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July 17, 2025

New discovery at Cern could hint at why our universe is made up of matter and not antimatter

Source: The Conversation – UK – By William Barter, UKRI Future Leaders Fellow, University of Edinburgh

Why didn’t the universe annihilate itself moments after the big bang? A new finding at Cern on the French-Swiss border brings us closer to answering this fundamental question about why matter dominates over its opposite – antimatter.

Much of what we see in everyday life is made up of matter. But antimatter exists in much smaller quantities. Matter and antimatter are almost direct opposites. Matter particles have an antimatter counterpart that has the same mass, but the opposite electric charge. For example, the matter proton particle is partnered by the antimatter antiproton, while the matter electron is partnered by the antimatter positron.

However, the symmetry in behaviour between matter and antimatter is not perfect. In a paper published this week in Nature, the team working on an experiment at Cern, called LHCb, has reported that it has discovered differences in the rate at which matter particles called baryons decay relative to the rate of their antimatter counterparts. In particle physics, decay refers to the process where unstable subatomic particles transform into two or more lighter, more stable particles.

According to cosmological models, equal amounts of matter and antimatter were made in the big bang. If matter and antimatter particles come in contact, they annihilate one another, leaving behind pure energy. With this in mind, it’s a wonder that the universe doesn’t consist only of leftover energy from this annihilation process.

However, astronomical observations show that there is now a negligible amount of antimatter in the universe compared to the amount of matter. We therefore know that matter and antimatter must behave differently, such that the antimatter has disappeared while the matter has not.

Understanding what causes this difference in behaviour between matter and antimatter is a key unanswered question. While there are differences between matter and antimatter in our best theory of fundamental quantum physics, the standard model, these differences are far too small to explain where all the antimatter has gone.

So we know there must be additional fundamental particles that we haven’t found yet, or effects beyond those described in the standard model. These would give rise to large enough differences in the behaviour of matter and antimatter for our universe to exist in its current form.

Revealing new particles

Highly precise measurements of the differences between matter and antimatter are a key topic of research because they have the potential to be influenced by and reveal these new fundamental particles, helping us discover the physics that led to the universe we live in today.

Differences between matter and antimatter have previously been observed in the behaviour of another type of particle, mesons, which are made of a quark and an antiquark. There are also hints of differences in how the matter and antimatter versions of a further type of particle, the neutrino, behave as they travel.

Equivalent amounts of matter and antimatter were generated by the Big Bang.
Triff / Shutterstock

The new measurement from LHCb has found differences between baryons and antibaryons, which are made of three quarks and three antiquarks respectively. Significantly, baryons make up most of the known matter in our universe, and this is the first time that we have observed differences between matter and antimatter in this group of particles.

The LHCb experiment at the Large Hadron Collider is designed to make highly precise measurements of differences in the behaviour of matter and antimatter. The experiment is operated by an international collaboration of scientists, made up of over 1,800 people based in 24 countries. In order to achieve the new result, the LHCb team studied over 80,000 baryons (“lambda-b” baryons, which are made up of a beauty quark, an up quark and a down quark) and their antimatter counterparts.

Crucially, we found that these baryons decay to specific subatomic particles (a proton, a kaon and two pions) slightly more frequently – 5% more often – than the rate at which the same process happens with antiparticles. While small, this difference is statistically significant enough to be the first observation of differences in behaviour between baryon and antibaryon decays.

To date, all measurements of matter-antimatter differences have been consistent with the small level present in the standard model. While the new measurement from LHCb is also in line with this theory, it is a major step forward. We have now seen differences in the behaviour of matter and antimatter in the group of particles that dominate the known matter of the universe. It’s a potential step in the direction of understanding why that situation came to be after the big bang.

With the current and forthcoming data runs of LHCb we will be able to study these differences forensically, and, we hope, tease out any sign of new fundamental particles that might be present.

William Barter works for the University of Edinburgh. He receives funding from UKRI. He is a member of the LHCb collaboration at Cern.

– ref. New discovery at Cern could hint at why our universe is made up of matter and not antimatter – https://theconversation.com/new-discovery-at-cern-could-hint-at-why-our-universe-is-made-up-of-matter-and-not-antimatter-261274

July 17, 2025

From coal to crops: Dayak women lead a just transition through backyard farming

Source: The Conversation – Indonesia – By Aidy Halimanjaya, Associate lecturer, Universitas Katolik Parahyangan

The global shift toward renewable energy is no longer a choice but a necessity: the climate crisis intensifies, with 2024 confirmed as the warmest year on record.

Yet in Indonesia, coal remains an economic lifeline for several regions. In East Kutai, East Kalimantan, coal mining accounts for nearly 75% of the district’s gross regional domestic product (GRDP).

The end of the coal mining era will come at a cost to local residents, many of whom risk losing their current jobs — especially after their traditional forest-based livelihoods have already been eroded by environmental degradation tied to fossil fuel extraction.

Aulia, 31, a Dayak women from East Kutai, admitted:

We’re heavily dependent on mining—it’s the only thing that gives us a substantial income.

Yet, amid this dilemma, indigenous Dayak women are unfolding a quiet revolution.

By growing food crops in their backyards, these women not only generate income but also demonstrate that sustainable agriculture can align with local traditions. Their initiative is an inspiration, especially for communities near mining sites seeking alternative sources of income.

Mining’s hidden toll on women and indigenous communities

While coal fuels East Kalimantan’s economy, its benefits are unevenly distributed. In 2024, Kutai Kartanegara and East Kutai regencies were ranked first and third among the province’s poorest regions.

Instead of prosperity, many residents face environmental degradation and the loss of traditional livelihoods (land-based livelihood). This is especially true for women, who are often marginalised in decision-making and excluded from the mining sector.

Since the forest was converted into a mining pit, the indigenous Dayak Basap community, which once relied on the forest for its livelihood, has lost its traditional living space and been forced to adapt to survive.

