Jupiter's Great Red Spot feeds on smaller storms

The massive storm near the gas giant's equator has been shrinking, but collisions with a series of anticyclones are likely only surface deep

AMERICAN GEOPHYSICAL UNION

Research News

 

IMAGE: A FLAKE OF RED PEELS AWAY FROM JUPITER'S GREAT RED SPOT DURING AN ENCOUNTER WITH A SMALLER ANTICYCLONE, AS SEEN BY THE JUNO SPACECRAFT'S HIGH RESOLUTION JUNOCAM ON 12 FEBRUARY... view more 

CREDIT: AGU/JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH: PLANETS

WASHINGTON-- The stormy, centuries-old maelstrom of Jupiter's Great Red Spot was shaken but not destroyed by a series of anticyclones that crashed into it over the past few years.

The smaller storms cause chunks of red clouds to flake off, shrinking the larger storm in the process. But the new study found that these disruptions are "superficial." They are visible to us, but they are only skin deep on the Red Spot, not affecting its full depth.

The new study was published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, AGU's journal for research on the formation and evolution of the planets, moons and objects of our solar system and beyond.

"The intense vorticity of the [Great Red Spot], together with its larger size and depth compared to the interacting vortices, guarantees its long lifetime," said Agustín Sánchez-Lavega, a professor of applied physics at the Basque Country University in Bilbao, Spain, and lead author of the new paper. As the larger storm absorbs these smaller storms, it "gains energy at the expense of their rotation energy."

The Red Spot has been shrinking for at least the past 150 years, dropping from a length of about 40,000 kilometers (24,850 miles) in 1879 to about 15,000 kilometers (9,320 miles) today, and researchers still aren't sure about the causes of the decrease, or indeed how the spot was formed in the first place. The new findings show the small anticyclones may be helping to maintain the Great Red Spot.

Timothy Dowling, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Louisville who is a planetary atmospheric dynamics expert not involved in the new study, said that "it's an exciting time for the Red Spot."

Stormy collisions

Before 2019, the larger storm was only hit by a couple of anticyclones a year while more recently it was hit by as many as two dozen a year. "It's really getting buffeted. It was causing a lot of alarm," Dowling said.

Sánchez-Lavega and his colleagues were curious to see whether these relatively smaller storms had disturbed their big brother's spin.

The iconic feature of the gas giant sits near its equator, dwarfing earthly concepts of a big bad storm for at least 150 years since its first confirmed observation, though observations in 1665 may have been from the same storm. The Great Red Spot is about twice the diameter of Earth and blows at speeds of up to 540 kilometers (335 miles) per hour along its periphery.

"The [Great Red Spot] is the archetype among the vortices in planetary atmospheres," said Sánchez-Lavega, adding that the storm is one of his "favorite features in planetary atmospheres."

Cyclones like hurricanes or typhoons usually spin around a center with low atmospheric pressure, rotating counter-clockwise in the northern hemisphere and clockwise in the southern, whether on Jupiter or Earth. Anticyclones spin the opposite way as cyclones, around a center with high atmospheric pressure. The Great Red Spot is itself an anticyclone, though it is six to seven times as big as the smaller anticyclones that have been colliding with it. But even these smaller storms on Jupiter are about half the size of the Earth, and about 10 times the size of the largest terrestrial hurricanes.

Sánchez-Lavega and his colleagues looked at satellite images of the Great Red Spot for the past three years taken from the Hubble Space Telescope, the Juno spacecraft in orbit around Jupiter and other photos taken by a network of amateur astronomers with telescopes.

Devourer of storms

The team found the smaller anticyclones pass through the high-speed peripheral ring of the Great Red Spot before circling around the red oval. The smaller storms create some chaos in an already dynamic situation, temporarily changing the Red Spot's 90-day oscillation in longitude, and "tearing the red clouds from the main oval and forming streamers," Sánchez-Lavega said.

"This group has done an extremely careful, very thorough job," Dowling said, adding that the flaking of red material we see is akin to a crème brûlée effect, with a swirl apparent for a few kilometers on the surface that doesn't have much impact on the 200-kilometer (125-mile) depth of the Great Red Spot.

The researchers still don't know what has caused the Red Spot to shrink over the decades. But these anticyclones may be maintaining the giant storm for now.

"The ingestion of [anticyclones] is not necessarily destructive; it can increase the GRS rotation speed, and perhaps over a longer period, maintain it in a steady state," Sánchez-Lavega said.

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Notes for Journalists

This research study will be free available for 30 days. Download a PDF copy of the paper here. Neither the paper nor this press release is under embargo.

