Category: The Conversation – Global Perspectives

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Shannon Bosch, Associate Professor (Law), Edith Cowan University

Afghanistan says at least 400 people have been killed in a Pakistani airstrike on a drug rehabilitation hospital in Kabul on Monday night, with potentially hundreds more wounded.

Pakistan has denied deliberately targeting the health-care facility. In a statement on X, the Pakistani Information and Broadcasting Ministry said the strikes “precisely targeted military installations and terrorist support infrastructure including technical equipment storage and ammunition storage of Afghan Taliban”.

Attacks on health-care facilities are surging worldwide.

On March 14, an Israeli airstrike hit a health-care facility in Lebanon, killing 12 doctors, nurses and paramedics. The strike brought the number of health-care workers killed in Lebanon in recent days to 31.

Since early March, the World Health Organization (WHO) has verified 27 attacks on health-care facilities in Lebanon alone, as Israeli strikes in Lebanon and joint US–Israeli operations in Iran have intensified.

The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and the WHO condemned these attacks as violations of international law.

So, what laws protect medical facilities, staff and patients during conflict? And do they lose this protection if facilities are used to shelter combatants?

What the ‘laws of war’ say about protecting hospitals

International humanitarian law contains detailed rules to protect medical personnel, facilities and the sick and wounded during armed conflict.

Under these “laws of war”:

• medical personnel, including doctors, nurses and paramedics, must be respected and protected while performing their duties

• there are special protections for ambulances and transport used exclusively for medical purposes

• these protections extend to the wounded and sick in their care. This includes enemy fighters who require treatment and are no longer taking part in hostilities

• impartial humanitarian organisations must be allowed to provide medical assistance. Consent to their work cannot be refused arbitrarily

• medical facilities must display the distinctive protective emblems of the Red Cross, Red Crescent or Red Crystal. Medical personnel must carry identification and armlets displaying these emblems

• misusing these symbols to shield military operations is prohibited. Doing so may amount to perfidy, a type of deliberate deception which is a war crime under international law

• deliberately attacking medical personnel or facilities displaying these emblems can also constitute a war crime.

Where did these rules come from?

The laws protecting medical services in war emerged in response to the enormous suffering witnessed in 19th and 20th-century conflicts.

The first treaty protecting wounded soldiers and medical personnel dates back to 1864, when states adopted the original Geneva Convention.

Today, the 1949 Geneva Conventions, their Additional Protocols, together with a body of customary international law, form a near-universal legal framework binding all parties to conflict. This includes non-state armed groups.

These rules require warring parties to respect and protect medical personnel, facilities and the wounded and sick in all circumstances.

Why are attacks on health care increasing?

In January, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) reported attacks on medical facilities and personnel had reached unprecedented levels around the world. In 2025 alone, there were 1,348 attacks on health-care facilities, double the number reported in 2024.

The law itself has not changed. But warfare has. Recent conflicts in South Sudan, Ukraine, Gaza, Iran and Lebanon are taking place in densely populated urban environments. Armed groups operate within complex civilian settings, often near hospitals and clinics.

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Read more:
Attacks on health care during war are becoming more common, creating devastating ripple effects

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This has shifted the narrative used by some warring parties. What were once described as “mistaken attacks” are now frequently justified on grounds of military necessity. States often claim insurgents are exploiting hospitals or ambulances to gain military advantage.

Israel, for example, has accused Hezbollah and Hamas of using medical infrastructure for military purposes.

Can hospitals lose their protection if fighters are hiding inside?

Yes. Hospitals can lose their special protection if they are used, outside their humanitarian role, to harm the enemy.

However, the law sets a very high threshold for this.

Medical personnel may carry light weapons for self-defence. Armed guards may be present to protect the facility. The presence of wounded fighters receiving treatment does not change this – protections still apply.

Protection may be lost only if hospitals are used for activities such as:

• launching attacks

• serving as an observation post

• storing weapons

• acting as a command or liaison centre

• sheltering able-bodied combatants.

Even then, in cases of doubt hospitals must be presumed protected.

Importantly, verifying a hospital is being misused does not give parties a free licence to attack.

Before launching an attack on a compromised medical facility, international humanitarian law requires a warning to be issued, and reasonable time allowed for the misuse to stop.

If the warning is ignored, the attacking party must still comply with the core principles of international humanitarian law:

Proportionality

The expected military advantage must be weighed against the humanitarian consequences of the attack. This includes long-term impacts on health-care services. If the expected civilian harm would be excessive, the attack must be cancelled.

Precautions

All feasible precautions must be taken to minimise harm to patients and medical staff. This may include facilitating evacuations, planning for disruption to medical services, and helping restore health-care capacity after the attack.

Even when a facility loses protection, the wounded and sick must still be respected and protected.

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Read more:
Health-care workers should not be a target. In Gaza, their detention and death affect the entire population

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Are attacks on health care becoming normalised?

The UN Security Council, WHO, MSF and the OHCHR have expressed concern attacks on medical personnel and facilities – and the lack of accountability for them – are becoming dangerously normalised.

The legal framework protecting hospitals and health-care workers already exists.

States and armed groups must disseminate the law and train their military forces.

National legal systems are expected to investigate and prosecute those perpetrating war crimes against the wounded and sick, medical personnel and their facilities, or misusing protective emblems for military advantage.

In practice, however, investigating attacks during active conflict is extremely challenging. Territorial states are often unwilling or unable to pursue prosecutions.

Can we reverse this trend?

Open-source investigative groups such as Forensic Architecture, Bellingcat, Mnemonics and Airwars now play a growing role in preserving satellite imagery, geo-location data, and videos uploaded to social media. These allow independent fact-finding missions to conduct credible investigations. They may pursue accountability even when territorial states are unwilling or unable to do so.

Without such accountability, places meant to save lives during conflict may increasingly become targets themselves.

Shannon Bosch 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. Attacks on hospitals are surging in war zones. What do the laws of war say about protecting them? – https://theconversation.com/attacks-on-hospitals-are-surging-in-war-zones-what-do-the-laws-of-war-say-about-protecting-them-278414

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Eylem Altuntas, Researcher, Speech & Language Development, The MARCS Institute for Brain, Behaviour and Development, Western Sydney University

Anyone who has spent time with a baby knows how unpredictable the first year can feel. One week a baby suddenly seems to “get” something new. The next week, that same response may disappear.

Parents often describe this as progress coming in bursts rather than in a straight line. These changes can be exciting to watch, but they can also raise questions. Did my baby forget? Did something go wrong?

Our new research, published in Language Learning and Development, suggests early language learning unfolds in much the same way. We found babies can pick up how speech sounds are made as early as four months old.

