Category Archives: Evolution

At what point was the term "reintegration" dropped from the mental health vocabulary? Furthermore, at what point did it become a major achievement rather than the expected norm for a mental health consumer not to be incarcerated or homeless--or for it to be an accomplishment to live into one's sixth decade? At what point did it become ingrained into people's minds that a mentally ill person can't have a professional career or a decent relationship?

Two or three decades ago, the talk was all about "reintegration" for mentally ill people in recovery, an objective of rejoining society that included competitive work, healthy relationships, living as would someone in the mainstream, and being accepted by others and oneself--as someone essentially "normal." Today, the idea of reintegrating is never spoken of, and it is all about segregation, and preventing mentally ill people from disrupting, or interfering with, the orderliness of society. The underlying assumption is that we absolutely do not have the potential to live normally.

Since the nineteen eighties, society has in general become increasingly hostile, more violent, and meaner. Opportunities for advancement of the ordinary woman or man are less, and that includes any category of person. People are judged by readily obtainable information and not as much as how they presently come across. If you want to make a fresh start in life, you can't do that. Your past will come back to you electronically.

We've seen more terrorism. We've seen less tolerance. We've seen increasing expectations, and the widespread fear of becoming unhoused. Hence, it is no wonder that it is harder for a disabled person of any gender to do well.

War and other violence, in general, cause the human mind to de-evolve to lower levels of consciousness. Violence kills spirit. Violence causes people's minds to function on a primitive level, blocking higher levels of thought, and depriving people of the insights that come with feeling safe. Violence causes the human consciousness to de-evolve.

Almost all of society has, in a multitude of ways, de-evolved. There has been widespread dumbification. Mental health treatment and resources, additionally, have de-evolved. In the nineteen eighties, hope was prevalent that mentally ill people could and would do better in life. But now we're merely struggling to get mentally ill people housed and not incarcerated. We face a systemic degeneration of human thought and cognition. The shoddy treatment of society toward mentally ill people is a symptom of this.

In the latter part of the nineteen eighties, Clozaril became more widely available in the U.S. It is considered the forerunner of a newer group of antipsychotics called "Atypical Antipsychotics." The terminology has been updated to "Second-Generation Antipsychotics." In 1996, Olanzapine was approved by the FDA for use in the U.S. It is newer to chemists by decades. And while Clozaril carries a 1 to 2 percent risk of potentially deadly agranulocytosis, Olanzapine does not have that problem--it has other problems. Things began to go in retrograde at about the time that the "second generation antipsychotics" were put into circulation.

But rather than newer antipsychotics contributing to the decline in the existences of mentally ill people who take it, I'd guess the two changes are mostly unrelated. Newer antipsychotics could do more to block brain function. Second-Generation Antipsychotics act on Dopamine receptors and on Serotonin receptors. On the other hand, older antipsychotics act only on Dopamine receptors. This could make a difference in how we process information while we are medicated. Since I'm not a doctor or an expert on brain chemistry, I'd be unable to dispense any kind of advice or answer to that question.

A friend who has been around the mental health treatment scene longer than I, has made a comment that concerns me. She said that when a mental health consumer is in crisis and seeks help, they are put into facilities that are worse than jails. Apparently, that's the kind of de-evolvement that has taken shape. Mental health services are reverting to Stone Age methods of supposed treatment. What happened to an inpatient psych hospital being a "sanctuary"--a safe and kind place where we could get better?

Mentally ill people face more discrimination than we did thirty years ago. We face more prejudice. We face meaner attitudes. People will intentionally ostracize us when we have done nothing to harm them.

My friends, we have de-evolved. The exact causes could be analyzed for centuries if people still exist and can think centuries from now. And it is no wonder that the lot in life is harder for mentally ill people.

More here:

ON MENTAL WELLNESS: The De-evolution of Humans. Category: Columns from The Berkeley Daily Planet - Berkeley Daily Planet

Imagine doing a homework assignment that forced you to leave your computer running for half a year.

That is what a team of scientists at the IBS Center for Climate Physics in South Koreas Pusan National University did to answer one of sciences most compelling questions: Did climate change affect the evolution of humans?

The researchers have a supercomputer named Aleph. Led by IBS Director Alex Timmermann, the team left Aleph running for six months to complete a climate simulation that covered the last 2 million years of the Earths environmental history. The resulting 500 terabytes of data were enough to fill several hundred hard disks.

The half-year of simulation was worth it, though, as the scientists provided the first clear evidence that climate change affected early human evolution and the speciation of the genus Homo.

Scientists have struggled to prove that climate change affected human evolution, because we lack climate data from the areas where human fossils are found. Despite the lack of data, climate-related migration is such a ubiquitous force that most scientists agree it played a role in human evolution.

Specifically, climate researchers and evolutionary biologists suspect that changes in temperature, rainfall, and vegetation (a proxy for food sources) pushed humans away from their original habitats in Africa, and toward Europe and Eurasia. These patterns probably forced our ancestors to adapt by becoming global wanderers and nomads.

The idea has taken a step closer to confirmation thanks to Aleph, a state-of-the-art supercomputer. Aleph, which takes its name from the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, needs one second to complete calculations that would require 45 million years or so of effort from any one of us. The researchers wanted to use Aleph to create a climate model spanning two million years in order to determine whether climate change and human migration are correlated.

Speed aside, any computer-simulated model is only as good as the data it receives. Fortunately, the researchers had no shortage of high-quality archeological and fossil records that they could feed to Aleph. In collaboration with researchers at the Universit di Napoli Federico II in Italy, the researchers gained access to a compilation of archeological and human fossil data. The collection included 3,245 data entries across six different species of humans: H. habilis, H. ergaster, H. erectus, H. heidelbergensis, H. neanderthalensis and H. sapiens. The researchers then gave Aleph data from known changes in the earths orbital eccentricity a measure of how much Earths orbit deviates from a perfect circle as well as its wobble and tilt. Equipped with this knowledge, Aleph could reliably predict large climate events such as glacial cycles and the onset of ice ages.

