It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Thursday, February 06, 2025
Study shows link between income inequality and health and education disparities may drive support for economic reform
New research forthcoming in Social Psychological and Personality Science shows that when people understand how income inequality creates disparities in healthcare and education access, they become more likely to support policies addressing economic inequality.
Across four studies, the research shows that highlighting connections between income gaps and inequalities in health and education access decreases acceptance of economic disparities and increase support for redistributive actions.
"Research has shown that people often tolerate income inequality. However, our study shows that when people perceive that income inequality spills over into health and education disparities, they are less likely to accept it and more likely to support redistributive policies and collective actions to address it," explains lead researcher Dr. Francisco Miguel Soler-Martínez from Aarhus University.
The findings come at a crucial time amid growing global economic disparities. "Despite being a central focus of the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals, inequality continues to increase globally, with the richest 10% of the population holding around 80% of global wealth, while the poorest half barely owns 2%," notes Dr. Soler-Martínez.
The research reveals a potential pathway for building consensus on addressing inequality. "Simply put, thinking about inequality in a multidimensional way—considering how it affects health and education—can lead to a greater willingness to reduce it," says Dr. Soler-Martínez. "Our key message is that we need to see and understand the connection between income disparities and other inequalities that matter to everyone, such as having good health and access to education."
The researchers emphasize that their findings shouldn't be misinterpreted. "Our research should not be interpreted to suggest that economic inequality is acceptable as long as there are no visible disparities in health or education," cautions Dr. Soler-Martínez. "Economic conditions are one of the most important factors shaping every domain of people's lives."
The study also highlights the self-perpetuating nature of these disparities. "Recognizing the overlap between income disparities and inequality in health and education is also important because it reveals the vicious cycle of inequality," explains Dr. Soler-Martínez. "It is not only that when you are poorer you will have worse health and education. It is also that you will probably have a worse job and salary if you have poor health or low education. Thus, economic inequality persists and perpetuates from one generation to the next."
Credit: Image courtesy of Arti Singh/Iowa State University
AMES, Iowa – A farmer notices an unfamiliar insect on a leaf.
Is this a pollinator? Or a pest? Good news at harvest time? Or bad? Need to be controlled? Or not?
That farmer can snap a picture, use a smartphone or computer to feed the photo into a web-based application called InsectNet and, with the help of machine learning technology, get back real-time information.
“The app identifies the insect and returns a prediction of its taxonomic classification and role in the ecosystem as a pest, predator, pollinator, parasitoid, decomposer, herbivore, indicator and invasive species,” said a scientific paper describing InsectNet recently published by the journal PNAS Nexus. Iowa State University’s Baskar Ganapathysubramanian and Arti Singh are the corresponding authors. (See sidebar for a complete list of authors.)
InsectNet – which is backed by a dataset of 12 million insect images, including many collected by citizen-scientists – provides identification and predictions for more than 2,500 insect species at more than 96% accuracy. When the application isn’t sure about an insect, it says it is uncertain, giving users more confidence when it does provide answers.
And, because the application was built as a global-to-local model, it can be geographically fine-tuned using expert-verified local and regional datasets. That makes it useful to farmers everywhere.
So, beware, armyworms, cutworms, grasshoppers, stink bugs and all the other harmful insects. And, hello, butterflies, bees and all the other pollinators. Good to see you, lady beetles, mantises and all the other pest predators.
“We envision InsectNet to complement existing approaches, and be part of a growing suite of AI technologies for addressing agricultural challenges,” the authors wrote.
A village of researchers
InsectNet’s ability to be fine-tuned for specific regions or countries make it particularly useful, said Singh, an associate professor of agronomy.
In Iowa, for example, Singh said there are about 50 insect species particularly important to the state’s agricultural production. To identify and provide predictions about those insects, Singh said the project used about 500,000 insect images.
That could happen for farmers all over the globe. And wherever there isn’t sufficient data – these sophisticated models often require millions of images – for local fine-tuning, the global dataset is still available for farmers.
InsectNet isn’t just for farmers, though. Singh said it could also help agents at ports or border crossings identify invasive species. Or it could help researchers working on ecological studies.
