A synthesis of evidence for policy from behavioural science during COVID-19

It's been over a year since the release of OpenAI's ChatGPT launched an international conversation about how generative artificial intelligence--i.e., AI capable of producing text, images, video, and more--could transform our lives. This past October, President Joe Biden signed an executive order outlining the government's priorities for regulating artificial intelligence, which included initiatives to protect national security and privacy, advance equity and civil rights, and promote innovation and competition. Sen. Chuck Schumer has also led a series of roundtable discussions with AI executives, business leaders, and other experts to inform policymakers' legislative approach.

Cortex

Executive function, an umbrella term used to describe the goal-directed regulation of thoughts, actions, and emotions, is an important dimension implicated in neurodiversity and established malleable predictor of multiple adult outcomes. Neurodevelopmental differences have been linked to both executive function strengths and weaknesses, but evidence for associations between specific profiles of executive function and specific neurodevelopmental conditions is mixed. In this exploratory study, we adopt an unsupervised machine learning approach (self-organising maps), combined with k-means clustering to identify data-driven profiles of executive function in a transdiagnostic sample of 566 neurodivergent children aged 8–18 years old. We include measures designed to capture two distinct aspects of executive function: performance-based tasks designed to tap the state-like efficiency of cognitive skills under …

Frontiers in Social Psychology

The extant literature recognizes national identity as a pivotal factor motivating both individual and collective actions to tackle environmental problems. Yet, prior research shows mixed evidence for the relationship between national identity and environmentalism. Here, we propose a theoretical approach that articulates distinctions between different forms of national identity and their differential associations with environmental attitudes and behaviors. Specifically, we argue that it is key to differentiate national identification, which reflects a positive attachment to one's country and ties to other compatriots, from national narcissism, which reflects viewing one's country as exceptional and deserving of special treatment. In contrast to national identification, national narcissism is consistently associated with lower environmental concern and predicts support for anti-environmental policies. We show that this is likely due to national narcissism being linked to belief in climate-related conspiracy theories, support for policies that challenge external pressures yet present the nation in a positive light (e.g., greenwashing), and focusing on short-term benefits for the nation. Extending past individual-level findings, we report a pre-registered analysis across 56 countries examining whether national narcissism is also linked to objective indices of lower environmental protection at the country level of analysis. Results revealed a negative relationship between countries' environmental performance and country-level national narcissism (while adjusting for national identification and GDP per capita). We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our approach and …

This is a commentary piece on the proposal by Isager et al.(2021) for a new metric, RVCn, designed to evaluate the replication value of psychological studies. We discuss the hope of utilizing the RVCn metric in undergraduate education and possible improvements on using only sample size to derive this metric.

PLoS ONE

Observing the earth from space: Does a virtual reality overview effect experience increase pro-environmental behaviour? — Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Skip to main navigation Skip to search Skip to main content Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Home Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Logo Help & FAQ Home Profiles Research units Research output Courses Projects Datasets Activities Prizes Press/Media Search by expertise, name or affiliation Observing the earth from space: Does a virtual reality overview effect experience increase pro-environmental behaviour? Femke Van Horen, Marijn HC Meijers, Yerong Zhang, Michael Delaney, Annahita Nezami, Paul van Lange Marketing Amsterdam Sustainability Institute Social Psychology IBBA A-LAB Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article › Academic › peer-review Overview Original language English Journal PLoS ONE Publication status Accepted/In press - 2024 …

Available at SSRN 4776172

In this paper, we test and compare several message-based nudges designed to promote civil discourse and reduce the circulation of hate speech. We conducted a large pre-registered experiment (N= 4,081) to measure the effectiveness of seven nudges: making descriptive norms, injunctive norms, or personal norms salient, cooling down negative emotions, stimulating deliberation or empathy, and highlighting reputation. We used an online platform that reproduces a social media newsfeed and presented the nudge as a message when entering the platform. Our findings indicate that nudges making descriptive norms salient selectively increase participants' overall engagement with relatively harmless content. Additionally, making injunctive norms salient increased the likelihood of liking harmless posts. Exploratory text analysis also reveals that highlighting reputation leads to more substantial and coherent comments on harmful posts. These results suggest that nudges that activate norm considerations represent a promising approach to promoting civil discourse and making social media a safer and more inclusive space for all.

