Biggest companies pay the least tax, leaving society more vulnerable to pandemic

NOT PAYING TAXES IS THEFT

by Sandy Brian Hager and Joseph Baines, City University London

Giant advantages. Credit: Bloomicon

The coronavirus pandemic is rocking financial markets, disrupting supply chains and sharply reducing consumer spending. The crisis is hitting the likes of airlines and high street retailers particularly hard, and is decimating many small businesses. Unfortunately, this is proving devastating for millions of precarious and low-income workers across the world.

Many governments—including the UK and the US – have announced fiscal stimulus packages, including tax relief, to individuals and business. Such measures are welcome, but our new research suggests that they should be understood against broader shifts in the tax regime which leave society less able to withstand the pandemic.

As we show by looking at American companies, these shifts reinforce inequality not only between large and small firms but also between high and low-income households. The result is a fraying social fabric through which the coronavirus can spread rapidly.

The big discount

The graph below maps the worldwide effective tax rate—the rate that is really paid as opposed to any rate set by governments—for US non-financial corporations listed on the stock market. The dark grey bars show the average tax rate of the top 10% of corporations ranked by revenues, while the light grey bars show the bottom 90%. The line above the bars shows the ratio of the tax rate of the top 10% relative to the bottom 90%.

Worldwide effective tax rates

Source: Compustat/Wharton Research Data Services. Credit: Sandy Hager/Joseph Baines

This shows that the worldwide tax system was progressive in the 1970s, with the largest corporations paying slightly higher rates than the smaller ones. By the mid-1980s the system had turned sharply regressive and has stayed so ever since. For 2015-18, smaller listed corporations were effectively paying a 41% rate on their profits, while larger corporations paid 28%.

What accounts for this persistent tax advantage for larger corporations? Are they gaming the domestic system? Or do they enjoy a foreign tax advantage because they have the resources to evade taxes and shift profits to low-tax jurisdictions? To address these questions, we compared the tax rate on domestic income to the rate on foreign income.

The graphs below looks at how much US corporations really pay in taxes to different authorities. Again comparing the largest 10% corporations with the rest, the top left graph focuses on tax payments in the US as a whole. The top right graph drills down to US federal taxes while the graph on the bottom left is for the total taxes paid to US states. These three graphs show that the entire domestic system of taxes, both federally and at state level, has been persistently biased towards large corporations since the mid-1980s.

Effective tax rates by jurisdiction

Source: Compustat/Wharton Research Data Services. Credit: Sandy Hager/Joseph Baines

This is different to what American corporations pay to other countries, as shown in the graph labelled "foreign" in the bottom right-hand corner. This rate has fallen dramatically for larger and smaller corporations alike, fitting the conventional wisdom that tax competition has intensified with globalisation. Until as recently as the end of the 1990s, however, the foreign tax structure in the US was progressive, meaning that the largest corporations were paying more. This has now reversed, just like it did for domestic taxes several decades earlier.

Concentration and inequality

Why should we care if big business has a persistent tax advantage? One problem is that the tax system encourages businesses to concentrate into bigger and bigger entities. In recent years there have been growing concerns about the dominance of big business in advanced economies, including the US. Studies show that as large corporations take greater shares of revenues, profits and assets, they also charge higher prices, pay lower wages, provide lower quality goods and services, and scale back innovation and investment.

Most policy debate has focused on governments rolling back antitrust legislation to remedy this concentration of businesses. Our research suggests that, at minimum, corporate tax should be part of this conversation: the global tax system rewards corporations for reaching a size that is actually bad for society. This may include impeding our ability to mitigate the spread of coronavirus.

Take the notoriously concentrated pharmaceuticals sector, which was already being blamed for a growing problem of drug shortages well before the arrival of the pandemic – partly due to business decisions to discontinue old products that wereren't profitable enough. Lobbyists for big pharma were also successful in blocking provisions in a new US$8.3 billion (£6.7 billion) coronavirus emergency spending bill that would tackle unfair pricing and thus threaten companies' intellectual property rights over essential medicines.

The tax advantage of big business also helps to widen household inequality. Supporters often claim that tax savings allow business to expand productive capacity, employment and wages, and therefore create widespread prosperity. Yet our research shows that as the rate they effectively pay declines worldwide, large corporations scale back their capital expenditures.

If large corporations aren't using their tax windfall to expand productive capacity, what are they doing with it? According to our findings, they are enriching their shareholders.

In the 1970s, large corporations allocated 30 cents toward dividend payments and stock buybacks for every dollar of capital expenditure. From 2010-18, the amount they spent on enriching their shareholders had jumped to 93 cents.

This surge wouldn't be such a problem if share ownership was widely dispersed, but it's not. The top 1% of US households own, either directly or indirectly, 40% of all corporate shares, and the top 10% of households own 84%.

So the corporate tax regime has fueled inequality, which is an important vector for the spread of the coronavirus. Many people on lower incomes are forced to make the wrenching choice between going into work and potentially contracting and spreading the coronavirus, or staying at home and failing to make ends meet.