So, the app is usable and flexible. But is it accessible?
You can’t go to an app store and download a version just yet, said Ganapathysubramanian, the Joseph and Elizabeth Anderlik Professor in Engineering and director of the AI Institute for Resilient Agriculture based at Iowa State. But the app is running on a server at Iowa State. With a QR code (see sidebar) or this URL (insectapp.las.iastate.edu/), users can upload insect pictures and get an identification and prediction.
This works throughout the stages of an insect’s life: from egg to larva to pupa to adult. It works with look-alike species. And it works with diverse image qualities and orientations.
The bottom line for any user is basic information about an insect: “Is this a pest?” Singh said. “Or is it a friend?”
Developers demonstrated the app during last August’s Farm Progress Show in Boone, Iowa. And now the research paper is introducing it to a broader, scientific audience.
But aren’t there already apps that help identify insects?
Yes, said Ganapathysubramanian, but they’re not to the scale of InsectNet and aren’t capable of global-to-local applications. And they’re also not open-source applications with technology that can be shared.
“Making InsectNet open source can encourage broader scientific efforts,” he said. “The scientific community can build on these efforts, rather than starting from scratch.”
The project also answered a lot of technical questions that could be applied to other projects, he said.
How much data is enough? Where can we get that much data? What can we do with noisy data?
How much computer power is necessary? How do we deal with so much data?
“Lastly, it takes a village of expertise to get to this point, right?” said Ganapathysubramanian.
It took agronomists and computer engineers and statisticians and data scientists and artificial intelligence specialists about two years to put InsectNet together and make it work.
“What we learned working with insects can be expanded to include weeds and plant diseases or any other related identification and classification problem in agriculture,” Singh said. “We’re very close to a one-stop shop for identifying all of these.”
– 30 –
Read the paper
“InsectNet: Real-time identification of insects using an end-to-end machine learning pipeline,” PNAS Nexus, Dec. 27, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgae575.
The InsectNet project was supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture (through the AI Institute for Resilient Agriculture), the National Science Foundation (through COALESCE: COntext Aware LEarning for Sustainable CybEr-Agricultural Systems), the NSF’s Smart and Connected Communities Program, the USDA’s Current Research Information System Project, and Iowa State’s Plant Sciences Institute.
Corvallis, OR — February 6, 2025 — A new study reveals the profound ecological effects of wolves and other large carnivores in Yellowstone National Park, showcasing the cascading effects predators can have on ecosystems. In Yellowstone, this involves wolves and other large carnivores, elk, and willows. The research, which utilized previously published data from 25 riparian (streamside) sites and collected over a 20 year period, from 2001 to 2020, revealed a remarkable 1,500% increase in willow crown volume along riparian zones in northern Yellowstone National Park, driven by the effects on elk due to a restored large carnivore guild following the reintroduction of wolves in 1995–96, and other factors. The study was led by Dr. William J. Ripple of Oregon State University and the Conservation Biology Institute in Corvallis, OR, and published today in Global Ecology and Conservation.
Trophic cascades, the effects of predators on herbivores and plants, have long been a topic of ecological interest. The study quantifies the strength of this phenomenon for the first time using willow crown volume as a proxy for aboveground biomass, demonstrating a significant three-dimensional recovery of riparian vegetation represented by the growth in both crown area and height of established willows. The strength of the Yellowstone trophic cascade observed in this study surpasses 82% of strengths presented in a synthesis of global trophic cascade studies, underscoring the strength of Yellowstone’s willow recovery process. The authors note that there is considerable variability in the degree of recovery and not all sites are recovering.
Even though riparian areas in the western United States comprise a small portion of the landscape, the study has particular relevance since these areas provide important food resources and habitat for more wildlife species than any other habitat type. These areas also connect upland and aquatic ecosystems and are widely known for their high diversity in species composition, structure, and productivity.
“Our findings emphasize the power of predators as ecosystem architects,” said William Ripple. “The restoration of wolves and other large predators has transformed parts of Yellowstone, benefiting not only willows but other woody species such as aspen, alder, and berry-producing shrubs. It’s a compelling reminder of how predators, prey, and plants are interconnected in nature.”
