SineIraEtStudio

@SineIraEtStudio@midwest.social

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SineIraEtStudio ,

It was so bad that it made me realize I could be a screenwriter.

I think what happens is Zach Snyder gets together some good ideas for characters and stories (and some pretty mockup pictures), then he uses those to sell the project. Unfortunately from there, he doesn't or isn't able to flush those ideas into a compelling narrative with engaging characters. Everything stays very 1 dimensional.

I suggest a hard pass to everyone.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Relevant text:

According to the research, lab-grown P. album was observed to break down a given piece of UV-treated plastic at a rate of roughly 0.05 percent per day for every nine-day period. Which isn't nothing, but it'd take a very long time for the bacteria to get through the entirety of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, let alone the millions of metric tons of plastics that enter the ocean every year.

SineIraEtStudio ,

This report makes clear that the tripling target is ambitious but achievable – though only if governments quickly turn promises into plans of action. (emphesis mine)

SineIraEtStudio ,

Appreciate your view point.

My understanding is that the US is a net fossil fuel exporter with ~10% of exports going to China (source: https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=727&t=6). So that aspect of your argument should probably be reworked.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Interesting read. Found this particularly interesting:

Within a year of the rule’s adoption in 2021, Colorado’s Department of Transportation, or CDOT, had canceled two major highway expansions, including Interstate 25, and shifted $100 million to transit projects. In 2022, a regional planning body in Denver reallocated $900 million from highway expansions to so-called multimodal projects, including faster buses and better bike lanes.

Now, other states are following Colorado’s lead. Last year, Minnesota passed a $7.8 billion transportation spending package with provisions modeled on Colorado’s greenhouse gas rule. Any project that added road capacity would have to demonstrate how it contributed to statewide greenhouse gas reduction targets. Maryland is considering similar legislation, as is New York.

“We’re now hoping that there’s some kind of domino effect,” said Ben Holland, a manager at RMI, a national sustainability nonprofit. “We really regard the Colorado rule as the gold standard for how states should address transportation climate strategy.”

SineIraEtStudio ,

Relevant text:

Ukrainian crews say the fundamental problem is that the Abrams were built for advances aided by air power and artillery, which Ukraine lacks.

Russia, meanwhile, continues to make heavy use of drones in its attacks, which the Abrams struggle to defend against.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Interesting read. I'm inclined to agree with the author that the UN 2086 population peak is BS and humanity will hit population peak sooner (potentially in the first half of the century).

United Nations’ expert “model” appears to have picked an arbitrary long-term fertility rate out of who-knows-where to which all regions asymptote, abruptly abandoning their current declines to head for theory-land! I’m honestly a bit aghast.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Relevant text below:

District 19 represents 8,000 machinists who repair locomotives and heavy equipment for freight rail carriers including CSX, BNSF, and Union Pacific.

The Department of Labor and the Machinists entered into an agreement to rerun last year’s election—which Murtaugh lost by just six votes—after the challengers filed charges over irregularities with member addresses. It is extremely rare to have an election redone in this way. Fewer than 0.3 percent of union elections lead to a rerun supervised or ordered by the DOL.

Ballots were cast—or due in the mail—on May 3, but then had to be sealed and shipped to a central location to be counted under DOL direction.

Murtaugh and Rosato campaigned on a platform of increased transparency and a more militant posture toward the employers.

“The members have voted in a working member, because they're tired of the ways things have been run,” says Murtagh. “I campaigned on having members engaged in the contract negotiations—no more closed doors.”

Negotiations for the next national rail contracts are expected to begin later this year. Contract negotiations under the Railway Labor Act, which covers railroad and airline workers, often take years.

SineIraEtStudio ,

No particular order, but it seems I hit quite a few different genres.