Many men have turned to mining, while women have sought other ways to support their families: some teach, others run small businesses, and many now grow chillies, spinach, and watercress in their backyards.

From backyards to resistance: A community’s fight for survival

With the changing economic landscape, Basap Dayak women are turning to their yards as a source of alternative income. There, they grow food crops that yield quick harvests, are in high demand, and may influence local inflation — such as chillies. Spinach and watercress are also among the popular choices.

This shift is driven by a 2024 pilot project from Just Transition Indonesia and Parahyangan University, supported by Energi Muda, a local NGO focused on energy transition issues.

On a 700-square-metre plot, local residents have learned to blend traditional farming with modern permaculture techniques, including composting and crop rotation. Permaculture is a holistic approach to agriculture and land management that mimics patterns found in surrounding natural ecosystems. Local youth are also engaged as community mobilisers to support the post-coal transition.

The results are promising. With agricultural science and technological support from the startup HARA, Dayak Basap women have overcome challenges such as acidic soil and water pollution caused by mining. Through seed cultivation, their crop yields have even outperformed those of conventional farming methods previously tested.

They’ve also learned to sell their harvests directly to consumers — such as restaurants and cracker producers — cutting out middlemen and increasing their bargaining power. This combination of traditional knowledge and modern innovation is not only enhancing community capacity but also delivering tangible economic benefits.

When innovation meets tradition: Overcoming barriers

However, the journey is far from easy. Formerly mined land takes a long time to recover. Acidic soil and water contaminated with heavy metals pose serious challenges, while limited access to tools and fertilisers remains a significant barrier. In some cases, communities must purchase pre-grown seedlings to speed up the planting process.

This chilli planting program has been very good. It’s just that the condition of the land was inadequate and hard to improve. If there’s a chance, maybe we can try farming that lasts more than just one season—Indigenous Dayak women.

Furthermore, the transition from shifting cropping to a long-term management system requires ongoing training. This kind of adaptation certainly cannot be achieved overnight and requires intensive mentoring.

A just transition must be grassroots-led

Initiatives like these offer valuable lessons.

First, the energy transition must involve local communities—especially women—from the outset.

Second, collective, community-based approaches have proven more sustainable than top-down programmes, which often fail to address real needs on the ground.

Third, policy support must be directed toward grassroots initiatives like this. The focus should not only be on meeting transition targets, but also on ensuring social and ecological justice.

In the global context, Indonesia has expressed its commitment through the Paris Agreement and the Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP). However, this commitment must be grounded in the lived experiences of communities, particularly indigenous women and those directly impacted by extractive industries.

A just energy transition requires gradual steps, targeted programme support, inclusive partnerships, and genuine commitment from all stakeholders.

The story of the Dayak Basap women is more than one of resilience—it is a roadmap for a just energy transition. Their success proves that economic diversification is possible, even in coal-dependent regions. But that success hinges on the quality of support: whether it truly meets community needs and is led by strong local leadership.

Aidy Halimanjaya terafiliasi sebagai pendiri dan direktur Yayasan Transisi berkeadilan Indonesia. Ia menerima dana dari Bank Indonesia melalui Universitas Parahyangan.

– ref. From coal to crops: Dayak women lead a just transition through backyard farming – https://theconversation.com/from-coal-to-crops-dayak-women-lead-a-just-transition-through-backyard-farming-260827

July 17, 2025

Do women really need more sleep than men? A sleep psychologist explains

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Amelia Scott, Honorary Affiliate and Clinical Psychologist at the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research, and Macquarie University Research Fellow, Macquarie University

If you spend any time in the wellness corners of TikTok or Instagram, you’ll see claims women need one to two hours more sleep than men.

But what does the research actually say? And how does this relate to what’s going on in real life?

As we’ll see, who gets to sleep, and for how long, is a complex mix of biology, psychology and societal expectations. It also depends on how you measure sleep.

What does the evidence say?

Researchers usually measure sleep in two ways:

by asking people how much they sleep (known as self-reporting). But people are surprisingly inaccurate at estimating how much sleep they get
using objective tools, such as research-grade, wearable sleep trackers or the gold-standard polysomnography, which records brain waves, breathing and movement while you sleep during a sleep study in a lab or clinic.

Looking at the objective data, well-conducted studies usually show women sleep about 20 minutes more than men.

One global study of nearly 70,000 people who wore wearable sleep trackers found a consistent, small difference between men and women across age groups. For example, the sleep difference between men and women aged 40–44 was about 23–29 minutes.

Another large study using polysomnography found women slept about 19 minutes longer than men. In this study, women also spent more time in deep sleep: about 23% of the night compared to about 14% for men. The study also found only men’s quality of sleep declined with age.

The key caveat to these findings is that our individual sleep needs vary considerably. Women may sleep slightly more on average, just as they are slightly shorter on average. But there is no one-size-fits-all sleep duration, just as there is no universal height.

Suggesting every woman needs 20 extra minutes (let alone two hours) misses the point. It’s the same as insisting all women should be shorter than all men.

Even though women tend to sleep a little longer and deeper, they consistently report poorer sleep quality. They’re also about 40% more likely to be diagnosed with insomnia.

This mismatch between lab findings and the real world is a well-known puzzle in sleep research, and there are many reasons for it.

For instance, many research studies don’t consider mental health problems, medications, alcohol use and hormonal fluctuations. This filters out the very factors that shape sleep in the real world.

This mismatch between the lab and the bedroom also reminds us sleep doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Women’s sleep is shaped by a complex mix of biological, psychological and social factors, and this complexity is hard to capture in individual studies.

Let’s start with biology

Sleep problems begin to diverge between the sexes around puberty. They spike again during pregnancy, after birth and during perimenopause.