The government measures for individuals and small businesses are a welcome—but by no means sufficient—attempt at ameliorating problems that the regressive tax regime has helped to create. Let's also use this crisis as an opportunity to reform the tax system in ways that help tackle inequality and reduce corporate concentration.We are entering a recession: What did we learn from the last one?

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More information: Sandy Brian Hager et al. The Tax Advantage of Big Business: How the Structure of Corporate Taxation Fuels Concentration and Inequality, Politics & Society (2020). DOI: 10.1177/0032329220911778

Provided by City University London 

Criminals taking advantage of COVID-19 crisis for attacks on protected birds of prey in Central and Eastern Europe

by WWF

Imperial eagle. Poaching is one of the most documented causes of death in rare species  such as the white-tailed eagle and the imperial eagle. Credit: naturepl.com / Juan Carlos Munoz / WWF

Criminals are using the COVID-19 pandemic as cover for a significant increase in wildlife crime in Central and Eastern Europe. In March alone, in total at least 27 protected birds of prey were illegally killed in Austria and another three in neighboring Hungary, Czech Republic and Slovakia. Several other suspected cases are still being investigated and clarified, while the number of unreported cases is likely to be much higher. "While public life is severely restricted and the authorities are focused on fighting the pandemic, dozens of protected animals are victims of unscrupulous criminals. This is a real scandal and endangers important nature conservation successes," says Christina Wolf-Petre, species protection expert, WWF-Austria.

Birds of prey play a key role in the ecosystem, and also reflect the healthy or poor status of their environment. Removing a top predator can often alter the gentle balance of an entire ecosystem. However, despite their protected status, birds of prey are still seen as "competitors" by some hunters and farmers. In fact, their control of vermin such as rats and mice should be seen as a benefit. Furthermore, these majestic and precious birds sometimes fall victim to illegally laid poisoned bait possibly meant for foxes and marten (also via the natural food chain).

"Birds of prey fly far beyond national borders on their forays. It is therefore particularly important that we can work across borders to combat their persecution," says Wolf-Petre.

Poaching is one of the most documented causes of death in rare species such as the white-tailed eagle and the imperial eagle. Therefore, as part of the international PannonEagle LIFE Project, WWF- Austria is working with partners such as BirdLife Austria to reduce illegal hunting of these magnificent endangered birds. The project has enlisted the help of trained dogs to support the responsible authorities in tracking down both poisoned bait and dead birds.

"Poaching must be persecuted and punished consistently. To do this, the investigating authorities must have access to more resources in the future. So far, most of the perpetrators have remained undetected. In addition, the punishments are often too low to act as a deterrent," says Wolf-Petre, demanding action from governments in the region.

Current chronicle of known cases in March, 2020:

White-tailed eagle. Criminals are using the COVID-19 pandemic as cover for a significant increase in wildlife crime in Central and Eastern Europe. Credit: Shutterstock / Neil Burton / WWF

• March 7th to 11th: 3 sea eagles and 16 buzzards poisoned in Hungary
• March 19: Imperial eagle "Alois," probably shot down
• March 23: Poisoned imperial eagle discovered in Slovakia
• March 25: Sea eagle found poisoned in the Czech Republic
• March 28: 5 buzzards in Slovakia poisoned

Other protected birds are also at risk. TRAFFIC, a leading non-governmental organisation working globally on trade in wild animals and plants in the context of both biodiversity conservation and sustainable development, notes that there is also a songbird market in Europe. For example, Italians have a tradition to eat some songbirds. TRAFFIC is monitoring this trade in Europe, specifically countries that supply the market; mostly Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia and Montenegro (report here).

In Central and Eastern Europe, WWF is cooperating with Interpol to train local law enforcement, prosecutors, police and customs officers to be more effective in their fight against illegal logging and working on the root causes of poaching of strictly protected sturgeon and large carnivores such as lynx, brown bears and wolves. There are already strong indications in Bulgaria and Ukraine that poachers are trying to take advantage of the pandemic movement restrictions to catch Danube sturgeon, the most endangered group of species on the planet. Hundreds of karmaci hook lines have been discovered and confiscated by authorities in recent weeks, from which 2 Beluga sturgeon were rescued and released.

Our region is not only a point of origin for poached animals, animal parts and illegal timber; it is also a recognised global transit point for these products. Cracking down on illegal and unregulated wildlife trade is important to prevent future zoonotic epidemics and safeguard people's well-being and lives. With strong public support, we call on Ministers of Health and Ministers of Environment to work together to stop the next potential epidemic. Biodiversity must be protected in order to protect our own health as well as the planet's. This is why the EU Biodiversity Strategy under the European Green Deal must provide a strong push towards shutting down illegal wildlife trade and preserving ecosystems in Europe and abroad. Future pandemics will only be avoided if people learn to live in harmony with nature.

Public assistance required—please report incidents online or by phone.