  • Starcraft
  • Stardew Valley
  • Subnautica
  • Final Fantasy Tactics
  • Infamous
  • Hades
  • Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
  • Halo 2
  • Super Smash Brothers Melee
  • Rome: Total War
SineIraEtStudio ,

It's strange to me they tested mice. My understanding is that Porcine (pigs) models are usually utilized to evaluate potential GI/intestinal effects on humans. As human and Porcine GI tracts are similar (why you really need to cook pork or you can get diseases or worms from the meat).

The article mentioned cats, so the current list of know susceptible species seems to be bird, cow, mice, and cats. Not a great sign.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Relevant sections of the article:

The EU Council finalized the agreement earlier on May 21, which would provide Ukraine with between 2.5 billion and 3 billion euros ($2.7-3.26 billion) annually, with most of it allocated to Kyiv's military needs.

The European Commission then announced later in the day that the "resources will be available to support Ukraine starting from July 2024, with bi-annual payments."

The distribution will be reviewed on an annual basis.

More and faster: Electricity from clean sources reaches 30% of global total ( apnews.com )

Scientists say emissions from burning fuels like coal must ramp steeply down to protect Earth’s climate, yet there was an increase in electricity made from burning fossil fuels. China, India, Vietnam and Mexico were responsible for nearly all of the rise....

SineIraEtStudio ,

Good news we are increasing the percent from renewables. The pace leaves something to be desired though:

  • 23 years to increase 12% (2000 to 2023, 18% to 30%)

  • 12 years to increase 10% (2011 to 2023, 20% to 30%)

  • 6 years to increase 5% (2017 to 2023, 25% to 30%)

Based on the charts and write up, it seems like China is the main driver of us even making significant progress.

I'd like to be optimistic but 6 years to go 5% will have us totally renewable in 84 years (2023+[6x14]=2107).

SineIraEtStudio , (edited )

Research in the last 5ish years has shown that "any" cell can be induced to change into a stem cell by changing its environment and adding specific growth factors.

Edit:
I spent an hour looking for the research I was referring to. I found the papers and dissertation of the author who's talk I went to where the topic was discussed. Unfortunately, with a quick read I didn't find where the author talked about it, leading me to believe it was a discussion had at the end of their defense.

Although I couldn't find the research, BubbleMonkey@slrpnk.net found what I was talking about (induced pluripotent stem cells)

Edit 2: As CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org points out the techniques are not currently at the level where induced stem cells can replace native stem cells.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Certainly. The research is still ongoing but shows promise and is making progress toward being a viable replacement.

I'll edit my original comment to clarify that point.

SineIraEtStudio ,

That's a very cute comic. Thanks for sharing the link.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Some good stats in the article:

... bicycles already surpass cars as a means of transportation in the interior of Paris, accounting for 11.2% of trips compared to 4.3%. A similar trend is seen in trips between the suburbs and the city center: 14% are made by bicycle and 11.8% by car.

Rue de Rivoli, with its two-way cycle lanes and its dedicated lane for buses and taxis ...

... Paris has more than 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) of facilities adapted for cyclists, including more than 300 km (186 m) of bike lanes and 52 km (32 m) of provisional lanes, according to the latest available municipal data, from 2021. The rest are lanes shared with cars or lanes only marked with paint on the ground.

By 2026, local officials want the entire city to be suitable for two-wheel transportation. To this end, it has set aside $250 million, $100 million more than in Hidalgo’s first term.

... only 27% of the “bike plan” has been carried out despite the fact that 62% of Hidalgo’s second term in office has already elapsed.

... indicated that 11.2% of trips in Paris were made by bike between 2022 and 2023, compared to 4.3% by car. The change in trend is clear. In 2021, two wheels still represented 5.6% of trips, while cars were 9%, according to Belliard.

... the research indicates that residents of the nearest suburbs also prefer to use the bike, with 14% of trips compared to 11.8% for cars. The figures are even better during rush hour, when 18.9% of trips are made by bike and only 6.6% by car. Travel on foot, however, continues to lead mobility within the municipality with 53%, followed by those made on public transit, with 30%. The study was carried out with 3,337 residents of the capital region who agreed to be fitted with a GPS tracker.