Aleph crunched the data to create a highly accurate climate model spanning two million years. Timmerman and his team could then look at what the climate was like in the computer simulation at the times and in the places humans lived. From these data, they created habitat suitability models for each of the six human species. For example, by comparing the climate niches of our species, H. sapiens, with those of the other five human species, the team determined that H. sapiens was the best equipped to deal with dry conditions. This adaptability probably gave us an advantage when we were moving across continents in search of the perfect habitat. Once the researchers got a better idea of what types of habitats each species liked, they could see whether and how those habitats changed geographically across two million years.

The researchers could fast-forward in time through their simulations to create changing maps of potential habitats for each species. They could then see if these were correlated with climate change. The researchers re-ran many analyses using randomly selected groups of fossils. If humans were not affected by climate, each analysis should show similar habitat distributions. For three human species H. sapiens, H. neanderthalensis and H. heidelbergensis the researchers found a significant relationship between climate change and population locations. In particular, the model showed two pronounced periods of climate stress in southern Africa for H. heidelbergensis around 400,000 years ago. This timeframe correlated with an absence of the species from the fossil record and an appearance of H. sapiens in southern Africa, consistent with the hypothesis that H. heidelbergensis progressively evolved into H. sapiens. Another period of climate stress around 210,000 years ago probably put more stress on remaining H. sapiens, leading to further dispersal and genetic diversification.

In a press release, Timmermann said that this result implies that at least during the past 500 thousand years, the real sequence of past climate change, including glacial cycles, played a central role in determining where different hominin groups lived and where their remains have been found.

Next, the researchers wanted to know whether suitable habitats for different human species overlapped in space and time in areas they called contact zones. If the habitats overlapped, the different humans probably interbred and competed, informing species succession. From their contact zone analysis, the researchers created a human family tree showing that Neanderthals (H. neanderthalensis) evolved from the Eurasian clade of H. heidelbergensis around 500,000 to 400,000 years ago, while our species, H. sapiens, came from the African populations of late H. heidelbergensis around 300,000 years ago. These trees matched up with similar estimates derived from genetic and fossil data, complementing the existing evidence that supports the evolution of H. sapiens from H. heidelbergensis.

As the early human species became global wanderers, they needed to acquire new skills, which further strengthened their ability to expand their geographic range. The researchers suggest this positive feedback fueled biological or cultural shifts that allowed the species to adapt to wider climate envelopes and eventually to speciate toward H. sapiens and H. neanderthalensis, both of which had larger brains than H. heidelbergensis. This connects the long-term positive trend in brain size to past climatic shifts in Africa, strengthening the role that climate change played not only in the geographic location of our species, but also in our intellectual development.

When considered alongside other research that shows H. sapiens is the only species whose climatic niche was still expanding toward the end of the analysis period, the researchers suggest that the ability to adapt to a changing climate played an unquestionable role in the radiation of our species.

Climate change can shape the evolution of life on Earth, but modern humans have shown an ability to outwit climate and make their homes in inhospitable places, from the deserts of Las Vegas to the Siberian tundra. These analyses and other research propose that climate change authored the evolution of our species, making clear its fingerprints on human extinction and speciation. Though our ability to adapt to climate has played a key role in our persistence, we are now accelerating the very climate shifts that might have doomed our closest relatives to extinction.

Link:

How climate shaped 2 million years of human evolution - Big Think

So Erling Haaland has reached an agreement to join Manchester City, which to most of his new clubs opponents is like being told that the local tyrannosaurus has grown another molar. The beast was always going to eat you in the end; it doesnt really matter that it has one more sharp tooth. Manchester City exert so much dominance over the vast majority of the football world that their recruitment of Haaland, a supremely accomplished center forward who is still only 21, feels like an indulgence. Yet Haalands imminent signing from Borussia Dortmund is much more than that: It represents a statement of intent, a desire to claim the UEFA Champions League for the first time in Manchester Citys history. For his new team, too, it will mean a significant shift in style, a greater directness of tactical approacha little like watching a Shakespearean stage actor suddenly go off to star in action movies.

For a player of Haalands youth and ability, the transfer fee Manchester will have to payHaaland reportedly had a release clause of around $60 million in his contractis relatively low in a market where stars tend to move for around twice that amount. That fee is due to smart thinking by his management team, which includes his father, Alf-Inge (himself a former Manchester City player), and wanted to make sure that Haaland would have the widest range of major clubs to choose from when he became available. Nor, in this context, is his reported salary particularly eye-catching given that it is close to what Manchester United are paying Jadon Sancho, or less than, say, Aaron Ramsey was being paid by Juventus. No: The most interesting thing here is that, with Haaland in their ranks, City have reached their final form, their last stage of evolution.

Consider this: Until Haalands arrival, City had every other type of player on their roster. They had the fullback who could engulf an entire flank with pace alone in the form of Kyle Walker; in Joo Cancelo, they had one of the worlds best playmaking fullbacks since Dani Alves; they had the hard-running, self-sacrificing midfielder in Bernardo Silva; and the supremely guileful artists in the form of Phil Foden and Kevin De Bruyne. Yet they have never had a player defined first and foremost by their sheer presence. Not just in physical terms, but in their entire aura. In that sense, Haaland is to Manchester City what Virgil van Dijk is to Liverpool. Not just a focal point for his teams play, but someone who is capable of shifting its entire center of gravity.