Journal of Applied Social Psychology

In this research, we aim to develop a better understanding of the different ways in which employees can advance or resist the diversity and inclusion (D&I) policies implemented by their organization. To this end, we complement prior work by distinguishing between employees' attitudinal and behavioral opposition versus support for D&I policies. We combine these to distinguish different combinations of attitudinal and behavioral responses that characterize specific groups of employees, which we label opponents, bystanders, reluctants, and champions. In a large‐scale survey study conducted among employees from seven organizations located in the Netherlands (n = 2913), we find empirical support for the validity of this taxonomy and its value in understanding the likelihood that employees advance or resist D&I policies. Furthermore, we find more convergence between attitudinal and behavioral support when …

The internet is one of the fastest technological revolutions in human history (Xu et al., 2018). Almost 5 billion people worldwide use social media, and the average social media user now spends about two and a half hours a day online (Petrosyan, 2024). Unfortunately, the online environment is not a true representation of the offline world. In this paper, we argue that social media is akin to a funhouse mirror, reflecting and warping our collective sense of what is normative (Fisher, 2022). When people stare into the mirror they do not see a true version of reality, but one that has been distorted by a small but vocal minority of extreme outliers–often amplified by design features and algorithms–whose opinions create illusory norms. Not only does this extreme minority stir discontent and spark outrage online from other vocal social media users, they also bias the meta-perceptions of most users who passively “lurk.” This can lead to false polarization and pluralistic ignorance, which have been associated with a number of potential problems including increasing drug and alcohol use (Prentice & Miller, 1993), intergroup hostility (Lees & Cikara, 2020; Moore-Berg et al., 2020), and support for authoritarian regimes (Kuran, 1998). Furthermore, exposure to extreme content can normalize unhealthy and dangerous behavior. For example, when teens are exposed to extreme content related to alcohol consumption, they thought dangerous alcohol consumption was normative (Davis et al., 2023).Here, we draw from work in political science, psychology, and cognitive science to explain how online environments become saturated with false norms, who is …

International Journal of Eating Disorders

Objective Appearance focused self‐concept (i.e., overvaluing the importance of appearance for self‐definition and self‐worth) is theorized to predict dietary restraint and binge eating in the short‐term (e.g., daily life). Yet, no research has examined whether appearance focused self‐concept increases within‐persons during a day and if such increases are linked to greater dietary restraint and binge eating for that day. We addressed this gap in knowledge. Method Sixty‐three female university students completed four items from the Beliefs About Appearance Scale as a measure of appearance focused self‐concept six times per day (9 am, 11 am, 1 pm, 3 pm, 5 pm, and 7 pm) for 14 days. Daily at 9 pm, they completed measures of dietary restraint and binge eating for that day. Results Analyzing data from 555 days, latent growth curve analyses revealed a small‐to‐moderate linear increase in appearance …

Political Psychology

The twenty‐first century has been one of democratic backsliding. This has stimulated wide‐ranging scholarship on the causes of democratic erosion. Yet an overarching framework that identifies actors, behaviors, and decision processes has not been developed. I offer such a structure that includes elites (e.g., elected officials, the judiciary), societal actors (e.g., social movements, interest groups, media), and citizens. I discuss erosive threats stemming from each actor and the concomitant role of psychological mechanisms. The framework highlights the challenge of arriving at a holistic explanation of erosion within a given country during a finite period. It also accentuates why scholars should regularly consider the implications of their specific findings for democratic stability. I conclude by discussing various lessons and suggestions for how to study democratic backsliding.

