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AeroGP: machine learning how aerosols impact regional climate
Get PDFAerosol particles from both natural and anthropogenic sources play a critical role in the Earth's
climate by interacting with solar radiation and clouds. Anthropogenic aerosol and precursor emissions have historically exerted a global cooling effect, which has partially offset the warming from concurrent greenhouse gas emissions. Recent reductions and shifts in aerosol and precursor emission patterns may reduce this offset and introduce spatially and temporarily varying climate impacts. Investigating aerosol‐climate effects is typically done with computationally expensive Earth System Models, which include complex representations of physical, chemical, biological, and geological processes and their coupled interactions for the entire global climate system. In this study, we develop a machine‐learning climate emulator using Gaussian processes, called AeroGP, that can be used to quickly assess, for example, the impact of different policy decisions on future climate mitigation strategies. The emulator is trained on a unique data set from the Norwegian Earth System Model (NorESM), analyzed as an ensemble here for the first time. AeroGP accounts for the joint spatial covariance of the output variables and captures the complex, heterogeneous impacts of aerosols on surface temperature using coregionalization. We believe this is the first time this method has been used to account for the spatial correlation of such climate data. We show that AeroGP retains the spatial complexity of NorESM at a fraction of the computational cost and demonstrate its usefulness to assess the sensitivity of temperature to idealized future aerosol emission scenarios
Assessing the impact of Roman occupation on England through the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) hypothesis
Get PDFThe Roman occupation of England (AD 43–410), characterised by urbanisation and militarisation, is generally understood to have had a negative impact on population health. Yet our understanding of associated socioeconomic changes is hindered by the comparatively limited analysis of inhumations from the preceding Iron Age. Deploying the DOHaD hypothesis, this study examines negative health markers in the skeletons of 274 adult females of childbearing age and 372 non-adults aged below 3.5 years from Iron Age and Roman contexts, revealing the long-lasting negative influence of urbanisation but with a more limited impact in rural communities implying continuation of cultural norms
Mediating proximate care in transnational families in Sweden and the UK: language practices and institutional processes
Get PDFThe paper advances our understanding of care in transnational families by exploring how proximate family members engage in care within two institutional contexts, a school and a hospital. It considers how care processes and outcomes are shaped by the transnational character of families and by the related power dynamics inherent within families and institutions. It does so by studying language and literacy practices that people engage in when they act as language brokers and literacy mediators for family members who are accessing care. Working with two families in the United Kingdom and Sweden, our analysis draws on fieldnotes, interviews with caregivers, and interactional data. We describe the language and literacy practices and interactional events associated with our participants' institutional encounters, relating them to individuals' intersecting positionalities. Analysis demonstrates the ways in which these practices enable them to challenge inequalities inherent in health and educational systems
“Think of it no longer as a broken yew-tree…but as a living witness”: the cultural and ecological meaning of iconic trees
Get PDFAcross the centuries, trees have been recognised as one of the oldest lifeforms on earth, witnessing and subject to the passage of time on a scale that far exceeds human life, telling us who we are in the world. This paper explores the intricate nature of human interactions with trees across a broad chronological and conceptual range, and the cultural, symbolic, and ecological meaning of “iconic” trees, drawing upon a selection of case studies to explore and analyse the relationship between the tree as a living organism and its cultural, textual, and mnemonic meaning. In conducting this, it reflects upon the cultural geographies of presence and absence, and the role of emblematic trees as places of memory and structures of belief. The relationship between human life and the life of trees is shown to be symbiotic; multiple cultural values and symbolic forms are ascribed to trees, and those same trees shape the physical, ecological, and human environment. The social and cultural construction of the landscape and sites of memory is presented as a key component in the formation of narratives and mentalities that define the relationship between humans and iconic trees, material and imagined. Physical, ecological, and cultural erosion, it is suggested, have the capacity of memorialising forgetfulness and creating a space in which the absence of presence and the presence of absence co-exist. The iconic image of the fallen tree, in its presence and absence, exposes the extent to which trees are also human objects, constructed and understood in human terms, and subject to a range of personal, political, and pragmatic impulses. A tree can be iconic not simply because of what it was but because of what it was believed to be, integrating a physical, historical, memory, and ecological or cultural space into our relationship with the natural world
Solar farms as potential future refuges for bumblebees