Thats not to say that City cant get physical: No team prevails against Diego Simeones Atltico Madrid in the Champions League if they are averse to a skirmish. But with Haaland in the mix, they can take this aspect of their play to a different level. A trio of Rodri, Rben Dias, and Haaland will be a formidable threat at any attacking set piece. Furthermore, Haaland is part of a small number of center forwardswhich includes, on current form, Harry Kane, Robert Lewandowski, Karim Benzema, and Dusan Vlahovicwho can occupy an entire defenses attention by himself.

Haalands presence carries a warning, though. Just as the Norwegian can shift gravity, Pep Guardiola must be careful not to drag Manchester City away from its ethos of collaborative attacking play. As we have seen with Lewandowski at Bayern and Benzema at Madrid, elite squads filled with attacking stars have still somehow become worryingly over-dependent on their central strikers. And how could they not? Of late, Lewandowski has broken one of the Bundesligas oldest scoring records, while Benzema has achieved rarely seen feats in the UEFA Champions League, and Haaland has averaged over a goal a game in two and a half seasons in Germany. It is just as well that both Lewandowski and Benzema are so durable since a significant injury to either of them has recently threatened to end their teams championship hopes. Haaland is not so fortunateif there is anything that stands between him and an all-conquering time at City, it is injury. Last season, he missed 16 games and 95 days of training with various ailments, statistics which will have attracted the scrutiny of Citys medical staff. Such are Citys resources, though, that Haaland can be protected so that he is available for the most important matches of the seasonthat is to say, for the closing stages of Europes premier club competition. Not since Neymar went to Paris Saint-Germain has a footballer been signed with such a singular sense of purpose. City, thanks to Guardiolas remarkable coaching, are good enough to win the Premier League without a prolific center forward, but so far the Champions League title has eluded them. The challenge for City is to do something that they have not yet managed in this tournament: They must stop losing games in which they are the superior team. Too often City overwhelm their opponents with passing and chances, only to lose: They are like the supervillain who spends an age explaining their cunning plan for world domination, only to be sucker-punched by their adversary at the last minute.

Haaland is a different proposition entirely. He is Manchester Citys chaos agent, the character who has the capacity to strike decisively before the devious scheme is fully formed. His new team now has a man without preamble, a protagonist who shoots top-corner first and asks questions later. Since their greatest European heartbreaks have come in the last minutes of close games, Haaland is there to ensure that there are no such twists in the tale. It is ironic, and maybe it is fitting, that the addition of a new and unpredictable element to their squad promises to bring an end to Citys most uncomfortable drama.

Originally posted here:

Erling Haaland Is the Final Stage in Manchester Citys Evolution - The Ringer

Every game day, Lightning defenseman Cal Foote gets a text message from his dad.

It usually comes around lunchtime, and Adam Foote the former longtime NHL defenseman will send his son a couple of basic reminders for anyone who plays the position:

Move your feet inside the dots.

Make hard plays.

Foote, 23, knows theyre coming, but still gets a boost from the notes. So does his brother, Nolan, a forward with the Devils AHL Utica, who said their dad will send video messages with him drawing tips on a whiteboard, or clips of other NHL players. There may be an extra detail here and there for Cal, especially in the past few weeks.

Its a little longer, Cal Foote says, smiling, Because of the playoffs.

If you asked Lightning fans even coaches midway through this season, they would have been surprised at the thought of Foote being a regular on the blue line in the first-round playoff series against the Leafs. But here Foote is, with the former first-round pick coming into his own on the biggest stage and thriving heading into Saturdays Game 7 at Scotiabank Arena. Coach Jon Cooper said Foote was their best defenseman in a Game 1 loss, and there have been many other games in which hes stood out for his poise, his physical play and his smarts.

In the Lightnings 4-3 overtime victory in Game 6 on Thursday, Foote was entrusted with key minutes with their season on the line, finishing with 20:45, three hits, two blocks and two shots on goal. What Toronto fans will remember is Foote drawing and, perhaps, selling a high-sticking penalty in David Kampf in the third period. It was the first of two penalties that led to Tampa Bays game-tying power-play goal.

But the fact that Foote, at 6-foot-4, 227, showed the instincts and confidence to carry the puck into the offensive zone and make hard plays in deep was another sign of his growth. He was just listening to his old man. Foote looks like hes been here before, and this experience will be significant for his development and his chances of earning a full-time spot in the lineup next season, especially with Jan Rutta becoming a UFA this summer.

To be honest, I thought Id be more nervous, Foote said of his first playoffs. Its felt like any other big game. The crowd is louder, you try to block that out. But everyone comes to play. Its faster. Everyone is more physical. But its fun to be a part of.

The night before Cals NHL debut in January 2021, Adam Foote scrolled through some old photos.

Foote, 50, found one from his 2001 summer workouts. The menacing defenseman, who had just won his second Stanley Cup championship with the Colorado Avalanche, was tying his skates in the dressing room. Cal, then 2 years old, stood and watched, just like he did for most of his childhood while his father was in the league.

I want to say I remember the 01 Cup, but I dont, Foote said. All I really remember about playoff time in Colorado was that they have the white pom-poms. I used to love playing with those and cheering him on.

Wed collect those pom-poms, as many as we could, Nolan said. Wed bring them home. I dont know why.

Nolan will never forget when Cal, then around 6 years old, was interviewed during an Avalanche intermission at a home game. They asked him who his favorite player was.

Peter Forsberg, Cal said.

Your second favorite player? he was asked.

He thought about it, Nolan recalled Friday. He finally said our dad.

Nolan, a fellow former Lightning first-rounder, spent countless hours with Cal on their familys backyard rink in their Denver-area home. The professional-looking sheet of ice was complete with blue and red lines and a scoreboard just underneath the trees.