The Human Ecology of Overshoot: Why a Major Population Correction Is Inevitable ( www.mdpi.com )

Homo sapiens has evolved to reproduce exponentially, expand geographically, and consume all available resources. For most of humanity’s evolutionary history, such expansionist tendencies have been countered by negative feedback. However, the scientific revolution and the use of fossil fuels reduced many forms of negative...

SineIraEtStudio , (edited )

Interesting piece of the journal article:

On the contrary, many analysts reject historical precedents as guides to contemporary policy. Perhaps they should take warning from the aforementioned infamous 1972 Club of Rome/MIT study, Limits to Growth (LTG) [99], which showed that, on a business-as-usual track, global society would face collapse by mid-21st century. As might be expected, many economists and techno-optimists roundly rejected this assessment—economists ignore overshoot and even grossly underestimate the damage from climate change; their concepts and models are divorced from biophysical reality [100]. However, subsequent studies show that the real world is behaving with disturbing fidelity to LTG modelling, particularly the two (of four) scenarios that indicate a halt in growth over the next decade or so, followed by subsequent declines and collapse [101].

[Emphasis mine]

Complete Abstract:

Homo sapiens has evolved to reproduce exponentially, expand geographically, and consume all available resources. For most of humanity’s evolutionary history, such expansionist tendencies have been countered by negative feedback. However, the scientific revolution and the use of fossil fuels reduced many forms of negative feedback, enabling us to realize our full potential for exponential growth. This natural capacity is being reinforced by growth-oriented neoliberal economics—nurture complements nature. Problem: the human enterprise is a ‘dissipative structure’ and sub-system of the ecosphere—it can grow and maintain itself only by consuming and dissipating available energy and resources extracted from its host system, the ecosphere, and discharging waste back into its host. The population increase from one to eight billion, and >100-fold expansion of real GWP in just two centuries on a finite planet, has thus propelled modern techno-industrial society into a state of advanced overshoot. We are consuming and polluting the biophysical basis of our own existence. Climate change is the best-known symptom of overshoot, but mainstream ‘solutions’ will actually accelerate climate disruption and worsen overshoot. Humanity is exhibiting the characteristic dynamics of a one-off population boom–bust cycle. The global economy will inevitably contract and humanity will suffer a major population ‘correction’ in this century.

SineIraEtStudio ,

A bit disappointing, was hoping for a bigger milestone but this is still a positive.

Relevant Text:

California has set a benchmark for renewable energy, with wind, solar, and hydro providing 100% of the state's energy demand for 25 out of the last 32 days (and counting).

Added context is that it isn't for the full day, only needs to be part of the day (ex. 15 minutes), where renewables provided all of the electricity needs for the state.

SineIraEtStudio ,

To add on to what NegativeInf said and linked, "0.25" is a weird way to say a quarter of a day. It makes more sense, to me, that the zero at the front was left off and it should read "0.25-6 hr per day".

SineIraEtStudio ,

I think this information was already posted a week or so ago, but if you haven't seen it yet the relevant text is:

Chinese battery giant CATL, supplier to some of Australia’s biggest grid-scale project developers, has unveiled a new containerised battery energy storage system promising a one-third increase in energy density, a 20% reduction in overall footprint and a longer service life.

Stored in a 20-foot TEU container, the mass producible Tener has a 6.25 MWh capacity which CATL says represents a 30% increase in energy density per unit area and a 20% reduction in the overall project footprint.

The new battery also claims to provide zero degradation of capacity over the first five years of use, “a significant advancement”, which CATL says increase the lifespan of batteries.

“Tener is equipped with long service life and zero-degradation cells tailored for energy storage applications, achieving an energy density of 430 Wh/L, an impressive milestone for LFP batteries used in energy storage,” the company says.

