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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Dark matter, mysterious invisible stuff that makes up most of the mass of galaxies including our own Milky Way, is confounding scientists again, with new observations of distant galaxies conflicting with the current understanding of its nature.
An undated NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows the massive galaxy cluster MACSJ 1206. NASA/ESA/G. Caminha (University of Groningen), M. Meneghetti (Observatory of Astrophysics and Space Science of Bologna), P. Natarajan (Yale University)/The CLASH team and M. Kornmesser/ESA/Hubble/Handout via REUTERS
Research published this week revealed an unexpected discrepancy between observations of dark matter concentrations in three massive clusters of galaxies encompassing trillions of stars and theoretical computer simulations of how dark matter should be distributed.
“Either there is a missing ingredient in the simulations or we have made a fundamental incorrect assumption about the nature of dark matter,” Yale University astrophysicist Priyamvada Natarajan, a co-author of the study published in the journal Science, said on Friday.
Dark matter is the invisible glue that holds stars together inside a galaxy. It also creates an invisible scaffold that enables galaxies to form clusters. But it has very peculiar properties. It does not emit, absorb or reflect light and does not interact with any known particles.
The bulk of the matter in the universe, about 96%, is thought to be dark matter, with ordinary matter - the visible stuff that makes up stars, planets and people - a mere 4%.
Dark matter’s presence is known only through its gravitational pull on visible matter in space. It differs from the similarly enigmatic and unseen dark energy, which is considered a property of space and is driving the universe’s accelerated expansion. Dark energy is repulsive. Dark matter attracts through gravity.
The new study involved observations from the Hubble Space Telescope and the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope in Chile.
When the light from distant sources like faraway galaxies travels through matter such as another galaxy or a cluster of them, the light is deflected and bends - a phenomenon called “gravitational lensing,” said astrophysicist and study lead author Massimo Meneghetti of the Observatory of Astrophysics and Space Science in Bologna and National Institute for Astrophysics in Italy.
The new observations showed that gravitational lensing effects produced by galaxies residing inside the huge galaxy clusters were far stronger than current dark matter theory envisioned, suggesting an unexpectedly large concentration of dark matter in these galaxies.
South Africa: Community beats to death three suspected criminals in Eastern Cape
Three men were beaten to death and their bodies set alight by Rhwantsana villagers on Wednesday, near Cacadu, formerly known as Lady Frere. The men, aged between 25 and 30, were said to have confessed to murder, according to community members. They were interrogated before they were killed.
Provincial police commissioner Lieutenant-General Lizwe Ntshinga strongly condemned the killings.
The vigilantism come after an 85-year-old woman, Notest Lolo, was found dead inside her house on Friday, 4 September. Her daughter, Phathiswa, said she was living alone in a large house. Her children had been trying to reach her since 28 August.
“At first we thought she had a network problem, but after three days we started to panic,” said Phathiswa.
Her sister called neighbours to check on their mother. They found her home padlocked. When they broke in they found her body.
“The blood was already dry. Those who saw her said the murderers tried to cut her neck,” said Phathiswa.
The villagers say that since 2016, nine people have been murdered in their village; most victims were elderly people or young girls. Ward councillor Tozma Mrweni confirmed this.
During the lockdown period, three people were murdered. Police have made no arrests.
Mrwebi said, “Before the death of the old woman, a young girl was raped and killed. No arrest was made.”
Ward committee member Bukiwe Mgwebi said the only police stations are at Queenstown (55km away) and Cofimvaba (40km away), and the village, together with six other villages in ward 1, fall under the Bolotho police station, which is just outside Cofimvaba.
“When we call the police they do not come and for years we have been asking for a mobile police station with no luck. Even this January, we sent a letter asking for a mobile police station,” said Mgwebi.
Before the killings on Wednesday, residents met with police to complain about the lack of policing.
“In that meeting young people told the police that they know the perpetrators and if police can promise to arrest them the same day they will name them. And we believe there were enough police to make the arrests that day,” said Mgwebi. She said there had been nine officers at the meeting.
She said the officer, who addressed them on behalf of the Bolotho police, insulted the villagers and said they were talking nonsense (“intswaqane”).
The meeting then turned sour.