Recent studies have found promising evidence that lightweight, scalable tips promoting digital media literacy can improve the overall accuracy of social media users’ sharing intentions and improve their ability to determine the accuracy of true versus false headlines. However, existing research is designed to test entire bundles of such tips, which limits our practical knowledge about whether some kinds of tips are more effective than others and hinders our ability to theorize about mechanisms. We address this limitation by designing experiments in which we randomly assign participants to receive one or more of 10 possible tips (or none, in a pure control group) and then indicate the extent to which they either believe or would share a series of social media posts. We find that assignment to nearly any of the tips improves sharing, but only tips drawing attention to the posts’ source improved accuracy discernment (because source was highly diagnostic of accuracy in our stimulus set). Sharing intent appears to be more malleable than belief, consistent with the idea that fickle processes like attention play an important role in driving this behavior.

The Oxford Handbook of Behavioral Political Science

Even before Allport’s seminal work, The Nature of Prejudice in 1954 (see Allport 1979), the fields of social and political psychology investigated why individuals of certain social groups are targets of negative stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination across a broad variety of domains such as housing, the criminal justice system, the education system, the healthcare system and labor markets (for reviews, see, eg, Pager and Shepherd 2008; Sidanius and Pratto 1999). The groups usually examined in these contexts include traditionally marginalized targets such as ethnic/racial and religious minorities, women, and the elderly. Recently, social and political psychologists have broadened their gaze to include groups such as sexual and national minorities, immigrants, the poor, and those with physical or mental disabilities. Beyond merely documenting the existence of these phenomena, social and political psychologists have focused on ameliorating the negative outcomes of marginalization and discrimination (eg, Paluck and Green 2009), while social dominance theorists have endeavored to explore the manner in which both dominant and subordinate groups contribute to the creation and maintenance of groupbased hierarchy and intergroup oppression (see also Jost and Banaji 1994). As a result of a concentrated focus on intergroup relations and conflict, there is increasing knowledge of how prejudices such as racism and sexism operate as well as how being targets of such prejudices and discrimination alter individuals’ cognition, affect, behaviors, and life outcomes. However, when one takes a more critical look at social and political …

Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin

Moral foundations theory (MFT) argues that liberals and conservatives form different moral positions because liberals emphasize the values of harm and fairness, whereas conservatives emphasize the values of group loyalty, authority, and purity. In five studies (total N = 3,327), we investigated whether political orientation moderated the relationship between the perceived relevance of each moral foundation and moral conviction (i.e., the extent to which one perceives their attitude as based on morality) across four issues. Political differences in this relationship emerged but were inconsistent across issues and did not always align with the predictions of MFT or several other theoretical explanations. Our findings together with previous research indicate that MFT may do a better job predicting attitude position than it does predicting whether people perceive that their attitudes are moral convictions, and that some …

Available at SSRN 4729529

Some regulations do not only reduce human deaths, injuries, and illnesses; they also protect nonhuman animals. Regulatory Impact Analyses, required by prevailing executive orders, usually do not disclose or explore benefits or costs with respect to nonhuman animals, even when those benefits or costs are significant. This is an inexcusable gap. If a regulation prevents dogs, horses, or cats from being killed or hurt, the benefits should be specified and quantified. This proposition holds even if those benefits are in some sense incidental to the main goal of the regulation. At the same time, turning the relevant benefits into monetary equivalents raises serious challenges, akin to those raised by the valuation of statistical children.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Concern over democratic erosion has led to a proliferation of proposed interventions to strengthen democratic attitudes in the United States. Resource constraints, however, prevent implementing all proposed interventions. One approach to identify promising interventions entails leveraging domain experts, who have knowledge regarding a given field, to forecast the effectiveness of candidate interventions. We recruit experts who develop general knowledge about a social problem (academics), experts who directly intervene on the problem (practitioners), and nonexperts from the public to forecast the effectiveness of interventions to reduce partisan animosity, support for undemocratic practices, and support for partisan violence. Comparing 14,076 forecasts submitted by 1,181 forecasters against the results of a megaexperiment (n = 32,059) that tested 75 hypothesized effects of interventions, we find that both types …

