NewzIntel.com

Category: Science

  • MIL-OSI Economics: Mastering Microsoft 365 Copilot in education

    Source: Microsoft

    Headline: Mastering Microsoft 365 Copilot in education

    Microsoft 365 Copilot is your AI assistant that frees up time for what matters most.

    Imagine reclaiming a whole day of your work week. That’s exactly what educators at St Francis College experienced during their Microsoft 365 Copilot trial, with participants reporting an average time savings of 9.3 hours weekly.

    This time savings is especially significant in a profession where burnout is all too common. As St Francis College Principal John Marinucci observed, Copilot transforms education by expediting those administrative tasks that often overwhelm educators. The result? Teachers have more energy and time to focus on what brought them to education in the first place—helping students learn and grow.

    Read the St Francis College story

    Your AI assistant for education

    Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat is the AI chat experience you can use every day. It’s powered by broad knowledge from the web, built on the latest AI models, and designed to be safe and secure. Copilot Chat includes free, secure AI chat powered by GPT-4o, agents accessible right in the chat, and IT controls, including enterprise data protection and agent management. In addition, pay-as-you-go agents are available for Microsoft 365 education customers through Copilot Chat.

    Moving forward, educational institutions will have a mix of Copilot Chat and Microsoft 365 Copilot. While Copilot Chat is an excellent starting point for integrating AI into your day-to-day workflow, Microsoft 365 Copilot offers all the features of Copilot Chat and additional capabilities to transform educational experiences. Integrated into the apps you use every day, Microsoft 365 Copilot combines the power of the latest AI models with your data—documents, presentations, emails, meetings, chats, and more—plus the web to deliver relevant responses with sources.

    Smart help across your apps

    Unlike other AI tools, Copilot works within your Microsoft 365 environment to provide contextually relevant assistance.

    • In Word, you can draft and refine documents—such as lesson plans and reports—in seconds that might otherwise take hours.
    • In PowerPoint, you can transform basic content into engaging visual presentations that are tailored to your needs.
    • In Excel, you can analyze data and identify patterns that inform instructional and policy decisions—without complex formula creation.
    • In Outlook, you can more easily manage communications by drafting clear messages and summarizing important information from lengthy email threads.
    • In Microsoft Teams, you can capture key points from meetings, organize action items, and help manage collaborative projects more efficiently.
    • Copilot Chat turns your organizational content into a rich database of information and insight, enabling you to collaborate with Copilot like a partner to perform tasks in a single interface.
    • Use agents to make Copilot your own. Easily build an agent right in Copilot Chat or SharePoint with agent builder and explore agents pre-built for you.
    Explore Microsoft 365 Copilot

    Copilot is your AI assistant that frees up time for what matters most and transforms education experiences, bringing opportunity to life through customization.

    Enhancing efficiency with Copilot

    Microsoft 365 Copilot helps you balance strategic vision with day-to-day operations. Copilot puts thousands of skills at your command and can reason over all your content and context to take on any task using natural language—freeing you to focus on what matters most.

    Data-driven decision making

    Educational leadership increasingly demands evidence-based approaches to resource allocation, program evaluation, and strategic planning. Copilot helps you analyze complex data sets, identify meaningful patterns, and communicate your findings effectively to various stakeholders.

    Try these prompts:

    • Analyze this attendance data spreadsheet and identify any concerning patterns or trends that might require intervention.
    • Summarize the key findings from our quarterly assessment data and suggest three to five focus areas based on the results.
    • Write a data-informed narrative for our school board presentation that explains our resource allocation decisions for next year.

    Streamlining admin tasks and communication

    Education leaders often manage extensive communications, creating and reviewing documentation, and coordinating across departments. By using Copilot to streamline these tasks, you can spend less time on paperwork and more time on the people-focused aspects of leadership.

    Read how USF streamlined workflows

    Try these prompts:

    • Create a template for our weekly staff communication that includes sections for celebrations, important dates, and professional development opportunities.
    • Help me organize this folder of policy documents by creating an executive summary of each document with key points highlighted.
    • Draft a grant proposal outline based on our school improvement goals and the requirements in this funding announcement.

    Preparing presentations

    School leaders need to process large amounts of data and present findings in clear, impactful ways to support decision-making. Copilot can transform how you analyze and communicate educational data, helping you create meaningful visualizations and distill complex information into actionable insights that drive improvement.

    Try these prompts:

    • Help me create a slide that clearly shows the relationship between our new reading program implementation and student achievement scores.
    • Build a presentation about our school’s new academic programs and initiatives for tonight’s Alumni Donor event.
    • Turn the insights I prepared in this Word document into an 8-10 slide presentation for the conference I’m attending next week.

    Classroom-ready prompts for Copilot Chat

    Copilot Chat helps you tackle time-consuming and repetitive tasks so you can focus on what matters most. View links to sources, generate images, summarize or analyze files, and more. Get started with Copilot Chat for free with this collection of prompts designed to help you save time by streamlining your daily tasks.

    Try Copilot Chat today

    Lesson planning and curriculum development

    Creating engaging, standards-aligned lesson plans often requires hours of preparation time. Copilot Chat can generate structured frameworks, differentiate existing content, and help align materials with curriculum standards—all while preserving your unique teaching approach and classroom needs.

    Try these prompts:

    • Create a 7th-grade science lesson plan on photosynthesis that includes a hands-on activity, digital resources, and assessment options aligned with NGSS standards.
    • Transform my lecture notes on algebraic equations into an interactive lesson with think-pair-share activities and real-world application problems.

    Assessments and rubrics

    Developing varied assessments that accurately measure understanding across different learning levels is challenging and time intensive. Copilot Chat helps you create diverse question types, design clear rubrics, and craft personalized feedback to support student success.

    Try these prompts:

    • Create a rubric for assessing a persuasive essay from 10th-grade students, with criteria for argument structure, evidence quality, and mechanics.
    • Draft three versions of constructive feedback for students who struggle with supporting their arguments with evidence in their history essays.

    Content personalization

    Educational research consistently shows that addressing different learning styles improves engagement and retention. Copilot Chat helps you transform existing materials to meet different learning needs.

    Try these prompts:

    • Convert this text explanation of the water cycle into a visual learning aid with minimal text for visual learners.
    • Adapt this worksheet on fractions to make it more accessible for students with dyslexia, including font and layout recommendations.

