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Category: Science

  • MIL-OSI Global: Syria faces renewed sectarian violence as government fails to deliver inclusivity

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Katya Alkhateeb, Senior Researcher in International Human Rights Law & Humanitarian Law at Essex Law School and Human Rights Centre, University of Essex

    A recent surge in violence against Syria’s Druze religious community has reportedly seen over 100 people killed since the start of May. This is a grim extension of sectarian targeting that began with the massacre of Alawite civilians in March.

    Both crises are grounded in the same religious justifications, revealing problems in Syria’s transition following the end of the Assad family’s 53-year rule.

    Specifically these atrocities are linked by the misuse of nafir aam – a general call to arms or mass mobilisation. It is an Arabic term rooted in classical Islamic jurisprudence, especially in discussions about jihad and collective defence.

    It is declared only when the Muslim community faces an existential threat, such as an invasion or overwhelming danger from an enemy.

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    Recently though, it has been used by extremist groups such as Islamic State and al-Qaeda to summon Muslims to fight supposed enemies of the faith. These enemies have, in most cases, been innocent civilians.

    In March, when gunmen loyal to Syria’s former leader Bashar al-Assad (who is an Alawite) clashed with security forces, the transitional government issued a nafir aam. Loudspeakers in mosques across northern Syria broadcast mobilisation calls, tribal groups pledged support, and recruitment links flooded social media.

    The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that close to 1,400 Alawite civilians were subsequently murdered, with the final death toll likely to be much higher.

    A post on the Telegram channel of Syria’s ruling Hayat Tahrir al-Sham organisation reading: ‘General mobilisation now being announced via loudspeakers in Idlib and Aleppo toward the coast. Listen to the important and urgent announcement directly.’
    Telegram

    The same sectarian machinery has now been turned against the Druze. This latest wave of violence was triggered by the unproven allegation that a Druze cleric was responsible for an audio recording containing anti-Islamic remarks. Despite the cleric’s immediate denial, armed groups launched assaults on Druze areas near Syria’s capital, Damascus.

    Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, vowed to protect the Druze and the Israeli military subsequently carried out a series of airstrikes across Syria. These included strikes near the presidential palace. While Netanyahu has positioned these actions as protecting a vulnerable minority, they risk further destabilising Syria’s fragile transition.

    Deeply entrenched sectarianism

    Syria’s transitional government is led by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). Following its campaign against Assad, HTS has been implementing a new policy of tolerance towards minority groups. The Syrian president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, has vowed to protect minorities and pursue more inclusive policies.

    But HTS is arguably failing to deliver the inclusive governance it promised when seizing control of the country in December 2024. The seven-member committee for the national dialogue conference, which began in February to discuss a new path for the nation, lacked Alawite, Kurdish and Druze representation.

    The resulting constitutional declaration offered no explicit protections for Syria’s religious diversity. It also centralises power in ways that undermine pluralism.

    Article 3 of the constitutional declaration states that the “religion of the president of the republic is Islam” and “Islamic jurisprudence is the principal source of legislation”. Officials have clarified that any future parliament would remain subordinate to Islamic law.

    The ideological basis and policy for sectarian violence in Syria remains deeply entrenched. A 14th-century fatwa (a religious edict) by Sunni Muslim scholar Ibn Taymiyyah branded Alawites as “infidels”. This fatwa continues to circulate in areas under government control.

    At the Brussels donors’ conference on Syria in March, Syrian foreign minister Asaad al-Shibani blamed “54 years of minority rule” for mass displacement and deaths – raising concerns about sectarian narratives. And the integrity of the investigation into the recent massacres have been questioned, notably by the Syrians for Truth and Justice human rights group.

    Criticisms have also been made over the inclusion of controversial figures to the newly formed Civil Peace Committee, which is tasked with healing the sectarian wounds left by Assad family rule. One of these figures, Sheikh Anas Ayrout, was reported 12 years ago to have made inciting comments against Alawites.

    Civil society organisations, including the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, have called on the government to issue protective religious rulings for minority communities. But their appeals have gone unanswered. And violence, particularly against Alawites in Homs and Aleppo, has surged dramatically.

    Five months after Assad’s fall, it seems that Syria is not witnessing the long hoped for fruition of its 2011 revolution, where pro-democracy protests swept through the country, but rather its continuing unravelling.

    The groups now in power had little to do with the revolution’s early democratic hopes. They have emerged from transnational jihadist networks with a radically different vision for Syria’s future.

    In the view of prominent Syrian intellectual Yassin al-Haj Saleh, Syria urgently needs a period of de-escalation and genuine political concessions. He argues for “taking two or three steps back … to move more firmly forward”. Political solutions must precede the creation of public institutions, not the other way around.

    If the cycle of sectarian violence is not broken, Syria risks sliding deeper into communal bloodshed that could permanently fracture the nation’s social fabric.

    The international community must act decisively. It has to apply concrete political pressure that makes the protection of all Syrians – regardless of sect – a non-negotiable foundation for Syria’s path forward.

    The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Syria faces renewed sectarian violence as government fails to deliver inclusivity – https://theconversation.com/syria-faces-renewed-sectarian-violence-as-government-fails-to-deliver-inclusivity-255974

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How the weather got ‘stuck’ over the UK – and produced an unusually dry and warm spring

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Simon H. Lee, Lecturer in Atmospheric Science, University of St Andrews

    Wildfires have ignited in forests and on moorland across the UK in recent months. LSP EM/Shutterstock

    A “blocking” weather system lingering high above the UK has produced one of the driest, warmest and brightest starts to spring on record.

    April 2025 was the sunniest since records began in 1910. This followed the third-sunniest March, and both months saw temperatures well above average nationwide. On May 1, the temperature reached 29.3°C in Kew Gardens in London – a new record for the date.

    Meteorologists are warning of the potential for a summer drought, as the UK has seen roughly half its usual amount of rainfall for March and April. While farmers fret about this year’s harvest, some water companies are urging customers to help reservoir levels recover by limiting water use.

    Meanwhile, wildfires have engulfed forest and moorland in areas of Scotland, Wales and England.

    Most of the UK has experienced a record-dry spring so far.
    Met Office

    For several weeks, a stubborn area of high pressure over the UK has diverted the usual flow of mild, moist air from the North Atlantic like a boulder in a river. This is known as a blocking weather system.

    Within it, air descends, warms and dries, which is why this weather pattern tends to be linked to heatwaves and drought. Blocking is usually persistent, making it seem like the weather is stuck.

    Here’s how climate change may have played a role in setting up this unusual spring.

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    The human fingerprint

    The warming climate means that unusually warm weather is occurring more often and becoming more intense. At the same time, we can expect more periods of both severe drought and extreme rainfall. Sudden changes from drought to deluge, termed “weather whiplash”, are due to the intensification of the water cycle in a warmer atmosphere that can hold more water vapour.

    However, certain weather patterns are necessary to produce extreme weather. More blocking events in future could increase the chance of heatwaves or drought. But are blocking weather patterns becoming more common?

    It’s difficult to determine how weather patterns will change as a result of the rising concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which is predominantly caused by the burning of fossil fuels.

    Part of the difficulty arises from the fact that weather patterns vary year to year. Several years in a row with more blocking events than usual could make it seem like blocking is increasing due to climate change, but it could simply be down to chance.

    As a result, it is difficult to detect the fingerprint of human activity from weather observations alone. For example, blocking weather patterns over Greenland during summer have happened more often in recent decades, which can enhance the melting of the ice sheet. But it isn’t clear that this trend is the result of human-induced climate change.

    Climate models do suggest future changes in the occurrence of blocking, however. These computer simulations, consisting of equations that describe the fundamental physics of the atmosphere, are the main tool scientists use to perform experiments that parse how the climate will behave in future.

    The blocking system is visible in the area of high pressure over Britain and Ireland.
    National Centers for Environmental Prediction/National Center for Atmospheric Research/NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory, CC BY

    When scientists run climate model simulations with increased greenhouse gas concentrations the results consistently show a decrease in blocking events. But blocking generally happens more often in real life than model simulations, which reduces the confidence scientists have in future projections.

    Keeping track of the jet stream

    The movement of weather systems in Earth’s mid-latitudes – including over the UK – is linked to the jet stream, which is a fast-flowing river of air driven by the contrast in temperature between the poles and mid-latitudes.

    Some researchers have suggested that, because the Arctic is warming faster than the tropics, the jet stream may weaken and become more “wavy”, increasing the occurrence of blocking events, contrary to what most climate models show.

    Outside of the scientific community, this idea has become popular. However, the hypothesis remains controversial among scientists, and observational evidence has weakened in recent years.

    In fact, tens of kilometres above the Earth’s surface, near commercial aircraft cruising altitudes, the opposite trends are occurring: the temperature difference between the Arctic and mid-latitudes is increasing, acting to increase the strength of the jet stream.

    There are considerable challenges with understanding how climate change is affecting the large-scale atmospheric patterns which drive the weather we experience. These include large natural variability and imperfect climate models. Models mostly suggest a decline in blocking events with climate change, though this remains relatively uncertain compared with other aspects of the science.

    Overall, we can be confident that climate change is bringing warmer conditions in all seasons. Scientists also have strong evidence to suggest that drought conditions will become more common. These changes are already affecting food production, energy generation and water availability and these impacts will continue to worsen with climate change.

    Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?

    Get a weekly roundup in your inbox instead. Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. Join the 45,000+ readers who’ve subscribed so far.

    Simon H. Lee has received funding from the Natural Environment Research Council and the National Science Foundation.

    Matthew Patterson receives funding from the Natural Environment Research Council in the UK via the the National Centre for Atmospheric Science.

    – ref. How the weather got ‘stuck’ over the UK – and produced an unusually dry and warm spring – https://theconversation.com/how-the-weather-got-stuck-over-the-uk-and-produced-an-unusually-dry-and-warm-spring-255987

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: AI can guess racial categories from heart scans – they’re detecting bias not biological differences

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Tiarna Lee, Doctoral Candidate, School of Biomedical Engineering & Imaging Sciences, King’s College London

    Radiological imaging/Shutterstock

    Imagine an AI model that can use a heart scan to guess what racial category you’re likely to be put in – even when it hasn’t been told what race is, or what to look for. It sounds like science fiction, but it’s real.

    My recent study, which I conducted with colleagues, found that an AI model could guess whether a patient identified as Black or white from heart images with up to 96% accuracy – despite no explicit information about racial categories being given.

    It’s a striking finding that challenges assumptions about the objectivity of AI and highlights a deeper issue: AI systems don’t just reflect the world – they absorb and reproduce the biases built into it.

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    First, it’s important to be clear: race is not a biological category. Modern genetics shows there is more variation within supposed racial groups than between them.

    Race is a social construct, a set of categories invented by societies to classify people based on perceived physical traits and ancestry. These classifications don’t map cleanly onto biology, but they shape everything from lived experience to access to care.

    Despite this, many AI systems are now learning to detect, and potentially act on, these social labels, because they are built using data shaped by a world that treats race as if it were biological fact.

    AI systems are already transforming healthcare. They can analyse chest X-rays, read heart scans and flag potential issues faster than human doctors – in some cases, in seconds rather than minutes. Hospitals are adopting these tools to improve efficiency, reduce costs and standardise care.

    Bias isn’t a bug – it’s built in

    But no matter how sophisticated, AI systems are not neutral. They are trained on real-world data – and that data reflects real-world inequalities, including those based on race, gender, age, and socioeconomic status. These systems can learn to treat patients differently based on these characteristics, even when no one explicitly programs them to do so.

    One major source of bias is imbalanced training data. If a model learns primarily from lighter skinned patients, for example, it may struggle to detect conditions in people with darker skin.
    Studies in dermatology have already shown this problem.

    Even language models like ChatGPT aren’t immune: one study found evidence that some models still reproduce outdated and false medical beliefs, such as the myth that Black patients have thicker skin than white patients.

    Sometimes AI models appear accurate, but for the wrong reasons – a phenomenon called shortcut learning. Instead of learning the complex features of a disease, a model might rely on irrelevant but easier to spot clues in the data.

    Imagine two hospital wards: one uses scanner A to treat severe COVID-19 patients, another uses scanner B for milder cases. The AI might learn to associate scanner A with severe illness – not because it understands the disease better, but because it’s picking up on image artefacts specific to scanner A.

    Now imagine a seriously ill patient is scanned using scanner B. The model might mistakenly classify them as less sick – not due to a medical error, but because it learned the wrong shortcut.

    This same kind of flawed reasoning could apply to race. If there are differences in disease prevalence between racial groups, the AI could end up learning to identify race instead of the disease – with dangerous consequences.

    In the heart scan study, researchers found that the AI model wasn’t actually focusing on the heart itself, where there were few visible differences linked to racial categories. Instead, it drew information from areas outside the heart, such as subcutaneous fat as well as image artefacts – unwanted distortions like motion blur, noise, or compression that can degrade image quality. These artefacts often come from the scanner and can influence how the AI interprets the scan.

    In this study, Black participants had a higher-than-average BMI, which could mean they had more subcutaneous fat, though this wasn’t directly investigated. Some research has shown that Black individuals tend to have less visceral fat and smaller waist circumference at a given BMI, but more subcutaneous fat. This suggests the AI may have been picking up on these indirect racial signals, rather than anything relevant to the heart itself.

    This matters because when AI models learn race – or rather, social patterns that reflect racial inequality – without understanding context, the risk is that they may reinforce or worsen existing disparities.

    This isn’t just about fairness – it’s about safety.

    Solutions

    But there are solutions:

    Diversify training data: studies have shown that making datasets more representative improves AI performance across groups – without harming accuracy for anyone else.

    Build transparency: many AI systems are considered “black boxes” because we don’t understand how they reach their conclusions. The heart scan study used heat maps to show which parts of an image influenced the AI’s decision, creating a form of explainable AI that helps doctors and patients trust (or question) results – so we can catch when it’s using inappropriate shortcuts.

    Treat race carefully: researchers and developers must recognise that race in data is a social signal, not a biological truth. It requires thoughtful handling to avoid perpetuating harm.

    AI models are capable of spotting patterns that even the most trained human eyes might miss. That’s what makes them so powerful – and potentially so dangerous. It learns from the same flawed world we do. That includes how we treat race: not as a scientific reality, but as a social lens through which health, opportunity and risk are unequally distributed.

    If AI systems learn our shortcuts, they may repeat our mistakes – faster, at scale and with less accountability. And when lives are on the line, that’s a risk we cannot afford.

    Tiarna Lee receives funding from the EPSRC.

    – ref. AI can guess racial categories from heart scans – they’re detecting bias not biological differences – https://theconversation.com/ai-can-guess-racial-categories-from-heart-scans-theyre-detecting-bias-not-biological-differences-254416

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Is matcha a healthier alternative to coffee? Here’s what you need to know

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Anthony Booker, Reader in Ethnopharmacology, University of Westminster

    Ekateryna Zubal/Shutterstock

    Matcha, with its vibrant green hue and centuries-old tradition, is often celebrated as a health boosting superfood. But what exactly sets it apart from regular green tea, or even your morning coffee?

    Like green and black tea, matcha comes from
    the camellia sinensis plant. The difference lies in how it’s grown and processed. While black tea is fermented and regular green tea is simply dried, matcha is shade-grown for several weeks before harvest.

    This unique method alters the plant’s chemistry, boosting certain compounds like chlorophyll and amino acids and giving matcha its distinct flavour and rich green colour. The leaves are then dried and finely ground into a powder – hence its name, which literally translates to “powdered tea” in Japanese.

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    Although widely associated with Japanese culture and Zen tea ceremonies, matcha actually originated in China. It was brought to Japan in the 12th century by Buddhist monks, who used it to support meditation. Over time, it became a staple in Japanese tea culture, especially in formal tea ceremonies.

    From a health perspective, matcha offers many of the same benefits as green tea – thanks to its high content of polyphenols, including flavonoids, which are known antioxidants. However, because the leaves are consumed whole in powdered form, matcha may provide a more concentrated dose of these beneficial compounds.

    Lots of potential, relatively little research

    Matcha is touted for its wide range of potential health benefits: antioxidant, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, anti-obesity and even anti-cancer effects, as well as potential improvements in brain function, stress relief, heart health and blood sugar regulation.

    But there’s a catch: most of the evidence supporting these claims comes from lab studies (on cells or animals), not robust clinical trials in humans. So while the early research is promising, it’s far from conclusive.

    One thing we do know: matcha contains caffeine – more than regular green tea, though typically less than coffee. Caffeine itself has well documented health benefits when consumed in moderation, including improved focus, mood, metabolism and even reduced risk of certain diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.

    But high doses can cause side effects like insomnia, anxiety and elevated blood pressure. The “more is better” approach doesn’t apply here, and the optimal dose of caffeine remains unclear.

