Tuesday, September 19, 2023

Job strain combined with high efforts and low reward doubled men’s heart disease risk


These psychosocial stressors are each associated with heart disease risk and the combination was especially dangerous to men, finds study in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes journal

Peer-Reviewed Publication

AMERICAN HEART ASSOCIATION




Research Highlights:

  • Men exposed to stressful working conditions who also felt that they put forth high effort but received low reward had twice the risk of heart disease compared to men who were free of those psychosocial stressors.
  • The impact of job strain and effort-reward imbalance combined was similar to the magnitude of the impact of obesity on the risk of coronary heart disease, in the study of nearly 6,500 white-collar workers in Canada. 
  • Results on how work stress affects women’s heart health were inconclusive.

DALLAS, Sept. 19, 2023 — Men who say they have stressful jobs and also feel they exert high efforts for low reward had double the risk of heart disease compared to men free of those stressors, according to new research published today in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, a peer-reviewed American Heart Association journal.

“Considering the significant amount of time people spend at work, understanding the relationship between work stressors and cardiovascular health is crucial for public health and workforce well-being,” said lead study author Mathilde Lavigne-Robichaud, R.D., M.S., doctoral candidate, Population Health and Optimal Health Practices Research Unit, CHU de Quebec-University Laval Research  Center in Quebec, Canada. “Our study highlights the pressing need to proactively address stressful working conditions, to create healthier work environments that benefit employees and employers.”

Heart disease is the No. 1 cause of death in the U.S. according to American Heart Association statistics. In 2020, nearly 383,000 Americans died of heart disease.

Research has shown that two psychosocial stressors — job strain and effort-reward imbalance at work — may increase heart disease risk. However, few studies have examined the combined effect.

“Job strain refers to work environments where employees face a combination of high job demands and low control over their work. High demands can include a heavy workload, tight deadlines and numerous responsibilities, while low control means the employee has little say in decision-making and how they perform their tasks,” Lavigne-Robichaud explained.

“Effort-reward imbalance occurs when employees invest high effort into their work, but they perceive the rewards they receive in return — such as salary, recognition or job security — as insufficient or unequal to the effort. For instance, if you’re always going above and beyond, but you feel like you’re not getting the credit or rewards you deserve, that’s called effort-reward imbalance.”

The study found:

  • Men who said they experienced either job strain or effort-reward imbalance had a 49% increase in risk of heart disease compared to men who didn’t report those stressors.
  • Men reporting both job strain and effort-reward imbalance were at twice the risk of heart disease compared with men who did not say they were experiencing the combined stressors.
  • The impact of psychosocial stress at work on women’s heart health was inconclusive.
  • In men, the impact of job strain and effort-reward imbalance combined was similar to the magnitude of the impact of obesity on the risk of coronary heart disease.

“Our results suggest that interventions aimed at reducing stressors from the work environment could be particularly effective for men and could also have positive implications for women, as these stress factors are associated with other prevalent health issues such as depression,” Lavigne-Robichaud said. “The study's inability to establish a direct link between psychosocial job stressors and coronary heart disease in women signals the need for further investigation into the complex interplay of various stressors and women’s heart health.”

Interventions might include different approaches, such as providing support resources, promoting work-life balance, enhancing communication and empowering employees to have more control over their work, she said.

“The U.S. workforce is among the most stressed in the world, and these workplace stressors can be as harmful to health as obesity and secondhand smoke,” Eduardo J. Sanchez, M.D., M.P.H., FAHA, FAAFP, chief medical officer for prevention at the American Heart Association. “This study adds to the growing body of evidence that the workplace should be prioritized as a vehicle for advancing cardiovascular health for all. The American Heart Association remains committed to and engaged in providing employers with the resources and information they need to actively support the health of their employees and communities through science-backed changes to policy and culture.”

Study background and details:

  • Researchers studied nearly 6,500 white-collar workers, average age about 45 years old, without heart disease, and followed them for 18 years, from 2000 to 2018.
  • They studied health and workplace survey information for 3,118 men and 3,347 women in a wide range of jobs in Quebec. The surveys included employees working in senior management, professional, technical and office workers roles. Education levels ranged from no high school diploma to university degree.
  • Researchers measured job strain and effort-reward imbalance with results from proven questionnaires and retrieved heart disease information using established health databases.

One study limitation is that the researchers studied men and women in white-collar jobs primarily in Quebec, Canada, and the results might not fully represent the diversity of the American working population. However, the study findings may be relevant to white-collar workers in the United States and other high-income countries with similar job structures, according to Lavigne-Robichaud.

Co-authors, disclosures and funding sources are listed in the manuscript.

Studies published in the American Heart Association’s scientific journals are peer-reviewed. The statements and conclusions in each manuscript are solely those of the study authors and do not necessarily reflect the Association’s policy or position. The Association makes no representation or guarantee as to their accuracy or reliability. The Association receives funding primarily from individuals; foundations and corporations (including pharmaceutical, device manufacturers and other companies) also make donations and fund specific Association programs and events. The Association has strict policies to prevent these relationships from influencing the science content. Revenues from pharmaceutical and biotech companies, device manufacturers and health insurance providers and the Association’s overall financial information are available here.