    Communication

    Clear, consistent communication with caregivers and colleagues is essential but often time-consuming. Copilot Chat helps you craft professional messages, summarize student progress, and prepare for conferences with organized, actionable information.

    Try these prompts:

    • Help me organize student data from this spreadsheet into a narrative format I can use during parent-teacher conferences, highlighting strengths and growth areas.
    • Create a template for weekly classroom updates that I can send to families, with sections for curriculum highlights, upcoming events, and celebration moments.

    Get started with Copilot

    When introducing Copilot to your institution, consider starting with a small pilot group of educators who can explore its capabilities and develop best practices before you move forward with wider implementation. This approach allows your organization to identify the most valuable use cases and identify training opportunities.

    To help you and your team build competency with AI and Copilot, check out these resources:

    Ready to explore how you can transform your workflows with a powerful AI assistant? Get started with Copilot today.

    MIL OSI Economics –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The animal alliances reshaping our understanding of intelligence

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Alexandra Schnell, Research Fellow in Comparative Psychology, University of Cambridge

    Cleaner wrasse form unlikely alliances with other fish Azrael3141/Shutterstock

    In nature, interactions between species are often framed in terms of survival — those that hunt and those that are hunted. But research is showing some animals form surprising partnerships, reshaping scientists’ ideas about how intelligence evolves in the animal kingdom.

    Take Octavia and Finn, a striking duo hunting along a coral reef. I observed this pair while exploring a research site on the Great Barrier Reef as part of a project to understand complex behaviour in the wild. Octavia moves with fluid grace, slipping between the rocks, while Finn zips through the water with bursts of speed. They work as a team. Each of them brings a unique skill to the hunt – Octavia with her dexterity, Finn with his quick strikes. Octavia is a day octopus, and Finn is a coral trout.

    This kind of collaboration isn’t unique to the ocean — on land, other species have also developed remarkable partnerships. Take, for instance, the relationship between the greater honeyguide bird (Indicator indicator) and humans. Honeyguides call and flutter to lead humans to bee nests. Once the humans harvest the honey, the bird swoops in for the leftovers, beeswax and larvae – a treat that it couldn’t easily access without help. The two species engage in a kind of cross-species conversation, each relying on the other’s skills.

    Other collaborations show how different species can use trust and deception to their advantage. The fork-tailed drongo (Dicrurus adsimilis) acts as a sentinel for meerkats (Suricata suricatta), issuing alarm calls to warn them of approaching predators. Drongos sometimes give false alarms, sending meerkats scattering so the bird can steal their abandoned food. Even so, the relationship is beneficial for both parties: meerkats gain an extra set of eyes, while the drongo secures an occasional meal.

    In the underwater world, similar dynamics are at play. Cleaner wrasse (Labroides dimidiatus) remove parasites from the bodies of larger “client” fish, such as groupers and manta rays. Client fish will congregate at underwater “cleaning stations”, often atop coral heads, and will even queue up for their turn. But these partnerships aren’t always fair. Sometimes, cleaner wrasse sneak a nibble of their client’s protective mucus instead. When this happens, the client fish can cut the interaction short and leave. This disruption suggests that these relationships involve strategic decision-making.

    Perhaps the most captivating example of marine collaboration happens between octopuses and fish. Initially, scientists assumed fish took advantage of octopuses, snatching prey they flushed out. But thanks to advances in tracking technology, a richer, more cooperative dynamic is emerging. Combining data from two cameras allows researchers to study highly accurate movement patterns. One of my collaborators applied this method to study the octopus-fish partnership, published in Nature Ecology & Evolution in 2024.

    The day octopus keeps its partner in line.
    Shpatak/Shutterstock

    The day octopus (Octopus cyanea) collaborates with fish such as coral trout (Plectropomus spp.) and goatfish (Parupeneus spp.) during hunts. The 2024 study found these fish don’t just follow the octopus, they participate in the hunt. Scientists have even observed octopuses “punching” fish that aren’t pulling their weight. Fish like the coral trout produce signals by using their bodies. They perform a “head-stand”, tipping their heads downward and hovering above crevices to indicate hidden prey. This prompts the octopus to flush it out with its dexterous arms. Although octopuses are solitary animals, these brief partnerships reveal a degree of social sophistication.

    A blend of ecological and cognitive factors probably underpins these partnerships. Dietary overlap plays a crucial role, as partnerships are more likely to form when animals of different species feed on similar prey.

    Cognitive abilities are equally important. For these partnerships to work, both species must recognise each other as reliable partners. Octopuses demonstrate behavioural flexibility, adapting their tactics in real time, based on their partner’s actions. Fish show self-control by holding back until the octopus has flushed prey from hiding.

    Habitat complexity also shapes the partnership. Coral reefs, with their maze of crevices, make hunting alone difficult). Timing may also help make these partnerships work. Since both species are active during the day they can capitalise on daylight to communicate using visual signals.

    Rethinking animal intelligence

    It remains unclear whether octopuses truly understand the meaning behind their partner fish signals or follow them instinctively. But either way the interaction hints at a surprising level of cognitive sophistication. Research in animal cognition suggests that behaviour such as perspective-taking – (understanding that others may have different views) and theory of mind (the ability to attribute thoughts, beliefs, or intentions to others) – could be involved in referential signals.

    These abilities are typically seen in social animals (such as chimpanzees, crows, or jays) that live in groups or among family members, where understanding one another’s intentions can offer a real survival advantage. Animal alliances are challenging the traditional view in research that intelligence and social skills develop solely through interactions within the same species.

    This idea broadens the way in which scientists think about social intelligence, showing that the capacity to collaborate can arise wherever there’s something to be gained from working together. A project funded by the National Geographic Society through the Meridian Grant Program aims to push these ideas further. A team of behavioural ecologists, comparative psychologists (including myself), robotics researchers, and underwater storytellers are developing a robotic fish to interact with day octopuses. By controlling one partner in the interaction, we can test responses and decode the signals exchanged between octopuses and their fish collaborators.

    Just like the octopus and fish, this project is a reminder that some tasks can only be achieved through collaboration. No single species, or team, can do it alone.

    Alexandra Schnell receives funding from the National Geographic Society.