Fluctuating levels of ovarian hormones, particularly oestrogen and progesterone, seem to explain some of these sex differences in sleep.

For example, many girls and women report poorer sleep during the premenstrual phase just before their periods, when oestrogen and progesterone begin to fall.

Perhaps the most well-documented hormonal influence on our sleep is the decline in oestrogen during perimenopause. This is linked to increased sleep disturbances, particularly waking at 3am and struggling to get back to sleep.

Some health conditions also play a part in women’s sleep health. Thyroid disorders and iron deficiency, for instance, are more common in women and are closely linked to fatigue and disrupted sleep.

How about psychology?

Women are at much higher risk of depression, anxiety and trauma-related disorders. These very often accompany sleep problems and fatigue. Cognitive patterns, such as worry and rumination, are also more common in women and known to affect sleep.

Women are also prescribed antidepressants more often than men, and these medications tend to affect sleep.

Society also plays a role

Caregiving and emotional labour still fall disproportionately on women. Government data released this year suggests Australian women perform an average nine more hours of unpaid care and work each week than men.

While many women manage to put enough time aside for sleep, their opportunities for daytime rest are often scarce. This puts a lot of pressure on sleep to deliver all the restoration women need.

In my work with patients, we often untangle the threads woven into their experience of fatigue. While poor sleep is the obvious culprit, fatigue can also signal something deeper, such as underlying health issues, emotional strain, or too-high expectations of themselves. Sleep is certainly part of the picture, but it’s rarely the whole story.

For instance, rates of iron deficiency (which we know is more common in women and linked to sleep problems) are also higher in the reproductive years. This is just as many women are raising children and grappling with the “juggle” and the “mental load”.

Women in perimenopause are often navigating full-time work, teenagers, ageing parents and 3am hot flashes. These women may have adequate or even high-quality sleep (according to objective measures), but that doesn’t mean they wake feeling restored.

Most existing research also ignores gender-diverse populations. This limits our understanding of how sleep is shaped not just by biology, but by things such as identity and social context.

So where does this leave us?

While women sleep longer and better in the lab, they face more barriers to feeling rested in everyday life.

So, do women need more sleep than men? On average, yes, a little. But more importantly, women need more support and opportunity to recharge and recover across the day, and at night.

Amelia Scott is a member of the psychology education subcommittee of the Australasian Sleep Association. She receives funding from Macquarie University.

– ref. Do women really need more sleep than men? A sleep psychologist explains – https://theconversation.com/do-women-really-need-more-sleep-than-men-a-sleep-psychologist-explains-259985

July 17, 2025

Catholic clergy are speaking out on immigration − more than any other political issue except abortion

Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By Evan Stewart, Assistant Professor of Sociology, UMass Boston

Catholic bishops invited by Mark Seitz, center, the bishop of El Paso, Texas, lead a march in solidarity with migrants on March 24, 2025, in downtown El Paso. AP Photo/Andres Leighton

Catholic priests across the U.S. discuss immigration with their congregations more than leaders in many other faith traditions, according to our new research published in the journal Sociological Focus.

Catholic priests also said they discussed immigration more than nearly all other political issues, including hunger in their communities, capital punishment, health care and the environment. Abortion was the only one priests discussed slightly more often.

Our study, which uses data from the 2022 National Survey of Religious Leaders, found that 71% of Catholic priests surveyed said they spoke about any political issue with their congregations. Among them, just over half talked about immigration.

In white conservative Protestant congregations, Black Protestant congregations and non-Christian congregations, only about a quarter of leaders who discussed political issues said they talked about immigration. Leaders of white liberal Protestant congregations, however, talked about the topic almost as much as Catholic leaders did.

Why it matters

The United States has a long history of religious leaders addressing political matters, on both the left and the right – and today is no different.

With immigration raids on the rise across the country and an unprecedented level of funding approved for deportations, Catholic bishops in the U.S. are speaking out. Many of them have called for compassion and care for migrants and the need to uphold human dignity and due process, regardless of someone’s immigration status – in line with Catholic social teaching.

As sociologists who study politics and religion, we wanted to know what is happening on the ground in congregations. Given the church’s teachings about caring for the vulnerable, we expected that Catholic clergy might be particularly likely to speak out.

However, the percentage of people affiliated with a religious congregation is decreasing, and those who do attend are increasingly politically conservative. Rank and file Catholics are very divided on their support for immigrants, according to a 2024 national survey by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate.

In this context, we were curious about whether clergy would discuss a political issue such as immigration with their congregations or say they avoid it altogether.

What still isn’t known

The survey we used is from 2022, before some of today’s immigration enforcement policies took effect. That said, these findings demonstrate that immigration was on the radar for Catholic leaders before the recent changes under the current administration.

Because we focused on survey data, we got a good picture of trends among Catholic leaders nationwide. However, we could look only at whether religious leaders reported discussing immigration; we could not know exactly what they said, or how. There is much more to learn about what kinds of political messages come from the pulpit today and what messages tend to stick with congregants.

We did find that Catholic leaders of congregations where the majority of worshipers are Hispanic were much more likely to talk about immigration, compared with leaders of non-Catholic Hispanic congregations and Catholic leaders of mostly white congregations. Because Hispanic communities in the U.S. are facing the brunt of the immigration crackdown, this finding shows that Catholic leaders have been addressing the needs of their communities.

What’s next

Catholic parishioners may be exposed to different opinions about immigration from religious and political leaders. Diane, one of the authors, is furthering this research by conducting interviews with Catholics in Greater Boston. By asking church members to talk through their attitudes toward immigrants, we can learn more about how people make sense of complicated ethical questions.

The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.

Diane Beckman received funding from Duke University to conduct research using data from the National Survey of Religious Leaders.

