Category Archives: Evolution

By Donna Keeya June 1, 2020

The University began its journey of remote education in 1953 through its television station, KUHT. | Juana Garcia/The Cougar

When the coronavirus pandemic became widespread across the nation, the University made the decision to enforce remote learning by having all classes proceed online, continuing the distance education efforts that began at UH in 1953.

The University has been a leader in distance learning since KUHT, the Universitys television station, became the first educational television station in the United States in the 1950s, according to UHs Online and Special Programs mission statement.

From there, the University has continued to offer online classes and courses at off-campus instructional sites.

In KUHTs early days, University professors would record classes and then broadcast them for public learning. Some of these classes included biology, poetry and philosophy. The station made educational content intended for primary education as well.

KUHT also collaborated with (Houston Independent School District) to create educational programming for K-12 education like dance and art, said Audiovisual Archivist for UH Libraries Emily Vinson in an email. It was all based on a really lovely vision of making education more accessible.

Additionally, during these times KUHT made specialty content about specific topics for educational purposes. Doctors in Space was a video made in 1956 teaching about safety equipment involving pilots and astronauts. People Are Taught to Be Different was a video from 1958 about different personalities in different cultures.

These werent exactly for grades, like some of the other examples, but were meant for the education of the general public, Vinson said. You have to remember that PBS wasnt created until late 1970, so all other television was commercial. I think these are some of the best examples of educational television.

In the present day, distant learning is more apparent in online courses. The University has academic tips themed around study habits, time management and communication in an effort to help students achieve success in online classes.

Under regular conditions, the University has four undergraduate degrees that students can completely complete remotely. These degrees are psychology ,nursing and retailing and consumer sciences, and are all intended for students who have previously completed at least two years of college.

As far as graduate programs go, there are 27 different programs University students can complete fully online. These programs fall under the categories of business and management, health and social care, engineering and trades and education.

In light of the coronavirus, the University has employed Blackboard and Courseware (CASA) as methods to provide students with educational resources. Both these platforms are accessible through smartphones as well as computers.

For more of The Cougars coronavirus coverage, click here.

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Tags: KUHT, Online and Special Programs, Remote learning, UH libraries

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From TV to online: The evolution of remote learning at UH - The - The Daily Cougar

Medium ground finch with its blunt beak. This particular bird has been banded by Rosemary and Peter Grant during their field studies on Daphne Major. Reproduced with permission from K. Thalia Grant, and Princeton University Press, which first published the remaining images in 40 Years of Evolution (P. R. Grant & B. R. Grant, 2014). Credit: Peter R. Grant and B. Rosemary Grant

Despite the traditional view that species do not exchange genes by hybridization, recent studies show that gene flow between closely related species is more common than previously thought. A team of scientists from Uppsala University and Princeton University now reports how gene flow between two species of Darwins finches has affected their beak morphology. The study is published today in Nature Ecology and Evolution.

Darwins finches on the Galpagos Islands are an example of a rapid adaptive radiation in which 18 species have evolved from a common ancestral species within a period of 1-2 million years. Some of these species have only been separated for a few hundred thousand years or less.

Rosemary and Peter Grant of Princeton University, co-authors of the new study, studied populations of Darwins finches on the small island of Daphne Major for 40 consecutive years and observed occasional hybridization between two distinct species, the common cactus finch and the medium ground finch. The cactus finch is slightly larger than the medium ground finch, has a more pointed beak and is specialized to feed on cactus. The medium ground finch has a blunter beak and is specialized to feed on seeds.

Common cactus finch with its pointed beak feeding on the Opuntia cactus. Credit: Lukas Keller

Over the years, we observed occasional hybridization between these two species and noticed a convergence in beak shape. In particular, the beak of the common cactus finch became blunter and more similar to the beak of the medium ground finch, say Rosemary and Peter Grant. We wondered whether this evolutionary change could be explained by gene flow between the two species.

We have now addressed this question by sequencing groups of the two species from different time periods and with different beak morphology. We provide evidence of a substantial gene flow, in particular from the medium ground finch to the common cactus finch, explains Sangeet Lamichhaney, one of the shared first authors and currently Associate Professor at Kent State University.

A surprising finding was that the observed gene flow was substantial on most autosomal chromosomes but negligible on the Z chromosome, one of the sex chromosomes, says Fan Han, Uppsala University, who analyzed these data as part of her PhD thesis. In birds, the sex chromosomes are ZZ in males and ZW in females, in contrast to mammals where males are XY and females are XX.

The common cactus finch has a pointed beak adapted to feed on cactus whereas the medium ground finch has a blunt beak adapted to crush seeds. Their hybrid progeny have an intermediate beak morphology adaptive under certain environmental conditions as explained in this paper. Credit: Sangeet Lamichhaney, Rosemary and Peter Grant

This interesting result is in fact in excellent agreement with our field observation from the Galpagos, explain the Grants. We noticed that most of the hybrids had a common cactus finch father and a medium ground finch mother. Furthermore, the hybrid females successfully bred with common cactus finch males and thereby transferred genes from the medium ground finch to the common cactus finch population. In contrast, male hybrids were smaller than common cactus finch males and could not compete successfully for high-quality territories and mates.

This mating pattern is explained by the fact that Darwins finches are imprinted on the song of their fathers so that sons sing a song similar to their fathers song and daughters prefer to mate with males that sing like their fathers. Furthermore, hybrid females receive their Z chromosome from their cactus finch father and their W chromosome from their ground finch mother. This explain why genes on the Z chromosome cannot flow from the medium ground finch to the cactus finch via these hybrid females, whereas genes in other parts of the genome can, because parents of the hybrid contribute equally.

Our data show that the fitness of the hybrids between the two species is highly dependent on environmental conditions which affect food abundance, says Leif Andersson of Uppsala University and Texas A&M University. That is, to what extent hybrids, with their combination of gene variants from both species, can successfully compete for food and territory. Therefore, the long-term outcome of the ongoing hybridization between the two species will depend on environmental factors as well as competition.

One scenario is that the two species will merge into a single species combining gene variants from the two species, but perhaps a more likely scenario is that they will continue to behave as two species and either continue to exchange genes occasionally or develop reproductive isolation if the hybrids at some point show reduced fitness compared with purebred progeny. The study contributes to our understanding of how biodiversity evolves, Andersson concludes.

Reference: Female-biased gene flow between two species of Darwins finches by Sangeet Lamichhaney, Fan Han, Matthew T. Webster, B. Rosemary Grant, Peter R. Grant and Leif Andersson, 4 May 2020, Nature Ecology & Evolution.DOI: 10.1038/s41559-020-1183-9

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How Gene Flow Between Species Influenced the Evolution of Darwins Finches - SciTechDaily

In an interview with The Sunday Times, Legend said the two friends and past collaborators are just living their own lives and that the evolution of their relationship is not tied to West's vocal support for President Donald Trump. "I don't think we're less friends because of the Trump thing," Legend said. "I just think we're doing our own thing. He's up in Wyoming. I'm here in L.A. We've both got growing families and I no longer have a formal business relationship with him as an artist, so I think it's just part of the natural cycle of life."