Together with BirdLife, WWF-Austria is appealing to the population to inform the police or report anonymously if they suspect illegal poisoning or the shooting of birds of prey.

www.kaiseradler.at, Tel: +43 660/869 23 27

Covid-19 pandemic puts illegal wildlife trade in the spotlight

Provided by WWF 

Coronavirus pandemic requires action to protect people who are homeless

by Lauren Slagter, University of Michigan

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

As the coronavirus pandemic grows, the University of Michigan's Jennifer Erb-Downward discusses how people who are homeless will likely be affected by the public health emergency and how policymakers can respond. Erb-Downward is a senior research associate at U-M's Poverty Solutions initiative who studies family homelessness, behavioral health, chronic illness and the reduction of health disparities.

What are some unique challenges people who are homeless face in taking precautions to prevent the spread of the coronavirus?

When you are homeless, you have very little control over the spaces where you live. This makes social distancing—one of the main recommendations for coronavirus prevention—incredibly difficult. Both living in a shelter or temporarily with another family means you are in an environment that is overcrowded, where it is easier for viruses to spread. If you are couch surfing or living in public spaces, it means you are frequently changing locations and encountering new people every time—again, increasing your risk of exposure. Lack of stable housing also means that if you fall ill, you do not have a stable place to recover.

More than 560,000 people in the U.S. were counted as homeless during a point-in-time count by HUD (Department of Housing and Urban Development) in 2019, and about 37% of them were unsheltered. People who are unsheltered are already having difficulty finding places to use the restroom and wash their hands now that many businesses are closed during the pandemic, and this will become even more challenging as states implement strict shelter-in-place orders.

Another issue facing unaccompanied minors experiencing homelessness in Michigan is that they cannot consent for their own routine medical care. This creates unnecessary barriers to accessing care—which is exactly what we do not need at this time. During a declared emergency, the governor has the ability to waive these consent requirements and increase access to care.

What steps can policymakers at the local, state and federal levels take to address these issues?

Michigan's Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and federal lawmakers have already taken action to prevent more people from losing their homes by temporarily suspending residential evictions and foreclosures. But there still is a need for more support for people who are currently homeless during the coronavirus pandemic.

Ideally, we should find housing for people who are unsheltered or living in unstable housing situations—such as doubled up with another family or couch surfing. California is purchasing trailers and leasing hotel rooms to provide shelter for vulnerable populations and isolate homeless people displaying COVID-19 symptoms. Convention centers, university dorms, recreation centers and other public spaces that are currently empty due to shelter-in-place orders also could serve as temporary homeless shelters. While these makeshift shelters likely would not allow for self-isolation, they would give traditional shelters some breathing room and enable them to better comply with guidelines around hygiene and social distancing.

In the meantime, homeless shelters are trying to quarantine people with COVID-19 symptoms and connect them with medical care, while still providing services to healthy clients. Additional funding for the existing homelessness system would help ensure shelters are fully staffed and have adequate supplies like hand sanitizer and facemasks.

If we cannot find shelter for everyone who needs it, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends allowing homeless encampments to remain undisturbed while asking that people maintain a safe distance between sleeping quarters and providing access to nearby restrooms or portable toilets and hand-washing stations. In general, funneling federal and state resources to local officials and temporarily loosening restrictions that would prevent quick action will be the best way to make sure responses directly address local needs.

What other long-term considerations related to homelessness should we keep in mind as the pandemic progresses?

As the federal stimulus packages are rolled out, one thing we need to be proactive about is ensuring that people who lack a stable address are able to access the direct stimulus payments and other supports. The Michigan Coalition Against Homelessness (PDF) tells us roughly 48,000 adults were living in shelters at some point in 2018. People in homeless shelters are likely eligible for the stimulus checks, and we need to make sure they complete the forms necessary to file their taxes and submit their bank information or current address to the IRS, because not filing means a loss of $1,200 per adult.

Many states have closed their K-12 schools to slow the spread of COVID-19. While this is a necessary step, it has a significant impact on children and youth experiencing homelessness in terms of taking away access to school meals and increasing their risk of trafficking, predation and harm as they look for alternative places to spend their days. While school meal distribution sites are critical during this time, the families of Michigan's approximately 37,155 homeless K-12 students may not have access to reliable transportation, which could prevent them from picking up the meals. Also, children who are homeless often do not have access to Wi-Fi or the technology needed for online learning, let alone a place where they can do their school work. As long as the schools are closed, the learning gap will grow between students who have access to needed resources and those who don't.

Given the high number of business closures and layoffs due to the coronavirus pandemic, we also need to think about how loss of income will affect people's ability to pay for basic necessities such as food and medical care long term. We need to implement policies now that will prevent more people from being forced out of their homes as the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic grows and the state's moratorium on evictions ends

More than 21,000 homeless people in U.S. could be hospitalized due to COVID-19

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Provided by University of Michigan 

CORONAVIRUS IS CAPITALIST CRISIS
50% overall dip in purchases: Household spending swings dramatically in reaction to coronavirus

by University of Chicago

Many Americans dramatically increased their purchases during the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, but other shopping trends were more surprising. A new paper examines how these patterns divereged along demographic lines. Credit: Shutterstock.com
As COVID-19 cases climbed across the United States, households in affected areas began to change their shopping patterns. In recent weeks, many dramatically increased their purchases—clearing out store shelves and straining supply lines.