But this early ability does not simply grow stronger month by month. Instead, as babies move through the first year, the way they show what they know can change, even while learning continues quietly in the background.

Learning about speech

In earlier research, we showed babies as young as four months can learn patterns about how speech sounds are made.

After a short game involving two made-up “mini-languages”, four-month-olds could link what they had heard with what they later saw, even when the test was completely silent.

This told us babies were not just remembering individual sounds. They were picking up something more general about speech, such as whether sounds were made with the lips or with the tongue tip.

For many researchers, and for parents following this work, that raised a natural question: if babies can do this so early, what happens next?

Watching learning change over time

To find out, we followed the same babies over time and tested them again at seven and ten months. We also tested a separate group of ten-month-olds who had never seen the task before.

This allowed us to watch how learning changed within the same children, while also seeing how babies at the same age responded when everything was new.

The task itself was designed to be simple and engaging. Babies first learned links between made-up words and cartoon animals. For example, a word like “buviwa”, made using the lips, might always appear with a kangaroo, while a word like “dazolu”, made using the tongue tip, appeared with a kookaburra. Each “language” followed a clear pattern based on how its sounds were made.

Later, babies watched silent videos of a person speaking new words and then saw an animal image. Because the videos were silent, babies had to rely on what they had learned earlier, rather than matching sound and sight in the moment.

At four months, babies showed a clear response, paying closer attention when the talking face matched the animal they had learned. At seven months, this clear response was no longer there, which at first surprised us.

But at ten months, a different pattern emerged. Babies paid more attention when something did not match what they had learned. This response was especially clear in babies who were seeing the task for the first time, and became stronger when results from both ten-month-old groups were considered together.

Reorganising language systems

When we look at these findings together, the pattern starts to make sense.

Younger babies often prefer what feels familiar, while older babies tend to focus more on what is new or unexpected. Seven months appears to be a transitional period. Learning is still happening, but it is not expressed as a clear preference in either direction. Rather than signalling a loss of ability, the shift we see reflects a change in how babies respond as they mature.

This period of change fits with what is happening more broadly in babies’ lives. Between about seven and ten months, babies are becoming increasingly tuned to the sounds of the language they hear every day. They are also beginning to recognise common words and link sounds to meaning.

During this time, their language system is not just growing, it is reorganising. When that happens, learning can look uneven from the outside.

Many parents notice similar moments at home. A baby who once turned immediately toward a familiar voice may suddenly seem less responsive, only to show new signs of understanding weeks later.

These moments can be worrying, especially when progress is expected to be steady. Our findings suggest some of these changes may reflect learning in motion rather than learning lost.

Behaviour doesn’t always tell the full story

For parents, this work is a reminder that behaviour does not always tell the full story. If a baby doesn’t show a clear response at a particular age, it does not necessarily mean they have stopped learning or missed an important step.

For researchers and clinicians, the findings highlight the limits of relying on single tests at single ages. Early language learning is flexible and changing. To understand it properly, we need to look at how babies develop over time, not just how they perform at one moment.

Importantly, the results show babies don’t learn in a straight line, and quiet moments are not empty ones. Even when progress is hard to see, learning may still be unfolding, preparing the ground for what comes next.

Eylem Altuntas 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. Babies learn a lot in their first year. But their behaviour doesn’t always tell the full story – https://theconversation.com/babies-learn-a-lot-in-their-first-year-but-their-behaviour-doesnt-always-tell-the-full-story-274032

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By James Dwyer, Lecturer, School of Social Sciences, University of Tasmania

As the US–Israeli war with Iran enters its third week, reports are emerging that Israel is potentially running out of air defence interceptors due to Iran’s retaliatory attacks.

The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) and Israeli foreign minister have denied the reports. The government did reportedly approve around US$826 million (A$1.17 billion) for “urgent and essential defence procurement” over the weekend, however.

It’s difficult to gauge just how many interceptors are remaining, as the IDF does not disclose this type of information. But the possibility of this occurring was not entirely unexpected before Israel and the US began bombing Iran more than two weeks ago.

What are these interceptors?

Israel has a sophisticated and layered air defence system, capable of repelling attacks from ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, aircraft, drones and artillery shells at multiple altitudes, both inside and outside the atmosphere.

The famous “Iron Dome” makes up just one of these layers – it intercepts short-range artillery shells and rockets.

While there are technological differences between all of these systems, they are comprised of three basic elements:

• the IDF personnel to operate them
• the radar systems to detect incoming attacks
• the interceptors themselves.

Israel has a new “Iron Beam” laser system that can be used to destroy missiles and drones, but the most common interceptors are surface-to-air missiles.

Ballistic missile defence interceptors, in particular, are incredibly complex and expensive weapons. The more capable they are, the more expensive they are to build. They are also limited in number. A sustained attack can quickly deplete even Israel’s stockpile.

Why might Israel be running low?

The 12-day war that Israel fought with Iran last year significantly depleted both its stockpile of anti-ballistic missiles, as well as that of its ally, the United States.

One Washington-based research centre calculated that Israel and the US intercepted 273 of 322 Iranian missiles they attempted to stop in the war, an 85% success rate.

Given a large number of these interceptors were used so recently, Israel and the US are unlikely to have fully replenished their stockpiles before launching the current war.

Another sign this is the case: the US is reportedly moving parts of its THAAD missile defence system from South Korea to the Middle East. This means the US will need to carry more of the defensive burden in the region, which could quickly deplete its own assets.

Ballistic missiles are also very difficult to intercept due to the speed and altitude they attain. Several interceptors are usually required to ensure each incoming missile is stopped. Iran is also using cluster munitions on some of its ballistic missiles, which further compounds the problem.

Iran has cheap, easy-to-replace drones, which it is using to try to overwhelm Israeli and American air defence systems, as well. These can also be launched from dispersed locations that are difficult to detect, making them harder to destroy on the ground than ballistic missiles.

Iran has so far launched more than 500 missiles and 2,000 drones since the war began.

Jet fighters can help defend against these drone attacks and have done so with great success, but the missiles they fire are also more expensive than the drones themselves. And other weapons platforms (such as the Iron Beam) are currently in limited supply.

The US and Israel are not the only ones reportedly running low on interceptors. The Persian Gulf states have also come under Iranian attack, and are burning through what defensive assets they have.

The Iranians have specifically targeted missile defence radars across the region, with reports they have successfully destroyed or damaged several systems.

All of this, of course, raises the question of why Israel and the US would start another conflict in the first place if their stockpiles were not fully replenished. There could be several potential reasons:

• they had managed to rebuild their stockpiles faster than anyone anticipated, though this is unlikely

• they were confident they could destroy a sufficient amount of Iran’s offensive weapons before they ran out of defensive munitions

• they believed Iran would want to end the war sooner than it has.