Paper title:

"Jupiter's Great Red Spot: strong interactions with incoming anticyclones in 2019"

Authors:

• Agustín Sánchez-Lavega, corresponding author, (Universidad del País Vasco UPV/EHU)
• Asier Anguiano-Arteaga (Universidad del Pais Vasco UPV/EHU)
• Peio Iñurrigarro (Universidad del Pais Vasco UPV/EHU)
• Enrique Garcia-Melendo (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya UPC)
• Jon Legarreta (Universidad del País Vasco)
• Ricardo Hueso (UPV/EHU)
• Jose Francisco Sanz-Requena (Universidad Europea Miguel de Cervantes)
• Santiago Perez-Hoyos (Universidad del Pais Vasco UPV/EHU)
• Iñigo Mendikoa (Universidad del Pais Vasco UPV/EHU)
• Manel Soria (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya UPC)
• Jose Rojas (Universidad del Pais Vasco UPV/EHU)
• Marc Andrés-Carcasona (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya UPC)
• Arnau Prat-Gasull (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya UPC)
• Iñaki Ordoñez-Etxebarria (Universidad del País Vasco UPV/EHU)
• John Rogers (British Astronomical Association)
• Clyde Foster (Astronomical Society of Southern Africa)
• Shinji Mizumoto (Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers ALPO-Japan)
• Andy Casely (Independent scholar)
• Candice Hansen (Planetary Science Institute)
• Glenn Orton (Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology)
• Thomas Momary (Jet Propulsion Laboratory)
• Gerald Eichstädt (Independent scholar)

 

The impact of childhood trauma on performance-enhancing substance use

New research shows that adverse childhood experiences are linked with performance-enhancing substance use in young adulthood

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO

Research News

Toronto, ON -A new study published in the journal Substance Use and Misuse has found that adverse childhood experiences, such as physical and sexual abuse and neglect, predict greater performance-enhancing substance use in young adults.

Analyzing a sample of over 14,000 U.S. young adults from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health, researchers found that adverse childhood experiences are strongly associated with both legal (e.g., creatine monohydrate) and illegal (e.g., anabolic-androgenic steroids) performance-enhancing substance use. This relationship was especially strong among individuals who experienced sexual abuse during childhood, where the likelihood of using anabolic-androgenic steroids increased nine times among men and six times among women.

"Performance-enhancing substance use is common among young adults, despite many adverse outcomes associated with their use, such as the development of eating disorders, muscle dysmorphia, and substance use disorders. To date, we've known relatively little about what may lead to the use of these substances," says lead author Kyle T. Ganson, PhD, MSW, assistant professor at the University of Toronto's Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work. "While it's been documented that adverse childhood experiences are associated with mental health conditions and other substance use behaviors, this study expands our knowledge by now including performance-enhancing substance use."

Over 25% of both men and women in the study reported physical abuse, while roughly 4% reported sexual abuse in childhood. Over 15% of men reported legal performance-enhancing substance use, while 3% reported anabolic-androgenic steroid use. Among both men and women in the study, experiencing all four of the adverse childhood experiences studied had the strongest effect on use of performance-enhancing substance use.

"Our results continue to confirm that experiencing a greater, cumulative number of adverse childhood experiences is strongly associated with poor outcomes. This was particularly true in our study, as both men and women who reported four adverse childhood experiences were significantly more likely to report performance-enhancing substance use," says Ganson.

Being the first known study to investigate such associations between adverse childhood experiences and performance-enhancing substance use, this article's conclusions add to the growing understanding of risk factors of performance-enhancing substance use, as well as add to the literature on the effects of childhood trauma.

"Experiencing childhood abuse may lead to a desire to develop a large, muscular body to protect against future interpersonal trauma, and young people commonly use performance-enhancing substances to build muscle.," says senior author Jason M. Nagata, MD, MSc, assistant professor at the University of California, San Francisco's Department of Pediatrics. "In addition to other adverse health outcomes, legal performance-enhancing substance use has been linked to anabolic steroid use, which can lead to irritability, aggression, poor mental health, heart disease, and liver damage."

This study provides further insight into the importance of monitoring for potential performance-enhancing substance use among patients with reported adverse childhood experiences, in addition to providing psychoeducation regarding the consequences associated with performance-enhancing substance use.

"Medical and mental health professionals should be aware of the common use of performance-enhancing substances, particularly among boys and men. Screening for performance-enhancing substance use and adverse childhood experiences should be a regular occurrence," says Ganson. "We also need to ensure that current public policy is informed by research to protect the health and well-being of adolescents and young adults from the adverse outcomes associated with adverse childhood experiences and the dangers of performance-enhancing substance use."

