UTokyo researchers imagine future see-through objects

Business Announcement

INSTITUTE OF INDUSTRIAL SCIENCE, THE UNIVERSITY OF TOKYO

 

IMAGE: PROJECT RESEARCHER NAOTO TAKAYAMA, YU UCHIKURA, AND PROFESSOR MILES PENNINGTON OF DLX DESIGN LAB AT INSTITUTE OF INDUSTRIAL SCIENCE, THE UNIVERSITY OF TOKYO (HEREINAFTER DLX DESIGN LAB ), IN COLLABORATION WITH PROFESSOR TETSU TATSUMA, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR TAKUYA ISHIDA AND PROJECT RESEARCH ASSOCIATE SEUNG HYUK LEE OF INSTITUTE OF INDUSTRIAL SCIENCE, THE UNIVERSITY OF TOKYO (HEREINAFTER IIS), HAVE PRODUCED A FIVE-MINUTE VIDEO SUMMARISING THE TECHNOLOGY FOR CREATING NANOPARTICLES USING AN INNOVATIVE APPROACH WITH LIGHT AND THE FUTURE POSSIBILITIES IT OFFERS. THE VIDEO INTRODUCES IN AN EASY-TO-UNDERSTAND MANNER HOW THESE TINY PARTICLES MAY IN THE FUTURE LEAD TO NEW MATERIALS CALLED 'METAMATERIALS' THAT CAN FREELY MANIPULATE LIGHT AND PERFORM UNIQUE PROPERTIES, SUCH AS MAKING MATERIALS APPEAR TRANSPARENT. THE VIDEO WAS PRODUCED AS PART OF DLX DESIGN LAB TREASURE HUNTING PROJECT, WHICH AIMS TO COMMUNICATE THE VALUE AND FUTURE POTENTIAL OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH TO THE GENERAL PUBLIC. view more 

CREDIT: INSTITUTE OF INDUSTRIAL SCIENCE, THE UNIVERSITY OF TOKYO

Researchers from the Institute of Industrial Science（IIS）, The University of Tokyo, conducts a wide range of research, including physics, chemistry and biology. In this context, DLX Design Lab carries out activities aimed at fusing science, technology, and design. One of these activities is the Treasure Hunting Project, which aims to inform the general public about the value and potential of scientific research. As part of this project, in 2022-2023, DLX Design Lab produced a video introducing future 'metamaterials' in cooperation with Tatsuma laboratory (hereinafter Tatsuma Lab) at IIS.

At the beginning of the video, we introduce the 'Future Window', which would allow people to see outside from their basements. We also show the special nanoscale particles that are necessary to achieve this conceptual product.

Next, we introduce technology for easily creating these special particles with light, through work being done in the Tatsuma Lab. In summary, the particles are grown spontaneously by light using a chemical method.

A model is used to illustrate how, if special nanoparticles are created and well aligned, they could make it possible to bend light at will.

The DLX Design Lab and Tatsuma Lab collaborated to design a roadmap for the realisation of the 'Future Window'. The first step is to create particles, which must then be arranged in planes and even three-dimensionally. 

It is predicted that development of the 'Future Window' will also derive light absorbent solar panels without reflection and translucent walls and columns that allow only certain colours of light to penetrate. One day, there may be a ‘Future Window’ that transmits full colour and even heat. The ‘Future Window’ will have the same effect as looking directly at what is outside the window, rather than seeing an image as on an LCD or other display. Sunlight shines through and shadows are created. You can look in, and even bask in the sun.

While the technology behind this concept is promising, the ‘Future Window’ is still in the realm of science fiction. As this video shows, by drawing a concrete image of the future (even if it is still science fiction) researchers become keenly aware of what they need to do to get closer to that future.

DLX Design Lab's Treasure Hunting Project has so far given form to the various research results produced at IIS, and through exhibitions and workshops has communicated the excitement and potential of science to the general public. However, it is not always easy to give form to research that deals with objects not seen by the human eye such as nanomaterials and molecules, or research that is far from being applied or realised. Using moving images to visualise the future and express it in a multifaceted and easy-to-understand manner is considered very effective in communicating to the general public about the significance of research that is difficult to give form to immediately.