    – ref. The animal alliances reshaping our understanding of intelligence – https://theconversation.com/the-animal-alliances-reshaping-our-understanding-of-intelligence-251301

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Salinas Leads Oregon Delegation in Calling on Trump Administration to Protect American Manufacturing

    US Senate News:

    Source: United States Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore)

    March 20, 2025

    Salinas Leads Oregon Delegation in Calling on Trump Administration to Protect American Manufacturing

    Washington, DC – Today, U.S. Representative Andrea Salinas (OR-06) led the Oregon delegation – including U.S. Senators Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley, along with U.S. Reps. Suzanne Bonamici (OR-01), Val Hoyle (OR-04), Maxine Dexter (OR-03), and Janelle Bynum (OR-05) – in a letter to U.S. Department of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, expressing concern about the Trump Administration’s decision to fire dozens of workers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). NIST provides guidance, training, and assistance to American manufacturers to help them grow and stay competitive on the global stage.

    “We write with deep concern regarding reports of significant ongoing and planned layoffs at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. NIST plays a critical role supporting Oregon businesses and workers. Widespread and indiscriminate terminations of hard-working public servants at the agency would undermine our domestic manufacturing industrial base and threaten technological innovation that drives future economic progress,” wrote the members.

    Oregon manufacturers contribute nearly $40 billion to our state’s economic output and support over 175,000 good paying jobs in a wide variety of industries, including wood products, aerospace components, and microelectronics. NIST-supported programs like the Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) help drive innovation and deliver critical resources that local businesses need to succeed. In their letter, the members stress how mass layoffs will undermine NIST’s work and jeopardize manufacturing in Oregon and across America.

    “President Trump has consistently promised Americans that he will support domestic manufacturing – and the good jobs that come with it,” the lawmakers continued.

    “That is why it is so concerning to see that, instead of doubling down on what works, the President is attacking the federal programs manufacturers rely on, calling to repeal the CHIPS and Science Act, and imposing punishing tariffs that will harm American businesses while making everyday goods more expensive for consumers.”

    Read the full letter below or click here.

    The Honorable Howard Lutnick

    Secretary of Commerce

    U.S. Department of Commerce

    1401 Constitution Avenue N.W.

    Washington, D.C. 20230

    Dear Secretary Lutnick,

    We write with deep concern regarding reports of significant ongoing and planned layoffs at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. NIST plays a critical role supporting Oregon businesses and workers. Widespread and indiscriminate terminations of hard-working public servants at the agency would undermine our domestic manufacturing industrial base and threaten technological innovation that drives future economic progress.

    Oregon manufacturers contribute nearly $40 billion to our state’s economic output and support over 175,000 good paying jobs. These represent a wide variety of industries, producing everything from innovative wood products to aerospace components, to the microelectronics development and manufacturing at the heart of Oregon’s Silicon Forest. NIST is responsible for implementing some of our nation’s most effective and cost-efficient programs to help these manufacturers succeed:

    • Across the United States, the Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) leveraged just $175 million in federal investment to deliver more than $5 billion in new investments and over 108,000 jobs created or retained in fiscal year 2024. In Oregon, the return was even greater. Just $2.2. million in federal funding led to $165.6 million in private investments – a remarkable $75 of economic output for every dollar of taxpayer support.
    • The CHIPS Program Office is responsible for stewarding over $2 billion of public investment in Oregon companies, which is catalyzing tens of billions of dollars of corporate investment in Oregon’s high-tech economy – while ensuring America’s self-sufficiency in this critical technology.
    • ManufacturingUSA fosters collaboration between industry and researchers to develop and deploy next-generation manufacturing methods and technologies. These partnerships support and benefit from partnerships with Oregon businesses and universities.
      • Examples include Oregon State University’s contributions to the RAPID institute, semiconductor companies like Analog Devices and Microchip working with PowerAmerica to accelerate the adoption of advanced semiconductors, and businesses such as Twist Bioscience partnering with BioMADE to enable the expansion of bioindustrial manufacturing.

    All these activities build on NIST’s core measurement science and standards work that provides tools manufacturers rely on every day. Mass layoffs at the agency will undermine the work NIST has carried out over years to ensure American businesses have the tools they need to compete on the world stage.

    President Trump has consistently promised Americans that he will support domestic manufacturing – and the good jobs that come with it. During his inaugural address, he asserted that “America will be a manufacturing nation once again” and you recently echoed the President’s rhetoric, telling reporters that “We want factory production in America. We want employment to blossom in America. We’re going to bring factories back to America.”

    We agree.

    That is why it is so concerning to see that, instead of doubling down on what works, the President is attacking the federal programs manufacturers rely on, calling to repeal the CHIPS and Science Act, and imposing punishing tariffs that will harm American businesses while making everyday goods more expensive for consumers.

    We are seriously worried that any attacks on NIST will undermine its capacity to support Oregon’s manufacturers and request that you respond to the following inquiries no later that March 31, 2025:

    1. How many NIST employees accepted the “Fork in the Road” deferred resignation offer, including those who departed the agency [at that time] without having signed the paperwork required by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)? Please provide a breakdown of which offices were affected and to what extent.
    2. Recent reports indicate over 70 probationary employees were terminated. Please confirm the accuracy of this reporting and provide a breakdown of which offices were affected and to what extent.
    3. CHIPS Incentives awards rely on complex contracts to ensure that industry partners successfully and responsibly invest taxpayer dollars. How will you ensure that any layoffs, deferred resignations, or future reductions in force do not impede the CHIPS Program Office’s ability to conduct robust oversight of and effective support for these awards, including in Oregon?
    4. How will you ensure that any layoffs, deferred resignations, or future reductions in force do not limit the Manufacturing Extension Partnership program’s capacity to offer services to small- and medium-sized domestic manufacturers, including in Oregon?
    5. NIST has decades of experience serving as a trusted partner to industry, providing some of the United States’ strongest tools to support and expand domestic manufacturing. How do you plan to leverage this experience to achieve your stated goal of bring manufacturing jobs back to America, including in our home state of Oregon?

    Thank you for your prompt response.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: SEC Announces Agenda, Panelists for Roundtable on Artificial Intelligence

    Source: Securities and Exchange Commission

    The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced the agenda and panelists for the March 27 roundtable on artificial intelligence in the financial industry.  

    “I look forward to hearing from the panelists on how emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, can both improve the cost-effectiveness of the Commission’s regulations and provide additional value to market participants,” said SEC Acting Chairman Mark T. Uyeda. “I encourage members of the public to provide data and other evidence on how artificial intelligence can be used to protect investors, maintain fair, orderly, and efficient markets, and facilitate capital formation.”