In 2016, West tweeted a screenshot of a text he received from Legend, a Hilary Clinton supporter during the campaign.

"Hey it's JL. I hope you'll reconsider aligning yourself with Trump," Legend wrote at the time. "You're way too powerful and influential to endorse who he is and what he stands for. As you know, what you say really means something to your fans. They are loyal to you and respect your opinion. So many people who love you feel so betrayed right now because they know the harm that Trump's policies cause, especially to people of color. Don't let this be part of your legacy. You're the greatest artist of our generation."

West replied: "I love you John and I appreciate your thoughts. You bringing up my fans or my legacy is a tactic based on fear used to manipulate my free thought."

Following the social media disagreement, the two were cordial.

Legend, who along with wife Chrissy Teigen, was a guest at the rapper's wedding to Kim Kardashian in 2014, insisted that politics was "never a part" of their conversations.

"Our interaction was almost always about creativity and music," he said. "He's also in a different place musically. He's doing gospel music. That's what he's focused on right now, designing his clothes, so we're in different places."

Originally posted here:

John Legend says his friendship with Kanye West has evolved - CNN

Humans are mere animals in Darwinian thinking. The same evolutionary mechanisms and selective pressures that make fruit flies cooperate, or fish to swarm, or rams to bash their heads together, cause Homo sapiens to form political parties, revolt against kings, or cheer at baseball games. Human exceptionalism is omitted from their equations. According to Darwinians, every human behavior, as well as every fish behavior or fruit fly behavior or chimpanzee behavior, is a consequence of natural selection. If this premise were scientific, evolutionary anthropologists should be able to model human behavior and make predictions.

Suppose a scientist tells you about his new model. It goes like this:

If we assume X, then Y might result under particular circumstances, as long as we hold A constant, as Dr. Wizard surmised in his widely accepted model of the evolution of human and non-human animal behavior H. But according to our revised model, the situation is more complex. It turns out that B is a function of C, which affects A in unpredictable ways, resulting in chaotic behavior, depending on whether selection is taken into account. When selection is not considered, stable cyclic behavior is a possible outcome, at least in some studies, but those models do not correlate with field observations. Our revised model finds that D(E) has been overlooked, which is likely influenced by F(P), and since A is not always constant, as has been assumed, one might get a stable equilibrium, or a cycle, or chaos, depending on the weather. Its complicated.

Are you impressed by this advance toward the scientific understanding of human nature?

Something very similar to it was just published in PNAS by four scientists from Stanford and Tel Aviv Universities pretending to explain Cultural evolution of conformity and anticonformity. Conformity might be illustrated by a fruit fly imitating its neighbors behavior, or a teen following what the other teens are doing. Anticonformity might be a bird leaving the flock, or a man defying his states coronavirus lockdown guidelines. To Kaleda Krebs Denton, Yoav Ram, Uri Liberman, and Marcus W. Feldman, the subjects in the population make no difference, because Were all in this [Darwinian thing] together.

The evolutionary dynamics of cultural variants under conformist- and anticonformist-biased transmission have implications for humans and nonhuman animals. Humans display both conformist and anticonformist biases, and models of conformist-biased transmission have been proposed to explain large-scale human cooperation. Nonhuman animals have been shown to display conformist biases in mating and foraging decisions. Here, we investigate established mathematical models of conformist and anticonformist bias with and without selection and find complex dynamics, including multiple stable polymorphic equilibria, stable cycles, and chaos. [Emphasis added.]

This paper illustrates two things: (1) Darwinian theory is utterly useless when applied to human behavior, and (2) no amount of mathematical hand-waving can fix bad premises.

Admittedly, there may be a little predictability to human behavior in regard to conformity. When a wave starts in a football stadium, most people (but not all) will cheerfully join in to keep it going. Every parent worries about peer pressure their offspring will face at college. Military recruits are drilled to obey orders, fearing the bad consequences of disobedience. But people are not fish! Papers like this one relegate humans to pawns of evolutionary forces. Its a denial of free will. And its absurd; if a person conforms, natural selection did it. If the person does not conform, natural selection did that, too. Natural selection is Darwins catch-all explanation for everything, even opposite things. Daniel Dennett called it a universal acid, but didnt catch the fact that it dissolves its container, too evolutionary theory itself! In the end, it explains absolutely nothing.

Nave readers of this PNAS paper might be intimidated by the math. You can ignore the following example paragraph, because it is so vague, it has nothing to do with the real world. Human behavior is a subject that matters to all of us, but this Darwinian approach to behavior signifies much nothing (emptiness) about ado (fuss, or busy activity about something that matters). To borrow another line from Shakespeare, it is full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. The real message is in the theory rescue words between the symbols:

It might be expected that if p=12 is the unique polymorphic equilibrium, then either p=0 and p=1 are both stable and p=12 is not stable, or both p=0 and p=1 are not stable and p=12 is stable, since it is a protected polymorphism. In fact, when p=0 and p=1 are both stable, there is global convergence to one of them; p=12 is not stable, such that [0,12) is the domain of attraction of p=0 and (12,1] that of p=1. However, when both p=0 and p=1 are not stable, then even when p=12 is the unique polymorphic equilibrium, it is possible that p=12 is not stable. For example, following Eq. B8 in SI Appendix, section B, let n=1+(12)n2n1j=kD(j)n(nj)(2jn). From Eq. 4, the lower bound of n occurs when D(j)=j for all kjn1, in which case all of the D(j) s are negative and p=12 is unique by Result 3. SI Appendix, Table S1 presents the lower bounds on n for n=3,4,,20. The bounds on D, namely, j

On and on this paper goes, manipulating symbols this way and that, qualifying every situation with exceptions, ending with a final dramatic letdown:

Our detailed analysis of the two-population case without selection illustrates how complex the relationship between migration and conformist transmission can be. If the conformity coefficients are the same in both populations, two polymorphic equilibria other than (12,12), as well as the fixation states (0,0) and (1,1), can be stable if the migration rate is less than 18 and the conformity coefficient is large enough (Eq. 64). However, if this coefficient is small enough, only the fixation states are stable.

Thus the claim that conformist transmission generates a population-level process that creates and maintains group boundaries and cultural differences through time (ref. 4, p. 231) is not always true.

