Black America Web Featured Video Source: KAMIL KRZACZYNSKI / Getty The votes are in, America! After a long and grueling fight from both political parties, some displaying more morality than others, the 2024 presidential race has officially come to an end with Donald Trump coming out in the end as your next President Of The…
Republican Donald Trump was elected the 47th president of the United States on Wednesday, an extraordinary comeback for a former president who refused to accept defeat four years ago, sparked a violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, was convicted of felony charges and survived two assassination attempts. With a win in Wisconsin, Trump cleared the…
It’s no secret that vapes offer a variety of different tastes – from the traditional flavours of watermelon and mint, to the more bizarre unicorn hoops and gummy bears. But alarming new research has now issued a warning about flavours that may be detrimental to lung health. The Canadian McGill University study sought to investigate…
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Scientists at the CUNY ASRC have developed a novel approach to better understand and predict the behaviors of water-responsive materials—solid matter that can change shape by absorbing or releasing water in response to humidity fluctuations. These materials, commonly found in Nature, have the potential to revolutionize a range of industries, from robotics and smart textiles to bioelectronics and clean energy generation systems.Despite water-responsive materials’ growing popularity in research and development, a gap exists in the theoretical understanding of how these materials generate mechanical stress when they absorb and release water. A research team led by Professor Xi Chen at the CUNY ASRC Nanoscience Initiative and City College of New York’s Chemical Engineering Department has pioneered a new quantitative method to correlate the structure of confined water with the macroscopic water-responsive properties of materials like silk.“Water-responsive materials that react to humidity changes are highly promising for use as actuators in robotics and for energy harvesting applications, yet we lack the theories to explain or predict the stress they generate,” said Chen.“Our research shows that nanoconfinement of water plays a crucial role in determining the behavior of regenerated silk fibroin films. The important parameters highlighted in the study, will allow us to better predict material performance and engineering for future use in water-responsive actuators” said Darjan Podbevšek, the paper’s first author and a postdoctoral research associate in Chen’s and Raymond Tu’s labs. Tu is a co-corresponding author of the paper and a Chemical Engineering professor at CUNY’s City College of New York.Want more breaking news?Subscribe to Technology Networks’ daily newsletter, delivering breaking science news straight to your inbox every day.Subscribe for FREEThe study, published in Nature Communications, introduces a groundbreaking approach to explain water-responsive materials’ behavior, focusing on how water’s molecular structure within these materials affects stress generation. Previous studies have only qualitatively explained hydration and dehydration-induced stress in WR materials, but this new approach quantitatively demonstrates that the water structure, rather than the material’s structural properties, is the main factor governing stress.The team discovered that all the samples began to exert force when they reached a critical threshold at which their bound and mobile water ratios reached a specific value, consistent to all samples. This finding highlights the importance of the different water populations in the biomaterials and suggests universal guidelines for predicting and engineering water-responsive behavior in biopolymers.“This breakthrough not only helps us understand how water-responsive materials work, but also opens doors to exciting new applications in tissue engineering, biocompatible materials, optical coatings, and beyond,” said Tu.The study, funded by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research and the National Science Foundation, provides key insights that could be applied to a wide range of hygroscopic and water-absorbent materials, with significant implications for industries like biomedical engineering, food preservation, and cosmetics.Reference: Podbevšek D, Jung Y, Khan MK, Yu H, Tu RS, Chen X. The role of water mobility on water-responsive actuation of silk. Nat Commun. 2024;15(1):8287. doi:10.1038/s41467-024-52715-6This article has been republished from the following materials. Note: material may have been edited for length and content. For further information, please contact the cited source. Our press release publishing policy can be accessed here.