Nolan loved Evgeni Malkin he had stickers of him in his room and wanted to be like the power forward. Cals position might surprise you.

All (Nolan) cared about was shooting, Adam Foote said in 2019 on Nolans draft day, laughing. And Cal wanted to play in goal. Im like, Not a chance youre playing goal. I remember Patrick Roy for way too long. Goalies are weird.

Cal is a bit different, too. When he was a young kid, he was so analytical, perceptive, cerebral. Perhaps it was the daily hockey dinner conversations with their dad, but Cal would notice little things. Hed point out to his coach that the opposing team only had a few players with white tape on their stick, or point out they had just three left-handed shots. Footes youth coach, Steve Frye, would jokingly squirt a water bottle in Cals face, trying to wake him up, only to find out he was just mentally locked in.

Cal would somehow know when the referees were looking and when they werent, and that helped a lot when others would target the kid with the high-profile name. As Fry once put it, He was the center of attention, but he didnt get anything for free here. He earned every bit of it.

And he didnt get messed with, lets put it that way. He made sure of it.

While Cal may seem reserved and more understated than his dad, hes got a bit of a mean streak, too. Nolan recalled a time when he was 13 and they were messing around, hitting each other with pillows. Nolan caught his brother in the eye. He lost it and pummeled the crap out of me with two pillows for five minutes, Nolan said, laughing. Brotherly love.

Cal said his father taught him everything he knows about hockey, but Adam has made it a point to stay in the background and let his sons make their own names. Adam Foote, for example, has politely declined interviews, only speaking on the days when Nolan and Cal were drafted. But Adam said when the Lightning drafted Cal at No. 14 in 2017 that he liked the organizations plan to take their time with the young defenseman, knowing how difficult the position is to grasp at this level.

Tampa Bay didnt have to rush Foote because of the depth on their blue line, especially after trades for Erik Cernak, Ryan McDonagh and Mikhail Sergachev. And Foote needed the work, including improving his skating and building his strength. That meant 150 American League Hockey games with Syracuse before he reached the NHL. Its just another success story of the Lightnings development system.

Hes really matured, Cooper said. Hes trusted the system, and it hasnt always been easy. Going from junior to pro then the AHL to the NHL, those are huge steps. Its taken him time to find his way, especially on a d-core where you have to wedge your way in. Hes found a way to do that, hes really simplified his game.

Hes found out, OK, you know what, I can do this here, I can use my size to my advantage. Hes become reliable back there. I think a little experience has helped and its been fun to watch him grow.

What was the turning point?

There was no lightning in the bottle moment. The coaches say there was no come to Jesus meeting or sit-down with the young defenseman. That would make a great story, a neat narrative.

But this is a process that was years in the making. There were countless hours spent on empty ice sheets with skating coach Barb Underhill, as Foote with a size 13.5 skate, size 16 shoe tried to find the necessary quickness and agility to keep up in a faster game. Syracuse coach Ben Groulx talked about Foote improving mentally in terms of putting bad shifts or bad moments behind him.

Foote played 35 games with the Lightning last season, though he was a healthy scratch for the entire playoffs. This was supposed to be the year in which hed challenge for a regular spot on the blue line, along with veteran Zach Bogosian. But a summer injury to his finger required surgery, forcing him to miss training camp and the start of the season. Cooper estimated it took Foote one-third of the season to get in the right kind of shape. There were some road bumps, like Foote getting sat for a game or two due to an internal reason, which assistant Rob Zettler dubbed minor and long forgotten. Cooper and the staff would continue to communicate with Foote when hed sit out as part of the rotation, telling him, Hang in there, you did nothing wrong here. It boosted the second-year NHLers confidence.

But did the coaches think back in February that Foote could be someone theyd rely on in playoffs?

Its hard to say, said Zettler, who runs the blue line. He just chipped away, chipped away and kept getting better and better. There are a few aspects on the physical side of it, and secondly is his ability to get involved with the rush and up in the play. Hes created some offensive opportunities because hes shown hes willing to get up in the play. Hes got good instincts, better than you think, and thats a big part of it.

Foote is at his best when hes physically engaged, but he needed to get quicker to be in position to finish plays. That all came together in the last few months of the season. Foote had the other tools: hockey IQ, a heavy shot, offensive instincts. It all began to click starting at the Feb. 26 outdoor game in Nashville, when Foote said he really started to feel good, more confident.

Nolan said he and Cal call each other or FaceTime almost every day. Sometimes its for 10 to 15 minutes. If neither has a game, its longer. Nolan could sense Cals comfort level growing, not to mention his excitement when he found out the day before Game 1 he was in the lineup.

Finally.

He handled it really well, Nolan said. There were times this year when he was in and out of the lineup every other game for Bogosian. You just have to stay confident with yourself and continue to work hard and, every practice, show how badly you want to be in the lineup, and he did exactly that. Even last year, in the playoffs, not getting a game, but the team winning, you want to have that positive mindset where youre happy youre there.

There was a time even before the playoffs this year where we FaceTimed and he wasnt fully 100 percent sure hed be in the lineup. He said, I want to play every game. Its going to be a lot of fun.'

No, Foote wont be the exact same player as his dad, but hes got that edge to his game, and Zettler said hes coming out of battles with the puck more, with opponents debating whether they want to go into the corner with him. Thats part of being a defenseman at this level. Its what Zettler calls the Cal Foote evolution.

You can tell hes his dads kid, said Brian Engblom, a two-time Cup-winning defenseman and curent Lightning color analyst. He knows how to check, he knows his job when he gets there. The rest is that flow to the game and being able to have some ease to your game in your own mind and youre starting to see that.

Hes efficient. He makes the simple plays, protects the puck well and he hasnt panicked. Thats a sign of maturity for sure, something you absolutely have to have in the playoffs.