SineIraEtStudio , (edited )

The text is a bit vague about if this is an 80% cut from the total or 80% cut from the remaining, previously cut fees. Good news regardless though.

Article Text:

The [Biden] administration on Thursday finalized a rule that cuts costs for developing solar and wind energy on public lands. 

The rule was expected to cut by 80 percent fees that are based on how much energy is produced through the year 2035.

A partial reduction is already in place based on [2022 guidance], but the administration said that the new rule contains further cuts and codifies them into the federal register. 

The fee cuts become less dramatic after 2035 and will ratchet down in the following years to be just a 20 percent cut in 2038 and beyond. 

The rule also seeks to expand energy production in designated “priority areas” by simplifying the process for issuing new rights to build wind and solar projects. 

The administration announced additional milestones alongside the rule, saying that the Interior Department has now given the OK to enough renewable projects on public lands to power 12 million homes. 

Interior Secretary [Deb Haaland] told reporters on a press call that the Biden administration has approved more than double the number of renewable energy projects than the Trump administration did during its four years. 

“The previous administration did everything they could to hobble our department’s clean energy program, but we’re making up for lost time,” she said.

In addition to the cost cut and milestone, the administration announced that two major solar projects in California were now fully operational.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Besides the additional Norway airplanes, this was new information to me:

The primary bottleneck to the Ukrainian Air Force’s fielding F-16s in quantity is not limited numbers of airframes but how many combat pilots and ground crew Kyiv can spare from the actual war, to train on transition to the F-16, Cavoli said.

According to Ukrainian mil-bloggers, the first six F-16s with pilots and ground crew will reach Ukraine in June or July. Earlier deadlines had predicted the arrival in April or May.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Relevant section:

According to Zelensky, Ukraine needs 25 Patriots to cover the country completely but Kuleba said he is initially focused on securing seven. This would be enough to protect Ukraine's largest cities and leave at least one battery to be closer to the battlefield.

Kuleba said that his team identified over 100 available Patriots abroad, adding that he "struggles to understand" why some countries refuse to transfer at least one of their systems to Ukraine.

SineIraEtStudio , (edited )

After the arrival of Europeans, native American dogs almost completely disappeared, leaving a minimal genetic legacy in modern dog populations.

Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7116273/

I did not do a very deep dive but it looks like there were "domesticated" dogs in the Americans prior to Europeans, but they were almost completely replaced by their European counterparts. This leads me to believe the European versions were far superior for the intended usage. If the American version was indeed significantly inferior for their intended purposes, they may have been at or below the effectiveness/usefulness levels of semi-domesticated animals, like foxes.

Edit: The_Sasswagon brings up a good point about the effects of potential European diseases on American dogs.

SineIraEtStudio ,

That's a good point about disease and I think it could be a potential cause of the low genetic prevalence.

I don't know about your roaming free option. I think if that were true, there would still be wild packs today or there would have been roving dog packs mentioned in historical text (possible but I don't recall any mention of them). Alternatively, they would have inter-breed with European varieties and had a more significant impact on genetics, but that's not seen.

While I agree that Europeans liked to remove/exterminate "uncivilized" things, that mostly applies to people. I suspect if the American dogs were significantly useful they would have made use of them.

This conversation allowed me to recall that the plains tribes utilized dogs as pack animals. Then once horses made their way onto the scene those tribes switched from dogs to horses for that role. I'm not sure what other "jobs" American dogs performed but I suspect if they were significantly utilized as pack animals they were probably breed for such and with that niche gone they may not have performed well in other "dog" tasks, compared to European varieties.

To conclude, for American dogs to be such a small percent of the current dog genome, I think, the European varieties had to significantly outlive their American counterparts. Whether because they were replaced by better performing European varieties/horses, because they died from European diseases, or a combination of those options.