    When comparing matcha to coffee, both offer similar antioxidant properties and cardiovascular benefits. However, coffee has been studied more extensively, with clearer guidelines: three to four cups a day appears to be a safe upper limit for most people.

    For matcha, the guidance is slightly more conservative, with sources suggesting one to three cups a day, probably due to the higher levels of polyphenols.



    Read more:
    All the reasons a cup of coffee really can be good for you

    Tannins and polyphenols in both tea and coffee can interfere with iron absorption, especially from plant-based foods. Drinking large amounts regularly, particularly around mealtimes, may increase the risk of iron-deficiency anaemia.

    That’s why it’s recommended to enjoy these beverages at least two hours before or after meals, especially for people who follow a predominantly plant-based diet or are already prone to low iron levels.

    Jitter-free

    Another consideration: both coffee and matcha are mildly acidic and can cause digestive discomfort or reflux in people with sensitive stomachs. That said, matcha may be a better choice for some. Unlike coffee, it contains L-theanine, an amino acid that promotes relaxation and may counteract the jittery effects of caffeine, making it a gentler alternative for people prone to anxiety.

    Both matcha and coffee have potential health benefits and the right choice depends on your personal needs and preferences. Coffee is better studied and may be ideal for those who tolerate caffeine well and enjoy several cups a day. Matcha, on the other hand, is a great option for those looking to consume less caffeine while still benefiting from antioxidants – and without the crash or jitters.

    Just remember to enjoy either in moderation, especially if you’re managing iron levels or digestive issues.

    Anthony Booker does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Is matcha a healthier alternative to coffee? Here’s what you need to know – https://theconversation.com/is-matcha-a-healthier-alternative-to-coffee-heres-what-you-need-to-know-255729

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Medetomidine: what you need to know about the animal sedative turning up in opioid deaths

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Paul Chazot, Professor of Pharmacology, Durham University

    Michael O’Keene/Shutterstock.com

    The opioid crisis, increasingly driven by synthetic opioids, continues to claim tens of thousands of lives annually in the US alone. Similar crises have arisen all over the western world.

    The crisis has become more complex as powerful synthetic opioids like fentanyl, nitazenes and oxycodone are now being “cut” (mixed) with other drugs that slow brain activity, including animal tranquillisers.

    The emergence of medetomidine as a new contaminant in the US illicit drug market signals a worrying development in this escalating crisis. When public health officials in Philadelphia first began testing for the drug in May last year, medetomidine was found in 29% of fentanyl samples analysed. Six months later, the drug was found in 87% of fentanyl samples.

    Medetomidine, a drug approved only for veterinary use as a sedative and painkiller, has increasingly been implicated in illicit fentanyl-related overdoses.

    Get your news from actual experts, straight to your inbox. Sign up to our daily newsletter to receive all The Conversation UK’s latest coverage of news and research, from politics and business to the arts and sciences. Join The Conversation for free today.

    Like xylazine – another veterinary tranquilliser recently detected in street drugs – it is believed that medetomidine is added to fentanyl to boost its euphoric effects and hence make it more appealing to users. However, medetomidine is even more potent and longer-lasting than xylazine.

    An overdose of medetomidine can cause extreme sleepiness, very low blood pressure, slow heart rate, trouble breathing (respiratory failure), and even coma or death. This is because medetomidine rapidly depresses the central nervous system and slows the heart rate significantly.

    When medetomidine is used with opioids, the risk is even greater because both drugs can slow breathing, and together they can make it much worse.

    Overdose-reversing drugs

    Police and paramedics use naloxone to reverse fentanyl overdoses. But if the drug is mixed with medetomidine, naloxone won’t work because medetomidine affects the body in a different way.

    Naloxone won’t reverse the effects of animal tranquillisers.
    oasisamuel / Shutterstock.com

    Atipamezole can reverse the effects of medetomidine – such as sedation, slowed breathing and slowed heart rate – but it’s only been tested in dogs. The US Food and Drug Administration has not approved the drug for human use.

    Overdoses from fentanyl and high-potency nitazenes are also common in the UK and across Europe. The spread of medetomidine in street drugs in other parts of the world needs urgent attention.

    The first death in the UK involving xylazine was reported by the National Programme on Substance Abuse Deaths in December 2022. Between April 2023 and January 2024, 17 cases were reported in the UK, in a range of opioid tablets and powders, including codeine, tramadol and heroin.

    So far, no confirmed cases involving medetomidine have been reported in the UK. If trends in the US are reliable indicators, the UK may face similar challenges soon.

    Paul Chazot does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Medetomidine: what you need to know about the animal sedative turning up in opioid deaths – https://theconversation.com/medetomidine-what-you-need-to-know-about-the-animal-sedative-turning-up-in-opioid-deaths-256015

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Deadly blood clots, risky treatments: The high-stakes battle against deep vein thrombosis in sports and beyond

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Peter Anthony Andrisani, PhD Candidate, Medical Sciences, McMaster University

    Seven-time NBA all-star Damian Lillard, 34, recently joined a growing list of NBA athletes to be sidelined by a diagnosis of deep-vein thrombosis, or DVT.

    The Milwaukee Bucks player joins Victor Wembanyama, 21, a rising star in the NBA who was diagnosed with the life-threatening condition earlier this season, along with Chris Bosh and Brandon Ingram, who were also sidelined with DVT during their careers.

    DVT in athletes

    DVT is caused by blood clots in the veins of the arms or legs. The condition is commonly associated with age, decreased mobility, obesity, some estrogen-containing medications and smoking, among other factors. Repetitive arm action above the head, like throwing a basketball, can also increase the risk of DVT.

    Typically, DVT causes swelling, pain and bruising in the affected limb. DVT on its own is not lethal, but left untreated, it can have serious consequences.

    Without treatment, pieces of blood clots that cause DVT can break off and travel to the lungs in a condition called pulmonary embolism (PE), which can result in severe damage to the lungs. Both DVT and PE are venous thromboembolic diseases, which are the third most common cause of deaths associated with the vascular system after heart attack and stroke.

    Tennis superstar Serena Williams developed PE twice. Like many people who develop it, she had trouble breathing, shortness of breath and chest pain.

    Although it might be scary to be diagnosed with DVT or PE, there are effective medicines to treat the conditions.

    My lab’s research focuses on identifying new blood-thinning drugs to treat blood-clotting conditions like DVT and stroke. Surgery and blood thinners are often combined to combat DVT and PE by removing the original blood clot and reducing the chances of a new clot forming.

    Despite their name, blood thinners do not literally make blood thinner. Instead, they make it harder for blood clots to form. Three general classes of blood thinners can be prescribed for DVT and PE: vitamin K antagonists such as warfarin, heparin and direct oral anticoagulants.

    Despite the help blood thinners provide, they create risks of their own, as they can increase the risk of bleeding, because blood clotting is a normal and necessary physiological process.

    Clot risks vs. bleeding risks

    Taking blood thinners is like walking a tightrope. The person taking the blood thinner is in a constant state of balance between preventing abnormal blood clots and excessive bleeding, which depends on the strength of the blood thinner. If you lean too far in either direction, you might fall off the tightrope, with serious consequences.

    The challenges of managing bleeding risk while preventing DVT was amplified in the case of Williams. Immediately after delivering her second child, Williams underwent a PE event and was placed on intravenous heparin. While heparin did prevent blood clots, Williams did have significant bleeding at the site of her C-section.

    The risk of bleeding often extends past the hospital. Typically, blood thinners are given to people with DVT for months, even years, to prevent ongoing risk of clot formation. The risk of bleeding persists as long as the person is taking the drug.

    Athletes on blood thinners playing contact sports are more vulnerable to injuries compared to others. Players commonly fall, which is more likely to cause potentially life-threatening internal bleeding.

    Due to this risk, athletes often must take to the sidelines to avoid injury after a DVT diagnosis.

    Balanced blood thinners

    The challenge of creating balanced blood-thinning drugs is of great interest to my lab at McMaster University’s Thrombosis and Atherosclerosis Research Institute. A promising candidate for treating clotting disorders is ADAMTS13. It’s a protein that plays a role in the typical maintenance of blood clots but shows great potential as a blood-thinning medication.

    Previous research with this protein has found that in acute blood-clotting conditions such as ischemic stroke, ADAMTS13 is effective at breaking apart blood clots but does not result in the same risk of bleeding. Further testing on the protein in chronic conditions like DVT still needs to be performed, but there is potential for it to act as a long-term blood thinner.

    The use of safer blood thinners will not only allow athletes like Lillard and Wembanyama to continue playing their respective sports, but will also help the general population.

    Approximately seven million new blood-thinner prescriptions for DVT and other conditions are written each year in Canada, highlighting the need for better therapeutics across the board.

    Peter Anthony Andrisani receives funding from CanVECTOR.

    Colin Kretz receives funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health (R01HL172780).

    – ref. Deadly blood clots, risky treatments: The high-stakes battle against deep vein thrombosis in sports and beyond – https://theconversation.com/deadly-blood-clots-risky-treatments-the-high-stakes-battle-against-deep-vein-thrombosis-in-sports-and-beyond-253985

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Media Alert: Low-level flights to image geology over parts of New England

    Source: US Geological Survey

    The survey is part of USGS Earth Mapping Resources Initiative, a partnership with the geological surveys of Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont as well as other states.

    “Increasing knowledge of New England’s geologic framework will help with national priorities, like sourcing critical minerals, and regional concerns – like mapping pyrrhotite to minimize its use in local infrastructure,” said Jamey Jones, science coordinator for the USGS Earth Mapping Resources Initiative. 

    Pyrrhotite, a mineral found in bedrock under certain parts of Connecticut and Massachusetts, can cause long-term structural weakness in construction when used in cement.

    The survey is being coordinated by the U.S. Geological Survey as part of a larger, nationwide effort to provide data and images that expand the fundamental knowledge of geology across the nation. The data collected will be made freely available to the public once complete. 

    During the survey, which will be conducted in spring to fall 2025, instruments on the airplane will measure variations in the Earth’s magnetic field and natural, low-level radiation created by different rock types beneath vegetation and up to several miles below the surface. This information will help researchers develop geologic maps of resources and hazards in three dimensions. 

    The aircraft will be equipped with an elongated “boom” that extends either in front of or behind the main cabin that houses sensors. These scientific instruments are completely passive with no emissions that pose a risk to humans, animals, or plant life. No photography or video data will be collected. 

    The aircraft will be flown by experienced pilots who are specially trained and approved for low-level flying. These pilots work with the FAA to ensure flights are safe and in accordance with U.S. law. The surveys will be conducted during daylight hours only. 

    The aircraft will fly along pre-planned fight paths relatively low to the ground at about 300 feet (100 meters) above the surface in some areas. The ground clearance will be increased to 1,000 feet (300+ meters) over populated areas and will comply with Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regulations. 

    Funding by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act has facilitated coverage of such a large area. 

    Flights will cover areas within the following counties: 

    Connecticut: Fairfield, Hartford, Litchfield, Middlesex, New Haven, New London, Tolland, Windham. Massachusetts: Berkshire, Franklin, Hampden, Hampshire, Middlesex, Worcester. New Hampshire: Cheshire, Hillsborough. Rhode Island: Kent, Providence, Washington. Vermont: Bennington, Windham, as well as Fisher’s Island, New York. 

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The Moomins drift through time like a myth – that’s why they resist meaning and endure

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Steve Nash, Lecturer in Literature, Media, and Creative Writing, Leeds Beckett University

    The Moomins may look like hippos in aprons and top hats, but they’re more than just adorable characters from children’s books. Over the decades, these gentle creatures have become part of a living mythology – one that drifts across time, borders and generations.

    Created by Finnish-Swedish author Tove Jansson in the 1940s, the Moomins live in stories that blur the lines between fairy tale, folk wisdom and quiet philosophy. And perhaps that’s the secret to their enduring appeal: they resist being pinned down.

    Unlike traditional children’s characters tied to a tidy moral or neat storyline, the Moomins meander literally and metaphorically. Their world is one of seasonal migrations, long silences, floods, comets and unexpected departures.

    This is part of a series of articles celebrating the 80th anniversary of the Moomins. Want to celebrate their birthday with us? Join The Conversation and a group of experts on May 23 in Bradford for a screening of Moomins on the Riviera and a discussion of the refugee experience in Tove Jansson’s work. Click here for more information and tickets.

    Moominvalley isn’t a safe haven – it’s a landscape shaped by change. In that sense, Jansson’s stories echo something far older than modern literature: the mythic rhythms of Nordic storytelling, where time loops, endings blur and characters return in altered forms.

    A myth that moves

    The Viking sagas, for instance, were not written down at first but passed from voice to voice, reshaped with each telling. They weren’t concerned with tidy endings or moral clarity. Characters disappeared and reappeared. Time looped and fragmented.

    Similarly, Jansson’s stories don’t build to a climax. They wander. One book might end with a mystery, a quiet mood or a long silence. It’s a narrative style that feels strangely modern – and yet deeply ancient.

    Jansson herself resisted giving her stories a single message. In letters and interviews, she said she disliked moralising and preferred ambiguity. “A good story,” she wrote, “has no need to be explained; its truth lies in its telling, not in its conclusion.” That idea – of a truth that doesn’t depend on being pinned down – is at the heart of what makes the Moomins mythic.

    Of course, myths evolve. And the Moomins have evolved spectacularly. After the books found international success, the characters were adapted into Japanese anime, Nordic theatre, British radio and global branding campaigns.

    Each version tells a slightly different story. In Japan, the Moomins became symbols of warmth and nostalgia – gentle mascots of a simpler life. In the UK and US, early translations softened the melancholy and existential tones. More recently, new editions and critical reappraisals have returned to Jansson’s deeper themes of loss, solitude and transformation.

    The many lives of the Moomins

    This global journey has parallels with the evolution of Viking mythology. Once oral stories shared around fires, Norse myths have been repackaged for everything from national pride to Hollywood action. Like the Moomins, they’ve become flexible cultural symbols – used and re-used in ways that often have little to do with their original context.

    But unlike the fierce warriors of Norse myth, the Moomins are gentle, uncertain creatures. They worry. They drift. They don’t fight monsters – they reflect, explore, adapt. In Moominland Midwinter, Moomintroll wakes from hibernation to find the world cold and unfamiliar.

    His journey isn’t about conquering the landscape, it’s about learning how to live in it. That emotional honesty resonates with readers of all ages. It also reflects something uniquely Nordic: an existential awareness of solitude, change and survival.

    Folklore, loneliness and the Groke

    One character, the Groke, captures this beautifully. She’s a shadowy figure who creates frost wherever she walks. She’s not a villain, she’s just lonely. Children often fear her, but readers grow to understand her.

    She recalls Nordic spirits like the huldra or tomte – ghostly beings that live in the forests, blurring the line between human and otherworldly. In Jansson’s hands, this folklore becomes a way to explore anxiety, estrangement and the human need for warmth.

    The Moomins’ refusal to settle – geographically or philosophically – also speaks to today’s world of cultural fluidity. Jansson was from Finland’s Swedish-speaking minority and grew up between languages, cultures and post-war upheaval.

    Her books reflect that liminal identity, and they’ve found a home among readers who don’t always fit neatly into one place. That might be why the Moomins are particularly popular in countries dealing with identity shifts or cultural nostalgia.

    A myth for a shifting world

    As with all mythologies, there’s also a commercial side. The Moomins are now a global brand, with theme parks, merchandise, museums and a thriving fanbase. Some of this has softened their original complexity.

    But even through plush toys and animation, something essential remains: the feeling that these characters, like the stories they inhabit, can’t be reduced to one message. They are always slightly mysterious, slightly out of reach.

    In a world that often demands quick answers and strong opinions, the Moomins offer something gentler: ambiguity, openness and quiet reflection. They remind us that not all stories are meant to be solved with a neat conclusion. Some are meant to be returned to – revisited like familiar places in the mind, reshaped each time we arrive.

    That’s what makes the Moomins mythic. Not just their age or popularity, but their ability to change – and to change us – with every retelling. They invite us to wander, like Snufkin, and to sit still, like Moominmamma.

    They show us that myth isn’t just about gods and monsters – it’s about living with uncertainty, embracing return, and finding meaning in the stories that help us feel at home in the world.

    Steve Nash works for Leeds Beckett University.

    – ref. The Moomins drift through time like a myth – that’s why they resist meaning and endure – https://theconversation.com/the-moomins-drift-through-time-like-a-myth-thats-why-they-resist-meaning-and-endure-254742

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World should be read in tandem to understand today’s troubled times

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Emrah Atasoy, Associate Fellow of English and Comparative Literary Studies & Honorary Research Fellow of IAS, University of Warwick

    Is there any past work of fiction that can help us make sense of today’s troubling trends? Taking into account the proliferation of references to obfuscating “Newspeak”, Big Brother-style leaders and impossible-to-circumvent surveillance systems in newspaper articles, this question cries out for a simple answer: “Yes – and that work is George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four.”