Evan Stewart does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Catholic clergy are speaking out on immigration − more than any other political issue except abortion – https://theconversation.com/catholic-clergy-are-speaking-out-on-immigration-more-than-any-other-political-issue-except-abortion-260485

July 16, 2025

The government wants local authorities to embrace AI – here’s one way it could work in practice

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Alex Lord, Professor, Lever Chair of Urban Planning, University of Liverpool

Few issues ignite communities more fiercely than what to do with land. The prospect of releasing small portions of green belt land for housing developments, a windfarm proposal or plans for a new road can transform mild-mannered citizens into passionate advocates overnight.

This visceral connection between people and place perfectly illustrates the famous observation that “all politics is local”. In England, the principle that every citizen should be given the opportunity to “have their say” on planning matters is enshrined in law. Before any planning document is adopted, local authorities must give the public the chance to provide feedback.

The logic for this is based on a common-sense morality: before binding decisions are made about how an area might change, the local people who have to live with those decisions should be given the opportunity to endorse or reject that plan.

In practice this is a hugely cumbersome process. Local authorities have to make sense of thousands of comments. This prompted my colleagues and I at the University of Liverpool to begin thinking about how AI could be used to make this process more efficient.

Once a local authority publishes the relevant local planning document, every citizen, company, public, private or third sector organisation has the right to submit a written response. These may address the entire document or focus on a specific issue.

In all cases, the local authority is obliged to collate, comprehend and concisely summarise all public submissions. They will then decide whether the document requires amendments or if further evidence is needed to justify the proposals.

This creates an overwhelming burden for planning departments up and down the country. In high-development areas, submissions often number in the tens of thousands. And individual submissions range from a few sentences to over 100 pages.

Planners must read, absorb and synthesise all this information into a final report which will be used to make a decision. This report must fairly represent the aggregate views across all submissions.

Beyond the sheer volume of responses, human cognitive limitations and biases further complicate the process. Some submissions may be given greater emphasis than others. Recently read submissions are likely to have a greater influence on the reader than those reviewed earlier.

A digital solution

These challenges prompted us to explore alternatives. We partnered with Greater Cambridge Shared Planning – the planning authority for Cambridge City and South Cambridgeshire District Councils – to develop an AI-powered solution. Our tool, Plan AI, would read and summarise public submissions to the planning process.

In 2025, my colleagues and I conducted a real-world experiment. Three live public consultation exercises were processed in parallel – once by planners and once by Plan AI.

It took a planning officer just over 60 hours in total to download and process 320 submissions. Eighteen hours of this time was used to summarise each submission – a task that took Plan AI only 16 minutes. In that time, the AI tool was also able to create comprehensive reports identifying key themes, referenced sources and geographic analysis of the submissions.

A subsequent qualitative assessment found there to be no discernible difference in the quality of the summaries produced by the human planning officer and those by Plan AI. In fact, the general overview document produced by Plan AI is a significant addition to what would normally be produced. It included a geographic analysis of the origins of submissions – crucial information for planners to understand which communities and demographic groups were participating in the consultation.

Close up of a solar farm — Controversial planning proposals can attract tens of thousands of public comments.
pjhpix/Shutterstock

The future of planning

The UK government has set out a vision for local authorities to embrace AI for reducing administrative burden and improving the efficiency of government. For example, it recently rolled out an AI tool, developed with Google DeepMind, to digitise planning records.

The implications of experiments like these are far reaching. Planners can focus on their core expertise – assessing applications and supporting government priorities for housing, new towns and infrastructure renewal – rather than spending countless hours processing public comments.

AI can process vast amounts of text more consistently and comprehensively than humans. It can also identify connections between submissions that might otherwise be missed.

With the administrative burden drastically reduced, local authorities could potentially consult citizens more frequently across a wider range of planning issues, making planning even more democratic. Planners freed from paperwork could also dedicate more time to meaningful public engagement.

Of course, one danger with AI is that it could be used on the other side of the consultation, to generate a large volume of submissions in an attempt to over-amplify a particular point of view. However, AI tools could be used to defend against this.

PlanAI or similar programmes can generate an immediate summary of a comment submission, an ideal opportunity to insert a verification check that the submitter is indeed human. Putting the human back in the loop in this way reduces the potential for AI to be used to skew consultations.

By building the right tools and systems, we can create planning processes that are both more efficient and more responsive to citizen input – a win for democracy and effective governance alike.

PlanAI was developed under a paid contract with Greater Cambridge Shared Planning. At the time of publication, it is not sold or marketed to other governments or authorities, but may be so in the future. Alex Lord and the other researchers involved received funding from the UK government’s PropTech initiative and Greater Cambridge Shared Planning.

– ref. The government wants local authorities to embrace AI – here’s one way it could work in practice – https://theconversation.com/the-government-wants-local-authorities-to-embrace-ai-heres-one-way-it-could-work-in-practice-258449

July 16, 2025

Why drones and AI can’t quickly find missing flood victims, yet

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Robin R. Murphy, Professor of Computer Science and Engineering, Texas A&M University

The landscape In the aftermath of a flood makes it challenging to spot victims. AP Photo/Gerald Herbert

For search and rescue, AI is not more accurate than humans, but it is far faster.

Recent successes in applying computer vision and machine learning to drone imagery for rapidly determining building and road damage after hurricanes or shifting wildfire lines suggest that artificial intelligence could be valuable in searching for missing persons after a flood.

Machine learning systems typically take less than one second to scan a high-resolution image from a drone versus one to three minutes for a person. Plus, drones often produce more imagery to view than is humanly possible in the critical first hours of a search when survivors may still be alive.

Unfortunately, today’s AI systems are not up to the task.

We are robotics reseachers who study the use of drones in disasters. Our experiences searching for victims of flooding and numerous other events show that current implementations of AI fall short.

