Daily Archives: August 16, 2021

What can we learn from a zebrafishs regenerating tail? Or a termite armys march into uncharted terrain? Welcome to the fields of ecology and evolution, where researchers observe the natural world to better understand how species are shaped by each other and their environments.

In practice, it takes years of notetaking and analysis to break down adaptations and other evolutionary forces. Charles Darwin noticed the uniquely shaped beaks of the Galapagos finches during a five-week foray to the islands, and then spent the next decade and a half trying to make sense of them.

But even a single moment can shed light on an organisms grind for survival, especially when its captured on camera. The BioMed Central Ecology and Evolution image competition highlights photos that show adaptations in action. Experts submit works from lab benches and field sites across the world to vy for the crowning spot in their area of study.

[Related: 14 hypnotizing photos that captured the world during the pandemic]

Here are the judges 2021 selections for each category, along with the grand prize winner.

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Animal photos that show the power of evolution - Popular Science

In 1988, Richard Lenski, a thirty-one-year-old biologist at UC Irvine, started an experiment. He divided a population of a common bacterium, E. coli, into twelve flasks. Each flask was kept at thirty-seven degrees Celsius, and contained an identical cocktail of water, glucose, and other nutrients. Each day, as the bacteria replicated, Lenski transferred several drops of each cocktail to a new flask, and every so often he stored samples away in a freezer. His goal was to understand the mechanics of evolution. How quickly, effectively, creatively, and consistently do microorganisms improve their reproductive fitness?

Lenskis flasks produced about six new generations of E. coli a day; the bacteria woke up as babies and went to bed as great-great-great-grandparents. In this way, Lenski and his team have studied more than seventy thousand generations of E. coli over thirty-three years. Compared with their distant ancestors, the latest versions of the bacterium reproduce seventy per cent faster; it once took them an hour to double their ranks, but now they can do it in less than forty minutes. Different populations have taken different paths to enhanced fitness, but, after decades, most have arrived at reproduction rates within a few percentage points of one another.

Lenskis Long-Term Evolution Experiment, or L.T.E.E., as its called, has yielded fundamental insights into the mutational capabilities of microorganisms. For his work, Lenski, now in his sixties and at Michigan State University, has received a MacArthur genius grant and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Im not sure I can tell you how its affected my thinking, because Im not sure I can conceive of being in this field without this experiment existing, Michael Baym, an evolutionary biologist at Harvard Medical School, recently told Discover.

Three of the experiments key findings are especially relevant today. The first is that, in general, there were diminishing returns to mutation over time: the bacteria made many of their most reproductively advantageous moves early on. A second finding, however, was that the bacteria never stopped getting fitter. Seventy thousand generations in, theyre still finding new ways to improve, albeit at a somewhat slower rate. I had sort of imagined that things would have flatlined, Lenski told me recently, when we spoke over Zoom. But there seem to be endless possibilities for tinkering and progress. If there is a hard limit, its so, so far away that its impractical to consider on an experimental timescalemaybe even a geological timescale.

Lenski has a friendly, expressive face, with pale blue eyes and a neat beard; his voice pulses with excitement when he considers a provocative question or explains the implications of his research. He told me about a third major finding: in 2003, some fifteen years and thirty thousand generations into the experiment, Lenski arrived at his lab to find that, overnight, a flask that was normally fairly translucent had turned cloudy. The bacteria it contained had experienced an explosive surge in growth. Normally, E. coli eat mainly glucose, but this population had unlocked an entirely new source of energy: a chemical compound called citrate. The capacity to metabolize citrate is so unusual that no population in the study had developed it until that point, and none have attained it since. Its as if a family of humans could suddenly drink salt water.

The emergence of a citrate-eating lineage suggests that exceptionally rare, profoundly consequential evolutionary leaps are possible long after the low-hanging fruit has been picked. How can something like this happen, and yet be so rare that it never happens again? Lenski asked. One possibility is that you have a super-rare mutation that is just so unique that its only happened once in the entire history of this experiment. Alternatively, maybe you need a whole set of earlier changes, so that you set up a genetic background where an ordinary mutation can allow this new function. I think its both: this was an unusual mutation, and it could only produce growth on citrate because there were specific genetic changes that preceded it.

SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, has already had one citrate moment: the instant, probably sometime in 2019 but possibly earlier, when it developed the ability to leap into humans. Since then, the virus has accumulated innumerable mutations, some of which allow it to generate copies of itself more efficientlyby altering how it binds to our cells, for instance, or by finding new ways to slip past our immune systems. Its a process that has occurred with every infectious disease in historymeasles, tuberculosis, bubonic plague, influenza, and untold others. The difference with the coronavirus is that the world is now watching every mutational move as it happens.

During this pandemic, weve developed and deployed vaccines in real time. Meanwhile, SARS-CoV-2 is replicating not in a dozen flasks but in tens of millions of people, some of whom have been immunized, all of whom exert selective pressure for the virus to find new, more efficient replication strategies. The virus will continue to mutate every moment of every day, for years, for decades. The fear is that it will hit upon a second citrate moment: a mutation, or set of mutations, that enables it to circumvent our vaccines, which so far have proved spectacularly effective and resilient. For those who remain unvaccinatedthe majority of humankindthere is also the horrifying prospect of a variant that is vastly more contagious or deadly. Every few months, we learn of a version of the virus that seems somehow worse: Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta. The coronavirus appears destined to march its way through the Greek alphabeta prizefighter getting quicker, slicker, stronger with each opponent. What are the limits to its evolutionary fitness? Are they knowable? And, if so, how close are we to reaching them?