Article contentEconomists and policy analysts have long pointed to New Brunswick’s high business taxes as an obstacle to economic growth. Why? Because high business taxes discourage investment and drive down wages.Article contentThis problem has persisted for so long that many may believe it’s too difficult and expensive to solve. In fact, the opposite is true. With its majority in the legislature, the new Holt government could lower the province’s business income tax rate to match the lowest current level in Canada at little cost to the treasury. And the benefits of such a tax reduction would be broadly shared across the income distribution.Let’s start by looking at the problem. New Brunswick currently maintains a provincial business income tax rate of 14 per cent. That’s tied with Nova Scotia and just slightly lower than Newfoundland and Labrador and Prince Edward Island.Compared to the rest of Canada, New Brunswick’s business tax rate is high. The next highest provincial rate is at 12 per cent in Saskatchewan, British Columbia and Manitoba. Alberta has the lowest rate in the country at eight per cent, which means that businesses in Alberta face a tax rate six percentage points lower than in New Brunswick.Here’s why that’s a problem.A high business tax rate makes New Brunswick a less attractive destination for investment compared to lower-tax jurisdictions. Not surprisingly, research suggests that provincial business taxes are among the most economically harmful taxes in the entire tax mix. In light of Canada’s dismal recent economic growth performance, there’s a compelling argument for tax reductions at both the provincial and federal level.Article contentClearly, reducing the business income tax in New Brunswick would help drive economic growth. But opponents argue that the province simply can’t afford to forgo that tax revenue. However, according to a recent analysis, even if we assume that reducing New Brunswick’s business tax rate to eight per cent to match the lowest rate in Canada (Alberta’s) had no effect on economic growth, provincial revenue would shrink by just two per cent.And, of course, a lower business tax rate would spur economic growth, even if the size of the effect is in dispute. Another study published by the University of Calgary estimated that lowering the business tax rate to eight per cent in New Brunswick would actually increase government revenue from current levels due to increased economic activity.In other words, while it’s impossible to precisely predict the growth effect of a business tax reduction in New Brunswick, the evidence is crystal clear that it wouldn’t produce large revenue losses for the government in Fredericton.Finally, it’s worth underscoring that a lower business income tax rate would benefit New Brunswickers across income levels including workers in the form of higher wages. While economists can debate exactly how the gains are split, there’s a near-consensus among experts that both workers and shareholders benefit from business tax reductions.Oftentimes, policymaking involves hard choices and difficult tradeoffs. Sometimes, however, there are policy changes that help encourage widespread economic growth with negligible costs. Reducing the business income tax in New Brunswick to match the lowest in Canada (again, 8 per cent) would attract investment and encourage growth while costing little and delivering benefits across the income spectrum.Ben Eisen is a senior fellow in Provincial Prosperity Studies with the Fraser Institute. Share this article in your social network
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Red wine consumption in moderate amounts has been a topic of interest in scientific research, especially for its potential positive impact on cardiovascular health. This beverage, with a millenary history in Mediterranean culture, has been the subject of numerous studies exploring how it can contribute to the prevention of heart disease. However, it is important to remember that the beneficial effects only seem to be present when consumed in moderation.What does science say?The American Heart Association (AHA) and other health bodies have stressed that while there is evidence of certain benefits of red wine, these are not sufficient to recommend alcohol consumption as a preventive strategy. Overall, the studies are limited and there are multiple confounding factors, such as diet and lifestyle, that may influence the results.However, further research suggests that red wine consumed in moderation can be part of a healthy lifestyle, particularly when combined with a balanced diet and regular exercise.Improvement in cardiovascular healthA review of several studies, such as the Mediterranean Countries Study, has shown that those who consume red wine in moderate amounts have a lower incidence of heart disease compared to those who do not consume it or who consume other alcoholic beverages.This observation led to the concept of the “French paradox”, in which a lower rate of heart disease was observed in French populations despite their relatively high-fat diet, something that was partly attributed to the regular and moderate consumption of red wine.
Washington — Voters in Missouri cleared the way to undo one of the nation’s most restrictive abortion bans in one of seven victories for abortion rights advocates, while Florida, Nebraska and South Dakota defeated similar constitutional amendments, leaving bans in place. Abortion rights amendments also passed in Arizona, Colorado, Maryland and Montana. Nevada voters also…
The Central Somerville Avenue Project aspires to become a hub of artistic and technical innovation.
By Katherine Davis
On October 28 the Mayor’s Office of Strategic Planning and Community Development kicked off its first meeting regarding the Central Somerville Avenue Project, the area also known as the stretch between Market Basket and Conway Park.
The idea of the Central Somerville Avenue Project is not new, the city and the impacted community have been working for around 4.5 years to preserve the artist/maker and also grow the climate tech industries simultaneously, the interim Director of Somerville’s Planning Preservation and Zoning, Dan Bartman, saying “We’re really trying to not redo everything, but bring all of those loose threads together and come to a consensus so that we can move forward into the future.”
Opening discussion to the public is the next step in order to provide the necessary input needed by the Development Office to ensure the final plans for this area are handled with respect and efficiency. Mayor Ballantyne officially started the meeting by saying that the main concern of the Mayor’s Office is, “How do we ensure that our city continues to thrive as a hub of innovation and economic growth while protecting the creative spaces that have been at the heart of our community for so long?”
In order to accomplish the balance between the arts and science in the Central Somerville Avenue area, this meeting proposed a Five Point Plan:
Clarify zoning language addressing arts and office / laboratory uses. 2. Draft a research and development zoning district for start-ups and incubators. 3. Update the SomerVision map to accommodate potential redevelopment areas. 4. Create an Urban Design Framework to guide future development. 5. Write a zoning overlay district to allow for expansion of the research and development uses.
Speakers from the three stakeholders involved in this project gave presentations on the importance of this issue, and the multiple perspectives of who will be impacted by the changes that could or will ultimately occur with the Central Somerville Avenue stretch. These three groups that made up the Stakeholders panel were the Union Square Neighborhood Council (USNC), the #ArtStaysHere and Don’t F With Fab movement, and lastly SomerNova.
The meeting also included a brief section on the history of the area, and an important note was made by the Senior Planner with the Planning Preservation & Zoning Division, Sarah White, which was that “You can’t have the large industries without the small businesses, [and] without the residents, so it’s this absolute constellation of moving parts and this symbiotic relationship between the big and the small and the medium and everything.”