However, the technology can play a role in searching for flood victims. The key is AI-human collaboration.

a large red SUV with a white horizontal stripe and symbols and lettering along the side — Drones have become standard equipment for first responders, but floods pose unique challenges.
Eric Smalley, CC BY-ND

AI’s potential

Searching for flood victims is a type of wilderness search and rescue that presents unique challenges. The goal for machine learning scientists is to rank which images have signs of victims and indicate where in those images search-and-rescue personnel should focus. If the responder sees signs of a victim, they pass the GPS location in the image to search teams in the field to check.

The ranking is done by a classifier, which is an algorithm that learns to identify similar instances of objects – cats, cars, trees – from training data in order to recognize those objects in new images. For example, in a search-and-rescue context, a classifier would spot instances of human activity such as garbage or backpacks to pass to wilderness search-and-rescue teams, or even identify the missing person themselves.

A classifier is needed because of the sheer volume of imagery that drones can produce. For example, a single 20-minute flight can produce over 800 high-resolution images. If there are 10 flights – a small number – there would be over 8,000 images. If a responder spends only 10 seconds looking at each image, it would take over 22 hours of effort. Even if the task is divided among a group of “squinters,” humans tend to miss areas of images and show cognitive fatigue.

The ideal solution is an AI system that scans the entire image, prioritizes images that have the strongest signs of victims, and highlights the area of the image for a responder to inspect. It could also decide whether the location should be flagged for special attention by search-and-rescue crews.

Where AI falls short

While this seems to be a perfect opportunity for computer vision and machine learning, modern systems have a high error rate. If the system is programmed to overestimate the number of candidate locations in hopes of not missing any victims, it will likely produce too many false candidates. That would mean overloading squinters or, worse, the search-and-rescue teams, which would have to navigate through debris and muck to check the candidate locations.

Developing computer vision and machine learning systems for finding flood victims is difficult for three reasons.

One is that while existing computer vision systems are certainly capable of identifying people visible in aerial imagery, the visual indicators of a flood victim are often very different compared with those for a lost hiker or fugitive. Flood victims are often obscured, camouflaged, entangled in debris or submerged in water. These visual challenges increase the possibility that existing classifiers will miss victims.

Second, machine learning requires training data, but there are no datasets of aerial imagery where humans are tangled in debris, covered in mud and not in normal postures. This lack also increases the possibility of errors in classification.

Third, many of the drone images often captured by searchers are oblique views, rather than looking straight down. This means the GPS location of a candidate area is not the same as the GPS location of the drone. It is possible to compute the GPS location if the drone’s altitude and camera angle are known, but unfortunately those attributes rarely are. The imprecise GPS location means teams have to spend extra time searching.

How AI can help

Fortunately, with humans and AI working together, search-and-rescue teams can successfully use existing systems to help narrow down and prioritize imagery for further inspection.

In the case of flooding, human remains may be tangled among vegetation and debris. Therefore, a system could identify clumps of debris big enough to contain remains. A common search strategy is to identify the GPS locations of where flotsam has gathered, because victims may be part of these same deposits.

aerial view of a landscape with green rings superimposed — A machine learning algorithm identified piles of debris large enough to contain bodies in an aerial image of a flood aftermath.
Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue and University of Maryland

An AI classifier could find debris commonly associated with remains, such as artificial colors and construction debris with straight lines or 90-degree corners. Responders find these signs as they systematically walk the riverbanks and flood plains, but a classifier could help prioritize areas in the first few hours and days, when there may be survivors, and later could confirm that teams didn’t miss any areas of interest as they navigated the difficult landscape on foot.

Robin R. Murphy receives funding from the National Science Foundation. She is affiliated with the Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue.

Thomas Manzini is affiliated with the Center for Robot Assisted Search & Rescue (CRASAR), and his work is funded by the National Science Foundation’s AI Institute for Societal Decision Making (AI-SDM).

– ref. Why drones and AI can’t quickly find missing flood victims, yet – https://theconversation.com/why-drones-and-ai-cant-quickly-find-missing-flood-victims-yet-261035

July 16, 2025

Why Russia is not taking Trump’s threats seriously

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Patrick E. Shea, Senior Lecturer in International Relations and Global Governance, University of Glasgow

The US president, Donald Trump, recently announced that Russia had 50 days to end its war in Ukraine. Otherwise it would face comprehensive secondary sanctions targeting countries that continued trading with Moscow.

On July 15, when describing new measures that would impose 100% tariffs on any country buying Russian exports, Trump warned: “They are very biting. They are very significant. And they are going to be very bad for the countries involved.”

Secondary sanctions do not just target Russia directly, they threaten to cut off access to US markets for any country maintaining trade relationships with Moscow. The economic consequences would affect global supply chains, targeting major economies like China and India that have become Russia’s commercial lifelines.

Despite the dire threats, Moscow’s stock exchange increased by 2.7% immediately following Trump’s announcement. The value of the Russian rouble also strengthened. On a global scale, oil markets appear to have relaxed, suggesting traders see no imminent risks.

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This market reaction coincided with a nonplussed Moscow. While official statements noted that time was needed for Russia to “analyse what was said in Washington”, other statements suggested that the threats would have no effect. Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev, for example, declared on social media that “Russia didn’t care” about Trump’s threats.

The positive market reaction and lack of panic from Russian officials tell us more than simple scepticism about Trump’s willingness to follow through.

If investors doubted Trump’s credibility, we would expect market indifference, not enthusiasm. Instead, the reaction suggests that financial markets expected a stronger response from the US. As Artyom Nikolayev, an analyst from Invest Era, quipped: “Trump performed below market expectations.”

A reprieve, not a threat

Trump’s threat isn’t just non-credible – the positive market reaction in Russia suggests it is a gift for Moscow. The 50-day ultimatum is seen not as a deadline but as a reprieve, meaning nearly two months of guaranteed inaction from the US.