DLX Design Lab will continue to use various forms and means, including these videos, to contribute to communicating the "treasures" of humanity - the results of scientific research - to society.

 

What is DLX Design Lab?:

DLX Design Lab is an international design team established in 2016 within the Institute of Industrial Science at The University of Tokyo. Our mission is to “Create Value Through Design”. The goal of DLX Design Lab is to develop innovative prototypes of products and services through close collaboration between designers, researchers, engineers, or other diverse disciplines. DLX Design Lab also focuses on disseminating knowledge and nurturing future talent by organizing classes, forums, exhibitions, and workshops to share design-led innovation methods with academia, industry, government agencies and the general public.

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Video information:

https://vimeo.com/845226045

 

Interactive networks for capturing gas with high selectivity

Soft metal-organic polymer networks can adsorb selected molecules from gas mixtures by opening pores when the molecules bind.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

KYOTO UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: RESEARCHERS DEVELOPED A NEW FLEXIBLE POROUS MATERIAL THAT OPENS GATES AND ADSORBS ONLY CARBON DIOXIDE AMONG VARIOUS SIMILAR GAS MOLECULES. view more 

CREDIT: MINDY TAKAMIYA/KYOTO UNIVERSITY ICEMS

“Our work demonstrates exceptional molecule recognition and separation performance by deliberately organizing the pore geometry, structural flexibility, and molecular-level binding sites within a porous coordination polymer (PCP),” says chemist Susumu Kitagawa, leader of the research team at Kyoto University’s Institute for Integrated Cell-Material Sciences.

PCPs, also known as metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), have metal ions or clusters held together by organic (carbon-based) linker groups. Choosing different metallic components and adjusting the size and structure of the organic groups can create a huge variety of crystalline materials containing pores with finely controlled sizes, structures and chemical binding capabilities. The new work goes beyond that, however, with pores that adapt when desired molecules bind to them.

“We designed a flexible PCP with a corrugated channel system that can interact with and adsorb CO2 molecules by selectively opening pores that acts as gates, allowing only the CO2 to pass through,” says Ken-ichi Otake, also of the Kyoto team. Capturing CO2 is particularly challenging, he explains, due to the molecule’s relatively small size and low affinity for many adsorptive materials.

The technical term for what the interaction between the CO2 and the PCP achieves is exclusion discrimination gating. This means that binding of molecules chosen as the extraction target, in this case CO2, initiates a synergistic structural change that enhances the binding and opens up the solid phase structure to let the bound molecule enter.

The team demonstrated the power of their system by using it to gather CO2 from mixtures containing many industrially significant molecules, including nitrogen, methane, carbon monoxide, oxygen, hydrogen, argon, ethane, ethene and ethyne.

The process is significantly more energy efficient than existing options, over a full cycle of selective gas capture and regeneration. This could be important for the development of more sustainable gas separation technologies that can support low-carbon industrial processes. Energy efficiency will also be vital for any large-scale climate engineering efforts to extract carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. These will not be practical options if they require the generation of large amounts of energy to power the cycle of extraction, release and storage.

“By building on this initial success, future research will hopefully achieve more versatile breakthroughs in a wide range of selective gas extraction processes, says postdoctoral researcher Yifan Gu, first author of the research report.
 

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Paper:
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-39470-w

 

About Kyoto University’s Institute for Integrated Cell-Material Sciences (iCeMS):
At iCeMS, our mission is to explore the secrets of life by creating compounds to control cells, and further down the road to create life-inspired materials.
https://www.icems.kyoto-u.ac.jp/

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JOURNAL

Nature Communications

DOI

10.1038/s41467-023-39470-w 

ARTICLE TITLE

Soft corrugated channel with synergistic exclusive discrimination gating for CO2 recognition in gas mixture

 

AniFaceDrawing: Delivering generative AI-powered high-quality anime portraits for beginners

