Culture

About 70-80% of crop losses due to microbial diseases are caused by fungi. Fungicides are key weapons in agriculture's arsenal, but they pose environmental risks. Over time, fungi also develop a resistance to fungicides, leading growers on an endless quest for new and improved ways to combat fungal diseases.

The latest development takes advantage of a natural plant defense against fungus. In a paper published in Biotechnology and Bioengineering, engineers and plant pathologists at UC Riverside describe a way to engineer a protein that blocks fungi from breaking down cell walls, as well as a way to produce this protein in quantity for external application as a natural fungicide. The work could lead to a new way of controlling plant disease that reduces reliance on conventional fungicides.

To gain entrance into plant tissues, fungi produce enzymes that use catalytic reactions to break down tough cell walls. Among these are polygalacturonases, or PGs, but plants are not helpless against this attack. Plants produce proteins called PG-inhibiting proteins, or PGIPs, that slow catalysis.

A group of UC Riverside researchers located the segment of DNA that tells the plant how to make PGIPs in common green beans. They inserted complete and partial segments into the genomes of baker's yeast to make the yeast produce PGIPs. The team used yeast instead of plants because yeast has no PGIPs of its own to muddy the experiment and grows quicker than plants.

After confirming the yeast was replicating with the new DNA, the researchers introduced it to cultures of Botrytis cinerea, a fungus that causes gray mold rot in peaches and other crops; and Aspergillus niger, which causes black mold on grapes and other fruits and vegetables.

Yeast that had both the complete and partial DNA segments that coded for PGIP production successfully retarded fungal growth. The result indicates the yeast was producing enough PGIPs to make the method a potential candidate for large-scale production.

"These results reaffirm the potential of using PGIPs as exogenous applied agents to inhibit fungal infection," said Yanran Li, a Marlan and Rosemary Bourns College of Engineering assistant professor of chemical and environmental engineering, who worked on the project with plant pathologist Alexander Putman in the Department of Microbiology and Plant Pathology. "PGIPs only inhibit the infection process but are likely not fatal to any fungi. Therefore, the application of this natural plant protein-derived peptide to crops will likely have minimal impact on plant-microbe ecology."

Li also said that PGIPs probably biodegrade into naturally occurring amino acids, meaning fewer potential effects for consumers and the environment when compared with synthetic small molecule fungicides.

"The generation of transgenic plants is time-consuming and the application of such transgenic crops in agricultural industry requires a long approval period. On the other hand, the engineered PGIPs that are derived from natural proteins are applicable as a fast-track product for FDA approval, if they can be utilized exogenously in a manner similar to a fungicide," Li said.

By tweaking the yeast a slightly different way, the researchers were able to make it exude PGIPs for external application. Previous studies have shown freeze drying naturally occurring microbes on apples, then reconstituting them in a solution and spraying them on crops, greatly reduces fungal disease and loss during shipping. The authors suggest that PGIP-expressing yeast could be used the same way. They caution, however, that because plants also form beneficial relationships with some fungi, future research needs to ensure plants only repel harmful fungi.

Li will continue to engineer PGIPs for enhanced efficiency and broader spectrum against various pathogenic fungi. Meanwhile, Li and Putman will keep evaluating the potential of using engineered PGIPs to suppress fungi-induced pre-harvest and post-harvest disease.

What are the fundamental skills that young children need to develop at the start of school for future academic success? While a large body of research shows strong links between cognitive skills (attention, memory, etc.) and academic skills on the one hand, and emotional skills on the other, in students from primary school to university, few studies have explored these links in children aged 3 to 6 in a school context. Researchers from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and Valais University of Teacher Education, Switzerland (HEP-VS), in collaboration with teachers from Savoie in France and their pedagogical advisor, examined the links between emotion knowledge, cooperation, locomotor activity and numerical skills in 706 pupils aged 3 to 6. The results, to be read in the journal Scientific Reports, show for the first time that emotion knowledge, cooperative social behaviour and locomotor activity are interrelated and associated with numerical skills. These results are in line with the political and scientific consensus on the importance of social-emotional skills in early schooling and suggest that locomotor activity should be added to these fundamental skills.

A growing number of studies are examining the fundamental abilities that prepare children for school and that are particularly crucial for their future academic success. "Among these abilities, 'emotion knowledge' contributes significantly and is a long-term predictor of social behaviour and academic success", says Edouard Gentaz, professor in the Department of Psychology at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences (FPSE) of the UNIGE and the last author of this study. On the other hand, few studies have examined the links between socio-emotional and academic skills in preschool children. "To fill this gap, we joined forces with the HEP-VS and a team of teachers from Savoie in France and their pedagogical advisor to examine how emotion knowledge, social behaviour and locomotor activity are associated and linked to the numerical skills in 706 pupils aged between 3 and 6 years old", continues the Geneva-based researcher. Unlike most research that generally examines school results through reading tests, this study focuses on numerical learning, the performance of which is less correlated with parents' socio-economic level than language skills.

Original tests adapted to the preschool age and educational context

To examine the links between the four variables studied, age-appropriate tests were developed in close collaboration with 33 volunteer teachers, who participated in an interactive workshop in which they were trained to set up, perform and evaluate the different tests in a standardised manner. Thus, emotion knowledge was assessed through two emotion comprehension tasks. The first measured the recognition of the primary emotions of anger, fear, joy and sadness as well as a neutral facial expression and the second measured the understanding of the external causes underlying these emotions in others. This second task was subdivided into two different subtasks: the teacher successively presented the student with five drawing scenarios illustrated by a picture of a character with a blank face facing a particular situation (e.g., 'This boy has just received a present for his birthday') and then asked the student to indicate, among five illustrations of facial expressions, the one that corresponded to what the character felt in each situation, first by pointing to it (non-verbal responses) and then by naming it. The assessment of mathematical skills included three numerical tests. For example, the first test sought to assess whether students understood that the cardinal of a collection does not change when the spatial arrangement or nature of its elements is modified: the teacher placed a photograph in front of the student showing four collections of objects (two of which were composed of the same number of elements) and asked the student to indicate which collection contained the largest number of objects, which contained the fewest, and which two collections contained the same number.