Does their model make any predictions? No. Is it falsifiable? No. Did it advance human understanding in any measurable way? Certainly not. In fact, it undermined earlier models that tried to do the same thing by noting more exceptions and omissions. Whatever it is trying to model is critically dependent on unprovable assumptions and false premises, namely, that humans are mere animals. It is hard to find any redeeming value in this exercise, and yet the NAS printed it gleefully, because it is Darwinian.

Theres a stronger reason for dismissing this paper. As Nancy Pearcey has shown on ID the Future, Darwinians almost always fail to apply their own models to themselves. If these four authors really believed their own assumptions, the act of writing the paper was a consequence of natural selection, too. They didnt mean any of it. They were not searching for unbiased truth. They merely wanted to boost their own fitness, and the best way to do it was to take the conformist position on Darwinism. One could go further and say their minds were not even involved; the words on the page came about by selection pressure.

Another article in PNAS is downright scary. In an article on Science and Culture (sound familiar?), David Adam advocates spinning fictions by scientists. The title is, Science and Culture: Design fiction skirts reality to provoke discussion and debate. By design fiction, he means that researchers are learning how to create fake realities, in order to watch how humans react. He starts with an example:

In October 2015, researchers presented an unusual paper at a computer science conference in London. The paper described the promising results of a pilot project in which a local community used surveillance drones to enforce car parking restrictions and to identify dog owners who failed to clean up after their pets. Controlled by four elderly retirees, the drones buzzed around the city and directed council officials on the ground.

The paper and its accompanying video generated lively discussion about the ethics and regulation of drone use among delegates at the CHI PLAY conference. But there was a catch: The paper, the video, and the pilot scheme were fictional, as the researchers admitted at the end of both the paper and the presentation.

David Adam doesnt appear to have any ethical qualms about misleading people in this way. It generated lively discussion, thats all. The ethical qualms were about drone use not about the fictional scheme, and fibbing for science. The experiment was provocative by design.

Design fiction is one of a number of overlapping terms that have emerged in the last decade or so to describe the process by which designers, researchers, artists, engineers, and technologists devise and sometimes present or publish scenarios to provoke debate.

Is that not like evidence that Russians are trying to divide Americans by provoking discord from both sides of the aisle? The popular YouTube channel Smarter Every Day spoke with the leading social media giants to show how the Internet is filled with bots using high tech to manipulate public opinion. What if science journals did that? What if they decided never to reveal that their design fiction research was all fictional? Who could trust any research ever again?

Circling around, why not just dismiss the PNAS paper about the evolution of conformity and call it design fiction? If it is fine for the researchers to dissemble, it is fine for their readers to dismiss it as Darwinian fiction. Were onto them. We are human beings. We dont get pushed around by blind, unguided processes like natural selection. We use our minds. If they respond with the claim that natural selection nudged you into the anticonformist position, we can counter with, And natural selection nudged you to write this paper.

Photo: Football fans do The Wave at the University of Michigan, by Ken Lund from Reno, Nevada, USA / CC BY-SA.

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Much Nothing about Ado: The Uselessness of Dehumanized Darwinism - Discovery Institute

Look, I get it. We all went onto Disney+ the minute we could and collectively shredded in the most radical fashion by loading up X-Men: The Animated Series and listening to a truly killer Whitney Houston riff. Were all Children of the Atom, and Children of the 90s, at heart. But we couldve been doing something more, my X-Men. We could have should have been watching X-Men: Evolution.

The nostalgic glitz and glamour of access to The Animated Series overshadowed the fact that Disney+ also launched with (alongside approximately one billion other things) X-Men: Evolution, a continued overshadowing the latter has endured pretty much since it first aired in the early aughts. But the chance to revisit Evolution allows us to remember that, in rejecting the nostalgic glee that makesTAS the charmer it is for all its clunkiness at times, it remains a full-throated celebration of 90s X-books at their best and weirdest its reboot sibling did some really interesting things with the X-formula.

When it couldve easily been a way to try and launch a show riffing off the newly-found cinematic successes of the X-Men at the time, Evolution which aired on Kids WB from 200-2003 did something that felt unprecedented instead. It allowed its heroes to, wellevolve. It did so, ironically, by devolving several of them. Well, de-ageing them.

One of Evolutions biggest risks to the X-Formula was giving us a show that truly embraced that Xaviers abode was a school for mutant education, not just a cool base for the X-Men to hang out in between missions. The vast majority of the cast in Evolution is presented as teens only relatively recently awakened to their mutant powers, rather than X-heroes in their prime. While a few familiar mutant favourites, like Cyclops and Jean Grey, were slightly older than the main crew (initially including Kitty Pryde, Nightcrawler, Rogue, and newcomer Spyke), only Storm, Professor X, and Wolverine remained a similar age as to how they were presented in the comics. Although they were all X-Men, they were no longer just teammates and colleagues, but teacher and mentors to this next generation of mutants.

It was the best of both worlds in the younger cast, Evolution balanced storylines about acceptance and teen angst with these kids just hanging out and being friends with each other, slowly but surely coming into their abilities as they became more assured in themselves and their relationships with the kids around them. In the older crew, there was now a new dynamic, not just leaders on the battlefield but people who had to teach the kids around them lessons theyd learned long ago as seasoned superheroes.

X-Men storytelling has always been about the future fighting not just for acceptance in the now, but to secure the safety and prosperity of new mutants for generations beyond their own to avoid the struggles the X-Men and mutantkind at large have long endured. Evolution took that dynamic and made it less about generational storytelling on a societal level, and more on a personal one. The characters and their relationships with each other drove Evolutions heart more than the action of the week, even if that was made compelling by watching these accurately bratty teens work with each other and their elders to be forged into an effective superhero team.

But this focus on examining new, younger iterations of the X-Men also worked in tandem with another thing that made Evolution so compelling: unlike TAS before it, which dove headfirst into the ephemera of X-Men comics sagas to tell its own definitive versions of beloved tales, Evolution was initially very hands-off with tackling the larger X-Mythos while it set up this new take on its familiar cast. Although the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants was the primary antagonist of the first few seasons (its members de-aged to match the X-Men, creating a fascinating recruitment arms-race between the heroes and villains), prominent villains like Mystique and Magneto were left to linger in the background.

Mystique eventually became a major foil for Rogues arc in particular in later seasons, challenging her uncertain path to the side of heroism after initially joining the Brotherhood. Magneto only really shows up in a major way at the climax of the second season, making his status as a major threat feel that more tangible, but also one that feels much more appropriate for a cast of young X-Men whove had the time to come into their own. It meant that instead of leaning on familiar stories, Evolution got to deal with its own ideas beyond examining the intrapersonal drama of its heroes: its why we got, after all, the creation of X-23, before she became a fundamental aspect of the X-Mens comic book history.