Researchers use a generative artificial intelligence framework to create high-quality anime portraits from incomplete freehand sketches to remove creative barriers for general users

Reports and Proceedings

JAPAN ADVANCED INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

 

IMAGE: IMAGE GENERATIVE AI FACES INHERENT DIFFICULTIES IN GENERATING IMAGES FROM INCOMPLETE LINE DRAWING WITH SMALL AREAS MISSING AND SOMETIMES EVEN FROM COMPLETE SKETCHES. THE PROPOSED ANIFACEDRAWING SYSTEM CAN GENERATE HIGH-QUALITY RESULTS THAT CONSISTENTLY MATCH THE INPUT SKETCH THROUGHOUT THE SKETCHING PROCESS. THE IMAGE DEPICTS (A) THE FINAL USER SKETCHES, (B) THE GUIDANCE IN DETAIL MODE (COLOR LINES REPRESENT THE SEMANTIC SEGMENTED PARTS), AND (C) THE GENERATED COLOR DRAWINGS FROM (A) AFTER THE FINAL REFERENCE IMAGE SELECTION. view more 

CREDIT: HAORAN XIE FROM JAIST.

Ishikawa, Japan -- Anime, the Japanese art of animation, comprises hand-drawn sketches in an abstract form with unique characteristics and exaggerations of real-life subjects. While generative artificial intelligence (AI) has found use in the content creation such as anime portraits, its use to augment human creativity, and guide freehand drawings proves challenging. The primary challenge lies with the generation of suitable reference images corresponding with the incomplete and abstract strokes made during the freehand drawing process. This is particularly true when the strokes created during the drawing process are incomplete and offer insufficient information for generative AI to predict the final shape of the drawing.

To tackle this problem, a research team from Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) and Waseda University in Japan, sought to develop a novel generative AI tool that offers progressive drawing assistance and helps generate anime portraits from freehand sketches. The tool is based on a sketch-to-image (S2I) deep learning framework that matches raw sketches with latent vectors of the generative model. It employs a two-stage training strategy through the pre-trained Style Generative Adversarial Network (StyleGAN)—a state-of-the-art generative model that uses adversarial networks to generate new images.

The team, led by Dr. Zhengyu Huang from JAIST, including Associate Professor Haoran Xie and Professor Kazunori Miyata, and Lecturer Tsukasa Fukusato from Waseda University proposed a novel "stroke-level disentanglement”, a strategy that associates input strokes of a freehand sketch with edge-related attributes, in the latent structural code of StyleGAN. This approach allows users to manipulate the attribute parameters, thereby having greater autonomy over the properties of generated images. Dr. Huang says, “We introduced an unsupervised training strategy for stroke-level disentanglement in StyleGAN, which enables the automatic matching of rough sketches with sparse strokes to the corresponding local parts in anime portraits, all without the need for semantic labels.”

This study will be presented at ACM SIGGRAPH 2023, the premier conference for computer graphics and interactive techniques and the only CORE ranking A* conference in the research fields worldwide.

Regarding the development of the tool, Prof. Xie adds, “We first trained an image encoder using a pre-trained StyleGAN model as a teacher encoder. In the second stage, we simulated the drawing process of generated images without additional data to train the sketch encoder for incomplete progressive sketches. This helped us generate high-quality portrait images that align with the disentangled representations of teacher encoder.”

To further highlight the effectiveness and usability of AniFaceDrawing in aiding users with anime portrait creation, the team conducted a user study. They invited 15 graduate students to draw digital freehand anime-style portraits using the AniFaceDrawing tool, with the option to switch between rough and detailed guidance modes for line art. While the former provided prompts for specific facial parts, the latter provided prompts for the full-face portrait based on the user’s drawing progress. Participants could pin the generated guidance once it matched their expectations, and further refine their input sketch. This tool also allowed participants to select a reference image to generate a color portrait of their input sketch. Next, they evaluated the tool for user satisfaction and guidance matching through a survey.