SineIraEtStudio ,

3 Buyan-class Corvettes Cost (yr. 2016): 27B rubles. 65R:$1 US (2016). Each Corvette costs ~$138M US (2016).

Cost Source: https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2021/02/buyan-m-class-corvette-graivoron-commissioned-with-russias-black-sea-fleet/

Added context from OP article: "the fire had "disabled" the ship and that "its means of communication and automation were "completely destroyed."

OP Article Text:

The Russian missile ship Serpukhov, which was docked off the exclave of Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea, was set on fire on April 8, Ukraine's military intelligence claimed.

In a post on Telegram, the agency said that the fire had "disabled" the ship and that "its means of communication and automation were "completely destroyed." The military intelligence also shared a video appearing to show a fire breaking out on the ship.

A source from Ukraine's military intelligence confirmed to the Kyiv Independent that its operatives were behind the fire. It was the first such attack on Russian naval assets in the Baltic Sea.

In recent months, Ukraine has intensified its attacks on Russia's Black Sea Fleet targets in occupied Crimea, successfully targeting several ships and forcing some Russian vessels to redeploy to safer waters.

Dmytro Pletenchuk, a spokesperson for Ukraine's navy, said on March 30 that the Russian Navy had withdrawn nearly all its major ships from ports in occupied Crimea as a result.

According to the website of the Russian Navy, the Serpukhov is a Buyan-M missile corvette, and is 74 meters long (242 feet), and contains a variety of different weapons systems.

Russian authorities announced earlier on April 8 that the Russian ice navigation vessel Katerina Velikaya caught fire while undergoing repairs at the shipyard Dalzavod in the far eastern city of Vladivostok.

One person was killed, and three others were injured, Russian authorities said, adding that the circumstances of the fire were under investigation.

SineIraEtStudio ,

The cost of one “Orlan-10” drone is estimated between $87,000 and $120,000, as reported by the UK's Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies.

Source: https://euromaidanpress.com/2024/01/13/russian-drone-manufacturer-orlan-10-ramps-up-production-despite-sanctions-inform-napalm-reports/

SineIraEtStudio ,

The 7 listed aircraft are from the Yeysk air base only.

For the curious:

The Beriev Be-200 Altair is a jet-powered amphibious flying boat designed for fire fighting, search and rescue operations, and maritime patrol, as well as freight and passenger transportation.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Relevant Section, with example implementation:

With an annual budget of roughly $2 million, the program saves Eugene $14 million annually in ambulance trips and emergency room costs, plus an estimated $8.5 million in public safety costs—and has successfully diverted thousands from the criminal legal system. Of the estimated 17,700 calls CAHOOTS responded to in 2019, teams requested police backup only 311 times.

311/17700=~1.75%

Article Text Below:

What Happens When We Send Mental Health Providers Instead Of Police

For Daniel Prude, Patrick Warren Sr., and Ricardo Muñoz, 911 calls led to tragedy. They are three of at least 97 people killed just last year after police responded to reports of someone “behaving erratically or having a mental health crisis.”

Like Prude, Warren Sr., and Muñoz, nearly a quarter of the more than 6,000 people fatally shot by police since 2015 were experiencing a mental health crisis. Today, a person having a mental health crisis is more likely to encounter law enforcement than they are to get any medical support or treatment, making jails the largest behavioral health facilities in the country. Chicago’s Cook County Jail, the Los Angeles County Jail, and New York’s Rikers Island jail complex each hold more people with serious mental health conditions than any dedicated treatment facility in the country.

Numerous deadly encounters prove that police are ill-equipped to safely and effectively serve people experiencing mental health crises, yet police have been the default first responders for a range of social issues. And as with so many aspects of our broken criminal legal system, Black people become victims in disproportionate numbers. A study published in January 2021 found that police are more likely to shoot and kill Black men who exhibit mental health conditions than white men who display similar behaviors.