    The roundtable, announced in February, will be held at the SEC’s headquarters at 100 F Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. from 9:00 a.m. – 4:15 p.m. The event will be open to the public and webcast live on the SEC’s website. Doors will open at 8:00 a.m.

    For online attendance, no registration is necessary. A link to watch the event will be available on March 27 on www.sec.gov. Please register for in-person attendance.

    More information, including how to submit feedback on artificial intelligence in the financial industry, is available on the SEC Artificial Intelligence Roundtable’s event page.

    Agenda

    8:00 am

    Doors Open

    9:00 am – 9:30 am

    Opening Remarks from Acting Chairman Mark Uyeda, Commissioner Hester Peirce, and Commissioner Caroline Crenshaw

    9:30 am – 10:45 am

    Panel: The Benefits, Costs, and Uses of AI in the Financial Industry

    Moderator:  Rob Hegarty, Division of Trading and Markets

    Panelists:

    • Mike Kelly, Head of Strategic AI Governance and Enablement, JP Morgan Chase & Co.
    • Gregg Berman, Director of Market Analytics and Regulatory Structure, Citadel Securities
    • Douglas Hamilton, Head of AI Engineering and Research, Nasdaq
    • Hillary Allen, Professor of Law, American University, Washington College of Law
    • Daniel Pateiro, Managing Director, Office of Chief Operating Officer, Strategic Initiatives/Artificial Intelligence, BlackRock

    10:45 am – 11:00 am

    Break

    11:00 am – 12:15 pm

    Panel: Fraud, Authentication, and Cybersecurity

    Moderator:  Alexis Hall, Division of Examinations

    Panelists:

    • Brad Ahrens, Senior Vice President of Advanced Analytics, FINRA
    • Michael Wellman, Professor of Computer Science & Engineering, University of Michigan
    • Kristen McCooey, Chief Information Security Officer, Edward Jones
    • Alexander Leblang, Office of Cybersecurity and Critical Infrastructure Protection, Department of Treasury

    12:15 pm – 1:15 pm

    Lunch

    1:15 pm – 2:30 pm

    Panel: AI Governance and Risk Management

    Moderator:  Valerie Szczepanik, Strategic Hub for Innovation and Financial Technology

    Panelists:

    • Jeff McMillan, Head of Firmwide Artificial Intelligence, Morgan Stanley
    • Johnna Powell, Managing Director and Head of Technology, Research and Innovation, The Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation
    • Ryan Swann, Chief Data Analytics Officer, The Vanguard Group, Inc.
    • Scott Mullins, Managing Director, Worldwide Financial Services Industry, Amazon Web Services
    • Conan French, Director of Digital Finance, Institute of International Finance

    2:30 pm – 2:45 pm

    Break

    2:45 pm – 4:00 pm

    Panel: What’s Next/Future Trends

    Moderator: Marco Enriquez, Division of Economic and Risk Analysis

    Panelists:

    • Hardeep Walia, Managing Director, Head of AI & Personalization, Charles Schwab
    • Tyler Derr, Chief Technology and Product Officer, Broadridge
    • Peter Slattery, MIT FutureTech
    • Sarah Hammer, Executive Director, Wharton School; Adjunct Professor, University of Pennsylvania Law School; CEO of Wharton Cypher Accelerator

    4:00 pm – 4:15 pm

    Closing Remarks

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Canada’s Africa strategy is a landmark moment for Canada-Africa relations, but still needs work

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By David J Hornsby, Professor of International Affairs and the Vice-Provost and Associate Vice-President (Academic), Carleton University

    For the first time in its history, Canada has unveiled a comprehensive Africa strategy, marking a significant milestone in the Canadian approach to engaging with the African continent.

    Launched on March 6 by Liberal MP Rob Oliphant, the parliamentary secretary to the foreign affairs minister, the strategy represents a crucial step towards a more coherent and intentional relationship with Africa.

    This development is worthy of praise for several reasons.

    The strategy’s strengths

    First, it demonstrates Canada’s recognition of Africa’s growing importance on the global stage. It acknowledges the need for Canada to work closely with African states and organizations in multilateral forums such as the United Nations, the G20 and the Francophonie.

    It also positions Canada not only as a partner in enhancing Africa’s voice in global affairs, but also as an ally in advancing the Canadian government’s strategic interests abroad.

    The strategy’s development process was remarkably inclusive, with more than 600 stakeholder submissions. This consultative approach not only ensured a diverse range of perspectives, but also promotes accountability in the strategy’s implementation.

    Finally, the initiative’s broad scope is commendable. By intentionally crafting the strategy to encompass a wide array of African partners — from the African Union to diaspora groups in Canada — the government has created a framework that allows various African nations and organizations to see themselves reflected in the partnership.

    Remaining questions

    However, as with any significant policy development, there are areas for improvement and questions to be addressed. These include:

    Resource allocation: While the strategy sets ambitious goals, it’s unclear how these will be achieved without new funding.

    Although the argument can be made that the government has the option to reconfigure existing funding to align with broader policy shifts, that would leave major gaps in current development programming. The government must provide more specific details about funding and, just as importantly, metrics for implementation.

    Competitive landscape: The strategy doesn’t fully acknowledge Canada’s current position in Africa. While it identifies increased competition from familiar players like China, the European Union and Russia, as well as a growing array of competitors like Brazil, Turkey and the Gulf states, it doesn’t confront the degree to which, relatively speaking, Canada has lost ground.

    This needs to be acknowledged alongside Canada’s residual reputational strength, rooted in a history of supporting democratic transitions for African nations — particularly during the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa, but also during numerous peacekeeping engagements.



    Read more:
    Brian Mulroney’s tough stand against apartheid is one of his most important legacies

    Investments in developmental projects related to education and health in Africa have led to Canada garnering a reputation as a constructive and responsive collaborator on African issues. That said, Canada’s reputation in terms of mining and other extractive activities on the continent is an unhelpful counterpoint.

    Canada must strongly position itself as a state that can be trusted to champion African issues while forging partnerships based on mutual interest and respect in the fast-changing global competitive environment.

    Innovation and education: Despite the strategy’s mention of engaging youth and diaspora communities, it’s unclear on how to do this. A crucial way to connect with youth in particular is to enhance education connections and expand the links between universities and science and technological innovation institutions in Canada and African states.

    Dual degrees, funded collaborative research projects, student exchanges and scholarships are all tried-and-tested mechanisms to foster cross-cultural understandings that bind societies together.