The team noted that the system consistently provided high-quality facial guidance and effectively supported the creation of anime-style portraits, by not only enhancing user sketches, but also by generating desirable corresponding colored images. Prof. Fukusato remarks, “Our system could successfully transform the user’s rough sketches into high-quality anime portraits. The user study indicated that even novices could make reasonable sketches with the help of the system and end up with high-quality color art drawings”. 

“Our generative AI framework enables users, regardless of their skill level and experience, to create professional anime portraits even from incomplete drawings. Our approach consistently produces high-quality image generation results throughout the creation process, regardless of the drawing order or how poor the initial sketches are,” summarizes Prof. Miyata.

In the long run, these findings can help democratize AI technology and assist users with creative tasks, thereby augmenting their creative capacity without technological barriers.

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Reference

Title of original paper:	AniFaceDrawing: Anime Portrait Exploration during Your Sketching
Authors:	Zhengyu Huang, Haoran Xie, Tsukasa Fukusato, Kazunori Miyata
Conference:	ACM SIGGRAPH 2023
Project:	http://www.jaist.ac.jp/~xie/AniFaceDrawing.html
Video:	https://youtu.be/GcL67h8QEOY
DOI:	https://doi.org/10.1145/3588432.3591548

                                   

About Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Japan

Founded in 1990 in Ishikawa prefecture, the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) was the first independent national graduate school in Japan. After 30 years of steady progress, JAIST has become one of Japan’s top-ranking universities. JAIST counts with multiple satellite campuses and strives to foster capable leaders with a state-of-the-art education system where diversity is key; about 40% of its alumni are international students. The university has a unique style of graduate education based on a carefully designed coursework-oriented curriculum to ensure that its students have a solid foundation to conduct cutting-edge research. JAIST also works closely both with local and overseas communities by promoting industry–academia collaborative research.

 

About Associate Professor Haoran Xie from Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Japan

Dr. Haoran Xie is an Associate Professor at the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST), Japan. With a research career spanning over a decade, Dr. Xie has over 100 publications to his credit and holds a Ph.D. in Computer Graphics from JAIST. His research interests focus on User Interfaces for Augmented Intelligence—especially for content creation, machine learning, human augmentation, and other artificial intelligence (AI)-related applications. Prof. Xie’s work has garnered him many academic awards, including several Best Paper Awards in international conferences, and FUNAI Research Award for Young Scientists. His work has been reported by various medias include Tech Xplore, China Science Daily, Nikkan Kogyo Shimbun and ITmedia NEWS.

 

Funding information

This research was supported by the JAIST Research Fund, Kayamori Foundation of Informational Science Advancement, JSPS KAKENHI JP20K19845, and JP19K20316.

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DOI

10.1145/3588432.3591548 

ARTICLE TITLE

AniFaceDrawing: Anime Portrait Exploration during Your Sketching

 

NUS scientists develop a new class of artificial water channels for more efficient industrial water purification

These self-assembling, precise and complex nanostructures can help to purify water more efficiently

Peer-Reviewed Publication

NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SINGAPORE

 

IMAGE: A TEAM OF SCIENTISTS FROM THE NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SINGAPORE COMPRISING (LEFT TO RIGHT) PROFESSOR PRAKASH KUMAR, PROFESSOR MANJUNATHA KINI, DR LI JIANWEI AND DR PANNAGA KRISHNAMURTHY, HAS DEVELOPED A NEW CLASS OF ARTIFICIAL WATER CHANNELS FOR MORE EFFICIENT INDUSTRIAL WATER PURIFICATION. view more 

CREDIT: NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF SINGAPORE

Singapore, 02 Aug 2023 -- A team led by scientists from the National University of Singapore's (NUS) Department of Biological Sciences in collaboration with the French Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) has successfully synthesised a special protein-mimic that can self-assemble into a pore structure. When incorporated into a lipid membrane, the pores permit selective transport of water across the membrane while rejecting salt (ions). These protein-mimics, known as ‘oligourea foldamers’, represent an entirely new class of artificial water channels (AWC) that can be used to improve the energy-efficiency of current methods of industrial water purification.