Advocates across the country have called for officials to develop services that curb police involvement in mental health crises, and community organizations have led the way. Approaches vary, but a growing number of cities are starting programs that rely on first responders who aren’t police, such as counselors or social workers, to respond to calls that involve mental health crises and substance use.

Eugene, Oregon, is home to one of the oldest such civilian response programs in the country, launched in 1989. The Crisis Assistance Helping Out on the Streets (CAHOOTS) program, operated by Eugene’s White Bird Clinic, pairs a medic with a crisis worker to respond to 911 and non-emergency calls involving mental health, homelessness, and substance use. The teams are trained to provide crisis intervention, counseling, basic emergency medical care, transportation, and referrals to services.

With an annual budget of roughly $2 million, the program saves Eugene $14 million annually in ambulance trips and emergency room costs, plus an estimated $8.5 million in public safety costs—and has successfully diverted thousands from the criminal legal system. Of the estimated 17,700 calls CAHOOTS responded to in 2019, teams requested police backup only 311 times.

The program has served as a model for places like Denver and Olympia, Washington, with many other cities looking to create their own programs. Of course, every community is different, so a one-size-fits-all approach will not work. Eugene, for example, is more than 80 percent white. White Bird Clinic Director of Consulting Tim Black recognizes that residents have a “healthy enough relationship” with police, so they may feel more comfortable calling 911 for crisis response incidents than people who live in communities that are overpoliced.

Denver’s Support Team Assisted Response (STAR) program, which launched as a pilot in June 2020, similarly sends health care workers to respond to incidents related to mental health, poverty, homelessness, and substance use. As of May 2021, STAR had successfully responded to 1,323 calls, none of which resulted in injury, arrest, or a request for police backup. Denver’s police chief has said the program “saves lives” and “prevents tragedies.”

But the program faces criticism from community members and advocates, who have said that responses have been “clinical” and that responders often can’t relate personally to the people they serve. STAR is staffed by social workers who are predominantly white, and advocates envision a community-driven program that includes “providers who share lived experiences and identities with Denver’s diverse population.”

Polling shows that Democrats, independents, and Republicans alike support programs that replace police with trained experts in situations involving behavioral or mental health crises. But residents, community organizations, behavioral health professionals, and others need to be involved in the creation and implementation of any crisis response program. And stakeholders need to ensure that these programs don’t perpetuate inequities based on who they serve, which calls get diverted, and how first responders work to resolve a situation.

With American Rescue Plan (ARP) funding, local governments have an opportunity to make real investments in health-first approaches. Denver has already committed to using ARP dollars to enable an expansion of STAR, and other cities—including Charlotte, Long Beach, Phoenix, and San Francisco—are funding similar programs through ARP. Cities need to create and implement programs that actually promote public safety—and save lives.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Interesting article. Relevant section below:

The HUR thinks it can disable the bridge soon. “We will do it in the first half of 2024,” one official told the Guardian, adding that Kyrylo Budanov, the head of the main directorate of intelligence, already had “most of the means to carry out this goal”. He was following a plan approved by Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, to “minimise” Russia’s naval presence in the Black Sea.

Over the past five months Ukraine has sunk seven landing boats and large ships belonging to Moscow’s Black Sea fleet. The latest, the Sergei Kotov, capsized in March after a night-time raid involving 10 Ukrainian Magura V5 amphibious drones packed with explosives as it was on patrol south of the Kerch bridge. HUR officials indicated this was a “shaping operation” prior to another attack on the crossing.

Another interesting piece of the article:

Pro-Kremlin Russian channels last month released an intercepted phone call in which high-ranking German military officials discussed the capabilities of Taurus. The experts estimated that 10 to 20 missiles would probably be enough to destroy the bridge.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Tldr: Advanced western equipment takes so long to reach Ukraine that Russia adapts to it's potential capabilities before it's deployed.

Relevant section:

Unnamed Ukrainian military officials said there is an unfortunate pattern of the West finally sending weapons when they are "no longer relevant" for the current battlefield dynamics, Politico reported on April 3, citing sources.