Additional Resources:

About the American Heart Association

The American Heart Association is a relentless force for a world of longer, healthier lives. We are dedicated to ensuring equitable health in all communities. Through collaboration with numerous organizations, and powered by millions of volunteers, we fund innovative research, advocate for the public’s health and share lifesaving resources. The Dallas-based organization has been a leading source of health information for nearly a century. Connect with us on heart.org, Facebook, X (formerly known as Twitter)or by calling 1-800-AHA-USA1.

###

JOURNAL

Circulation Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes

DOI

10.1161/CIRCOUTCOMES.122.009700 

ARTICLE TITLE

Psychosocial Stressors at Work and Coronary Heart Disease Risk in Men and Women:18-Year Prospective Cohort Study of Combined Exposures

Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the a

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POV: You're A NASA Probe Skimming The Surface Of The Sun

Bradley Brownell
Tue, September 19, 2023 


Gif: NASA

The Parker Space Probe is described by NASA as being “about the size of a small car,” and its only goal is to fly as close to the sun as possible to try to unravel some solar mysteries. What exactly is going on in the ‘solar corona,’ and what do solar flares really do? The space car, launched back in 2018, is currently sitting about 5.8 million miles from the sun and just over a year ago it flew right through a massively powerful sun explosion. Here is what that looked like.


The explosion is called a coronal mass ejection, and this is the first time in history that any spacecraft has ever flown straight through one. A stream of particles erupted from their orbit around the sun, interplanetary space dust blown away from the sun by the CME event. You can see in the gif from NASA that at the start the view of the satellite’s sensor is obscured by lots of dust and debris, and the surrounding stars get clearer as the dust is vacuumed away from view. Without the interplanetary dust in view, there’s nothing to reflect the light of the sun.

Massive solar flare strikes Nasa spacecraft sent to study Sun

Vishwam Sankaran
Tue, September 19, 2023 

Massive solar flare strikes Nasa spacecraft sent to study Sun

A massive solar flare has struck the closest spacecraft ever sent by humans to the Sun, revealing unprecedented insights into eruptions that have the potential to cause blackouts spanning continents.

Nasa’s Parker spacecraft, the fastest human-made object and the first-ever mission to ever “touch the Sun”, has now added another first to its belt by flying through a powerful solar explosion called a coronal mass ejection (CME).

The probe first detected the CME remotely before skirting along its flank, then passed into the structure and finally exited through the other side, scientists pointed out in a study published recently in The Astrophysical Journal.

It cruised in at about 9.2 million km (5.7 million miles) from the solar surface – closer than Mercury ever gets to the Sun.

Eruptions from the Sun expel billions of tons of charged particles at speeds ranging from 100-3,000km per second (60-1,900 miles per second).

When directed towards Earth, they can alter the planet’s magnetic field, generate spectacular auroras and also devastate satellite electronics and electrical grids on the ground, if strong enough.

“The potential damage of this class of event, large and very fast CMEs, can be colossal,” said Parker project scientist Nour Raouafi at the Johns Hopkins University.

“This is the closest to the Sun we’ve ever observed a CME. We’ve never seen an event of this magnitude at this distance,” Dr Raouafi said.

The research was published earlier this month, a full year after the spacecraft experienced the massive solar storm.

In the process, the spacecraft spent about two days observing the solar storm, revealing an unparalleled view into these stellar events.

As the probe passed behind the CME’s shockwave, its suite of instruments clocked particles accelerating up to 1,350km (840 miles) per second.

If such a flare had been directed towards Earth, Dr Raouafi suspects it may have been close in magnitude to the Carrington Event – an 1859 solar storm held as the most powerful on record to hit Earth.

Such an event today, if detected too late, could disable communications systems and lead to continent-wide blackouts, researchers said.

However, the Parker probe was unfazed thanks to its heat shield and radiators, while its thermal protection system ensured its temperatures never changed.

Scientists are currently working to piece together how the event unfolded by comparing measurements collected by the probe within the CME with those gathered outside it.

“You try simplified models to explain certain aspects of the event, but when you are this close to the Sun, none of these models can explain everything,” said study lead author Orlando Romeo from the University of California, Berkeley.

“We’re still not exactly sure what is happening there or how to connect it,” Dr Romeo said.

Researchers said the spacecraft is likely to observe more such massive CMEs as the Sun approaches solar maximum – a peak in its 11-year activity cycle that is expected in 2025.

The spacecraft’s next solar flyby is set to occur on 27 September.

Parker Solar Probe and Solar Orbiter team up to tackle 65-year-old sun mystery

Robert Lea
Sun, September 17, 2023 

Two views of the sun, the left looks like a yellow fiery ball of plasma while the right looks like a glowing white light with reddish beams around it.

A new groundbreaking measurement made by the Solar Orbiter spacecraft and the Parker Solar probe brings scientists closer than ever to solving a longstanding mystery surrounding the sun. Oddly enough, our host star's atmosphere, or corona, is staggeringly hotter than the solar surface despite being further away from the obvious source of the sun’s heat — and this is a puzzle that has troubled physicists for about 65 years.