These were the questions on my mind as I spoke with experts in an effort to understand the future of the pandemic. With questions so complex, its helpful to start by figuring out what, exactly, we want to know. For each new coronavirus variant, we want to find out if its more transmissible, if it will make us sicker, and if it will more effectively get around our immune defenses. On that last front, we want to understand two more questions: How much will it succeed in hiding from our antibodies (which recognize and bind to the virus, preventing infection) and from our T cells (which recognize chopped-up viral fragments displayed by infected cells, and specialize not in preventing infection but in controlling and terminating it).

Roberto Burioni, a physician and professor at Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, in Milan, has been called the most famous virologist in Italy; he has written about the prospects for a final variant, a version of the coronavirus that has reached maximum transmissibility, and which becomes the dominant strain, experiencing only occasional, minimal variations. As Burioni sees it, there are three potential futures for the coronavirus. The firstthe most optimistic for usis one in which the virus simply cant evolve its way around the vaccines. This is not an unlikely possibility. Many virusesmeasles, mumps, rubella, polio, smallpoxhave never meaningfully circumvented their vaccines, and so far the best of our current jabs have remained remarkably protective against new coronavirus variants, including Delta.

A second possibility is that the virus will partially evade our vaccine-generated immune defenses while paying a price, becoming less infectious or lethal. In order for the coronavirus to hide from our antibodies, it has to change aspects of the key components recognized by our immune systems, including the spike protein; those changes could end up diminishing the proteins ability to bind to the receptors it needs to infect cells. We can consider, for example, the Beta and Gamma variants, which exhibit some level of immune evasion but havent become as infectious as Alpha or Delta. In the nineteen-nineties, H.I.V. experienced such a fate, when it hit upon a mutation known as M184V, which conferred resistance to the antiviral drug lamivudine. On the surface, this was a setback, but doctors soon learned that patients with the M184V variant had lower viral loads, suggesting that the mutation also reduced how efficiently the virus replicated inside the body. It became common for patients with H.I.V. to continue taking lamivudine even after resistance emerged, in part to select for the variant with a lower replication rate.

The third future is the most concerning: the virus could accumulate mutations that allow it to circumvent immunity without suffering a major reduction in transmissibility or lethality. This would require it to open up a new evolutionary spacea citrate moment. Even in this scenario, Burioni told me, were in a fortunate position: we can quickly modify our vaccines to confront new variants. At the same time, the manufacturing and distribution challenges facing those variant-specific boosters would be colossal; were struggling to fully vaccinate even a quarter of the worlds population with the vaccines we already have.

Vaccination is the most fundamental difference between Lenskis experiment and our reality. In Lenskis flasks, the environment is held constant; in the pandemic, we are doing everything we can to change it. A virus evolves one set of weapons when the world is immune-nave, and others as parts of the global population become fully vaccinated, partially vaccinated, andif immunity wanesformerly vaccinated. Different traits become more or less important in different settings. If youre a tennis fan, you might bet on Nadal on clay, Federer on grass, and Djokovic on a hard court. The question of whether a virus has reached something like peak fitness is inescapably linked to where, when, and whom its playing.

There is such a thing as peak fitness within a particular landscape, Kristian Andersen, an infectious-disease researcher at the Scripps Research Institute, told me. The problem is that the landscape keeps changing. That puts very strong selective pressure on the virus. The Beta and Gamma variants evolved in areas with high levels of prior infection, and so settled on mutations that offered them gains in immune escape but not transmissibility. The Delta variant, by contrast, emerged in India, which had relatively low vaccination levels; its goal was to spread as fast and as far as possible. Although it may be somewhat more immune-evasive and lethal, Deltas defining feature is its extreme contagiousness.

Some scientists argue that there are strict limits on how effectively the virus can slip past our immune defenses while retaining its infectiousness. Our antibodies recognize the specific parts of the virus that it uses to enter cells; the virus may alter these, but in doing so it may become a less effective invader. There are certainly limits, Andersen told me. We just have no idea where they are. The fundamental question is: How tolerant is the virus to these mutations? Can it still do what it needs to donamely, enter the cellwith a substantially mutated spike protein? Coronaviruses are generalists: they can bind to ACE-2 receptors, their ports of entry into cells, in many ways, across many species. We often use a lock-and-key model to understand how a protein binds to a receptor, Andersen said. That doesnt tell the whole story here: coronaviruses have shown they have many keys that can open the same lock.

Tyler Starr, an evolutionary biologist at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, shares Andersens concerns. Starr recently led an ambitious project mapping all possible mutations to a key part of the spike protein. He wanted to know how the proteins structureand, therefore, its affinity for ACE-2changes as each amino acid in its receptor-binding sites mutated. The findings were not terribly reassuring. The big picture is that there is not that much biological constraint, Starr said. Theres a ton of tolerated mutational space that the virus can take while trying to evade immunity. Its quite flexible. Some researchers have seen as good news the fact that many variants share similar mutations despite having evolved separatelya phenomenon known as convergent evolution. According to one view, this means that the virus has a limited toolbox from which to work. According to another, these are only the easiest and earliest mutational options; future variants could hit upon more innovative ways to enhance transmissibility and evade immune defenses. The situation is further complicated by the fact that, unlike in Starrs experiment, the real-world virus isnt limited to one change at a time: it can combine multiple mutations to vastly expand its evolutionary space.