But those changes did not sweep the country in a single, uniform movement. According to new research co-authored by a University of Chicago economist, stay-at-home orders spurred distinctive spending across gender and age demographics, income groups—and even political party affiliation.

"These spending habits tell us more about how and when U.S. households reacted to the growing crisis," said Asst. Prof. Constantine Yannelis of the Booth School of Business, an expert on household and public finance. "We find a sharp increase in spending in early March, consistent with reports of stockpiling. But other differences are more surprising."

Relying on transaction-level data for 4,735 individuals through the first three months of 2020, the working paper found that total household spending has declined by about 50%—with sharp spending drops in restaurants, retail, air travel and public transport in mid- to late March outweighing an earlier spike in purchases of groceries and household goods.

That earlier increase occurred between Feb. 26 and March 11, with spending for groceries and household goods increasing by half in the aggregate. Yannelis and his fellow researchers also identified specific demographic trends: families with children stockpiled more, younger households stockpiled later and men stockpiled slightly less than women.

"Liquidity—cash available on hand—seems to play a very important role," Yannelis said. "Perhaps surprisingly, income does not. And while we do find differences among partisanship, they are not that large given media reports and polling, and we actually find similar overall spending patterns between Republicans and Democrats over the past few weeks."

Republicans spent more in retail shops and at restaurants in late March, but also stockpiled more than Democrats, purchasing more on groceries in late February and early March.

The primary data for the paper was collected by a financial tech non-profit that offered incentives for households to grow their savings. That information was linked to individual checking, savings and credit card accounts, but allowed the authors to link those transactions to demographic and geographic information, such as zip codes. Many users of the non-profit also self-reported their age, education and family size.

All data used in the paper was anonymized.

Yannelis produced the paper with Scott R. Baker of Northwestern University, R.A. Farrokhnia and Michaela Pagel of Columbia Business School and Steffen Meyer of the University of Southern Denmark.


Explore further Becoming new parents increases produce purchases

Provided by University of Chicago

THE MUSIC OF THE SPHERES (X4)
Researcher unraveling SARS-CoV-2 spike protein through music (Update)

by Kim Martineau, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

MIT Professor Markus Buehler designs new proteins with the help of artificial intelligence. He recently translated the spike protein of the novel coronavirus (SARS-Cov-2) into sound to visualize its vibrational properties, as seen here, which could help in finding ways to stop the virus. Primary colors represent the spike’s three protein chains. Credit: Markus Buehler

The proteins that make up all living things are alive with music. Just ask Markus Buehler: The musician and MIT professor develops artificial intelligence models to design new proteins, sometimes by translating them into sound. His goal is to create new biological materials for sustainable, non-toxic applications. In a project with the MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab, Buehler is searching for a protein to extend the shelf-life of perishable food. In a new study in Extreme Mechanics Letters, he and his colleagues offer a promising candidate: a silk protein made by honeybees for use in hive building.


In another recent study, in APL Bioengineering, he went a step further and used AI discover an entirely new protein. As both studies went to print, the Covid-19 outbreak was surging in the United States, and Buehler turned his attention to the spike protein of SARS-CoV-2, the appendage that makes the novel coronavirus so contagious. He and his colleagues are trying to unpack its vibrational properties through molecular-based sound spectra, which could hold one key to stopping the virus. Buehler recently sat down to discuss the art and science of his work.

Q: Your work focuses on the alpha helix proteins found in skin and hair. Why makes this protein so intriguing?

A: Proteins are the bricks and mortar that make up our cells, organs, and body. Alpha helix proteins are especially important. Their spring-like structure gives them elasticity and resilience, which is why skin, hair, feathers, hooves, and even cell membranes are so durable. But they're not just tough mechanically, they have built-in antimicrobial properties. With IBM, we're trying to harness this biochemical trait to create a protein coating that can slow the spoilage of quick-to-rot foods like strawberries.

Q: How did you enlist AI to produce this silk protein?

A: We trained a deep learning model on the Protein Data Bank, which contains the amino acid sequences and three-dimensional shapes of about 120,000 proteins. We then fed the model a snippet of an amino acid chain for honeybee silk and asked it to predict the protein's shape, atom-by-atom. We validated our work by synthesizing the protein for the first time in a lab—a first step toward developing a thin antimicrobial, structurally-durable coating that can be applied to food. My colleague, Benedetto Marelli, specializes in this part of the process. We also used the platform to predict the structure of proteins that don't yet exist in nature. That's how we designed our entirely new protein in the APL Bioengineering study.


Q: How does your model improve on other protein prediction methods?