It makes the last two seasons tonal shift away from the school drama and into more traditional X-Men storytelling avenues after Magnetos attack exposes mutantkind on a societal level, feel that much more earned, because youre actually invested in the stakes of these characters at that point. Theyre more than just the X-Men, theyre characters youve watched develop and flourish as they accept who they are, so when the time came for the show to tackle Apocalypses resurgence on the scene in its final, truncated season, the scale and scope of the story had an added weight more than if these were just the X-Men we knew and loved, and Apocalypse threatening the end of all things was just another week of cartoons.

Not all of these bold changes were for the better, admittedly. The first few seasons where theres more of a focus on standalone hijinks with the students, as the larger mutant worldbuilding develops in the background, meant that the expanding roster of X-Kids left some characters getting the short shrift. Spyke, in particular, was also often the weakest beneficiary of that. Although an interesting vector for a lot of Evolutions core ideas not just as the face of the younger main cast, but his role as an entirely new character, allowing for a new lens to examine both the established heroes and the bonds between both the older and younger X-heroes alike as the show progressed, that same newness also left him underdeveloped. Pushed back to the sidelines even when he was ostensibly the focus, we never really got to delve into what made him stand on his own two feet outside of being the new character until Evolution was arguably much more interested in its wider narratives.

But X-Men: Evolution, for all its bold changes to what we knew and loved about the animated interpretation that came before it, still understood what makes the X-Men as a concept so appealing and that makes it worth revisiting now more than ever.

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X-Men: Evolution Is the Mutant Cartoon You Should Be Bingewatching Right Now - Gizmodo Australia

Research from the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History has demonstrated that when young birds are nurtured by their parents for extended time periods, they become more intelligent and better equipped for survival.

The study places new emphasis on the critical role of parents in the evolution of intelligence. Like birds, children need a supportive environment that helps brain development reach its fullest potential.

While observing two species of birds in their natural habitats, the team investigated the influence of parenting on learning in adolescence and survival in adulthood.

At a study site in Sweden, the researchers observed Siberian jays. The young jays live in family groups for up to four years under the care of a breeding pair.

Using a field test, the experts discovered that birds who stayed with their parents longer were able to learn faster. As a result, they were more intelligent, better equipped for long-term survival, and more likely to start their own family.

The experts also observed New Caledonian crows in the wild to understand how the young birds learn to make tools for food retrieval, which takes about a year.

The researchers found that Caledonian crows can stay with their parents for up to three years a childhood that is much longer than that of most other crows.

The team noted that parents and other adults were extremely patient with young crows. While adults used a tool to get food, they fed the juveniles and let them watch closely. The crows even tolerated tool theft and physical contact by juveniles.

According to the researchers, this tolerant learning environment is responsible for the large brain size and intelligence of New Caledonian crows.

The study authors argue that the influence of parenting on the evolution of cognition has been overlooked. Parental care gives children the time and opportunity to make mistakes and learn from them.

Extended parenting has profound consequences for learning and intelligence, explained study co-author Michael Griesser.

Learning opportunities arise from the interplay between extended childhood and extended parenting. The safe haven provided by extended parenting is critical for learning opportunities. It creates extended developmental periods that feed back into the extended childhood.

The study is published in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.

By Chrissy Sexton, Earth.com Staff Writer

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Parents play a crucial role in the evolution of intelligence Earth.com - Earth.com

And has seemed to embrace the last few months.

A great event and a great cause ... winners all around! It was so fun having millions watch me shank shots, ask for lost ball rulings, and rip my pants wide open! Brady said online.

Brady has been in the public eye for a long time and does just fine as the center of attention on football Sundays. Hes often, though, seemed uncomfortable in that same glare off the field. He has cited a desire for privacy often and avoided politics. Some of his most telling interviews were those he walked out of as means of declining to engage in their subject matter.

That has changed. Whether Brady wanted to keep his life to himself or didnt feel he was allowed to be as open as hed have liked to be before this offseason, the quarterback is suddenly willing to put himself out there in ways he hasnt been in a long time.

For example: Hes starting a production company. Hes doing a nine-part documentary with ESPN about himself. He was mostly micd up for an entire Sunday of golf that was seen by a record-setting average 5.8 million homes reaching even more viewers once the pants incident went viral.

The only thing I saw from TB12 and them was he split his pants at one point and he sunk a hole-in-one, said Jason McCourty, errantly referring to the birdie Brady made from the fairway. So, I was happy to see he split his pants. The next time I see him, Ive got to give him a hard time.

Brady has also recently shared that his wife, Gisele Bundchen, at times, was unhappy with their marriage as a result of his time commitment to football. He has also told us (on TikTok) that he exercises more than she does but also spends more money, has more clothes, and is more of a whiner when sick. Hes posted selfies with goofy filters and photoshopped a Caddyshack reference. He is, as the kids say, very online.

More significantly, Brady has delved into the political. He has requested, via an Instagram post, justice for George Floyd, the Minnesota man who died last Monday after a Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck while arresting him. Earlier in May, Brady signed a letter from the Players Coalition to the Justice Department demanding a federal investigation into the February killing of another Black man, Ahmaud Arbery.

He has screenshot a TMZ post about his accidental barging-in on a Tampa man whose home he mistook for that of Buccaneers offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich. He addressed a mini-controversy on social media, screenshooting a report claiming tension between he and Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels and captioning it please stop this nonsense! Please be more responsible with reporting.

Beyond the confines of the Internet, hes also selling his custom Escalade, with its blacked-out windows and privacy curtains. Hes currently living in a home (Derek Jeters, if you havent heard) in Tampa that he told Howard Stern is far less private than the Brookline manse his family inhabited for the last few years.

Where I lived in Chestnut Hill, I was pretty private for a long time, Brady said. So I forgot, in a way, like people could drive up to your house. You couldnt drive up to my house where I lived in Chestnut Hill. Here, they could pull right up to the back of the house.

This is a little different because when you go out to the backyard, theres a lot of boats that have pulled up and people out the front.

Oh, also, he did multiple hours with Stern.

Maybe this was part of the plan. Its smart business Bradys Twitter-follower count has grown from 977,730 on March 11 to more than 1.2 million now, the new followers roped in by the 37 tweets (out of a lifetime total of 206) hes sent since then.

Maybe it just makes him happy.

He wanted to go somewhere and enjoy himself, have more fun than he was having, Bradys friend Jay Feely said during an guest spot on NFL Networks Good Morning Football, speaking of Bradys change of scenery. He earned that right. He was a free agent and well see how that ends up.

The degree to which Patriots players are discouraged from having active presences online, and otherwise with the public, is usually overstated but still a factor.

Maybe it took the confluence of a global pandemic that requires the public to stay inside and become round-the-clock content consumers and the biggest change of his professional life to get Brady on TikTok, but there he is.