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MSU scientists one million 'hops' closer to ending a disease endemic in

MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

IMAGE: BRUCELLA (YELLOW OVALS) CAN INFECT A COW THROUGH THE COW'S EYE AND TRAVEL FROM THERE TO THE LYMPH NODES, WHERE THEY REPLICATE. view more 

CREDIT: ARETHA FIEBIG

Many people have never heard of Brucellosis, but farmers and ranchers in the United States forced to cull animals that test positive for the disease and people infected by the animal-transmitted Brucella abortus (B. abortus) pathogen that suffer chronic, Malaria-type symptoms, certainly have.

Brucellosis is an agricultural and human health concern on a global scale. It was introduced over 100 years ago to Bison and elk in Yellowstone National Park by cattle and has been circulating among the wild herds ever since, leading to periodic outbreaks and reinfection. There is no vaccine for humans, and experimental studies of B. abortus in its natural animal hosts are technically difficult, extremely expensive and only a few facilities are capable of conducting these studies.

That did not stop Sean Crosson, MSU Rudolph Hugh Endowed Professor, and colleague Aretha Fiebig, research associate professor in Michigan State University's Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, from bringing sophisticated genomics tools from the lab to the field to gain new insight into how B. abortus infects cattle and help stop the spread of this deadly disease.

The results of their study were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"B. abortus primarily infects cattle, causing pregnant cows to abort the fetus, but the infection is typically studied in mouse models, which are not the true host of the bacterium," explained Crosson, who has been studying the bacteria for more than 14 years. "If you want to understand the infection biology underlying bovine disease, then it's helpful to study things in the natural host in a field context."

In the microbiological equivalent to tagging cattle, Crosson and Fiebig harnessed the hopping ability of specialized DNA called transposons to tag individual strains of B. abortus with unique barcodes. This gave them the ability to count how many B. abortus bacteria made it from the cow's eye, a common point of infection in the field, to the lymph nodes.

"As molecular biologists, we can harness hopping DNA by separating away the enzyme that allows it to continue moving," said Fiebig, who specializes in bacterial regulatory mechanisms. "We temporarily gave DNA the ability to hop into the B. abortus genome, but it didn't hop out again."

The scientists mixed millions of E. coli bacteria carrying transposons with millions of B. abortus in a broth containing amino acids and sugars, initiating mass tagging through a process called bacterial conjugation where transposons hop into and unite with the B. abortus genome. When the remaining E. coli cells were washed away, they were left with a vat of individually barcoded B. abortus strains.

"We were able to make a rich pool of about a million different barcoded strains," Fiebig said. "When we infected the cattle, we could track almost every single strain and ask, 'how many strains got lost, what strains had an advantage and was that advantage for a genetic reason or just chance?'"

Millions of bacteria went in, but surprisingly few came out. And while the genetic identity of strains that made it through was random, the number of strains that managed to infect individual lymph nodes was remarkably similar.

"We knew there was some restriction, or infection bottleneck, but we didn't understand the magnitude until this study," said Fiebig.

The unexpected results required nontraditional computational analysis, so Marianne Huebner, director of MSU's Center for Statistical Training and Consulting, provided expert guidance on the use of mathematical models to assess the population structures of the bacteria that survived the bottleneck.

Infecting a large animal host with a federally regulated pathogen also presented significant methodological challenges. The researchers relied on the highly skilled veterinarians and high-tech facilities at the United States Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service's (USDA-ARS) National Animal Disease Center in Ames, Iowa where the cows in the study were housed and treated.

The challenging field study paid off, providing critical insight into just how good the cow's mucosal barrier is at restricting B. abortus during infection.

"In the end, we gained a quantitative understanding of an infection bottleneck via a common route of bovine infection in the field," Crosson said. "This information is useful for scientists studying the epidemiology of Brucellosis in livestock and wildlife and can help us build better transmission models as we work to stop the spread of this disease."

The proof of principle paper also opened new doors to discovering specific B. abortus genes involved in the devastating disease.

"Going forward, we better understand how to use our library of barcoded mutants over longer timepoints in a pregnant host to find B. abortus genes that influence the most severe outcomes in cattle, including abortion," Crosson said. "This is a goal of the USDA-ARS as well, to know what genes in B. abortus are critical to infection in the bovine host."

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The researchers emphasized that MSU's College of Veterinary Medicine, the College of Natural Science and AgBioResearch in the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources were instrumental in supporting the study.

 

Polystyrene waste is everywhere

Scientists just found a way to break it down

DOE/AMES LABORATORY

Research News

 

Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory and their partners from Clemson University have discovered a green, low-energy process to break down polystyrene, a type of plastic that is widely used in foam packaging materials, disposable food containers, cutlery, and many other applications.