A: We use end-to-end prediction. The model builds the protein's structure directly from its sequence, translating amino acid patterns into three-dimensional geometries. It's like translating a set of IKEA instructions into a built bookshelf, minus the frustration. Through this approach, the model effectively learns how to build a protein from the protein itself, via the language of its amino acids. Remarkably, our method can accurately predict protein structure without a template. It outperforms other folding methods and is significantly faster than physics-based modeling. Because the Protein Data Bank is limited to proteins found in nature, we needed a way to visualize new structures to make new proteins from scratch.

Q: How could the model be used to design an actual protein?

A: We can build atom-by-atom models for sequences found in nature that haven't yet been studied, as we did in the APL Bioengineering study using a different method. We can visualize the protein's structure and use other computational methods to assess its function by analyzing its stablity and the other proteins it binds to in cells. Our model could be used in drug design or to interfere with protein-mediated biochemical pathways in infectious disease.

With the MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab, Markus Buehler and his colleagues used artificial intelligence to reproduce the alpha-helical protein that honeybees produce in making silk to build their hives. Credit: Markus Buehler

Q: What's the benefit of translating proteins into sound?

A: Our brains are great at processing sound! In one sweep, our ears pick up all of its hierarchical features: pitch, timbre, volume, melody, rhythm, and chords. We would need a high-powered microscope to see the equivalent detail in an image, and we could never see it all at once. Sound is such an elegant way to access the information stored in a protein.

Typically, sound is made from vibrating a material, like a guitar string, and music is made by arranging sounds in hierarchical patterns. With AI we can combine these concepts, and use molecular vibrations and neural networks to construct new musical forms. We've been working on methods to turn protein structures into audible representations, and translate these representations into new materials.

Q: What can the sonification of SARS-CoV-2's "spike" protein tell us?

A: Its protein spike contains three protein chains folded into an intriguing pattern. These structures are too small for the eye to see, but they can be heard. We represented the physical protein structure, with its entangled chains, as interwoven melodies that form a multi-layered composition. The spike protein's amino acid sequence, its secondary structure patterns, and its intricate three-dimensional folds are all featured. The resulting piece is a form of counterpoint music, in which notes are played against notes. Like a symphony, the musical patterns reflect the protein's intersecting geometry realized by materializing its DNA code.

Q: What did you learn?

A: The virus has an uncanny ability to deceive and exploit the host for its own multiplication. Its genome hijacks the host cell's protein manufacturing machinery, and forces it to replicate the viral genome and produce viral proteins to make new viruses. As you listen, you may be surprised by the pleasant, even relaxing, tone of the music. But it tricks our ear in the same way the virus tricks our cells. It's an invader disguised as a friendly visitor. Through music, we can see the SARS-CoV-2 spike from a new angle, and appreciate the urgent need to learn the language of proteins.

Q: Can any of this address Covid-19, and the virus that causes it?

A: In the longer term, yes. Translating proteins into sound gives scientists another tool to understand and design proteins. Even a small mutation can limit or enhance the pathogenic power of SARS-CoV-2. Through sonification, we can also compare the biochemical processes of its spike protein with previous coronaviruses, like SARS or MERS.

In the music we created, we analyzed the vibrational structure of the spike protein that infects the host. Understanding these vibrational patterns is critical for drug design and much more. Vibrations may change as temperatures warm, for example, and they may also tell us why the SARS-CoV-2 spike gravitates toward human cells more than other viruses. We're exploring these questions in current, ongoing research with my graduate students.

We might also use a compositional approach to design drugs to attack the virus. We could search for a new protein that matches the melody and rhythm of an antibody capable of binding to the spike protein, interfering with its ability to infect.

Q: How can music aid protein design?

A: You can think of music as an algorithmic reflection of structure. Bach's Goldberg Variations, for example, are a brilliant realization of counterpoint, a principle we've also found in proteins. We can now hear this concept as nature composed it, and compare it to ideas in our imagination, or use AI to speak the language of protein design and let it imagine new structures. We believe that the analysis of sound and music can help us understand the material world better. Artistic expression is, after all, just a model of the world within us and around us.

Viral Counterpoint of the Coronavirus Spike Protein (2019-nCoV): soundcloud.com/user-275864738/viral-counterpoint-of-the-coronavirus-spike-protein-2019-ncov>

Composing new proteins with artificial intelligence
More information: Zhao Qin et al. Artificial intelligence method to design and fold alpha-helical structural proteins from the primary amino acid sequence, Extreme Mechanics Letters (2020). DOI: 10.1016/j.eml.2020.100652

Provided by Massachusetts Institute of Technology 

This story is republished courtesy of MIT News (web.mit.edu/newsoffice/), a popular site that covers news about MIT research, innovation and teaching.

POSTMODERN ALCHEMY

World's most complex microparticle: A synthetic that outdoes nature's intricacy (Update)

by University of Michigan

Made from curved gold-cysteine nanosheets that all twist in the same direction, the spiky nanoparticle achieved the highest complexity measured. It absorbs UV light and emits twisted light in the visible part of the spectrum. Credit: Wenfeng Jiang, Kotov Lab, University of Michigan

Synthetic microparticles more intricate than some of the most complicated ones found in nature have been produced by a University of Michigan-led international team. They also investigated how that intricacy arises and devised a way to measure it.