Still, there is reason for optimism. As James Somers explained in this magazine, last year, the human immune system is staggeringly complex and, over millennia, has honed countless defenses against microscopic intruders. And as Katherine Xue wrote, last month, it is especially effective when it has previously encountered a pathogen. In 2009, when the H1N1 influenza strain emerged, it had a curious feature: it caused more severe illness in younger people than older people. Globally, four in five H1N1 deaths were estimated to have occurred in people under sixty-five. (Typically, some seventy to ninety per cent of flu deaths occur in older adults.) It turned out that many older people had likely been exposed to a relative of the strain decades agoand that their immune systems, remembering that fight, were prepared for the next one.

Regardless of how drastically they mutate, new coronavirus variants will probably have more in common with the original SARS-CoV-2 than with SARS-CoV-1, the virus that caused the SARS outbreak in 2003. Even so, the blood of COVID-19 survivors has the potential to neutralize the 2003 strain. The vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna, similarly, appear to generate huge numbers of antibodies that work against SARS-CoV-1 in those who have also been infected with COVID-19. These two viruses span a really large evolutionary distance, Starr told me. The fact that the same antibodies bind to both of them should give us some confidence. With new coronavirus variants, we may see a partial decrease in immunity, but, given the polyclonal response, Starr saidthe fact that vaccines generate not one type of antibody but manywhen one set of antibodies drops the rope, another will pick it up. I dont think there will ever be a variant that completely escapes our immune systems. Were never going to wipe the slate clean and be back to a totally nave population. Over time, the infections we do get will be more likely to be mild or asymptomatic. Whether that process takes a year, five years, ten years, or longer, I dont know.

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The New Yorker How Will the Coronavirus Evolve? - The New Yorker

Overall Winner and Best Image for Conservation Biology. A school of jack fish in a spiral formation at Heron Island in the Great Barrier Reef. A visual metaphor for the spiraling crisis unfolding within our oceans and the need for concentrated efforts to protect marine ecosystems. Credit: Kristen Brown

From furry crustaceans to hunting wasps and escaping frogs, the 2021BMC Ecology and EvolutionImage Competition has produced an impressive collection of celebrated images that showcase the diversity of Earths animal and plant life. All images are open access and available for use under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CCBY) license.

The overall winning image by Kristen Brown from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA depicts a school of jack fish in a spiral formation at Heron Island in the Great Barrier Reef, Australia.

Runner Up and Best Image for Evolutionary Developmental Biology and Biodiversity. Eulimnogammarus verrucosus, a species of crustacean endemic to the UNESCO World Heritage Site Lake Baikal, suffering from a parasitic ciliate infection. Credit: Kseniya Vereshchagina

Kristen Brown said: This image represents both the beauty and bounty of our oceans as well as the spiraling crisis unfolding within the marine environment. Coral reefs with high coral cover and plentiful fish populations like this one at Heron Island on the Great Barrier Reef are sadly becoming rarer. Without a concentrated effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve water quality, coral reefs as we know them are at risk of disappearing within our lifetime.

Best Image for Behavioural Ecology. The Hunter depicts a wasp and its spider prey in Tiputini, Ecuador. Credit: Roberto Garca-Roa

Section editor Josef Settele recommended the entry, saying: Marine biodiversity sustains life and the health of our planet, but human activities are threatening the well-being of the worlds oceans. Kristen Browns striking image is a symbol for the need for concentrated efforts to manage biodiversity loss and set conservation priorities.

In addition to the winning image, the judges also selected an overall runner up, as well as winners in six categories: Conservation Biology; Evolutionary Developmental Biology and Biodiversity; Behavioural Ecology; Human Evolution and Ecology; Ecological Developmental Biology; Population Ecology; and the Editors Pick. The winning images celebrate Earths biodiversity and its evolutionary origins, from how species learn and develop, to conflict, collaboration and parasitic relationships, both between and within species.

Best Image for Population Ecology. Small Big Migration captures a moment in the life of a population of soldier termites as they migrate to ensure survivorship and reproduction of the colony. Credit: Roberto Garca-Roa

The Population Ecology category winner was captured by Roberto Garca-Roa from University of Valencia, Spain, who also submitted the winning images for the Behavioural Ecology and Human Evolution and Ecology categories. It shows soldier termites migrating along a length of abandoned rope in a Malaysian forest.

Roberto Garca-Roa said: Thousands of soldier termites are able to migrate in a complex social environment where each individual has its own mission framed altogether in a global objective: the survivorship and reproduction of the colony. In this case, these termites used meters of an abandoned rope to move across the Malaysian forest. Once humans disappear, nature recovers its space and uses what is needed to survive.