After Game 6, Foote got a text from former Lightning teammate Luke Schenn, who used to work out with the Footes in Kelowna.

Best game Ive seen you play in the NHL. Keeper going!

Hes defending really well and trusting his skating, Schenn said Friday. Being involved in every play around the ice and having poise with the puck, yet still playing fast and being decisive. Its hard to do all that when you dont play much but now theyre trusting him more and hes trusting himself more.

The Lightning are showing trust in Foote by putting him in the lineup for Saturdays Game 7, one of the most important games of their last three postseasons. Itll be a chaotic environment in Toronto. Every mistake, every play will matter.

So its no surprise that Foote got a note from his dad on Friday, reminding him not to get caught up in a good game. The gist of the advice? Come down from the high, knowing Game 7 is going to be fast and unpredictable.

Keep it simple and hard early until things settle down.

(Top photo of Cal Foote: Kevin Sousa/NHLI via Getty Images)

Original post:

The Cal Foote evolution What it means for the Lightning in Game 7 and beyond - The Athletic

How will agriculture keep feeding the world's growing population? The technology keeping farms productive now is the same technology that has the power to make agriculture more sustainable for decades to come.

Northampton, MA --News Direct-- Bayer

In addition to the unfolding impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, ongoing pressures due to climate change, labor shortages, socio-political instability, and other market disruptions are threatening our food system. To overcome these challenges, farmers are relying on one of agricultures most trusted resourceshuman ingenuity.

From planting to harvest, farmers are further adopting tools like automation, digital platforms and other precision agriculture methods to keep food production moving in a sustainable fashion.

From Planting to Harvest and Beyond

Planting

It all starts with a seed in the ground. Plants used to rely on the wind to scatter their fruit. Or a hungry animal. But, with the advent of agriculture, there were hands willing to do the work. Then machines.

Automation was a giant leap forward for agriculture, and it now has the potential to keep our vital food systems producing, while reducing the need for physically demanding farm work.

Flying Seed Spreaders

In recent years, drones have begun buzzing over farmland. And they have the potential to help maintain production of rice - one of the world's most vital crops - well into the future.

Autonomous drones have many duties on a rice farm. But at the beginning of the season, their first job is to spread seeds.

Autonomous Planters

In many other crop systems, self-driving planters and tractors are becoming more and more popular, and affordable. Guided by GPS, these machines offer incredible precision throughout the planting process.

Modern planters measure the depth of each seed they drop, and the distance between it and its neighbor.

Spraying

Brilliant leaps in science and technology have kept agriculture moving forward, even in the face of daunting obstacles. When it comes to sustainably protecting crops and evading food loss, technology is becoming extremely precise.

Story continues

On the ground and above, precision sprayers protect our food supply while using less water and reducing the use of pesticides.

Rolling Autonomous Sprayers

Like drones, rolling sprayers save time and labor. But in dry fields, they provide an opportunity for farmers to get even closer to the root of their crop - and the weed that's threatening it.

These AI-driven technologies enable sprayers to target just the weeds, and avoid spraying surrounding crops or soil.

Flying Autonomous Sprayers

Drones have incredible potential in crop protection, too. With greater precision and stamina, they cover more groud, using fewer inputs like water and pesticides.

Swooping in from above, drones can assist farmers by reducing on-field labor and unnecessary exposure in application areas.

Monitoring

Sensors in the ground and satellites in orbit monitor soil moisture, plant health, and temperature and humidity variations throughout the growing season.

These tools save farmers hours of walking through fields to gather insights. When we can minimize manual labor, farms can become more productive, efficient, and sustainable.

Satellites

Satellites the size of frying pans are orbiting miles above the earth right now. And many of them are sending information to farmers about the conditions of their fields.

These technologies can detect plant health and other threats before a farmer even notices them.

Sensors

Sensors buried in the soil can give farmers information about their fields at distinct points, every day, all year long. They can see temperature variations, moisture and nutrition levels, and more.

All of this information can be sent straight to a farmers tablet or smartphone.

Harvesting

While automation has been prevalent in cereal harvesting for decades, the technology to pick and pluck delicate fruits and vegetables is still emerging. Although this field is one of the most visionary in agriculture technology, many see it as the answer to sustainability and alleviating manual labor.

Automation will play an important part in feeding all 8.5 billion of us in 2030 and beyond.

Pepper Pickers

Engineers and programmers have worked for years to perfect this type of machine. But as the need for robotics in agriculture has developed, so has the technology.

Lasers, cameras, robotic arms, and miniature saws. To pick a pepper, all of it has to come together just right.

Strawberry Pickers

With rubber and steel immune systems, farming robots offer an alternative to potentially dangerous manual labor.

How to save a strawberry: point a robot at it.

Learning

All of this agricultural machinery collects data. Together, these technologies act as nerve endings, feeling their way around the farm. But where's the brain? It's in the software.

Artificial intelligence and machine learning technology are changing the way we farm.

Climate FieldView

Climate FieldView uses artificial intelligence to collect, process and understand all this data.

Farmers use data to make more informed decisions that optimize inputs and conserve resources.

Agricultural innovations make our food system more sustainable. They limit our use of land, water, energy, pesticides, time, and labor. Computation limits the guesswork. Automation limits the inefficiency. And these growing technologies create different types of jobs in agriculture.

Now is the time to invest seriously in solutions that can help build a steadier food supply and create a more sustainable food system in the process. Because the only way to address some of humanitys most urgent and ongoing challenges is to pursue big, bold, and new ideas that benefit both people and our planet.