Working closely with the teachers and their advisor, the psychologists developed observation grids to assess the locomotor activity and social behaviour of the pupils. For locomotor activity, the grid created made it possible to rate the children's performance on an agility course consisting of various installations on the ground and in the air. As for social behaviour, the grid developed made it possible to evaluate the children's reactions and attitudes during the practice of two different team games (one with a ball and the other without) observed by the teachers.

Key skills to promote numerical learning

The results of this study reveal that emotion knowledge, locomotor activity and social behaviour are interdependent and associated with pupils' numerical skills from the age of 3 to 6 years. "Indeed, specific statistical analyses (regression and mediation) show that high scores on tests assessing emotion knowledge, locomotor activity and social behaviour predict better mathematical performance in these students", notes Thalia Cavadini, researcher in the Department of Psychology at FAPSE and first author of the study. "Thus, our results are in line with the scientific consensus on the importance of social-emotional skills at the beginning of schooling and suggest that locomotor activity should be added to these fundamental skills", she concludes. Furthermore, this study is the first to show that emotional, social and locomotor skills promote school learning in toddlers.

Contamination of urban lakes, rivers and surface water by human waste is creating pools of 'superbugs' in Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMIC) - but improving access to clean water, sanitation and sewerage infrastructure could help to protect people's health, a new study reveals.

Researchers studied bodies of water in urban and rural sites in three areas of Bangladesh - Mymensingh, Shariatpur and Dhaka. They found more antibiotic resistant faecal coliforms in urban surface water compared to rural settings, consistent with reports of such bacteria in rivers across Asia.

Publishing their findings in mSystems today, researchers from the University of Birmingham and the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh call for further research to quantify the drivers of antibiotic resistance in surface waters in Bangladesh.

Lead author Willem van Schaik, Professor of Microbiology and Infection at the University of Birmingham, commented: "The rivers and lakes of Dhaka are surrounded by highly-populated slums in which human waste is directly released into the water. The presence of human gut bacteria links to high levels of antibiotic resistance genes, suggesting that such contamination is driving the presence of these 'superbugs' in surface water.

"Interventions aimed at improving access to clean water, sanitation and sewerage infrastructure may thus be important to reduce the risk of antimicrobial resistance spreading in Bangladesh and other LMICs. While levels of antibiotic resistance genes are considerably lower in rural than in urban settings, we found that antibiotics are commonly used in fish farming and further policies need to be developed to reduce their use."

The prevalence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria causing infections is increasing globally, but the clinical issues, including significant morbidity and mortality, posed by these bacteria are particularly alarming in LMICs. The prevalence multidrug-resistant E. coli among healthy humans is relatively high in Bangladesh, as it is in other LMICs.

Dhaka, has a population of around 16 million people, with a population density that ranks among the highest of any megacity, but less than 20% of households are directly connected to sewerage infrastructure.

The research team found that urban surface waters in Bangladesh are particularly rich in antibiotic resistance genes, with a higher number of them associated with plasmids indicating that they are more likely to spread through the population.

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria that colonize the human gut can be passed into rivers, lakes and coastal areas through the release of untreated wastewater, the overflow of pit latrines during monsoon season or by practices such as open defecation.

These contaminated environments are often used for bathing, for the washing of clothes and food preparation equipment, thus increasing the risk of human gut colonisation by antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

COVID-19 NEWS: CAN DIETARY SUPPLEMENTS HELP THE IMMUNE SYSTEM FIGHT CORONAVIRUS INFECTION?

Media Contact: Patrick Smith, pjsmith88@jhmi.edu

Johns Hopkins Medicine gastroenterologist Gerard Mullin, M.D., and a team of co-authors published an article May 11, 2021, in Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology that details the scientific rationale and possible benefits -- as well as possible drawbacks -- of several dietary supplements currently in clinical trials related to COVID-19 treatment.

According to business analysts, the U.S. nutritional supplement industry grew as much as 14.5% in 2020, due in large part to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mullin, associate professor of medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and his colleagues shine a light on melatonin, vitamin C, vitamin D, zinc and several plant-based compounds, such as green tea and curcumin. For instance, the authors explain that ascorbic acid -- also known as vitamin C -- "contributes to immune defense by supporting cell functions of both the innate and adaptive immune systems."

In the journal article, they discuss the mechanics of how each of the supplements works and how each might benefit a patient fighting COVID-19.

Zinc, they write, has been shown "to inhibit coronavirus RNA replication." They also note that, when administered at symptom onset, zinc "can reduce the duration of symptoms from illness attributed to more innocuous coronavirus infections, such as the common cold."

Finally, Mullin and his colleagues provide short explanations of the clinical trials underway to test each supplement's effectiveness in fighting COVID-19.

For example, Mullin says that, "to date, there are abundant data associating low vitamin D status to higher vulnerability to COVID-19 and poor clinical outcomes."

The authors caution that "any benefit of dietary supplements against COVID-19 depends on results of randomized controlled trials" and peer-reviewed literature.

Mullin is available for interviews.

JOHNS HOPKINS MEDICINE HELPS DEVELOP PHYSICIAN TRAINING TO PREVENT GUN INJURIES, DEATHS

Media Contact: Kim Polyniak, M.A., kpolyni1@jhmi.edu

Each year, nearly 40,000 people in the United States die because of guns, making firearm-related injuries a leading cause of death for adults and children. According to a recent report, gun violence surged during the COVID-19 pandemic, making 2020 one of the nation's deadliest years for firearm-related casualties on record. Health care professionals could help reduce the toll, but only about 20% receive any education on firearm injuries or their prevention. To help change that, Johns Hopkins Medicine experts and collaborators across the United States established a national consensus guideline on educational priorities regarding firearm injury prevention for health care professionals.

The guideline appeared July 6, 2021, in the journal Academic Medicine.

"In many cases, physicians haven't felt comfortable talking about firearms with patients because it's been viewed as a divisive subject," says Katherine Hoops, M.D., M.P.H., assistant professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

"We set out to change that by being the first to create standards for undergraduate, graduate and continuing medical education, so clinicians and educators have a foundation from which they can develop educational programming for their learners," says Hoops, who cares for patients -- including those with gun-related injuries -- in the pediatric intensive care unit at Johns Hopkins Children's Center.