    People on both the political left and right see Orwell’s 1949 novel as the book from the last century that speaks to the present most powerfully. But there are others who regard consumer culture and social media obsession as the primary concerns of today. They have a different answer: “Yes – and that work is Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World.”

    We, however, think the answer is “both”.

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    In the long-running debate over who was the most prophetic writer of their era, Orwell, who was a pupil of Huxley’s at Eton, is generally the favourite.

    One reason for this is that international alliances that long seemed stable are now in flux. In Nineteen Eighty-Four, his final novel, Orwell envisioned a future tri-polar world divided into competing blocks with shifting allegiances.

    In the short time since the US president, Donald Trump, began his second term, his policies and statements have triggered surprising realignments. The US and Canada, close partners for more than a century, have faced off against each other. And in April, an official from Beijing joined with his counterparts from South Korea and Japan to push back as an unlikely trio against Trump’s new tariffs.

    That is perhaps why there is a booming field of “Orwell studies”, with its own academic journal, but not “Huxley studies”. It also probably explains why Nineteen Eighty-Four, but not Brave New World, keeps making its way on to bestseller lists – sometimes in tandem with Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale (1985). “Orwellian” (unlike the rarely heard “Huxleyan”) has few competitors other than “Kafkaesque” as an immediately recognisable adjective linked to a 20th-century author.

    Trailer for the film 1984, an adaptation of Orwell’s novel.

    As wonderful as Atwood and Kafka are, we are convinced that combining Orwell’s vision with Huxley’s offers scope for deeper analysis. This is true in part because of, not despite, how common it has been to contrast the modes of autocracy Orwell and Huxley describe.

    Orwellian and Huxleyan visions as one world

    We live in an era when all sorts of systems of control limit our freedoms of expression, identity and religion. Many do not quite fit the template that either Orwell or Huxley imagined, but instead combine elements.

    There are certainly places, such as Myanmar, where those in power rely on techniques that immediately bring Orwell to mind, with his focus on fear and surveillance. There are others, such as Dubai, that more readily evoke Huxley, with his focus on pleasure and distraction. In many cases, though, we find a mixture.

    This is especially clear if you take a global view. That’s something we specialise in as international and interdisciplinary researchers – a literary scholar from Turkey based in the UK, and a Californian cultural historian of China who has also published on southeast Asia.

    Like Orwell, Huxley wrote many books that were not dystopian fiction, but his foray into that genre became his most influential. Brave New World was well known throughout the cold war. In courses and commentaries, it was commonly paired with Nineteen Eighty-Four as a narrative illustrating a shallow society based on indulgence and consumerism, as opposed to the bleaker Orwellian world of suppression of desire and strict control.

    While it is common to approach the two books via their contrasts, they can be treated as interconnected and entangled works as well.

    Trailer for an adaptation of Brave New World, released in 2020.

    During the cold war, some commentators felt that Brave New World showed where capitalist consumerism in the age of television could lead. The west, according to this interpretation, could become a world in which autocrats like those in the novel stayed on top. They would do this by keeping people busy and divided among themselves, happily distracted by entertainment and the drug “soma”.

    Orwell, by contrast, seemed to provide a key to unlock the harder mode of control in non-capitalist, Communist Party-run lands, especially those of the Soviet bloc.

    Huxley himself in Brave New World Revisited, a non-fiction book he published in the 1950s, thought it was important to think about ways the techniques of power and societal engineering in the two novels could be combined, approached and analysed. And there is even more value in combining the approaches now, when capitalism has gone so global and the autocratic wave keeps reaching new shores in the so-called post-truth era.

    Orwellian hard-edged and Huxleyan soft-edged approaches to control and social engineering can be and often are combined. We see this within countries such as China, where the crude repressive methods of a Big Brother state are used against the Uyghur population, while cities such as Shenzhen evoke Brave New World.

    We see this mixing of dystopian elements in many countries – variations on the way that science fiction writer William Gibson, author of novels such as Neuromancer (1984), wrote about Singapore with a phrase that had a soft-edged first half and a hard-edged second: “Disneyland with the death penalty.”

    This can be a useful first step toward better understanding, and perhaps beginning to try to find a way of improving the troubling world of the mid-2020s. A world in which the smartphone in your pocket both keeps track of your actions and provides an endless set of enticing distractions.

    The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World should be read in tandem to understand today’s troubled times – https://theconversation.com/nineteen-eighty-four-and-brave-new-world-should-be-read-in-tandem-to-understand-todays-troubled-times-253872

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: UK’s India trade deal offers wider access to a surging economy – and could make food imports cheaper

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Sangeeta Khorana, Professor of International Trade Policy, Aston University

    India’s economy is growing rapidly. Radiokafka/Shutterstock

    After more than three years and 14 rounds of negotiations, the UK and India have finally announced a free trade agreement (FTA). UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer will formally sign the deal on a visit to India later this year. This is the biggest and most economically significant bilateral trade deal the UK has struck since leaving the EU. It will have implications for both businesses and workers.

    In 2024, the UK’s trade with India was worth £43 billion – £17.1 billion of exports and £25.5 billion of imports. Government modelling estimates that trade between the nations will increase by as much as 39% and the UK’s GDP will expand by £4.8 billion or 0.1 percentage points per year as a result.

    India’s economy is growing fast. It is expected to expand by 6% annually, becoming the world’s third largest economy by 2028 after the US and China. This certainly makes the deal with the UK very timely.

    With a population of more than 1.4 billion and a growing middle class, the country offers huge market potential. Its import demand is predicted to grow by 144% between 2021 and 2035. This combination of strong economic growth and increasing numbers of citizens with disposable cash makes a compelling case for the deal.

    Get your news from actual experts, straight to your inbox. Sign up to our daily newsletter to receive all The Conversation UK’s latest coverage of news and research, from politics and business to the arts and sciences. Join The Conversation for free today.

    Both the UK and India have agreed to reduce tariffs under the deal. India will immediately lower its 150% tariffs on Scotch whisky and gin to 75%, and then to 40% within ten years. Tariffs on foodstuffs such as lamb, salmon and cheeses will fall from around 30% to zero.

    Simplified trade rules, including faster customs processing, reduced barriers such as complex labelling requirements, and enhanced support for small businesses should bring gains for companies. Timely customs clearance will support exports of perishable items like Scottish salmon, where delays reduce the product’s shelf life. Similarly, exporters of things like biscuits and cheese will benefit from streamlined paperwork and be able to compete in India’s growing market.

    There will no longer be limits on the number of UK businesses allowed to provide telecommunications, environmental and construction services. And UK businesses will not need to set up a company in India or be a resident in India to supply their services in these sectors.

    Once the FTA comes into force, which could take up to a year, the UK will allow 99% of Indian imports duty-free access into the UK. The sectors set to benefit most are footwear, textiles and clothing, as well as processed prawns, basmati rice and ready meals. These reductions will mean lower prices for UK consumers, given tariffs on clothing and footwear are 12% and 16% respectively.

    Clothing and textile imports to the UK will have tariff-free access.
    Yevhen Prozhyrko/Shutterstock

    Tariffs on luxury cars will also be reduced from more than 100% to 10% under quotas on both sides. The FTA locks in zero tariffs on industrial machinery, advanced materials for use in hi-tech industries, and components for electric vehicles. This will position British suppliers inside a manufacturing market ranked the world’s second-most attractive after China.

    In terms of workers, there were well publicised fears that the agreement might lead to UK workers being undercut by Indian counterparts. Plans for a so-called “double contribution convention” grants a three-year exemption from national insurance contributions for Indian employees temporarily working in the UK. But this is a reciprocal deal and is likely to apply only to workers who are seconded from one country to the other, so should not result in UK workers being more expensive to hire.

    And although no changes to immigration policy are planned, the FTA will offer easier movement for skilled workers. UK providers of services like construction and telecoms will have access to India’s growing market.

    Both countries have committed to encouraging the recognition of professional qualifications. A professional services working group for UK and Indian government officials will provide a forum to monitor and support this initiative.

    Timing is everything

    Against a backdrop of rising protectionism and geopolitical tensions, the UK-India FTA stands out as a strategic deal. It is also a significant milestone in Britain’s Indo-Pacific “tilt”. This approach gives UK firms a hedge against over-reliance on any single region or country-centric supply chains, to keep trade flowing in the event of more US tariff shocks, for example.

    With the US fixation on tariffs, and global supply chains facing continued disruption, securing preferential access to the world’s fastest-growing major economy is a strategic win for the UK. From India’s perspective, the trade deal is aligned with its rise as a “China-plus-one” manufacturing hub (where businesses diversify to ensure they do not invest only in China).

    The UK and India share historical ties that are underpinned by cultural, educational and people-to-people links. The UK-India FTA marks a new phase in this relationship, where shared economic interests define a forward-looking partnership between the two countries.

    And in terms of its ongoing talks with the EU, India could use the agreement to showcase its willingness to negotiate ambitious trade deals. For the UK, given its own upcoming trade and cooperation talks with the EU, the FTA with India demonstrates that new partnerships can be built while maintaining vital European ties.

    Sangeeta Khorana has received funding from UK-ESRC, EU and other international organisations. She is affiliated with Chartered Institute of Export and International Trade as a Trustee Director.

    – ref. UK’s India trade deal offers wider access to a surging economy – and could make food imports cheaper – https://theconversation.com/uks-india-trade-deal-offers-wider-access-to-a-surging-economy-and-could-make-food-imports-cheaper-256387

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: From Zoo Quest to Ocean: The evolution of David Attenborough’s voice for the planet

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Neil J. Gostling, Associate Professor in Evolution and Palaeobiology, University of Southampton

    Over the course of seven decades, Sir David Attenborough’s documentaries have reshaped how we see the natural world, shifting from colonial-era collecting trips to urgent calls for environmental action.

    His storytelling has inspired generations, but has only recently begun to confront the scale of the ecological crisis. To understand how far nature broadcasting has come, it helps to return to where it started.

    When Attenborough’s broadcasting career began in the 1950s, Austrian filmmakers Hans and Lotte Hass were already pushing the boundaries of what was possible by taking cameras below the sea and touring the world aboard their schooner, the Xafira.

    In one of their 1953 Galapagos films, a crewman handled a sealion pup, having crawled across the volcanic rock of Fernandina honking at sealions to attract them. A penguin and giant tortoise were brought on board Xafira. And as Lotte Hass took photographs, she’d beseech some poor creature to “not be frightened” and “look pleasant”.

    This is a world away from today’s expectations, where both research scientists and amateur naturalists are taught to observe without touching or disturbing wildlife. When the Hasses visited the Galápagos, it was still five years before the creation of the national park and the founding of the island’s conservation organisation Charles Darwin Foundation. Now, visitors must stay at least two metres from all animals – and never approach them.

    Get your news from actual experts, straight to your inbox. Sign up to our daily newsletter to receive all The Conversation UK’s latest coverage of news and research, from politics and business to the arts and sciences. Join The Conversation for free today.

    At the same time, television was beginning to shape public perceptions of the natural world. In 1954, Attenborough was working as a young producer on Zoo Quest. By chance, he became its presenter when zoologist Jack Lester became ill.

    The programme followed zoologists collecting animals from around the world for London Zoo. Zoo Quest was filmed in exotic locations around the world and then in the studio where the animals found on the expedition were shown “up close”.

    Attenborough has since acknowledged that Zoo Quest reflected attitudes that would not be acceptable today. The series showed animals being captured from the wild and transported to London Zoo – practices which mirrored extractive, colonial-era approaches to science.

    David Attenborough’s Zoo Quest for a Dragon aired in 1956.

    Yet, Zoo Quest was also groundbreaking. The series brought viewers face-to-face with animals they might never have seen before and pioneered a visual style that made natural history television both entertaining and educational. It helped establish Attenborough’s reputation as a compelling communicator and laid the foundations for a new genre of science broadcasting – one that has evolved, like its presenter, over time.

    After a decade in production, Attenborough returned to presenting with Life on Earth (1979), a landmark series that traced the evolution of life from single-celled organisms to birds and apes. Drawing on his long-standing interest in fossils, the series combined zoology, palaeobiology and natural history to create an ambitious new template for science broadcasting.

    Life on Earth helped cement Attenborough’s reputation as a trusted communicator and became the foundation of the BBC’s “blue-chip” natural history format – big-budget, internationally produced films that put high-quality cinematic wildlife footage at the forefront of the story. The series did not simply document the natural world. It reframed it, using presenter-led storytelling and global spectacle to shape how audiences understood evolutionary processes.

    For much of his career, Attenborough has been celebrated for showcasing the beauty of the natural world. Yet, he has also faced criticism for sidestepping the environmental crises threatening it. Commentators such as the environmental journalist George Monbiot argued that his earlier documentaries, while visually stunning, often avoided addressing the human role in climate change, presenting nature as untouched and avoiding difficult truths about ecological decline.

    Building on the legacy of Life on Earth, Attenborough’s later series began to respond to these critiques. Blue Planet (2001) expanded the scope of nature storytelling, revealing the mysteries of the ocean’s most remote and uncharted ecosystems. Its 2017 sequel, Blue Planet II, introduced a more urgent tone, highlighting the scale of plastic pollution and the need for marine conservation.

    Although Blue Planet II significantly increased viewers’ environmental knowledge, it did not lead to measurable changes in plastic consumption behaviour – a reminder that awareness alone does not guarantee action. The subsequent Wild Isles (2023) continued the shift towards conservation messaging. While the main series aired in five parts, a sixth episode – Saving Our Wild Isles – was released separately and drew controversy amid claims the BBC had sidelined it for being too political. In reality, the episode delivered a clear call to action.

    Attenborough’s latest film, Ocean, continues in this more urgent register, pairing breathtaking imagery with an unflinching assessment of ocean health. After decades of gentle narration, he now speaks with sharpened clarity about the scale of the crisis and the need to act.

    A voice for action

    In recent years, Attenborough has taken on a new role – not just as a broadcaster, but as a powerful voice in environmental diplomacy. He has addressed world leaders at major summits such as the UN climate conference Cop24 and the World Economic Forum, calling for urgent action on climate change. He was also appointed ambassador for the UK government’s review on the economics of biodiversity.

    On the subject of environmemtal diplomacy, Monbiot recently wrote: “A few years ago, I was sharply critical of Sir David for downplaying the environmental crisis on his TV programmes. Most people would have reacted badly but remarkably, at 92, he took this and similar critiques on board and radically changed his approach.”

    Attenborough not only speaks. He listens. This is part of his charm and popularity. He is learning and evolving as much as his audience.

    What makes Attenborough stand out is the way he speaks. While official climate treaties often rely on technical or legal language, he communicates in emotional, accessible terms – speaking plainly about responsibility, urgency and the moral imperative to protect life on Earth. His calm authority and familiar voice make complex issues easier to grasp and harder to dismiss.

    Frequently named Britain’s most trusted public figure, Attenborough has become something of an unofficial diplomat for the planet – apolitical, measured, and often seen as a voice of reason amid populist noise. Despite his criticisms, Attenborough’s documentaries walk a careful line between fragility and resilience, using emotionally ambivalent imagery to prompt reflection. He shares his wonder with the natural world and brings people along with him

    Ocean shows our blue planet in more spectacular fashion than Lotte and Hans Hass could ever have imagined. But it is also Attenborough’s most direct reckoning with environmental collapse. With clarity and urgency, it confronts the damage wrought by industrial trawling and habitat destruction.

    After 70 years of gently guiding viewers through the natural world, Attenborough’s voice has sharpened. If he once opened our eyes to nature’s wonders, he now challenges us not to look away. As he puts it: “If we save the sea, we save our world. After a lifetime filming our planet, I’m sure that nothing is more important.”

    Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?