The collaboration between these two instruments was made possible when the Solar Orbiter, operated by the European Space Agency (ESA) performed some space-based gymnastics. These maneuvers allowed the spacecraft to observe the sun and NASA’s Parker Solar Probe at the same time. Ultimately, that allowed for simultaneous solar observations between the two, which together indicated that turbulence is likely heating the solar corona to incredible temperatures.

"The ability to use both Solar Orbiter and Parker Solar Probe has really opened up an entirely new dimension in this research," Gary Zank, co-author of a study on the results and a researcher at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, said in a statement.

This team-up could finally solve the so-called "coronal heating mystery," which revolves around that heat discrepancy between the corona, made of wispy and nebulous electrically charged gas called plasma, and the sun’s surface, or photosphere.

What is the coronal heating mystery?

The corona can reach temperatures as great as 1.8 million degrees Fahrenheit (1,000,000 degrees Celsius), while 1,000 miles below it, the photosphere only reaches temperatures of around 10,800 degrees Fahrenheit (6,000 degrees Celsius).

That is a troubling fact because the sun’s core, where the nuclear fusion of hydrogen to helium occurs, is where the vast majority of the sun’s heat comes from. This is like air about one foot above a campfire being hotter than air one inch away from the flames.

The discrepancy in heat also means there must be another heating mechanism at play directly on the corona. Until now, that mechanism has evaded scientists, but turbulence in the atmosphere of the sun significantly heating coronal plasma has long been considered a plausible explanation. However, that hypothesis had been impossible to investigate with data from one spacecraft.

Satellites can investigate the sun in two ways: they can get up close and personal, making in-situ measurements like NASA’s Parker Solar Probe does, or they can make more remote investigations like the Solar Orbiter. The Solar Orbiter studies the corona from around 26 million miles (42 million kilometers) away from the sun, while the Parker Solar Probe braves the blazing hot plasma of the sun as it passes around 4 million miles (6.4 million km) from the solar surface.

But, there is a trade-off between the two approaches.

Remote sensing can see broad details about the sun, but suffers when it comes to making observations of what physics is at play in coronal plasma. On the other hand, in-situ observations can measure that plasma in greater detail but tend to miss the bigger solar picture.

That means uniting the large-scale measurements of events on the sun from the Solar Orbiter with the detailed observations of the same phenomenon by the Parker Solar Probe could present us with the total picture of the sun with all intricate details filled in — the best of both worlds.

This isn’t as straightforward as it sounds, however. To facilitate this team-up, the Parker Solar Probe would have to be within the field of view of one of the Solar Orbiter’s instruments as the two observe the sun from their relative positions.
How scientists achieved the 'best of both worlds' to potentially solve a solar mystery

A team of astronomers, including Italian National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF) researcher Daniele Telloni, discovered that on June 1, 2022, the two solar observatories would be within touching distance of the desired orbital configuration to engage in such a team-up.

As the Solar Orbiter would be looking at the sun, the Parker Solar Probe would be just off to the side, only a little bit out of view of the ESA spacecraft’s Metis instrument — a device called a "coronagraph" that blocks out light from the photosphere to image the corona and is ideal for large-scale, distant observations.

An artist's illustration of the sun, the Earth, the Parker Solar Probe and Solar Orbiter in one scene.


To perfectly line up the two spacecraft and get the Parker Solar Probe in view of Metis, the Solar Orbiter performed a 45-degree roll and was then pointed slightly away from the sun.

The data that was collected as a result of this well-planned maneuver authorized by the spacecraft’s operation team paid off, revealing turbulence that could indeed be transferring energy in the way solar physicists had theoretically predicted would be causing coronal heating.

The turbulence drives coronal heating in a way that is similar to what happens when coffee is stirred here on Earth. Energy is transferred to smaller scales by random movements in a fluid or gas — coffee and plasma — and this converts that energy to heat. In the case of the corona, plasma is magnetized, and that means stored magnetic energy can also be converted to heat.

The transfer of magnetic and movement or kinetic energy from larger to smaller scales is the very essence of this turbulence, and at the smallest scales, it allows the fluctuations to interact with individual particles, mostly positively charged protons, heating them.

That isn’t to say the mystery of coronal heating is "case closed," however. Solar scientists still need to confirm the mechanism that has been hinted at by these results and by the collaboration between the Parker Solar Probe and the Solar Orbiter.

"This is a scientific first. This work represents a significant step forward in solving the coronal heating problem," Solar Orbiter Project Scientist Daniel Müller said.

The team’s research was published on Thursday (Sept. 14) in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.


See the sun's atmosphere like never before thanks to a simple Solar Orbiter camera hack (video)

Tereza Pultarova
September 6, 2023

A composite image of the sun consisting of the view of the sun's atmosphere as observed by the Solar Orbiter's EUI instrument and an image of the sun's disk taken by NASA's STEREO spacecraft.


The European Solar Orbiter spacecraft has peered into previously unexplored parts of the sun's atmosphere thanks to scientists who applied a simple hack to its main camera.