In April 2019, Hoops and Jahan Fahimi, M.D., M.P.H., an associate professor of emergency medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, convened a diverse group of more than 30 subject matter experts in medicine, nursing and public health from academic institutions across the United States to create a comprehensive and adaptable framework for firearm injury education.

The group outlined six categories previously identified in medical research as priorities. These include a general category with priorities applicable to all types of gun-related injuries and five specific categories focused on intimate partner violence, peer violence, mass violence, suicide and unintentional injury.

According to the researchers, training based on the new standards should enable clinicians to describe fatal and nonfatal firearm injury epidemiology; understand firearm access, possession, ownership, transfer and use; and be familiar with basic types of firearms and ammunition. They also should be able to provide counseling about firearm injury prevention -- such as safe gun storage -- to their patients.

Regarding suicide and suicide prevention, the researchers say clinicians should be able to describe the epidemiology of suicide and suicide attempts relating to firearm injury and death, as well as have the ability to assess patient suicide risk and understand how to escalate concerns for patients who may be at risk.

The published paper includes more guidelines and can serve as a resource for educators in health care professional schools.

"We hope that this educational framework will fundamentally change how physicians talk about violence in their practices," Fahimi says. "It's engaging with patients, talking about their experiences, helping them understand the risk of injury, and ultimately preventing injuries and saving lives."

Along with Hoops and Fahimi, Megan Ranney, M.D., M.P.H., of Brown University was a key researcher on this project.

Hoops is available for interviews.

COVID-19 NEWS: STUDY SAYS PANDEMIC IMPAIRED REPORTING OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES

Media Contact: Michael E. Newman, mnewma25@jhmi.edu

With the health care community heavily focused on COVID-19 since the first quarter of 2020, there have been concerns that reporting of other infectious diseases -- and the resulting data that enables them to be more effectively treated and controlled -- may have been impacted.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine and the University of Southern California analyzed the number of reported cases of 42 infectious diseases at the state and national levels between March 2020 and March 2021, compared with those recorded over the previous five years. Their findings were reported online June 7, 2021, in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases.

The researchers looked for reporting differences by geographic location and by five routes of transmission: sexual, foodborne/waterborne, vectorborne (such as mosquito transmission), injection drug-use associated and respiratory.

Among the study's highlights was a nationwide 82% drop in the number of cases of mumps reported in 2020, compared with the previous year. Between the same dates, the number of reported cases of chlamydia in the United States fell almost 15%, from 1.57 million to 1.34 million.

"We found substantial differences in the reporting of diseases between 2019 and 2020 by route of transmission, with the greatest relative decrease -- nearly 51% -- seen for respiratory diseases," says Matthew Crane, a medical student at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and the study's lead author. "There also were significant decreases for drug use-associated diseases [47%], vector-borne diseases [44%] and foodborne/waterborne diseases [40%]."

Regarding reporting variation by geographic location, Crane says he and his colleagues found decreases of 50% or greater in 2020 relative to 2019 in five states: Hawaii (75%), Kentucky (66%), Nebraska (65%), Missouri (59%) and North Dakota (55%). Five other states had decreases between 40% and 49%, three states were between 30% and 39%, and seven states were between 20% and 29%. There were decreases in reporting of infectious diseases in 34 states during the pandemic compared with the 2015-2019 period.

"Overall, we found decreased reporting of almost all nationally notifiable infectious diseases and conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic," Crane says. "These decreases were found nationwide and at the state level, and appeared in all of the disease transmission routes we studied."

Crane says it's unknown whether the observed decreases indicate true reductions in infectious disease cases or an impairment of typical disease reporting during the pandemic.

"We believe that both factors likely contributed to our findings," he says.

Based on these findings -- and similar results in an earlier study looking at pandemic-driven reporting variations for sexually transmitted infections -- the researchers feel there is a critical need for more investment in disease surveillance in order to understand whether infectious disease transmission may have been underreported during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Crane is available for interviews.

JOHNS HOPKINS MEDICINE HELPS CREATE TREATMENT GUIDE FOR NEURODEGENERATIVE DISORDERS

Media Contact: Michel Morris, melben1@jhmi.edu

Some people may think nothing can be done for neurodegenerative disorders such as progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP) and corticobasal syndrome (CBS). However, a Johns Hopkins Medicine researcher and his colleagues are adamant that is not the case.

PSP is a rare brain disorder that causes serious problems with walking, balance and eye movements, and later with swallowing. CBS is a condition that causes changes in movement, language skills or both. Both are characterized by deposition in the brain of abnormal, malfunctioning proteins known as tau proteins. These usually show up in people of mid-60s age, leading to death after an average of seven years.

In a study published July 1, 2021, in the journal Frontiers in Neurology, Alexander Pantelyat, M.D., assistant professor of neurology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and 35 colleagues at the non-profit organization CurePSP, outline best practices in the management of these difficult-to-treat disorders. Pantelyat is the study's joint first author and a member of the four-person steering committee that oversaw the project's completion.

"There is still a lingering impression that nothing can be done for these conditions and I hope that this comprehensive review can do a lot to dispel this notion," says Pantelyat, director of the Johns Hopkins Atypical Parkinsonism Center/CurePSP Center of Care. "Time is really of the essence with these conditions and it's important to understand that much can be done to improve a patient's quality of life."

Pantelyat says most physicians, including many neurologists, are reluctant to care for patients with these conditions because they are unfamiliar with the wide range of interacting symptoms and neurological deficits (abnormal functioning, such as the inability to speak). While there currently is no specific or disease-modifying treatment for either PSP and CBS, their symptoms are amenable to a variety of treatment strategies.

Pantelyat says several pharmacological and nonpharmacological interventions can meaningfully improve quality of life for patients with PSP and CBS. With a lack of approved pharmaceuticals for these conditions, the guidelines recommend useful off-brand medications to physicians and clinicians.

"One aspect that the guidelines discuss is avoiding medications that can worsen cognitive function, since in some ways, these diseases are closer to Alzheimer's disease than Parkinson's disease," says Pantelyat.