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    The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. From Zoo Quest to Ocean: The evolution of David Attenborough’s voice for the planet – https://theconversation.com/from-zoo-quest-to-ocean-the-evolution-of-david-attenboroughs-voice-for-the-planet-251727

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Cassidy Visits Louisiana Tech Design and Research Conference, Meets with University Officials

    US Senate News:

    Source: United States Senator for Louisiana Bill Cassidy
    MONROE – On Monday, U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, M.D. (R-LA) visited the 2025 Design and Research Conference at Louisiana Tech University, which featured senior presentations from students in their College of Engineering and Science. During the conference, students made presentations featuring innovations that could help in the fields of computing, energy, medicine and transportation, among others.
    “There is so much innovation taking place on Louisiana Tech’s campus,” said Dr. Cassidy. “The students, and also Tech graduates who have stayed near the campus, are using their education to create products marketed around the world. This is impressive.”
    Cassidy is a strong supporter of Louisiana Tech University. In January, Cassidy announced that the National Science Foundation would award the Louisiana Board of Regents $8 million to expand STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) research and development, generate more scholarships and fellowships, and enhance collaboration for Louisiana’s students. Louisiana Tech is a partner in this initiative, and Cassidy wrote a letter of support for the grant.
    Additionally, Cassidy secured $7 million across Fiscal Years 2024 and 2023 specifically for Louisiana Tech to empower North Louisiana research support for domestic semiconductor technology and workforce development. He also took part in a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Monroe Street Corridor Project last October, which will improve roads and create more space for runners and cyclists in Ruston, including at Louisiana Tech.
    While at Louisiana Tech, Cassidy also met with members of the University’s executive team, to discuss the University’s robust research portfolio and private partnerships that are benefiting the region, state and nation. In a statement, he was thanked for coming to Louisiana Tech by Mr. Jim Henderson, president of the University.
    “We appreciate Senator Cassidy taking time to visit Louisiana Tech to hear about our vision and interact with students and faculty,” said Mr. Jim Henderson. “The Senator has been a consistent supporter of Louisiana Tech and the entire higher ed enterprise. This opportunity to share our research vision, including our work in advancing the timber industry through our new Forest Products Innovation Center and our leading-edge research in traumatic brain injury, is important to showcase our faculty’s commitment to addressing enduring and emerging challenges.”

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Governor Kehoe Announces Appointments to Missouri School Funding Modernization Task Force

    Source: US State of Missouri

    MAY 12, 2025

    Jefferson City — Building on the education priorities outlined in his inaugural State of the State Address in January, Governor Mike Kehoe announced today the full slate of members appointed to the Missouri School Funding Modernization Task Force. The Task Force, established by Executive Order 25-14, is charged with reviewing and recommending changes to Missouri’s K-12 school funding model and providing a final report to the Governor by December 1, 2026.

    “To secure a better future for Missouri students and schools, we must rethink how we fund Missouri’s foundation formula,” said Governor Kehoe. “We need a modernized funding model that rewards outcomes, encourages innovation, and ensures fairness for all Missouri students. These Task Force members bring the experience, perspective, and commitment needed to make responsible changes at business-speed. We look forward to reviewing their recommendations.”

    The 16-member body represents a broad range of voices—urban and rural, traditional and nontraditional, academia and industry—who will help build a model that delivers results for every Missouri student. The Task Force will operate under core guiding principles that promote equal access for students, local flexibility, performance accountability, and long-term funding sustainability.

    Governor Kehoe’s appointments include the following individuals:

    • Matt Davis, of Eldon, is a dedicated educational leader with more than 25 years of experience in the Missouri school system, including 17 years as superintendent of Eldon School District. Prior to serving as superintendent, he led career and technical education programs and prioritized securing grants and funding to enhance program offerings and facilities at Eldon Career Center. Davis will serve as the representative for superintendents from small rural school districts in Missouri.
    • Noah Devine, of Kansas City, is the executive director of the Missouri Charter Public School Association. He previously served as the deputy director of the Kansas City Action Fund and led the implementation of the sixth iteration of the Missouri School Improvement Plan (MSIP) standards for the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education as the MSIP 6 support facilitator. Devine will serve as the representative for charter schools in Missouri.
    • Emily LeRoy, of Hermann, is a senior advisor at Missouri Farm Bureau, serving on a leadership team that advocates for the diverse interests of farmers. She began her career at the Missouri Department of Agriculture as a legislative assistant and youth program coordinator before rising to the position of legislative and budget director. LeRoy will serve as an additional member as appointed by the Governor.
    • James “Jim” Meats, of Springfield, is the vice president of sales and marketing at Loren Cook Company and a licensed professional engineer. He previously worked as a technical consultant to manufacturers and municipalities in southwest Missouri, where he supported the development of formal plan reviews, permitting procedures, and construction inspection processes. Meats will serve as the representative for the business community.
    • Mike Podgursky, of Columbia, is a school finance expert with more than 40 years of experience, currently serving as the Chancelor’s Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri–Columbia and an affiliated scholar at Sinquefield Center for Applied Economic Research. He is also the author of several peer-reviewed articles and the book, Teacher Pay and Teacher Quality. Podgursky will serve as an additional member as appointed by the Governor.
    • Donald “Don” Thalhuber, of Columbia, is the policy director for the Senate Minority Caucus. Prior to serving in his current position, Thalhuber worked as a senior research analyst crafting education, pension, financial, tax, and veterans’ affairs legislation. He also drafted Missouri’s most recent public school funding formula in 2005. Thalhuber will serve as an additional member as appointed by the Governor.
    • Michael “Jeremy” Tucker, of Liberty, is the superintendent for Liberty Public Schools, managing the district’s $279 million budget and providing oversight and strategic guidance to executive leadership and their respective departments. Prior to serving as superintendent, he worked as an adjunct professor for Evangel University and Southwest Baptist University as well as a social studies teacher at Logan-Rogersville High School. Tucker will serve as the representative for superintendents from large urban school districts in Missouri.
    • Chris Vas, of Kansas City, is a senior director for the Herzog Foundation, working to implement school choice initiatives and trainings across the nation while overseeing an $8 million annual budget. He previously served as the executive director of Liberty Alliance USA, a regional, conservative grassroots network and watchdog organization. Vas will serve as the representative for non-profit organizations that work on expanding school choice in Missouri.
    • Casey Wasser, of California, is the deputy executive director and chief operating officer for the Missouri Soybean Association, a grassroots organization dedicated to advocating on behalf of soybean producers and crafting state and federal policy initiatives that support farmers’ freedom to operate and improved profitability. He has an extensive background in public policy, previously serving as the legislative director for the Missouri Department of Revenue. Wasser will serve as the representative for the agriculture industry.
    • David Wood, of Versailles, most recently served as a policy analyst and liaison for the Missouri State Tax Commission before retiring in June 2023. He previously served in the Missouri House of Representatives from 2013 to 2020 and worked as an upper-level math and computer science teacher for Morgan County R-II Schools. Wood will serve as the representative for teachers from schools in Missouri.

    These ten appointments will be joined on the Task Force by two members of the State Board of Education.

    • Kerry Casey, of Chesterfield, recently retired from her position as vice president of Exegy, a global leader in financial market data, trading platforms, and predictive signals, where she was responsible for Global Sales Operations and Enablement. Casey was a founding board member of the KIPP Charter School in St. Louis and served on the board of directors until her appointment to the State Board in 2023.
    • Pamela Westbrooks-Hodge, of Pasadena Hills, is a former vice president of the Normandy Schools Collaborative Joint Executive Governing Board and recently retired general partner from Edward Jones, where she co-led the Internal Audit Division. She previously worked for Express Scripts, Anheuser-Busch and Bank of America in senior governance, risk and compliance roles and held certifications in financial, operational, and information systems auditing.

    Missouri Senate President Pro Tem Cindy O’Laughlin and Missouri House Speaker Jonathan Patterson have also appointed Senators Rusty Black and Travis Fitzwater as well as Representatives Ed Lewis and Marlene Terry to serve on the Task Force.

    Senator Black, a former educator, will chair the task force.

    “As a former educator, I know firsthand the challenges our teachers face and the importance of ensuring that every dollar we invest in education has a meaningful impact,” said Senator Black. “I’m honored to help lead this important work as we build a funding model that supports student success in every corner of Missouri.”

    For more information on the Missouri School Funding Modernization Task Force, click here.

  • MIL-OSI USA: Celebrating the Heart of the UConn Experience

    Source: US State of Connecticut

    This April, the Office of the Provost presented the University’s first-ever Teaching, Advising, and Mentoring Awards ceremony—an event that brought together a wide range of recognitions under one roof. The ceremony highlighted the essential work of faculty, staff, and students who support learning, foster belonging, and help others thrive at UConn.

    “By bringing these awards together in a single ceremony, we are underscoring the importance and prestige of these honors,” said Provost Anne D’Alleva. “We are celebrating the essential role that teaching, advising, and mentorship play in the life of our university.”

    Honorees were recognized for their contributions both in and outside the classroom: teaching that sparks curiosity, advising that helps students navigate challenges, mentorship that opens new possibilities, and peer support that strengthens our community.

    The event was attended by colleagues, university leaders, and the friends and family of honorees, whose presence added warmth and meaning to the celebration. They’ve been the champions of our honorees, much like our honorees have been champions for their students.

    President Maric shared, “behind every student’s success is someone who taught them, advised them, or simply believed in them. These awards honor the people who make that kind of impact every day at UConn.”

    (Photo by Dustin Corriveau at Designing Studios)

    The awards span programs across the university, including the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning, Office of Undergraduate Advising, First Year Programs, Honors & Enrichment, the Office of Undergraduate Research, and The Graduate School. Together, they honor a wide range of efforts that are central to the student experience at UConn.

    2024-2025 Teaching, Advising, and Mentoring Award Recipients

    Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning Awards

    • Outstanding Graduate Teaching Award: Samantha Archer, Anthropology
    • Outstanding Adjunct Award: Dr. Michael Zacchera, Allied Health
    • Teaching Fellow Award: Dr. David Wagner, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
    • Teaching Innovation Award: Dr. Vindhya Pathirana, Mathematics

    Undergraduate Advising Awards

    • Outstanding New Professional Staff Advisor: Lyn Alexander, School of Pharmacy
    • Outstanding Professional Advisor: Ramón Espinoza, Center for Access and Postsecondary Success
    • Outstanding Faculty Advisor: Dr. Mary Anne Amalaradjou, Animal Science
    • Outstanding Faculty Advisor: Dr. Matthew Singer, Political Science

    Honors and Enrichment Awards

    • Honors Faculty Member of the Year: Dr. Ryan D. Talbert, Sociology
    • Tanaka Award for Innovative Undergraduate Advising: Dr. Stephanie Singe and Dr. Brian Aneskievich

    Undergraduate Research Mentorship Excellence Awards

    • Dr. Benjamin Sinder, Orthopedic Surgery
    • Dr. Mallory Perry-Eaddy, Nursing
    • Charlotte Fuqua, Graduate Student, Chemistry

    Edward C. Marth Mentorship Award (Graduate School)

    • Dr. Željko Bošković, Linguistics

    First Year Experience Faculty, Staff, and Graduate Instructor Awards

    • FYE Teaching Innovation Award: Fany Hannon, Dean of Students
    • FYE Impact Award: Daniel Facchinetti, CETL
    • FYE One UConn Award: Wiley Dawson, UConn Hartford
    • FYE Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor: Sarah Cooper, Graduate Student, Educational Leadership
    • FYE Teaching Excellence Award: Annie Casarella, Center for International Students & Scholars

    First Year Experience Peer Mentor Awards (John T. Szarlan Award)

    • Anytra Culbreath Evans, Undergraduate Student, HDFS & Sociology
    • Lucas Denucci, Undergraduate Student, Chemical Engineering
    • Stephanie Mora-Gutierrez, Undergraduate Student, Psychological Sciences

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: ICYMI: Rep. Pfluger’s ACES Act Passed the House

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Congressman August Pfluger (TX-11)

    The passage of Rep. Pfluger’s legislation was celebrated by several veteran organizations and advocacy groups, who released the following statements:

    Vince Alcazar, COL, USAF, ret., MACH Coalition Founder & Director, said, “The Military Aviator Coalition for Health (MACH) celebrates the passage of H.R. 530, the Aviator Cancer Examination Study (ACES) Act. With three major Department of Defense studies in the last four confirming and quantifying significantly elevated cancer rates among U.S. military flyers, the ACES Act goes the next step. This bill would ask the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to apply their extensive Veteran health study capacity to determine what in the operating environments of military aviation is likely causing cancer. This study is essential. Without the ACES Act, military medicine will have no practical way of mitigating risk, and Veteran flyers will have no basis to correlate their service to potential cancer. This day was five years in the making. We recognize and praise the leadership of Congressman August Pfluger in leading this bill through three Congresses to today. Congressman Pfluger is an amazing champion of this work.”

    Jose Ramos, Vice President of Government and Community Relations, Wounded Warrior Project, said, “Wounded Warrior Project is grateful to Rep. Pfluger and his fellow Members of Congress for passing the ACES Act in the House of Representatives by an overwhelming majority. This legislation represents a critical step toward safeguarding the long-term health and well-being of military aviators and support personnel. These groups are routinely exposed to unique occupational hazards, and collaborative research across the federal government will help inform cancer prevention and veteran health strategies.We urge the Senate to take up this legislation as soon as possible.”

    Rye Barcott, Co-Founder & CEO of With Honor Action, said, “With Honor Action congratulates Reps. August Pfluger and Jimmy Panetta in securing House passage of the ACES Act—comprehensive legislation that will advance research into potential links between aviator service and increased cancer rates,” said Rye Barcott, Co-Founder & CEO of With Honor Action. “As members of the For Country Caucus, Reps. Pfluger and Panetta built strong bipartisan support among their fellow veteran lawmakers that led to a full caucus endorsement. We look forward to seeing this critical legislation become law.”

    Theo Lawson, Assistant Director, Legislative Programs, Fleet Reserve Association, said, “The Fleet Reserve Association (FRA) wholeheartedly celebrates the passage of the ACES Act in the House and extends our sincere congratulations to Congressman August Pfluger, his staff, and the bill’s cosponsors for their incredible dedication in advancing this vital legislation. Understanding cancer is the first step to defeating it, and this bill brings us closer to uncovering the critical links between aircrew service and cancer risks. Their leadership ensures our sea service aviators and all aircrew members are better equipped to identify and combat this silent enemy. We look forward to continuing the fight alongside them until the ACES Act becomes law–honoring the sacrifices of our servicemembers and safeguarding future generations.”

    Mario Marquez, Executive Director of Government Affairs, The American Legion, said, “On behalf of the 1.5 million veterans nationwide, The American Legion proudly supports the ACES Act. Research is critical to our understanding of the impacts of toxic exposures, from Agent Orange to harmful chemicals on aircraft. We applaud Representative Pfluger for prioritizing this critical issue and thank the House of Representatives for passing the ACES Act with resounding support. The American Legion urges the Senate to vote on this bill and continue to invest in research surrounding the impacts of toxic exposures.”

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: USGS offers funding to states to find critical minerals in mine waste

    Source: US Geological Survey

    Interested state geological surveys can apply online at grants.gov under Funding Opportunity Number G25AS00258. 

    Applications are due by May 14, 2025. More information on how to apply can be found in the Notice of Funding Opportunity available at grants.gov.  

    “The USGS is partnering with state geological surveys to modernize our understanding of critical minerals in the U.S., both below ground and above ground in mine waste, and this competitive funding will help us get there,” said Jamey Jones, science coordinator for the USGS Earth Mapping Resources Initiative, also known as Earth MRI. “Minerals, such as germanium, are essential for high-performance computer chips used in applications that weren’t even dreamed of when old mines closed. Germanium often occurs with zinc in ore, and it might have been left behind in mine waste when zinc ore was processed.” 

    The cooperative agreements are offered through Earth MRI, a partnership with state geological surveys, private companies, academia and other state and federal agencies.  Earth MRI is transforming the nation’s mapping of the subsurface and mine wastes needed to assess mineral resources critical for the U.S. economy and national security, as directed by Executive Orders including “A Federal Strategy to Ensure Secure and Reliable Supplies of Critical Minerals” in 2017 and “Unleashing American Energy” in 2025. 

    Through this funding, Earth MRI will provide science to evaluate the potential to extract valuable minerals from mine waste. This $5 million funding opportunity supports USGS efforts to build a national mine-waste inventory and characterize mine waste at mine sites across the nation. It also supports partnering with state geological surveys to plan Earth MRI data acquisition. 

    Mine waste is the material left over after mining. It consists of tailings, the material that remains after mined ore is milled and concentrated, as well as waste rock and other materials that were removed to get to the ore or left behind during ore processing. 

    Some critical minerals, like rare earth elements, are known to occur alongside more commonly mined minerals like iron or nickel. Because of this, mine wastes are now being revisited to see if the waste has potential for critical-mineral commodities that were not a primary product of the original mining. Understanding what is in mine waste also helps identify potential hazards of reprocessing it to recover the critical minerals and other valuable commodities and opportunities for remediation. 

    For example, the USGS revisited legacy iron mines in the Adirondack Mountains of New York to determine if rare earth elements might occur there. Results indicated significant potential that merits further exploration, especially for rare earth elements. 

    Since 2018, Earth MRI has focused new data collection in parts of the nation with known or suspected critical mineral potential, significantly increasing high-quality data coverage and geologic mapping across large regions. New data collection and critical mineral mapping under Earth MRI is propelling efforts to make once-in-a-generation advancements in the nation’s geologic and geophysical data collections and critical minerals mapping.   