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View additional multimedia and more ESG storytelling from Bayer on 3blmedia.com

View source version on newsdirect.com: https://newsdirect.com/news/the-evolution-of-automation-on-the-farm-131909912

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The Evolution of Automation on the Farm - Yahoo Finance

The cellular network evolution is miles ahead of its early 2G and 3G days. One of the industry leaders of that evolution is Digi International. Harald Remmert, CTO for Cellular Solutions at Digi International spoke with Infinite IoTs Mat Ackley and provided insights into that journey, todays technical advancements, and the future of cellular networks.

Today, the continued shuttering of existing 2G and 3G networks will affect everyday devices that still use these older networks. One example Remmert cited was vehicle safety. Could older vehicles utilizing 2G and 3G networks for safety features suddenly find themselves outdated, putting drivers at risk? Older security panels relying on 2G and 3G networks may also be at risk of not functioning as these older networks shut down.

Remmert said Digi looked at these networks as plannable events. We work with our customers early on, for example, by providing advanced shutdown information on our website. We also enable customers to update firmware and configuration on those thousands of devices remotely. We thought this through, and were very methodical in helping our customers move up to the next level of networks.

These cellular network evolutions tend to go in waves every ten years and to make the generational leaps, new and improved infrastructure must be in place before those improved networks get up to scale. These include new base stations, antennas, and band spectrums.

It started with 4G and really pushed into 5G as well, where more and more of the functions that the network provides were compartmentalized, and theyre much easier to deploy, Remmert said. They can run on regular data-center-grade hardware. Youre not going to need to have specialized monolithic hardware anymore.

And 5G is not simply a faster network; Remmert believes it will transform how people live, work, and play with its robust capabilities. AI and edge compute technologies can advance and flourish through 5G networks as well.

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The Evolution of the Cellular Network - MarketScale

Poonam Saha, better known as Doodlebug to netizens, always had a keen interest in painting, but over the years she realised that the tools of the trade were above her pay grade. And like most Bengali households, artistic pursuits don't tend to make it on the list of priorities, thus limiting the resources at her disposal.

Far from being dissuaded, Poonam resorted to doodling mandalas in her sketchbook. "I have always had a strong affinity towards drawing almost all my life," shared Poonam. "Art has been the only constant in my life and, truth be told, a getaway and stress-buster for me after a long day of classes, work, etc."

Some of the common themes that feature in her work involve mysticism, lore, ancient history and architecture. "I really like the idea of what could be/has been, the ability to create something that has no connection to our current reality."

It is this element of feeling transported to a surreal world that has resonated with the masses, bringing a much needed appreciation for doodling as its own art form. Poonam says, "For me, doodling holds a special place solely because of its simplicity and the fact that it doesn't require you to buy the most expensive equipment."

Apart from creating dreamlike worlds, Poonam also likes to play around with symmetry and balance. "Geometry is another aspect that I really enjoy incorporating into my artworks, for some reason it has always been one of my favourite topics of study. The concept of balance and proportions in simple everyday objects fascinate me."

A childhood hobby has now grown into the driving force behind Poonam's trailblazing rise in the artistic arena. Her wide collection of works have been drawing attention, both online and offline, over the last couple of years. Doodlebug's eclectic body of work emerged from Poonam's earliest medium for drawing a notepad and a basic gel pen.

Developing the signature Doodlebug style

Growing up, Poonam dreamt of becoming a fashion designer or an architect, professions involving art. Now with a 9-5 design career that allows her to draw all the time, Poonam spends her time working as a graphic designer and an interior architect.

"The sheer simplicity of doodling/illustrations is what inspired me to push myself into this sector."

She remembered coming home from classes, then tutoring kids, and finishing up her chores after a long day of work. She would get the chance to unwind with a simple drawing that she didn't think would pass more than 25 peoples' views. She didn't even spend money on buying expensive materials until 2017.

From freelancer to a professional

Starting off as a freelancer, Poonam has been working with brands as early as 2011. Her official collaboration from 'The Doodlebug Project' was when her illustrations caught Newscred's attention, and she was asked to illustrate for their in-house merchandise.

She has since collaborated with BYLC, Huawei and Bata.

"The memorable one has to be with Bata where I got to draw on their shoes for their museum collection. It was a brief collaboration where I was able to combine my love for apparel design with my artwork and to this day, I still get positive feedback from everyone for it."

Poonam's popularity as Doodlebug isn't limited to commissioned work; over the last year, her crossover series of artworks of the game 'Among Us' swept Reddit and spread to all other social media platforms. The game was at its peak, and the series' inventiveness touched people's hearts and tickled their funny bones all around the world.

The crossover series was even noticed by Buzzfeed, who covered it on their website.

Doodlebug's latest collaboration was with SHEIN, a $100 billion online retailing giant, to establish an artist line of products that combines the brand's and creator's visions.

Speaking on the collaboration, Poonam explained, "At the start of this year, I was offered the opportunity of a possible collaboration by one of SHEIN's representatives. We discussed printing some of my artworks on their apparels. Later, SHEIN and I agreed on an official contract to print my artworks on their shirts and other merchandise."

This collaboration will aid in the evolution of the creator's art and will also make her art accessible to the world.

Inspiring doodlers in Bangladesh and beyond

From a hobby to a passion, Poonam has established her brand, The Doodlebug Project which has garnered its own mass following and inspired doodler/artists in Bangladesh and beyond.

Doodlebug is influencing a generation of artists to put their own unique take on doodling.

"When my illustrations pop up in their newsfeed, I want people to feel something nice and warm, even if it's for like four seconds of their scrolling time."

Lastly, the humble self-made artist said that no matter how many collaborations lie ahead, she feels like she'll always be the girl who just drew her heart out from her little bedroom space without wondering whether anyone will ever see it.