“The young people demanded an apology but the officer refused to apologise and they [police] marched out of our meeting. The young people told them they will look for the criminals, but police ignored them,” she said.
On Thursday morning, villagers went hunting for a fourth suspect.
Police confirmed that three cases of murder were opened. Our other questions went unanswered.
SEPTEMBER 10, 2020, by Jack Parkin, The Conversation
https://techxplore.com/news/2020-09-cashless-payment-booming-coronavirus-financial.html
Credit: Christian Bruna / EPA
A banknote has been sitting in my wallet for six months now. As time ticks on, it burns an ever greater hole in my pocket.
At first I felt uneasy spending it, following COVID-19 warnings to pay more attention to hand hygiene and the surfaces we all touch on a daily basis.
Now I have less and less opportunity to do so. While the World Health Organization has never advised against using cash, more and more businesses are displaying signs that read "We Only Accept Contactless Payment" next to their registers.
A recent global poll conducted by MasterCard—a company with reason to favor card-based payments—found 82% of its users see contactless payments as cleaner than cash.
But while electronic payment may reduce our exposure to germs, it also shows banks, vendors and payment platforms what we do with our money. Social media is awash with posts condemning the forced use of contactless payment for fear of overseers eyeballing spending. Some people are even boycotting stores that won't accept cash.
The growth of digital transactions exposes yet another aspect of our personal life to, what the social psychologist Shoshana Zuboff has called, "surveillance capitalism." Financial data is now a valuable raw material that can be bought, sold and refined in the name of profit.
The decline of cash
When the pandemic began, cash had already been on the decline for years. In Australia, demand for coins fell by more than 50% between 2013 and 2019.
For many people, increasing digitisation is synonymous with progress. It can be seen as a way of leaving the cumbersome, historical artifacts of coins and banknotes behind.
COVID-19 has accelerated this move away from cash. Wariness of microbe-ridden banknotes has seen contactless payment become a spontaneous public health standard.
Because cash is a social material, it moves between us, connecting us both financially and physically. The US Federal Reserve even decided to quarantine dollars returning from Asia earlier this year in an attempt to stop the coronavirus crossing its borders.
Dropping digital breadcrumbs
One perk of paper money is that it does not leave paper trails. Digital money, however, leaves traces in the databases of banks, vendors and platform owners, while governments look keenly over their shoulders.
Tax officials love digital transactions because they make it easier to monitor the nation's economy. Banks and payment platforms are pleased as well: not only do they collect fees and gain the ability to allow or obstruct transactions, they can also profit from the troves of personal data piling up on their servers.
Internally, banks use this data to offer you other bespoke services such as loans and insurance. But information is also aggregated to better understand wider economic trends, and then sold on to third parties.
At the moment, these data metrics are anonymised but that doesn't guard against retailers using de-anonymising techniques to attach transactions back to your identity.
Data brokers exist for this very reason: building digital profiles and creating a marketplace for them. This allows retailers to target you with tailored advertisements based on your spending. The devices at everyone's fingertips become a feedback loop of information in which companies analyze what people have bought and then urge them to buy more.
Can surveillance work on your behalf?
Having records of every transaction can also be useful for individuals. Companies such as Revolut and Monzo offer "spending analytics" services to help customers manage their money by tracking where it goes each month.
While filling virtual baskets or paying by tapping a card does open up transactions for inspection, there are still ways you can protect your health and your data at the same time.
"Virtual cards" like those provided by privacy.com are one useful tool. These services let users create multiple card numbers for different online purchases that conceal consumption patterns from banks and credit card details from merchants.
Cryptocurrencies might also find a new limelight in the pandemic. Hailed as cash for the internet, the inbuilt privacy mechanisms of Bitcoin, Zcash and Monero could work to mask transactions.
However, finding companies that accept them is challenging, and their privacy capabilities are often overstated for everyday users. This is particularly true when using exchanges and third-party wallet software such as Coinbase.
In brick-and-mortar stores, staying under the radar can be more difficult. Prepaid cards are one option—but you'll need to buy the card itself with cash if you want to keep your anonymity fully intact. And that takes us back to square one.