Polystyrene is part of a much larger global plastic waste problem. Hundreds of millions metric tons of polymers are produced each year, a large majority of which is discarded after use. Due to the chemical stability and durability of industrial polymers, plastic waste does not easily degrade in landfills and is often burned, which produces carbon dioxide and other hazardous gases. In order to stop the growing flood of polymer waste and reduce carbon dioxide emissions, plastics have to be recycled or converted into new value-added products.

Currently, recycling of the vast majority of plastics is not economically feasible; their sorting and separation are time and labor intensive, while chemical processing and remanufacturing requires a significant energy input and toxic solvents. Re-processed polymers often show inferior performance to that of the freshly manufactured "made from scratch" materials.

A team of scientists at Ames Laboratory used processing by ball-milling to deconstruct commercial polystyrene in a single step, at room temperature, in ambient atmosphere in the absence of harmful solvents. Ball-milling is a technique that places materials in a milling vial with metal ball bearings which is then agitated until a desired chemical reaction occurs. Called mechanochemistry, this experimental approach has numerous applications in new materials synthesis, and attractive features where plastics recycling is concerned.

The deconstruction of polystyrene proceeds through a series of chemical events involving mechanical cutting apart of the macromolecules, which generates free radicals detectable in the milled material even after its prolonged exposure to air. The metal bearings used for milling and the ambient oxygen act as co-catalysts that enable extraction of the monomeric styrene from the oligomeric radical-bearing species formed. The experiments showed that the temperature rise in the material during milling is not responsible for the observed phenomenon since the temperature inside the milled powder does not exceed 50oC while the thermal decomposition of polystyrene in air starts at about 325oC. The Clemson's group confirmed the comprehensive deconstruction of the original polymer into smaller fragments, oligomeric materials, suitable for further processing into new value-added products.

"This method represents an important breakthrough that enables dismantling of a polymer simultaneously with its break-down under ambient conditions, that is, ~300oC below the thermal decomposition temperature of the pristine material" said Ames Laboratory Senior Scientist Viktor Balema. "We think this proof of concept is an exciting possibility for developing new recycling technologies for all kinds of plastics, and that will contribute to establishment of the circular economy."

His partner from Clemson University, Kentwool Distinguished Professor Igor Luzinov, further commented that "this discovery opens new avenues for low temperature recovery of monomers from multicomponent polymer based systems such as composites and laminates. Also, our technology will allow extracting the monomer from crosslinked materials containing styrene units in their structures."

Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Research Fellow, Professor Aaron Rossini of Iowa State University, further noted that "electron paramagnetic resonance spectroscopy shows large concentrations of free radical carbon-centered species in polystyrene that was milled in air. This is a startling result because free radicals are normally very reactive. Also, the presence of the radicals gives direct evidence that the milling directly causes scission of the polymer chains. We expect that the reactive sites associated with the free radicals can be used to functionalize the processed polymers to obtain new value-added products."

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The research was funded in part by Ames Laboratory's Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Program.

The research is further discussed in the paper "Depolymerization of polystyrene under ambient conditions," authored by Viktor P. Balema, Ihor Z. Hlova, Scott L. Carnahan, Mastooreh Seyedi, Oleksandr Dolotko, Aaron J. Rossini, and Igor Luzinov; featured on the front cover of the New Journal of Chemistry.

Ames Laboratory is a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science National Laboratory operated by Iowa State University. Ames Laboratory creates innovative materials, technologies and energy solutions. We use our expertise, unique capabilities and interdisciplinary collaborations to solve global problems.

Ames Laboratory is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy. The Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States, and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit https://energy.gov/science.

Pioneering study gives new insight into formation of copper deposits

UNIVERSITY OF EXETER

Research News

 

A groundbreaking study has given new insights into how copper deposit-forming fluids are transported naturally from their source deep underground towards the Earth's surface.

A team of geologists, led by Lawrence Carter from the University of Exeter's Camborne School of Mines, has published a new theory for how porphyry copper deposits form.

Porphyry deposits provide around 75 per cent of the world's copper which is in increasing demand for electric vehicles, power infrastructure and green technologies such as wind turbines. They originally develop several kilometres below the Earth's surface above large magma chambers. Not only are porphyry deposits rare but most large near-surface examples have already been found. Any new model for how and where they form will be of great interest to mining companies.

In the new study, the researchers have shown that vast quantities of mineralising fluids could be extracted and transported from their source magmas and focussed into the ore-forming environment through 'crystal mush dykes'.