    A sustainable Canada-Africa strategy must see educational and scientific partnerships, training and knowledge circulation as cornerstones for success.

    It would be a missed opportunity if the government fails to use this blueprint to leverage Canada’s extensive educational and scientific assets to generate innovative ideas that support the strategy’s implementation. This approach could also create opportunities for Canadian and African youth to build a strong foundation for a lasting and meaningful Canada-Africa relationship in the future.



    Read more:
    Why international students could be a critical factor in bolstering Canada’s economic resilience

    Ethical considerations: The strategy doesn’t adequately address issues related to the mining sector and the need for more ethical practices.

    Given Canada is touted as a mining superpower in Africa, a clear commitment to supporting human rights-centred and community development-oriented mining practices would go a long way to sustaining Canada’s interest in the extractive sector in Africa. This would also enhance its overall reputation on the continent.

    Furthermore, the ethics of Canada’s immigration regime and the often punitive approach to giving out temporary visas to African travellers is starkly missing from the strategy.

    It’s critical in terms of Canada’s future engagements and relations with African nations to recognize the current system is broken and considered overly intrusive by Africans. If Canada is serious about learning from Africa and forming equitable partnerships based on mutual respect, it cannot mete out indignities at the border.

    High-level commitment: The launch of the strategy by a parliamentary secretary, rather than the foreign affairs minister or the prime minister, raises questions about the perceived importance of this strategy at the highest levels of government.

    The launch was diplomatically underwhelming, with no invitations extended to the Canadian media or the African diplomatic community in Canada. This created the impression that the government was either already distancing itself from the strategy, or was anxious to manage expectations.

    Given that the launch of the strategy coincided with the Independence day of Ghana, one of the first African countries that Canada established official diplomatic relations with, the Canadian government should have seized on this historic moment to send a strong diplomatic message to the African continent.

    Substantial starting point

    Despite these concerns, the Africa strategy represents a significant and promising starting point.

    It provides a coherent, multidimensional and multi-purpose framework for Canada’s engagement with Africa. It synthesizes ongoing initiatives, sets intentions for future collaborations and seeks to move beyond paternalistic motivations to build an enhanced Canada-Africa relationship based on trust and respect.

    The strategy is realistic not only about Canada’s own limitations and needs, but also about the complexities of building partnerships with a large and diverse continent. It highlights humanitarian and security priorities while also emphasizing economic and political opportunities in Africa. The combination of humanitarian concerns with strategic interests signals a shift toward a more balanced and consistent approach towards the continent.



    Read more:
    Why Canada must seize the moment and launch its long-awaited Africa strategy

    As we move forward, the Canadian government must address the strategy’s shortcomings and provide more concrete plans for its implementation.

    Nonetheless, this moment deserves recognition. Canada has taken an important first step towards a more strategic, intentional and mutually beneficial relationship with Africa. It’s now up to policymakers, businesses, the academic community and civil society to build upon this foundation and turn this strategy into tangible, positive outcomes for both Canada and its African partners.

    David Black receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

    Thomas Kwasi Tieku receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

    David J Hornsby and Edward Akuffo 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. Canada’s Africa strategy is a landmark moment for Canada-Africa relations, but still needs work – https://theconversation.com/canadas-africa-strategy-is-a-landmark-moment-for-canada-africa-relations-but-still-needs-work-252367

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Canada: Establishing Canada’s first large-scale bioinnovation centre

    Source: Government of Canada News (2)

    Significant federal contribution supports bioprocessing manufacturing, growing green supply chain

    March 20, 2025 · Dartmouth, Nova Scotia · Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA)  

    Strengthening the biomanufacturing sector creates opportunities, supports Canadian production and moves our country towards a more sustainable future. The Government of Canada is investing to help position Nova Scotia as a leader in life sciences, clean tech, health tech and precision fermentation.

    Building a world-class facility for biomanufacturing, clean tech

    Today, the Honourable Darren Fisher, Member of Parliament for Dartmouth – Cole Harbour, announced a $5 million, non-repayable contribution to Neptune BioInnovation Inc. to establish a multi-user bio-innovation hub and Contract Manufacturing Organization (CMO). The announcement was made on behalf of the Honourable Anita Anand, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry.

    The funding will help transform an underutilized facility in Dartmouth into a fully-equipped multi-user space for innovation and industry that will enable Canada to compete globally, strengthen domestic supply chains, and foster biotechnology advancements across critical sectors. It will provide shared industrial space, contract manufacturing, spray drying, and precision fermentation up to 100,000L, enabling companies to scale locally instead of leaving Canada.

    A one-of-a-kind facility in Canada, the Neptune BioInnovation Centre (NBC) will encourage biotechnology advancements in areas such as smart materials, bioplastics, functional foods, green chemicals, therapeutics and alternative proteins. It will attract users locally and from across Canada and globally. As NBC grows, there will be job creation, measurable progress toward sustainable development goals and a stronger domestic supply chain to address environmental and human health challenges.

    Today’s announcement further demonstrates the Government of Canada’s commitment to support innovation, keep manufacturing and Intellectual Property at home, attract investment and strengthen the national economy.

    MIL OSI Canada News –

  • MIL-OSI Canada: Minister Duguid to announce federal investments in performing arts in Manitoba and Saskatchewan

    Source: Government of Canada News

    March 11, 2025 – Winnipeg, Manitoba – The Honourable Terry Duguid, Minister of Environment and Climate Change Canada, on behalf of the honourable Anita Anand, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, will announce federal funding in support of performing arts that will drive economic development across Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

    Date:
    March 21, 2025

    Time:
    11:30 a.m. CT

    Location:
    Royal Winnipeg Ballet
    380 Graham Avenue
    Winnipeg, Manitoba

    Media are welcome to attend.

    MIL OSI Canada News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Nigeria’s oil-rich Rivers State under emergency: sending in the army isn’t the answer

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Al Chukwuma Okoli, Reader (Associate Professor) Department of Political Science, Federal University of Lafia, Nigeria, Federal University Lafia

    President Bola Tinubu recently declared a state of emergency in Nigeria’s oil-rich Rivers State, in the country’s south-south region.

    Prior to this decision, governance in Rivers State was practically paralysed as a result of a power struggle between the Governor, Siminalayi Fubara and his predecessor, Nyesom Wike, now the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.