Expert who devoted his life to protecting isolated
Amazon tribes killed by tribesman’s arrow
Brasilia - A top expert on isolated Amazon
tribes in Brazil was killed by an arrow that struck him in the chest as he
approached an indigenous group, friends and a police witness said on Thursday.
Rieli Franciscato, 56, had spent his
career as an official in the government's indigenous affairs agency Funai,
working to set up reservations to protect Brazil's tribes.
On Wednesday, as he moved close to a
hitherto uncontacted indigenous group, he was hit by an arrow above the heart in
the forest near the Uru Eu Wau Wau reservation in the western Brazilian state of
Rondonia near the border with Bolivia.
"He cried out, pulled the arrow from
his chest, ran 50 meters and collapsed, lifeless," a policeman who accompanied
the expedition said in an audio posted on social media.
His death comes at a time when indigenous
people in Brazil are under increasing threat from invasions by illegal land
grabbers, loggers and gold miners, emboldened by the policies of far-right
President Jair Bolsonaro who wants to develop the Amazon and reduce the size of
indigenous reservations.
The leading authority on Brazil's
remaining isolated tribes and a former head of Funai, Sydney Possuelo, said
Bolsonaro had kept his campaign promise to destroy the agency that is meant to
defend rights of indigenous people.
Possuelo said the government had defunded
Funai and left itwithout staff needed for security at its isolated posts just
as increasing land invasions increase the risk of violent clashes.
Brazil's presidency did not immediately
respond to a request for comment. Bolsonaro has repeatedly proposed the need to
integrate the indigenous, who he has described as living "like cave
men," into broader Brazilian society.
"Rieli was a calm, methodical, soft-spoken man who knew the dangers
very well, but he was alone and so he went to ask the police to accompany
him," Possuelo said. The presence of police, Possuelo explained, might
have triggered the attack.
This is not a drill: Gold Tickets really are being hidden for you to find.
As Jelly Belly founder David Klein—aka The Candy Man—gets ready to retire, he’s decided to leave the candy industry with a bang (and a fizz and a pop) by placing Willy Wonka-style golden tickets out into the world for people to hunt for.
David and his partner have started going across the USA and hiding tickets in the form of necklaces in places they come across with an interesting story. Plans are to have multiple treasure hunts for these golden tickets in each state.
You can join one of their treasure hunts at this website. Each treasure hunt is valued at $5,000 and there’s a cost of $49.99 to enter.
The biggest and best part of these treasure hunts? Anyone who joins at least one treasure hunt will be eligible to search for The Ultimate Treasure—the key to one of David’s candy factories and an all-expenses paid trip and education to a candy-making university.
He will add this treasure hunt after all the states have had a chance to play.
“With The Gold Ticket Treasure hunt, our goal is to get people out and about with their families. Grandma and Grandpa can even join with the kids and grandkids,” said David.
We think this is one initiative Willy Wonka and the Oompa Loompas would be proud of.
Jared Kushner in front of the White House, Aug. 14, 2020.President
Donald Trump’s son-in-law and senior advisor Jared Kushner is not
giving up on his efforts to sell the F-35 stealth warplanes to the
United Arab Emirates as part of its peace agreement with Israel. He also
insisted that Israel has agreed to a Palestinian state in return for
the same agreement.
On Wednesday, Kushner went on the record
regarding the administration’s Middle East peace efforts, including next
week’s historic signing of the Abraham Accords on the White House lawn
between the United Arab Emirates and Israel, and the President’s
nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Ambassador
David Friedman and envoys Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt meet wth Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem, June 22, 2018. / Matty
Stern/U.S. Embassy JerusalemKushner was asked
by a reporter: “With regard to talks with the Emirates on the F-35, can
you tell us a little bit about where those discussions stand, and
particularly shed some light on some of the pushback that’s come from
Congress – bipartisan pushback that’s come back on some of the concerns
of selling the F-35 to the Emirates.”
Kushner answered: “Right
now, again, it’s just something that’s being discussed; we’re going
through consultations. President Trump has shown that he’s – that he
understands Israel’s security probably more than any American president
in decades. He’s been a great friend of Israel. He’s made the region
safer. He’s brought America and Israel closer than they’ve ever been
before. And we’re going to, obviously, work with the QME (Israel’s
doctrine of maintaining its Qualitative Military Edge – DI). And we’ll
do what we can do to make sure that we accommodate that circumstance.”