Lawrence Carter, a final year PhD student at Camborne School of Mines, based at the University of Exeter's Penryn Campus said: "Our study addresses the missing link in models for the formation of porphyry-type copper deposits - how vast quantities of mineralising fluids are extracted and transported from their source magmas and focussed into the ore-forming environment.

"In doing so we provide the first field, petrographic and microscale evidence for fluid transport through what we term 'crystal mush dykes'. Their recognition is paramount to the development of more reliable porphyry exploration models and has significance for other ore-forming systems and volcanic processes."

Collaborating with scientists from the British Geological Survey (BGS) and University of Surrey, this research involved field studies and micro-textural and geochemical analyses of samples from the archetypal Yerington porphyry district in Nevada, where an exceptional ~8 km palaeo-vertical cross-section through a number of porphyry copper deposit systems is exposed.

The team were able to identify a wormy interconnected network of quartz within dykes found in rocks that were once beneath the copper deposits. This represents palaeo-porosity in a once permeable magmatic crystal mush of feldspar and quartz. The mush acted as conduits for vast quantities of porphyry-deposit-forming fluids from deep portions of underlying magmas.

It is believed that this breakthrough may provide insights for the discovery of new porphyry copper deposits, and the proposed mechanism key to the formation of other ore deposit types as well as degassing processes in volcanic systems.

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NERC GW4+ DTP, the Society of Economic Geologists Foundation and the NERC highlight topic 'FAMOS' supported the research.

The paper, entitled "Crystal mush dykes as conduits for mineralising fluids in the Yerington porphyry copper district, Nevada", is published in the leading journal Nature Communications Earth & Environment on March 17th 2021.

Socioeconomic factors play key role in COVID-19 impact on Blacks, Hispanics

AMERICAN THORACIC SOCIETY

Research News

 

IMAGE: BLACKS, HISPANICS MORE IMPACTED BY #COVID-19 DUE TO FACTORS SUCH AS INCOME, NEIGHBORHOOD, HOUSEHOLD SIZE view more 

CREDIT: ATS

March 17, 2021-- A new study published online in the Annals of the American Thoracic Society reveals how socioeconomic factors partially explain the increased odds that Black and Hispanic Americans have of testing positive for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

In "Association of Race and Ethnicity With COVID-19 Test Positivity and Hospitalization Is Mediated by Socioeconomic Factors," Hayley B. Gershengorn, MD, associate professor, Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine, University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and co-authors looked at the medical records of 15,473 patients tested and 295 hospitalized with COVID-19 between March 1, 2020 and July 23, 2020 at University of Miami hospitals and clinics. This research was conducted as a retrospective cohort study--one that follows two groups of former patients.

Dr.Gershengorn and colleagues found that the socioeconomic factors of population density at the patient's recorded address, median income, and household size were significantly related to race/ethnicity and explained some of the relation of race/ethnicity with both test positivity and hospitalization. They found no association between race or ethnicity with death rates or other outcomes for hospitalized patients.

"The associations between race/ethnicity and test positivity or hospitalization were not as strong once we adjusted for these socioeconomic factors," she said.

Of patients who were tested for SARS-CoV-2, 29.0 percent were non-Hispanic white, 48.1 percent were Hispanic white, 15.0 percent were non-Hispanic Black, 1.7 percent were Hispanic Black, and 1.6 percent were "other." Among those tested, 1,256 patients (8.1 percent) tested positive and, of the hospitalized patients, 47 (15.9 percent) died. After adjustment for demographics, race/ethnicity was associated with test positivity and hospitalization.

The researchers conducted a mediation analysis to see if household income, population density and household size explained the association of race and ethnicity with COVID-19 outcomes. Mediation analysis is a statistical technique to help explain underlying reasons for an association of an exposure (in this case, race/ethnicity) and an outcome (in this case, test positivity).

"Numerous studies have demonstrated an association of race and/or ethnicity with outcomes (e.g., case positivity, hospitalization, and, sometimes, mortality) in COVID-19," saidDr.Gershengorn. "Specifically, we have seen that, on the whole, non-white and/or Hispanic people tend to fare worse than non-Hispanic white individuals. Appropriately, much has been written about how these associations with worse outcomes almost assuredly have little to do with differences in biology or intrinsic susceptibility to infection across races and ethnicities. Rather, these associations reflect external factors to which minority individuals are more often subject. One of these proposed factors is socioeconomic circumstance; this hypothesis has face validity, but had not been demonstrated in COVID-19. We set out to prove that socioeconomic disparities mediate the association of race and/or ethnicity with worse outcomes in COVID-19."