Best Image for Human Evolution and Ecology. Learning to Be Human captures a researcher using a baboon to study the evolution of human locomotion. Credit: Roberto Garca-Roa

The Editors pick titled Eerie Stalker by Dimitri Ouboter from the Institute for Neotropical Wildlife and Environmental Studies, Suriname captures a Giant Gladiator Frog seconds before escaping from an attempted snake attack. Giant Gladiator Frogs have been previously observed escaping from the jaws of snakes by emitting distress calls, jumping and inflating their lungs, making it harder for small snakes to hold on to them.

Best Image for Ecological Developmental Biology. A zebrafish regrew its tail fin only two weeks after the appendage was clipped at the white horizontal dotted line. Credit: Chey Chapman

TheBMC Ecology and EvolutionImage Competition was created to give ecologists and evolutionary biologists the opportunity to use their creativity to highlight their work and celebrate the intersection between art and science. It follows on from theBMC Ecologycompetition, which ran for seven years untilBMC Ecologymerged withBMC Evolutionary Biologyto formBMC Ecology and Evolution. The winning images are selected by the Editor ofBMCEcology and Evolutionand senior members of the journals editorial board.

Editors pick. Eerie Stalker depicts a giant gladiator frogs escape from a snake. Credit: Dimitri Ouboter

Editor Jennifer Harman said: We had a wonderful experience judging the fantastic images submitted to this years competition. Our section editors used their expertise to ensure the winning images were picked as much for the scientific stories behind them as for the technical quality and beauty of the images themselves. As such, the competition very much reflects BMCs ethos of innovation, curiosity and integrity. We thank all those who took part in this years competition; we hope that our readers enjoy viewing these images and discovering the stories behind them.

Reference: Inaugural BMC Ecology and Evolution image competition: the winning images by Jennifer L. Harman, Alison L. Cuff, Josef Settele, Luke M. Jacobus, David A. Liberles and Arne Traulsen, 12 August 2021, BMC Ecology and Evolution.DOI: 10.1186/s12862-021-01886-7

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2021 BMC Ecology and Evolution Image Competition: See the Spectacular Winning Photographs - SciTechDaily

DUBLIN--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The "Nonresidential Prefabricated Building Systems - Global Market Trajectory & Analytics" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

Global Nonresidential Prefabricated Building Systems Market to Reach $94 Billion by 2027

Amid the COVID-19 crisis, the global market for Nonresidential Prefabricated Building Systems estimated at US$67.9 Billion in the year 2020, is projected to reach a revised size of US$94 Billion by 2027, growing at a CAGR of 4.8% over the analysis period 2020-2027.

Metal Building Systems, one of the segments analyzed in the report, is projected to record a 4.6% CAGR and reach US$47.7 Billion by the end of the analysis period. After an early analysis of the business implications of the pandemic and its induced economic crisis, growth in the Modular Building Systems segment is readjusted to a revised 5.4% CAGR for the next 7-year period.

The U.S. Market is Estimated at $20 Billion, While China is Forecast to Grow at 4.5% CAGR

The Nonresidential Prefabricated Building Systems market in the U.S. is estimated at US$20 Billion in the year 2020. China, the world's second largest economy, is forecast to reach a projected market size of US$16.6 Billion by the year 2027 trailing a CAGR of 4.5% over the analysis period 2020 to 2027.

Among the other noteworthy geographic markets are Japan and Canada, each forecast to grow at 4.5% and 3.8% respectively over the 2020-2027 period. Within Europe, Germany is forecast to grow at approximately 4% CAGR.

Panelized Precast Concrete Systems Segment to Record 4.7% CAGR

In the global Panelized Precast Concrete Systems segment, USA, Canada, Japan, China and Europe will drive the 4.7% CAGR estimated for this segment. These regional markets accounting for a combined market size of US$9.9 Billion in the year 2020 will reach a projected size of US$13.6 Billion by the close of the analysis period.

China will remain among the fastest growing in this cluster of regional markets. Led by countries such as Australia, India, and South Korea, the market in Asia-Pacific is forecast to reach US$10.8 Billion by the year 2027.

Key Topics Covered:

I. METHODOLOGY

II. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

1. MARKET OVERVIEW

2. FOCUS ON SELECT PLAYERS (Total 211 Featured):

3. MARKET TRENDS & DRIVERS

4. GLOBAL MARKET PERSPECTIVE

III. REGIONAL MARKET ANALYSIS

IV. COMPETITION

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/ji7re4

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Global Nonresidential Prefabricated Building Systems Market Report 2021: Evolution of Prefabricated Buildings as the Revolutionary Change in the...

During a drill in the early portion of Arkansas State's practice Wednesday, an assistant coach reminded the Red Wolves to stay on their feet.

Although they had helmets and shoulder pads on, it was just a thud session -- hitting without going to the ground.

That won't be the case this afternoon when Arkansas State University has its first scrimmage of fall camp on the turf inside Centennial Bank Stadium. Just more than a week into the first preseason camp of the Butch Jones era, it'll be the first opportunity for the Red Wolves' coaches to evaluate their defense in a gamelike scenario.

"It's a critical day in the evolution and the evaluation of our football team," Jones said earlier this week. "It's an opportunity for them to really put their identity on video. We're finding out the players who we can win with, who we can trust in critical situations, and really just let them go out and play football."

