Saturday, May 10, 2025

A small bicycle handlebar sensor can help map a region’s riskiest bike routes

University of Washington

ProxiCycle_01 — image:
A UW-led team has developed a system, called ProxiCycle, that logs when a passing car comes too close to a cyclist (four feet or less). A small, inexpensive sensor plugs into bicycle handlebars and tracks the passes, sending them to the rider’s phone. Here the team tests how well the system estimates the distance of a passing car. The line on the left is a meter for scale.
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Credit: Breda et al./CHI ‘25

While things like rain or hills can keep people from cycling, a major impediment is the risk of getting hit by a car. It’s hard to identify the safest routes to ride, especially for beginner cyclists, and a key way to flag dicey streets involves time and injury: waiting until cars have hit several cyclists at a given location.

A University of Washington-led team has developed a system, called ProxiCycle, that logs when a passing car comes too close to a cyclist (within four feet). A small, inexpensive sensor plugs into bicycle handlebars and tracks the passes, sending them to the rider’s phone. The team tested the system for two months with 15 cyclists in Seattle and found a significant correlation between the locations of close passes and other indicators of poor safety, such as collisions. Deployed at scale, the system could support mapping or navigating cyclists on safer bike routes through cities.

“Experienced cyclists have this mental map of which streets are safe and which are unsafe, and I wanted to find a simple way to pass that knowledge down to novice cyclists,” said lead author Joseph Breda, a UW doctoral student in the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering. “Cycling is really good for your health and for the environment. Getting more people biking more often is how we reap those rewards and increase safety in numbers for cyclists on the roads.”

The team presented its research Apr. 29 at the ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems in Yokohama, Japan.

To start, researchers surveyed 389 people in Seattle. Respondents of all cycling experience levels ranked the threat of cars as the factor which most discouraged them from cycling, and said they’d be very likely to use a map that helps navigate for safety. But a key factor preventing this is limited data on road safety.

The team then built a small sensor system that plugs into a bike’s left handlebar. The system, which costs less than $25 to build, consists of a 3D printed plastic casing that houses a pair of sensors and a Bluetooth antenna. The antenna transmits data to the rider’s phone, where the team’s algorithm susses out what’s a passing car rather than a person, or another cyclist, or a tree.

The team validated the system both by testing it in a parking lot, with a car passing at different distances, and with seven cyclists riding through Seattle with GoPro cameras on their handlebars. Researchers watched the footage from these rides and compared this to the sensor output.

The team then recruited 15 cyclists through the newsletter of Seattle Neighborhood Greenways, a local advocacy group. Each got a ProxiCycle sensor, a custom Android application and instructions. The cyclists took 240 bike rides over two months and recorded 2,050 close passes. Researchers then compared the locations of close passes with riders’ perceived safety at different locations in the city — which they measured by showing cyclists images of locations and having them rate how safe they felt at those locations (referred to as “perceived safety”) — and with the locations of known automobile-to-bike collisions in the last five years.

The team found a significant correlation between close passes and both other indicators of cycling risk. They also found that this measure of close passes was a better indicator of actual safety than the surveyed perceived safety, which is the current standard used by policymakers to study safety when collisions aren’t enough.

In the future, researchers hope to scale the study up and potentially account for other risk factors, such as cyclists being hit by opening car doors, and deploy ProxiCylce in other cities. With enough data, existing bike mapping apps, such as Google Maps or Strava, might include safer route suggestions for cyclists.

Some of those routes involve only minor adjustments.

“One study participant, who was living down by Seattle Center, was biking down Mercer all the time,” Breda said. “It’s this busy, multi-lane road. But just before the study, they found out that there’s a great bike lane on a quieter street, just one block north.”

Keyu Chen, an applied science lead at Gridware, and Thomas Ploetz, a professor at Georgia Institute of Technology, are also co-authors on this paper. Shwetak Patel, a UW professor in the Allen School, is the senior author.