Solar Orbiter, launched in 2020, has delivered an impressive string of new discoveries during its three years studying the sun so far. The spacecraft, fitted with a suite of ten instruments, has proven to be especially capable of unraveling mysteries surrounding the sun's atmosphere. From the discovery of miniature flares, called campfires, in the spacecraft's first images to the recent finding of the likely mechanism driving the solar wind, Solar Orbiter has been consistently delivering ground-breaking science about the star at the center of our solar system. And more is to come.

Researchers behind one of Solar Orbiter's most powerful instruments, the Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) — a camera that studies the most energetic parts of ultraviolet light emitted by the sun — have now, for the first time, revealed a completely new way of using this powerful instrument.

Related: Solar Orbiter catches Mercury crossing the sun. Here's the amazing video.

Solar Orbiter took this image of the sun during its close approach in March 2022. At that time, the spacecraft was closer to the star than the solar system's innermost planet Mercury.

This new mode of operation works similarly to an instrument called the coronagraph. The coronagraph is a device that shields the sun's disk to allow scientists to view the surrounding atmosphere that is up to a million times fainter than the blocked-out region. Though Solar Orbiter actually carries a coronagraph, called METIS, that instrument observes the solar atmosphere in visible light and in the lower-energy ultraviolet part of the electromagnetic spectrum.

But it is in the part of the light spectrum that is only visible to EUI that scientists can study the most intriguing phenomena that occur at the boundary between the sun's atmosphere and its surface.

"Physics is changing there, the magnetic structures are changing there, and we never really had a good look at it before," David Berghmans, EUI principal investigator and solar physicist at the Royal Observatory of Belgium, said in the statement. "There must be some secrets in there that we can now find."

EUI science team member Frédéric Auchère, an astrophysicist at the Institute of Astrophysics of the Université Paris-Sud in France, described the new imaging mode as a result of "a hack," a last-minute modification devised before the launch of Solar Orbiter in early 2020.

"I had the idea to just do it and see if it would work," Auchère said in a European Space Agency (ESA) statement. "It is actually a very simple modification to the instrument."

The scientists added a tiny protruding "thumb" to the instruments shutter. When the shutter opens only halfway, this thumb obscures the sun's disk, allowing EUI to see with great clarity the faint solar atmosphere.

In the video sequence obtained through the new imaging mode, scientists combined the Solar Orbiter's EUI view of the sun's atmosphere with an image of the star taken by NASA's STEREO mission, which orbits the sun at a slightly closer distance than Earth does. Solar Orbiter, for comparison, follows an elliptical orbit that periodically takes the spacecraft within the orbit of the solar system's innermost planet, Mercury.

By coincidence, STEREO happened to be looking at the sun from the same angle as Solar Orbiter was during the experiments with the new EUI imaging mode. That allowed scientists to combine the images and study the links between phenomena observed on the surface and in the atmosphere.

Observers on Earth can naturally see the outermost parts of the sun's atmosphere during total solar eclipses. The new EUI imaging mode, however, allows scientists to peer into regions of the atmosphere that are much closer to the sun's surface than what such rare events and conventional coronagraphs allow.

EUI images the sun in very high resolution, and although Earth-based telescopes with large mirrors can study the sun's surface in even greater resolution, they can't observe the fascinating high-energy, ultraviolet light that EUI sees. This is because that light gets absorbed by Earth's atmosphere before it reaches the telescopes' lenses. Solar Orbiter, on the other hand, travelling in the vacuum of space has a perfectly clear view of the star. The mission takes the closest ever images of the star and in a few years will take a look a the star's poles — the world's first. Scientists hope that studying the sun's polar regions up close will shed light on the mysterious forces driving the sun's magnetic field, which in turns drives the generation of sunspots, solar flares and eruptions.
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A DIFFERENT KIND OF VLT
Very Large Telescope surprisingly finds exoplanet lurking in 3-body star system

Tereza Pultarova
SPACE.COM
Mon, September 18, 2023 

An artist's illustration of the gas giant discovered in star system HIP 81208. It looks like a cream-colored orb in the foreground. A bright star is seen glowing in the background.

The Very Large Telescope in Chile has photographed a planet orbiting a star in a multi-star system located some 480 light-years from Earth.

The exoplanet, 15 times more massive than our solar system's largest planet Jupiter, orbits a small star that itself orbits a larger star. Also orbiting the larger star is a brown dwarf, or "failed" star. Brown dwarfs are given such a gloomy moniker because these objects are not massive enough to sustain nuclear fusion in their cores like typical stars do, but are still too large to be called planets.

The system of the two stars and the brown dwarf, collectively called HIP 81208, has been known to astronomers for a long time. But the existence of an exoplanet in orbit of the smaller star came as a surprise to astronomers who recently re-examined images of the system taken earlier by the European Southern Observatory's (ESO) Very Large Telescope in Chile.

The newly discovered exoplanet is also quite massive, nearly large enough to be called a brown dwarf itself.

Related: The 10 most Earth-like exoplanets

The team's discovery marks the first hierarchical quadruple system to be found using direct imaging, ESO said in a statement. Most exoplanets are discovered through the so-called transit method, which involves observing subtle dips in a star's brightness caused by a planet passing in front of its disk from the point of the observer.


A diagram showing the quadruple-body star system.