Current methods of water purification involve the use of reverse osmosis and membrane distillation technologies. Reverse osmosis, however, is a highly energy-intensive process as high pressures are needed to pass seawater or wastewater through a series of semi-permeable membranes to remove salts and other pollutants. In light of climate change and the growing demand for fresh water, there is an impetus to develop more energy-efficient, water-selective membranes for large-scale desalination purposes. This invention represents an excellent contribution to these efforts. The relatively high water permeability of the pores formed by these oligourea foldamers suggests that overall energy requirement for water purification can potentially be reduced.

Addressing the limitations of conventional membrane technologies

Research in this field has largely focused on fabricating membranes with aquaporins, which are naturally-occurring proteins containing pores that allow water molecules to pass through in a single file. They are known as ‘water channels’ and can be found in the cell membranes of all living cells including microbes, plant and animal cells. Due to the complex structure of aquaporin, synthesising sufficient quantities of this bulky protein for use in water purification membranes remains an expensive and time-consuming process.

In a paper published in the scientific journal Chem on 8 May 2023, a team of NUS scientists led by Professor Prakash Kumar described a breakthrough in the development of a simpler molecular component that can self-assemble to generate transmembrane channel-like structures with a pore. These structures mimic the functions of aquaporin, allowing only water molecules to cross the membrane while salts and other pollutants are rejected. The individual oligourea foldamers are also much smaller in size at just 10 amino acid-residues long – which makes them easier to modify, synthesise, and purify compared to aquaporin or other classes of AWC.

How it works

The foldamers are amphiphilic in nature, which means that they possess different charges which allow them to assemble into more complex structures, similar to how magnets tend to clump together in a ball when they are in close proximity with each other. The resulting complex, or quaternary, structures contain pore-like water channels which are further stabilised by strong bonds known as hydrophobic and electrostatic interactions.

The hydrophobic components are clustered on the exterior that allows insertion into lipid membranes. The interior (lumen) of the pore is more hydrophilic, which allows water molecules to move across the membrane while rejecting ions from passing through. And this is responsible for the selective water permeability across lipid membranes observed in lab tests. The scientists discovered that the oligourea foldamers were similar in function to natural porin-like structures, which makes them viable potential candidates for the fabrication of AWC membranes for water purification.

Greater stability and resistance to degradation

The foldamers developed by the NUS researchers were also demonstrated to be more robust compared to other AWCs.

Normal proteins are made up of amino acids joined together by peptide bonds. These peptide bonds are vulnerable to be cut by microbial enzymes that digest proteins, and such microbes exist in unprocessed water. In their research, NUS scientists replaced the peptide bonds with urea bonds, which makes the oligourea foldamers less susceptible to enzymatic and microbial degradation.

First-of-its-kind protein-mimics that self-assemble into pores

The development of the oligourea foldamers marks the first published attempt to create AWCs using short molecular chains that can self-assemble into precise nanostructures with high porosity and selectivity for water molecules.

Prof Kumar, who has a joint appointment with the NUS Environment Research Institute, said, “The discovery of this new class of artificial water channels is significant because the individual foldamer molecules do not contain any pores, unlike other AWCs where the pores are found within their larger molecular structure. In our novel design, the water-selective pores only emerge when the individual units self-assemble. The high-water permeability coupled with resistance to proteolytic degradation makes these foldamers excellent candidates for industrial water purification applications.”

Next steps

In the initial phase, the team of scientists applied the foldamers to a test membrane to demonstrate the water purification capabilities of the self-assembling molecules. For the next phase of research, the team plans to optimise the production of the foldamers and apply them to a larger membrane, before trialling its efficiency in an industrial water purification facility.  