How long can Iran keep this up?

There’s no way of knowing what Iran’s strategy is, besides extending the war as long as possible and creating chaos in the region and with global energy markets.

Some have speculated Iran may be deliberately holding back its more advanced missile technologies to use after the US and Israeli interceptors are depleted. But other analysts say there is no evidence this is the case. This would also be a risky strategy on Iran’s part.

One thing is certain, though: the US and Israel do have finite numbers of interceptors at their disposal. Iran, too, will not be able to keep up the same level of attacks indefinitely.

While the economic impacts of the war are placing significant pressure on all parties – and the world more widely – Iran seems to be in a better position for a longer conflict, given the costs involved for the US and Israel and their reluctance to commit to a potentially even more disastrous ground invasion.

James Dwyer 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. Is Israel running low on missile interceptors? How long can it withstand Iran’s retaliatory attacks? – https://theconversation.com/is-israel-running-low-on-missile-interceptors-how-long-can-it-withstand-irans-retaliatory-attacks-278404

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Kliti Grice, John Curtin Distinguished Professor of Organic and Isotope Geochemistry, Curtin University

A new study reveals all five fundamental nucleobases – the molecular “letters” of life – have been detected in samples from the asteroid Ryugu.

Asteroid particles offer a glimpse into the chemical ingredients that may have helped kindle life on Earth. The Ryugu samples were returned from space in 2020 by Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) Hayabusa2 mission.

In 2023, an international team reported they had found one of the nucleobases in these samples – uracil. Now, in a study published in Nature Astronomy today, a team of Japanese scientists has confirmed all five nucleobases are present in this pristine asteroid material.

This means these ingredients for life may have been widespread throughout the Solar System in its early years.

Why look for nucleobases?

Nucleobases are nitrogen-containing organic molecules that form the “letters” of genetic information in DNA and RNA. The five main nucleobases are adenine and guanine (known as purines), as well as cytosine, thymine and uracil (known as pyrimidines).

These molecules combine with sugars and phosphates to yield nucleotides – the building blocks of genetic material. Without nucleobases, the genetic code that allows organisms to grow, reproduce and evolve would not exist.

By studying purines and pyrimidines in Ryugu samples, scientists can reconstruct the chemical history of primitive asteroids. In turn, this gives us a better understanding of how the building blocks of life may have been formed and existed across the Solar System.

Hayabusa2 delivered a total of 5.4 grams of pristine asteroid material. Researchers have to use ultra-clean lab conditions to avoid contaminating it. They extracted organic molecules using water and hydrocholoric acid, and then purified them for further detection.

They found all five nucleobases in the two Ryugu samples they analysed, in roughly similar amounts.

Key components of genetic material – in space

The new results align with previous findings on space rocks. The Murchison meteorite that fell in Australia in 1969, and the Orgueil meteorite in France, 1864, have previously yielded a rich variety of organic molecules, including nucleobases.

Of course, meteorites that land on Earth can be contaminated by their journey and landing. But pristine samples from NASA’s mission to asteroid Bennu also yielded all five nucleobases in 2025.

Asteroids such as Ryugu, Bennu, and the parent body of the Orgueil meteorite are remnants of the early Solar System. They can preserve materials largely unchanged for about 4.5 billion years.

Interestingly, these asteroids show chemical differences. Murchison is enriched in purines, while Bennu and Orgueil contain more pyrimidines. It is thought this balance may be influenced by ammonia, a key molecule that can shape which nucleobases can form.

By peering into Ryugu’s relatively pristine samples and comparing them with meteorites like Murchison and Orgueil, researchers are tracing the cosmic journey of life’s probable molecular ingredients.

Their results suggest key components of genetic material may have formed in space and later delivered to the early Earth. In other words, the story of life on our planet may be deeply connected to the chemistry of such ancient asteroids.

A path for the ingredients of life

Together, these discoveries show that carbon-rich asteroids throughout the Solar System contain diverse prebiotic chemistry. However, the precise mixture of molecules – such as the balance between purines and pyrimidines – varies depending on the asteroid’s chemical environment and history.

Because the Ryugu samples were collected directly in space and protected from Earth’s contamination, they provide one of the clearest views of ancient Solar System chemistry.

The discovery of all five nucleobases on Ryugu suggests the molecular ingredients of life may have been already forming in space billions of years ago. Asteroids may have helped deliver those ingredients to the early Earth – making the origin of life part of a much larger cosmic chemical story.

Kliti Grice receives funding from the ARC.

– ref. All 5 fundamental units of life’s genetic code were just discovered in an asteroid sample – https://theconversation.com/all-5-fundamental-units-of-lifes-genetic-code-were-just-discovered-in-an-asteroid-sample-278099

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Lyndsey Collins-Praino, Associate Professor, School of Biomedicine, Adelaide University

Parkinson’s disease is the fastest growing neurological disorder, with over 10 million cases worldwide. Up to 150,000 Australians currently live with the disease and 50 new cases are diagnosed each day.

The number of people living with Parkison’s is projected to more than triple between 2020 and 2050.

Yet despite the immense impact on those living with Parkinson’s and their loved ones, and the staggering cost to our economy – at least A$10 billion a year – there is still a lot we don’t know about how this disease presents and progresses.

A recent large-scale study of nearly 11,000 Australians living with Parkinson’s disease provides some critical insights into symptoms, risk factors and how these affect men and women differently. Let’s take a look.

First, what is Parkinson’s disease?

Parkinson’s is a progressive disease in which cells that produce the chemical messenger dopamine in a part of the brain called the “substantia nigra” begin to die. This is accompanied by multiple other brain changes.

It is usually considered a movement disorder. Common motor symptoms include a resting tremor, slowed movement (bradykinesia), muscle stiffness and balance issues.

But Parkinson’s also involves a variety of lesser known non-motor symptoms. These may include:

• mood changes
• difficulties with memory and cognition (including slower thinking, challenges with planning or multitasking and difficulty paying attention or concentrating)
• sleep disturbances
• autonomic dysfunction (such as constipation, low blood pressure and urinary problems).

While these are sometimes referred to as the “invisible” symptoms of Parkinson’s, they often have a greater negative impact on quality of life than motor symptoms.

So, what does the new research tell us?

The study used data collected as part of the Australian Parkinson’s Genetics Study led by the QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute. After a pilot study in 2020, it was launched as an ongoing, nationwide research project in 2022.

Some 10,929 Australians with Parkinson’s were surveyed and provided saliva samples for genetic analysis. This is the largest Parkinson’s cohort studied in Australia and the largest active cohort worldwide.

There were several key initial findings.

1. Non-motor symptoms are common

The study reinforced how common non-motor symptoms are, with loss of smell (52%), changes in memory (65%), pain (66%) and dizziness (66%) all commonly reported.