This will allow Russia more time to press its military advantages in Ukraine without facing new economic pressure. Fifty days is also a long time in American politics, where other crises will almost certainly arise to distract attention from the war.

More importantly, Trump’s threat actively undermines more serious sanctions efforts that were gaining momentum in the US Congress. A bipartisan bill has been advancing a far more severe sanctions package, proposing secondary tariffs of up to 500% and, crucially, severely limiting the president’s ability to waive them.

By launching his own initiative, Trump seized control of the policy agenda. Once the ultimatum was issued, US Senate majority leader John Thune announced that any vote on the tougher sanctions bill would be delayed until after the 50-day period. This effectively pauses a more credible threat facing the Kremlin.

This episode highlights a problem for US attempts to use economic statecraft in international relations. Three factors have combined to undermine the credibility of Trump’s threats.

First, there is Trump’s own track record. Financial markets have become so accustomed to the administration announcing severe tariffs only to delay, water down or abandon them that the jibe “Taco”, short for “Trump always chickens out”, has gained traction in financial circles.

This reputation for failing to stick to threats means that adversaries and markets alike have learned to price in a high probability of backing down.

Second, the administration’s credibility is weakened by a lack of domestic political accountability. Research on democratic credibility in international relations emphasises how domestic constraints – what political scientists call “audience costs” – can paradoxically strengthen a country’s international commitments.

When leaders know they will face political punishment from voters or a legislature for backing down from a threat, their threats gain weight. Yet the general reluctance of Congress to constrain Trump undermines this logic. This signals to adversaries that threats can be made without consequence, eroding their effectiveness.

And third, effective economic coercion requires a robust diplomatic and bureaucratic apparatus to implement and enforce it. The systematic gutting of the State Department and the freezing of United States Agency for International Development (USAID) programmes eliminate the diplomatic infrastructure necessary for sustained economic pressure.

Effective sanctions require careful coordination with allies, which the Trump administration has undermined. In addition, effective economic coercion requires planning and credible commitment to enforcement, all of which are impossible without a professional diplomatic corps.

Investors and foreign governments appear to be betting that this combination of presidential inconsistency, a lack of domestic accountability, and a weakened diplomatic apparatus makes any threat more political theatre than genuine economic coercion. The rally in Russian markets was a clear signal that American economic threats are becoming less feared.

Patrick E. Shea does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Why Russia is not taking Trump’s threats seriously – https://theconversation.com/why-russia-is-not-taking-trumps-threats-seriously-261296

July 16, 2025

Design and Disability at the V&A is a rich, thought-provoking exhibition

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Laudan Nooshin, Professor of Music, School of Communication and Creativity, City St George’s, University of London

One of the first things to greet visitors at the V&A’s new Design and Disability exhibition is a striking blue bench by artist Finnegan Shannon titled, Do You Want Us Here Or Not? This exhibit is a response to the often inadequate seating in museums, which not only acts as a barrier to accessibility for many people, but is more widely symptomatic of ableist approaches to museum and exhibition design.

In this case, the invitation to “Please sit here!” sets the tone for the whole exhibition, which also includes a large sensory map of the layout (located at wheelchair level), a tactile map, and QR codes that link to audio description for blind and partially sighted visitors, and also British Sign Language interpretation.

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Aiming to showcase the radical contributions of disabled, deaf and neurodivergent people to design history and contemporary culture from the 1940s until the present, the exhibition goes well beyond this, addressing an impressively wide range of issues around access, disability and exclusion. It also reveals how ableism operates across a range of exclusions, such as race, gender, class and more.

As the introductory notes point out: “Disabled people past and present have challenged and confronted the imbalance of design in society. This exhibition highlights disabled individuals at the heart of design history … It is both a celebration and a call to action.”

While the fight for disability justice goes back many decades – also documented in the exhibition – it’s only relatively recently that questions of access and equality have gone beyond the physical. These include a wide range of issues related to neuro-inclusion and sensory access, including calm spaces and sensory maps that indicate noisy areas.

My own interest in sound in museums has come partly out of research focusing on the role of acoustics in creating accessible spaces, and from my own experience of noise sensitivity conditions hyperacusis and misophonia. Inclusive sonic design seeks to address how sound operates as a factor of social inclusion and exclusion in places like museums.

The V&A exhibition comprises three sections: visibility, tools and living. Visibility focuses on design and art as fundamental tools of activism and includes work created as part of disability justice movements over many decades. This section is a stark reminder of the justice and rights that only come about through extensive struggles.

Tools highlight the extraordinary contribution to design innovation made by disabled people. Living explores stories of disabled people claiming space and imagining the worlds that they want to live in.

Sections two and three both advocate for the social model of disability in which people are rendered disabled by their environment, something that calls for design solutions (as opposed to the medical model in which people are required to navigate and find solutions to their “problem”).

The exhibition draws attention to a wide range of physical and sensory exclusions, both in the displays and the design of the space itself. The in-house design team includes staff with personal experience of disability who also worked closely with external partners living with disability.

There are plenty of exhibits that can be experienced through touch. For partially sighted visitors, there are strong visual contrasts in the wall colours and the edges of displays are lit up. And there are raised edgings on all exhibits for people using a cane – all of which help with navigation.

There are also quiet areas and plenty of seating. Some of these features are already being incorporated into gallery and exhibition design, and hopefully will soon become standard.

I particularly liked the way various issues intersect in the exhibition, in which a range of exclusions are set alongside one another: race, hearing impairment, youth exclusion and stammering, for example.

Other favourites included the B1 Blue Flame rattling football used for blind football, which visitors can pick up, feel, smell, shake and listen to. The Deaf Rave set and Woojer Vest are designed for deaf clubbers and performers and use vibrating tactile discs that amplify sound vibrations.

The beautiful blanket and pillow entitled Public S/Pacing by Helen Statford offers an invitation to rest, drawing attention to “crip time”, accepting “a different pace to non-disabled norms, challenging conventions of productivity, and resting in radical ways that would actually benefit society at large”.