Although many of the names who finished last season as defensive starters are back for Arkansas State, defensive coordinator Rob Harley is in the process of transitioning the Red Wolves from a 3-4 to a 4-3 base defense.

The only player who appears to have cemented himself on defense is senior linebacker Caleb Bonner, who Jones repeatedly has praised for his leadership.

It means there's ample opportunity for transfers such as Kivon Bennett, John Mincey and Joe Ozougwu to assert themselves along the defensive line. Arkansas State ranked 115th out of 127 teams last year in yards allowed per game, and the Red Wolves weren't helped by a pass rush that Pro Football Focus graded as 114th among all FBS teams.

They'll all get a chance in a situational scrimmage that Jones said will feature the first-team offense going against the first-team defense. The plan is to include live special teams while focusing on all types of scenarios -- red zone, move the chains and backed-up deep in the offense's territory.

Based on practice, Layne Hatcher will run the first-team offense while Florida State transfer James Blackman will man the second unit.

But Hatcher could have at least half of his group different from the one with which he finished 2020. TCU transfer Te'Vailance Hunt slotted in at wide receiver opposite Jeff Foreman and tight end Reed Tyler, and the offensive tackle spots were manned by Kentucky transfer Nick Lewis and Austin Peay transfer Robert Holmes during the open portion of Wednesday's session

That doesn't include redshirt freshman Ethan Miner, who was at center alongside returners Andre Harris and Ivory Scott, and Corey Rucker, who was limited earlier in the week after suffering a shoulder injury but should be close to a full participant today.

"The big thing is just focusing one day at a time and continuing to evaluate and see where we're at," Jones said. "Everything is evaluated in our program -- every single rep, whether it's a team rep, an individual rep, leadership reps, accountability reps. All those things in our program are evaluated on a daily basis."

Senior linebacker Caleb Bonner (center) is in a leadership role for a Red Wolves defense thats intent on improving this season. Arkansas State will have its first scrimmage of fall camp today at Centennial Bank Stadium in Jonesboro.(Photo courtesy Arkansas State Athletics)

Arkansas State wide receiver Jeff Foreman caught 13 passes for 439 yards and 3 touchdowns last season. Foreman will take part in the Red Wolves first scrimmage of fall camp today at Centennial Bank Stadium in Jonesboro.(Courtesy Arkansas State Athletics)

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ASU's 'evolution' takes another step - Arkansas Online

Jurassic World Evolution 2 is getting some pretty big updates in the form of guided tours and fallible Gyrosphere travel.

Guided tours through dino enclosures was an original part of the first game, which has been updated and reintroduced to Jurassic World Evolution 2. Guests travel along a track in a Gyrosphere, a method of transportation featured prominently in the films.

Using one of these Gyrospheres in the original game would yield very little drama, but this new update to Jurassic World Evolution 2 sets guests up with a chance to be attacked while viewing a dinosaur enclosure.

These updates and more were announced through an official forum post by developer Frontier, revealing how the guided tours could now be directed to act as transport around the parks.

Park Managers can also set up photo points where automatic cameras take photos of guests on their tours, adding detail to the experience. The forum post also dropped a hint about the newest voice of guided tours, saying Finally, wed be remiss if we didnt mention the tour guide, who can be heard in the Guided Tours you can add to your parks.

Jurassic World spares no expense, of course, so the tour guide will be a learned figure that provides commentary of whats happening in the tour, from facts about the parks environment, to announcing when the tour is entering the territory of specific species. If youve been following our Park Management Guides, the tour guide will sound very familiar to you.

In other news, Call Of Duty: Vanguards official reveal event has now been announced via the PlayStation Store.

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Travel by Gyrosphere in Jurassic World Evolution 2 just got risky - NME

eFootball is a fresh start for Konamis long-running Pro Evolution Soccer (PES) series. Not only does the game take a radically different approach by switching from a paid annual release to a free-to-play model, but its also being built on an entirely new game engine this time around: Unreal Engine 4.

The shift has naturally led to questions over whether eFootball will be able to overcome some of the typical pitfalls and challenges that the free-to-play model can pose, and how content will be delivered to players after release.

In an exclusive interview with TechRadar, we spoke with eFootballs producer Seitaro Kimura about how the development team will manage cross-play, the benefits of working with Unreal Engine 4, and what he considers eFootballs biggest innovation to be.

From Pro Evolution Soccer to PES, and now eFootball Kimura-san explained that the decision to scrap the series long-running name (known as Winning Eleven in Japan) was down to a multitude of factors. Chiefly, the prospect of turning the game into a viable esport.

We were working on a project to revamp the PES game engine to coincide with the release of the next-generation of home game console such as the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, says Kimura-san.

At the same time, we knew that we needed to meet the needs of the market by making the game free-to-play and cross-platform, allowing players to compete and cooperate across devices.

Following the major changes in the game engine and business aspects, we [wanted to] create a large cross-platform esports scene. To this end, we made the decision to unify Winning Eleven in Japan and PES overseas into eFootball.

eFootball is powered by Unreal Engine 4, replacing Konamis FOX Engine that powered the likes of Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain and previous iterations of PES behind. Building a game in an entirely new engine is always a challenge, but Kimura-san that Unreals development community helped make the series transition to Unreal Engine 4 a little smoother.