Notably, 96% of participants experienced sleep disturbances, such as insomnia and daytime sleepiness.

2. A better picture of risk factors

The study also provided insights into what can influence Parkinson’s risk.

This is important because we don’t completely understand what causes the dopamine producing cells in the substantia nigra to die in the first place.

Age is the primary risk factor for Parkinson’s. The new study found the average age for symptom onset was 64, and for diagnosis, 68.

3. Genes and environment both play a role

In the recent study, one in four people (25%) had a family history of Parkinson’s. But only 10–15% of Parkinson’s cases are caused by – or strongly linked to – mutations in specific genes.

It’s important to remember that families don’t only share genes but often their environment.

Multiple environmental factors, such as pesticide exposure and traumatic brain injury, also increase risk of Parkinson’s.

The majority (85–90%) of cases of Parkinson’s are likely due to complex interaction between genetic and environmental risk factors, and advancing age.

The study showed environmental exposures linked to Parkinson’s risk were common:

• 36% of people reported pesticide exposure
• 16% had a prior history of traumatic brain injury
• 33% had worked in high-risk occupations (such as agriculture, or petrochemicals or metal processing).

These exposures were significantly higher in men than in women.

4. Differences between the sexes

The disease is 1.5 times more common in men. In the new study, 63% of those surveyed were male.

Parkinson’s also presents and progresses differently in males and females.

The study found women were younger than men at time of symptom onset (63.7 versus 64.4 years) and diagnosis (67.6 versus 68.1 years), and more likely than men to experience pain (70% versus 63%) and falls (45% versus 41%).

Men experienced more memory changes than women (67% versus 61%) and impulsive behaviours, particularly sexual behaviour (56% versus 19%) – although most participants exhibited no or only mild impulsivity.

What we still don’t know

The large-scale study and its comprehensive survey shed valuable light on people living with Parkinson’s in Australia.

But it’s still only a sliver of the population. More than 186,000 people with Parkinson’s were invited to participate and just under 11,000 took part – a less than 6% response rate.

Of these participants, 93% had European ancestry. So this sample may not be fully representative of Parkinson’s disease.

The information we have about symptoms also relied on self-reports by the study’s participants, which are subjective and can be biased or less reliable than objective measurements of function. To address this, the researchers are planning to use smartphones and wearable devices to collect more comprehensive data.

Finally, while this provides a snapshot of the current cohort, it’s not clear how participants compare to people of a similar age without Parkinson’s, or how their symptoms may change over time.

These are important areas of future research for this ongoing study.

What all this means

Studies like this provide crucial insights into risk factors linked to Parkinson’s. They also help us better understand the symptoms people experience.

This is important because the way Parkinson’s presents varies from person to person. Not everyone will experience the same symptoms to the same extent.

Similarly, the way the disease progresses over time differs between people.

A better understanding of the factors that influence this can lead to earlier identification of who’s at risk and more personalised ways of managing this disease.

Lyndsey Collins-Praino receives funding from the National Health and Medical Council, the Medical Research Future Fund, the Australian Research Council and various philanthropic organisations. In addition to her academic role, she is affiliated with the Dementia Australia Research Foundation Scientific Panel, the MS Australia Research Management Council and the Hospital Research Foundation – Parkinson’s SA Board of Governors.

– ref. Largest ever Parkinson’s study shows how symptoms differ between men and women – https://theconversation.com/largest-ever-parkinsons-study-shows-how-symptoms-differ-between-men-and-women-277730

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Ry Holland, Research Fellow in Microbial Ecology, Monash University

Winter in Antarctica is long and dark. Temperatures remain well below freezing. In many places, the Sun sets in April and does not rise above the horizon again until August. Without sunlight, photosynthetic life such as plants, mosses and algae cannot make energy.

But that’s not to say all life stops.

In a new study published in The ISME Journal, my colleagues and I show that Antarctic microbes make energy from the air at temperatures as low as –20°C. This finding improves our understanding of how life survives at temperature extremes in Antarctica – and how climate change will affect this important process.

How to make energy from air

In 2017, scientists showed that a large number of Antarctic microbes can generate energy from atmospheric gases present at very low concentrations.

This process is called “aerotrophy”. By using enzymes that are very finely tuned to “sniff out” the hydrogen and carbon monoxide in the atmosphere, these microbes have found a way to make energy from the air itself – a huge advantage in Antarctica’s nutrient-poor desert soils.

What remained unknown until now was the temperature limits of this process. Could aerotrophy be a way to power the continent’s soil communities through the winter?

Taking the lab down south

Measuring how quickly these microbes consume such a small amount of fuel can be difficult.

From 2022–24, we collected surface soil samples from different areas across East Antarctica and analysed them in our lab.

We measured how quickly they can use the atmospheric gases. We also extracted all the DNA from the soil microbes and sequenced it. This tells us what microbes are present, what genes they have, and what they are capable of using as energy sources.

We showed aerotrophy happening in the lab at representative summer (4°C) and winter (–20°C) temperatures. This means hydrogen and carbon monoxide are a viable food source not just over the summer months, but year-round. What was even more surprising though, was the upper temperature limit.

Soil temperatures in Antarctica rarely rise above 20°C. Yet we found microbes in these soils that continued to generate energy from hydrogen up to a staggering 75°C. It seems as though microbes in Antarctic soils are well adapted to the continent’s cold temperatures, but not restricted to them. It’s a bit like seeing a penguin thrive in a tropical jungle.

We also wanted to see this process occurring in Antarctica itself, so two years ago we brought the lab down south. We collected fresh soil samples, sealed them in the glass vials, and took gas samples.

For the first time, it was clear that under real-world conditions these soil microbes were still munching their way through hydrogen.

The primary producers of Antarctica

DNA sequencing has showed us that the vast majority of microbes in Antarctic soils encode the genes to gain energy from hydrogen. Many of these bacteria also have genes to take carbon from the atmosphere.

These aerotrophs are “primary producers”, generating new biomass from the air itself.

In most land-based ecosystems, photosynthesis is thought to be the bottom of the food chain. Photosynthesis takes energy from sunlight and carbon from the atmosphere and turns it into yummy organic compounds.

It’s what makes plants grow. Plants are primary producers that are eaten by herbivores, which are then eaten by carnivores.

In Antarctica’s desert soils, photosynthesis is relatively rare. Instead, we hypothesise that aerotrophy fulfils the primary producer role in many places.

This makes sense because, unlike sunlight-dependent photosythesis, we now know that aerotrophy can happen year-round. Another benefit is that it doesn’t require liquid water, whereas photosynthesis does.