That
was concession talk, then came the sale: “But the United Arab Emirates
is a great military, you know, partner of America. We work together on a
lot of things. They’re right on the border with Iran and have real
threats. And I think that there’s a lot of opportunity to be gained by
working on this. So this is something that we’re discussing very
seriously. And we’ll see what happens as we go through consultations
with the Israelis and with Congress and with other partners.”
F-35I ‘Adir’ fighter jets in formation / Lt. Col. E. / IDFSo
far, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been stubbornly on the
record as opposing the sale of the world’s most advanced warplanes to an
Arab nation, never mind how good its relationship with the US has been.
If Netanyahu is telling Israelis the truth, he would do whatever he can
to push Congress against the deal – which shouldn’t be hard to do in
the Democratic-controlled House.
Kushner shared with the
reporters: “You’re seeing every day new announcements of, you know,
airlines that are looking to fly from Israel to different Arab cities
that traditionally they weren’t allowed to go to. And backwards, you
have a lot of excitement building in the Arab world and Muslim world
with people wanting to go to Israel to visit the tourist sites and to
pray at the Al-Aqsa Mosque. You’re seeing Kosher restaurants opening up
now in Dubai.”
It should be noted that all Muslims who don’t carry
explosive charges are welcome to visit the Temple Mount and even pray
there (unlike Jewish tourists) – since 1967, really. But the kosher
restaurants thing in Abu Dhabi is great news, especially since last time
an Israeli mission arrived there they served them camel.
Kushner
was asked to “shed some light on the status of efforts to get the
Palestinians and Israelis to find some sort of a peace deal and move
forward with the effort that you had put forward several months ago.
Where does that stand?”
And right off the bat, the presidential
son-in-law stated for the record: “You know, Israel agreed to a state
for the Palestinians, and they agreed to a map, which is something that
had never been done before.”
Those two things – arming
an Arab country with weapons that are equal to the IDF’s and claiming
Israel has embraced the idea of a Palestinian state, might constitute
the greatest threat to Israel’s security since Jimmy Carter.
Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas meets with Jason Greenblatt in Ramallah, March 14, 2017. / Flash 90Kushner
waxed nostalgic: “In the first meetings with President Abbas, he said,
‘If you could get Israel to agree to a map, then the rest will be easy
to figure out.’ We did better than that: We got them to agree to a state
with a map and then real granular conditions as to, you know, how
operationally the two people can live together. And so we worked very
carefully on that proposal, which is what we thought would be a fair
place to start from America.”
So, Netanyahu can protest until he’s blue in the face – Jared Kushner says he agreed to a Palestinian State, come and get it.
“Israel
agreed to negotiate on that basis,” Kushner told Wednesday’s
teleconference. “And then the Palestinians rejected it before it even
came out, so before they even knew what was in it. So – and, again,
their strategy has been just to avoid getting into the details on this.
But I think that there’s a real desire in the region to try to see it
resolved and move on.
“And so, you know, the offer still remains
out there for their leadership. The proposal is on the table. We’ve
chosen not to chase them. But the moment that they’re ready to engage,
we believe that we have the ability to make a peace deal between them
and Israel. But we can’t want them to make peace. We can’t want them to
have peace more than they want to have peace.
“So when they’re
really ready for peace, they’ll call us. They know the terms that we
were able to get Israel to agree to negotiate on the basis on. Again, if
they think that the lines are drawn in the wrong place, we should come
and try to come with a counter proposal, and then we’ll see if we can,
you know, bring the two parties together.”
OK, now please try to
use your imagination (and we live in an era that anything you imagine
happens half an hour later): let’s suppose President Trump does not win
the November 3 elections. There are actually reliable indications that
this outlandish prediction could become a reality, seeing as he trails
his Democratic opponent in the national polls as well as in the must-win
states of Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Arizona, all of them
beyond the margin of error. So let’s strain our imagination and ask
ourselves what would happen should, God forbid, President Joe Biden will
be sworn in on January 20 – what do we imagine the new Secretary of
State, Susan Rice, will do with Jared Kushner’s peace efforts? Yes, she
will turn them into demands and bring on the entire weight of the White
House and Congress.