    The USGS provides science for a changing world. Learn more at https://www.usgs.gov or follow us on Facebook @USGeologicalSurvey, YouTube @USGS, Instagram @USGS, or Twitter @USGS. 

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How Donald Trump could remain president of the United States

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Pascal Lupien, Assistant Professor, Political Science, University of Alberta

    United States President Donald Trump has repeatedly floated the idea of remaining in office after his second term ends in 2029. Since the 22nd Amendment of the U.S. Constitution was ratified in 1951, no U.S. president has challenged the two-term limit it established.

    However, attempts to circumvent constitutional term limits are not unprecedented elsewhere.

    Virtually every country in Latin America has enshrined constitutional term limits as a safeguard against tyranny. These rules vary: some allow only a single term, some permit two, while others enable non-consecutive re-election. Yet several presidents have managed to defy these provisions.

    Recent examples include Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua, Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, Evo Morales in Bolivia, Rafael Correa in Ecuador and Nayib Bukele in El Salvador.

    Although the institutional norms and political cultures of these countries differ from those of the U.S., examining how term limits have been dismantled offers valuable insights into how any similar efforts by Trump might unfold.

    How presidents have overstayed their term

    The most common tactic is for presidents to first ensure their political party in the legislature is fully subservient to them, and then leverage a loyal majority to amend the constitution — a move that has already been initiated in the U.S.

    Ortega and Correa successfully used their legislative majorities to pass constitutional amendments that eliminated term limits in Nicaragua and Ecuador.

    Whether Trump has achieved the same level of unwavering loyalty among Republicans is debatable, but getting amendments through the U.S. Congress is significantly more difficult. The process requires a two-thirds majority vote in both houses, followed by ratification from three-quarters of state legislatures.

    In contrast, Nicaragua’s constitution can be amended with a 60 per cent majority and, as in Ecuador, sub-national jurisdictions have no say in the matter.

    Another crucial step involves co-opting or capturing the judiciary. In Bolivia, Morales achieved a controversial third term in 2014 supported by a partisan Constitutional Tribunal. More recently, El Salvador’s Bukele secured a 2021 Supreme Court ruling (from judges he appointed) allowing him to seek immediate re-election in 2024, despite a constitutional prohibition on consecutive terms.

    We have seen a worrying pattern of subservience to Trump by the U.S. Supreme Court. The limits of this deference are increasingly uncertain.

    Securing popular support

    Some presidents have turned to plebiscites to legitimize constitutional tampering by appealing directly to the electorate and framing the move as a democratic exercise. Chávez employed this strategy in Venezuela, winning a 2009 referendum to abolish term limits.

    The absence of a national referendum mechanism in the U.S. — where popular consultations are organized at the sub-national (state) level — limits the options available to a president seeking to remove term limits through this type of populist ploy.

    Related to this, populist presidents who have successfully circumvented term limits have typically done so while enjoying extraordinarily high levels of public support.

    Correa maintained approval ratings near 70 per cent during much of his presidency, while independent polls have put Bukele’s support at well over 80 per cent. Both, along with Morales and Chávez, leveraged their popularity to justify constitutional changes through legislative and judicial channels, framing their actions as carrying out the will of the people.

    In contrast, Trump’s approval ratings have consistently remained far lower. Currently, his favourability sits in the low 40s, making any attempt to claim a broad popular mandate for a third term both dubious and precarious.

    The military matters

    Due to inevitable opposition, military support is central to any leader’s attempt to defy the constitution. In much of Latin America, the military is highly politicized, and armed forces have historically been shaped by doctrines of internal control rather than external defence.

    Rooted in Cold War-era national security ideologies, this orientation casts domestic dissenters (“socialists,” Indigenous movements, unionists) as internal enemies, legitimizing repression as a patriotic duty.

    In some countries, military oaths reflect this politicization. In both Nicaragua and Venezuela, these oaths increasingly emphasize loyalty to the president or ruling party and their revolutionary legacy, undermining institutional neutrality.

    By contrast, in the U.S., military personnel swear an oath to defend the Constitution, not the president. While they must follow orders, these must align with constitutional and legal boundaries.

    The absence of a tradition of using soldiers against American citizens and an institutional culture of constitutional loyalty and political neutrality may, at least in principle, provide some protection against the authoritarian overreach that has allowed certain Latin American presidents to remain in power indefinitely.

    But a substantial portion of the U.S. armed forces leans politically to the right, like their counterparts in Latin America, raising concerns that partisan sympathies within the military could influence its response to a constitutional crisis.

    Furthermore, the increasing use of non-military security forces — such as local police and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — against civilians demonstrates that the state has a range of instruments at its disposal for exercising control.

    The U.S. government’s use of ICE is reminiscent of how governments in countries like Venezuela and Nicaragua have used police and paramilitary units loyal to the president with impunity to suppress dissent.



    Read more:
    How ICE is becoming a secret police force under the Trump administration

    The perils of complacency

    Many in the West still hold on to the belief that constitutional erosion is something that only happens in the Global South. Some believe that American institutions are uniquely resilient and therefore capable of withstanding any attempt to subvert the constitution.

    For much of U.S. history, this confidence may have been justified, but today, it’s not only complacent but dangerous.

    The strength of democratic institutions depends on the political will to defend them. Time will tell if the barriers that exist in the U.S. are strong enough to withstand the pressures now being placed upon them. What is clear is that relying on increasingly tenuous institutional resilience or historical exceptionalism is no substitute for vigilance and active defence of democratic norms.

    Pascal Lupien does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. How Donald Trump could remain president of the United States – https://theconversation.com/how-donald-trump-could-remain-president-of-the-united-states-255589

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Duckworth Statement on DOT Secretary Duffy’s Plan to Modernize Our Aging Air Traffic Control System

    US Senate News:

    Source: United States Senator for Illinois Tammy Duckworth

    May 08, 2025

    [WASHINGTON, D.C.] – Today, U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL)—a member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation (CST) and Ranking Member of the CST Aviation Subcommittee—issued the following statement after Department of Transportation (DOT) Secretary Sean Duffy announced his new plan to modernize our nation’s air traffic control system:

    “For years, I’ve sounded the alarm that we must modernize our air traffic control system in order to safeguard the flying public. After the deadly DCA crash, multiple near-misses and a terrifying equipment failure impacting Newark, it is encouraging that Secretary Duffy and the Trump Administration recognize how urgent this matter is and are calling for new funding to upgrade our nation’s aging air traffic control technology and facilities.

    “While this may be a positive development, we shouldn’t forget that these are the same officials who just months ago indiscriminately fired hundreds of FAA workers who helped keep our civilian aviation system safe. If America wants to remain the gold standard in aviation safety, we need smart investments—not canceled investments and funding cuts. I look forward to reviewing the details of the Trump Administration’s plan with my colleagues on the Commerce committee so we can ensure our air traffic controllers have the support and equipment they need to keep passengers and crew safe.”

    For years, Duckworth has been sounding the alarm that we must make these critical aviation safety investments immediately to prevent all-too-often near-misses from becoming catastrophic tragedies. Last Congress, Duckworth chaired two CST Aviation Subcommittee hearings—one last December and the other a year prior—to address our aviation industry’s chilling surge in near-deadly close calls and underscore the urgent need to improve air traffic control systems to protect the flying public.

    Last year, Duckworth helped author the landmark bipartisan FAA reauthorization that was signed into law to extend the FAA’s funding and authorities through Fiscal Year 2028. The reauthorization included several of her provisions to improve consumer safety, expand the aviation workforce and enhance protections for travelers with disabilities.

    -30-

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: What causes inequality in African countries? New book traces a vicious cycle

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Murray Leibbrandt, UCT Chair in Poverty and Inequality Research; Director of ARUA’s African Centre of Excellence for Inequality Resaearch with the Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit., University of Cape Town

    Inequality is a problem that exists in various forms in sub-Saharan Africa.

    Inequality is created by, among other factors, where you are born and live. Alongside this, income, assets, and access to education and healthcare differ among and between populations. These inequalities reinforce each other. The result is persistent poverty, lack of social mobility across generations, increased exposure to climate change, and a lack of inclusive economic growth.

    Our recently published book Inequalities in Sub-Saharan Africa: Multidimensional Perspectives and Future Challenges presents an overview of the current situation. It identifies the key dimensions, challenges and causes of inequalities in the region. The book also proposes some solutions for equitable and sustainable development. These include progressive taxation and policies that address inequalities at their roots.

    The impact of inequality

    Migration: On a global scale, the greatest determinant of individual incomes – and thus of inequalities between individuals – is place of birth. More than half of income’s variability is explained by the country of residence and by the given circumstances at birth. These include being born in a rural environment.

    In sub-Saharan Africa, especially in low-income countries, internal migration remains the most prevalent migration pattern. Migration is often the chosen route for people seeking to escape poverty. The rural exodus that characterises many countries in sub-Saharan Africa illustrates this well. Young people in Africa, faced with high unemployment rates, often see migration as the only opportunity for social mobility.

    The dynamics of international migration are more complex. Given the high costs involved, international migration concerns only 2.5% of the population in sub-Saharan Africa. This is mostly intra-continental.

    Labour market: Access to the labour market remains the main
    determinant of inequalities in sub-Saharan Africa.

    Labour markets in the region are characterised by high proportions of informal employment. Formal sectors are relatively small (about 15% of total employment on the continent). Since the turn of the century, countries like Kenya have seen their share of informal employment increase significantly (from 73% in 2001 to 83% in 2017). At the same time formal wage employment has declined.

    This amplifies inequality because the informal sector is characterised by a lack of protection and high vulnerability. But not all informal activities are precarious. Some serve as springboards into formal jobs.

    In the formal sector, wage inequality in Africa is among the highest in the world.
    In South Africa, workers in high-skilled jobs earn nearly five times more than those in low-skilled jobs.

    Young people entering the labour market have much higher unemployment rates and little chance of regular employment.

    Gender inequality: Many gender inequalities persist, particularly access to the labour market. Unpaid care work makes women’s work invisible. In many African countries, women and girls spend more time on unpaid care which limits their economic opportunities.

    These inequalities are reinforced by inequalities in access to resources. About 38% of African women report owning land, compared to 51% of African men.

    Climate change: Africa is suffering the most severe impacts – droughts, floods and food insecurity – while contributing less than 5% of global carbon emissions.

    Arid conditions affect 43.5% of agricultural land in sub-Saharan Africa compared to an estimated global average of 29%. Similarly, climate change mitigation costs, such as finding alternatives to hydroelectric power, are higher for low-income countries.

    In sub-Saharan Africa, the richest 10% emit seven times more tonnes of carbon dioxide than the poorest 50%. Disadvantaged groups are more vulnerable to adverse climate effects as their housing and wealth are more likely to be damaged by storms and floods.

    Skewed economic growth benefits: Economic growth has led to notably lower reductions in poverty in African countries than elsewhere. Unequal distribution of growth and its capture by those at the top of the income distribution ladder are evidence of non-inclusive economic growth. The richest 1% of Africans received 27% of the total revenue from growth on the continent.

    What needs to be done

    It is vital to give priority to promoting social and economic inclusion in the development strategies of African countries. Importantly, multidimensional inequalities such as income and health persist because they reinforce each other. Tackling them therefore requires coordinated and coherent policies.

    Murray Leibbrandt receives funding from the National Research Foundation of South Africa, the Agence Française de Développement, UK Research and Innovation, the World Institute for Development Economics Research and the International Inequalities Institute of the London School of Economics. He is affiliated with the United Nations University’s World Institute for Development Economics Research and the Jackson School of Global Affairs at Yale University.

    Anda David, Rawane Yasser, and Vimal Ranchhod do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. What causes inequality in African countries? New book traces a vicious cycle – https://theconversation.com/what-causes-inequality-in-african-countries-new-book-traces-a-vicious-cycle-253376

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: US funding cuts have crippled our HIV work – what’s being lost

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Glenda Gray, Distinguished Professor, Infectious Disease and Oncology Research Institute, Faculty of Heath Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Executive Director Perinatal HIV Research Unit, Chief Scientific Officer, South African Medical Research Council

    The loss of research capability means losing an understanding of how to prevent or treat HIV. Photo by sergey mikheev on Unsplash

    The Trump administration’s cuts to funding for scientific research have left many scientists reeling and very worried. At the National Institutes of Health in the US, which has an annual budget of US$47 billion to support medical research both in the US and around the world, nearly 800 grants have been terminated. The administration is considering cutting the overall budget of the National Institutes of Health by 40%.

    In South Africa, where tensions are running high with the new Trump administration over land reform and other diplomatic fault lines, scientists have had research grants from the National Institutes of Health suspended. Glenda Gray, who has been at the forefront of HIV/Aids scientific research for decades, assesses the impact of these cuts.

    How have the cuts affected your research? When did you start worrying?

    There was subliminal fear that started to percolate at the end of January. I said to my team, we need to start looking at our grants. We need to start looking at our exposure.

    The first institute to go under the Trump administration’s cuts was USAID. The multibillion-dollar agency that fought poverty and hunger around the world was the first to face the chop.

    As a result, a USAID-funded US$46 million consortium on HIV vaccine discovery and experimental medicine to evaluate first in Africa or first in human HIV vaccines was terminated.

    Then in mid-April, funding for a clinical trial in Soweto near Johannesburg in South Africa was marked as “pending”. The unit was involved in trials for HIV vaccines. On top of that,  four global research networks on HIV/Aids prevention and treatment strategies were told by the National Institutes of Health in the US that they could no longer spend any money in South Africa. The Soweto unit was affiliated with those networks.

    So basically you can’t start new studies in South Africa?

    There is a great deal of uncertainty. I’m sitting on many calls, working out how we survive in the next couple of months.

    I’m going from bankrupt to absolutely bankrupt in terms of our ability to do work.

    We’ve been doing scenario planning, looking at all our contingencies, but it’s very hard to know exactly what you’re doing until you have the relevant documentation in front of you.

    To all intents and purposes for the next period, South Africa is eliminated from the National Institutes of Health networks and its scientific agenda.

    How is the South African government responding?

    The government doesn’t have the kind of money to replace the substantial amount of finances that we got through the National Institutes of Health competitive processes. However scientists have been working together with the Medical Research Council, Treasury and various government departments to plot the best way forward.

    Everyone’s been writing grant proposals, speaking to the Gates Foundation, speaking to the Wellcome Trust, looking at public-private partnerships, talking to other philanthropists. But the bottom line is that funding is never going to be at the kind of level that will replace the research infrastructure that we’ve got.

    To get money from the National Institutes of Health we had to compete with all scientists all over the world. This wasn’t just aid being doled out to us.

    Where does this leave the future of research in South Africa for HIV vaccine trials?

    South Africa has been able to contribute to global guidelines to improve care. The loss of research capability means that you lose the knowledge or the value of understanding HIV prevention, HIV vaccines or therapeutics.

    We in South Africa have the infrastructure, we have the burden of disease, the sciences, the regulator and ethical environment and the ability to answer these questions. And so it’s going to take the world a lot longer to answer these questions without South Africa.

    If we slow down research, we slow down HIV vaccine research, we slow down cures and we slow down other HIV prevention methodologies.

    And so basically you slow down the process of knowledge generation.

    What does it feel like to be a scientist right now in South Africa?

    South African scientists are resilient. We’ve had to weather many storms, from the explosion of HIV to Aids denialism … watching people die, getting people onto treatment, having vaccine trials that have failed.

    You have to be resilient to be a scientist in this field.

    It’s going to be very hard to bring the fight against HIV/Aids back to the current level again.

    It feels now like we are deer in the headlights because we don’t know how to pivot.

    This is an edited transcript of an interview with Professor Gray aired in a podcast produced by The Conversation UK. You can listen to the full podcast here.

    Glenda Gray receives funding from US-NIH which is currently being evaluated. .

    – ref. US funding cuts have crippled our HIV work – what’s being lost – https://theconversation.com/us-funding-cuts-have-crippled-our-hiv-work-whats-being-lost-255645

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Africa: What causes inequality in African countries? New book traces a vicious cycle

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Murray Leibbrandt, UCT Chair in Poverty and Inequality Research; Director of ARUA’s African Centre of Excellence for Inequality Resaearch with the Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit., University of Cape Town

    Inequality is a problem that exists in various forms in sub-Saharan Africa.

    Inequality is created by, among other factors, where you are born and live. Alongside this, income, assets, and access to education and healthcare differ among and between populations. These inequalities reinforce each other. The result is persistent poverty, lack of social mobility across generations, increased exposure to climate change, and a lack of inclusive economic growth.