Hydrogen in a heating world

Aerotrophy clearly has an important role in Antarctic ecosystems. So next, we wanted to determine how global warming might affect this process.

Under low-emissions scenarios, we predict a 4% increase in how quickly aerotrophs use atmospheric hydrogen. Under very high-emissions scenarios, this increase rises to 35%. The numbers are similar for carbon monoxide.

Although hydrogen isn’t a greenhouse gas itself, it is important because it affects how long some greenhouse gases, including methane, hang around in the atmosphere.

Soils (including the microbes that live in them) are responsible for 82% of all hydrogen consumed on Earth globally. In other words, they are a hydrogen sink. This is a crucial component in the global hydrogen cycle.

There are a lot of factors that determine how microorganisms will respond to climate change. Temperature is just one of them. This study is an important piece of the puzzle as scientists figure out how resilient Antarctica’s unique microbal ecosystems are.

Ry Holland is a Research Fellow at Monash University funded by the Australian Research Council Special Research Initiative ‘Securing Antarctica’s Environmental Future’ (SAEF). Their field work has been supported by the Australian Antarctic Division and White Desert. They are affiliated with the Australian Society for Microbiology and the International Society for Microbial Ecology.

– ref. Microbes in Antarctica survive the freezing and dark winter by living on air – https://theconversation.com/microbes-in-antarctica-survive-the-freezing-and-dark-winter-by-living-on-air-276384

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By David Smith, Associate Professor in American Politics and Foreign Policy, US Studies Centre, University of Sydney

No US president in living memory has gone to war with less public support than Donald Trump has for the war in Iran. Even Barack Obama’s much-maligned Libyan intervention began with 60% of Americans in support in 2011. There is no poll that shows a majority of Americans supporting the Iran war, and multiple polls showing clear majorities against it. And wars usually lose public support as they go on.

Trump did not make a public case for the war before it began, because he preferred quick, surprising strikes preceded by theatrical suspense. He presented the vast military buildup in the Persian Gulf as a high-pressure negotiating tactic in the short-lived bargaining sessions over Iran’s nuclear enrichment.

Trump was undoubtedly emboldened by the tactical success of his removal of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, though that too was not very popular with Americans.

Wars are not necessarily better when the US government invests a huge effort in justifying them. The justification for the disastrous Iraq War, after all, was based on misperceptions, distortions and falsehoods. But by completely disregarding US public opinion before the war, Trump now finds himself in all kinds of trouble as he tries to fight it.

Americans don’t like seeing themselves as aggressors

Political scientist Bruce Jentleson argued that public support for war in the United States depends not just on how the war is going, but on the public’s understanding of the war’s aims. The US public is much more likely to support wars aimed at imposing restraints on aggressive powers than wars aimed at bringing political change to other countries.

That theory explains why the Bush administration made such an effort to claim Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and was linked to the September 11 terrorist attacks, even though “regime change” was the aim of the Iraq war.

Regime change is also, quite clearly, the aim of the Iran war. Trump has been talking about it for months, and is still talking about it.

It was only after the bombs started falling on Iran that Trump and his administration began to make the case that Iran was an “imminent threat” to the US. It wasn’t very convincing.

After all, Trump had been boasting until recently that he had “completely obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program the year before. In a video released shortly after the attacks, Trump complained about the 1979 Tehran hostage crisis, the 1983 Hezbollah attack on US marines in Beirut, and the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole, which he said Iran was “probably involved in”.

It was left to Secretary of State Marco Rubio to make the convoluted argument that the US was acting in preemptive self-defence, because it knew Israel was going to strike Iran, and that Iran would retaliate against Americans in the Middle East.

That did not play well in a country increasingly wary of Israel. A Gallup poll released just before the war began showed that, for the first time this century, more Americans said their sympathies were with Palestinians than Israelis. Recently, the biggest drop in support for Israel has been among political Independents, whose views have shifted significantly during the Gaza War.

Tucker Carlson, the loudest critic of the Iran war on the right, immediately labelled it “Israel’s war”. Joe Rogan, an influential figure among Trump’s 2024 support base of disillusioned young men, said they felt “betrayed” by the war.

Meanwhile, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has tried to sell the war to Americans by gloating about the death, destruction and fear being inflicted on Iran. Even as investigations show the US military was responsible for the bombing of a school that killed more than a hundred children, he dismisses rules of military engagement as “stupid”. The most recent Quinnipiac Poll showed Hegseth’s approval rating at 37%.

Americans are unprepared for sacrifice

Despite high-profile opponents like Carlson and Marjorie Taylor Greene, Trump still has most of the MAGA base with him for now. They were never really opposed to foreign wars. What they hated was losing foreign wars, and Trump is promising them swift victory in Iran.

But Trump has not prepared them or anyone else, including his own cabinet, for the costs this war will incur. Especially the disruption to global oil markets, which the International Energy Agency is calling the largest in history, and which will elevate the cost of everything from travel to food.

Trump’s rhetoric about the price of war has hardly been Churchillian. One night he posted on social media that a short term increase in oil prices is “a very small price to pay for U.S.A., and World, Safety and Peace. ONLY FOOLS WOULD THINK DIFFERENTLY!”

But the next day he was forced to calm markets by claiming the war was nearly over.

The Iranian regime, whose main goal is survival, is well aware of the political and economic vulnerabilities of the US and its Middle Eastern allies, and these appear to be what it is targeting.

At the beginning of the war, Iran’s seemingly scattered attacks on infrastructure, embassies and hotels in Gulf states were a source of mirth for some American commentators. But these were eventually enough to shut down large swathes of energy production and shipping, and inflict far more pain than Trump or his supporters were expecting.

Trump was already facing the same domestic problem that Joe Biden faced. It doesn’t matter how much you tell Americans about positive GDP, stock market and employment numbers; if they are struggling with the cost of living, their view of both the economy and the President will be bleak.

Trump’s glib dismissals of the price of oil are sounding a lot like his airy reassurances at the beginning of the pandemic.

Few Republicans in Congress have been prepared to stand up to Trump over the war. But as midterm elections approach, many of them will be silently praying he finds an excuse to end it as soon as possible.

David Smith 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 Donald Trump is losing the war at home – https://theconversation.com/why-donald-trump-is-losing-the-war-at-home-278079

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Daniel Baldino, Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations, University of Notre Dame Australia

Millions of people recently watched a video posted by the White House showing US strikes against Iranian targets. The clip didn’t just resemble Call of Duty: it mixed real strike footage with footage from the game itself, complete with “killstreak” animations designed to reward performance and simulate achievement.

Governments are increasingly communicating war using the visual language of video games and internet memes. In doing so, they don’t just trivialise violence – they make it harder to grieve the victims of the violence, by anaesthetising our responses to the suffering.