Nature

Type 2 diabetes (T2D) is a heterogeneous disease that develops through diverse pathophysiological processes, and molecular mechanisms that are often specific to cell type,. Here, to characterize the genetic contribution to these processes across ancestry groups, we aggregate genome-wide association study data from 2,535,601 individuals (39.7% not of European ancestry), including 428,452 cases of T2D. We identify 1,289 independent association signals at genome-wide significance (P < 5 × 10−8) that map to 611 loci, of which 145 loci are, to our knowledge, previously unreported. We define eight non-overlapping clusters of T2D signals that are characterized by distinct profiles of cardiometabolic trait associations. These clusters are differentially enriched for cell-type-specific regions of open chromatin, including pancreatic islets, adipocytes, endothelial cells and enteroendocrine cells. We build cluster …

Nature

Author Correction: CEACAM1 regulates TIM-3-mediated tolerance and exhaustion Author Correction: CEACAM1 regulates TIM-3-mediated tolerance and exhaustion Nature. 2024 Feb 9. doi: 10.1038/s41586-024-07164-y. Online ahead of print. Authors Yu-Hwa Huang 1 , Chen Zhu # 2 , Yasuyuki Kondo # 1 , Ana C Anderson 2 , Amit Gandhi 1 , Andrew Russell 3 , Stephanie K Dougan 4 , Britt-Sabina Petersen 5 , Espen Melum 1 6 , Thomas Pertel 2 , Kiera L Clayton 7 , Monika Raab 8 , Qiang Chen 9 , Nicole Beauchemin 10 , Paul J Yazaki 11 , Michal Pyzik 1 , Mario A Ostrowski 7 12 , Jonathan N Glickman 13 , Christopher E Rudd 8 , Hidde L Ploegh 4 , Andre Franke 5 , Gregory A Petsko 3 , Vijay K Kuchroo 2 , Richard S Blumberg 14 Affiliations 1 Division of Gastroenterology, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, 75 Francis Street, Boston, 02115, Massachusetts, USA. 2 …

Nature

화학공학소재연구정보센터(CHERIC) | 연구정보 | 문헌DB | 학술지 검색 화학공학소재연구정보 센터 홈 로그인 로그아웃 연락처 사이트맵 센터 센터소개 회원가입/정보수정 뉴스 공지사항 연구 동향 학회참관기 우수연구자소개 취업정보 연구정보 문헌DB KDB Compound Search 전문연구 정보 동영상 심포지움 자료 연구성과보고서 저널정보 논문 작성법 참고문헌DB 분석기기DB 화학 공정DB PSPDB 연구자지식지도 상태도정보 교육정보 사이버강의-학부 사이버강의-대학원 실무 강좌 강의자료 링크 교육자료 링크 사이버실험실 물성측정실험 매뉴얼 커뮤니티 공학포럼 카페 신진연구자인터뷰 리소스 특허정보 술어DB 관련법령 자격증정보 성과소개서 연구보고서 문헌DB 학술지 검색 학술대회 발표논문집 최신 국내 저널 최신 리뷰페이퍼 KDB Periodic Table of Elements Unit Conversion Universal Constants Pure Component Properties Binary Vapor-Liquid Equil. Data Calculation Modules Research Articles Citing KDB Compound Search …

Nature

EconPapers: Why it was right to reject the Anthropocene as a geological epoch EconPapers Economics at your fingertips EconPapers Home About EconPapers Working Papers Journal Articles Books and Chapters Software Components Authors JEL codes New Economics Papers Advanced Search EconPapers FAQ Archive maintainers FAQ Cookies at EconPapers Format for printing The RePEc blog The RePEc plagiarism page Why it was right to reject the Anthropocene as a geological epoch Mark Maslin (), Matthew Edgeworth, Erle C. Ellis and Philip L. Gibbard Nature, 2024, vol. 629, issue 8010, 41-41 Abstract: Letter to the Editor Keywords: Geology; Environmental sciences; Climate change; Sustainability (search for similar items in EconPapers) Date: 2024 References: Add references at CitEc Citations: Downloads: (external link) https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-01268-1 Abstract (text/html) Access to …