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JOURNAL

Chem

DOI

10.1016/j.chempr.2023.04.007 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Nature-inspired synthetic oligourea foldamer channels allow water transport with high salt rejection

 

Solar-driven conversion of waste plastics into their building blocks

Peer-Reviewed Publication

DALIAN INSTITUTE OF CHEMICAL PHYSICS, CHINESE ACADEMY SCIENCES

 

IMAGE: INSPIRED BY THE WARMING EARTH’S GREENHOUSE EFFECT, WE DESIGN A CATALYST ARCHITECTURE THAT ENABLES WAVES SELECTIVELY TO PASS THROUGH. THIS GREENHOUSE MIMIC IS COMPOSED OF A CARBONIZED MOF CORE WITH A MESOPOROUS SILICA SHEATH. WHEN BATHED IN SUNLIGHT, THE BLACK CORE GENERATES HEAT, WHICH IS TRAPPED THEREIN BY THE INFRARED SHIELDING EFFECTS OF THE MESOPORES, THUS BOOSTING THE RECYCLING EFFICIENCY OF WASTE PLASTICS. view more 

CREDIT: CHINESE JOURNAL OF CATALYSIS

Photothermal catalysis, fueled by clean solar energy, offers an efficient solution for converting waste plastic into valuable chemicals. This catalytic process harnesses the power of solar energy and converts it into chemical energy. However, the development of photothermal catalysts that exhibit high conversion efficiency and catalytic activity poses significant challenges.

A recent breakthrough comes from a research team led by Prof. Jinxing Chen from Soochow University, China. They have successfully developed an integrated photothermal catalyst comprising c-ZIF-8 coated with a SiO2 layer. This innovative approach focuses on enhancing catalytic activity by minimizing thermal radiation loss and maximizing the localized heating effect of the catalyst. The results were published in Chinese Journal of Catalysis (https://doi.org/10.1016/S1872-2067(23)64435-3).

This study introduces a novel catalyst design approach that involves the synthesis of ZIF-8 nanoparticles using a template method. To create an integrated photothermal catalyst (c-ZIF-8@SiO2), a layer of SiO2 is coated onto the surface of ZIF-8, followed by a high-temperature carbonization treatment. The internal carbon material within the catalyst absorbs solar energy and generates heat, while the outer SiO2 layer selectively allows penetration of solar light, which is then absorbed by the carbon core. This design effectively reduces thermal radiation loss from the internal carbon core and enhances the local thermal effect during the photothermal catalysis process. Furthermore, the SiO2 shell provides a protective effect, resulting in the catalyst's high stability. Overall, this catalyst design strategy offers a universal method for enhancing the local thermal effect in photothermal catalysis and holds potential applications in the development of efficient photothermal catalytic systems.

By irradiating sunlight, the c-ZIF-8@25SiO2 catalyst can efficiently upcycle PET into valuable monomers. The PET glycolysis experiment under outdoor sunlight and the selective recovery of PET from mixed plastics further demonstrate the promising applications in photothermal catalytic PET glycolysis. Photothermal catalysis not only contributes to energy conservation and emission reduction, promoting green and sustainable development but also provides new ideas and methods for efficient chemical recycling of plastics.

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About the Journal

Chinese Journal of Catalysis is co-sponsored by Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Chinese Chemical Society, and it is currently published by Elsevier group. This monthly journal publishes in English timely contributions of original and rigorously reviewed manuscripts covering all areas of catalysis. The journal publishes Reviews, Accounts, Communications, Articles, Highlights, Perspectives, and Viewpoints of highly scientific values that help understanding and defining of new concepts in both fundamental issues and practical applications of catalysis. Chinese Journal of Catalysis ranks at the top one journal in Applied Chemistry with a current SCI impact factor of 16.5. The Editors-in-Chief are Profs. Can Li and Tao Zhang.

At Elsevier http://www.journals.elsevier.com/chinese-journal-of-catalysis

Manuscript submission https://mc03.manuscriptcentral.com/cjcatal

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JOURNAL

Chinese Journal of Catalysis

 

The 2022 Sichuan-Chongqing spatio-temporally compound extremes: a bitter taste of novel hazards

Peer-Reviewed Publication

SCIENCE CHINA PRESS

This study is led by Dr. Zengchao Hao (College of Water Sciences, Beijing Normal University) and Dr. Yang Chen (Chinese Academy of Meteorological Sciences). This article documents the unfolding process, reason and impact of compounding and cascading amongst multiple weather and climate extremes during the course of 2022 summer, across the Sichuan Chongqing region.