Wouldn’t it be hilarious if Joe Biden receives
the Nobel Peace Prize for creating a Palestinian State? We here in
Israel won’t be able to follow the ceremony so closely, what with the
Palestinian State Qassam rockets falling on Tel Aviv, but still,
wouldn’t be the greatest irony since Jimmy Carter kicked the Shah out of
Iran to make way for an Islamic Republic, or when GW Bush invested a
trillion dollars in enhancing Iranian hegemony over Iraq?
Finally,
just so we all realize the full extent of the damage to Israel from the
son-in-law, a reporter asked him on Wednesday: “Can the diplomatic
relations between Israeli and – Israel and Arab countries put an end to
the Israeli annexation of the Palestinian West Bank territory?”
To
which Kushner responded: And then with regards to annexation … I look
at this much more simplistically, which is: Look, you have a territorial
dispute that basically exists because of – you had, you know, one –
Israel had independence in 1948. You had a war, then you had another war
in ‘67. You had another war in ’73. All were defensive wars. And
obviously, Israel conquered territory. Over years, you’ve had a lot of –
you know, Arab leaders use hatred of Israel as a way to deflect from a
lot of their shortcomings at home. It’s become, you know, a politicized
issue. The Palestinian people were used as pawns. And you have a lot of
claims.
“Now, the reality is, is I – and I showed a graph when I
spoke at the UN, that – you know, that over the course of the
negotiations for the last 25 years, the reason why they never
accomplished anything was because both parties were getting what they
wanted. Every time a negotiation failed, Israel took more land and the
Palestinians got more money from the international community. And the
conflict became a cash cow for the leadership. And, unfortunately, some
of it trickled down to the people, but not enough.
“So the reality
is, today, that a lot of this land is inhabited with Israelis. What we
did with our plan was we were trying to save the two-state solution
because if you – if we kept going with the status quo of what was
happening, ultimately, Israel would have eaten up all the land in the
West Bank.
“And so, right now, you have a situation where there is
land that could become a Palestinian state. It is possible to connect
it, but the land that Israeli settlers are in right now is land that
Israel controls, and the odds of them ever giving it up is unlikely.
That’s why the map that we drew was what we thought was a realistic map
based on the – we played the ball as it lies, right? We took the
realities in the world today and we drew a map based on that, knowing
what was achievable and what was not achievable.
“So, again, you
know, people used the Arab Peace Initiative, and that was a great
effort, but it was in 2002. If that would have worked, then we would
have made peace a long time ago.
“So, you know, we need new points
of reference, and that’s what we have right now. And so, you know,
again, my fear for the Palestinians is that if they do what they’re very
good at doing, which is figure out how to not make a deal and play the
victim card, then what’s going to happen is, you know, more time is
going to go by and the situation is just going to get worse and worse
for them.
“They have an amazing opportunity now, and I really hope
they have the courage and the wisdom to come to the negotiating table,
try to make the best deal for their people, and move forward with
(inaudible). You know, people want to focus on positivity and
opportunity, not on old conflicts.”
OK. Now, did you get from this
lengthy spiel even one word about Israel’s right to some of the Judea
and Samaria territories? I didn’t either. Did you get the feeling
Kushner was using the terminology of the militant left about Israel’s
pattern of behavior in the same territories? I did, too.
Wildlife tourism is amajor source of income and livelihoodfor many rural communities across southern Africa. But it also presents a potential threat to water resources.
Many wildlife tourism lodges in the region are in remote locations where little or no infrastructure exists. They depend on natural sources such as rivers, dams and boreholes for their water needs.
The lack of infrastructure such as housing, roads and public transport in these remote places also means that the staff employed at lodges often reside on the tourism properties. Lodges thus need water not only for tourism operations but for the domestic use of staff members.
But rural residents too need water to secure their livelihoods, such as raising cattle. Lodges’ water use should not be to the detriment of the local communities.
In Southern Africa water resources are becoming stretched because of growing population numbers as well as the reduction in the volume of available good quality water as a result of environmental degradation, erratic rainfall and climatic variability brought on by the effects of climate change.
Tourism ventures need to balance the needs of guests and staff with the needs of surrounding communities. Imbalances in a water-stressed region like southern African could lead to conflict around water use, similar to what has already been experienced in many island states.