This has not all gone over well in New England. While Brady stories continue to generate tons of interest, plenty of Patriots fans including those still rooting for the quarterback, as long as hes not playing New England have voiced the opinion that its getting tiring hearing about his every move. (Anyone who has ever social media-stalked an ex knows that these things can both be true.)

Beyond the specific dynamics of this offseason, though, its fascinating to watch one of the NFLs defining players change this way. Bradys always done most of his talking on the field, but hes starting to get chatty in other arenas, as well.

Nora Princiotti can be reached at nora.princiotti@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter at @NoraPrinciotti.

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The social evolution of Tom Brady: From Foxborough to TikTok - The Boston Globe

For as long as living things have been building proteins based on the code carried by messenger RNA molecules, aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases have been there. These enzymes, AARSs for short, link transfer RNAs (tRNAs) to the corresponding amino acids. That would seem to be a big enough job for one class of enzymesand when protein-based life began, it was. But as organisms became more complex, AARSs picked up additional domains that allow them to do much more.

By the time you get to humans, the synthetase has become highly decorated with those additional domains, says Paul Schimmel, a Scripps Research Institute biochemist who studies these add-on jobs.

Living things possess at least one type of AARS molecule for each of the 20 proteinogenic amino acids. For some amino acids, there are two varieties, with a separate enzyme for use in protein translation that takes place in the mitochondrion. All of these synthetases have a core segment that is involved in linking tRNAs and amino acids, and all but one harbor one or more additional accessory domains. Plus, by alternatively splicing their mRNAs or fragmenting the proteins post-translationally, cells can make more than 300 different protein variants from AARS genes. Some of these variants moonlight as inflammatory cytokines. Others orchestrate the formation of blood vessels. The AARSs for glutamic acid and proline are merged into a two-part protein; the linker between them seems to control immune activity and fat metabolism, and may even influence life span. Many AARSs have been linked to human diseases caused by defects not in protein assembly, but in these other, noncanonical functions.

I heard how skeptical the field was about those discoveries. I dont blame them. I would be confused too.

Xiang-Lei Yang, Scripps Research Institute

Some researchers now view the enzymes as drug targets for cancer, immune disease, and other conditions. The company Schimmel cofounded, aTyr Pharma in San Diego, envisions the AARS proteins themselves as an entirely new class of drugs, distinct from small molecules or other biologics. The firm is currently running a clinical trialtesting a piece of the histidine enzyme, HisRS, for treating inflammatory lung disease.

Alternative AARS functions have been known in lower organisms such as bacteria since the 1980s, but their activities arent extensive, says Schimmel. Then, starting in the 90s, Schimmel and others began to uncover noncanonical functions in higher eukaryotes, starting with unexpected roles in angiogenesis. The discovery of new functions for these ancient proteins was a big surprise, says David Dignam, a biochemist at the University of Toledo. But given the diverse functions that researchers studying AARSs have uncovered, many of which touch on crucial disease pathways, Dignam says he thinks aTyrs approach makes sense. Arguing that you can make medicines based on this, I think, is very logical.

While other proteins have adopted secondary functions, the quantity and variety of side gigs found in the AARSs is remarkable, says Schimmel. And he doesnt think its a coincidence. These particular synthetases have been present and available for evolution to modify since protein-based life began. Given their essential role in protein synthesis, theyre consistently produced, and unlikely to disappear from any viable genome. That makes them a stable substrate for new functional domains. Moreover, they possess specific amino acid binding sites, ready to interact with other proteins.

Its lock and key, says Schimmel. Any protein that sticks out a nice side chain that matches a synthetase could eventually become a partner.

Schimmel says hes long been fascinated with AARSs original function: interpreting the genetic code. Back in the 90s, Schimmels lab, then at MIT, was sequencing the AARS genes. We were interested in developing small molecules that would target them and kill their activities in specific ways, he says. For example, if the AARS of a pathogen was different enough from that in people, he reasoned, one could develop an antibiotic that shuts off protein synthesis in the infectious agent.

Schimmels then-postdoc Keisuke Wakasugi got curious about the sequence of the gene encoding TyrRS, the AARS for tyrosine. In humans, TyrRS includes an extra segment at the carboxyl end of the enzyme, a feature that isnt present in prokaryotes or lower eukaryotes. The amino acid sequence for this part of the protein was similar to that for a human cytokine, EMAP II, which recruits circulating immune cells into tissues to promote inflammation. Wakasugi decided to test that carboxyl domain for cytokine-like activity.

Thats a silly idea, Schimmel recalls thinking. But Wakasugi went ahead, and sure enough, the TyrRS carboxyl domain acted just like EMAP II, inducing cultured phagocytes and leukocytes to migrate and release inflammatory signals. The full-length TyrRS, in contrast, didnt influence the cells behavior. That hinted at the possibility that the carboxyl domain could be broken off the TyrRS for immune functions. No one in the lab would believe the finding at first, so Wakasugi repeated the experiments, with the same results.

Although it would take more than a decade to show that such AARS fragments were truly present and relevant in a living animal, Wakasugi knew he was onto something. Paul and I were very excited to discover a novel and unexpected function of human TyrRS, recalls Wakasugi, now a biochemist at the University of Tokyo. Throughout this project, I felt that we opened the door to a whole new research field.

As part of the same study, Wakasugi also investigated the amino-terminal, catalytic domain of TyrRS, wondering if it might also influence cell migration. It behaved in a manner reminiscent of the cytokine interleukin-8 (IL-8). Both the TyrRS amino-terminal fragment and IL-8 bind to the IL-8 receptor on certain leukocytes, causing them to migrate in culture.

Aminoacyl tRNA synthetases are crucial players in protein synthesis, linking tRNAs to the amino acids dictated by the codon sequence. All AARSs have also been found, in diverse in vitro and in vivo systems, to play non-protein synthesis roles in a number of body systems. This table includes a sampling of the more well-studied examples.

Schimmel recruited Xiang-Lei Yang, a postdoc with expertise in structural biology, to join his lab at Scripps in La Jolla, California, to investigate how TyrRS might manage alternative functions. Yang zeroed in on a particular sequence of amino acids, glutamic acidleucinearginine, required for the synthetase fragments cytokine activity. The same sequence was also found in IL-8 and related cytokines. In crystal structures, she found that full-length TyrRS buried this motif, but it was exposed in the cytokine-like fragment.

IL-8 was known to promote the formation and growth of blood vessels, so Wakasugi also tested his TyrRS amino-terminal fragment for angiogenic activity. When he injected a bit of gel containing the fragment into mice, blood vessels grew and suffused the gel. To explore that action further, Schimmel phoned his Scripps colleague Martin Friedlander, an ophthalmologist and cell and developmental biologist, and asked him to test the TyrRS fragment in his mouse models of eye vascularization. Friedlander agreed, but also asked for a control. So along with the human TyrRS fragment, Wakasugi provided a natural splice variant of the tryptophan enzyme, TrpRS, that lacks the glutamic acidleucinearginine motif.