An exceptionally severe and sustained hot—drought in afflicting the Sichuan Chongqing region increased the dryness of forests, creating flammable conditions and sparking the widespread wildfires near Chongqing. Subsequent extreme precipitation, as a part of southwest China autumn rainfall, coincidently fell on the overheated and burned grounds, and elevated the risk of geological hazards such as flash floods and mudslides as a result. The rapid sequence of these weather and climate extremes led to impacts cascading and multiplying across sectors, for instance human health, energy, agriculture, industry and emergency response. Both natural weather and climate variability and man-made climate change are at play in shaping the compound event. The team also pointed out underestimated socioeconomic and ecological vulnerability and therefore lack of preparedness to increasingly connected extremes.

Finally, the team proposed several key steps for addressing the imminent threat of compound and cascading hazards, including understanding and predicting extremes from a multivariate perspective, improving impact quantification and risk assessment through the compound event lens, and devising adaptation planning tailored to compound and cascading events.

See the article:

The 2022 Sichuan-Chongqing spatio-temporally compound extremes: a bitter taste of novel hazards

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scib.2023.05.034

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JOURNAL

Science Bulletin

DOI

10.1016/j.scib.2023.05.034 

 

Researchers discover the reason behind tans appearing only after we’ve left the beach

A scientific mystery solved

Peer-Reviewed Publication

TEL-AVIV UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: PROF. CARMIT LEVY view more 

CREDIT: TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY

Beachgoers are familiar with the experience of spending hours in the sun, going home, and noticing only hours later that their skin has changed color. A new Tel Aviv University study uncovers the science behind the mystery of why the body's tanning process does not occur immediately after sun exposure, but only after a few hours or even days. The research findings reveal the mechanism behind this phenomenon, according to which the body’s initial response is to prioritize repairing DNA damage in the skin cells, which inhibits the mechanism responsible for skin pigmentation, commonly known as tanning.

 

The study, published in the Nature Group’s Journal of Investigative Dermatology, was led by doctoral student Nadav Elkoshi and Prof. Carmit Levy of the Department of Human Molecular Genetics and Biochemistry at Tel Aviv University’s Faculty of Medicine, and in collaboration with a number of other researchers from Tel Aviv University, Wolfson Medical Center, the Weizmann Institute of Science, the University of California, and Paris-Saclay University.

 

Nadav Elkoshi explains: “We have two mechanisms designed to protect the skin from exposure to dangerous UV radiation. The first mechanism repairs the DNA in the skin cells damaged by the radiation, while the second mechanism involves increased production of melanin, which darkens the skin in order to protect it from future exposure to radiation. In our study, we discovered why the tanning phenomenon does not occur immediately when the body is exposed to the sun, but only following a delay. It turns out that the mechanism that repairs our DNA takes precedence over all other systems in the cell, temporarily inhibiting the pigmentation mechanism. Only after the cells repair the genetic information to the best of their ability do they begin to produce the increased melanin.”

 

To test their hypothesis, the Tel Aviv University researchers activated the DNA repair mechanism in both animal models and human skin tissues. In both, a tan developed even without any exposure to UV radiation, substantiating their findings.

 

Prof. Carmit Levy: “The genetic information must be protected from mutations, so this repair mechanism takes precedence inside the cell during exposure to ultraviolet radiation from the sun. The DNA repair mechanism essentially tells all the other mechanisms in the cell, ‘Stop everything, and let me work in peace.’ One system effectively paralyzes the other, until the DNA correction reaches its peak, which occurs a few hours after the UV exposure. Only then does the pigment production mechanism get to work. In our previous research, we showed that a protein called MITF, which is activated during exposure, is responsible for regulating these two mechanisms. In the current study we show that another protein, called ATM, which plays a key role in DNA repair, activates one mechanism while disabling the other. This process likely harnesses the pigmentation mechanism’s components to maximize the chances of the cell surviving without mutations following radiation exposure.”