    Rivers is at the heart of Nigeria’s once restive oil producing Niger Delta region and the emergency rule declaration was pronounced following reports of explosions rocking oil pipelines. Security scholar Al Chukwuma Okoli unpacks the implications of this development for security in the oil region previously known for militancy.

    What does declaring a state of emergency mean?

    The president has placed the governor, the deputy governor and the legislative arm of government on a six months suspension. He has appointed Vice Admiral Ibok-Étè Ibas, a retired Navy chief, as the state administrator. This means democratic institutions, except courts, have been suspended in Rivers State.

    Section 305 of Nigeria’s 1999 constitution empowers the president to declare a state of emergency when:

    • the federation is at war

    • the federation is in imminent danger of invasion or involvement in a state of war

    • there is actual breakdown of public order and public safety in any part of the country requiring extraordinary measures to avert danger

    • there is an occurrence or imminent danger of the occurrence of any disaster or natural calamity

    • there is any danger which clearly constitutes a threat to the existence of the federation

    • The Governor of a State may, with the sanction of a resolution supported by two-thirds majority of the state House of Assembly, request the President to issue a Proclamation of a state of emergency in the State

    The president can also make the decision if the governor of the affected state fails within a reasonable time to make a request.

    Is the state of emergency an effective response to the recent bombings?

    The state of emergency is a response to a dire internal security situation in which there is actual or threat of a breakdown of law and order. It applies also if security of lives and property is no longer guaranteed.

    In other words there’s been a major breach of governability in the area.

    There is an argument that the civil and security situations in Rivers State – and the civil unrest amid wanton destruction and vandalisation of oil and gas installations – calls for urgent intervention given the pivotal role of petroleum sector in sustaining the Nigerian economy.

    Oil and gas account for 40% of Nigerian government revenues and for around 92% of the value of all exports. Rivers State is a key oil producing area and hosts several major oil companies and critical oil infrastructure.

    Nevertheless, the emergency approach to the security crisis in Rivers State is, at best, problematic. Apart from amounting to unnecessary securitisation of politics and governance, it’s not capable of addressing the political undercurrents of the crisis.

    At the heart of the problem is the unresolved – or badly addressed – partisan and personality clashes between the suspended Governor Siminalayi Fubara and his estranged predecessor and political godfather, Nyesom Wike, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.

    The suspension of the Governor and the State Assembly may be strategically expedient. But it will fail to address the fundamental issues at stake without a concomitant suspension of Wike as the Federal Capital Territory Minister.

    This is because at the heart of the entire crisis is a power struggle between Wike and Fubara. As the immediate past governor of Rivers State, Wike influenced the emergence of Fubara as his successor during the 2023 general elections.

    They fell apart soon after the election. Wike who had become a minister and close ally of President Tinubu is believed to have influenced his loyalists in the Rivers State House of Assembly to oppose the governor. They were in the process of impeaching the governor before the state of emergency was imposed.

    Wike and Fubara’s power tussle has also led to a gradual return of Niger Delta militancy with former militants taking sides with the two political gladiators.

    Given this background, the emergency rule in Rivers state will be associated with consolidated military operations to quell the rising militancy. This, too, is likely to escalate the crisis.

    In handling the Rivers crisis, President Tinubu should have considered some historical precedents. Negotiations have fared a lot better than the military options in the region.

    The most recent armed conflict in the region arose in the early 1990s over tensions between foreign oil corporations and Niger Delta ethnic groups who feel cheated in the way their natural resources are exploited. The militant groups became notorious for their violent attacks on oil infrastructure and kidnapping of oil workers.

    Military response to this crisis did not seem to yield results until the Nigerian government introduced a disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration programme, known locally as the amnesty program. This was introduced in 2009 and was aimed at members of armed militant groups that were present in the Niger Delta region.

    Following this intervention, there has been relative peace in the recent past. Essentially, the emergency rule in Rivers state is likely to bring about a dramatic backlash in the sustenance of the gains of post-Amnesty peace-building in the Niger-Delta.

    What are the security implications of explosions rocking oil installations?

    Destruction of petroleum installations will bring about significant setback in the efficiency and functionality of Nigeria’s oil and gas industry. It will trigger production cuts and revenue losses capable of affecting the country’s petroleum earnings.

    This will be devastating considering the place of the industry in the national economy.

    In addition, the vandalisation of oil pipelines and other installations will lead to widespread environmental degradation and disaster. In turn this will affect the livelihood and ecological security of local communities.

    As experience from government’s use of force in the region in the early 1990s have shown, the declaration of a state of emergency may result in the renewal of piracy, cultism, hostage-taking, and kidnapping. This will in turn be a setback for the gains of peace building already recorded in the area since the introduction of the Niger Delta Amnesty program in 2009.

    Lastly, one of the most likely outcomes of the emergency rule will be the return of inter-militant fighting and vendetta. Already, lines are drawn between the militants aligned with Wike and Fubara.

    Such a development may dovetail into a major inter gang war with devastating implications for peace and development of the Niger Delta region.

    What approach should the appointed administrator take?

    The aftermath of the emergency declaration in Rivers State is dicey.

    To make progress with his mandate – which is to restore order in the state – the administrator needs to adopt a completely depoliticised approach to the partisan dispute that’s led to the current crisis. He has to initiate a credible peace process that is holistic and capable of alleviating the fears and doubts of parties.

    The administrator has to adopt a strictly non-partisan, multi-stakeholder and inclusive approach to dealing with the crisis. All the aggrieved parties must be treated fairly and reasonably.

    There must be a conscious effort at buildings bridges at local levels. These should be aimed at eliciting the buy-in of critical stakeholders and interested parties such as the militant groups and supporters of Wike and Fubara.

    Lastly, the administrator has to be conscious and sensitive to the local issues and sensibilities that are at the root of the crisis.

    Local problem require local remedies. An inward looking solution that carries everyone along, addresses the underlying issues and grievances, restores trust and goodwill, and transcends partisan divides, is the only route that will bring about a lasting solution to the Rivers state.

    Al Chukwuma Okoli teaches Political Science at Federal University of Lafia, Nigeria. An Associate Professor of Security Governance, Okoli has consulted for Center for Democracy and Development, Yaradua Foundation, Partners West Africa (Nigeria), CLEEN Foundation, African Union, UN Women, United Nations Development Programme, etc..He has received funding from the Tertiary Education Fund (Nigeria). A triple Laureate of Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), Okoli s a member of Conflict Research Network West Africa and Amnesty International.