The plan moving forward for the project before the next meeting is straightforward. The first is to submit zoning amendments, which has already been completed. These are as follows: the Arts and Creative Enterprise and Office Use Category Changes, the Research & Development or Laboratory Use Category Changes, and the New “Research & Development” Zoning District. The second is to form a stakeholder group which involves consolidating prior work from the last 4.5 years, and determining the redevelopment potential of SomerNova.
The hope of the group is to have the project’s drafts relatively wrapped up before the Christmas holiday. Future meetings and key dates to mark on calendars are:
November 12, 2024 Central Somerville Avenue Topic Summary Public Meeting – Civic Space and Mobility
November 18, 2024 Central Somerville Avenue Topic Summary Public Meeting – Infrastructure and Zoning
December 02, 2024 Central Somerville Avenue Public Presentation of Drafts
To gain an in-depth understanding of the project and its processes, access presentation slides, and make your voice heard to the city, visit voice.somervillema.gov
What do the brain map of the fruit fly, the location of exoplanet WASP-77 A b, the identification of antibiotic resistance in the bacterium Escherichia coli and crop security of the cassava plant (Manihot esculenta) in Uganda have in common? They are all the subjects of breakthroughs made possible by citizen scientists.Members of the public have long engaged in scientific pursuits — they were recording locust outbreaks in China nearly 2,000 years ago, for example. Today, amateur researchers can help to track endangered animals, record weather events and hunt for galaxies.Use citizen science to turbocharge big-data projectsBut chemistry can seem out of reach for amateur scientists, with its laboratory work technicalities and essential safety protocols. These concerns are valid — yet surmountable, as my foray into participative chemistry shows.In 2015, I was struggling to make enough samples for a research project. My colleague Julia Parker and I wanted to understand the formation of calcium carbonate — a compound found in natural materials ranging from chalk and pearl to the shells of eggs and molluscs.Pure calcium carbonate comes in three crystalline forms — calcite, vaterite and aragonite. In nature, amino acids and proteins determine which type is made, but it’s unclear how. We aimed to explore the effects of various additives, their concentrations and reaction times. But it would have taken us about 200 days to make the 1,000 samples we wanted, plus the time needed to clean mountains of glassware. We couldn’t fit this around our other commitments.But we realized that secondary schools use most of the chemicals needed, and so pupils, teachers and lab technicians might be able to help us. We approached 110 schools through national teaching networks and advertising in the media, asking for 10 samples per school. We named the effort Project M, after 1,000 in Roman numerals.Data on SDGs are riddled with gaps. Citizens can helpProject M scientists synthesized calcium carbonate with certain additives. They weighed starting materials, mixed and filtered solutions, dried the resulting powders and prepared them for characterization — keeping rigorous records. They sent us their samples and we ran a 24-hour experiment to reveal the crystals’ structures.In the end, 80% of the schools participated, and 20% of these did not send the 10 samples requested, because some teachers could not fit the experiments — two sessions of 45 minutes each — into their tight curricula. From the 659 suitable samples we received, we identified additives that favoured or deterred the formation of vaterite, and found that the structure of calcite expands to incorporate additives, but that of vaterite doesn’t (C. A. Murray et al. CrystEngComm 26, 753–763; 2024).When I tell fellow chemists and other scientists about Project M, many ask if school samples can be trusted. Some wonder whether we sacrificed scientific rigour. We did not.Any results are only as good as the experiment’s design and data. We carefully designed a robust protocol, working with teachers. We found out what equipment they had; we provided chemicals, filter paper and funnels; we used units and terms that schools were familiar with. The schools ran control tests and repeated measurements.Trust goes both ways. Just as chemists must be able to trust the data provided by citizen scientists, participants must be able to understand the aim and steps of a project. Our team built a website to allow all participants to check their results, identify which structure they had made and compare their results with others.There are risky experiments that amateur chemists should not perform. But the contents of a secondary-school lab hold more possibilities than you might have thought. And many teachers have done chemistry degrees, research or lab work. Their expertise can set experiments up for success.Asteroid collisions show how much amateur astronomers have to offerCitizen scientists, like professional ones, have various motivations. Fantastic participative chemistry projects can be initiated or led by non-chemists. Some existing ones are grounded in local, traditional or Indigenous communities — such as an effort by women in Yolombó, Colombia, to map mercury contamination from mines, and a project by members of the Shinnecock Nation to monitor water quality and track microbial sources in Shinnecock Bay, New York.Many Project M students told us how proud they were to be taking part in a real research project. Teachers were keen to reuse skills from their degrees. And our colleagues were excited about our unusual collaborators.The project was a lot of work — it took two years for us to even approach schools — but it was much more enriching than making all the samples ourselves. We learnt a lot (see C. A. Murray et al. Front. Commun. 8, 1229616; 2023). If we were to embark on such a collaboration again, we would provide better visual resources for the students to present to their peers, create an online community for teachers and ask each school for fewer samples.For me, the most rewarding part of Project M is that it led to meaningful science. We explored a chemical space that was too vast to tackle on our own, with some incredibly enthusiastic collaborators. I was surprised by their insights and their commitment to rigour. And we expanded the range of people who might see themselves as chemists.The world is full of budding scientists ready to make and break chemical bonds. Their curiosity can lead you down (reaction) pathways you never expected.