Of the three socioeconomic factors the researchers examined, they found that median income mediated the largest proportion of COVID-19 positive tests--27 percent. Population density mediated 17 percent and household size mediated 20 percent.

"We found that all three socioeconomic factors were associated with higher odds of test positivity, regardless of race or ethnicity," she stated. "For example, after accounting for other differences, individuals of all races and ethnicities living in the highest population density neighborhoods had 2.5-fold higher odds of test positivity than those living in areas with the lowest population density." Death following hospitalization for COVID-19 was no more common for Black or Hispanic patients than for non-Hispanic white patients.

The researchers believe it would be useful for similar studies to be done in other regions of the U.S.--and parts of the world--with different ethnic/racial makeups and socioeconomic pressures, in order to show the consistency of their findings in other settings and to better understand which (if any) socioeconomic factors impact the association of race and ethnicity with COVID-19 outcomes.

The research team finds it likely that the associations they found between the specific social determinants of health they evaluated and disease risk would be generalizable to other infections with droplet and airborne transmission. Improvements in the social situations of all patients living in more crowded, less well-off communities may pay dividends for their health when the next pandemic, or the next season of influenza, hits.

Dr. Gershengorn adds, "We need to recognize that however much we measure and adjust for potential mediators--socioeconomic factors, access to health care, access to education--we still have structural racism in this country that likely drives many health-related outcomes for minority people. Quantifying the impact of structural racism is important, but more important is working to abolish it."

The Blue Economy is more than resources: It has to focus on social equity and governance

UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

Research News

 

IMAGE: DIMENSIONS AND CRITERIA USED TO EVALUATE CAPACITY TO ESTABLISH AN EQUITABLE, SUSTAINABLE, AND VIABLE BLUE ECONOMY ('BLUE ECONOMY CAPACITY) view more 

CREDIT: ANDRES CISNEROS-MONTEMAYOR

The future of an equitable and sustainable global ocean, or "Blue Economy," depends on more than the resources available for technological advancement and industry expansion. A recent UBC-led study found that socioeconomic and governance conditions such as national stability, corruption and human rights greatly affect the ability to achieve a Blue Economy.

The study, published today in Nature, scored criteria across five global regions: Africa, Americas, Asia, Europe and Oceania, to identify the areas of investment and research necessary to develop ocean resources in a manner that is consistent with a Blue Economy ethos (socially equitable, environmentally sustainable and economically viable). These included: infrastructure, investment, economic and group equity, gender equality, human rights, biodiversity, habitat, water quality, corruption, and national stability.

"We found that there are considerable differences between regions, where some are focused primarily on resources, whereas others are really trying to make sure that development is meeting local social and cultural objectives," said lead author Andrés Cisneros-Montemayor, research associate for the Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries at the University of British Columbia and deputy director of the Nippon Foundation Ocean Nexus Center. "For all countries, including Canada, the most important question we need to be asking is, how are we going to make sure that we develop those resources in ways that actually benefit local communities? Otherwise we're back to business-as-usual, where only a few benefit from ocean resources. This is what the Blue Economy is trying to change."

As natural resources are widely but unevenly distributed across the oceans, many areas will be unable to competitively develop multiple sectors. It is, therefore, important to choose and manage sectors carefully, as development for sectors like ecotourism, fishing, mariculture, or others, can be important at local scales but may not be ecologically sustainable or socially desirable at larger scales. Ocean-based development plans for Asia and Europe, for example, do prioritize mariculture and tourism, but also sectors such as shipping, port construction, and large-scale ocean energy projects which have potential for economic growth, but unclear benefits for local communities. Oceania, on the other hand, has prioritized community objectives, traditional resource uses, and emerging sectors that can be developed in accordance with local goals. In other words, more focus on developing and transforming their ocean economies to advance equity and sustainability.

"Canada is in a great position to be a leader on this, with coastlines on three oceans and a lot of local knowledge and capacity to develop sectors carefully," said Cisneros-Montemayor. "It is currently in the process of developing it Blue Economy plan, yet, we are now seeing that the draft, which at the time our study was just being prepared, is very much focused on new technologies. Yet, as a nation, Canada has very publicly focused on equity, inclusion and deeper issues such as Indigenous reconciliation. We have to make sure that those national priorities are fully part of Canada's Blue Economy strategy and create an example that others can learn from. And yet these priorities are not currently reflected in its Blue Economy draft. What is happening in the oceans is not fundamentally different than the issues happening at a national level."