For more information, contact Breda at joebreda@cs.washington.edu.

DOI

10.1145/3706598.3713325

Article Title

ProxiCycle: Passively Mapping Cyclist Safety Using Smart Handlebars for Near-Miss Detection

A UW-led team has developed a system, called ProxiCycle, that logs when a passing car comes too close to a cyclist (four feet or less). A small, inexpensive sensor plugs into bicycle handlebars and tracks the passes, sending them to the rider’s phone. Here is the sensor on a table.
Credit
Breda et al./CHI ‘25

Women non-smokers still around 50% more likely than men to develop COPD

Findings challenge idea that heightened vulnerability to cigarette smoke is to blame

BMJ Group

Women’ are around 50% more likely than men to develop COPD, the umbrella term for chronic lung conditions, such as emphysema and bronchitis, even if they have never smoked or smoked much less than their male counterparts, suggests observational research, published in the open access journal BMJ Open Respiratory Research.

The findings challenge the widely held belief that women’s increased vulnerability to cigarette smoke likely explains this disparity, conclude the researchers.

Smoking is the principal cause of COPD. But despite significant falls in cigarette smoking over the past 50 years, it remains a leading cause of death in the USA, with the prevalence of COPD in women approaching that of men, say the researchers.

Women with COPD tend to have more severe symptoms, and at a younger age, than their male counterparts, prompting the suggestion that the explanation may lie in a heightened susceptibility to the effects of cigarette smoke, explain the researchers.

To clarify the associations between gender, cigarette smoke, and COPD, and to update previous estimates of the prevalence and impact of COPD, the researchers drew on a large nationally representative US survey of adults from the 2020 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS).

Respondents (12,638 women and 10,390 men aged at least 40) were asked about their smoking history, what tobacco products they used, and whether they vaped.

Women reported lower rates of both current and former cigarette, cigar, and pipe smoking, and smokeless tobacco use than men, but similar rates of vaping.

The prevalence of COPD was just under 8% for women and 6.5% for men. Women with COPD were more likely to have never smoked cigarettes than men with COPD (26.5% vs just over 14%), and less likely to use other tobacco products except for e-cigarettes (26.5% vs 20%).

Women also reported smoking fewer daily cigarettes than men, averaging around 18 compared with around 22, and to have done so for fewer years. And they were less likely than men to have started smoking before the age of 15:19% vs 28%.

Yet the prevalence of COPD was higher among women who had ever smoked than it was among men: 16% vs 11.5%. And among women who had never smoked the prevalence of COPD was almost twice as high as it was in male non-smokers: just over 3% compared with just over 1.5%.

In further analysis, female gender was associated with a significantly (47%) higher risk of being diagnosed with COPD after accounting for potentially influential factors.

This gender difference in risk persisted, irrespective of smoking history: among those who had never smoked, women were 62% more likely to be diagnosed with COPD, and among those who had ever smoked they were 43% more likely to do so.

The researchers acknowledge that their study relied on self report rather than objectively measured data. And they lacked potentially important information on hormonal influences, family history, or infectious, occupational, and environmental exposures.

But they nevertheless suggest: “These findings should raise questions about whether differing susceptibility to tobacco smoke is the key factor driving the increased COPD prevalence in women in the USA.

“If women were more susceptible to the effects of smoking, we would not expect to see a nearly identical risk per 10 pack-year exposure, nor would we expect to see a similarly increased relative risk among those who had never smoked.”

And they conclude: “Our findings refine prior estimates of COPD among those without a smoking history and re-emphasise the high burden of COPD in women, underscoring the need for thoughtful efforts to prevent, diagnose, and treat their disease.”

Journal

BMJ Open Respiratory Research

DOI

10.1136/bmjresp-2024-002462

Method of Research

Observational study

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Gender, tobacco and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: analysis of the 2020 National Health Interview Survey

Article Publication Date

8-May-2025

North Korea’s illegal wildlife trade threatens endangered species

The North Korean government engages in unsustainable and illegal wildlife trade, which includes species protected under its own laws and poses a threat to biodiversity recovery in the region, finds a groundbreaking new study by UCL researchers.

