The Unequal Pandemic Bambra, Clare; Lynch, Julia; Smith, Katherine E
06/2021
eBook
Odprti dostop
Rated as a top 10 book about the COVID-19 pandemic by New Statesman: https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/2021/07/best-books-about-covid-19-pandemic
EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under ...CC-BY-NC- ND
It has been claimed that we are ‘all in it together’ and that the COVID-19 virus ‘does not discriminate’.
This accessible, yet authoritative book dispels this myth of COVID-19 as an ‘equal opportunity’ disease, by showing how the pandemic is a syndemic of disease and inequality.
Drawing on international data and accounts, it argues that the pandemic is unequal in three ways: it has killed unequally, been experienced unequally and will impoverish unequally.
These inequalities are a political choice: with governments effectively choosing who lives and who dies, we need to learn from COVID-19 quickly to prevent growing inequality and to reduce health inequalities in the future.
COVID-19 is an unequal pandemic.
The roots of most plants are colonized by symbiotic fungi to form mycorrhiza, which play a critical role in the capture of nutrients from the soil and therefore in plant nutrition. Mycorrhizal ...Symbiosis is recognized as the definitive work in this area. Since the last edition was published there have been major advances in the field, particularly in the area of molecular biology, and the new edition has been fully revised and updated to incorporate these exciting new developments.
. Over 50% new material. Includes expanded color plate section. Covers all aspects of mycorrhiza. Presents new taxonomy. Discusses the impact of proteomics and genomics on research in this area
The emergence of a common security and foreign policy has been one of the most contentious issues accompanying the integration of the European Union. In this book, Michael Smith examines the specific ...ways foreign policy cooperation has been institutionalized in the EU, the way institutional development affects cooperative outcomes in foreign policy, and how those outcomes lead to new institutional reforms. Smith explains the evolution and performance of the institutional procedures of the EU using a unique analytical framework, supported by extensive empirical evidence drawn from interviews, case studies, official documents and secondary sources. His perceptive and well-informed analysis covers the entire history of EU foreign policy cooperation, from its origins in the late 1960s up to the start of the 2003 constitutional convention. Demonstrating the importance and extent of EU foreign/security policy, the book will be of interest to scholars, researchers and policy-makers.
Retinopathy of prematurity Hellström, Ann, Prof; Smith, Lois EH, Prof; Dammann, Olaf, Prof
The Lancet,
10/2013, Letnik:
382, Številka:
9902
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Summary The immature retinas of preterm neonates are susceptible to insults that disrupt neurovascular growth, leading to retinopathy of prematurity. Suppression of growth factors due to hyperoxia ...and loss of the maternal–fetal interaction result in an arrest of retinal vascularisation (phase 1). Subsequently, the increasingly metabolically active, yet poorly vascularised, retina becomes hypoxic, stimulating growth factor-induced vasoproliferation (phase 2), which can cause retinal detachment. In very premature infants, controlled oxygen administration reduces but does not eliminate retinopathy of prematurity. Identification and control of factors that contribute to development of retinopathy of prematurity is essential to prevent progression to severe sight-threatening disease and to limit comorbidities with which the disease shares modifiable risk factors. Strategies to prevent retinopathy of prematurity will depend on optimisation of oxygen saturation, nutrition, and normalisation of concentrations of essential factors such as insulin-like growth factor 1 and ω-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, as well as curbing of the effects of infection and inflammation to promote normal growth and limit suppression of neurovascular development.
Body size downgrading of mammals over the late Quaternary Smith, Felisa A; Elliott Smith, Rosemary E; Lyons, S Kathleen ...
Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science),
2018-Apr-20, 2018-04-20, 20180420, Letnik:
360, Številka:
6386
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Since the late Pleistocene, large-bodied mammals have been extirpated from much of Earth. Although all habitable continents once harbored giant mammals, the few remaining species are largely confined ...to Africa. This decline is coincident with the global expansion of hominins over the late Quaternary. Here, we quantify mammalian extinction selectivity, continental body size distributions, and taxonomic diversity over five time periods spanning the past 125,000 years and stretching approximately 200 years into the future. We demonstrate that size-selective extinction was already under way in the oldest interval and occurred on all continents, within all trophic modes, and across all time intervals. Moreover, the degree of selectivity was unprecedented in 65 million years of mammalian evolution. The distinctive selectivity signature implicates hominin activity as a primary driver of taxonomic losses and ecosystem homogenization. Because megafauna have a disproportionate influence on ecosystem structure and function, past and present body size downgrading is reshaping Earth's biosphere.