"In the case of CBS, it's like having a severe stroke except that it happens over months to years," he explains. "We encourage physicians to refer patients to a CurePSP Center of Care as soon as possible, enabling them to take advantage of resources like physical therapy, occupational therapy and speech-language pathology that can improve their daily function."

Pantelyat says the guidelines also address the use of botulinum toxin injections. For patients with excessive saliva, an injection of botulinum toxin can alleviate drooling, and it may improve symptoms for those with dystonia and pain. Since it's injectable, botulinum toxin doesn't have systemic side effects.

"We hope this comprehensive guide helps physicians identify patients as early as possible so they can get the appropriate care, and refer them appropriately," Pantelyat says.

Pantelyat and his colleagues hope to next look at how multidisciplinary care can be delivered remotely to patients with PSP and CBS using a virtual environment.

Pantelyat is available for interviews.

The UK government's latest pandemic plan involves recklessly exposing millions of people to the acute and long-term effects of mass infection, warn experts in The BMJ today.

A strategy that chooses mass infection in the young now over vaccination in order to achieve greater population immunity to protect the vulnerable in winter, is "unethical and unscientific" say Dr Deepti Gurdasani and colleagues.

Instead of allowing infections to rise, they urge the government to take urgent actions to inform and protect the public and prepare for autumn.

These include outlining a long-term strategy for pandemic control, keeping basic measures such as masks and physical distancing until cases return to low levels, investing in workplaces, schools and public transport to make them safer, and providing the means for extensive testing and support for people to isolate.

The prime minister's argument that it is better to accept mass infection now than to postpone until winter, when 'the virus has an advantage' is deeply flawed and misleading, they write. Instead, this strategy will place around 48% of the population (children included) who are not yet fully vaccinated, including the clinically vulnerable and those with compromised immune systems, at unacceptable risk.

This approach is already putting intense pressure on struggling healthcare services and will lead to many avoidable deaths and long-term illness, they add. It also provides a fertile environment for selection of escape variants which could have huge consequences for the UK and countries globally.

They point out that more than 1,000 scientists have already signed a letter to the Lancet setting out why allowing mass infection this summer is a 'dangerous and unethical experiment'. The British Medical Association, Directors of Public Health, SAGE, the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, the Royal College of Nursing and NHS leaders have all highlighted the dangers inherent in allowing mass infection.

Opening the UK up further is billed as "freedom day," but for too many people, removing mandated measures such as wearing masks and physical distancing restrict, rather than enable, freedom.

This, they say, is unlikely to bolster public confidence and engagement in economic activity. And if the government strategy leads us into yet another lockdown, they warn that this could have an even more devastating impact on the economy.

What's more, the public overwhelmingly supports sensible public health measures such as masking indoors. "This begs the question why dangerous public health decisions that are neither in the public interest, or in line with public sentiment, have been made in the midst of a raging pandemic," they write.

WHAT:

Among 6- and 7-year-olds who were born extremely preterm--before the 28th week of pregnancy--those who had more than two hours of screen time a day were more likely to have deficits in overall IQ, executive functioning (problem solving skills), impulse control and attention, according to a study funded by the National Institutes of Health. Similarly, those who had a television or computer in their bedrooms were more likely to have problems with impulse control and paying attention. The findings suggest that high amounts of screen time may exacerbate the cognitive deficits and behavioral problems common to children born extremely preterm.

The study was conducted by Betty R. Vohr, M.D., and colleagues. It appears in JAMA Pediatrics. Funding was provided by NIH's Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development; National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute; and National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences.

Previous studies have linked high amounts of screen time among children born full-term to language and developmental, behavioral and other problems. In the current study, researchers analyzed data from a study of children born at 28 weeks or earlier. Of 414 children, 238 had more than two hours of screen time per day and 266 had a television or computer in their bedrooms. Compared to children with less screen time per day, those with high amounts of screen time scored an average deficit of nearly 8 points on global executive function percentile scores, roughly 0.8 points lower on impulse control (inhibition) and more than 3 points higher on inattention. Children with a television or computer in their bedrooms also scored lower on measures of inhibition, hyperactivity and impulsivity.

The authors concluded that the findings support the need for physicians to discuss the potential effects of screen time with families of children born extremely preterm.

WHO:

Andrew Bremer, M.D., Ph.D., Acting Chief, NICHD Pregnancy and Perinatology Branch, is available for comment.

ARTICLE:

Vohr, BE, et al. Association of high screen-time use with school-age cognitive, executive function, and behavior outcomes in extremely preterm children. JAMA Pediatrics.2021. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2021.2041

Leesburg, VA, July 15, 2021--According to ARRS' American Journal of Roentgenology (AJR), return to routine screening for BI-RADS 3 lesions on supplemental automated whole-breast US (ABUS) substantially reduces the recall rate, while being unlikely to result in adverse outcome.

"This prospective study supports a recommendation for routine annual follow-up for BI-RADS 3 lesions at supplemental ABUS," wrote lead author Richard G. Barr of Northeastern Ohio Medical University in Rootstown.

From August 2013 to December 2016, Barr and colleagues' prospective study (NCT02650778) enrolled patients with BI-RADS 1 or 2 on screening mammography and breast density C or D to undergo supplemental ABUS, which was interpreted as BI-RADS 1, 2, 3, or 0. For ABUS BI-RADS 1, return to routine screening was recommended, whereas ABUS BI-RADS 0 lesions underwent targeted hand-held ultrasound.

In 2,257 women (mean age, 58 years), routine follow-up of BI-RADS 3 lesions detected on supplemental ABUS screening in women with dense breasts and any risk resulted in a recall rate of 3.8% (85/2,257), biopsy rate of 0.5% (12/2,257), and positive biopsy rate of 58.3% (7/12)--with no missed cancers (95% CI, 0.0-0.86%).

Noting that ABUS can help mitigate acquisition variability by standardizing the documentation, recording, and archiving of ultrasound images from the entire breast (excluding the axilla), Barr et al. reiterated that ABUS images of similar quality can be obtained from adequately trained ultrasonographers and mammographers.

"Avoiding earlier follow-up for these probably benign lesions can be associated with substantial cost savings," the authors of this AJR article added.