    – ref. Nigeria’s oil-rich Rivers State under emergency: sending in the army isn’t the answer – https://theconversation.com/nigerias-oil-rich-rivers-state-under-emergency-sending-in-the-army-isnt-the-answer-252672

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI: North Central College Student Receives SBB Research Group Foundation STEM Scholarship

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    CHICAGO, March 20, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — The SBB Research Group Foundation named Ivette Camacho a recipient of its STEM scholarship. The $2,500 award empowers students to create value for society by pursuing higher learning through interdisciplinary combinations of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM).

    Ivette Camacho, a second-year graduate student, is studying to be a physician’s assistant at North Central College. She is dedicated to the fight for inclusive policies in medicine and advocates for marginalized communities in that space.

    “We are happy to support someone so dedicated to making the world better for marginalized communities. We are excited to see how Ivette uses her education,” said Matt Aven, co-founder and board member of the SBB Research Group Foundation.

    For eligibility criteria and more information on the Foundation’s STEM scholarship, please visit http://www.sbbscholarship.org.

    About the SBB Research Group Foundation

    The SBB Research Group Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that furthers the philanthropic mission of SBB Research Group LLC (SBBRG), a Chicago-based investment management firm led by Sam Barnett, Ph.D., and Matt Aven. The Foundation sponsors the SBB Research Group Foundation STEM Scholarship, supporting students pursuing Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) degrees. In addition to its scholarship program, the Foundation provides grants to support ambitious organizations solving unmet needs with thoughtful, long-term strategies.

    Contact: Erin Noonan
    Organization: SBB Research Group Foundation
    Email: scholarship@sbbrg.org
    Address: 450 Skokie Blvd, Building 600, Northbrook, IL 60062 United States
    Phone: 1-847-656-1111
    Website: https://www.sbbscholarship.com/

    A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/de3cde71-676c-4e3e-8044-a6ae8b7a3a91

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI Canada: Government of Canada invests $108,000 in Indigenous economic development

    Source: Government of Canada News (2)

    FedNor funds will support jobs, tourism and business growth in Serpent River First Nation

    March 20, 2025 – Serpent River First Nation, ON – Federal Economic Development Agency for Northern Ontario – FedNor

    Terry Sheehan, Member of Parliament for Sault Ste. Marie, today announced a Government of Canada investment of $108,000 to help maximize tourism and business opportunities for Serpent River First Nation. The announcement was made on behalf of the Honourable Anita Anand, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry.

    Provided through FedNor’s Tourism Growth Program, the funding will allow the Serpent River First Nation (SRFN) Limited Partnership, the economic development arm of the First Nation, to develop a five-year strategic plan. The goal of the project is to help diversify the economy, develop new tourism products and extend the tourism season for the Batchewana Bay and Cutler highway trading post facilities.

    To support Serpent River First Nation’s tourism and economic development strategies, the project will also focus on job creation, training, business development, and infrastructure expansion. It will also support marketing and social media activities, as well as e-commerce and website development to increase sales and support local businesses.

    MIL OSI Canada News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Our new study indicates maternal exposure to relatively low fluoride levels may affect intelligence in children

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Maria Kippler, Associate Professor, Institute of Environmental Medicine, Karolinska Institutet

    Alena Matrosova/Shutterstock

    Fluoride occurs naturally in drinking water, especially well water, but the concentrations are generally low in public water supplies. In some countries, such as the US, Canada, UK, Australia and Ireland, fluoride is commonly added to the public water supply at around 0.7mg per litre to prevent tooth decay. The World Health Organization guideline for fluoride in drinking water is 1.5mg per litre.

    Given the concern that fluoride in drinking water might affect children’s intelligence, the addition of this mineral to drinking water has become controversial. Consensus among researchers about the precise nature of the link between fluoridation and intelligence is lacking and the existing evidence is widely debated.

    The US National Toxicology Program’s, part of the Department of Health and Human Services, most recent evaluation states with moderate confidence that higher fluoride exposure (above the World Health Organization guideline) is consistently associated with decreased child intelligence, while they conclude that more research is needed to understand the effects at lower fluoride exposure levels.



    Read more:
    Fluoride: very high levels in water associated with cognitive impairment in children

    A new study my colleagues and I conducted found that relatively low exposure to fluoride during the foetal stage (as a result of the mother’s exposure to fluoride) or in the child’s early years may affect their intelligence.

    For the study, which was published in Environmental Health Perspectives, we followed 500 mothers and their children in rural Bangladesh, where fluoride occurs naturally in the drinking water, to investigate the link between early life exposure to fluoride and children’s intelligence.

    Psychologists evaluated the children’s cognitive abilities at five and ten years of age, using standard IQ tests. The exposure to fluoride in the mothers during pregnancy and children at five and ten years of age was determined by measuring the concentrations in urine samples. Urine samples reflect the continuing exposure from all sources, such as drinking water, food and dental products (such as toothpaste and mouthwash). Urine samples are the most accurate way of determining fluoride exposure in people.

    Increasing urinary concentrations of fluoride in pregnant women were linked to decreasing intelligence in their children at five and ten. Even the lowest fluoride concentrations were associated with decreases in the children’s cognition. The average maternal urinary fluoride concentration was 0.63mg per litre, with the vast majority of concentrations falling between 0.26 and 1.4mg per litre.

    The children’s average urinary fluoride concentrations at five and ten years of age (0.62 and 0.66mg per litre, respectively) were similar to those of their mothers during pregnancy.

    Among children who had more than 0.72mg per litre of fluoride in their urine by age ten, increasing urinary fluoride concentrations were associated with lower intelligence. In children with less fluoride in their urine, there were no consistent associations with their intelligence. So childhood exposure seemed to be less detrimental than the exposure during early foetal development.

    Out of the cognitive abilities measured, associations of both maternal and child urinary fluoride concentrations were most pronounced with nonverbal reasoning and verbal abilities. There were no consistent differences between boys and girls.

    We didn’t find a link between fluoride concentrations in the urine of the five-year-olds and their intelligence. This could be due to the shorter exposure time or that urinary fluoride concentrations aren’t as reliable in younger children owing to greater variations in how much fluoride is taken up and stored in the body, particularly in the bones.

    As well as the children’s urinary fluoride concentration, the fluoride concentrations in drinking water were measured at the age of ten for a random subset of the studied children. The average was 0.20mg per litre, which is well below the WHO guideline value for fluoride in drinking water.