University College London

Asiatic black bear — image:
Bear bile farms exist in several different countries in Asia. The practice has been criticised for its impact on wild animal populations and the health and welfare of captive animals. Image taken on a bear farm in South Korea.
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Credit: Image by Dr. Joshua Elves-Powell

The report, published in Biological Conservation, found that although North Korea has a regulatory system of protected areas and protected species, these are regularly breached by people hunting and trapping wild animals for personal consumption or black market trade, either domestically or for sale to buyers in China.

Additionally, the North Korean state itself is implicated in, and actively profiting from, harvesting and trade of endangered species protected under domestic or international law. Protected species reported from state wildlife trade include Asiatic black bears, long-tailed gorals and Eurasian otters.

Their study is based on extensive interviews with North Korean defectors, including former hunters, wildlife trade middlemen and buyers, and is the first in-depth assessment of North Korea’s multifaceted wildlife trade, carried out between 2021 and 2022. The study was carried out in collaboration with researchers from the ZSL's Institute of Zoology, Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA) and University of Inland Norway.

The researchers argue that the North Korean government’s compliance with domestic protected species legislation should be an immediate priority. They call on China, as a key market for North Korean wildlife products, to continue efforts to curb domestic demand for illegal wildlife and put diplomatic pressure on its economically dependent neighbour to disengage from state-sanctioned illegal wildlife trade.

Lead author Dr Joshua Elves-Powell (UCL Geography) said: “The widespread harvesting of North Korea’s wildlife, driven by the economic limitations of the North Korean state and the shortages of food, medicine and basic goods experienced by many of its citizens, is an important threat to the biodiversity of North Korea and the wider region.”

China is the primary international market for the North Korean wildlife trade, with notable products including wild meat, furs, and body parts for use in traditional medicine. Some of this trade breaches China’s commitments as a Party to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and member of the UN Security Council, for example UN Security Council Resolution 2397, which prohibits the export of food from North Korea.

State wildlife trade

North Korean defectors who took part in the study reported that the North Korean state receives wild animals and their body parts from state-sanctioned hunters and local communities.

The study found this includes species which are legally protected in North Korea, including long-tailed gorals – hoofed mammals resembling a goat – and Eurasian otters. These species have been used domestically, for example furs in the manufacture of winter clothing, but they are also reported to be used as a tradable resource.

This is in keeping with North Korea’s use of natural resources such as timber and coal, but also illegal trade in weapons and narcotics, to generate revenue.

The study also details that the North Korean state operates wildlife farms, including animals such as otters, pheasants, deer, and Asiatic black bears. North Korea is believed to have first started farming bears for their bile in the 20th century, before the practice spread to China and South Korea. Bear bile has been used in various traditional Asian medicines, including traditional Korean medicine and traditional Chinese medicine.

Bear bile farming has been widely condemned by conservationists and animal welfare campaigners for perpetuating demand for endangered species and the unnecessary suffering of farmed animals.

Economic hardship drives black market trade

In addition, the report identifies economic hardship as a major driver of black market wildlife trade in North Korea. A wide range of animals are reported to be hunted and trapped for meat, for use in traditional medicine, to protect crops or domestic livestock, or for sale on the black market.

When North Korea’s economy collapsed in the 1990s, preceding a major famine which is believed to have killed between 600,000 and one million people, the country’s informal economy grew rapidly, as ordinary citizens turned to buying and selling goods, including wildlife, to provide essential food resources and generate income.

While economic conditions in North Korea have since improved, the researchers found no evidence that black market trade in wildlife has halted.

Dr Elves-Powell said: “A hunter might simultaneously engage in both state-sanctioned and black market trade. For example, the skin of an animal like a red fox might be submitted to the state, but it might equally be sold to North Korean middlemen to smuggle across the North Korea-China border. The hunter could keep the animal’s meat - a valuable food resource - for their family, or try to sell it locally.”