Concern has grown about prison systems' use of extended solitary confinement as a way to manage violent and disruptive incarcerated people. A new study identified groups that are more likely to be placed in extended solitary management (ESM). The study found that individuals sent to ESM differed considerably from the rest of the prison population in terms of mental health, education, language, race/ethnicity, and age.

The study, by researchers at Florida State University and the University of Cincinnati, appears in Justice Quarterly, a publication of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences.

"Many states and the federal prison system rely on long-term solitary confinement as a management tool, so it is important to shed light on the placements and disparities in this form of incarceration," according to Daniel P. Mears, professor of criminology at Florida State University, who led the study.

Prisoners have been placed in solitary confinement for more than 200 years. But in recent decades--especially with the rise of "supermax" prisons in the 1980s--correctional facilities have increased their reliance on the practice, with less focus on rehabilitation and more on control and punishment. Recent decades have also seen the rise of "restrictive housing" of incarcerated people, which includes confinement used for punishment or protection, and can limit privileges significantly.

ESM stands at the center of debates about solitary confinement: Critics argue that it is inhumane, unconstitutional, and harmful, especially to individuals with mental health disorders, while proponents say it is necessary for prison safety and order. Research on ESM is limited.

In this study, researchers used administrative records from the Florida Department of Corrections for approximately 192,000 individuals who entered or were released between 2007 and 2015. In this prison system, one of the largest in the United States, ESM typically entails a minimum stay of six months and up to 23 hours per day in isolation in a separate facility.

The study sought to identify disparities along a broad range of characteristics, including those related to demographics (e.g., age at admission, gender, race/ethnicity), mental health, substance abuse, education, language (i.e., English language proficiency), and prior criminal records (e.g., prior admissions, offense, time served). It also looked at disparities in placement, including multiple, early, and longer-duration placements.

Several patterns emerged from the study:

The profile of the population sent to ESM differed substantially from that of the rest of the admission-and-release population: Those sent to ESM were much more likely to be adolescents or young adults, males were more likely than females to be sent to ESM, and Blacks comprised 63 percent of the ESM population but just 43 percent of the overall prison population.

Mental health disparities were also pronounced: Individuals who spent time in a mental health unit or required outpatient care with medication were more likely to be placed in ESM early in their incarceration and have longer stays.

Other disparities appeared: Education among the ESM population was 1.6 grade levels lower than that for the prison population as a whole. Non-English speakers had a lower likelihood of an ESM stay than English speakers after controlling for age, sex, and other factors. Hispanics were more likely than others to be placed in ESM within six months of admission to prison. And stays of a year or longer in ESM were less likely among Hispanics and more likely among males and individuals with no prior prison admissions.

Early, repeated, and longer-duration placement in ESM was not the norm: 11 percent of all ESM incarceration stays entailed two or more ESM placements, 21 percent entailed an ESM placement within six months of admission, and 27 percent spent a year or more in ESM. There were relatively few differences in the profiles of these three groups.

"A focus on disparities in ESM placements is important for advancing research and policy," notes Jennifer M. Brown, a post-doctoral research fellow at Florida State University, who coauthored the study. "We need to understand more about the factors that contribute to placements. For example, some groups may engage in more violent or disruptive behavior, which could create the disparities. It also is possible that prison system practices may disadvantage certain groups or contribute to conditions that increase problematic behavior among those groups. In addition, it is possible that some groups may benefit more or be harmed more by ESM."

The authors point to a few limitations of their study, including that it focused on one state and one time period, so studies of other states and longer time periods might differ. In addition, the study did not include individuals who served more than eight years, which likely excluded inmates serving sentences for extremely violent crimes. Finally, the study relied on administrative records, which are not always accurate in capturing information such as individuals' mental health or organizational factors that might contribute to placements.

Earth's climate was relatively stable for a long period of time. For three billion years, temperatures were mostly warm and carbon dioxide levels high - until a shift occurred about 400 million years ago. A new study suggests that the change at this time was accompanied by a fundamental alteration to the carbon-silicon cycle. "This transformation of what was a consistent status quo in the Precambrian era into the more unstable climate we see today was likely due to the emergence and spread of new life forms," said Professor Philip Pogge von Strandmann, a geoscientist at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU). Together with researchers from Yale University, notably Boriana Kalderon-Asael and Professor Noah Planavsky, he has traced the long-term evolution of the carbon-silicon cycle with the help of lithium isotopes in marine sediments. This cycle is regarded as a key mechanism controlling the Earth's climate, as it regulates carbon dioxide levels and, with it, temperature. The researchers' findings have been published recently in Nature.

The carbon-silicon cycle is the key regulator of climate

The carbon-silicon cycle has kept Earth's climate stable over long periods of time, despite extensive variations in solar luminosity, in atmospheric oxygen concentrations, and the makeup of the Earth's crust. Such a stable climate created the conditions for long-term colonization of the Earth by life and allowed initially simple and later complex life forms to develop over billions of years. The carbon-silicon cycle contributes to this by regulating the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Silicate rock is transformed into carbonate rock as a result of weathering and sedimentation, and carbonate rock is transformed back into silicate rock by, among other things, volcanism. When silicate rock is converted to carbonate rock, carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere, while the reverse process releases carbon dioxide once again. "We consider this to be the main mechanism by which Earth's climate is stabilized over the long term," explained Pogge von Strandmann.

To trace long-term carbon-silicon cycles back in time and gain a better understanding of the precise relationships governing Earth's climate, the research team studied the ratio of lithium isotopes in marine carbonates. Lithium is present only in silicate rocks and their silicate and carbonate weathering products. The research team analyzed more than 600 samples deposited as sediments in shallow primeval marine waters and obtained from more than 100 different rock strata from around the world, including from Canada, Africa and China. "We used these samples to create a new database covering the past three billion years," Pogge von Strandmann pointed out.

These data show that the ratio of lithium-7 to lithium-6 isotopes in the oceans was low from three billion years ago to 400 million years ago, and then suddenly increased. It was precisely at this time that land plants evolved, while simultaneously marine animals with skeletons composed of silicon, such as sponges and radiolarians, spread throughout the oceans. "Both played a role, but as yet we do not know exactly how the processes are coupled," Professor Philip Pogge von Strandmann added.