While Ukraine's Western allies have provided tens of billions of military aid and equipment, some of the more advanced systems pledged, such as the F-16 fighter jet, have been slow-walked and have yet to reach the battlefield. At the same time, Russia has been steadily adapting its defensive capabilities to counter new Western weapons as they arrive.

An international coalition to train Ukrainian pilots on F-16s was launched in the summer of 2023. Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Norway have also pledged to supply Ukraine with dozens of U.S.-made fourth-generation jets.

Yet, the unnamed Ukrainian military officials told Politico that the "F-16s were needed in 2023; they won't be right for 2024."

The official explained that Russia has been testing its air defense posture and has likely deployed its radar and anti-air missiles in a manner that would render much of the F-16s' offensive capabilities ineffective.

US lifts sanctions against former European branch of Russia's VTB Bank ( kyivindependent.com )

Ost-West Handelsbank has been removed from the list, according to the information on the office's website. The names under which the bank used to operate earlier – VTB Bank Deutschland and VTB Bank Europe – were also struck down.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Tldr: Germany took over control of the bank from Russia, so US removed it from the sanctions list.

Relevant section:

Germany-based Ost-West Handelsbank has been removed from the list, according to the information on the Treasury's website. The positions with names under which the bank used to operate earlier – VTB Bank Deutschland and VTB Bank Europe – were also struck down.

The U.S. announced extensive anti-Russian sanctions that also targeted VTB Bank at the offset of Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.

In the wake of the sanctions, German authorities wrested control of the Frankfurt-based subsidiary from its Russian parent in April 2022 and appointed a special representative to help run it.

VTB Europe officially changed its name to Ost-West Handelsbank in November 2023.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Tldr: "while discussing science on social media has many professional and societal benefits (and has been a lot of fun), increasing the citation rate of a scientist’s papers is likely not among them."

Abstract:

Multiple studies across a variety of scientific disciplines have shown that the number of times that a paper is shared on Twitter (now called X) is correlated with the number of citations that paper receives. However, these studies were not designed to answer whether tweeting about scientific papers causes an increase in citations, or whether they were simply highlighting that some papers have higher relevance, importance or quality and are therefore both tweeted about more and cited more. The authors of this study are leading science communicators on Twitter from several life science disciplines, with substantially higher follower counts than the average scientist, making us uniquely placed to address this question. We conducted a three-year-long controlled experiment, randomly selecting five articles published in the same month and journal, and randomly tweeting one while retaining the others as controls. This process was repeated for 10 articles from each of 11 journals, recording Altmetric scores, number of tweets, and citation counts before and after tweeting. Randomization tests revealed that tweeted articles were downloaded 2.6–3.9 times more often than controls immediately after tweeting, and retained significantly higher Altmetric scores (+81%) and number of tweets (+105%) three years after tweeting. However, while some tweeted papers were cited more than their respective control papers published in the same journal and month, the overall increase in citation counts after three years (+7% for Web of Science and +12% for Google Scholar) was not statistically significant (p > 0.15). Therefore while discussing science on social media has many professional and societal benefits (and has been a lot of fun), increasing the citation rate of a scientist’s papers is likely not among them.

SineIraEtStudio ,

From the article:

Voters who chose "uninstructed delegation" in Wisconsin's presidential primary Tuesday more than doubled the 20,000 votes President Joe Biden won the state by in 2020, sending warning signs for his reelection chances in the battleground state.

Voters displeased with Biden's handling of the Israel-Hamas war organized into a "Listen to Wisconsin" campaign that mirrored other states like Michigan and Minnesota, where a similar "uncommitted" option took about 13% and 19% of the vote in the Democratic primary, respectively.

In Wisconsin, "uninstructed delegation" represented 9% of the vote on the Democratic side as of 10:15 p.m., taking about 42,269 votes. Around 408,610 voters have selected Biden as their choice, or 88%. About 3% voted for Minnesota congressman Dean Phillips, who has ended his campaign and endorsed Biden.