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The evolution of Doodblebug: From doodles to deals - The Business Standard

The fish shed light on metabolic disorders, because, despite elevated fat and blood glucose levels, they remain healthy.

Historically, humans have been able to adapt during periods of feast or famine. Today, however, feast has replaced famine in many regions around the globe leading to a rise in a host of diseases related to metabolism such as diabetes, heart disease and stroke. Collectively called metabolic syndrome, these conditions are associated with genetic mutations in regions of DNA that regulate how our genes work to keep us healthy; on an evolutionary timescale, the constant "feast state" is in its infancy, which for humans, means disease rather than adaptation.

This study marks the first time genetic mapping of the non-coding regions of liver DNA that act to regulate gene activity and expression have been performed. The new data is a now valuable resource for the scientific community studying starvation resistance and metabolism.

"It's a very good foundation for us or anyone to now ask relevant questions in relation to metabolism, diet, and adaptation," said Krishnan.

Metabolism, or the way in which we utilize and store energy, is an integral part of health in all species. Cavefish are ideal for studying metabolism; during periodic flooding of caves, these fish intake and store all the nutrition they need to survive until the next nutrient inundation, which may not be for another year. "They can shed light on metabolic disorders such as diabetes and obesity," said Krishnan, because, despite elevated fat and blood glucose levels, these fish remain vibrant and healthy.

"The fact that these fish are apparently healthy, despite having these extreme traits is, by definition, a good place to ask how they deal with that," said Rohner.

What is truly remarkable is that the two independently derived cavefish colonies examined in this study evolved strikingly similar metabolic adaptations to survive in dark, nutrient-scarce environments. This raises the question, what can we learn from animals who have had the time to evolve? And even further, if multiple cavefish populations evolved in a very similar manner completely independently from each other, are there universal adaptation mechanisms that could potentially be triggered in other species like humans?

"We know only a handful of genes that could be therapeutic targets," said Krishnan. "This means we need to adopt novel ways to identify such potential genes so that we can investigate them, and cavefish are a very powerful system for us to do that."

Coauthors include Christopher W. Seidel, PhD, Ning Zhang, PhD, Narendra Pratap Singh, PhD, Jake VanCampen, Robert Peu, PhD, Shaolei Xiong, Alexander Kenzior, Hua Li, PhD, and Joan W. Conaway, PhD.

Funding for the study was provided by JDRF, the Edward Mallinckrodt Foundation, the National Institutes for Health (award R01GM127872), the National Science Foundation (award IOS-1933428), the Enabling Discovery through GEnomics of the National Science Foundation (award 1923372), the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (award PE2807/1-1) and by institutional support from the Stowers Institute for Medical Research. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH.

About the Stowers Institute for Medical Research

Founded in 1994 through the generosity of Jim Stowers, founder of American Century Investments, and his wife, Virginia, the Stowers Institute for Medical Research is a non-profit, biomedical research organization with a focus on foundational research. Its mission is to expand our understanding of the secrets of life and improve life's quality through innovative approaches to the causes, treatment, and prevention of diseases.

The Institute consists of 17 independent research programs. Of the approximately 500 members, over 370 are scientific staff that include principal investigators, technology center directors, postdoctoral scientists, graduate students, and technical support staff. Learn more about the Institute atwww.stowers.organd about its graduate program atwww.stowers.org/gradschool.

Media Contact:Joe Chiodo, Head of Media Relations 742.462.8529 [emailprotected]

SOURCE Stowers Institute for Medical Research

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From cavefish to humans: Evolution of metabolism in cavefish may provide insight into treatments for a host of diseases such as diabetes, heart...

If you remember what old-school banner ads looked like in the 1990s, you know that digital advertising has come a long way. From the early days of display ads to viewability standards for video, growth in digital ad spend has always been driven by the ability to reach specific audiencesand to measure the efficacy of the ads they see.

Audio advertising, however, has been a different story. Until recently, podcasts accounted for a small fraction of overall digital ad spend. But new data from eMarketer shows that US podcast ad spending will surpass $2 billion by 2023. Podcasts now reach more than one-third of the US population for more than 50 minutes per day, and recent ad tech innovation has given advertisers the ability to scale, measure, and effectively target podcast listeners all over the world.

The podcast revolution is officially here, and its been years in the making. The Evolution of Podcast Advertising breaks down the history of the medium, the challenges for advertisers, and what the future of podcast innovation looks like. Heres a brief history of the advertising channel thats projected to reach 504 million global listeners by 2024:

20042012: Digital formats, analog advertising

In the early days of podcasting, podcast creators and publishers began to monetize their content by simply recording their ad reads directly into the audio file for the specific podcast episode at hand. These spots became known across the podcast industry as baked-in or burned-in ads. For advertisers, baked-in ads represented a scrappy but unique opportunity to align with a trusted podcast or hosttrue influencer marketing.

However, baked-in ads presented some challenges. First, advertisers couldn't target specific audiences with certainty, instead reaching generalized demos based on polls. Second, with the ads baked or burned into the audio files, advertisers couldnt remove stale ad creative.

20132019: Dynamic ad insertion (DAI) marks a step up

Podcast listening continued to see a steady rise in listenership. Then in 2013, the podcast advertising industry took a step forward with the introduction of DAI. With DAI, an advertisers ad read is recorded and produced separately from the podcast episode and the ad is inserted into the content at the time of download by the podcasts hosting platform. This meant for the first time, podcast advertisers could access basic targeting, control the insertion and refreshing of ad creative, and run ads across multiple episodes or podcasts.

By 2020, however, the shift from downloading to streaming podcasts began to take hold. Enter: Streaming Ad Insertion (SAI) by Spotify.