It’s a tactic that shapes how we interpret violence, and which quietly determines whose deaths register as deaths at all.

War as memes and viral content

United States Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth has publicly celebrated the strikes and wider military campaign, dubbed Operation Epic Fury – collapsing the distance between military spokesperson and combat enthusiast.

The White House video is not an isolated case. Across social media, videos with military footage are circulating as gaming clips or memes: drone strikes with cross-hair graphics, explosions set to pulse-pounding music. One Department of Homeland Security video of ICE raids was set to the Pokémon theme song.

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Read more:
How watching videos of ICE violence affects our mental health

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But the same features that make the content go viral also flatten the reality behind the footage. Important context often disappears. Who was targeted? Were civilians harmed? Was the strike legal? These questions are rarely addressed in a 20-second clip.

War’s visual language is never innocent. It carries instructions about how to feel. A huge problem arises when governments deliberately adopt the visual language of gaming to present real military operations. What this language doesn’t carry is consequence.

Meme culture compounds this. Irony and humour are structurally anti-grief. They create distance as their primary function. When violence circulates as a joke or a highlight reel, the emotional reality of it becomes difficult to access.

War is still seen, but it is no longer felt in the same way.

From CNN to Call of Duty

The so-called “CNN effect”, associated with television coverage of conflicts from Vietnam to Somalia, was premised on proximity. Footage of suffering brought distant wars into living rooms and generated moral pressure on governments.

While imperfect and selective, the underlying logic was that “seeing” produced “feeling”, and feeling produced accountability. The camera lingered. The correspondent named the dead. Viewers were given time to register what they were witnessing.

That model was already fracturing before social media. The 1991 Gulf War introduced a new aesthetic: precision strikes filmed from above, in which targets were rendered as abstract geometries on green-tinged screens.

The human body disappeared from the frame, replaced by the seductive promise of technological accuracy: the “smart” bomb or the “surgical” strike. American critic Susan Sontag noted how this outcome trained audiences to see military technology rather than military consequences.

The ungrievable

The philosopher Judith Butler has written about “grievability” as the condition that makes some lives recognisable as worth mourning. Not all deaths are grieved equally. Some bodies are rendered, by culture and politics, outside the frame of moral concern.

The visual grammar being used by the White House frames people as game avatars. And game avatars, by definition, are not grievable. They are targets – kills to be celebrated.

On February 28, more than 160 girls, most under 12, were killed by a US air strike at the Shajareh Tayyebeh elementary school in Minab. They did not appear in the White House’s content at all.

When pressed, President Trump suggested Iran may have struck the school itself using a Tomahawk missile and then said: “I just don’t know enough about it. Whatever the report shows, I’m willing to live with that”.

Hegseth, meanwhile, has already dissolved the Pentagon’s civilian protection mission and fired the military’s lawyers responsible for keeping operations within international law, describing them as “roadblocks”.

Democratic scrutiny of war depends not just on information but on moral response: the capacity to feel that what is happening matters.

What can be done?

Memes will continue to circulate. Governments will continue to compete for attention in crowded digital spaces.

But the starting point is recognising what is actually at stake. The problem is not simply that viral clips lack context (although they do). It is that the visual grammar they deploy actively forecloses the emotional responses that serious public debate requires.

Wes J. Bryant, a former US special operations targeting specialist (who worked on civilian harm prevention) puts it plainly:

We’re departing from the rules and norms that we’ve tried to establish as a global community since at least World War II. There’s zero accountability.

Audiences, too, can learn to pause. Not just to ask what happened, but what the format in front of them is preventing them from feeling, and about whom. That question, taken seriously, is the beginning of accountability.

War is not experienced as a highlight reel. It is experienced as loss, uncertainty, grief and irreversible destruction. Restoring that understanding is not a media literacy problem. It is a moral one.

Daniel Baldino 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. A deadly strike, or Call of Duty clip? How the US government is trying to memeify the war on Iran – https://theconversation.com/a-deadly-strike-or-call-of-duty-clip-how-the-us-government-is-trying-to-memeify-the-war-on-iran-277974

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Matthew Ricketson, Professor of Communication, Deakin University

Does the world need another biography of Rupert Murdoch? It depends what it has to say and who has written it.

Bonfire of the Murdochs, by journalist Gabriel Sherman, looks promising. He made his name with an exhaustively researched biography of long-running Fox News head and serial sexual harasser, Roger Ailes. The Loudest Voice in the Room (2014) has 98 pages of endnotes and a team of three fact-checkers. It was made into a series starring Russell Crowe as Ailes. Sherman was also the screenwriter of Donald Trump biopic, The Apprentice, which Trump fought hard to prevent being screened.

Promising credentials, yes, but what does Sherman add to the eight Murdoch biographies already published?

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Review: Bonfire of the Murdochs by Gabriel Sherman (Simon & Schuster).

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The first was Simon Regan’s business-oriented biography published in 1976. It has been forgotten, but not so George Munster’s A Paper Prince (1985), which laid out Murdoch’s deal-making modus operandi, nor William Shawcross’ 1992 semi-authorised work, which charted Murdoch’s creation of the first global media empire.

Michael Wolff’s The Man Who Owns the News (2008) painted the most vivid portrait of the Australian born media mogul. Flushed with the success of buying The Wall Street Journal, Murdoch agreed to more than 50 hours of interviews with Wolff and opened the doors of his notoriously secretive media empire to the Vanity Fair media columnist.

Wolff did report the Wall Street Journal takeover in detail, but he also retailed a breathtaking amount of industry and family gossip.

One example among many. He writes that Prudence, Murdoch’s daughter from his first marriage, gave him exasperated grooming advice after Murdoch botched a DIY makeover as he tried keeping up with Wendi Deng, his third wife who was the same age as his children.

“Dad, I understand about dyeing the hair and the age thing. Just go somewhere proper. What you need is very light highlights.” But he insists on doing it over
the sink because he doesn’t want anybody to know. Well, hello! Look in the mirror.
Look at the pictures in the paper. It’s such a hatchet job.

Murdoch’s response? He told her she needed a face lift.

Murdoch’s response to Wolff’s biography was that it needed more than a face lift – it should not have been published with the errors it had. He did not sue for defamation, however. Wolff has since become an even more controversial figure: he is embroiled in suit and counter-suit with Donald and Melania Trump over Wolff’s claims about Trump’s relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The long-running struggle for succession in the Murdoch family famously inspired the brilliantly coruscating fictional television series Succession (2018–2023). Sherman’s is the first biography to deal with its resolution, which happened only last September, when Rupert Murdoch and his eldest son, Lachlan, succeeded in changing the terms of an apparently irrevocable family trust.