With the Unreal Engine, there are many more options for approaches, and with so many people using the Unreal Engine, I can refer to a lot of knowledge, says Kimura-san. Also, at UNREAL FEST, I was able to listen to development case studies of titles that had adopted Unreal Engine, so I was able to get more practical information.

Also, because we were able to develop for all platforms in one environment, we were able to handle cross-platform play relatively smoothly. The gameplay portion of the game uses an in-house football engine, so the integration was very challenging.

eFootball is set to launch with nine officially licensed teams in total, and we now know that new teams will be added and updated for free, along with individual squads. We will also continue to offer Live Update, a free data update service, so each teams transfers and squad changes will be updated weekly, says Kimura-san.

There will also be the predictable mix of licensed teams and made up ones, according to Kimura-san. There will only be a small number of teams available at launch, but other licensed teams with made up names will be available as usual via free updates.

Popular offline modes such as Master League, will be available in the future as premium downloadable content in eFootball, and the game will feature a Match Pass system that allows you to pick your favorite players and earn items based on the numbers of matches you play. Both free and paid passes will be available, says Kimura-san. Paid elements will include individual players for our new Team Building Mode, the aforementioned Match Passes, and we plan to sell additional modes in the future."

But how will eFootball balance the multiplayer and single-player components when it comes to fixes and future updates, and avoid falling into the Pay to win trap that so many free-to-play games succumb to?

We do plan to sell the existing offline modes as premium content in the future. As for those fixes and updates, they will be done in the same way for all modes, says Kimura-san. We are focusing on making sure that all players can enjoy a fair game, so the game specifications will not be a Pay to Win system where paid elements will determine who wins or loses in a match.

Unlike FIFA 22, eFootball will let you play with friends no matter which platform theyre on, including mobile. If you do opt for the mobile version, which will also support controllers in a future update, the good news is you wont always need a Wi-Fi connection if you want to get your football fix on, Kimura-san confirms.

Yes, it is possible to play online using 4G or 5G connection, Kimura-san explains. We are developing and adjusting so that differences in communication quality depending on the environment you are playing in will have as little impact on gameplay as possible.

But will there be a Nintendo Switch version of eFootball? Perhaps, though Kimura-san failed to provide an answer at this point. He did shed some light on what PS5 and Xbox Series X players can expect when they boot up eFootball for the first time, however.

Please expect to see major visual enhancements on PS5 and Xbox Series X, says Kimura-san. However, there is no 120Hz support on console.

While switching to free-to-play and choosing a new name is certainly a big deal for eFootball, its success will ultimately be decided by how it recreates the beautiful game. And when it comes to improvements on the pitch, Kimura-san believes that by focusing on the 1v1 element of football, adding a completely new animation system, and by working with some of the best players in the world, eFootball will ultimately benefit.

The most interesting part of football, in my opinion, is the 1v1 attack and defense. The 1 vs. 1 gameplay is the most innovative aspect of eFootball and will change the balance of the game, says Kimura-san.

In order to make this happen, we have innovated in every way possible, Kimura-san explains. In order to understand how the best players in the world play, we brought in [Andreas] Iniesta and [Gerard] Piqu as our gameplay advisors and asked them for their advice.

In addition, realistic gameplay requires both varied animations and high responsiveness. To achieve this, we built a completely new animation system, including technology we call Motion Matching. You can enjoy the delicate touch of the ball, feinting to deceive your opponent, defending with your body, or blocking a shot at the last second.

Interestingly, this new approach has led to eFootball adopting a control scheme similar to FIFA, with the triggers now controlling sprint and close control instead of the shoulder buttons.

With the revamp of the game engine, we have focused on the most exciting part of football, the 1v1 battle between players. As we created the game system by deconstructing the mechanics of winning and losing in real-life 1v1 battles and the tactics used by top-level players, we had to restructure the control method in order for players to enjoy the evolved tactics, says Kimura-san. Also, instead of having more complicated controls, the game is more intuitive and allows players to focus on the gameplay against their opponents, so we believe that people who have enjoyed the PES series in the past will be able to get used to it and enjoy playing against each other.

We wont have to wait long until we can go hands-on with eFootball, which will release early Autumn (likely September) for PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PC and mobile. Whether the game will be a championship contender or relegation fodder remains to be seen.

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How the (pro) evolution of Konamis eFootball came to be - TechRadar

Sydney McLaughlin

Courtesy of New Balance

Sydney McLaughlin is feeling on top of the world.

Earlier this month, the 22-year-old narrowly topped Dalilah Muhammad, also of Team USA and the defending Olympic champion, to win gold in the women's 400m hurdles at the Summer Games. Finishing the race in 51.46 seconds, McLaughlin also smashed her own world record, which she'd previously set at the U.S. Olympic track and field trials.

"Honestly, it's a dream come true something I have truly dreamt about ever since I was a kid," McLaughlin tells PEOPLE, reflecting on the Olympic event while chatting about her upcoming footwear and apparel collaboration with New Balance.

Her performance in Tokyo was a victory lap following her previous Olympic experience when she failed to make the final in her event at the 2016 Rio Games, where she competed at 16 years old as one of the youngest American track athletes in history.