Impact on biodiversity

North Korea’s extensive harvesting of wildlife has serious consequences for the country’s wildlife populations, with evidence that almost all native mammal species larger than half a kilogram have been targeted in some capacity.

The sable, a native species of marten, was highly sought after by North Korean hunters for its fur but is now likely to be functionally extinct in the country. There are similar concerns regarding Amur tigers and Amur leopards, while deer populations are also thought to have been severely reduced due to overhunting.

The researchers warn that if exploitation in North Korea continues to pose a risk to wildlife populations, it could threaten biodiversity recovery throughout the region.

In recent years, Amur tiger populations have started to recover along North Korea’s border with China, but are likely to be targeted by hunters if they cross into North Korea. North Korea could also act as a barrier to the movements of native terrestrial species between the Korean Peninsula and mainland Asia.

Notes to Editors

For more information or to speak to the researchers involved, please contact Michael Lucibella, UCL Media Relations. T: +44 (0)75 3941 0389, E: m.lucibella@ucl.ac.uk

Joshua Elves-Powell, Jan C. Axmacher, John D.C. Linnell, Sarah M. Duranta, ‘Unsustainable and illegal wildlife trade during periods of extreme hardship threatens biodiversity in North Korea’ will be published in Biological Conservation on Friday 9 May 2025, 00:01 UK time and is under a strict embargo until this time.

The DOI for this paper will be https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2025.111102.

Additional material

Images available at https://we.tl/t-OFGxIweuyq

About UCL – London’s Global University

UCL is a diverse global community of world-class academics, students, industry links, external partners, and alumni. Our powerful collective of individuals and institutions work together to explore new possibilities.

Since 1826, we have championed independent thought by attracting and nurturing the world's best minds. Our community of more than 50,000 students from 150 countries and over 16,000 staff pursues academic excellence, breaks boundaries and makes a positive impact on real world problems.

The Times and Sunday Times University of the Year 2024, we are consistently ranked among the top 10 universities in the world and are one of only a handful of institutions rated as having the strongest academic reputation and the broadest research impact.

We have a progressive and integrated approach to our teaching and research – championing innovation, creativity and cross-disciplinary working. We teach our students how to think, not what to think, and see them as partners, collaborators and contributors.

For almost 200 years, we are proud to have opened higher education to students from a wide range of backgrounds and to change the way we create and share knowledge.

We were the first in England to welcome women to university education and that courageous attitude and disruptive spirit is still alive today. We are UCL.

Journal

Biological Conservation

DOI

10.1016/j.biocon.2025.111102

Method of Research

Survey

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Unsustainable and illegal wildlife trade during periods of extreme hardship threatens biodiversity in North Korea

Article Publication Date

9-May-2025

Bear bile farms exist in several different countries in Asia. The practice has been criticised for its impact on wild animal populations and the health and welfare of captive animals. Image taken on a bear farm in South Korea.

The biodiversity of North Korea and the threats it faces are poorly known. The Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), which divides North and South Korea, is home to a wide range of species and is an important over-wintering site for migratory species like cranes.

The biodiversity of North Korea and the threats it faces are poorly known. The Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), which divides North and South Korea, is home to a wide range of species and is an important over-wintering site for migratory species like cranes.

Water deer

The Korean Peninsula is home to a globally important population of water deer. Deer were one of the animals most often reported to have been eaten as wild meat in North Korea.

Water deer II

The Korean Peninsula is home to a globally important population of water deer. Deer were one of the animals most often reported to have been eaten as wild meat in North Korea.

Long-tailed gorals, here photographed in a restoration programme in South Korea, are restricted to the Korean Peninsula, China and Russia and are considered vulnerable to extinction. They are listed under Appendix I of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), the highest level of protection afforded by the convention.