The displacement of 'clay factories' to the land influences the carbon-silicon cycle

Research findings suggest that there was a massive change to the extent of the formation of clay, a secondary silicate rock composed of very fine particles, in the Earth's past - possibly due to an increase in clay formation on land and a decrease in the oceans. Clay formation is a crucial component of the carbon-silicon cycle and it influences the ratio of lithium isotopes. On land it is caused by the extensive weathering of silicate rocks, but in the oceans a range of different processes is involved. Increased continental clay formation is thought to have lowered carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere. In contrast, oceanic clay formation, known as "reverse weathering", releases CO2, so its decline will similarly have lowered atmospheric carbon dioxide levels.

According to the authors of the Nature paper, this suggests that the mode of climate regulation on Earth as well as the primary location where that process occurs has changed dramatically through time: "The shift from a Precambrian Earth state to the modern state can probably be attributed to major biological innovations - the radiation of sponges, radiolarians, diatoms and land plants." The result of this modification of climate regulation has been apparent ever since in the form of the frequent alternation between cold glacial periods on the one hand and warmer periods on the other. However, this climate instability, in turn, helps to accelerate evolution.

Burnout. It is a syndrome that is said to afflict humans who feel chronic stress. But after conducting a novel study using trail cameras showing the interactions between white-tailed deer fawns and predators, a Penn State researcher suggests that prey animals feel it, too.

"And you can understand why they do," said Asia Murphy, who recently graduated with a doctorate from Penn State's Intercollege Graduate Degree Program in Ecology. "Less than half of whitetail fawns live to see their first birthday, and many are killed by predators, such as coyotes, black bears and bobcats. Fawns instinctively 'know' they are in constant danger."

Ironically, the presence of humans -- who mean the fawns no harm and likely would protect them if they could -- only ratchets up the stress the young animals experience, Murphy added. Even if it's just people hiking on a trail in a state park, it is a disturbance to be avoided by fawns, leaving less landscape and less time for them to feed and evade predators.

"The presence of people creates an environment where the danger seems so high that the animals basically stop having vigilance behaviors," she said. "That was the surprising thing about my research -- when fawns perceive that there is so much danger coming from so many sources, their behavior seemed like they just relaxed, like there's no point in being ready to hide or flee. I saw that in older deer, too."

In areas where there are many predators and people present, fawns seem to relax instead of acting hypervigilant, she noted.

"Like so much constant stress leaves them burned out," she said.

The goal of the study was to examine how human-dominated landscapes influence the timing, frequency and physical spacing and locations of interactions between humans, black bears, coyotes, bobcats and fawns, as well as to contrast deer vigilance behavior at each location. The researchers compared "camera trap" data from six surveys in and around three central Pennsylvania public forest sites with different surroundings -- forest, agriculture and development.

The Bald Eagle and Rothrock State Forest sites were surrounded by agriculture and low-density housing, whereas the Susquehannock State Forest site was surrounded by largely unbroken forest. Analyzing more than 10,000 photos, researchers observed markedly different behavior of fawns, adult deer and predators at the three locations, dictated, they suggest, by the presence of humans and their changes to the landscape.

Camera trap surveys began in mid- to late-May, which coincided with the start of the period when fawns are born and are most vulnerable to predation, and ended in mid-September, before the hunting season. Researchers randomly established 18 camera locations at each of the three study sites, spaced a minimum of a half mile apart within an area of about 100 square miles.

At least one camera was placed at each location and typically remained there for an average of 47 days before being moved to a new location. Cameras were set to take three pictures when triggered by an animal with a one-minute rest period. Each location was baited with a combination of bobcat urine, a skunk-based scent attractant and a fatty acid tablet.

In findings recently published in the Journal of Animal Ecology, the researchers reported that bears, bobcats, coyotes, fawns and adult deer all had more frequent timing overlaps in the agriculture and development sites compared to the mostly unbroken forest site. In addition, factors that influenced deer vigilance, such as distance to forest edge and predator abundance in the agriculture and development sites, were not factors in the mostly unbroken forest site.

"By taking into account the different antipredator behaviors that can be detected and the different scales at which these behaviors might occur, we were able to gain a more comprehensive picture of how humans reduce available niche space for wildlife," Murphy said. "It was clear that disturbed landscapes -- agriculture and development -- create more time and space overlap between predators and fawns."

This research is important because it is among the first to document that human land disturbance influences the dynamics of predator-prey interactions, according to Murphy's adviser, Duane Diefenbach, adjunct professor of wildlife ecology in the College of Agricultural Sciences. Wildlife biologists suspected human interference enhances opportunities for predators, but they had not seen proof.

"This study shows that antipredator behavior by fawns varies across space, time and predator species," said Diefenbach, who is leader of the U.S. Geological Survey's Pennsylvania Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at Penn State. "When multiple predator species co-occur but vary in their use of space, time of activity and hunting mode, it creates a complex landscape for prey trying to avoid predation. Human presence has the potential to shift interactions among predators and prey and where and when encounters occur."

Reducing greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) and nitrogen water pollution from agriculture are top environmental priorities in the United States. Key to achieving climate goals is helping producers navigate carbon markets, while also helping the environment and improving farm income.

A new tool developed by a University of Minnesota research team allows farmers to create a budget balance sheet of any nitrogen reduction plans and see the economic and environmental cost, return and margins, all customized to fields under their management.

“With these numbers in mind, farmers can make more informed decisions on nitrogen mitigation that not only saves them money, but also significantly reduces pollutants to the environment,” said Zhenong Jin, who led the research and is an assistant professor in the Department of Bioproducts and Biosystems Engineering (BBE) in the College of Food, Agricultural and Natural Resource Sciences (CFANS).

Previous tools did not allow for customized predictions for every field in the U.S. corn belt, as the computational and storage costs of running these crop models at large scale would be very expensive.

As outlined in an article published in IOPscience, the research team built a series of machine-learning-based metamodels that can almost perfectly mimic a well-tested crop model at much faster speeds. Using the metamodels, they generated millions of scenario simulations and investigated two fundamental sustainability questions — where are the mitigation hotspots, and how much mitigation can be expected under different management scenarios.