Nature

Trees structure the Earth’s most biodiverse ecosystem, tropical forests. The vast number of tree species presents a formidable challenge to understanding these forests, including their response to environmental change, as very little is known about most tropical tree species. A focus on the common species may circumvent this challenge. Here we investigate abundance patterns of common tree species using inventory data on 1,003,805 trees with trunk diameters of at least 10 cm across 1,568 locations, , , , – in closed-canopy, structurally intact old-growth tropical forests in Africa, Amazonia and Southeast Asia. We estimate that 2.2%, 2.2% and 2.3% of species comprise 50% of the tropical trees in these regions, respectively. Extrapolating across all closed-canopy tropical forests, we estimate that just 1,053 species comprise half of Earth’s 800 billion tropical trees with trunk diameters of at least 10 cm. Despite …

Nature

Angiosperms are the cornerstone of most terrestrial ecosystems and human livelihoods,. A robust understanding of angiosperm evolution is required to explain their rise to ecological dominance. So far, the angiosperm tree of life has been determined primarily by means of analyses of the plastid genome,. Many studies have drawn on this foundational work, such as classification and first insights into angiosperm diversification since their Mesozoic origins, –. However, the limited and biased sampling of both taxa and genomes undermines confidence in the tree and its implications. Here, we build the tree of life for almost 8,000 (about 60%) angiosperm genera using a standardized set of 353 nuclear genes. This 15-fold increase in genus-level sampling relative to comparable nuclear studies provides a critical test of earlier results and brings notable change to key groups, especially in rosids, while substantiating …

Nature

Van der Waals encapsulation of two-dimensional materials in hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) stacks is a promising way to create ultrahigh-performance electronic devices 1, 2, 3, 4. However, contemporary approaches for achieving van der Waals encapsulation, which involve artificial layer stacking using mechanical transfer techniques, are difficult to control, prone to contamination and unscalable. Here we report the transfer-free direct growth of high-quality graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) in hBN stacks. The as-grown embedded GNRs exhibit highly desirable features being ultralong (up to 0.25 mm), ultranarrow (< 5 nm) and homochiral with zigzag edges. Our atomistic simulations show that the mechanism underlying the embedded growth involves ultralow GNR friction when sliding between AA′-stacked hBN layers. Using the grown structures, we demonstrate the transfer-free fabrication of embedded GNR field …

Nature

Scientific evidence regularly guides policy decisions, with behavioural science increasingly part of this process. In April 2020, an influential paper proposed 19 policy recommendations (‘claims’) detailing how evidence from behavioural science could contribute to efforts to reduce impacts and end the COVID-19 pandemic. Here we assess 747 pandemic-related research articles that empirically investigated those claims. We report the scale of evidence and whether evidence supports them to indicate applicability for policymaking. Two independent teams, involving 72 reviewers, found evidence for 18 of 19 claims, with both teams finding evidence supporting 16 (89%) of those 18 claims. The strongest evidence supported claims that anticipated culture, polarization and misinformation would be associated with policy effectiveness. Claims suggesting trusted leaders and positive social norms increased adherence to …

Nature

Topology, – and interactions are foundational concepts in the modern understanding of quantum matter. Their nexus yields three important research directions: (1) the competition between distinct interactions, as in several intertwined phases, (2) the interplay between interactions and topology that drives the phenomena in twisted layered materials and topological magnets, and (3) the coalescence of several topological orders to generate distinct novel phases. The first two examples have grown into major areas of research, although the last example remains mostly unexplored, mainly because of the lack of a material platform for experimental studies. Here, using tunnelling microscopy, photoemission spectroscopy and a theoretical analysis, we unveil a ‘hybrid’ topological phase of matter in the simple elemental-solid arsenic. Through a unique bulk-surface-edge correspondence, we uncover that arsenic features a …

Nature

The Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition in Europe is associated with the regional disappearance of Neanderthals and the spread of Homo sapiens. Late Neanderthals persisted in western Europe several millennia after the occurrence of H. sapiens in eastern Europe1. Local hybridization between the two groups occurred2, but not on all occasions3. Archaeological evidence also indicates the presence of several technocomplexes during this transition, complicating our understanding and the association of behavioural adaptations with specific hominin groups4. One such technocomplex for which the makers are unknown is the Lincombian–Ranisian–Jerzmanowician (LRJ), which has been described in northwestern and central Europe5–8. Here we present the morphological and proteomic taxonomic identification, mitochondrial DNA analysis and direct radiocarbon dating of human remains directly associated …