Credit

Image by Dr. Joshua Elves-Powell

UROLOGY

Urine, not water for efficient production of green hydrogen

University of Adelaide

Researchers have developed two unique energy-efficient and cost-effective systems that use urea found in urine and wastewater to generate hydrogen.

The unique systems reveal new pathways to economically generate ‘green’ hydrogen, a sustainable and renewable energy source, and the potential to remediate nitrogenous waste in aquatic environments.

Typically, hydrogen is generated through the use of electrolysis to split water into oxygen and hydrogen. It is a promising technology to help address the global energy crisis, but the process is energy intensive, which renders it cost-prohibitive when compared to extracting hydrogen from fossil fuels (grey hydrogen), itself an undesirable process because of the carbon emissions it generates.

In contrast to water, an electrolysis system that generates hydrogen from urea uses significantly less energy.

Despite this advantage, existing urea-based systems face several limitations, such as the low amounts of hydrogen that are able to be extracted and the generation of undesirable nitrogenous by-products (nitrates and nitrites) that are toxic and compete with hydrogen production, further reducing overall system efficiency.

Researchers from the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Carbon Science and Innovation (COE-CSI) and the University of Adelaide have developed two urea-based electrolysis systems that overcome these problems and can generate green hydrogen at a cost that they have calculated is comparable or cheaper than the cost of producing grey hydrogen.

The research for each system was published in separate papers, one in the journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition, the other in Nature Communications. PhD candidate Xintong Gao was first author on the Angewandte Chemie International Edition paper and is from the University’s team headed by COE-CSI Chief Investigator, Professor Yao Zheng and Professor Shizhang Qiao, Deputy Director and Chief Investigator of COE-CSI who are from the School of Chemical Engineering.

Making hydrogen from pure urea is not new, but the team has found a more accessible and cost-effective process that uses urine as an alternative source to pure urea.

“While we haven’t solved all the problems, should these systems be scaled up, our systems produce harmless nitrogen gas instead of the toxic nitrates and nitrites, and either system will use between 20-27 per cent less electricity than water splitting systems,” says Professor Zheng.

“We need to reduce the cost of making hydrogen, but in a carbon-neutral way. The system in our first paper, while using a unique membrane-free system and novel copper-based catalyst, used pure urea, which is produced through the Haber-Bosch ammonia synthesis process that is energy intensive and releases lots of CO2.

“We solved this by using a green source of urea – human urine – which is the basis of the system examined in our second paper.”

Urine or urea can also be sourced from sewage and other wastewater high in nitrogenous waste. Urine in an electro-catalytic system, however, presents another issue. Chloride ions in urine will trigger a reaction generating chlorine that causes irreversible corrosion of the system’s anode where oxidation and loss of electrons occurs.

“In the first system we developed an innovative and highly efficient membrane-free urea electrolysis system for low-cost hydrogen production. In this second system, we developed a novel chlorine-mediated oxidation mechanism that used platinum-based catalysts on carbon supports to generate hydrogen from urine,” says Professor Qiao.

Platinum is an expensive, precious and finite metal and its increasing demand as a catalytic material is unsustainable. It is a core mission of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Carbon Science and Innovation to enable transformative carbon catalyst technologies for the traditional energy and chemical industries.

The University of Adelaide team will build on this fundamental research by developing carbon-supported, non-precious metal catalysts for constructing membrane-free urine-wastewater systems, achieving lower-cost recovery of green hydrogen while remediating the wastewater environment.

Journal

Nature Communications

DOI

10.1038/s41467-025-57798-3

Article Title

Urine electrooxidation for energy–saving hydrogen generation

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Saturday, May 10, 2025

A small bicycle handlebar sensor can help map a region’s riskiest bike routes

DOI

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Women non-smokers still around 50% more likely than men to develop COPD

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DOI

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Article Publication Date

North Korea’s illegal wildlife trade threatens endangered species

Journal

DOI

Method of Research

Subject of Research

Article Title

Article Publication Date

Urine, not water for efficient production of green hydrogen

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