Astronomers thought HIP 81208 was a system consisting of a massive central star (A, the central bright spot), a brown dwarf (B) circling around it, and a low-mass star (C) orbiting further away. However, a new study has revealed a never-before-seen hidden gem: an object (Cb), approximately 15 times more massive than Jupiter, orbiting around the smaller of the two stars (C). (Image credit: ESO/A. Chomez et al.)

Direct imaging is, in essence, traditional photography. However, astronomers using this method to capture deep space worlds use very powerful telescopes and super-sensitive cameras to see planetary subjects directly. And in the reanalyzed images, astronomers from the Paris Observatory detected the giant exoplanet creating a blob in the ring of light surrounding its parent star.

The discovery will help astronomers further their understanding of the formation of complex systems, ESO said in the statement.
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Engineers utilize ancient materials to develop new ‘supercapacitor’ cement: It’s a ‘fascinating’ combination

Rick Kazmer
September 7, 2023·



The wise man built his house upon a … supercapacitor?

Engineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology believe that this could be the case as they continue working on a unique renewable-energy storage system created from cement, water, and carbon black. The latter material resembles fine charcoal, according to the MIT experts.

If the battery alternative proves successful, home foundations could soon be made from a unique mix of ancient and new materials, creating energy storage at home and beyond.

“The material is fascinating,” MIT professor Admir Masic said in a university report, “because you have the most-used man-made material in the world, cement, that is combined with carbon black, that is a well-known historical material — the Dead Sea Scrolls were written with it.”

It’s important as experts continue the search for effective storage for renewable energy from the sun, wind, and waves. Since those energy sources can only produce power during specific times, that power must be stored for later use.

For this invention, the MIT researchers have figured out how to make the chemistry that charges batteries work in cement. Part of the big breakthrough is including carbon black, which is highly conductive, into the mix. Water helps the carbon form “wire-like” structures in the cement as it dries. The material is soaked in a salty solution that is an electrolyte, which is key to the process, just like in regular batteries, all per MIT in a lengthy description of the process.

In short, some other key parts needed for the charge/discharge cycle are added, creating an environment that allows the supercapacitor to work. A big improvement is the use of readily  available materials like cement instead of lithium, which is rare and often takes invasive mining to gather.

The payoff is realized in the power storage. MIT researchers said that a nearly 59-cubic-yard piece of their cement, complete with nanosized carbon black, could store enough energy to power a house for a day.

“Since the concrete would retain its strength, a house with a foundation made of this material could store a day’s worth of energy produced by solar panels or windmills and allow it to be used whenever it’s needed. And, supercapacitors can be charged and discharged much more rapidly than batteries,” according to the research report.

The experts are still working out some specifics. The more carbon black is added, power storage capacity increases while structural strength is reduced.

One futuristic idea is to make concrete roads that can be charged with solar panels. A supercapacitor highway could then charge electric vehicles, similar to how certain cellphones can be juiced up wirelessly, per MIT.

The goal is for concrete to help create a cleaner planet instead of just contributing to the air pollution tally.

It’s “a new way of looking toward the future of concrete as part of the energy transition,” MIT Professor Franz-Josef Ulm said in the report.


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Mike Pence Pushes Ban on TikTok, 
Calling It a Communist Platform


Gregory Korte, Annmarie Hordern and Joe Mathieu
Fri, September 15, 2023




(Bloomberg) -- Former Vice President Mike Pence said the US should ban TikTok, calling it a platform that allowed the Chinese government to obtain data on Americans without their knowledge.

“We ought to be banning TikTok. TikTok is a platform for the Chinese Communist government. They are collecting data on Americans every single day,” Pence said Friday in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “Young Americans need to know that their privacy is being compromised.”

Pence’s comments come before a policy speech he will deliver Monday on China. The relationship between the world’s two largest economies has gained growing attention in the 2024 presidential race. Republican candidates, including Pence, have criticized President Joe Biden, saying he must take a tougher line with Beijing over a number of issues.

Pence delivered a jab at one of his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy.

“I know that one of my competitors, Vivek Ramaswamy in the Republican primary, he had rightly described Tiktok as a digital fentanyl for American youth, and this week he signed up for Tiktok. He said he’d met with one of their executives and they changed his mind,” Pence said. “Well, they are never going to change my mind.”

The fight over TikTok is just one aspect of the growing tensions between the US and China over their technological ambitions. Biden has limited exports of advanced chipmaking technology over fears it could be used to help China’s military. China in turn has imposed its own restrictions, including on US chipmaker Micron Technology Inc.’s ability to sell products.

China is also seeking to ban the use of iPhones for state-owned enterprises — a blow to Apple Inc. that would broaden previously announced restrictions. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby this week told reporters that China’s moves on Apple appeared to be retaliation.

Earlier: China’s Apple iPhone Ban Appears to Be Retaliation, US Says

Huawei Technologies Co. also recently quietly revealed a mobile telephone that uses technology the US has sought to keep out of Beijing’s hands, questioning the efficacy of US chip restrictions.

“We led the fight internationally against Huawei among Western nations, and we won that fight,” Pence said. “If you remember, the UK and other nations were going all in on Huawei, and the United States said it’s not going to happen.”