"History has taught us that having rich natural resources does not necessarily support sustainable development, and this applies to ocean economies as well" said William Cheung, co-author on the paper, professor in the Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries and Canada Research Chair in Ocean Sustainability and Global Change). "Global and local investment in the blue economy needs to prioritize in enhancing knowledge and their accessibility, developing appropriate and effective governance, improving social equity and reducing risks to the ocean such as from biodiversity loss and climate change."

"Enabling conditions for an equitable and sustainable blue economy" was published today in Nature.

CAPTION

Distribution of dimension scores across oceans, regions, and development groups

CREDIT

Gabriel Reygondeau

Low-education voters disregard policy beliefs at the polls, research finds

Voters who support left-wing social welfare programs vote against left-wing candidates

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - RIVERSIDE

Research News

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IMAGE: LOW-EDUCATION VOTERS ARE MORE LIKELY TO ABANDON THEIR SOCIAL WELFARE POLICY BELIEFS AT THE VOTING BOOTH. view more 

CREDIT: LUIS SANZ / UC RIVERSIDE

Many people who embrace social welfare programs vote against their own interests, according to new UC Riverside research.

The mitigating factor is education: The more education one has, the more likely one is to stick to one's policy preferences.

"It means candidates who employ tactics such as fear and attaching patriotism to certain concepts can persuade people to vote for candidates who are in opposition to their social beliefs," Diogo Ferrari, a professor of political science at UC Riverside, wrote in his recently published paper, "Education, Belief Structures, Support for Welfare Polices, and Vote," published in the journal Education & Society.

For the study, Ferrari looked at public opinion surveys collected in 2016 in more than 30 European, Asian, and North American countries. The surveys included information about peoples' education, and 18 questions gauging attitudes toward social welfare policies including social security, unemployment, education, health spending, industry financing, and income redistribution. Lastly, the survey asked which political party the respondent voted for in the last general election.

Among people with low education, social programs such as old-age pensions and giving financial aid to low-income students are met with support. Unemployment insurance, in particular, is popular among those with low education, defined as having a high school education or less. The program is about three times more popular than among those with high education, meaning at least an undergraduate degree.

"The least-educated support social protection more than the most-educated, as do the poorest groups within the same education group," Ferrari wrote.

But support for left-wing policies among people with low education doesn't translate to support for left-wing parties. It's not just left-wing beliefs and voting that are misaligned among the least educated voters: Attitudes against social welfare don't necessarily align with right-wing voting, either.

"It's only when schooling is high that ... positions are harmonized with the vote for right-wing or left-wing parties," Ferrari wrote. "Less-educated groups contradict, in behavior (vote), their attitudinal tendency to support welfare policies."

Ferrari wrote it makes them prey to the "demagogue candidate" who uses "caricatured notions of right and left to position himself politically before less attentive voters."

That could mean aligning party politics with patriotism, religion, or the promise of eliminating political corruption. And so, voters with low education can end up voting against their own interests.

"The idea is to deviate people's attention from some of the things they care about and focus on their attitudes on other areas," Ferrari said. "A candidate can emphasize anti-illegal-immigration policy, or economic nationalism, or anti-political-elite positions.

"The implication of the study is that, everything else the same, (such tactics) seem more effective among those who are less educated."

More educated voters, meanwhile, are less likely than low-educated voters to sacrifice their policy preferences and vote for parties more distant in terms of policy positions.

Ferrari's findings build on a long-held position among political scientists. In 1964's "The Nature of Belief Systems," political scientist Philip Converse argued citizens can't process large quantities of political information, which leads to a lack of structure and stability in their views. He asserted that, when people are asked to pair the terms "liberal" and "conservative" with ideology, they struggle.

Ferrari's new research qualifies that argument, asserting formal education can prevent that misalignment.

"The idea is that formal education, or schooling, makes people more likely to use broad organizing conceptual schemes such as notions of 'conservatism' and 'liberalism' to evaluate political affairs and categorize political actors," Ferrari said. "The fact is that we can clearly distinguish policy preferences between some social groups, and the match between those preferences and vote is stronger among the most educated, which indicates they are less likely to 'sacrifice' their overall policy preferences in favor of a few other 'issues of the day' when voting."

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Abundant and stable rocks are critical egg-laying habitat for insects in restored streams

NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

IMAGE: A RECENT STUDY HIGHLIGHTS THE IMPORTANCE OF ROCK CHARACTERISTICS IN STREAM HABITAT, WHICH SHOULD INFORM STREAM RESTORATION EFFORTS. HERE, FIRST AUTHOR SAMANTHA JORDT RECORDS THE PRESENCE OF INSECT EGGS IN... view more 

CREDIT: MICHELLE JEWELL

The abundance and other characteristics of rocks partially extending above the water surface could be important for improving the recovery of aquatic insect populations in restored streams.