2020Present: Upleveling industry standards with SAI

So, how does SAI work? Similar to DAI, a listener presses play on a podcast episode that has empty ad slots ready for ad insertion. However, rather than counting all impressions at the point of download, Spotify is able to record an ad impression in real-time, as soon as the ad starts playing. That means for the first time ever, podcast advertisers can get insight into confirmed ad impressions. They can have confidence knowing that their ads were heard, instead of simply using downloads as a listening proxy.

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The evolution of podcast advertising: What's next for marketers? | Sponsored Content - eMarketer

At the COBIS annual conference in London, international school representatives reimagined an education without formal written exams such as GCSEs and A-Levels instead looking to adopt curriculums that are less aligned to a very out of date assessment system,COBIS chairman, Trevor Rowell, indicated.

Theres an obsession with tests and examinations and there is far too little attention to developing the learning qualities needed for the middle of the 21st century, he said.

And even as we already have some profoundly well-developed edtech and AI is hurtling towards us, and with all that means for life and education, still we stick with the old systems which are very much 19th century.

Barnaby Sandow, head of school at ACS International School Cobham, which offers IB and AP programs, noted that children did not complete GCSE during the pandemic.

Were in the midst of a mental health crisis. And were about to put thousands of children into a whole bunch of high stakes exams that they dont need. Isnt that child abuse? he asked.

We havent got it right in the international sector at all, agreed international education consultant Matthew Savage.

We may get those attainment grades, but the mental health and wellbeing of the kids in our schools is just as fragile, just as vulnerable as any of the schools in the UK. Were at a point now where movement is essential We either move back to a system, which I believe was broken in the first place, or we move forward to something new.

Hayley White, assessment director at Pearson, nodding to areport into the Future of Qualifications & Assessment in England, said that it is not revolution, but evolution that the sector is looking for.

What I would say in terms of where we go from here is a need to be assessing the right skills in the right way, she said. So for some, that will be an exam with a variety of different question types. Some of it might be portfolio or on-screen assessments. And I think thats the challenge. How do we best assess what were trying to measure?

The conversation has got a lot of energy to it

Assessments and credentials from assessment are a currency and an asset that students use to go and get a job [or go to university]. Are those people then that use that currency to sift students just a bit lazy? PriyaLakhani, founder and CEO of CENTURY Tech, asked.

Some at the conference highlighted that they are opting to teach a minimum five GCSEs, and adding more personalised curriculum via other courses, others choosing IB qualifications, which are accepted by universities.

Speaking with The PIE, COBIS CEO Colin Bell emphasised that a strategic goal of COBISsnew development plan is to scope out how the association canwork closer with higher education institutions worldwide.

The conversation has got a lot of energy to it, he said. And behind that energy I think there is a real depth for a desire for change, but not change just for the sake of it. But change really to provide better pathway to success in life. And we all know that success isnt just derived from your grades in assessments.

But I think as well, its really important that for this change to actually take place and for it to be meaningful and impactful and sustainable, it cant just be related to schools. It has to be connected to the higher education sector globally.

At the moment, we are preparing children to do fantastically well in a pub quiz, Sandow added.

If we want to prepare them for the skills that they need so they are ready to go out [and] survive in the work place then weve got to stop thinking that the only thing that matters is whether Im better than you are.

Beyond the topic of assessments, international schools are seeing increases in admissions worldwide. Previous research has indicated that enrolment into international school groups has grown by 70% in the past five years.

Parents arelooking athigh quality British schools as an alternative to schools where they may have not had the best experience for their children during the pandemic, Bell said. Financial distress globally is leading to an impact on growth for mid-range price range schools in addition topremium schools, he added. The number of schools is also rising.

There is certainly growth in Dubai, but that growth globally is around about 6% thats the figure that we get from ISC Research, but its not just related to Dubai or the Middle East,Bell noted.

We see great growth in the number of British schools that are establishing and setting up, for example, in parts of Southeast Asia, like in particular Cambodia and Vietnam. Weve got a number of schools that are going through our accreditation process in those regions.

One attendee from a school in Georgia told The PIE about seeing a small influx of families who had previously been in Russia, while another from a school teaching the IB curriculum in Mumbai said they had been benefitting from more teachers applying for positions from schools in Russia who had chosen to leave the country.

Teachers who may have previously also applied for jobs in China have applied for jobs at the school in Indias most populous city, they added. Teacher recruitment and retention continues to be an issue, but speakers also suggested ways of maintaining staff levels.

We expect staff to seek opportunities, saidJan Steel, principal Outcomes and Standards, atGEMS Wellington International School. Staff must be engaged, prepared for development and schools should ensure they are a part of the journey of the school.

We are going to lose a lot of excellent teachers if we do not become more flexible at work

How are you investing in your teachers throughout the school?Joanne Standring, deputy head teacher Learning & Teaching, asked. Its not just about the barbecue at the end of term, but how you are checking in across the year and having checkpoints.

The rest of the world has moved on. The rest of the world is working from home, said senior teacher, Parmjeet Plummer. We are going to lose a lot of excellent teachers if we do not become more flexible at work.

One panel also shared statistics compiled by the Council of International Schools on wage disparity in international schools. In a sector where some 70% of workers are female, and only 23% of leaders are female, statistics show that there is an average $12,433 difference per year in wages between men and women.

The gap when it comes to ethnicity and locally hired staff versus internationally hired staff is wider still. White staff on average take home a $33,860 higher wage packet than non-white colleagues and internationally hired staff can expect $39,246 more per year than their locally hired co-workers.

Speakers also pointed to a Bloomberg expos on racism in hiring practises for staff at international schools. One representative of a school in Saudi Arabia said that it was often an issue among parents.

They say to me this teacher is not British, and I say, well yes they are, they are from West London, the representative told the conference.

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Assessment "evolution" expected at international schools - The PIE News