Pence on Friday said Biden had “dropped the ball” on China. Still, he said the US should not seek to decouple from the country despite the threat it posed.

“We have to recognize that China’s the greatest economic and strategic threat of the United States of America,” Pence said, but added, “I think using access to the most powerful economy in the world, the United States of America, is a means of having China end decades of trade abuses, end intellectual property thefts, stop their military provocations, and end the human rights abuses.”

Pence said his speech on Monday would be focused on “giving China an opportunity to join the family of nations and respect the international rules of the road as I like to say.”

“The other piece of this, I believe in free trade with free nations,” Pence said. “We ought to be working on a free trade agreement with Japan. We ought to be looking to strengthen trading relationships with free nations across the Asia Pacific.”

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UK
Significant artefacts found on Thornton site for homes

BBC
Fri, September 15, 2023 


Archaeologists excavating land for a proposed housing development say they have made some significant finds.

The team from Oxford Archaeology North (OAN) said the site in Lancashire has evidence of an Iron Age settlement and Roman occupation as well.

"Unlike other Iron Age sites in Lancashire we have found ceramics and pottery in Bourne Hill," said Paul Dunn of OAN.

Developer Ecclestone Homes has applied to build 158 homes on the site.

Mr Dunn said like other Iron Age excavations in the county the dig at Thornton, near Blackpool, had revealed round houses with their surrounding ditches, but the discovery of Iron Age bowls and Roman pottery marked it out from other excavations.

He added: "Lancashire was wet with marshland and settlements tended to be on a hill.

"It is a significant site because there of signs of a long occupation from the Iron Age to Roman Britain."

Wyre Council, which is liaising with OAN, said: "Ecclestone Homes have applied for planning permission to develop 158 homes on the site at Bourne Hill in Thornton.

"Planning permission is soon to be granted subject to a number of conditions. One of those is to conduct an archaeological survey and this is currently under way.

"So far, excavation works completed by a team of archaeologists from Oxford Archaeology North (OAN) has revealed findings of interest. Following the completion of the fieldwork on the site, OAN will produce a post-excavation assessment report."

Local MP Paul Maynard said he was excited by the discovery, adding: "It certainly piqued my interest.

"It is always interesting to know what the area you represent was like thousands of years before you came to represent it," he said.

The Conservative MP for Blackpool North and Cleveleys added: "We don't want to lose this important insight into our area's past before it is concreted over.

"There is a code of practice and I want to make sure it is adhered to."

Ecclestone Homes has been contacted for a comment.

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British Museum: Chinese TikTok hit amplifies calls for return of artefacts

Fan Wang & Derek Cai - BBC News
September 6, 2023·

Escape from the British Museum tells the story of a jade teapot becoming human and wishing to return to China.


A short video series is racking up views in China, amplifying calls for the British Museum to return artefacts.

It tells the story of a jade teapot, played by a woman, looking for its way back to China.

The world-renowned museum has been under pressure after 2,000 items were reported to be "missing, stolen or damaged" last month.

The scandal has prompted demands from China and other countries for treasures to be returned.

Titled Escape from the British Museum, the three-part series from two Chinese social media influencers tells the story of a jade teapot coming alive and taking a human form as she tries to escape from the museum.

Her wish? To return home to China, with the help of a Chinese journalist she meets on the streets of London.

The teapot is a real artefact - and relatively recent addition to the British Museum. It was made in 2011 by a Chinese artist who specialises in intricate jade carvings.

Though not exactly a cultural relic, the delicate technique used in the making of the pot is a craft unique to China and that has resonated with the Chinese public.

First released on China's version of TikTok, Douyin, the series has been played 270 million times on the platform. It has also seen its creators, who claim to be independent content makers, gaining more than five million followers on Chinese social media apps within one week.

The series has also been strongly endorsed by state media. State broadcaster CCTV gave it a pat on the back this week, saying: "We are very pleased to see Chinese young people are passionate about history and tradition… We are also looking forward to the early return of Chinese artefacts that have been displaced overseas".

The series has also inspired other influencers to dress up as characters from ancient Chinese paintings and sculptures.

While traditional media have scrambled to decode the secret of the series' success, social media users credit it to the relatable message of "homecoming".

The show has fuelled calls among Chinese for treasures to be returned

"Maybe the Chinese cultural relics in the British Museum are also missing home right now. But they can only be squeezed into the crowded booths. Will they be thinking 'Bring me home' when they see Chinese faces there?" read one top-liked comment on Douyin.

"Eventually, there will be a day when [the items] come home in a dignified way," another user commented on Weibo.

Cultural heritage and ownership has become a more sensitive topic for the Chinese public in recent years amid rising nationalist sentiment. President Xi Jinping continues to push for a strong Chinese identity against growing tensions with the West.

Last year, luxury brand Dior was accused of "culturally appropriating" a Chinese traditional design for one of its skirts, triggering backlash online and protests in front of their stores.

And earlier this year around the Lunar New Year, a video of a Chinese influencer visiting the museum went viral on Douyin, in which the user said the treasures must be homesick. A comment suggesting the escape of the treasures be turned into an animation inspired the series.