The findings pave the way for more stable fluid-and-particle mixes, such as paints, and new ways to twist light—a prerequisite for holographic projectors.

The particles are composed of twisted spikes arranged into a ball a few microns, or millionths of a meter, across.

Biology is a great creator of complexity on the nano- and microscales, with spiky structures such as plant pollen, immune cells and some viruses. Among the most complex natural particles on the scale of the new synthetic particles are spiky coccolithophores. A few microns in diameter, this type of algae is known for building intricate limestone shells around themselves. To better understand the rules that govern how particles like these grow, scientists and engineers try to make them in the lab. But until now, there was no formalized way to measure the complexity of the results.

"Numbers rule the world, and being able to rigorously describe spiky shapes and put a number on complexity enables us to use new tools like artificial intelligence and machine learning in designing nanoparticles," said Nicholas Kotov, the Joseph B. and Florence V. Cejka Professor of Engineering at U-M, who led the project.

If the gold-cysteine nanosheets are designed to remain flat, the result is a moderately complex design that the researchers called a “kayak” particle. Credit: Wenfeng Jiang, Kotov Lab, University of Michigan

The team—which includes researchers at the Federal University of São Carlos and the University of São Paulo in Brazil, as well as the California Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania—used the new framework to demonstrate that their particles were even more complicated than coccolithophores.

The computational arm of the team, led by André Farias de Moura, professor of chemistry at the Federal University, investigated the quantum properties of the particles and the forces acting on the nanoscale building blocks.

One of the key players in producing complexity can be chirality—in this context, the tendency to follow a clockwise or counterclockwise twist. They introduced chirality by coating nanoscale gold sulfide sheets, which served as their particle building blocks, with an amino acid called cysteine. Cysteine comes in two mirror-image forms, one driving the gold sheets to stack with a clockwise twist, and the other tending toward a counterclockwise twist. In the case of the most complex particle, a spiky ball with twisted spines, each gold sheet was coated with the same form of cysteine.


The team also controlled other interactions. By using flat nanoparticles, they created spikes that were flat rather than round. They also used electrically charged molecules to ensure that the nanoscale components built themselves into larger particles, bigger than a few hundred nanometers across, due to repulsion.

These relatively simple particles arise when flat gold nanosheets attach to one another without several conflicting restrictions. Credit: Wenfeng Jiang, Kotov Lab, University of Michigan

"These laws often conflict with each other, and the complexity emerges because these communities of nanoparticles have to satisfy all of them," said Kotov, professor of materials science and engineering and macromolecular science and engineering.

And that complexity can be useful. Nanoscale spikes on particles like pollen keep them from clumping together. Similarly, the spikes on these particles made by the research team help them disperse in virtually any liquid, a property that is useful for stabilizing solid/liquid mixtures such as paints.

The microparticles with twisted spikes also take in UV light and emit twisted—or circularly polarized—visible light in response.

"The understanding of these emissions was one of the hardest parts of the investigation," de Moura said.

From the results of the experiments and simulations, it appears that UV energy was absorbed into the hearts of the particles and transformed through quantum mechanical interactions, becoming circularly polarized visible light by the time it left through the curved spikes.

The limestone shell produced by the coccolithophore Syracosphaera anthos, one of the most complex particles on this scale found in nature, is more intricate than kayak particles but less intricate than the spiky synthetic particle. Courtesy of mikrotax.org

The researchers believe that the tactics they have uncovered can help scientists engineer particles that improve biosensors, electronics and the efficiency of chemical reactions.

The study is titled, "Emergence of Complexity in Hierarchically Organized Chiral Particles," and is published in the journal Science.

Explore further

Making twisted semiconductors for 3-D projection
More information: "Emergence of complexity in hierarchically organized chiral particles" Science (2020). science.sciencemag.org/lookup/ … 1126/science.aaz7949

Coronavirus highlights the painful political truth about health inequality

by Carol Johnson, The Conversation

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Health inequality was a major concern of 20th century social democrats in countries ranging from Britain to Sweden.

During the current coronavirus crisis, it has once again become one of the most crucial issues that social democrats need to address.

Coronavirus itself does not discriminate in terms of class. Indeed, those with the financial means to travel have often been among the first victims. More men than women appear to be dying of it.

Nonetheless, what a difference your position in the social hierarchy can make.

Access to excellent and affordable health care obviously remains a key issue, even allowing for the fact the wealthy may also fail to have access to ventilators in the current crisis. Years of neoliberal cutbacks have undermined the formerly good public health systems that social democrats established from the 1940s.

Significantly, the struggling Italian health care system has suffered from privatisation and substantial budget cuts.

Years of wage stagnation and the growth of precarious work have also resulted in rising economic inequality. This has made it impossible for many workers to build up a financial buffer for hard times and seriously limited their ability to stock up with food and medicines.