The blanket highlights the failures of the design of public spaces to include disabled people, “challenging ableist assumptions with care and visibility”. The reverse of the blanket has a quotation from Rhiannon Armstrong’s Radical Act of Stopping (2016), embroidered by Poppy Nash.

The exhibition includes many examples of “disability gain” by which design aimed at a particular group of people unintentionally benefits others, too. An example is the smartphone touchscreen, based on technology developed by engineers Wayne Westerman and John Elias as an alternative to the standard keyboard, which Westerman was unable to use due to severe hand pain.

Initially marketed to people with hand disabilities, the technology was later sold to Apple where it revolutionised mobile phone technology.

The final panel of the exhibition is titled Label for Missing Objects, an imaginative and fitting way to mark the continuing story of designing a world that works for “every body and every mind”.

Design and Disability is a rich, thought-provoking and landmark exhibition. Kudos to the V&A, although its importance is so obvious, I wonder why it took this long to host a show dedicated to disabled artists and designers and the wider social impact of their work.

I very much hope there are plans for the exhibition to tour the UK and beyond, and to become a permanent gallery at the V&A, so that it can inform curation and design work in other museums.

Design and Disability at the V&A runs until February 15 2026.

Laudan Nooshin received funding from the AHRC for the project Place-making Through Sound: Designing for Inclusivity and Wellbeing (2023-24).

– ref. Design and Disability at the V&A is a rich, thought-provoking exhibition – https://theconversation.com/design-and-disability-at-the-vanda-is-a-rich-thought-provoking-exhibition-261135

July 16, 2025

From tea towels to TV remotes: eight everyday bacterial hotspots – and how to clean them

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Manal Mohammed, Senior Lecturer, Medical Microbiology, University of Westminster

From your phone to your sponge, your toothbrush to your trolley handle, invisible armies of bacteria are lurking on the everyday objects you touch the most. Most of these microbes are harmless – some even helpful – but under the right conditions, a few can make you seriously ill.

But here’s the catch: some of the dirtiest items in your life are the ones you might least expect.

Here are some of the hidden bacteria magnets in your daily routine, and how simple hygiene tweaks can protect you from infection.

Shopping trolley handles

Shopping trolleys are handled by dozens of people each day, yet they’re rarely sanitised. That makes the handles a prime spot for germs, particularly the kind that spread illness.

One study in the US found that over 70% of shopping carts were contaminated with coliform bacteria, a group that includes strains like E. coli, often linked to faecal contamination. Another study found Klebsiella pneumoniae, Citrobacter freundii and Pseudomonas species on trolleys.

Protect yourself: Always sanitise trolley handles before use, especially since you’ll probably be handling food, your phone or touching your face.

Kitchen sponges

That sponge by your sink? It could be one of the dirtiest items in your home. Sponges are porous, damp and often come into contact with food: ideal conditions for bacteria to thrive.

After just two weeks, a sponge can harbour millions of bacteria, including coliforms linked to faecal contamination, according to the NSF Household Germ Study and research on faecal coliforms.

Protect yourself: Disinfect your sponge weekly by microwaving it, soaking it in vinegar, or running it through the dishwasher. Replace it if it smells – even after cleaning. Use different sponges for different tasks (for example, one for dishes, another for cleaning up after raw meat).

Chopping boards

Chopping boards can trap bacteria in grooves left by knife cuts. Salmonella and E. coli can survive for hours on dry surfaces and pose a risk if boards aren’t cleaned properly.

Protect yourself: Use separate boards for raw meat and vegetables. Wash thoroughly with hot, soapy water, rinse well and dry completely. Replace boards that develop deep grooves.

Tea towels

Reusable kitchen towels quickly become germ magnets. You use them to dry hands, wipe surfaces and clean up spills – often without washing them often enough.

Research shows that E. coli and salmonella can live on cloth towels for hours.

Protect yourself: Use paper towels when possible, or separate cloth towels for different jobs. Wash towels regularly in hot water with bleach or disinfectant.

Mobile phones

Phones go everywhere with us – including bathrooms – and we touch them constantly. Their warmth and frequent handling make them ideal for bacterial contamination.

Research shows phones can carry harmful bacteria, including Staphylococcus aureus.

Protect yourself: Avoid using your phone in bathrooms and wash your hands often. Clean it with a slightly damp microfibre cloth and mild soap. Avoid harsh chemicals or direct sprays.

Toothbrushes near toilets

Flushing a toilet releases a plume of microscopic droplets, which can land on nearby toothbrushes. A study found that toothbrushes stored in bathrooms can harbour E. coli, Staphylococcus aureus and other microbes.

Protect yourself: Store your toothbrush as far from the toilet as possible. Rinse it after each use, let it air-dry upright and replace it every three months – or sooner if worn.

Bathmats

Cloth bathmats absorb water after every shower, creating a warm, damp environment where bacteria and fungi can thrive.

Protect yourself: Hang your bathmat to dry after each use and wash it weekly in hot water. For a more hygienic option, consider switching to a wooden mat or a bath stone: a mat made from diatomaceous earth, which dries quickly and reduces microbial growth by eliminating lingering moisture.

Pet towels and toys

Pet towels and toys stay damp and come into contact with saliva, fur, urine and outdoor bacteria. According to the US national public health agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, pet toys can harbour E. coli, Staphylococcus aureus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa.

Protect your pet (and yourself): Wash pet towels weekly with hot water and pet-safe detergent. Let toys air dry or use a dryer. Replace worn or damaged toys regularly.

Shared nail and beauty tools

Nail clippers, cuticle pushers and other grooming tools can spread harmful bacteria if they’re not properly cleaned. Contaminants may include Staphylococcus aureus – including MRSA, a strain resistant to antibiotics – Pseudomonas aeruginosa, the bacteria behind green nail syndrome, and Mycobacterium fortuitum, linked to skin infections from pedicures and footbaths.