“We synthesized four simulated indicators of agroecosystem sustainability — yield, N2O emissions, nitrogen leaching, and changes in soil organic carbon — into economic net societal benefits as the basis for identifying hotspots and infeasible land for mitigation,” said Taegon Kim, CFANS research associate in the BBE department. The societal benefits include cost savings from GHG mitigation, as well as improved water and air quality.

“By providing key sustainability indicators related to upstream crop production, our metamodels can be a useful tool for food companies to quantify the emissions in their supply chain and distinguish mitigation options for setting sustainability goals,” said Timothy Smith, professor of Sustainable Systems Management and International Business Management in CFANS’s BBE department.

The study, conducted in the U.S. Midwest corn belt, found that:

Reducing nitrogen fertilizer by 10% leads to 9.8% less N2O emissions and 9.6% less nitrogen leaching, at the cost of 4.9% more soil organic carbon depletion, but only a 0.6% yield reduction over the study region.
The estimated net total annual social benefits are worth $395 million (uncertainty ranges from $114 million to nearly $1.3 billion), including a savings of $334 million by avoiding GHG emissions and water pollution, $100 million using less fertilizer, and a negative $40 million due to yield losses.
More than 50% of the net social benefits come from 20% of the study areas, thus can be viewed as hot spots where actions should be prioritized.

“Our analysis revealed hot spots where excessive nitrogen fertilizer can be cut without yield penalty,” said Jin. “We noticed in some places that reducing nitrogen-related pollution comes at a cost of depleting organic carbon in soil, suggesting that other regenerative practices, such as cover cropping, need to be bundled with nitrogen management.”

In the future, the team will expand the framework presented in this study and develop more advanced and accurate carbon qualification models through a combination of process-based models, artificial intelligence and remote sensing.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- A new study shows that it is possible to use mechanical force to deliberately alter chemical reactions and increase chemical selectivity - a grand challenge of the field.

The study led by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign researcher Jeffrey Moore and Stanford University chemist Todd Martinezz demonstrates how external mechanical forces alter atomic motions to manipulate reaction outcomes. The study findings are published in the journal Science.

"We think of chemical reactions as molecules moving on a surface of potential energy in the way hikers follow the contour map of mountains and valleys along a trail," said lead author Yun Liu, a post-doctoral researcher in Moore's research group. "A mountain along a reaction path is a barrier that needs to be traversed before the molecules can descend into their final product. Therefore, the relative height of barriers control which path the molecules will most likely choose, allowing chemists to make predictions about what a particular chemical reaction will produce - an outcome called selectivity."

Chemists have traditionally assumed that the jiggling of molecules - known as "molecular dynamics" - is governed by a potential energy surface. Molecules transform by chemical reactions that seek the path requiring a minimum amount of energy. However, emerging evidence shows that molecules often do not have time to sample the surface, leading to deviations called nonstatistical dynamic effects, the researchers said.

Nonstatistical dynamic effects are observed in some common reactions such as nitration of benzene and dehydration reactions," Liu said. "Despite these examples, NDEs have not fully captured chemists' attention because they are difficult to measure and cannot be controlled to change the reaction outcomes - the essential pursuit of chemistry."

Liu developed an experimental design using a carbon-13 isotope-labeled ring molecule with two polymer chains attached. Liu placed the polymers into a reaction vessel and applied a mechanical force via sonication, which rips the ring into two separate groups.

"The ring molecule can convert to one of three different products after being ripped apart, making it a good model for investigating NDEs," Liu said. "The 13-C label allows us to track and measure the chemical changes occurring to the ring, making it distinct from thousands of other chemical bonds in the polymer."

Liu hypothesizes that with the excitation of mechanical force, the atoms heat up along specific reaction directions, rather than following the directions shaped by the potential energy surface. The researchers named this departure from the conventional concept of chemical reactions a "flyby trajectory."

"Using the hiking example, the hypothesis is equivalent to saying that the hiker just decided not to follow the map," Liu said. "Instead, the hiker was excited enough to hop onto a hang-glider and just fly by between hills on their descent. As a result, the direction in which the molecules move becomes dependent on their initial jump, rather than the subsequent barrier height."

Liu performed multiple experiments demonstrating the tunability of the flyby trajectory by increasing the mechanical force so that the reaction can increasingly overcome barriers. Ideally, researchers can turn an unselective reaction into a highly selective one where any side products formed are undetectable.

To support the experimental finding, Stanford University graduate student Soren Holm collected 10,000,000 computed geometries to construct a theoretical model of the potential energy surface and then extracted the speed of reaction trajectories under the presence of mechanical force.

"We found that early trajectories do not slow down when moving past the barriers," Liu said.

In other words, barriers are flown past rather than being surmounted, which should have slowed down the chemical reaction rate, the researchers said. Over time, the molecules cool down, and subsequent trajectories follow the minimum energy path initially predicted.

"Our findings will give researchers a more complete understanding of how force can alter the course of chemical reactions to increase production efficiency," Moore said. "It's another tool in our toolbox to make the things we use every day."

The National Science Foundation, the Army Research Office, the Dr. Leni Schoninger Foundation and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft supported this research.

Moore is the director of the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, a professor of chemistry and materials sciences and engineering and is affiliated with the Center for Advanced Study, the Materials Research Laboratory, the Carle Illinois College of Medicine, the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology and the Center for Social and Behavioral Science.

A new national study published in Public Health Nutrition on July 15 found that Americans experiencing food insufficiency were three times as likely to lack mental health support during the COVID-19 pandemic than those not experiencing food insufficiency.

The most extreme form of food insecurity, food insufficiency occurs when families do not have enough eat. Among a nationally representative sample of 68,611 adults who participated in the US Census Household Pulse Survey in October 2020, 11% reported food insufficiency. Of those, 24% also reported an unmet mental health need compared to 9% of food-sufficient adults.

"Hunger, exhaustion, and stress related to not getting enough food to eat may lead to depression and anxiety," says lead author, Jason Nagata, MD, assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of California, San Francisco.