Some poorly paid workers cannot afford not to turn up to work even when they have possible symptoms. Others are continuing to work in jobs that put them at risk.

The economically vulnerable are also less likely to be able to afford the technology to enable people to work from home or help children study while schools are closed. Similarly, it is harder for them to buy in food or other services.

Women are disproportionately affected, too

Women may have a lower mortality rate than men, but have often been in a weaker financial position due to wage disparities and precarious and part-time work. In many countries, these factors can also reduce the payments women are entitled to if they become unemployed due to the pandemic.

At the same time, women's (gendered) carer responsibilities will have massively increased. Many are working in industries, such as aged care or health care, with an increased exposure risk. Some are now restricted to home with abusive partners.

Consequently, health professionals have emphasised the importance of having a gendered analysis of the impacts of the pandemic. Similar calls have been made in countries ranging from the US to India.

Bizarrely, conspiracy theories are now appearing suggesting the coronavirus is divine punishment for increased gender and same-sex equality. It is apparently all the fault of "gender theory".

The perils of globalisation

The list of COVID-19 scapegoats is a long one. Various racial and ethnic groups were among the first to experience virus-related discrimination.

Many racial and ethnic groups are also often in an economically vulnerable position, which then exacerbates their existing problems during a pandemic. Remote Indigenous communities are particularly at risk.

Doctors are having to make difficult choices about who gets access to scarce medical equipment. The elderly are at particular risk of being denied treatment in some countries. Older citizens are more prone to dying as a result of the virus, but there are suggestions ageism could be a factor, too.

Meanwhile, the perils of globalisation are becoming clear as global supply chains of crucial medical equipment, chemicals and food are disrupted. Countries are discovering they can no longer manufacture the essential products they need, including medical ones.

Major pharmaceutical and other companies are among those racing to develop treatments and vaccines. But will cheap, generic versions be publicly available or will they be subject to restrictive patents and price gouging?

After all, there are claims the shortage of ventilators in countries such as the US is partly due to firms prioritising producing more expensive and highly profitable models over cheaper, basic ones. Bidding wars for scarce ventilators are already breaking out.

A return to social democracy?

Given the market is not coping and the need for government to intervene is more apparent than ever, one might think the time for social democracy has come again.

Some countries, such as Sweden, are indeed evoking social democratic values of solidarity and caring for others. Controversially, the Swedish government may believe those values are so strong that stricter lockdown provisions are not required to enforce community compliance.

Other social democratic countries such as Denmark were among the first to introduce forms of wage support for those thrown out of work.

However, in a time when even conservative governments in countries such as Germany, Britain and Australia are abandoning neoliberal strictures on fiscal restraint to throw billions at the pandemic and their collapsing economies, the need for social democratic governments may not be as apparent as before.

Furthermore, social democratic governments face the same impossible challenges as conservative ones.

In my recent book on social democracy and equality, I argued that one of the main aims of social democratic governments was to make citizens feel secure and less fearful. Providing good publicly available health services and income support for the sick and unemployed was an important part of this.

But how can any government or political party make people feel secure or less fearful in a pandemic and economic disaster of this scale? This is a once-in-a-hundred-year crisis that could exacerbate xenophobia, as well as existing domestic social and economic divisions.

Consequently, the challenge for social democrats is that issues they would normally address may instead be taken up by their mainstream conservative opponents or those on the far right.

No work, no money: Self-isolation due to COVID-19 pandemic punishes the poor

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Provided by The Conversation 

The cold eyes of DUNE: 

International Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment

by Jerald Pinson, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory

Analog-to-digital convertors built to work at cryogenic temperatures, such as the prototype

 pictured here, will operate inside of liquid-argon chambers in the Deep Underground 

Neutrino Experiment. Credit: Alber Dyer, Fermilab

How do you detect a particle that has almost no mass, feels only two of the four fundamental forces, and can travel unhindered through solid lead for an entire light-year without ever interacting with matter? This is the problem posed by neutrinos, ghostly particles that are generated in the trillions by nuclear reactions in stars, including our sun, and on Earth. Scientists can also produce neutrinos to study in controlled experiments using particle accelerators. One of the ways neutrinos can be detected is with large vats filled with liquid argon and wrapped with a complex web of integrated circuitry that can operate in temperatures colder than the average day on Neptune.

Industry does not typically use electronics that operate at cryogenic temperatures, so particle physicists have had to engineer their own. A collaboration of several Department of Energy national labs, including Fermilab, has been developing prototypes of the electronics that will ultimately be used in the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, called DUNE, hosted by Fermilab. 

DUNE will generate an intense beam of neutrinos at Fermilab in Illinois and send it 800 miles through the Earth's crust to detectors in South Dakota. Results from the experiment may help scientists understand why there is more matter than antimatter, an imbalance that led to the formation of our universe.

Physics and chill

DUNE's neutrino detectors will be massive: a total of four tanks, each as high as a four-story building, will contain a combined 70,000 tons of liquid argon and be situated in a cavern a mile beneath Earth's surface.