SineIraEtStudio ,

From the article:

What alternatives to plastic are coming?

Here are a few new ideas headed to the produce aisle:

Bags from trees. An Austrian company is using beechwood trees to make biodegradable cellulose net bags to hold produce. Other companies offer similar netting that decomposes within a few weeks.

Film from peels. Orange peels, shrimp shells and other natural waste is being turned into film that can be used like cellophane, or made into bags. An edible coating made from plant-based fatty acids is sprayed on cucumbers, avocados and other produce sold at many major grocery stores. They work in a way similar to the wax coating commonly used on citrus and apples.

Clamshells from cardboard. Plastic clamshells are a $9.1 billion business in the United States, and the number of growers who use them is vast. Replacing them will be an enormous challenge, particularly for more fragile fruits and vegetables. Plenty of designers are trying. Driscoll’s has been working to develop paper containers for use in the United States and Canada. In the meantime, the company is using more recycled plastic in its clamshells in the United States.

Ice that feels like gelatin. Luxin Wang and other scientists at the University of California, Davis, have invented reusable jelly ice. It is lighter than ice and doesn’t melt. It could eliminate the need for plastic ice packs, which can’t be recycled. After about a dozen uses, the jelly ice can be tossed into a garden or the garbage, where it dissolves.

Boxes with atmosphere. Broccoli is usually shipped in wax-coated boxes packed with ice. The soggy cartons can’t be recycled. Iceless broccoli shipping containers use a mix of gases that help preserve the vegetable instead of chilling it with ice, which is heavy to ship and can transmit pathogens when it melts. Other sustainable, lighter shipping cartons are being designed to remove ethylene, a plant hormone that encourages ripening.

Containers from plants. Rice-paddy straw left over after harvests, grasses, sugar cane stalks and even food waste are all being turned into trays and boxes that are either biodegradable or can be composted.

SineIraEtStudio ,

The transmogrifier has been in the last week of posts (starting March 23rd). I'm not familiar with which strip you are asking about but my guess would be it's in the last 7 posts.

SineIraEtStudio ,

From the article:

The last coal producers in New England will shutter their doors permanently under an agreement reached with environmental groups and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Wednesday.

Two plants in New Hampshire, Schiller and Merrimack, will voluntarily cease operations in 2025 and 2028, respectively, said Jim Andrews, president and CEO of Granite Shore Power.

By closing the plants, Granite Shore Power — the company that operates them — resolved litigation brought by the Conservation Law Foundation and the Sierra Club, which alleged they violated the Clean Water Act.

The region’s coal-free status comes as part of a larger pledge by the U.S. to phase out coal power plants through the Powering Past Coal Alliance. The U.S. joins 56 other nations in committing to no new coal plants and the closing of existing operations.

The U.S. has not named a target date for completing the transition, but the Biden administration, through other works, has indicated a plan aimed at no coal by 2035.

New Hampshire will become the 16th coal-free state in the nation, according to a statement by the Sierra Club.

Facilities like Merrimack have fallen short of emissions requirements in the past, exceeding one emissions limit by 70 percent in 2023, according to reporting from New Hampshire Public Radio. Previous failures to meet requirements did not inform the company’s decision, Andrews said.

He has said that new “renewable energy parks” of solar arrays and storage facilities will be developed.

SineIraEtStudio ,

Thought this was a cool part of the article:

The acoustic sensors gather uncharacteristic sounds from the environment before artificial intelligence is used to establish whether anomalies are incoming kamikaze drones or missiles.

Dr Thomas Withington, an expert in air defence at the Royal United Services Institute said: “It’s interesting that this technology is making a comeback because it was all the rage before the invention of the radar in the 1920s and 1930s

“History, in a sense, comes full circle, but with the adaptation of the technological age that we have today.”

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