The series' release has come as the British Museum faces intense pressure over the thefts. Last week, Chinese nationalist newspaper The Global Times issued an editorial asking the museum to give back its entire Chinese collection.

"We formally request the British Museum to return all Chinese cultural relics acquired through improper channels to China free of charge," said the newspaper, which is known to be a Beijing mouthpiece.

It's not the first time China has made such demands - which also echo the calls of other countries including Sudan, Nigeria, and Greece, which have all asked the British Museum to give back stolen artefacts.

Egypt has been asking for the return of the Rosetta Stone, forcibly taken by the British empire in 1801. Greece has also been campaigning for its Parthenon sculptures, also known as the Elgin Marbles, to be returned.

The British Museum has long argued that it's in the best position to protect such treasures, but critics say the latest thefts show this argument no longer applies.

Some British lawmakers still insist it is a safe place. The museum houses about eight million objects from six continents. Only 80,000 items - or about 1% of the total collection - are on display at any given time.
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SpaceX's Vacuum Raptor Engine Aces Cold Space Test for Artemis Moon Missions


Passant Rabie
SPACE.COM
Fri, September 15, 2023 

The test was performed last month.


The test was performed last month.

In preparation of landing humans on the Moon as part of the ongoing Artemis program, SpaceX recently ran a test of one of its lunar lander engines while simulating the cold temperatures of space.

The private space venture demonstrated a vacuum-optimized Raptor, evaluating the engine’s performance “through a test that successfully confirmed the engine can be started in the extreme cold conditions resulting from extended time in space,” NASA announced on Thursday.

The test, which took place last month, was the second one to demonstrate the Starship Raptor engine’s ability to perform on the lunar surface. In November 2021, SpaceX tested the engine’s ability to perform a descent burn to land on the surface of the Moon. During the 2021 test, which lasted for 281 seconds, “Raptor demonstrated the powered descent portion of the mission, when the Starship [Human Landing System] leaves its orbit over the lunar surface and begins its descent to the Moon’s surface to land,” NASA wrote.

Despite the success of the two tests, there is concern that Starship could end up delaying NASA’s Artemis missions. Earlier in June, NASA’s Associate Administrator Jim Free said that Artemis 3 will likely be pushed to 2026 due to Starship delays. Free’s concern followed Starship’s first test flight in April, which ended with the rocket exploding in the skies


At NASA’s Michoud Facility in New Orleans, Aerojet Rocketdyne and Boeing teams installed the first RS-25 engine on the core stage for NASA’s Artemis moon mission. The 212-ft core stage displays the newly added engine E2059.

At NASA’s Michoud Facility in New Orleans, Aerojet Rocketdyne and Boeing teams installed the first RS-25 engine on the core stage for NASA’s Artemis moon mission. The 212-ft core stage displays the newly added engine E2059.

NASA has its own Moon rocket to worry about it, though. This week, the space agency installed the first of four RS-25 engines on the core stage of the Space Launch System rocket (SLS) that will launch the crewed Artemis 2 mission to the Moon in 2024.

The space agency has a dozen RS-25 engines taken from retired Space Shuttles and modified for use on the SLS core stage, four engines have already been used for the Artemis 1 mission in 2022. The four engines are located at the base of the rocket’s core stage, and will fire non-stop for over eight minutes during launch and flight.

NASA has come under heat for going over budget on its SLS rocket, which space agency officials recently admitted to be unaffordable.

Want to know more about humanity’s next giant leap in space? Check out our full coverage of NASA’s Artemis Moon program, the new Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft, the recently concluded Artemis 1 mission around the Moon, the four-person Artemis 2 crew, NASA and Axiom’s Artemis Moon suit, and the upcoming lunar Gateway space station. 

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Redwire Has 3D Bioprinted the First Human Knee Meniscus in Space

Published on September 13, 2023 by Madeleine P.
3D bioprinted knee meniscus

When it comes to innovation in outer space, additive manufacturing is on the front lines as we continue to push boundaries while exploring the final frontier. Indeed, the flexibility and ability to produce locally are two of the main reasons why the technologies have been adopted for space exploration with applications ranging from 3D printed habitats to food. Now we have yet another project to include. Redwire has announced that it has successfully 3D bioprinted the first human knee meniscus in orbit. This was done in the 3D BioFabrication Facility (BFF) on the International Space Station (ISS). The part was made as part of the larger project BFF-Meniscus-2 in conjunction with The print was conducted as part of the BFF-Meniscus-2 Investigation with the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences Center for Biotechnology (4D Bio3). 4D Bio3 is a biomedical research center exploring adapting biotechnologies specifically for warfighter benefit, including of course bioprinting.

Redwire is no stranger to research on the ISS. They have developed 20 research facilities for the ISS with 10 currently operating on the station. This includes work into seeing whether regolith can be used to 3D print structures on the Moon and Mars. Additionally, it is actually the second time that they have worked on making a 3D bioprinted knee meniscus, in 2019 the BFF 3D printed a meniscus-shaped scaffold using bioink derived from human tissue proteins. But this experiment will be the first time that a full human knee meniscus has been bioprinted in space using living cells. The company hopes that it will open the door to improved treatments for meniscal injuries which aren’t just one of the most widespread knee injuries worldwide but also one of the most common injuries for U.S. service members.