Argon occurs naturally as a gas in our atmosphere, and turning it into a liquid entails chilling it to extremely cold temperatures. The atomic nuclei of liquid argon are so densely packed together that some of the famously elusive neutrinos traveling from Fermilab will interact with them, leaving behind tell-tale signs of their passing. The resulting collision produces different particles that scatter in all directions, including electrons, which physicists use to reconstruct the path of the otherwise invisible neutrino.

A strong electric field maintained within the detector causes the free electrons to drift toward wires attached to sensitive electronics. As the electrons travel past the wires, they generate small voltage pulses that are recorded by electronics in the liquid-argon chamber. Amplifiers in the chamber then boost the signal by increasing the voltage, after which they are converted to digital data. Finally, the signals collected and digitized across the entire chamber are merged together and sent to computers outside the detector for storage and analysis.

Challenges for chilled electronics

The electronics in neutrino detectors work the same way as the technology we use in our everyday lives, with one major exception. The integrated circuitry in our phones, computers, cameras, cars, microwaves and other devices has been developed to operate at or around room temperature, down to about minus 40 degrees Celsius. The liquid argon in neutrino detectors, however, is cooled to around minus 200 degrees.

"If you use electronics designed to work at room temperature, rarely do you find that they work anywhere nearly as well as those designed to operate at cryogenic temperatures," said Fermilab scientist David Christian.

In the past, this issue was sidestepped altogether by placing the electronic circuitry outside of the argon tanks. But when you're measuring a limited number of electrons, even the slightest amount of electronics noise can mask the signal you're looking for.

The easiest way to mitigate the problem involves the same tactic you use to keep food from spoiling: Keep it cold. If all the electronics are submerged in the liquid argon, there are fewer thermal vibrations from atoms and a larger signal-to-noise ratio. Placing the electronics in the liquid-argon tank has the added benefit of decreasing the amount of wire you have to use to deliver signals to the amplifiers. If, for example, amplifiers and analog-to-digital converters are kept outside the chamber (as they are in some neutrino detectors), long wires have to connect them to the detectors on the inside.

"If you put the electronics inside the cold chamber, you have much shorter wires and therefore lower noise," said Carl Grace, an engineer at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. "You amplify the signal and digitize it in the argon chamber. You then have a digital interface to the outside world in which noise is no longer a concern."

There are several design challenges these teams have had to overcome during development, not the least of which was determining how to test the durability of the devices.

"These chips will have to operate for a minimum of 20-odd years, hopefully longer," Grace said. "And because of the nature of the argon chambers, the electronics that get put inside of them can't cannot be changed. They cannot be swapped out or repaired in any way."

Since Grace and his team don't have 20 years in which to test their prototypes, they've approximated the effects of aging by increasing the amount of voltage powering the chips to simulate the wear and tear of regular, long-term operation.

"We take the electronics, cool them down and then elevate their voltage to accelerate their aging," Grace said. "By observing their behavior over a relatively short period of time, we can we can then estimate how long the electronics would last if they were operated at the voltages for which they were designed."

Resistance in circuits

Not only do these circuits need to be built to last for decades, they also need to be made more durable in another way.

Electronic circuitry has a certain amount of resistance to the electric current flowing through it. As electrons pass through a circuit, they interact with the vibrating atoms within the conducting material, which slows them down. But these interactions are reduced when the electronics are cooled to cryogenic temperatures, and the electrons that constitute the signal move more quickly on average.

This is a good thing in terms of output; the integrated circuits being built for DUNE will work more efficiently when placed in the liquid argon. But, as the electrons travel faster through the circuits as temperatures drop, they can begin to do damage to the circuitry itself.

"If electrons have a high enough kinetic energy, they can actually start ripping atoms from the crystal structure of the conducting material," Grace said. "It's like bullets hitting a wall. The wall starts to lose integrity over time."

DUNE chips are designed to mitigate this effect. The chips are fabricated using large constituent devices to minimize the amount of damage accrued, and they are used at lower voltages than normally used at room temperature. Scientists can also adjust operating parameters over time to compensate for any damage that occurs during their many years of use.

Timeline to completion

With preparations for the DUNE well under way and the experiment slated to begin generating data by 2027, scientists from many institutions have been hard at work developing electronic prototypes.

Scientists at Brookhaven National Laboratory are working on perfecting the amplifier, while teams from Fermilab, Brookhaven and Berkeley labs are collaborating on the analog-to-digital converter design. Fermilab has also teamed up with Southern Methodist University to develop the electronic component that merges all of the data within an argon tank before it's transmitted to electronics located outside the cold detector. Finally, researchers working on a competing design at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory are trying to find a way to efficiently combine all three components into one integrated circuit.

The various teams plan to submit their circuit designs this summer for review. The selected designs will be built and ultimately installed in the DUNE neutrino detectors at the Sanford Underground Neutrino Facility in South Dakota.

Tests start at CERN for large-scale prototype of new technology to detect neutrinos