Working with wildlife tourism industry role players, our research team recently completed a multi-year study that reviewed the per capita water consumption of guests and staff at more than 30 exclusive luxury wildlife lodges across Namibia, Botswana and South Africa.
Wildlife tourism companies approached the researchers to do an independent review of water quantity and quality across their southern African operations. The results were made available to industry participants. This view of the existing situation would be used to set benchmarks for comparison across the industry.
The research
Our research used the international standard unit of measurement for guest water use namely litres per guest per night. Consumption includes all the activities associated with the lodge operations such as bathing, cleaning, cooking, laundry, gardening and swimming pools.
The average guest consumption across the three countries was 2,073 litres per guest per night. This average consumption is three to four times that of hotels in other countries.
We found that the international standard wasn’t suitable for the wildlife tourism industry in southern African. This is because of the large number of staff who reside on the lodge premises. They add a lot to the total volume of water consumption at the tourist establishments. According to our research, the average water consumption per bed or per capita, when staff consumption is included, was 503 litres per bed per night.
When only guest consumption was considered, the average water use was outrageously high compared to destinations such as Greece, Morocco, Zanzibar, Germany and the USA. But when staff use is included, the average water consumption was similar to the majority of other countries around the world.
We found that water consumption rates by guests and staff at the lodges were excessive compared to the consumption of local communities. For the three southern Africa countries in the study, water consumption by the local communities varied between 88 and 371 litres per person per day, according to The International Benchmarking Network for Water and Sanitation Utilities.
The tourism ventures could be depleting scarce water resources to the detriment of local communities and the wildlife attractions that brought tourism there in the first place.
Going forward
The study proposes water-use benchmarks for the wildlife tourism industry in southern Africa, namely 2,073 litres per guest per night or 503 litres per bed per night. This is based on the average consumption recorded during the study across all the investigated tourism ventures. These benchmarks would need to be reviewed in future as consumption rates come down. The proposed benchmarks, which would be a first, provide targets for the wildlife tourism industry in southern African to aim for.
The benchmarks also serve as a planning tool for future wildlife tourism developments. Developers would be able to ensure that the type and size of developments are appropriate for the available water resources.
Although the proposed benchmarks won’t be monitored or regulated by government at this stage, it’s important for the industry to adhere to them in an attempt to reduce water consumption.
Even though the proposed benchmarks provide some form of water use reduction, wildlife lodges across southern Africa will need to improve their water management in order to reduce their consumption drastically and avert possible water conflict situations in local communities. Wildlife lodges may in the future need to scale down or even close operations during water scarce times to ensure equitable water availability.
The tourism lodges that are relatively well resourced compared to the host rural communities will need to find new ways to reduce, recycle and use alternative sources of water such as rain water harvesting. This may require capital investments.
Guest and staff awareness and education on water use should also become a standard for the tourism industry. Luxury wildlife lodges should always manage their water usage with the local community’s needs in mind.
SEPTEMBER 9, 2020
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-09-russia-virus-vaccine-volunteers-moscow.html
Credit: CC0 Public Domain
Russia on Wednesday began inoculating volunteers in Moscow with the country's new coronavirus vaccine, the capital's deputy mayor said.
Russia announced last month that its vaccine, named "Sputnik V" after the Soviet-era satellite that was the first launched into space in 1957, had already received approval.
"The first participants have already had the vaccination at clinics in the capital," Deputy Mayor Anastasia Rakova, responsible for social development, said in a statement.
The vaccine project is financed by Russia's sovereign wealth fund, the Russian Direct Investment Fund.
The vaccine was developed by the Gamaleya research institute in Moscow in coordination with the Russian defence ministry.
High-profile Russians have already been vaccinated, including President Vladimir Putin's daughter, nationalist politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky and Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin.
Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday that the president would "inform you about it himself" if he decided to get vaccinated.
The Moscow city government website said 40,000 people from the capital can receive the vaccine, given in two doses with a 21-day interval.
The site says they are taking part in a "post-registration study" of the vaccine.
Those volunteering must not have had COVID-19 or recent contact with anyone ill and must not be pregnant or trying for a baby.
Rakova said that more than 35,000 Muscovites had already applied online.