Cerebrovascular and cardiovascular diseases cause vascular brain injury that can lead to vascular cognitive impairment (VCI). VCI is the second most common neuropathology of dementia and mild ...cognitive impairment (MCI), accounting for up to one-third of the population risk. It is frequently present along with other age-related pathologies such as Alzheimer's disease (AD). Multiple etiology dementia with both VCI and AD is the single most common cause of later life dementia. There are two main clinical syndromes of VCI: post-stroke VCI in which cognitive impairment is the immediate consequence of a recent stroke and VCI without recent stroke in which cognitive impairment is the result of covert vascular brain injury detected only on neuroimaging or neuropathology. VCI is a syndrome that can result from any cause of infarction, hemorrhage, large artery disease, cardioembolism, small vessel disease, or other cerebrovascular or cardiovascular diseases. Secondary prevention of further vascular brain injury may improve outcomes in VCI.
Organic electrochemical transistors (OECTs) are presently a focus of intense research and hold great potential in expanding the horizons of the bioelectronics industry. The notable characteristics of ...OECTs, including their electrolyte‐gating, which offers intimate interfacing with biological environments, and aqueous stability, make them particularly suitable to be operated within a living organism (in vivo). Unlike the existing in vivo bioelectronic devices, mostly based on rigid metal electrodes, OECTs form a soft mechanical contact with the biological milieu and ensure a high signal‐to‐noise ratio because of their powerful amplification capability. Such features make OECTs particularly desirable for a wide range of in vivo applications, including electrophysiological recordings, neuron stimulation, and neurotransmitter detection, and regulation of plant processes in vivo. In this review, a systematic compilation of the in vivo applications is presented that are addressed by the OECT technology. First, the operating mechanisms, and the device design and materials design principles of OECTs are examined, and then multiple examples are provided from the literature while identifying the unique device properties that enable the application progress. Finally, one critically looks at the future of the OECT technology for in vivo bioelectronic applications.
The role of organic electrochemical transistors in different in vivo bioelectronic applications, ranging from human electrophysiology to plant interfacing, is discussed. Particular emphasis is given on analyzing the key materials design and device design aspects that make these devices ideal for addressing future in vivo biological systems. Finally, some challenges, limitations, and future applications are critically assessed.
•Analysis of pro-climate behavior and policy support in 35 nations.•We test for a “social trap” where lack of trust blunts the effect of perceived risk.•At both the individual and national level, ...risk and trust are important predictors.•Inconsistent interaction between trust and risk perception.•A “thin social trap” may exist for social trust for policy support, but not behaviors.
Climate change presents a global problem that requires a collective, coordinated response to reduce the rate of greenhouse gases currently emitted. But, even in the face of these serious growing dangers, behavioral and policy responses have been rather muted. A growing literature has documented cross-national differences in climate change attitudes and related scholarship has analyzed general environmental concern across nations. Yet there are several holes in our knowledge. In this manuscript, we consider the role of trust, risk perceptions and investigate the possibility of a “social trap” (Rothstein, 2005) whereby a lack of trust blunts the effect of risk perceptions on public willingness to engage in behaviors or support policies to address climate change. Using between- and within- random effects models coupled with survey data from 35 countries, we find that, at the individual level, trust and risk perceptions are generally positively associated with ameliorative behavior and policy support. Results for a contextual effect of trust and risk perceptions are more mixed, and we find only slim support for an interactive relationship between trust and risk perceptions.
People have always been xenophobic, but an explicit philosophical and scientific view of human racial difference only began to emerge during the modern period. Why and how did this happen? Surveying ...a range of philosophical and natural-scientific texts, dating from the Spanish Renaissance to the German Enlightenment,Nature, Human Nature, and Human Differencecharts the evolution of the modern concept of race and shows that natural philosophy, particularly efforts to taxonomize and to order nature, played a crucial role.
Smith demonstrates how the denial of moral equality between Europeans and non-Europeans resulted from converging philosophical and scientific developments, including a declining belief in human nature's universality and the rise of biological classification. The racial typing of human beings grew from the need to understand humanity within an all-encompassing system of nature, alongside plants, minerals, primates, and other animals. While racial difference as seen through science did not arise in order to justify the enslavement of people, it became a rationalization and buttress for the practices of trans-Atlantic slavery. From the work of François Bernier to G. W. Leibniz, Immanuel Kant, and others, Smith delves into philosophy's part in the legacy and damages of modern racism.
With a broad narrative stretching over two centuries,Nature, Human Nature, and Human Differencetakes a critical historical look at how the racial categories that we divide ourselves into came into being.
PDF