The trust had been created when Rupert and his second wife, Anna, separated in 1998. (She died on February 17 this year.) It was her attempt to put a brake on Murdoch’s continual pitting of his children, especially his sons, against each other in the quest to succeed him as head of News Corporation.

It didn’t work. Rupert’s plan for Lachlan to lead the company, continuing its hard right position led by Fox News, eventually succeeded. To a greater or lesser degree, the other children from his first two marriages – Prudence, Elisabeth and James – loathed what Fox News had become and, reportedly led by James, were prepared to use their votes in the family trust to oust Lachlan after Rupert died.

In the end, though, they agreed to sell their shares in the family trust for US$1.1 billion each. Grace and Chloe, the two children from Murdoch’s third marriage, are part of a newly drawn family trust with their own shares in News.

The machinations behind this episode were reported last year in two extraordinary pieces of journalism, by Jonathan Mahler and Jim Rutenberg of The New York Times, who were leaked 3,000 pages of court documents about the case, and by McKay Coppins in The Atlantic magazine. He secured a long, revealing interview with James Murdoch, who was labelled in Rupert and Lachlan’s legal materials the “troublesome beneficiary”.

For those without subscriptions to these publications, my colleague, Andrew Dodd, and I discussed the case in The Conversation here and here.

An outstanding journalist

Sherman, another outstanding journalist, has been reporting on the Murdochs since 2008. Ailes threatened him with legal action and engineered a smear campaign over The Loudest Voice in the Room, as Sherman calmly detailed in “A Note on Sources” at the end of the book. It was Sherman who in 2016 broke the news about Fox News presenter Gretchen Carlson’s sexual harassment suit against Ailes that led to his ousting from the network.

In 2018, he revealed Murdoch came close to death after a fall on Lachlan’s maxi-yacht while sailing in the Caribbean.

Sherman also had the inside scoop on the end of Murdoch’s fourth marriage in 2022. The then 91-year-old mogul not only broke up by text with his wife, supermodel and actor Jerry Hall, but included in the divorce terms a demand she not give story ideas to the scriptwriters of Succession!

Hall later realised the marriage had ended, in Murdoch’s eyes, some time before, when he met Ann Lesley Smith, a 65-year-old former dental hygienist turned conservative radio host and follower of QAnon-style conspiracy theories. At a dinner at Murdoch’s ranch in Carmel, Smith gushed that Murdoch and Fox News were the saviours of democracy, and offered to clean his teeth for him.

Murdoch proposed to Smith in early 2023, but he soon called off the wedding after another dinner, where she told then Fox News host Tucker Carlson he was a messenger from God. Hall felt humiliated by Murdoch’s treatment of her but told friends she took satisfaction in making an effigy of him, tying dental floss around its neck and burning it on the barbecue.

All these disclosures, and gossip, are included in Bonfire of the Murdochs. Indeed, Sherman’s reporting, for New York and Vanity Fair magazines, forms a good deal of the book. If you have already read his lengthy articles, there is not much new here. But if you haven’t, or if you are confused by the countless deals and complex financial/political transactions of Murdoch’s seven-decades-plus career in media, this biography is well worth reading.

‘Destroyed everything he loved’

At 241 pages, it has the virtue, as well as the shortcoming, of being the shortest of the Murdoch biographies. Sherman has a gift for succinctly summarising key themes.

The first is that more than most, Murdoch’s media empire is secretive. Remember, his plan to change the family trust was supposed to be heard behind closed doors. We only know about it because The New York Times was leaked the court records, which revealed Murdoch’s testimony. As Sherman puts it: “Rupert crafted narratives in the shadows, but the courtroom would require him to do it in the open.”

Initially, it did not go well for Murdoch. Under cross-examination, his determination to get his way no matter what and his sexism towards his daughters was revealed.

The second theme is the extent to which Murdoch will ignore the stated mission of his media outlets – report what is happening accurately – if it aligns with his commercial goals. During the global pandemic, while Fox News hosts fulminated about lockdowns and advocated dubious treatments like hydroxychloroquine, Murdoch followed the science and, Sherman reports, was one of the first in the world to be vaccinated, in December 2020.

“He was scared for himself and was very careful,” a person who spoke to Murdoch at the time recalled for Sherman. Questioned about the disconnect between his network’s coverage and his own behaviour, Murdoch would deflect responsibility for the presenters’ commentary, even though this seeming passivity contrasted sharply with his history of editorial interference.

As Sherman comments: “The hypocrisy revealed something essential about Rupert’s worldview: he had always been able to separate his personal beliefs from his business interests.” He adds that Murdoch thought then president, Donald Trump, grievously mishandled the pandemic but refused to use his position as head of Fox to pressure the president to treat it seriously.

Nor did Murdoch take any responsibility when a friend told him the channel was killing its elderly audience. According to one of Sherman’s sources, he replied: “They’re dying from old age and other illnesses, but COVID was being blamed.”

The biographer quotes other sources who say the quid pro quo was that Murdoch had successfully lobbied Trump in his first term to take action against Facebook and Google, who were winning advertising revenue from News (along with other legacy media companies) and to open up land for fracking, which was to boost the value of Murdoch’s fossil fuel investments.

The third theme is that Murdoch built the world’s first global media empire but has always run his companies as a family business, with him as the first and ultimate decision-maker. Nimbleness is the advantage of this approach. As with any autocratically run organisation, though, there are disadvantages. Among them is that no one has a perfect strike rate for success.

Along the way, talented executives such as Barry Diller, former chief executive at Twentieth Century Fox or Chase Carey, former top executive at 21st Century Fox, knew – or found out – that their path to the top was blocked not only by the company’s head, but by Murdoch’s desire to advance or protect family members. Murdoch once told shareholders complaining about nepotism: “If you don’t like it, sell your shares.”

From the 1950s, when Murdoch was the “boy publisher” of the afternoon newspaper he inherited from his father, the Adelaide News, he behaved, Sherman writes, as though “promises were like inconvenient facts: fungible when they got in the way of profit.” The newspaper’s editor, Rohan Rivett, was the first among several, alongside numerous politicians, who learnt this to their cost.

The fourth theme is that Murdoch has always wanted his children involved in his business, but only on his terms. “Growing up,” Sherman writes, “the children’s relationship to their father was expressed through the business, making them equate paternal love with corporate advancement.”

Where earlier writers have drawn parallels with Shakespeare’s King Lear, Sherman thinks King Midas is a more appropriate comparison.

Like the mythical monarch whose touch turned everything to gold, Rupert built a $17 billion fortune but destroyed everything he loved in the process. His media outlets stoked hatred and division on an industrial scale, and amassing that wealth
required him to damage virtually anything he touched: the environment, women’s
rights, the Republican Party, truth, decency – even his own family.