    Our recently published book Inequalities in Sub-Saharan Africa: Multidimensional Perspectives and Future Challenges presents an overview of the current situation. It identifies the key dimensions, challenges and causes of inequalities in the region. The book also proposes some solutions for equitable and sustainable development. These include progressive taxation and policies that address inequalities at their roots.

    The impact of inequality

    Migration: On a global scale, the greatest determinant of individual incomes – and thus of inequalities between individuals – is place of birth. More than half of income’s variability is explained by the country of residence and by the given circumstances at birth. These include being born in a rural environment.

    In sub-Saharan Africa, especially in low-income countries, internal migration remains the most prevalent migration pattern. Migration is often the chosen route for people seeking to escape poverty. The rural exodus that characterises many countries in sub-Saharan Africa illustrates this well. Young people in Africa, faced with high unemployment rates, often see migration as the only opportunity for social mobility.

    The dynamics of international migration are more complex. Given the high costs involved, international migration concerns only 2.5% of the population in sub-Saharan Africa. This is mostly intra-continental.

    Labour market: Access to the labour market remains the main determinant of inequalities in sub-Saharan Africa.

    Labour markets in the region are characterised by high proportions of informal employment. Formal sectors are relatively small (about 15% of total employment on the continent). Since the turn of the century, countries like Kenya have seen their share of informal employment increase significantly (from 73% in 2001 to 83% in 2017). At the same time formal wage employment has declined.

    This amplifies inequality because the informal sector is characterised by a lack of protection and high vulnerability. But not all informal activities are precarious. Some serve as springboards into formal jobs.

    In the formal sector, wage inequality in Africa is among the highest in the world. In South Africa, workers in high-skilled jobs earn nearly five times more than those in low-skilled jobs.

    Young people entering the labour market have much higher unemployment rates and little chance of regular employment.

    Gender inequality: Many gender inequalities persist, particularly access to the labour market. Unpaid care work makes women’s work invisible. In many African countries, women and girls spend more time on unpaid care which limits their economic opportunities.

    These inequalities are reinforced by inequalities in access to resources. About 38% of African women report owning land, compared to 51% of African men.

    Climate change: Africa is suffering the most severe impacts – droughts, floods and food insecurity – while contributing less than 5% of global carbon emissions.

    Arid conditions affect 43.5% of agricultural land in sub-Saharan Africa compared to an estimated global average of 29%. Similarly, climate change mitigation costs, such as finding alternatives to hydroelectric power, are higher for low-income countries.

    In sub-Saharan Africa, the richest 10% emit seven times more tonnes of carbon dioxide than the poorest 50%. Disadvantaged groups are more vulnerable to adverse climate effects as their housing and wealth are more likely to be damaged by storms and floods.

    Skewed economic growth benefits: Economic growth has led to notably lower reductions in poverty in African countries than elsewhere. Unequal distribution of growth and its capture by those at the top of the income distribution ladder are evidence of non-inclusive economic growth. The richest 1% of Africans received 27% of the total revenue from growth on the continent.

    What needs to be done

    It is vital to give priority to promoting social and economic inclusion in the development strategies of African countries. Importantly, multidimensional inequalities such as income and health persist because they reinforce each other. Tackling them therefore requires coordinated and coherent policies.

    – What causes inequality in African countries? New book traces a vicious cycle
    – https://theconversation.com/what-causes-inequality-in-african-countries-new-book-traces-a-vicious-cycle-253376

    MIL OSI Africa –

  • MIL-OSI Africa: US funding cuts have crippled our HIV work – what’s being lost

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Glenda Gray, Distinguished Professor, Infectious Disease and Oncology Research Institute, Faculty of Heath Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Executive Director Perinatal HIV Research Unit, Chief Scientific Officer, South African Medical Research Council

    The Trump administration’s cuts to funding for scientific research have left many scientists reeling and very worried. At the National Institutes of Health in the US, which has an annual budget of US$47 billion to support medical research both in the US and around the world, nearly 800 grants have been terminated. The administration is considering cutting the overall budget of the National Institutes of Health by 40%.

    In South Africa, where tensions are running high with the new Trump administration over land reform and other diplomatic fault lines, scientists have had research grants from the National Institutes of Health suspended. Glenda Gray, who has been at the forefront of HIV/Aids scientific research for decades, assesses the impact of these cuts.

    How have the cuts affected your research? When did you start worrying?

    There was subliminal fear that started to percolate at the end of January. I said to my team, we need to start looking at our grants. We need to start looking at our exposure.

    The first institute to go under the Trump administration’s cuts was USAID. The multibillion-dollar agency that fought poverty and hunger around the world was the first to face the chop.

    As a result, a USAID-funded US$46 million consortium on HIV vaccine discovery and experimental medicine to evaluate first in Africa or first in human HIV vaccines was terminated.

    Then in mid-April, funding for a clinical trial in Soweto near Johannesburg in South Africa was marked as “pending”. The unit was involved in trials for HIV vaccines. On top of that,  four global research networks on HIV/Aids prevention and treatment strategies were told by the National Institutes of Health in the US that they could no longer spend any money in South Africa. The Soweto unit was affiliated with those networks.

    So basically you can’t start new studies in South Africa?

    There is a great deal of uncertainty. I’m sitting on many calls, working out how we survive in the next couple of months.

    I’m going from bankrupt to absolutely bankrupt in terms of our ability to do work.

    We’ve been doing scenario planning, looking at all our contingencies, but it’s very hard to know exactly what you’re doing until you have the relevant documentation in front of you.

    To all intents and purposes for the next period, South Africa is eliminated from the National Institutes of Health networks and its scientific agenda.

    How is the South African government responding?

    The government doesn’t have the kind of money to replace the substantial amount of finances that we got through the National Institutes of Health competitive processes. However scientists have been working together with the Medical Research Council, Treasury and various government departments to plot the best way forward.

    Everyone’s been writing grant proposals, speaking to the Gates Foundation, speaking to the Wellcome Trust, looking at public-private partnerships, talking to other philanthropists. But the bottom line is that funding is never going to be at the kind of level that will replace the research infrastructure that we’ve got.

    To get money from the National Institutes of Health we had to compete with all scientists all over the world. This wasn’t just aid being doled out to us.

    Where does this leave the future of research in South Africa for HIV vaccine trials?

    South Africa has been able to contribute to global guidelines to improve care. The loss of research capability means that you lose the knowledge or the value of understanding HIV prevention, HIV vaccines or therapeutics.

    We in South Africa have the infrastructure, we have the burden of disease, the sciences, the regulator and ethical environment and the ability to answer these questions. And so it’s going to take the world a lot longer to answer these questions without South Africa.

    If we slow down research, we slow down HIV vaccine research, we slow down cures and we slow down other HIV prevention methodologies.

    And so basically you slow down the process of knowledge generation.

    What does it feel like to be a scientist right now in South Africa?

    South African scientists are resilient. We’ve had to weather many storms, from the explosion of HIV to Aids denialism … watching people die, getting people onto treatment, having vaccine trials that have failed.

    You have to be resilient to be a scientist in this field.

    It’s going to be very hard to bring the fight against HIV/Aids back to the current level again.

    It feels now like we are deer in the headlights because we don’t know how to pivot.

    This is an edited transcript of an interview with Professor Gray aired in a podcast produced by The Conversation UK. You can listen to the full podcast here.

    – US funding cuts have crippled our HIV work – what’s being lost
    – https://theconversation.com/us-funding-cuts-have-crippled-our-hiv-work-whats-being-lost-255645

    MIL OSI Africa –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: expert reaction to Government White Paper on immigration

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    Scientists comment on R&D elements of the Government’s White Paper on immigration. 

    Sir Adrian Smith, President of the Royal Society, said:

    “Today’s white paper talks of making it simpler and easier for top scientific talent to come to the UK but our visa system remains one of the most expensive in the world and that is holding the UK back. Simpler and easier is good news but it is not enough – the costs have to come down if we want to attract the best talent.

    “There is a lot of detail that still needs to be explored about the impact of any changes, in what is a complex system. We will be talking to the Government to find out exactly what their plans will mean in practice.”

     

    Tom Grinyer, CEO of the Institute of Physics, said:

    “We understand the need for reform but these proposals risk us cutting off urgently needed scientific and technological talent at a time when the need to keep up with global change has never been greater.

    “The UK must continue to welcome international scientific talent both to work and to study if it is to keep its place as a leading science and technology nation – and deliver the growth our economy needs.

    “Ensuring visas go to the right people is important but in looking to control migration, we must not undermine our research and innovation economy. The Institute of Physics welcomes incentives for skilled people to come through ‘high talent routes’ but we are very concerned that changes to salary thresholds and graduate eligibility could stop much-needed scientific talent and harm universities and businesses. We’re also concerned that the proposed levy on higher education providers will exacerbate the serious financial challenges these institutions are already facing.

    “The Prime Minister rightly emphasises homegrown skills and sectors like engineering and AI, both powered by physics. But physics is an intensely international, collaborative field. The UK’s strength in the technologies on the future absolutely depends on attracting the right international talent to work alongside the UK’s own brilliant scientists and innovators.”

     

    Dr Alicia Greated, Executive Director, Campaign for Science and Engineering (CaSE), said:

    “Attracting talented scientists and researchers to the UK from around the world is vital for a thriving research sector that can contribute to economic growth. It is therefore welcome to see the Government’s recognition of the importance of the Global Talent route in the Immigration White Paper published today. It is also pleasing that CaSE recommendations on increasing uptake of the Global Talent Visa and streamlining the visa application process have been taken up. However, we will need to see the detail of these changes and work with the Government as they implement their plans.

    “The white paper also includes changes to the rules governing student and graduate study visas. It is critical that the Government makes clear the work it has done to understand and mitigate the impact of these changes on the university sector given the current issues of financial sustainability.”

    https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/restoring-control-over-the-immigration-system-white-paper

     

     

     

    Declared interests

    The nature of this story means everyone quoted above could be perceived to have a stake in it. As such, our policy is not to ask for interests to be declared – instead, they are implicit in each person’s affiliation.

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Russia: A graduate of the SPbGASU Master’s program was awarded the I. G. Lezhava RAASN medal

    Translation. Region: Russian Federal

    Source: Saint Petersburg State University of Architecture and Civil Engineering – Saint Petersburg State University of Architecture and Civil Engineering – Dmitry Shvidkovsky presents the award to Mikhail Vilensky

    A graduate of the SPbGASU Master’s program, Anna Baranova, and her supervisor, Associate Professor of the Department of Urban Planning, Mikhail Vilensky, became laureates of the competition for the Medal of the Russian Academy of Architecture and Construction Sciences named after Ilya Georgievich Lezhava for the best diploma project in the field of urban planning in 2024.

    On April 25, at the general meeting of RAASN members in the Central House of Architects in Moscow, the medal and diplomas were presented to Mikhail Vilensky by RAASN President Dmitry Shvidkovsky. As Mikhail Vilensky reported, this award was given for the first time for a master’s thesis project defended in St. Petersburg.

    Ilya Georgievich Lezhava (1935–2018) is an outstanding Soviet and Russian architect, theorist and practitioner of urban planning, academician of the Russian Academy of Architecture and Construction Sciences, Honored Architect of the Russian Federation, one of the founders of “Paper Architecture” – a movement that includes architectural projects that are unrealistic due to their technical complexity or other reasons.

    The RAASN Medal named after I. G. Lezhava is awarded annually to one graduate of a Russian architectural university or faculty, a citizen of the Russian Federation, for a final qualifying work for the qualification of “Master” in the field of “Urban Planning”.

    The medal and diplomas were awarded for the master’s thesis “Urban planning organization of the sports infrastructure system in St. Petersburg”. The project was completed at the Department of Urban Planning of SPbGASU. We asked the author of the project and her scientific supervisor to tell us about their work.

    Anna Baranova: “For me, architecture is not only design work, but also research work. In modern architectural activity, in my opinion, they are disconnected. For example, in my research on urban planning organization of mass sports infrastructure, to highlight the problem of insufficient sports facilities in St. Petersburg, it was necessary to check the existing indicators of provision. It turned out that many factors, such as territorial accessibility, the location of planned facilities and their nature, are simply not taken into account. An analysis of how such objects are designed led to the conclusion about problems in the organization of architectural activity at the legislative level.

    Therefore, it is important to reduce the gap between scientific academic activity and architectural practice. They must work together: without understanding the organization and processes of architectural design (practice), science can go into utopia, and design practice without science can lose the common vision of the past, present and future.”

    Mikhail Vilensky: “The study is devoted to the formation of sports infrastructure in St. Petersburg. For a modern person, sports are an integral part of life, but we have outdated social and spatial forms of such infrastructure.

    Our work examines the evolution and development of such forms in St. Petersburg from their inception to the current state, taking into account the variability of both sports and urban planning forms. The work is based on a large-scale analysis of archival and planometric materials, an assessment of the availability of sports infrastructure and its provision.

    For the first time, the development of urban planning regulations in the field of sports infrastructure and their impact on urban planning in the USSR and Russia has been studied. Territories in St. Petersburg where the provision of sports infrastructure is not only insufficient, but also absent, have been identified, which leads to complex spatial conflicts when dilemmas arise as to which functions are more important for the city in the context of a shortage of free space. Strategies for the development of various urban territories within the framework of the formation of sports infrastructure have been proposed.

    Currently, Anna and I continue to work on this topic – we are developing proposals for improving regional urban development regulations in terms of creating infrastructure for sports.”

    Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.

    MIL OSI Russia News –

  • MIL-OSI: MaxisIT Evolves to Maxis AI, Launches Enterprise-Ready Agentic AI Platform to Transform Clinical Trials in Pharmaceutical and Life Sciences Industry

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    EDISON, N.J., May 12, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — MaxisIT, a long-recognized provider of clinical data analytics platform for clinical trials, today announced its transformation into Maxis AI. This strategic evolution is marked by the introduction of the company’s innovative Agentic AI Platform, launched with the guiding principle: “Designed to Think. Built to Act.” This initiative signals a new direction for clinical development. As part of this change, Maxis AI’s new platform will support pharmaceutical and life sciences companies in achieving greater efficiency, deeper insights, and accelerated progress.

    Bringing life-saving therapies to patients comes with complexity, rising costs, and lengthy timelines. Maxis AI addresses these challenges with Agentic AI, enabling systems to understand objectives, determine key steps, and execute tasks throughout clinical trials.

    The launch marks a major milestone in the evolution of enterprise AI, an evolution from passive copilots and static chatbots to fully actionable, domain-aware agents that can reason, act, and adapt across complex workflows.

    Built for Enterprise, Tuned for Industry

    Maxis AI’s Agentic AI Platform is designed to meet enterprise requirements from the ground up. Features include:

    • Multi-agent orchestration for automating end-to-end workflows
    • Built-in governance and auditability for compliance with HIPAA, GxP, 21 CFR Part 11, and other regulations
    • Pre-trained industry agents for pharma R&D, regulatory operations, clinical trials, and patient services
    • Ecosystem of 100s of integrations with various third-party systems and data sources

    The core idea behind the Agentic AI platform emphasizes its capacity to lead industry in transitioning from moving from AI that answers… to AI that achieves, thereby speeding up results and supporting more informed decision-making. This platform will be the engine for a collaborative approach where AI agents and human experts work together to coordinate and improve all facets of clinical research.

    “Today signifies an important new direction for our company and, we believe, Scaling Agentic AI in clinical trials isn’t just a tech lift, it’s an organizational evolution,” said Moulik Shah, CEO of Maxis AI. “Our transition to Maxis AI and our platform vision, ‘Designed to Think. Built to Act.,’ highlight our commitment to innovation. We empower partners to steer through clinical trials with greater agility, deeper insights, and streamlined processes to accelerate progress.”

    Proven Results in Pharma and Healthcare

    Maxis AI has already piloted its platform with early adopters in the pharmaceutical and healthcare sectors. In a recent deployment with a large pharma organization, AI agents built on the platform demonstrated significant proof of value. Another implementation at a CRO organization improved site monitoring, reducing turnaround time from days to mins in detecting and addressing compliance issues.

    “We’ve seen strong early validation: our AI agents are helping organizations operationalize AI—not just as a prototype, but in production environments. Whether it’s a clinical data agent or a site monitoring agent, we’re seeing measurable proof of value within weeks of deployment,” said Nicole Powell, Senior Vice President, Business Development at Maxis AI.

    The Maxis AI Platform will enhance its suite of trusted solutions, including CTRenaissance® Clinical Data Analytics, while ensuring seamless interoperability with other clinical data platforms. This supports a smooth transition for clients and a unified industry offering. Its core INSPIRE values –Innovation, Security, Precision, Transparency, Integrity, Diversity, and Excellence – will continue guiding the development of responsible technology solutions.