Nature

The glymphatic movement of fluid through the brain removes metabolic waste, , –. Noninvasive 40 Hz stimulation promotes 40 Hz neural activity in multiple brain regions and attenuates pathology in mouse models of Alzheimer’s disease, , –. Here we show that multisensory gamma stimulation promotes the influx of cerebrospinal fluid and the efflux of interstitial fluid in the cortex of the 5XFAD mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease. Influx of cerebrospinal fluid was associated with increased aquaporin-4 polarization along astrocytic endfeet and dilated meningeal lymphatic vessels. Inhibiting glymphatic clearance abolished the removal of amyloid by multisensory 40 Hz stimulation. Using chemogenetic manipulation and a genetically encoded sensor for neuropeptide signalling, we found that vasoactive intestinal peptide interneurons facilitate glymphatic clearance by regulating arterial pulsatility. Our findings …

Nature

Western Eurasia witnessed several large-scale human migrations during the Holocene, , , –. Here, to investigate the cross-continental effects of these migrations, we shotgun-sequenced 317 genomes—mainly from the Mesolithic and Neolithic periods—from across northern and western Eurasia. These were imputed alongside published data to obtain diploid genotypes from more than 1,600 ancient humans. Our analyses revealed a ‘great divide’ genomic boundary extending from the Black Sea to the Baltic. Mesolithic hunter-gatherers were highly genetically differentiated east and west of this zone, and the effect of the neolithization was equally disparate. Large-scale ancestry shifts occurred in the west as farming was introduced, including near-total replacement of hunter-gatherers in many areas, whereas no substantial ancestry shifts happened east of the zone during the same period. Similarly, relatedness …

Nature

Determining the structure and phenotypic context of molecules detected in untargeted metabolomics experiments remains challenging. Here we present reverse metabolomics as a discovery strategy, whereby tandem mass spectrometry spectra acquired from newly synthesized compounds are searched for in public metabolomics datasets to uncover phenotypic associations. To demonstrate the concept, we broadly synthesized and explored multiple classes of metabolites in humans, including N-acyl amides, fatty acid esters of hydroxy fatty acids, bile acid esters and conjugated bile acids. Using repository-scale analysis,, we discovered that some conjugated bile acids are associated with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Validation using four distinct human IBD cohorts showed that cholic acids conjugated to Glu, Ile/Leu, Phe, Thr, Trp or Tyr are increased in Crohn’s disease. Several of these compounds and …

Nature

Understanding the cellular processes that underlie early lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) development is needed to devise intervention strategies. Here we studied 246,102 single epithelial cells from 16 early-stage LUADs and 47 matched normal lung samples. Epithelial cells comprised diverse normal and cancer cell states, and diversity among cancer cells was strongly linked to LUAD-specific oncogenic drivers. KRAS mutant cancer cells showed distinct transcriptional features, reduced differentiation and low levels of aneuploidy. Non-malignant areas surrounding human LUAD samples were enriched with alveolar intermediate cells that displayed elevated KRT8 expression (termed KRT8+ alveolar intermediate cells (KACs) here), reduced differentiation, increased plasticity and driver KRAS mutations. Expression profiles of KACs were enriched in lung precancer cells and in LUAD cells and signified poor survival …

Nature

Muscle atrophy and functional decline (sarcopenia) are common manifestations of frailty and are critical contributors to morbidity and mortality in older people. Deciphering the molecular mechanisms underlying sarcopenia has major implications for understanding human ageing. Yet, progress has been slow, partly due to the difficulties of characterizing skeletal muscle niche heterogeneity (whereby myofibres are the most abundant) and obtaining well-characterized human samples,. Here we generate a single-cell/single-nucleus transcriptomic and chromatin accessibility map of human limb skeletal muscles encompassing over 387,000 cells/nuclei from individuals aged 15 to 99 years with distinct fitness and frailty levels. We describe how cell populations change during ageing, including the emergence of new populations in older people, and the cell-specific and multicellular network features (at the transcriptomic …