Protect yourself: Bring your own tools to salons or ask how theirs are sterilised. Reputable salons will gladly explain their hygiene practices.

Airport security trays

Airport trays are handled by hundreds of people daily – and rarely cleaned. Research has found high levels of bacteria, including E. coli.

Protect yourself: After security, wash your hands or use sanitiser, especially before eating or touching your face.

Hotel TV remotes

Studies show hotel remote controls can be dirtier than toilet seats. They’re touched by many hands and rarely sanitised.

Common bacteria include E. coli, enterococcus and Staphylococcus aureus, including MRSA, according to research.

Protect yourself: Wipe the remote with antibacterial wipes when you arrive. Some travellers even put it in a plastic bag. Always wash your hands after using shared items.

Bacteria are everywhere, including on the items you use every day. You can’t avoid all germs, and most won’t make you sick. But with a few good habits, such as regular hand washing, cleaning and smart storage, you can help protect yourself and others.

It’s all in your hands.

Manal Mohammed does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. From tea towels to TV remotes: eight everyday bacterial hotspots – and how to clean them – https://theconversation.com/from-tea-towels-to-tv-remotes-eight-everyday-bacterial-hotspots-and-how-to-clean-them-260784

July 16, 2025

Britons are less likely than Americans to invest in stocks – but they may not have the full picture

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Sam Pybis, Senior Lecturer in Economics, Manchester Metropolitan University

UK chancellor Rachel Reeves would like Britons to invest more in stocks – particularly UK stocks – rather than keep their money in cash. She has even urged the UK finance industry to be less negative about investing and highlight the potential gains as well as the risks.

Stock ownership is important for governments for a variety of reasons. Boosting capital markets can encourage business expansion, job creation and long-term economic growth. It can also give people another source of income in later life, especially as long-term investing can offer greater returns than saving.

But in the UK, excluding workplace pensions, only 23% of people have invested in the stock market, compared to nearly two-thirds in the US. Survey results suggest that American consumers are generally more comfortable with financial risks.

And it appears that a greater degree of risk translates into closer political engagement. During market shocks driven by US president Donald Trump’s tariff chaos, many Americans tracked headlines – and their portfolios – closely. This contrasts with the UK, where most people keep their savings in safer assets like cash savings accounts or premium bonds.

If Britons are more risk-averse, media coverage that tends to be noisier when markets fall than when they recover may be having an impact. While concerns regarding market volatility may be valid, they can overshadow the long-term benefits of investing.

One key opportunity that many British consumers have missed out on is the rise of low-cost, diversified exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which have made investing more accessible and affordable. An ETF allows investors to buy or sell baskets of shares on an exchange. For example, a FTSE100 ETF gives investors exposure to the UK’s top 100 companies without having to buy each one individually.

This is exactly the kind of long-term, low-cost investing that Reeves appears to be promoting. But should savers be worried about current market volatility – much of it driven by trade tensions and tariff uncertainty? One view, of course, is that volatility is simply part of investing.

But it could also be argued that big shifts within the space of a single month are often exaggerated. People are also likely to be put off by news headlines, which tend to exaggerate the swings in the market.

Examining daily excess returns in the US stock market from November 2024 to April 2025, I plotted cumulative returns (which show how an investment grows over time by adding up past returns) within each month. April 2025 stands out. Despite experiencing several sharp daily losses, the market rebounded swiftly in the days that followed.

This pattern isn’t new. Historically, markets have shown a remarkable ability to recover from short-term shocks. Yet many potential investors could be deterred by alarming headlines that, while factually accurate, often highlight single-day declines without broader context.

The reality is that the stock market is frequently a series of short-lived storms. These are volatile, yes, but often followed by calm and recovery.

Fear and caution

During market downturns, it’s common for people to try to understand why this time is worse or analyse if this crash is more serious than previous ones.

The fear these headlines generate could feed into barriers to long-term investing in the UK. And that’s one of the challenges the chancellor faces in encouraging more Britons to invest.

For those already invested in the stock market, short-term declines are part of the journey. They are risks that can be borne with the understanding that markets tend to recover over time.

My analysis of daily US stock market data since 1926 shows that after sharp daily drops, the market often rebounds quickly (see pie chart below). In fact, more than a quarter of recoveries occur within just a few days.

But this resilience is rarely the focus of media coverage. It’s far more common to see headlines reporting that the market is down than to see follow-ups highlighting how quickly it bounced back.

Research has shown that negative economic information is likely to have a greater impact on public attitudes. For example, a sharp drop in the stock market might dominate front pages, while a steady recovery over the following weeks barely gets a mention. The imbalance reinforces a sense of crisis, even when the broader picture is less bleak.

front page of daily mail newspaper from april 2025 with the headline 'meltdown' — Markets went on to recover in April 2025… but did the headlines reflect this?
David G40/Shutterstock

Unbalanced reporting can distort perceptions, discouraging potential investors who might otherwise benefit from long-term participation in the market. It appears that American perceptions of their finances are also affected by news coverage in a similar way.

Over the long term, the difference between stock market returns and the generally lower returns from government bonds is known as the “equity risk premium puzzle”. Economists have long debated why this gap is so large. Some observers argue it may narrow in the future. But many others, including the chancellor, believe that investing in the stock market remains a beneficial long-term strategy.

If more people are to benefit from long-term investing, it’s vital to tell the full story. That means not just highlighting when markets fall, but following up on how they recover afterwards.

Sam Pybis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Britons are less likely than Americans to invest in stocks – but they may not have the full picture – https://theconversation.com/britons-are-less-likely-than-americans-to-invest-in-stocks-but-they-may-not-have-the-full-picture-259485