    About Maxis AI

    Maxis AI (formerly MaxisIT) is focused on transforming drug development through the power of intelligent technology. With its forward-thinking “Maxis AI – Drug Development Agency” model and its Intelligent Platform “Designed to Think. Built to Act.,” the company helps pharmaceutical, and life sciences organizations achieve smarter, faster insights and more effective processes for superior clinical outcomes. Drawing on over 20 years of industry experience and a comprehensive suite of solutions, Maxis AI is committed to accelerating the delivery of life-saving therapies. Headquartered in Edison, NJ, Maxis AI is committed to innovation, precision, and integrity in advancing clinical trials. Explore the future of clinical development at www.maxisai.com.

    Contact Information:

    Nicole Powell
    SVP, Business Development
    Nicole.P@maxisit.com

    Moulik Shah
    CEO
    MShah@maxisit.com

    Press/Media Contact:
    Sneha Gupta
    Associate Director, Corporate Communications and Marketing
    Sneha.Gupta@maxisclinical.com

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI Global: If you really want to close the US trade deficit, try boosting innovation in rural manufacturing

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Amitrajeet A. Batabyal, Distinguished Professor, Arthur J. Gosnell Professor of Economics, & Interim Head, Department of Sustainability, Rochester Institute of Technology

    President Donald Trump has long been preoccupied by the trade deficit — the gap between what the U.S. sells to the rest of the world and what it buys from it. He recently declared the issue a national emergency and used trade deficit data to calculate so-called “reciprocal tariffs” targeting nearly 100 countries. Although those specific tariffs are now on pause, Trump’s concern with the trade deficit persists.

    As an economist, I know there are two basic ways for a country to reduce a trade deficit: import less or export more. While Trump has focused on the former strategy, a more productive path may lie in the latter – especially by looking at untapped opportunities in rural America.

    Economists have long studied the differences between rural and urban regions. But while research shows that urban areas tend to be more technologically advanced, fast-growing and economically dynamic, economists have historically paid less attention to how regional differences affect export performance.

    New research is starting to fill that gap. Economists recently found that urban businesses export significantly more than rural ones – a difference with significant implications for national trade.

    The urban-rural export gap

    Looking at data from the Census Bureau’s Annual Business Survey as well as trade statistics from 2017 to 2020, researchers used econometric techniques to measure the urban-rural export gap. They also examined two categories of potential causes – “explained” and “unexplained.”

    The first is due to differences in what economists call “endowments” – for example, a region’s digital infrastructure, its access to renewable energy and its opportunities for high-tech employment. These endowments can be observed and therefore explained.

    The second is due to what economists call “structural advantage.” This refers to attributes of a region that matter for export performance but can’t be observed and, as a result, remain unexplained.

    They found that most of the urban-rural export gap is due to explained differences. That means rural businesses could close the export gap if they were provided with similar endowments – meaning comparable access to renewable energy, similar digital infrastructure and analogous opportunities for high-tech employment – to their urban counterparts.

    Even more strikingly, the unexplained component was negative – which means rural businesses outperform expectations given their characteristics. That suggests rural regions have significant untapped export potential.

    Several factors collectively account for the urban export advantage. First, urban regions have a greater concentration of highly educated science and technology workers. Urban businesses also tend to be larger and more tech-savvy, and because they have better access to broadband, they use cloud technology more frequently. Urban areas also have more foreign-born business owners who may leverage their international networks.

    However, many of these differences suggest possible policy solutions. For instance, since cloud adoption depends on broadband availability, it follows that investing in digital infrastructure could boost rural exports. Also, rural manufacturers, especially in sectors like metals manufacturing, show comparable or higher export intensity per worker than their urban counterparts. So encouraging rural manufacturing would be one way to reduce the urban-rural export gap.

    Rethinking trade and rural development

    I think this research has important policy implications.

    First, it shifts some of the focus away from other countries as the root cause of the trade deficit. And second, it bolsters the case for what economists call “place-based policies” targeting specific geographic areas – as opposed to “people-based policies,” which provide support directly to individuals.

    Even though many economists dislike place-based policies, they are increasingly attracting both academic and governmental attention.

    The 2022 CHIPS and Science Act had special significance to rural areas.

    During the Biden administration, three major laws – the Inflation Reduction Act, the CHIPS and Science Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act – directed significant federal funds to rural areas. About 43% of funds from those laws – or US$440 billion – was designated as either “rural relevant” or as “rural stipulated,” meaning the funds were either geographically targeted or designed to address disproportionately rural challenges.

    Such massive investments in rural regions have led researchers and policymakers to question whether rural export underperformance stems from differences in observable endowments – in other words, things like access to broadband – or from inherent disadvantages that are much harder to deal with.

    In my view, this research provides compelling evidence that much of the urban-rural export gap is due to unequal distribution of productive assets, rather than inherent rural disadvantages. With appropriate investments in digital infrastructure, human capital and support for export-capable industries, America’s rural regions could play a much larger role in global trade. These findings also suggest the value of continued federal support for rural development efforts.

    In other words, if the U.S. wants to shrink its trade deficit, one answer could be more innovation in rural manufacturing.

    Amitrajeet A. Batabyal does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. If you really want to close the US trade deficit, try boosting innovation in rural manufacturing – https://theconversation.com/if-you-really-want-to-close-the-us-trade-deficit-try-boosting-innovation-in-rural-manufacturing-255851

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Population explosions and declines are related to the stability of the economy and the environment

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Ken G. Drouillard, Professor, Great Lakes Institute for Environmental Research and Director of the School of the Environment, University of Windsor

    A country’s population is affected by, and in turn affects, environmental and economic issues. (Shutterstock)

    For 200 years, we’ve been warned of unchecked population growth and how it leads to environmental instability. On the other hand, today some countries face decreasing populations, alongside increasing proportions of elderly people, causing economic instability.

    These two facets of population crises — explosions and declines — are occurring in different parts of the world, and have a global impact on the environment and on economies. Discussions about achieving economic and environmental sustainability must consider population changes, technology and the environment, given these concepts are closely interwoven.

    Population explosions and declines are related to both environmental and economic instability; some countries make reactionary choices that trade off short-term domestic economic progress over the environment.

    The crisis of population explosions

    In 1798, English economist Thomas Malthus warned of a population explosion, inferring that population growth will outstrip agricultural production. Malthus’s ideas became re-popularized by American scientist Paul R. Ehrlich in his book published at the height of population growth in the 1960s. Both predicted that a population explosion would cause shortages in resources and escalating environmental damage.

    Like Malthus, Ehrlich was criticized for a crisis “that never happened” because human ingenuity, a byproduct of population, overcomes the worst fears of environmentalists. This counter-argument relies on technological advances making more efficient use of resources while lowering the environmental impacts.

    This is best exemplified by efficiency gains of agriculture that have continued to feed a growing world. Ehrlich’s predictions of cumulative environmental damage are best illustrated by the growing intensity of climate change and species loss as the global population continues to grow even though the current growth rate is slower than it was in the 1960s.

    A graph reflecting how population growth, species diversity and global temperature correlate over time.
    (K. Drouillard), CC BY

    Unified growth theory describes how economies change over the long term. It starts with a period of slow technological progress, low income growth and high population growth. Over time, these conditions give way to a modern growth phase, where technology improves quickly, income rises steadily and population growth slows as societies go through a demographic transition towards stable population sizes.

    Technological progress positively contributes to national economies over the long term. However, early adoption of green technology often relies on finance and government incentives that may imply short-term economic burdens. Yet when green technology is implemented and coupled to slowing population growth, it leads to decreasing national environmental footprints that pave a way towards joint environmental and economic sustainability.

    The crisis of population declines

    Declining populations cause inverted age pyramids with larger numbers of elderly people. These shifting demographics cause economic instability. They also constrain technological progress and social security.

    Population declines work against the gains described by unified growth theory. Presently, 63 countries have reached their peak population and 48 more are expected to peak within 30 years. Fears of population decline are also being forecast at the global scale.

    The global population is predicted to peak between the mid-2060s to 2100, stabilizing at 10.2 billion from its present 8.2 billion.

    In their book, Empty Planet, political scientist Darrell Bricker and political commentator John Ibbitson warn that zero population growth will happen even faster. They argue once a country decreases its fertility to below replacement (2.1 children per woman), the social reinforcements of increasing urbanization, costs of raising children and increased empowerment over family planning make it almost impossible to increase the birth rate.

    For highly affluent countries, the per capita GDP is decreasing as the proportion of elderly in the population increases. Although this pattern doesn’t hold when less affluent countries are added, the figure demonstrates tangible economic impacts for countries grappling with aging populations.

    A graph showing the percentage of elderly people in a country’s population, correlated with GDP and adjusted for inflation.
    (K. Drouillard), CC BY

    Simultaneous explosions and declines

    Affluent nations facing decline can react to economic instability in ways that counter global economic and environmental sustainability.

    In the past, affluent nations were the drivers of green technology. However, economic instability from population declines can cause reluctance to invest, adopt and share green technology crucial for mitigating environmental damage at the global scale.

    The issue is compounded by the fact that many countries overlook how their own decline in population growth contributes to economic instability. They instead focus on short-term solutions to their economic situation that may include unsustainable resource use.

    Left unaddressed, the real issue of population decline becomes unresolved, allowing social anxieties against immigration and global trade to grow. This can exacerbate the issue halting technology sharing, slowing economic growth and increasing economic inequality and environmental damage.

    The above is exemplified by policies now being implemented by the United States. Where immigration was previously used as a backstop against low fertility, growing cultural backlash to immigration pressures rooted in anxiety about economic uncertainties have generated new policies causing the deportation of millions of immigrants and closing borders. This will most likely accelerate a population decline in the U.S., as highlighted by a Congressional Budget Office report.

    At the same time, the U.S. is shifting its energy policy away from increased shares of renewable, green energy sources back to a focus on fossil fuels that will worsen climate damage.

    Climate damage costs are currently two per cent of global GDP, and may increase to between two to 21 per cent of some countries’ incomes by the end of the century. The growing applications of artificial intelligence (AI) and its high energy use will add to climate damage. AI may also contribute to the economic challenges related to population decline if it replaces, rather than supports, labour.

    Finally, tariff wars add new barriers against green technology sharing.

    Canada’s lowered immigration

    Canada, which already has a low fertility rate and is reacting to the U.S. trade war, has its own challenges. This year, immigration targets were decreased by 19 per cent. The lack of support for and subsequent removal of the carbon tax and possible extension of pipeline infrastructure could generate similar delays in the transition away from fossil fuels.



    Read more:
    Who really killed Canada’s carbon tax? Friends and foes alike

    In the most recent federal election, discussions about environmental policy were largely side-tracked by economic issues.

    Our research indicates that Canada and other affluent nations need to establish longer-term solutions to economic instabilities that mitigate environmental damage while promoting sustainable national and global economies.

    The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals offer pathways for economic, social and environmental sustainability. However, realizing these goals requires society to fully acknowledge the intertwined relationships between population growth, economy, environment and international technology-sharing in ways that transcend short-term national interests and reactionary policies.

    The past decade has seen strong momentum from social and natural sciences as well as international organizations, business and civil society. Unfortunately, the current climate of economic uncertainty is halting this progress — unless the public can force broader discussions about sustainable approaches back into the political sphere.

    Ken G. Drouillard receives funding from Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), Canadian Water Agency, Environment and Climate Change Canada, St. Clair River Conservation Authority and North Shore of Lake Superior Remedial Action Plans.

    Claudio N. Verani receives/has received funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), U.S. Department of Energy (DoE), Petroleum Research Fund (ACS-PRF), and the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).

    Marcelo Arbex has received funding from University of Windsor UW-SSHRC Explore.

    – ref. Population explosions and declines are related to the stability of the economy and the environment – https://theconversation.com/population-explosions-and-declines-are-related-to-the-stability-of-the-economy-and-the-environment-253302

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Colossal Bioscience’s attempt to de-extinct the dire wolf is a dangerously deceptive publicity stunt

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By David Coltman, Professor, Western University

    Colossal Biosciences, a Texas-based biotech company, made headlines this April after falsely claiming to resurrect the extinct dire wolf. The company presents this as a breakthrough for conservation biology. However, our team of conservation geneticists at the University of Western Ontario — along with many other academics views it as a dangerous deception.



    Read more:
    ‘Return’ of the dire wolf is an impressive feat of genetic engineering, not a reversal of extinction

    Colossal’s so-called dire wolf is not a resurrected species. It’s a genetically modified grey wolf. Its creation is a publicity stunt designed to generate profit, with serious consequences.

    TIME reports on claims that Colossal Biosciences has brought back the dire wolf.

    Jenga approach to conservation

    Conservation aims to safeguard ecosystems by preserving the networks of interaction between animals and their environment. Human activity has caused widespread habitat loss, driving extinction rates to levels estimated to be about 1,000 times higher than the natural background rate. We are living through a biodiversity crisis, and conservation remains our only real defence against further declines.

    Colossal proposes de-extinction to combat this crisis, using a Jenga-block metaphor to explain their approach. The ecosystem is a Jenga tower, with each species representing a block — and losing a species weakens the structure, pushing it closer to collapse. Colossal Biosciences proposes that inserting a de-extinct species where a block was lost could help restore ecosystem stability and prevent collapse.

    The premise isn’t entirely flawed; in some cases, introducing an animal into an unstable ecosystem to fill a lost ecological role can help restore balance. This is similar to reintroducing a species to an area where it once lived, which is a well-established conservation strategy.

    Conservation and cloning

    Likewise, cloning technology has the potential to aid in meaningful conservation projects. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has successfully used the technology to help restore the black-footed ferret, a species once considered extinct.

    Every year scientists release 150 to 200 black-footed ferrets into their native habitat, with cloned individuals and their future offspring expected to strengthen the species’ chances of survival.

    The flaw in Colossal’s plan is that the animals they focus on — Ice Age megafauna like the mammoth and dire wolf — no longer belong to any modern ecosystem. Most of the species they once interacted with disappeared, along with their habitats, roughly 10,000 years ago.

    These synthetic animals are the wrong shape for our unstable Jenga tower. Forcing them into the gap might make the ecosystem more likely to collapse.

    ‘Frankensheep’: A cautionary tale

    A warning tale of misused cloning technology comes from Montana rancher Arthur Schubarth, who illegally cloned hybrid bighorn sheep — “Frankensheep” — for trophy hunting. His operation not only exploited endangered species for profit, but also triggered outbreaks of infectious disease, demonstrating the risks that unchecked cloning technology poses to wildlife and ecosystems.

    One of the most damaging aspects of Colossal’s announcement is the perpetuation of a decades-old myth that technology will save us. It would be comforting to believe we can genetically engineer our way out of the current biodiversity crisis, but that is not our reality.

    Introducing Ice Age animals would have unpredictable and potentially damaging consequences. And even if we focused on more suitable animals — those whose ecosystems still exist and could benefit from de-extinction — we could never keep pace with the current rate of biodiversity loss.

    Colossal’s de-extinction project also doesn’t tackle the forces driving extinction like climate change, habitat loss, exploitation, pollution and invasive species.

    That’s not the story Colossal wants the public to understand. They brand themselves as leaders in conservation to sell content — catchy memes, viral videos, photoshoots with Game of Thrones author George R.R. Martin and banter with Elon Musk about his future pet woolly mammoth.

    Concerning implications

    Valued at US$10.2 billion, Colossal is now contacting zoos about putting its pups on display.

    The Toronto Zoo and the Association of Zoos and Aquariums have issued warnings against participating in the development or display of de-extinct animals. Still, some zoos may jump at the opportunity to boost ticket sales by offering the public a glimpse of this sci-fi spectacle.

    As Colossal profits from marketing its greenwashed construct and hints at the creation of “Pleistocene Parks,” it is still unclear what this technology really means for the future of conservation.

    Worse still, the de-extinction myth provides a guise for undermining habitat protection.

    U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has already cited Colossal’s announcement as justification for weakening the Endangered Species Act.

    Proposed changes to the act would give industrial activities greater freedom to destroy the habitats endangered species depend on — at a time when habitat loss remains the leading threat to species. A project marketed to rescue biodiversity could, instead, help speed up its decay.

    We are deeply concerned about the implications of Colossal’s announcement, but we hope this moment drives more public interest and funding toward the difficult and less glamorous work that needs to be done to protect habitat and conserve biodiversity. The fanfare around Colossal’s genetic engineering feat should not distract from the global biodiversity crisis, which remains truly dire.

    David Coltman receives funding from NSERC, Genome Canada and Ontario Genomics.