The results, Friedlander recalls, werent exactly what he expected. TrpRS, the supposed control, had a much more potent effect, says Friedlander, who is also president of the Lowy Medical Research Institute in La Jolla. But that effect was the opposite of TyrRS action: rather than promote angiogenesis, as Wakasugi had seen in the gel, the TrpRS fragment blocked it in mammalian cell culture, chicken embryos, and mouse eyes. TyrRS and TrpRS may have evolved as opposing regulators of angiogenesis, says Wakasugi.

Scientists were initially resistant to the idea that an AARS could have functions beyond protein synthesis. Yang recalls attending a conference, shortly after Wakasugi published his work on angiogenesis, where others were unaware that she was a Schimmel acolyte. Thus incognito, I heard how skeptical the field was about those discoveries, she recalls. I dont blame them. I would be confused too.

Aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases play a fundamental role in protein translation, linking transfer RNAs to their cognate amino acids. But in the hundreds of millions of years that theyve existed, these synthetases (AARSs) have picked up several side jobs. One of these is to manage the development of vertebrate vasculature.

Multiple AARSs play roles in the development of the vertebrate circulatory system. During development, the serine enzyme SerRS downregulates the expression of vascularendothelial growth factor A (VEGF-A), preventing over-vascularization.

In addition, a combo synthetase for glutamic acid and proline, GluProRS, links up with other proteins to form the interferon- activated inhibitor of translation (GAIT) complex to block VEGF-A translation.

A piece of the tryptophan synthetase TrpRS also contributes to dampening angiogenesis by binding and blocking VE-cadherin receptors on endothelial cells so they cant link together to form blood vessel lining.

Meanwhile, a fragment of the tyrosine synthetase TyrRS appears to promote the growth of blood vessels by stimulating migration of those endothelial cells.

According to Scripps Research Institute biochemist Paul Schimmel, the addition of accessory domains that perform such tasks parallels major events in the evolution of circulation. The first blood vascular system, which lacked the endothelium present in modern vertebrates, probably arose in a common ancestor of vertebrates and arthropods around 700 million to 600 million years ago. Around this same time, TyrRS acquired a glutamic acidlysinearginine motif that today is thought to promote angiogenesis. Then, around 540 million to 510 million years ago, an ancestral vertebrate evolved a closed vascular system, with blood pumping through vessels lined by endothelium. At some point around that same time period half a billion years ago, the TrpRS picked up a WHEP domain, which today regulates its ability to block angiogenesis. In addition, SerRS acquired a domain unique to this enzyme, which now prevents over-vascularization in developing zebrafish, and likely other vertebrates.

GluProRSs role in angiogenesis, on the other hand, doesnt seem to be so precisely timed to the evolution of vasculature. A linker protein tied together the AARSs for glutamic acid and proline enzymes around 800 million years ago, before circulatory systems existed.

While the TyrRS and TrpRS functions Wakasugi and colleagues had discovered were interesting, it wasnt clear that the enzyme fragments genuinely performed these functions in vivo. Yang realized that to give herself and other scientists confidence about noncanonical functions of AARSs, shed have to find evidence that they were present in animals.

The team still hasnt done so for TrpRS or TyrRS, but Wakasugi found her opportunity with the serine enzyme, SerRS. Multiple published genetic screens in zebrafish had identified defects in vascular development when SerRS was mutated. But mutations that knocked out the enzymes ability to link tRNAs and amino acids did not cause such defects, indicating that something else was going on.

To figure out what, Yang turned to a sequence, christened UNE-S, that is found in vertebrate, but not invertebrate, SerRS. Yangs teamshe joined the Scripps faculty in 2005, and now shares a lab with Schimmelquickly identified a nuclear localization sequence within UNE-S, and determined that mutations altering this signal caused the vascular defects in zebrafish embryos. In the nucleus, they found, SerRS seems to minimize the expression of vascular endothelial growth factor A (VEGFA). The study, published in 2012, was the first to illustrate an essential, natural role for an AARS accessory domain in a living animal. Shortly thereafter, the team reported that nuclear SerRS blocks VEGFA by competing and interfering with c-Myc, a transcription factor that normally promotes the genes expression.

Meanwhile, Schimmels and Yangs groups continued to try to explain the noncanonical functions of TrpRS and TyrRS, even as they found more side gigs for these enzymes. Yang led studies on the TrpRS fragments structure and mechanism. She discovered that full-length TrpRS doesnt influence angiogenesis because its capped by a WHEP domainso called because this domain appears in aminoacyl tRNA synthetases for tryptophan (W), histidine (H), glutamic acid (E), and proline (P), as well as in the glycine and methionine enzymes. Yangs team found that when uncapped by proteases in the extracellular space, TrpRS binds to a cellular receptor called VE-cadherin. Specifically, tryptophans in the receptor seemed to enter the TrpRSs active site to create the bond. Thats why Wakasugi saw that only the fragment, not the full TrpRS, blocked angiogenesis.

More recently, Schimmel has also been interested in plant-based amino acidlike compounds, such as resveratrol, the stuff in red wine thats thought to counter oxidative stress. Resveratrol and tyrosine are similar in that both contain a phenolic ring, and thats important for resveratrols ability to influence the expression of pro- and anti-oxidative genes. In 2015, Schimmels team reported that under conditions of stress, TyrRS moves into the nucleus of human cultured cells or living mice, where any resveratrol present fits neatly into TyrRSs active site. This turns off the normal TyrRS catalytic activity to connect tyrosine molecules with the appropriate tRNAs. Instead, TyrRS stimulates the activation of PARP-1, an enzyme involved in DNA repair.

A few years later, the team found that an alternatively spliced version of TyrRS stimulates platelet proliferation in mice and cultured cells, and could potentially be used to treat people with a low platelet count.

Schimmel expects noncanonical AARS functions will keep the group busy for a long time. We are barely scratching the surface of what is to be learned, he says. I am as excited, or even more excited, about these enzymes as I was when I started out decades ago.

As evidence of noncanonical functions for AARSs was trickling out of Schimmels lab, Paul Fox, a biochemist at the Cleveland Clinics Lerner Research Institute, was studying the control of inflammation in macrophages. Specifically, his team was investigating a complex generated when the cells were exposed to the cytokine interferon-. A protein complex called GAIT (for interferon- activated inhibitor of translation), generated within macrophages, binds to and blocks mRNAs related to inflammation. Inside the complex, the researchers found GluProRS, an enzyme that includes the AARSs for glutamic acid and proline.

We ran into it just absolutely by accident, Fox recalls. I didnt think it was an interesting enzyme. But he knew of Schimmels work, and he picked up the phone to call Scripps.