The weakest part

These are potent themes that resonate with those of us living in the country of Murdoch’s origin, which brings us to the book’s shortcoming. Australia features early on, but this is the weakest part of the book. Murdoch’s early years are well covered in Munster and Shawcross’s biographies and more recently have been given detailed attention in Walter Marsh’s Young Rupert (2023).

There are basic errors: The Daily Mirror in Sydney, which Murdoch bought in 1960, is misnamed The Mirror, while the Herald and Weekly Times Ltd., which he bought in 1987, becomes the Herald Times Group. Nor does it help that on the book’s final page, Sherman writes “Rupert was with his fourth wife while his children were scattered across the globe” – when Murdoch had discarded Jerry Hall in 2022 and was now married a fifth time, to Elena Zhukova.

Fourth, fifth? It’s easy to lose count. More seriously, in buying the HWT, Murdoch became the dominant newspaper owner in Australia, but his control did not account for 75% of the market, as Sherman writes. It is more like 60% to 65%, depending on whether you use circulation or number of newspapers as a measure.

Murdoch’s early years in Australia are briskly dealt with in chapter one, before he moves on in his relentless quest to acquire more media properties in the United Kingdom and the US. This is true as far as it goes, but once Murdoch does head north, his biographer loses almost all interest in how Australia is faring – even, or especially actually, after Murdoch acquires the HWT.

The same is true to a lesser extent with Sherman’s treatment of the UK. The phone hacking scandal is covered, of course, but not much else is once Murdoch arrives in New York in the mid-seventies.

What is lost, then, in Sherman’s compression, is context for events. Such as: where did the phone hacking culture come from? What lengths did News go to in denying the practice went beyond two “rogue reporters” or in obstructing official inquiries? Why have they since paid so much money settling with phone hacking victims, rather than going to court?

Missing, too, is any sense of the connections between Murdoch’s media outlets in the three main countries in which News operates. Has the hostile coverage of trans people been imported from Fox News to Sky News Australia? What affect has his media outlets’ campaigning against action on climate change had across these three countries?

These, and others, are relevant questions to ask about a global media empire. Rupert Murdoch may have handed over the company to Lachlan in 2023, but he led it for 70 years, he created its culture and he still wields influence. In case it passed you by, it was Rupert Murdoch – not Lachlan, according to the reports – who in February had a private dinner at the White House with US president Donald Trump.

Matthew Ricketson is the co-author, with Andrew Dodd, of Getting Murdoched: How Murdoch’s Media Wields Power and Punishment, to be published by Hardie Grant in mid-2026.

– ref. Secrets, sexism and hypocrisy: Bonfire of the Murdochs reveals the family’s real succession drama – https://theconversation.com/secrets-sexism-and-hypocrisy-bonfire-of-the-murdochs-reveals-the-familys-real-succession-drama-275938

Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Zachary Aman, Professor of Chemical Engineering, The University of Western Australia

As the US–Israel war on Iran escalates, so too does the global oil crisis.

The effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly 20% of the world’s oil and natural gas flows, and the targeting of oil production facilities in the Middle East have lifted the oil price by 34%.

The price of Brent crude – the global benchmark – now sits at more than US$100 a barrel.

This means the cost of the many products derived from crude oil, such as petrol or gasoline, has also surged.

But how does crude oil become the fuel you pump into your car?

Like simmering a pasta sauce

Most consumers are transfixed when the oil price exceeds US$100 per barrel. But the economic reality is both more complex and longer-term.

That’s because the content of the barrel itself is not directly usable.

Rather, it must be broken (or “fractionated”) into the chemicals used to produce more than 6,000 everyday products.

These household items include the textiles and clothing dyes on our literal backs, electronics in our hands, flooring beneath our feet, and pharmaceuticals regulating our bodies.

Some of these products can be replaced with non-petroleum alternatives. But doing so can increase consumer prices by an order of magnitude.

The process of transforming a barrel of oil into these products is managed in the discipline of chemical engineering, through which high-temperature vessels (called “columns”) allow fluids to be split (or “fractionated”) into less- and more-dense products.

The experience is similar to simmering a pasta sauce, where the chef uses a precise temperature to boil off water (the less dense product) and concentrate the chemistry that makes tomatoes enjoyable.

Splitting in sequences

Unlike the hundreds of chemicals in the humble tomato, the tens of thousands of individual chemicals in a barrel of oil mean that between five and ten of these fractionation columns must be placed in sequence, each producing a more precise product than the last.

Most consumers would be familiar with the products of the first few columns, in which natural gas is the least dense (or “lightest”) product that typically powers the above-mentioned chef’s stove.

The next-densest product is gasoline, which accounts for around half of the volume of a traditional barrel of oil.

With additional heat and cost, the heavier products can be split into kerosene (“jet fuel”) and, with yet more heat, the diesel fuel that constitutes around one quarter of an average barrel.

Separating out the remaining products requires extremely high temperatures. This results in chemicals used to manufacture modern roads, rubbers, synthetic fabrics, plastics and cosmetics, among many others.

Not all oil is the same

The final complication emerges from the geological processes that themselves “manufacture” crude oil.

Over millions of years, high pressures and temperatures degrade and liquefy (or “cook”) volumes of dead plants and animals, often deep under the ground.

As the plants, animals and geology of each biome are unique, so too is the crude oil formed under ground. This reality means that one barrel of oil cannot simply be traded for another and used in the refinery columns described above. The collection of columns requires months to reach stable operation, and they are heavily dependent on the type and properties of the oil at the inlet.

Crucially, the time lag between producing one barrel of oil and finding its chemistry in the hands of an eager shopper is typically between one and three months, depending on the complexity of the consumer product.

Gasoline prices may feel an impact within a few weeks, while consumer plastics (such as food storage containers) may require multiple quarters to demonstrate an impact.

Alongside countries heavily dependent on crude oil imports, those with limited crude oil reserves or refining capacity are further exposed, as they must also import the crude oil “products” described above.

Nearly one third of the oil exported through the Straight of Hormuz is destined for China, while together China and other Asian buyers make up three quarters of these export destinations.

The conflict itself involves Western and Middle Eastern forces. But it is ironically those Pacific nations that carry the greatest near- and mid-term inflationary risk as this crucial shipping lane is put in jeopardy.

Zach Aman has consulted with multiple oil and gas companies, including Woodside, Chevron, Shell, and INPEX. He has received funding from oil and gas companies as well as the Australian Research Council. He is an Affiliate Faculty at the Colorado School of Mines.

– ref. Oil, petrol, gasoline: a chemical engineer explains how crude turns into fuel – https://theconversation.com/oil-petrol-gasoline-a-chemical-engineer-explains-how-crude-turns-into-fuel-278198