Nearly three quarters of stream insects reproduce on large rocks that sit above the water surface by crawling underneath to attach their eggs. Increasing the number of large and stable emergent rocks in streams could provide more egg-laying habitat and allow insects to quickly repopulate restored streams.

"We found that restored streams had fewer emergent rocks for egg-laying and fewer total eggs than naturally intact streams," says Samantha Jordt, first author of the paper and an M.Sc. student at NC State's Department of Applied Ecology.

The study also found that some of the large rocks in restored streams were unstable and rolled or were buried by sediment between Samantha's visits. According to the study, these variables combined-fewer large rocks available for egg laying and that some of those rocks were unstable-may delay insect recovery.

"When a rock rolls, any eggs on that rock will likely be destroyed either by being crushed or scraped off as the rock rolls, being buried by sediment, or by drying out if the rock settles into a new position that exposes the eggs to the air," says Jordt. "You end up with lots of insects laying eggs on the one good rock in the stream, truly putting all of their eggs in one, rolling, basket."

Less suitable egg-laying habitat means fewer larvae or adult insects - both important for the long term health and recovery of restored streams. Aquatic insects provide several ecosystem services, including breaking down leaf litter, consuming algae, cycling nutrients, and being food for fish, salamanders, and birds.

"Many people rely on streams for drinking water, which means they rely on all of the ecological processes that happen upstream before the water reaches them," says Jordt. "Aquatic insects maintain water quality for free. So we develop techniques so that restored streams have habitats that they can rebound and thrive in."

Most stream restoration projects focus on the recovery of physical and chemical aspects. This study highlights how incorporating the natural history of aquatic insects will be another critical tool for both the initial design and the long-term success of restoring streams.

"Unavailable or unstable egg-laying habitat may be a primary reason why biological recovery in restored streams lags decades behind geomorphological and hydrological recovery," says Brad Taylor, co-author of the paper and assistant professor of applied ecology at NC State. "Ensuring stable and suitable rocks for insect egg-laying could be a small design change to increase the return on our multi-million-dollar investment in stream restoration."

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The article, "A rolling stone gathers no eggs: the importance of stream insect egg laying natural history for stream restoration," was published in the journal Ecology on 12 March 2021. The paper is authored by Samantha Jordt and Brad Taylor from NC State's Department of Applied Ecology. The research was funded by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality and Division of Mitigation Services.

Nurse work environment influences stroke outcomes

UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA SCHOOL OF NURSING

Research News

 

PHILADELPHIA (March 17, 2021) - Stroke remains a leading cause of death worldwide and one of the most common reasons for disability. While a wide variety of factors influence stroke outcomes, data show that avoiding readmissions and long lengths of stay among ischemic stroke patients has benefits for patients and health care systems alike. Although reduced readmission rates among various medical patients have been associated with better nurse work environments, it is unknown how the work environment might influence readmissions and length of stay for ischemic stroke patients.

In a new study from the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing's (Penn Nursing) Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research (CHOPR), researchers evaluated the association between the nurse work environment and readmission and length of stay for close to 200,000 hospitalized adult ischemic stroke patients in more than 500 hospitals. They found that in hospitals with better nurse work environments, ischemic stroke patients experienced lower odds of 7? and 30?day readmissions and lower lengths of stay.

Their research has been published in the journal Research in Nursing & Health. The article "Better Nurse Work Environments Associated with Fewer Readmissions and Shorter Length of Stay Among Adults with Ischemic Stroke: A Cross?Sectional Analysis of United States Hospitals" is available online.

"The work environment is a modifiable feature of hospitals that should be considered when providing comprehensive stroke care and improving post?stroke outcomes," says Heather Brom, PhD, RN, NP-C, lecturer at Penn Nursing and lead author of the article. "Our findings have important implications for quality improvement initiatives for stroke care management."

Creating good work environments for nurses is especially important so that they have adequate time to spend with stroke patients and can communicate effectively with all team members and feel supported by managers to make decisions about nursing care. "All of these aspects of the nurse work environment facilitate an effective and efficient discharge planning process, which has the potential to decrease delays in discharge and avoidable readmissions," says J. Margo Brooks Carthon, PhD, RN, FAAN, Associate Professor of Nursing and one of the co-authors of the article.

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Additional co-authors include Mathew McHugh, PhD, JD, MPH,RN, FAAN, director of the Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research (CHOPR) at Penn Nursing, Linda Aiken, PhD, RN, FAAN, FRCN, founding director of CHOPR, and Douglas Sloane, PhD, Senior Fellow at CHOP