Nature

Myeloid cells are known to suppress antitumour immunity. However, the molecular drivers of immunosuppressive myeloid cell states are not well defined. Here we used single-cell RNA sequencing of human and mouse non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) lesions, and found that in both species the type 2 cytokine interleukin-4 (IL-4) was predicted to be the primary driver of the tumour-infiltrating monocyte-derived macrophage phenotype. Using a panel of conditional knockout mice, we found that only deletion of the IL-4 receptor IL-4Rα in early myeloid progenitors in bone marrow reduced tumour burden, whereas deletion of IL-4Rα in downstream mature myeloid cells had no effect. Mechanistically, IL-4 derived from bone marrow basophils and eosinophils acted on granulocyte-monocyte progenitors to transcriptionally programme the development of immunosuppressive tumour-promoting myeloid cells …

Nature

EconPapers: Urban trees: how to maximize their benefits for humans and the environment EconPapers Economics at your fingertips EconPapers Home About EconPapers Working Papers Journal Articles Books and Chapters Software Components Authors JEL codes New Economics Papers Advanced Search EconPapers FAQ Archive maintainers FAQ Cookies at EconPapers Format for printing The RePEc blog The RePEc plagiarism page Urban trees: how to maximize their benefits for humans and the environment Lina Tang (), Guofan Shao and Peter M. Groffman Nature, 2024, vol. 626, issue 7998, 261-261 Abstract: Letter to the Editor Keywords: Policy; Sustainability; Environmental sciences (search for similar items in EconPapers) Date: 2024 References: Add references at CitEc Citations: Track citations by RSS feed Downloads: (external link) https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-00300-8 Abstract (text/…

Nature

Crop production is a large source of atmospheric ammonia (NH 3), which poses risks to air quality, human health and ecosystems 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. However, estimating global NH 3 emissions from croplands is subject to uncertainties because of data limitations, thereby limiting the accurate identification of mitigation options and efficacy 4, 5. Here we develop a machine learning model for generating crop-specific and spatially explicit NH 3 emission factors globally (5-arcmin resolution) based on a compiled dataset of field observations. We show that global NH 3 emissions from rice, wheat and maize fields in 2018 were 4.3±1.0 Tg N yr− 1, lower than previous estimates that did not fully consider fertilizer management practices 6, 7, 8, 9. Furthermore, spatially optimizing fertilizer management, as guided by the machine learning model, has the potential to reduce the NH 3 emissions by about 38%(1.6±0.4 Tg N yr− 1 …

Nature

Understanding the formation and stabilization mechanisms of soil organic carbon (SOC) is important for managing land carbon (C) and mitigating climate change. Tao et al. 1 reported that microbial C use efficiency (CUE) is the primary determinant of global SOC storage and that the relative impact of plant C inputs on SOC is minor. Although soil microbes undoubtedly play an important role in SOC cycling, we are concerned about the robustness of the approach taken by Tao et al. 1. The potential biases in their analyses may lead to misleading, model-dependent results.An important piece of evidence in support of an empirical relationship between CUE and SOC stems from a meta-analysis based on 132 paired CUE and SOC measurements. Tao et al. 1 applied a linear mixed-effects model to this dataset that included CUE, mean annual temperature (MAT), soil depth and random effects and explained 55% of the …

Nature

Western Eurasia witnessed several large-scale human migrations during the Holocene, , , –. Here, to investigate the cross-continental effects of these migrations, we shotgun-sequenced 317 genomes—mainly from the Mesolithic and Neolithic periods—from across northern and western Eurasia. These were imputed alongside published data to obtain diploid genotypes from more than 1,600 ancient humans. Our analyses revealed a ‘great divide’ genomic boundary extending from the Black Sea to the Baltic. Mesolithic hunter-gatherers were highly genetically differentiated east and west of this zone, and the effect of the neolithization was equally disparate. Large-scale ancestry shifts occurred in the west as farming was introduced, including near-total replacement of hunter-gatherers in many areas, whereas no substantial ancestry shifts happened east of the zone during the same period. Similarly, relatedness …