RELATED: Sydney McLaughlin and Dalilah Muhammad Break Previous World Record Vying for Gold in Hurdles: 'A Great Race'

Sydney McLaughlin

Courtesy of New Balance

"I think 2016 definitely just taught me a lot about the stage in this high-level competition. Going into Tokyo, I was much more prepared mentally and emotionally," she says. "I am grateful to the experience of 2016, even though it wasn't the best. I can truly appreciate all of that because it prepared me for Tokyo this year."

This time around, McLaughlin says her biggest obstacle was "just being patient with myself."

"I think going in, I knew it was gonna be a very fast race. It was definitely a tough one, but my training had been in a place where I knew I was capable of going that fast," she shares. "It was really about executing and the confidence in myself to just go out there and do what I knew how to do."

After Tokyo, McLaughlin has been excited to launch a new venture. The athlete is releasing her New Balance x Sydney Signature Collection, which showcases her rise from young track athlete to world record holder and reigning Olympic gold medalist.

Story continues

Sydney McLaughlin

Courtesy of New Balance

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Sydney McLaughlin

Courtesy of New Balance

"I started working on this almost two years ago, and it was something that was supposed to come out last year after the Olympics, but it got pushed," McLaughlin tells PEOPLE. "So it's been a long time that we've been working on it. It's been really cool to just have the opportunity to create something that I can kind of call my own."

One of the themes of the collaboration is also one of McLaughlin's personal mottos: "Be the first you." A butterfly motif is present across the collection, which McLaughlin says holds a special meaning to her both personally and professionally.

"This idea of evolving and growing into this beautiful creation, I think, over this past year for me has definitely been one of the main themes of my life, so it's cool that the collection also reflects that," she explains. "New Balance first came to me with the idea of incorporating the butterfly because they knew that was something very close to me. Ever since I was young, my father always told me to 'be the butterfly.'"

RELATED: Sydney McLaughlin Shares Day in Her Life Ahead of the Tokyo Olympics, Reflects on Rio in 2016

Next, McLaughlin is set to compete next at the 2022 World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon. As an athlete, she explains that she's already feeling the pressure to ask herself, "what are we working on next?"

But before she gets back to training, McLaughlin says she's taking some time to soak in all that she's accomplished so far.

"It's one of those moments I truly want to just enjoy before progressing on to what's to come," she shares, adding: "Right now I'm just trying to turn my brain off and enjoy this time."

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Sydney McLaughlin on Her Evolution from 2016 Rio Games to Winning Gold in Tokyo: 'Dream Come True' - Yahoo Entertainment

Our Senior Editorial Board Members lent their expertise to judge the entrants to the competition, selecting the overall winner, runner up and best image from each category. The board members considered the scientific story behind the photos submitted in addition to their artistic judgement.

Please enjoy viewing our winning images and discovering the stories behind the camera!

The overall winning image by Kristen Brown from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA depicts a school of jack fish in a spiral formation at Heron Island in the Great Barrier Reef, Australia. Kristen Brown said: This image represents both the beauty and bounty of our oceans as well as the spiraling crisis unfolding within the marine environment. Coral reefs with high coral cover and plentiful fish populations like this one at Heron Island on the Great Barrier Reef are sadly becoming rarer. Without a concentrated effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve water quality, coral reefs as we know them are at risk of disappearing within our lifetime. Senior Editorial Board Member Josef Settele recommended the entry, saying: Marine biodiversity sustains life and the health of our planet, but human activities are threatening the well-being of the worlds oceans. Kristen Browns striking image is a symbol for the need for concentrated efforts to manage biodiversity loss and set conservation priorities.

Runner Up and Best Image for Evolutionary Developmental Biology and Biodiversity

Our runner up and best image for this category was submitted by Kseniya Vereshchagina, an ecologist who studies Lake Baikal in south-eastern Siberia. Lake Baikal is one of the oldest and deepest lakes in the world, giving rise to rich and particularly unique freshwater fauna. However, Kseniya explains that in areas of heavy industry and active tourism, there is a significant impact on coastal communities. Kseniya and her lab group at Irkutsk State University found that in areas of intense human activity, the immunity of endemic amphipod crustaceans is weakened, making them more susceptible to parasitic infection. Kseniya tells us that this image shows an endemic amphipod crustacean densely covered with an overgrown colony of parasitic ciliates. Lake Baikal holds exceptional scientific value to ecologists and evolutionary biologists. Such research highlights the need to minimize the impact of human activity on this precious site.

Behavioral Ecology

This stark winning image for the Behavioral Ecology category was submitted by an evolutionary biologist and conservation photographer affiliated with the University of Valencia, Spain. Roberto tells us that Spiders are one of the most sophisticated hunters on earth. Nevertheless, they cannot escape from what evolution has provided to other species. In particular, some groups of wasps are specialized in hunting spiders and use them as a trophic resource for their larvae. I found this epic scene in a wall of a biological station in Tiputini, Ecuador.

Population Ecology

The winning image for the Population Ecology category was also submitted by Roberto Garca-Roa. Roberto said: Thousands of soldier termites are able to migrate in a complex social environment where each individual has its own mission framed altogether in a global objective: the survivorship and reproduction of the colony. In this case, these termites used meters of an abandoned rope to move across the Malaysian forest. Once humans disappear, nature recovers its space and uses what is needed to survive.