    Carson Mitchell, Liam Alastair Wayde Carter, and Tommy Galfano do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Colossal Bioscience’s attempt to de-extinct the dire wolf is a dangerously deceptive publicity stunt – https://theconversation.com/colossal-biosciences-attempt-to-de-extinct-the-dire-wolf-is-a-dangerously-deceptive-publicity-stunt-255046

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Space law doesn’t protect historical sites, mining operations and bases on the Moon – a space lawyer describes a framework that could

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Michelle L.D. Hanlon, Professor of Air and Space Law, University of Mississippi

    Craters in the lunar surface are visible in this photo taken during the Apollo 11 mission. NASA via AP

    April 2025 was a busy month for space.

    Pop icon Katy Perry joined five other civilian women on a quick jaunt to the edge of space, making headlines. Meanwhile, another group of people at the United Nations was contemplating a critical issue for the future of space exploration: the discovery, extraction and utilization of natural resources on the Moon.

    At the end of April, a dedicated Working Group of the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space released a draft set of recommended principles for space resource activities. Essentially, these are rules to govern mining on the Moon, asteroids and elsewhere in space for elements that are rare here on Earth.

    As a space lawyer and co-founder of For All Moonkind, a nonprofit dedicated to protecting human heritage in outer space, I know that the Moon could be the proving ground for humanity’s evolution into a species that lives and thrives on more than one planet. However, this new frontier raises complex legal questions.

    Space, legally

    Outer space – including the Moon – from a legal perspective, is a unique domain without direct terrestrial equivalent. It is not, like the high seas, the “common heritage of humankind,” nor is it an area, like Antarctica, where commercial mining is prohibited.

    Instead, the 1967 Outer Space Treaty – signed by more than 115 nations, including China, Russia and the United States – establishes that the exploration and use of space are the “province of all humankind.” That means no country may claim territory in outer space, and all have the right to access all areas of the Moon and other celestial bodies freely.

    The fact that, pursuant to Article II of the treaty, a country cannot claim territory in outer space, known as the nonappropriation principle, suggests to some that property ownership in space is forbidden.

    Can this be true? If your grandchildren move to Mars, will they never own a home? How can a company protect its investment in a lunar mine if it must be freely accessible by all? What happens, as it inevitably will, when two rovers race to a particular area on the lunar surface known to host valuable water ice? Does the winner take all?

    As it turns out, the Outer Space Treaty does offer some wiggle room. Article IX requires countries to show “due regard” for the corresponding interests of others. It is a legally vague standard, although the Permanent Court of Arbitration has suggested that due regard means simply paying attention to what’s reasonable under the circumstances.

    First mover advantage – it’s a race

    The treaty’s broad language encourages a race to the Moon. The first entity to any spot will have a unilateral opportunity to determine what’s legally “reasonable.” For example, creating an overly large buffer zone around equipment might be justified to mitigate potential damage from lunar dust.

    On top of that, Article XII of the Outer Space Treaty assumes that there will be installations, like bases or mining operations, on the Moon. Contrary to the free access principle, the treaty suggests that access to these may be blocked unless the owner grants permission to enter.

    Both of these paths within the treaty would allow the first person to make it to their desired spot on the Moon to keep others out. The U.N. principles in their current form don’t address these loopholes.

    The draft U.N. principles released in April mirror, and are confined by, the language of the Outer Space Treaty. This tension between free access and the need to protect – most easily by forbidding access – remains unresolved. And the clock is ticking.

    The Moon’s vulnerable legacy

    The U.S. Artemis program aims to return humans to the Moon by 2028, China has plans for human return by 2030, and in the intervening years, more than 100 robotic missions are planned by countries and private industry alike. For the most part, these missions are all headed to the same sweet spot: the lunar south pole. Here, peaks of eternal light and deep craters containing water ice promise the best mining, science and research opportunities.

    Regions of the lunar south pole, left, and north pole, right, contain water in the form of ice (blue), which could be useful for space agencies hoping to set up lunar bases.
    NASA

    In this excitement, it’s easy to forget that humans already have a deep history of lunar exploration. Scattered on the lunar surface are artifacts displaying humanity’s technological progress.

    After centuries of gazing at our closest celestial neighbor with fascination, in 1959 the Soviet spacecraft, Luna 2, became the first human-made object to impact another celestial body. Ten years later, two humans, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, became the first ever to set foot upon another celestial body.

    More recently, in 2019, China’s Chang’e 4 achieved the first soft landing on the Moon’s far side. And in 2023, India’s Chandrayaan-3 became the first to land successfully near the lunar south pole.

    These sites memorialize humanity’s baby steps off our home planet and easily meet the United Nations definition of terrestrial heritage, as they are so “exceptional as to transcend national boundaries and to be of common importance for present and future generations of all humanity.”

    The international community works to protect such sites on Earth, but those protection protocols do not extend to outer space.

    Astronaut footprints are still intact on the lunar surface because the Moon doesn’t have weather. But nearby spacecraft or rovers could kick up dust and cover them.
    AP Photo

    The more than 115 other sites on the Moon that bear evidence of human activity are frozen in time without degradation from weather, animal or human activity. But this could change. A single errant spacecraft or rover could kick up abrasive lunar dust, erasing bootprints or damaging artifacts.

    Protection and the Outer Space Treaty

    In 2011, NASA recommended establishing buffer, or safety zones, of up to 1.2 miles (2 kilometers) to protect certain sites with U.S. artifacts.

    Because it understood that outright exclusion violates the Outer Space Treaty, NASA issued these recommendations as voluntary guidelines. Nevertheless, the safety zone concept, essentially managing access to and activities around specific areas, could be a practical tool for protecting heritage sites. They could act as a starting point to find a balance between protection and access.

    The U.N. Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space recently proposed new principles for space resource use.
    United States Mission to International Organizations in Vienna, CC BY-NC-ND

    One hundred and ninety-six nations have agreed, through the 1972 World Heritage Convention, on the importance of recognizing and protecting cultural heritage of universal value found here on Earth.

    Building on this agreement, the international community could require specific access protocols — such as a permitting process, activity restrictions, shared access rules, monitoring and other controls — for heritage sites on the Moon. If accepted, these protective measures for heritage sites could also work as a template for scientific and operational sites. This would create a consistent framework that avoids the perception of claiming territory.

    At this time, the draft U.N. principles released in April 2025 do not directly address the opposing concepts of access and protection. Instead, they defer to Article I of the Outer Space Treaty and reaffirm that everyone has free access to all areas of the Moon and other celestial bodies.

    As more countries and companies compete to reach the Moon, a clear lunar legal framework can guide them to avoid conflicts and preserve historical sites. The draft U.N. principles show that the international community is ready to explore what this framework could look like.

    Michelle L.D. Hanlon is affiliated with For All Moonkind, a not-for-profit organization committed to protecting human cultural heritage in outer space starting with the Apollo lunar landing sites.

    – ref. Space law doesn’t protect historical sites, mining operations and bases on the Moon – a space lawyer describes a framework that could – https://theconversation.com/space-law-doesnt-protect-historical-sites-mining-operations-and-bases-on-the-moon-a-space-lawyer-describes-a-framework-that-could-255757

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI China: Nurturing overall cooperation between China, Latin America

    Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News

    An aerial drone photo taken on March 12, 2024 shows the BYD battery factory in Manaus, capital of Amazonas state, Brazil. [Xinhua]

    Invoked by the 18th-century English writer Samuel Johnson, the phrase “From China to Peru” once conjured images of distant lands bound only by imagination. Today, it sketches a far more concrete arc — marked by shipping lanes, megaports and logistics corridors — linking China and Latin America across the Pacific.

    This transformation has gathered pace over the past decade, thanks in large part to the China-CELAC (Community of Latin American and Caribbean States) Forum, a cooperative mechanism launched under the aegis of Chinese President Xi Jinping. What Xi once described as “a young seedling” has since taken firm root.

    Ten years on, this mechanism has matured into a key platform for South-South collaboration that has drawn China and Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) into a closer partnership across political, economic, cultural and other domains.

    The forum’s fourth ministerial meeting is set to take place on Tuesday in Beijing. Xi will address its opening ceremony and unveil new initiatives and measures to promote closer ties.

    Qiu Xiaoqi, the Chinese government’s special representative for Latin American affairs, said the upcoming meeting is expected to deliver a message of peace, development and cooperation amid global turbulence, charting a new chapter in China-LAC relations.

    TOP-LEVEL DESIGN

    China and countries in Latin America and the Caribbean are fellow developing nations that hold common political aspirations, face similar development tasks, and can benefit from complementary economic strengths.

    Spanning one-fifth of the world’s land area and accounting for a quarter of the global population and economy, China and the LAC combined represent one of the most dynamic and promising regions on the planet.

    “Our shared aspiration for independence, development and rejuvenation has brought us closer together,” Xi said.

    Since the turn of the century, ties between the two sides have grown rapidly. Both sides realized they needed something more than the traditional one-on-one tango — a broader framework for cooperation.

    During the CELAC summit in Cuba in early 2014, Latin American and Caribbean leaders expressed support for such a framework. Xi welcomed the move, saying that “the time is ripe.”

    In July 2014, Xi flew half the globe for his second visit to the region as head of state. He was heading for a BRICS summit in Brazil, state visits to some countries in the region, and a historic moment — the first meeting between leaders of China and Latin America and the Caribbean.

    In the Brazilian capital Brasilia, the leaders announced the establishment of the China-CELAC Forum, an institutional framework to advance the vision of building a China-LAC community with a shared future.

    At the meeting, Xi laid out the guiding principles for this comprehensive cooperative partnership — equality, mutual benefit and common development. Backing his proposal was a roadmap driven by trade, investment and finance.

    Six months later, the inaugural ministerial meeting of the forum was held in Beijing, turning the vision of an overall cooperation platform covering China and all 33 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean into reality.

    Observers said this marked a new phase of China-LAC ties, where China’s cooperation with the region as a whole complements and strengthens its bilateral relations with individual regional countries.

    Xi proposed principles for the forum’s growth — equal partnership, shared wins, flexibility and pragmatism, and openness and inclusivity.

    Comparing it to a seedling just breaking through the soil, he said that “the forum needs the dedication and cultivation of both sides for it to grow bigger and stronger.”

    In the decade that has followed, Xi has provided consistent support to nurture this forum. At each of the three previous ministerial meetings, he offered clear guidance that helped shape the forum’s development at key moments in its evolution.

    Under the guidance of Xi and his Latin American and Caribbean counterparts, the forum now hosts a constellation of institutional interactions such as ministerial meetings, dialogues among foreign ministers, coordinators’ meetings, and a growing number of specialized sub-forums ranging from digital technology to poverty reduction.

    Chai Yu, director of the Institute of Latin American Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said Xi has led by example in advancing the forum’s development, which is key to deepening political trust and building consensus on cooperation.

    COMMON DEVELOPMENT

    Chancay, a modest city on the Peruvian coast, has been transformed into a megaport equipped with towering cranes and unmanned trucks.

    Last November, Xi and his Peruvian counterpart Dina Boluarte inaugurated the port via video link from the capital Lima, marking the launch of South America’s first smart port.

    Built in just three years through Chinese-Peruvian collaboration, the port shortens the shipping time across the Pacific by nearly one-third, reduces logistics costs by 20 percent, and is expected to create over 8,000 direct jobs.

    Boluarte lauded the project as a bold stride toward “deeper integration and shared prosperity with China” and “a gateway opening Latin America to the vibrant promise of the Asia-Pacific.”

    Chancay’s story is the latest episode in the booming cooperation under the China-CELAC Forum. Across the region, more than 200 Chinese infrastructure projects have been launched — generating over 1 million jobs.

    In Brazil, an ultra-high-voltage transmission project has overcome challenges in delivering clean hydropower over vast distances from the Amazon. In Jamaica, a Chinese-built highway has cut cross-island travel time by more than half, while in Bolivia, satellite collaboration has enabled free television access for half a million households.

    Visitors learn about coffee beans at the booth of Honduras at the 6th China International Import Expo (CIIE) in east China’s Shanghai, Nov. 6, 2023. [Xinhua]

    Numbers tell a compelling story. Trade between China and the region reached 518.4 billion U.S. dollars in 2024, doubling the figure recorded a decade ago. By 2023, Chinese investment in the region had exceeded 600 billion dollars. These figures have exceeded the goals announced by Xi when he and Latin American and Caribbean leaders met in 2014 to plan for closer cooperation.

    As the second-largest trading partner of Latin America and the Caribbean, China now has more free trade agreements in the region than anywhere outside Asia.

    One such deal with Chile has turned premium cherries into a symbol of thriving cross-Pacific commerce. In 2024, Chile’s cherry exports surged 51.4 percent to 3.57 billion dollars — with over 90 percent going to China.

    “The Chinese market has created a positive ripple effect in Chile, generating jobs across the supply chain, from harvesting to packaging,” said Hernan Garces Gazmuri, a Chilean cherry producer who moved his family to Shanghai for greater business opportunities.

    As Pavel Aleman, a Cuban scholar from the University of Havana, pointed out, China-LAC cooperation is mutually beneficial in essence, with China’s economic vitality fueling Latin America’s development, while the region plays a vital role in supporting China’s continued growth.

    “Deeper cooperation between the two sides can help offset the impact of tariff barriers and effectively counter global risks,” he said.

    Xi’s signature Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has brought China into closer partnership with countries across the vast Pacific. To date, more than 20 countries in the region have joined the Belt and Road cooperation framework, and 10 countries have signed cooperation plans with China under the initiative.

    Xi once described Latin America as a natural extension of the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road — an essential pillar of the BRI. He emphasized China’s commitment to strengthening cooperation with the region, aligning development strategies and promoting shared growth.

    “As we roll out the blueprint for the BRI, we strive to forge a route of cooperation across the Pacific, in order to draw closer the two lands of abundance of China and Latin America and the Caribbean,” Xi said in his congratulatory message to the second ministerial meeting of the China-CELAC Forum.

    Beyond trade and investment, collaboration between China and this region has also deepened in the fields of science, technology and environmental protection. China has supported joint Earth-resource satellite programs with Brazil, contributing to efforts aimed at curbing deforestation and preserving biodiversity in the Amazon.

    Xi said China and Latin America and the Caribbean should promote joint development to contribute to strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth of the global economy.

    HEART-TO-HEART CONNECTIONS

    Xi has long believed that strong state-to-state relations are built on people-to-people connections. Over his six trips to the region as head of state, he made a point of engaging with everyday people despite tight schedules.

    In Costa Rica, Xi visited the home of a coffee grower who showed him around his house and plantation. Over a cup of coffee, Xi chatted with the family and shared that he, too, had rural beginnings — having spent years working the land in his youth.

    A girl learns Chinese calligraphy at the 4th edition of the Chinese New Year cultural festival at the National Arts Center in Mexico City, capital of Mexico, Jan. 25, 2025. [Xinhua]

    His engagement has ignited vibrant people-to-people exchanges, with cultural festivals, youth projects and journalist initiatives flourishing under the China-CELAC Forum.

    To date, China has provided the region with 17,000 government scholarships and 13,000 training opportunities. It has signed 26 educational cooperation agreements or memoranda of understanding with 19 countries and established 68 Confucius Institutes or Confucius Classrooms in the region.

    Connections between China and the region have also been strengthened through practical measures — such as the launch of new direct air routes and the inclusion of more Latin American countries in China’s 240-hour visa-free transit program.

    As many countries in the region now officially celebrate the Chinese New Year, a growing number of Chinese travelers have headed to Latin America in recent years — some for business, others as tourists drawn by the region’s stunning landscapes and rich cultural diversity.

    These efforts have brought China and the region closer than ever, said Qiu, the Chinese government’s special representative for Latin American affairs.

    Both China and Latin America are home to ancient histories and flourishing civilizations. For Xi, civilizations grow richer and more colorful through exchanges and mutual learning.

    In 2013, at Mexico’s Chichen Itza, Xi explored ancient Maya ruins with archaeologist Jose Huchim Herrera. Amid stepped pyramids and temples, he inquired about the features of the ruins, such as the meaning of carved reliefs.

    His questions revealed a deep curiosity about the host civilization, said Huchim Herrera.

    In a signed article published last November ahead of his visit to Peru, Xi highlighted a cultural connection by pointing out the resemblance between the Incan gold masks unearthed in Peru and those discovered at the Sanxingdui archaeological site in southwest China’s Sichuan Province.

    That same month, a joint exhibition in the ancient city of Cusco showcased dazzling gold artifacts, bronze statues, jade treasures and wooden relics from Sichuan’s Sanxingdui and Jinsha sites, captivating nearly 10,000 Peruvian visitors.

    Daniel Grimaldi, executive director of the think tank Chile 21, praised exchanges between Chinese and Latin American civilizations for opening new channels of communication. Such interactions, he said, strengthen ties through mutual respect and open dialogue, while supporting both sides on their shared journey toward modernization.

    As Xi has said, in a globalization and information age, the Pacific is no barrier but rather a bond and a bridge. 

    MIL OSI China News –