modern-day St. Louis, on the Illinois side of the Mississippi River.

That’s where archaeologist Dr. Melissa Baltus, an associate professor of anthropology at The University of Toledo, does her prehistoric research going back nearly nine centuries.

The National Science Foundation recently awarded Baltus a five-year, $185,779 grant to study neighborhoods that surrounded the city of Cahokia and their role in the creation of the city.

“We are pleased to receive NSF support for our archaeological investigation into whether outlying neighborhoods at the physical margins of the Native American city of Cahokia were socially peripheral or fully engaged in central city projects and how that affected the historical trajectory of that city,” Baltus said. “This may help people understand the nuanced relationship between social investment and local participation, diversity of neighborhood identities, and the futures of modern cities from a bottom-up, grass-roots perspective that considers ideological engagement and a sense of belonging as much as material benefit.”

The study, done in collaboration with Dr. Sarah Baires, associate professor of anthropology at Eastern Connecticut State University, will focus on the lived experiences and social dynamics of Indigenous people in two different neighborhoods of the past.

It’s expected to take four seasons of field work and analysis.

Baltus will create field school opportunities for undergraduate students to learn techniques of archaeological survey and excavation, plus laboratory analysis during the academic year.

Baltus and Baires said this also is an opportunity for the local community around the ancient city, which is now largely comprised of immigrant or first-generation community members, to engage with and understand the similarities and differences between their modern experience of a city and those of people living in that space in the past.

“Supporting research with federal funding is critical to create jobs and improve our economy. We unleash more American innovation when we nurture all Ohio talent,” U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown said. “This award will help The University of Toledo advance our knowledge and continue Ohio’s leadership in research and innovation.”

The city of Cahokia was comprised of three precincts extending from St. Louis through East St. Louis to the bluff edge near Collinsville in Illinois.

“The outlying neighborhoods that we're exploring will be on the west and southeast edges of the Cahokia precinct, which forms the core of the Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site,” Baltus said.

The research will take into consideration local investments like architecture, infrastructure and neighborhood organization and the potential benefits of those investments in the form of access to certain goods, spaces or activities that coincide with an outlying neighborhood actively participating in a city's public works and community projects.

“Archaeology is uniquely situated to address these questions over the course of a city’s history, with a focus on material evidence for engagement, identity and inequality,” Baltus and Baires wrote in the proposal to the NSF. “By considering neighborhood diversity in relation to level of investment in the city, one can understand whether social, economic and political ties created through intentional engagement led people to stay and continue to participate in that city or, conversely, whether a lack of such ties may lead to more rapid abandonment of those neighborhoods.”