Human Evolution and Ecology

Our winner in this category entitled Learning to Be Human was captured by Roberto Garca-Roa. Primates can be useful models to study the evolution of human locomotion.To caption this winning image, Roberto Garca-Roas writes, To understand our present and predict our future, humans aim to gain enough knowledge to fill the gap of our past. Bipedalism, for example, is probably one of the most critical steps in our evolutionary history. How did it happen? With just a few seconds to capture this scene in France, I was allowed to photograph how a baboon Papio learnt to walk on two legs in a project that aims to investigate how bipedalism evolved in hominids.

Ecological Developmental Biology

Our winner in this category was an entry by Chey Chapman, a PhD student studying the mechanisms underlying zebrafish tissue regeneration at the Royal Veterinary College, the University of London. Mammals cannot repair severe damage to tissues a severed limb does not grow back. However, zebrafish have a spectacular ability to regenerate various tissues after traumatic injury. Chey tells us that This image shows the blood vessels in a regenerated zebrafish tail fin two weeks after clipping at the horizontal white line. Whether regeneration is a primitive or adaptive trait to environmental conditions is the subject of much debate, and the mechanisms underlying the regeneration process are not yet fully understood. Transgenic zebrafish, such as the line used to generate this image, are an important tool to help us better understand why some animals have the power of regeneration by allowing the visualization of certain cell types labelled by fluorescent reporters.

Editors Pick

The Editors pick titled Eerie Stalker by Dimitri Ouboter from the Institute for Neotropical Wildlife and Environmental Studies, Suriname captures a Giant Gladiator Frog seconds before escaping from an attempted snake attack. Giant Gladiator Frogs have been previously observed escaping from the jaws of snakes by emitting distress calls, jumping and inflating their lungs, making it harder for small snakes to hold on to them.

Many congratulations to all of our winners! Their images have been released under a Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY), so everyone is welcome and encouraged to share them freely, as long as you clearly attribute the image author.

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BMC Ecology and Evolution Image Competition 2021: the winning images! - BMC Series blog - BMC Blogs Network

GARRISON, N.Y. Prosperos grievance has been gnawing at him a dozen years when at last he speaks of it to his teenage daughter, Miranda, explaining how they were forced from their noble life in Milan into island exile.

His own treacherous brother snatched his dukedom away, propelled by an evil nature and a craving for power that Prospero bookish sorcerer, kindly father, distracted ruler hadnt suspected in him.

Does he sense his own darkness, though? His own lust for dominion? The way Prospero spins his tale, he is a great man and a good guy wronged. But in Ryan Quinns fitfully magical production of The Tempest at Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, the cruelty that lurks in him is abundantly on display.

The long-lashed, gold-dusted spirit Ariel (Britney Simpson), forced to do Prosperos bidding, desires her freedom from him more than anything. The brutish Caliban (Jason OConnell) wants the same, and to be left in peace on the island that was his before this enslaving invader arrived. Both of them call him master.

Whats curious is that Howard W. Overshowns Prospero, played with a recessiveness consistent with a character most at home in his library, does not dominate the play. He does, however, orchestrate all that happens in it, starting with the storm he whips up to shipwreck his brother (Sean McNall), the queen of Naples (Nance Williamson) and others in a quest for retribution.

Comedy is the strongest suit here, led by OConnells bedraggled, delicate Caliban, who sounds like John Lithgow might if he were a downtrodden brute with a sympathetic case to plead. The productions rollicking high point comes with his discovery by the delightfully put-upon Trinculo (Ralph Adriel Johnson), and their joint discovery by the drunken butler Stephano (Kurt Rhoads).

The young lovers Miranda (Kayla Coleman) and Ferdinand (an extraordinarily charming Tyler Fauntleroy) are sweet to watch, while much of the magic of the island comes from the lovely sung enchantments of Ariel.

Plumped up with music (sound design and music composition are by Charles Coes and Nathan Roberts) and movement (choreography is by Susannah Millonzi), this production is the festivals last in its longtime home at Boscobel House and Gardens, where performances take place in an airy tent that frames the expansive lawn and the hills beyond as background scenery. (The company is moving just a few miles away.)

When the show begins with clouds of fog billowing just where the lawn slopes down, and the figures of the company rising through it and coming toward us, we know that Quinn will use the landscape well.

There is some flatness to the production, though. At the performance I saw, the first frisson of pleasure came with Calibans initial scene: the laughter of an audience that suddenly finds itself in the palm of an actors hand. Standout performances by Simpson and OConnell, Fauntleroy and Johnson are more memorable than the storytelling as a whole.

But in Overshowns finely understated interpretation, Prosperos evolution is starkly clear. When he asks Ariel how the shipwrecked queen and nobles are, she suggests that they are pitiful from his torments: that if he could see them, his affections would become tender.

Dost thou think so, spirit? he asks.

Mine would, sir, were I human, she says, with such gentleness and dignity that compassion seems the only proper course.

And we feel him, very subtly, doing something that wounded, angry rulers seldom do. He begins to let go of his vengefulness.

The TempestThrough Sept. 4 at Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival, Garrison, N.Y.; hvshakespeare.org. Running time 2 hours 15 minutes.

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Review: The Tempest Starkly Amplifies Prosperos Evolution - The New York Times