Wolves were eradicated and cougars driven to low numbers from Yellowstone National Park by the 1920s. Browsing by elk soon increased, severely damaging the park’s woody vegetation, especially in riparian areas. Similar effects were seen in places like Olympic National Park in Washington, and Banff and Jasper National Parks in Canada after wolves were lost. While it’s well understood that removing predators can harm ecosystems, less is known about how strongly woody plants and ecosystems recover when predators are restored. Yellowstone offers a rare opportunity to study this effect since few studies worldwide have quantified how much plant life rebounds after large carnivores are restored.
“Our analysis of a long-term data set simply confirmed that ecosystem recovery takes time. In the early years of this trophic cascade, plants were only beginning to grow taller after decades of suppression by elk. But the strength of this recovery, as shown by the dramatic increases in willow crown volume, became increasingly apparent in subsequent years,” said Dr. Robert Beschta, an emeritus professor at Oregon State University. “These improving conditions have created vital habitats for birds and other species, while also enhancing other stream-side conditions.”
The research points to the utility of using crown volume of stream-side shrubs as a key metric for evaluating trophic cascade strength, potentially advancing methods for riparian studies in other locations. It also contextualizes the value of predator restoration in fostering biodiversity and ecosystem resilience.
Yellowstone National Park. Wolf portrait taken from a vehicle in a pullout.
Credit
NPS / Jacob W. Frank
Yellowstone National Park. Wolf, magpies, and ravens at carcass near Soda Butte.
CORVIDS (RAVENS, MAGPIES, CROWS) ARE KNOWN TO HUNT WITH WOLVES
Credit
NPS/Jim Peaco
Yellowstone National Park. Alpha male, Canyon Pack
Credit
NPS/Neal Herbert
Yellowstone National Park. Wolf.
Credit
NPS/Jim Peaco
Upstream view of Blacktail Deer Creek in 2005 and 2021, northern range of Yellowstone National Park
An across channel view in 2005 and 2021 of a downstream reach on Blacktail Deer Creek, northern range of Yellowstone National Park
On icy roads, studded winter tires can save lives – but they pulverize pavement and fill the air with dangerous, inhalable particles. A new Swedish study shows that both road wear and airborne particles could be reduced by as much as 20 percent if studs were made instead with an alternative hard metal.
In tests at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, researchers compared asphalt wear-and-tear and particle emissions caused by cobalt-containing studs with studs composed of an alternative, iron-nickel containing hard metal. They found that the iron-nickel stud material could grip ice and packed snow just as well—while causing significantly less damage to the road surface.
“Cobalt is a cheap solution,” says Ulf Olofsson, a professor in the Department of Engineering Design at KTH Royal Institute of Technology. “It’s so hard that it doesn’t wear down, which is why it’s also mass produced for rock drilling tools.”
“But asphalt is soft enough that cobalt-containing studs grind and pulverize it into ultra-fine particles that go deep down into the body when inhaled.”
Studs need to be only 20 to 30 percent harder than asphalt to make driving on ice safer, Olofsson says. “But the studs on the market today are double the hardness of road material and nine times the hardness of glacial ice at -40C.
“That’s overkill,” he says.
Olofsson says the research team is now studying the longevity of alternative stud materials – the next step in finding an alternative to cobalt-containing studs.
Though studies show studded tires save roughly 70 lives each year in Sweden, some cities in the country have banned them on designated roadways due to the health risk posed by airborne asphalt particles. In most U.S. states, use of studded tires is restricted, while several states have banned them altogether. Mostly allowed across Europe, the tires are however banned in several, including Germany, the Netherlands and Poland.
In the EU, non-exhaust vehicle emissions from tire, road and brake wear are equivalent to exhaust emissions in terms of PM10 (particles with aerodynamic diameters smaller than 10 µm), Olofsson says. But in the Nordic countries, non-exhaust PM10 emissions significantly exceed those from exhaust due to the frequent use of studded tires.
It also increases road maintenance costs for the public. He estimates that Swedish road surfaces have a lifespan half as long as the roads in Germany, where a ban on studded tires is in place.