 

Prof. Levy concludes: “This scientific discovery has revealed a molecular mechanism that could serve as a foundation for further research that may lead to innovative treatments that will provide maximum protection of the skin against radiation damage; in the long run, it may even contribute to the prevention of skin cancer.”

 

Link to the article:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022202X23021243

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DOI

10.1016/j.jid.2023.03.1686 

Secondary school students have difficulty identifying bird species

According to a study by the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU), their knowledge of biosphere reserves, marshes and bird migration is limited

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF THE BASQUE COUNTRY

 

IMAGE: THE STUDY CONCLUDES THAT ONE-DAY PROGRAMMES DO NOT AFFECT ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION; WHILE THEY SERVE TO PROMOTE ENVIRONMENTAL KNOWLEDGE AND ATTITUDES IN THE SHORT TERM, THEIR EFFECTIVENESS IS LIMITED view more 

CREDIT: TERE ORMAZABAL. UPV/EHU

In Western societies, the way nature and the environment are understood is very important, as knowledge of them can influence environmental attitudes. Environmental education is a key tool when it comes to increasing awareness, and a range of programmes are offered in both formal and informal settings.  The Urdaibai Bird Center (UBC), located in the heart of the Urdaibai Biosphere Reserve, has numerous habitats necessary for the observation and conservation of migratory birds and is also an ideal location for running environmental education programmes.

Although programmes to bring biodiversity closer to young people have been run for many years in these settings, their effectiveness has not been evaluated until now. Based on environmental education programmes of this type, researchers from the UPV/EHU's Department of Didactics of Mathematics, Experimental and Social Sciences analysed the extent to which 908 secondary school students taking part in the Urdaibai Bird Center's activities for a day assimilated what they had seen and learnt.

To do this, the students completed a written questionnaire to ascertain their perceptions about the Urdaibai Biosphere Reserve and the marshes, their interest in biodiversity, their ability to identify bird species, their knowledge of bird migration, and their attitude towards conservation.

The researcher Unai Ortega emphasised that the main aim of the research was, firstly, to diagnose the students’ knowledge and attitudes and, secondly, to evaluate these environmental education programmes. “They are very common, but their effectiveness has not been evaluated, so we need to know how well these programmes are achieving their objectives,” he explained.

 

The importance of environmental literacy 

The researchers found that secondary school students have scant knowledge of biosphere reserves, marshes and bird migration, especially when it comes to identifying bird species. However, despite the high scores in environmental attitudes, many students are of the opinion that conservation efforts in these environments are excessive and hinder economic development. The results also showed that students from rural areas and those living in or around the Urdaibai Biosphere Reserve know more about local biodiversity, and so do students who in primary school drew up a plan related to birds.

The study concludes that “one-day programmes do not affect environmental education”, said Ortega. “While useful in promoting environmental knowledge and attitudes in the short term, these programmes are of limited effectiveness.” So the researchers pointed out that it might be advisable to adapt the environmental education programme of the Urdaibai Bird Center so that it could be included in formal contexts through practical activities or projects, and so that the results could be systematically evaluated. They stressed the importance of continuing to develop “long-term strategies” for systematic evaluations of this type.

Ortega highlighted the importance of emotional attachment in environmental literacy. In his opinion, it is “essential to feel that it is worthwhile caring for what needs to be cared for”. In this respect, many of us “have participated in this type of programme, but the level of environmental literacy has not increased; on the contrary, the data show that this literacy is on the decline”, he pointed out.

 

Additional information 

This study was supported by a Basque Government grant awarded to the IKASGARAIA research group.
Unai Ortega is a lecturer in the Primary Education and Social Education undergraduate degree courses at the UPV/EHU.

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JOURNAL

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health

DOI

10.3390/ijerph20105769 

ARTICLE TITLE

Secondary Students’ Knowledge on Birds and Attitudes towards Conservation: Evaluation of an Environmental Education Program