"The experience of food insecurity could lead affected people to prioritize food over other needs such as seeking health care, using up considerable time and energy to navigate food pantries and free meal services, or locate and visit affordable food stores."

Food insufficiency was also associated with higher use of psychiatric medications: 27% of food-insufficient adults reported psychiatric medication use compared to 19% of food-sufficient adults.

"To better address these problems, medical professionals, social workers, and clinicians can screen patients for both symptoms of anxiety and depression to ensure they have sufficient access to food," says co-author Kyle T. Ganson, PhD, assistant professor at the University of Toronto's Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work.

The researchers argue that clinicians should assess for food insecurity and provide referrals to food assistance programs.

"Policymakers should focus on increasing funding for food assistance and mental health services as part of pandemic relief legislation," says Nagata. "Expanding access to supplemental food programs may help to mitigate the need for more mental health services during the pandemic."

A national study published in the Journal of Pediatrics found that Emergency Department (ED) visits by youth for self-harm were nearly 40 percent higher in rural areas compared to urban settings. Strikingly, ED visits by youth for self-inflicted firearm injuries were three times more common in rural areas. Youth from rural areas presenting to the ED for suicidal ideation or self-harm also were more likely to need to be transferred to another hospital for care, which underscores the insufficient mental health resources in rural hospitals.

"Our study used pre-pandemic data, and we know that increased attention to youth mental health is even more pressing now everywhere, but especially in rural settings to prevent self-harm in youth," said lead author Jennifer Hoffmann, MD, pediatric emergency medicine physician at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago and Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. "We need universal screening for suicidal ideation for all children and adolescents age 10 and up who present in the ED to identify youth at risk and intervene before tragedy occurs."

The study used national data on suicidal ideation or self-harm in youth (ages 5-19 years) from a sample of EDs across the country, including those in general hospitals and children's hospitals. Dr. Hoffmann and colleagues extrapolated the results to reach national estimates.

Dr. Hoffmann explains that a number of factors contribute to higher suicide rates and self-harm in rural youth. Access to mental healthcare is a huge challenge, she says. Shortages of pediatric mental health professionals in rural areas play a significant role, requiring patients to travel long distances for help, which is a barrier for many. Also, lower family income and higher unemployment rates in rural areas may result in poor insurance coverage, especially for mental health. In small towns, there are also concerns with anonymity, which may cause delays in seeking care until a crisis brings the child to the ED. Rural families are also more likely to own firearms, so increased access to firearms may account for the high degree of disparity in self-inflicted firearm injuries.

"We need to improve mental health training for ED providers, allocate more resources and implement policies in rural hospitals on managing young patients who present with suicidal ideation or self-harm," said Dr. Hoffmann. "More widespread use of tele-psychiatry also might help prevent unnecessary transfers to other hospitals. But even more importantly, we need to train primary care providers to help diagnose and treat mental health issues earlier, so we can prevent self-inflicted injuries and death."

Add this to the list of real-life spidey senses: Harvard researchers have shown that jumping spiders are able to tell the difference between animate objects and inanimate objects -- an ability previously known only in vertebrates, including humans.

Using a specialized treadmill system and a point-light display animation, the team of scientists found that these spiders are able to recognize biological motion. This type of motion refers to the visual movements that come from living organisms when they are moving. The visual cue is how people, even babies, can tell someone is another person just by the way their bodies move. Many animals can do this, too.

The ability, which is critical for survival, is evolutionarily ancient since it is so widespread across vertebrates. The study from the Harvard team is believed to be the first demonstration of biological motion recognition in an invertebrate. The findings pose crucial questions about the evolutionary history of the ability and complex visual processing in non-vertebrates.

"[It] opens the possibility that such mechanisms might be widespread across the animal kingdom and not necessarily related to sociality," the researchers wrote in the paper, which published in PLOS Biology on Thursday.

The study was authored by a team of researchers working in the lab of Paul Shamble, a John Harvard Distinguished Science Fellow. Massimo De Agrò (previously a postdoctoral researcher in the lab and now at the Animal Comparative Economics laboratory at the University of Regensburg, Germany) lead the project, along with co-authors Daniela C. Rößler (now a Zukunftskolleg Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Konstanz and the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior), and Kris Kim (a researcher in the Shamble Lab).

The researchers chose jumping spiders to test biological motion cues because the animals are among the most visually adept of all arthropods. With eight eyes, for example, vision plays a central role in a wide range of behaviors.

They placed the jumping spiders, a species called Menemerus semilimbatus, into a forced choice experiment. They suspended the spiders above a spherical treadmill so their legs could make contact with it. The spiders were kept in a fixed position so only its legs could move, transferring its intended direction to the sphere which spun freely because of a constant stream of compressed air shooting up below it.

(Friendly disclaimer: No spiders were harmed during the experiment and all were freed in the same place they were captured afterwards.)

Once in position, the spiders were presented two animations as stimuli. The animations were called point-light displays, each consisting of a dozen or so small lights (or points) that were attached to key joints of another spider so they could record its movements. The body itself is not visible, but the digital points give a body-plan outline and impression of a living organism. In humans, for example, it only takes about eleven dots on the main joints of the body for observers to correctly identify it as another person.

For the spiders, the displays followed the motion of another spider walking. Most of the displays gave the impression of seeing a living animal. Some of the displays were less real than others and one, called a random display, did not give the impression it was living.

The researchers then observed how the spiders reacted and which light display they turned toward on the treadmill. They found the spiders reacted to the different point-light displays by pivoting and facing them directly, which indicated that the spiders were able to recognize biological motion.

Curiously, the team found the spiders preferred rotating towards the more artificial displays and always toward the random one when it was part of the choice. They initially thought they would turn more toward the displays simulating another spider and possible danger, but the behavior made sense in the context of jumping spiders and how their secondary set of eyes work to decode information.

"The secondary eyes are looking at this point-light display of biological motion and it can already understand it, whereas the other random motion is weird and they don't understand what's there," De Agrò said.

The researchers hope to look into biological motion recognition in other invertebrates such as other insects or mollusks. The findings could lead to greater understanding of how these creatures perceive the world, De Agrò said.