One minute into the call, Schimmel interrupted to welcome Fox to what Schimmel called the most exciting area of AARS research: the noncanonical functions. Schimmel also promised his assistance, Fox says. Hes been a big supporter and a friend ever since. With tools supplied by Sunghoon Kim, a former Schimmel lab postdoc now at Yonsei University in South Korea, Foxs team discovered that interferon- causes GluProRS to become phosphorylated, abandon its post in translation, and join up with the other GAIT members to halt the production of inflammatory proteins.

Its not clear why the glutamic acid and proline synthetases paired up approximately 800 million years ago, but Fox has a hypothesis, which he published in 2018. Proline is synthesized from glutamic acid, and at that period in evolution, emerging animal proteins began to include more proline. That may have led to a rise in the production of ProRS that sopped up all the available proline, requiring more to be made from glutamic acid. That might have resulted in a deficit in glutamic acid levels, impairing protein synthesis. The solution to that was to fuse the two synthetases into a single gene, so they have to be made in the same amounts, says Fox. No ones stealing from the other.

The linker between the two synthetases is crucial for GAIT complex activity; its made of three WHEP domains that bind to target RNAs. Fox speculates that sometime after the linker appeared, the cell coopted it to regulate inflammation.

More recently, Foxs team wondered if the GAIT pathway might function in cells besides macrophages. When the researchers looked at fat cells, they saw that insulin treatment caused GluProRS to become phosphorylated and leave the protein-synthesis machinery. But it didnt join the other GAIT partners. Instead, it paired with a normally cytosolic protein called fatty acid transport protein 1 (FATP1). Together, the molecular duo went to the fat cells membrane, where the transporter brought fatty acids into the cell.

I am as excited, or even more excited, about these enzymes as I was when I started out decades ago.

Paul Schimmel, Scripps Research Institute

The researchers engineered a mouse lacking the phosphorylation site needed to free GluProRS to find FATP1. With less fatty acidstorage ability, the mice were lean, weighing about 15 percent to 20 percent less than control animals. Moreover, they lived nearly four months longer, giving them a lifespan that was increased by about 15 percent. A similar gain in people would correspond to a decade or more. If we could target that phosphorylation site, maybe we could increase life-span, says Fox. His lab is in the very early stages of looking for a small molecule to inhibit that phosphorylation event.

In the various jobs that AARSs have taken on above and beyond their traditional role, Schimmel and colleagues see a theme: they keep cells and bodies stable. They seem to be something thats playing a modulatory role, restoring more of a homeostasis, says Leslie Nangle, a former Schimmel lab grad student who is now senior director for research at aTyr Pharma. Many researchers think its risky to mess with such essential enzymes, says Kim, but he and Schimmel see potential in targeting AARSs for treating disease. Schimmels company aTyr, of which Kim and Yang are also cofounders, hopes to turn the enzymes themselves into biologic therapeutics. In addition, in Seoul, Kim directs the nonprofit drug discovery organization Biocon, where researchers are developing several small molecules that interact with AARSs, as well as biologics based on natural AARS variants.

Biocon is currently testing molecules to treat cardiac fibrosis, alopecia areata (an autoimmune disease that causes hair loss), and inflammation. A fibrosis treatment now under Phase 1 study targets the site on the proline synthetase that links the amino acid to its tRNA. Fibrosis results from an accumulation of collagen, which is two-thirds proline. Biocon researchers have found that a drug can go after that active site, knocking down the canonical function by more than 90 percent in healthy cultured cells without greatly affecting the synthesis of other proteins or cell proliferation, says Kim. At first, he and his colleagues didnt believe their results, but hes come to see sense in them. A normal cell is not necessarily doing high level protein synthesis all the time, he says. As long as it has a certain degree of residual activity going on, then a normal cell can be perfectly happy.

For cancer and other conditions, Biocon is developing small molecule candidates that avoid the tRNAamino acid linking site or target the extracellular activities of secreted AARSs, meaning that protein synthesis should not be affected. Similarly, aTyr researchers expect that the firms therapeutics, based on AARS derivatives themselves, to be relatively safe. Coming from a world of natural physiology, you start to feel better about it, says aTyr CEO Sanjay Shukla.

In the developing mouse retina, fragments of the tryptophan synthetase, TrpRS, that are missing a restrictive protein cap (B, C) prevent vascularization of a secondary tissue layer (right). (The right images include the shadows of the adjoining primary layers, which are shown at left.)

PNAS, 99:17883, 2002, 2002 NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES

Nangle and colleagues, alongside aTyrs subsidiary Pangu Biopharma in Hong Kong, began by cataloging natural AARS splice variants and then screening them for interesting biological activitiesin a variety of human cellbased assays. They looked for effects on cell proliferation and protection, immunomodulation and inflammation, cell differentiation, transcriptional regulation, and cholesterol transport. We figured theres got to be some therapeutic benefit there, says Schimmel.

Currently, aTyr is pursuing an immuno-modulator based on the WHEP domain of the histidine enzyme HisRS. In human T cell cultures, full-length HisRS quieted activated cells and reduced cytokine production. In further experiments, aTyr researchers found that the WHEP domain hooks up with receptors on those immune cells to dampen activity. The company hopes that its modified version of the HisRS WHEP peptide, attached to a bit of antibody to help it last longer in the bloodstream, will have the same quieting effect in an inflammatory disease called sarcoidosis. This disease affects a variety of organs, most often the lungs, and can sometimes require lifelong treatment with immune-suppressing steroids. Those medications come with a list of misery-inducing and dangerous side effects ranging from insomnia to glaucoma to infection.

aTyr presented results from several animal models of inflammatory lung disease at the American Thoracic Society meeting in 2017, 2018, and 2019, and those findings suggest the companys candidate 1923 looks promising. For example, the cancer drug bleomycin can cause lung damage, but HisRS or its WHEP domain reduced inflammation and fibrosis.19 Rats treated with bleomycin breathe quickly to compensate for their damaged lungs, but those treated with 1923 recovered normal respiratory rates.

aTyrs 1923 has already been through a Phase 1 trial for safety in healthy people without any red flags. Now, the company is running a Phase 1/2 study in people with sarcoidosis, looking to confirm safety, find the right dosage, and perhaps even see signs of efficacy. Patients enter the trial while taking steroids, and the aim is to taper down the steroid dosage during the study. Those receiving 1923, its hoped, will see their symptoms stay the same or improve, while those on placebo should see them worsen as the steroid doses are lowered.

Its a testament to the need for a new treatment that volunteers are willing to risk having their symptoms intensify if they end up in the placebo arm, says participating physician Daniel Culver, a pulmonologist at the Cleveland Clinic. [Steroids are] very toxic, says Culver, who notes that one of his patients calls his steroid prescription the Devils drug because it does almost as much harm as good. People are very, very motivated to find something different.