The Moscow city's website says that volunteers will be closely monitored via a specially created app.
Russia will also make the vaccine available shortly for people in high-risk groups: medics and teachers, who will receive it on a voluntary basis and will also be monitored.
Russia raised concerns among Western scientists by announcing that the vaccine had received approval before full clinical trials has been completed.
Patients in early trials involving 76 people all developed antibodies, according to research published in The Lancet medical journal last week, while experts said the trials were too small to prove safety and effectiveness.
The phase three trials, which the health ministry said began on Wednesday, are more rigorous and include some volunteers receiving a placebo. These will take part in several countries, according to the vaccine's website.
Russia has said it is ready to manufacture 500 million doses of vaccine per year.
The country has confirmed more than 1 million coronavirus cases and 18,305 people have died.
Moscow's infection rate has been relatively stable in recent months with 642 new cases confirmed Wednesday.
SEPTEMBER 10, 2020
https://phys.org/news/2020-09-germany-1st-case-swine-fever.html
Julia Kloeckner, Federal Minister of Food and Agriculture, speaks at a press conference. Following a suspected case of African swine fever in Brandenburg, the Minister informed about the results of the analysis after examining a sample of the carcass. The animal disease has been detected for the first time in Germany, Kloeckner confirmed.
(Kay Nietfeld/dpa via AP)
Germany has confirmed the first case of African swine fever on its territory, after a wild boar cadaver found in the eastern state of Brandenburg tested positive, the country's agriculture minister said Thursday.
African swine fever is usually deadly for pigs but doesn't affect humans. It has previously been confirmed in several European countries, leading to large-scale culls of wild boars and farmed pigs they have come into contact with.
Agriculture Minister Julia Kloeckner said authorities have prepared for the eventuality of a case occurring in Germany and will be imposing measures to prevent a possible spread of the disease from the Spree-Neisse region near the Polish border where the boar was found Wednesday.
The measures will include limiting the movement of people and vehicles out of the affected region, bans on farming and targeted culling of wild boars, she said.
German farmers had been dreading the arrival of swine fever, considered almost inevitable, because of the impact it will have on the pork industry.
Kloeckner said trade in German pork products will continue for now.
BUSINESS NEWS, Reporting by Jennifer Hiller in Houston; Editing by David Gaffen and Marguerita Choy, SEPTEMBER 8, 2020
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-shale-permits-election-focus/u-s-shale-producers-race-for-federal-permits-ahead-of-presidential-election-idUSKBN25Z0KV
FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump is greeted by Permian High School Football Player Harper Terry as he arrives at Midland International Air and Space Port in Midland, Texas, U.S., July 29, 2020. REUTERS/Carlos Barria/File Photo
Federal permitting in the largest U.S. oilfield in the Permian Basin, located in Texas and New Mexico, is up 80% in about the last three months, which analysts attribute to a hedge against a win by Biden, who currently leads U.S. President Donald Trump by several points in national polling.
Biden has stated that he does not want to ban fracking outright, putting him at odds with many environmentalists and Democratic party activists.
However, his climate plan includes banning new oil and gas permits on public lands, which industry groups say would hurt the economy and cut off an energy boom that has made the United States the world’s largest crude oil producer.
The shale revolution of recent years boosted U.S. crude output to roughly 12 million barrels per day (bpd) last year through hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, which is environmentally controversial as it involves pumping water, sand and chemicals into rock at high pressure to release oil or natural gas.
As of Aug. 24, producers have received 974 permits so far this year for new wells on federal land in the Permian, compared with 1,068 for all of last year and 265 in 2018, according to data firm Enverus.
In the 90 days up till Aug. 24, producers received 404 permits in the Permian, compared with 225 and 11 in the same period in 2019 and 2018, respectively.
The scramble for permits comes despite the weak outlook for oil drilling and prices due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
Crude prices LCOc1 plunged in spring following the outbreak and have remained stuck near $40 a barrel. The number of oil and gas rigs drilling new wells in the United States hit record lows for 15 weeks and last week was 71% lower year-on-year, according to Baker Hughes data, and analysts do not expect a sharp rebound for some time.