Get PDFSolar farms offer an opportunity for habitat creation for wildlife, including insect pollinators, potentially simultaneously contributing to both low-carbon energy and nature recovery. However, it is unknown whether cobenefits would persist under future land-use change given that habitat value is context dependent. For the 1042 operational solar farms in Great Britain, we predict their ability to support bumblebee populations (both inside and outside the solar farm) under three different socioeconomic futures. These futures represent alternative 1 km scale landcover projections for the year 2050 with accompanying narratives. We downscale these to 10 m resolution, spatially allocating crop rotations, agri-environment interventions and other habitat features consistent with the scenario narratives, to realistically represent fine-scale landscape elements of relevance to bumblebee populations. We then input these detailed maps into a sophisticated process-based model that simulates bumblebee foraging and population dynamics, enabling us to predict bumblebee density in and around Great Britain's solar farms, accounting for the effects of their changed habitat context and configuration in these different future scenarios. We isolate the drivers of bumblebee density change across scenarios and scales and show that solar farm management was the main driver of bumblebee density within solar farms, with ~120% higher densities inside florally enhanced compared to turf grass solar farms, although the exact figure was influenced by wider landcover changes. In foraging zones immediately surrounding solar farms, landscape changes had a greater impact on bumblebee densities, suggesting a single solar farm in isolation generally did not counteract the influence of wider land-use changes expected under future scenarios. In addition to providing insights into the potential future value of pollinator habitat on solar farms, our methodology demonstrates how combining process-based modelling with landcover projections that are downscaled to ecologically relevant resolutions can be used to better assess future effectiveness of habitat interventions. This represents a step change in our ability to account for species' interactions with socioeconomically driven futures, which can be extended and applied to other taxa and land-use interventions
Performing urban ecologies
No full textWith the majority of the global population living in cities, urbanisation and climate crisis have become urgent planetary issues. This Element examines 'urban eco-performance', exploring how theatre and performance intersect with urbanisation and ecological crises to reimagine equitable urban futures. Through rigorous ecodramaturgical analyses, this Element critiques the colonial and capitalist systems shaping cities and highlights performance's role in addressing climate justice. Performances from Canada, Mexico, Nigeria, Taiwan, UK and USA, as well as Indigenous performances, are brought together for the first time to examine how they challenge the human/nature divide, revealing cities as vibrant ecological spaces. These performances foreground underrepresented voices and reframe cities as 'bio-urban' spaces. This Element integrates decolonial and intersectional ecological frameworks over three thematic sections: Living Cities, Petro-Cities and Urban Futures Against the Apocalypse. It argues for justice for marginalised communities while envisioning cities as interconnected ecosystems that can foster collective action and ecological resilience
EPP: can’t live with it, can’t raise without it
Get PDFThe E(xtended) P(rojection) P(rinciple) (specifically, in its guise as a movement-triggering feature in designated syntactic heads), has been a thorn in the Minimalist side since the mid-1990s. Recently, in the context of attempts to reduce syntactic mechanisms to their minimal expression, the generative operation Merge has been defined as unordered set formation (“Simplest Merge”), and the EPP has been pronounced dead in favour of conditions over labelling which force phrasal movement in order to dissolve ‘symmetry points’. This article compares several theoretical analyses and shows that very simple cases of {XP, YP} copular constructions in Spanish satisfy all requirements for labelling without the need to resort to Internal Merge (IM). Therefore, if there is IM of a DP it must be motivated by reasons other than labelling. Once such a reason exists, the elimination of EPP on labelling grounds becomes dubious
Role of taste receptors in salty taste perception of minerals and amino acids and developments in salt reduction strategies: a review
Get PDFSalt (sodium chloride) plays a key role in maintaining the textural, microbiological, and sensorial aspects of the foods. However high dietary salt intake in the population has led to a series of health problems. Currently manufacturers are under pressure to reduce the sodium levels in foods without compromising the consumer experience. Because of the clean salty taste produced by sodium chloride, it has been challenging for the food industry to develop a suitable salt substitute. Studies have shown that different components within a food matrix can influence the perception of saltiness. This review aims to comprehend the potential synergistic effect of compounds such as minerals and amino acids on the perception of saltiness and covers the mechanism of perception where relevant to taste resulting from sodium ions and other metallic ions (such as K, Mg, Ca), as well as various amino acids and their derivatives. Finally, the review summarizes various salt reduction strategies explored by researchers, government organizations and food industry, including the potential use of plant-based extracts