The study plans to enroll 36 participants, but has been delayed by the COVID-19 crisis. With such a small sample size, Culver doesnt expect a home run, but he says he hopes the data will be good enough to embark on a larger, Phase 3 study. aTyr is also planning a Phase 2, 30-person trial of 1923 for respiratory complications associated with COVID-19.

If aTyr succeeds, it will be the first instance of a therapeutic built from an AARSbut probably not the last. As Kim sees it, AARSs are ready and waiting to respond to anything that challenges homeostasis, from cancer to the novel coronavirus. I rename the synthetases Molecular 911.

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Protein Synthesis Enzymes Have Evolved Additional Jobs - The Scientist

Dr Yu Jie, associate at LSE IDEAS and senior research fellow at Chatham House, dissects the possible evolution of the China-UK trade relationship

COVID-19 acts as a catalyst to provoke many domestic and foreign affairs debate in British politics, including its future relationship with China, the world second-largest economy. While many of the Tory and Labour grandees have called for reckoning with China, there are some which have insisted on the need for continued positive engagements with China on global issues. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab ambivalently suggested there could not be a return to business as usual with China-UK trade relations after COVID-19. The defining emotion for Downing Street is confusion, the direction nebulous.

The defining emotion for Downing Street is confusion, the direction nebulous.

This discombobulated mood highlights the difficult trade-offs the UK faces in its relationship with the Middle Kingdom in a period of frequent changes in Brexit foreign policy coupled with post-COVID 19 world order.

For the Chinese government, British trade officials efforts to boost economic ties cannot happily coexist with the UK House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee remarks about the Chinese governments cover-up and disinformation campaign during the outbreak.

On top of the pressure, the UK is under from the United States and other Five Eyes intelligence-sharing partners to revise the decision to allow Huaweis participation in critical infrastructure, such a controversy could further damage a relationship that was already turbulent.

Seen from Beijing, China has been very clear about what it wants from a relationship with Britain, but Britain appears unable to decide what it wants from China.

After hailing a so-called golden era of bilateral ties during a state visit by President Xi Jinping in 2015, Chinese leaders now see the shock of the Brexit vote steering the relationship in a totally new direction without, apparently, a clear agenda. All of the suspicions that the Communist Partys leaders had about the dangers of Western democracy have been confirmed in spades. They may have also learned a more pointed lesson from the Conservative party about the dangers of externalising internal party conflicts.

In contrast, China has a very clear set of economic priorities for the China-UK trade relationship irrespective of Brexit or COVID-19.

Firstly, Chinese companies continue to look to the UK to provide a secure home for investment, providing opportunities to enhance their global brand value or to make new acquisitions without the fierce resistance encountered in continental Europe and the US.

Secondly, as China grapples with a shuttered economy and international isolation led by the United States, it is looking to calm trade ties with Western powers committed to the principles of free trade and economic globalisation, like the UK, though not at the expense of relations with the EU.

Thirdly, Beijing remains eager to be recognised by established economies and has high hopes of the UK acting as a supporter for Chinas global ambitions as George Osborne did with the UKs membership of Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank. All three could theoretically be one of Chinas prized win-win outcomes, and perhaps also benefit the British economy to some degree.

It is also important to remember why China has prioritised its relationship with the UK over other major European economies. While British media often focus on Chinas interest in education and tourism connections, Beijing has long admired British expertise in financial and corporate governance. As far back as the 1950s, Mao Zedong was championing the desire to become more like Britains developed economy.

Today, while France and Germany have been important for providing manufacturing technologies, the UK is a more useful partner for the next stage of Chinese development: a shift to a consumption-led and service-based economy; the move to currency convertibility via Chinese yuan trading in the City of London; and a welcoming and absorbing of Chinese investment abroad. And in fact, the direct investments from China to the UK remains at a very low level compared with continental Europe. And most of the direct investments focus on real estates which well trumped over other sectors in terms of volume.

Yet, an inconsistent message from London jeopardises these economic possibilities by challenging a key element of the Chinese Communist Partys legitimacy: a resurgent Chinese nationalism. The party has strongly promoted the idea that its leadership has ended over 150 years of foreign bullying of China and helped the country regain its rightful place at the center of world affairs.

The UK is traditionally viewed by the Chinese as a former colonial power which inflicted humiliation on China in the Opium Wars.

So it is no wonder comments on Hong Kong by British Parliamentarians have sparked rage in Beijing. The UK is traditionally viewed by the Chinese as a former colonial power which inflicted humiliation on China in the Opium Wars. Seen in this light, the government must show its people that it can stand up to strong words from Britain.

Some parts of the world do not understand the sense of humiliation todays Chinese feel when they look back on the past, at least in the version that is popularly presented domestically.

Judging by the growing anti-China rhetoric from many parts of the world, Chinas relations with the West have soured significantly. This trend could not have come at a worse time, which emboldens China hawks in the United States to promote decoupling amid deteriorating relations between Beijing and Washington. This deterioration also poses a tremendous challenge to post-Brexit Global Britain.

To reconsider its relationship with China, the British government must better understand how economic and security strands of the relationship are connected and become more skilful at interacting along both lines. To nurture that partnership, London will have to balance mitigating its security concerns with realism about how much it can change the Chinese governments outlook and political choices. And it will have to accept that it cannot divorce its security stance from its hopes for a profitable economic relationship.

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The expected evolution of the China-UK trade relationship - Open Access Government

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Nashik, Jun 1 (UNI) With 28 more people testing positive for the deadly novel coronavirus here on Monday, the tally of infected patients in the district rose to 1,250.

Aurangabad, Maharashtra, Jun 1 (UNI) With addition of 44 fresh Covid-19 cases in Aurangabad by this evening, the overall number of infected patients in the district climbed up to 1,587.

Aurangabad, Maharashtra, Jun 1 (UNI) Expressing concern over the current state of India's economy, former chief minister of Maharashtra Prithviraj Chavan on Monday took a dig at the central government by describing its Rs 21 lakh crore economic package announced for revival of the badly-hit economy post the Covid-19 lockdown as "a mere show-off".

Nagpur, Jun 1 (UNI) A 53-year-old head constable attached to MIDC Butibori police station was killed after a truck hit his bike near Butibori bridge in Maharashtra's Nagpur, police said.

Nagpur, June 1 (UNI) The Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court comprising of Justice Ravi Deshpande and Justice Amit Borkar on Monday directed the state government to conduct RT-PCR TEST for frontline warriors (including doctors, nurses, pharmacist, policemen) working in entire Vidarbha with immediate effect.

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Thane's SPD College holds 'Evolution from Offline to Online Teaching' programme - United News of India