Uncertainty about a ban and other possible regulatory changes, including a proposal to modify royalties to account for climate costs, mean more permits will be filed ahead of the election, said Bernadette Johnson, vice president at Enverus.
The industry has raced to file for permits before ahead of potential regulatory changes.
In Colorado in 2018, as voters considered a proposition to increase the distance required between new wells and buildings, permitting jumped 165% in the last six months of the year compared with the first half, according to Enverus. At least nine producers stockpiled more than two years’ worth of permits.
EOG Resources Inc, Cimarex Energy Co, Matador Resources Co and Devon Energy Corp are among the shale producers who have said they expect to have years of drilling permits.
Devon is “proactively managing risks” by stockpiling more than 550 federal permits in New Mexico and Wyoming, Chief Executive Officer Dave Hager told analysts this month.
Most producers have “a runway of 12 to 18 months” in permits in the Permian and Wyoming’s Powder River Basin, said Jake Roberts at energy investment bank Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co.
Federal permits are for two years and can be extended another two, but there is no guarantee that routine permit extensions would continue in the future, Cimarex CEO Tom Jorden said on an earnings call in August.
U.S. oil production remains below 2019’s peak and analysts expect it will be slow to recover in the coming year, as shale production depends on new investment due to the short life of the wells drilled.
LAND OF ENCHANTMENT
The race for permits has centered on the part of the Permian located in New Mexico, said Artem Abramov, head of shale research at Rystad Energy.
About 85% of well permits there have been on federal lands this year, up from 60% in 2018 and 2019 - evidence of companies trying to “fast track” permits on federal acreage, Abramov said. Meanwhile, permits on state and private lands, which features similar geology, have fallen.
New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, has said she would ask for a waiver exempting it from any drilling bans. The state is one of the nation’s poorest, and a third of the state’s budget comes from oil and gas revenues. Around 65% of New Mexico production is on federal acreage.
Matador and EOG have been two of the most aggressive in adding federal permits in New Mexico.
Matador expects to have 300 federal permits by late 2020.
“We think the chances of them saying you can’t drill on your leasehold are fairly slim,” CEO Joseph Foran told analysts in July.
Its new federal permits in two key New Mexico counties that are among the most prolific in the Permian Basin are up 149% so far this year, compared with its 2019 total, according to Rystad.
EOG’s permits in those same New Mexico counties, Eddy and Lea, are up 49% so far this year compared with all of 2019, according to Rystad.
EOG has 2,500 permits on federal lands in four states approved or in the works, enough for four years, Chief Operating Officer Lloyd Helms said on an earnings call.
The industry has secured so many permits that investors and analysts have largely shrugged off the political risks of a federal fracking ban.
“I’m not sure if it would have the big impact that people are making it out to be,” said Rob Thummel, energy portfolio manager at Tortoise Capital.
Innovators at an Indiana university hope their new technology can help transform paper sheets from a notebook into a music player interface and make food packaging interactive.
Purdue engineers developed a simple printing process that renders any paper or cardboard packaging into a keyboard, keypad, or other easy-to-use human-machine interfaces.
“This is the first time a self-powered paper-based electronic device is demonstrated,” said Ramses Martinez, an assistant professor in Purdue’s School of Industrial Engineering and in the Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering in Purdue’s College of Engineering.
“We developed a method to render paper repellent to water, oil, and dust by coating it with highly fluorinated molecules.
This omniphobic coating allows us to print multiple layers of circuits onto paper without getting the ink to smear from one layer to the next one.”
Martinez said this innovation facilitates the fabrication of vertical pressure sensors that do not require any external battery, since they harvest the energy from their contact with the user.
This technology is compatible with conventional large-scale printing processes and could easily be implemented to rapidly convert conventional cardboard packaging or paper into smart packaging or a smart human-machine interface.
“I envision this technology to facilitate the user interaction with food packaging, to verify if the food is safe to be consumed, or enabling users to sign the package that arrives at home by dragging their finger over the box to properly identify themselves as the owner of the package,” Martinez said.
“Additionally, our group demonstrated that simple paper sheets from a notebook can be transformed into music player interfaces for users to choose songs, play them and change their volume.”
(WATCH this brilliant piece of technology in action below.)
Jared Kushner in front of the White House, Aug. 14, 2020.