The 3D bioprinted meniscus was done on Redwire’s special bioprinter which was recently installed on the ISS

Making the 3D Bioprinted Meniscus

As mentioned, meniscal injuries, and most specifically torn menisci, are some of the most common knee injuries. Considering that the two menisci in the knee work as shock absorber in the knee, this can be a real issue. Especially as symptoms often involve the catching or locking of the knee joint as well as the inability to fully extend or bend it. This is why Redwire believes this incredible milestone could have considerable implications for human health even on Earth.

The BFF created the 3D bioprinted meniscus by using living human cells in bioinks which were then printed on a bioprinter that was installed on the ISS. Once completed it was cultured for 14 days on the ISS in Redwire’s Advanced Space Experiment Processor (ADSEP). The meniscus was then returned to Earth onboard the SpaceX Crew-6 Mission for analysis with investigation conducted by NASA astronauts Frank Rubio, Warren “Woody” Hoburg, and Stephen Bowen and UAE astronaut Sultan Al Neyadi. Furthermore, already the company is planning future projects. On an upcoming SpaceX CRS-29 resupply mission in November, the company will launch microgravity research payloads focused on pharmaceutical drug development and regenerative medicine including an experiment to bioprint cardiac tissue according to a press release.

Discussing the completion of the 3D bioprinted knee meniscus, Redwire Executive Vice President John Vellinger concludes, “This is a groundbreaking milestone with significant implications for human health. Demonstrating the ability to successfully print complex tissue such as this meniscus is a major leap forward toward the development of a repeatable microgravity manufacturing process for reliable bioprinting at scale.” You can learn more on Redwire’s website HERE or in the video below where Dr. Aaron R. explains more about why the company has undertaken this project.


*All Photo Credits: Redwire




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 High school students unveil new data on NASA’s earth-killer asteroid experiment


Art Raymond
Thu, September 14, 2023 

This illustration made available by Johns Hopkins APL and NASA depicts NASA’s DART probe. | Steve Gribben, Johns Hopkins via Associated Press

Was last year’s NASA test to push a potential planet-killing asteroid away from Terra Prime even more successful than previously thought?

A group of California high school students used their school’s observatory to monitor the aftermath of the DART mission’s collision with the distant Dimorphos asteroid last September and discovered the intentional crash worked even better than early NASA data indicated.

Sponsored by NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office and led by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART, is a $325 million project designed to crash the 1,260-pound spacecraft traveling at 14,000 mph into Dimorphos, an asteroid that’s 525 feet in diameter and 7 million miles from Earth.

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The point of the exercise was to see how significantly the previous path of Dimorphos could be altered by the impact in a technique NASA calls “asteroid deflector by kinetic impactor.”



Dimorphos is a moonlet asteroid, orbiting a larger asteroid named Didymos, which is about a half-mile in diameter. Mission officials have stressed throughout the DART mission that the binary system “is not on a path to collide with Earth and therefore poses no actual threat to the planet” but is the “perfect testing ground” to see if an asteroid’s natural path can be altered via a high-velocity impact.

Before DART’s impact, it would take Dimorphos 11 hours and 55 minutes to make one revolution around Didymos. NASA was hoping the DART collision could alter the cycle by about 73 seconds, but observations made in the weeks following impact determined the results were much more significant, altering Dimorphos’ revolution period by some 33 minutes.

But students from the Thacher School, a private boarding school for ninth through 12th graders in Ojai, California, used the school’s own research-grade observatory to track Dimorphos and Didymos for several months last fall. Their findings revealed that Dimorphos’ orbital period was a full minute longer than the time reported by NASA last year, according to a recent report in New Scientist.

The Thacher School’s student findings brought the asteroid’s orbital period to 34 minutes shorter than it was pre-impact.

“That was inconsistent at an uncomfortable level,” Jonathan Swift, a math and science teacher at the Thacher School who took part in the research, told New Scientist, per Smithsonian Magazine. “We tried our best to find the crack in what we had done, but we couldn’t find anything.”

The unexpected findings were first shared by Swift and his students at a June meeting of the American Astronomical Society and the methodology was confirmed to Smithsonian Magazine by Peter Veres, an astronomer at the Center for Astrophysics, Harvard & Smithsonian.

Scientists aren’t sure exactly what is behind the degradation of Dimorphos’ orbital time around Didymos but one theory posits that giant boulders and other material that was blasted off the asteroid following the DART collision may be falling back to the surface, resulting in more collisions that are reducing its orbital cycle, according to Smithsonian Magazine’s report.

Right now, no known asteroid larger than 140 meters in size has a significant chance to hit Earth for the next 100 years, but only about 40% of those asteroids have been found as of October 2021, according to NASA.

As the collective knowledge-base and expertise grows to include comprehensive identification and tracking of future potential hazards from space, NASA Program Scientist Tom Statler last year said the DART mission will help prepare the residents of Earth to take effective action in the event of some distant, pending catastrophe.


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