    The concentrations in drinking water tracked with the concentrations in urine, confirming that water is a main source of exposure. Still, we couldn’t exclude the possibility that there were contributions from other sources. Fluoride in toothpaste is important for preventing tooth decay, but it’s important to encourage small children not to swallow the toothpaste during brushing.

    Limitations

    A limitation of our study is that we measured fluoride only in one urine sample at each time point. As a large fraction of the absorbed fluoride is excreted in some hours, one measurement may give uncertain levels for the individual. However, as the exposure largely comes from water it can be assumed that the intake is rather constant over time.

    Another limitation is that the intelligence tests that were used have not been standardised for the Bangladeshi population. As a result, we did not convert the results to IQ scores (with an average of 100) that can be compared across populations.

    Our findings support previous well-designed studies from Canada and Mexico, where exposure levels obtained below the existing WHO guideline for fluoride in drinking water were associated with impaired cognitive development.

    Similar findings were recently provided when combining multiple studies from several countries. It was noted that at low exposure levels, findings with cognitive development were more conclusive among studies estimating fluoride exposure via urine than among studies that relied on concentrations in drinking water only. This highlights that imprecise estimation of the exposure can lead to difficulties in assessing the true impact on cognitive development.

    Taken together, the concern about the effect of fluoride on children’s intelligence at low exposure levels is further strengthened by our study. In particular exposure during foetal development, but also prolonged childhood exposure seems to be of concern.

    Still, as this is an observational study, no firm conclusions can be drawn about causalities. There is still a need for more well-designed research studies on low-level fluoride exposure and cognitive development, in combination with experimental studies to determine the possible molecular mechanisms driving it. Collectively, this will create a robust basis for reviewing fluoride health risks and thresholds for drinking water, foods, and dental care products, especially for children.

    Maria Kippler receives funding from Swedish Research Council and the Swedish Research Council for Environment, Agricultural Sciences and Spatial Planning.

    – ref. Our new study indicates maternal exposure to relatively low fluoride levels may affect intelligence in children – https://theconversation.com/our-new-study-indicates-maternal-exposure-to-relatively-low-fluoride-levels-may-affect-intelligence-in-children-251193

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: UK businesses face a big tax hike. So what does it mean for workers and the economy?

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Phil Tomlinson, Professor of Industrial Strategy, Co-Director Centre for Governance, Regulation and Industrial Strategy (CGR&IS), University of Bath

    The hospitality sector will be among the most seriously affected. cktravels.com/Shutterstock

    Employers in the UK are about to be hit with a hefty tax rise. From April 1 2025, their national insurance contributions are rising to 15% on salaries above £5,000, instead of 13.8% on salaries above £9,100.

    Unsurprisingly, business owners are not happy. Since the change was announced last autumn, many have complained about the effect it will have on their ability to invest and hire staff. Care homes, supermarkets and GP surgeries are among those who have voiced their concerns, and a recent survey found that 54% anticipate raising prices.

    Some industries will be affected more than others. The hospitality sector, for example, expects around £1 billion in additional costs (alongside an inflation-busting minimum wage increase, which also comes into play on April 1). Partly because of these changes, manufacturing confidence has already taken a hit, contributing to a decline in overall GDP since the start of the year.

    But Rachel Reeves, the UK’s chancellor, has not budged, arguing that she needs to raise £40 billion in tax revenue to fund infrastructure and public services, and to address what she calls a “black hole” in the public finances.

    She had previously condemned the Conservative government’s employer national insurance hike in 2022 as a “tax on jobs”. Yet a Labour party manifesto pledge not to raise personal income tax, employees’ national insurance or VAT, has effectively left her with few options.

    As a result, the burden has been placed firmly on businesses. But in the UK’s sluggish economy, any added cost pressures could push struggling firms into pay freezes and cutbacks.

    Others may seek ways to mitigate the national insurance rise through creative accounting, by offering salary sacrifice schemes (such as cycle-to-work or electric vehicle purchase programmes) instead of direct wage increases.

    Some firms will no doubt explore other cost-cutting measures, such as reducing office space by encouraging more remote work. Or they may shift towards gig economy models, where they employ workers as “subcontractors” rather than as salaried staff. Larger firms might even move jobs abroad.

    Productivity push?

    But there could be an upside to all of this. Despite being politically sensitive, there is an economic argument for raising employment costs as a way of driving innovation and productivity. And some enterprising businesses may respond to the financial pressure by investing in labour-saving technology.

    For years the UK has relied on a low-wage, loosely regulated labour market. This has allowed businesses to hire and fire with ease, but has also led to persistently low levels of investment and weak productivity growth.

    Put simply, UK workers are often using outdated tools and equipment, making them less productive compared with their international competitors. Over time, this depresses wages, lowers economic growth (and living standards) and limits funding (through tax raised) for public services.

    Raising employment costs may now incentivise businesses to invest in automation and efficiency-enhancing technologies. The feasibility of this shift depends on what economists call the “elasticity of substitution” – the ease with which labour can be replaced by technology while maintaining (or improving) output.

    And evidence suggests automation and AI can drive productivity improvements even in traditionally labour-intensive industries. For instance, in social care, AI may be used to create personalised treatment plans, while robots could provide patients with physical, social and cognitive support.

    So far, the UK care sector has been slow to adopt such technology, lagging behind the likes of Australia, the Netherlands and Japan.

    Robotic care.
    Stock-Asso/Shutterstock

    Similarly, in hospitality, there are opportunities to use AI for predictive ordering and automated waste management. This could help hotels and restaurants reduce food waste, streamline supply chains and improve their profitability. Some businesses are also exploring robotic concierge services and automated customer interactions.

    Incentives and stability

    To ensure businesses embrace these productivity-boosting innovations, government support is essential. A well-designed industrial strategy is still needed to position the UK at the forefront of the “industry 4.0” technological revolution.



    Read more:
    The UK’s new industrial strategy is welcome, but here’s what is missing

    And, critically, businesses also need confidence in the broader economic outlook. Yet with continuing geopolitical uncertainty, trade tensions and fears of a global recession, the future feels fragile.

    The government’s challenge lies in encouraging businesses to adopt a strategy which ensures that investment in innovation actually materialises, and the benefits emerge swiftly. If businesses fail to adapt, or if productivity gains take too long, then the national insurance hike could just result in higher costs without any boost to growth.

    Ultimately, success hinges on whether businesses view this tax rise as a burden to absorb or an incentive to modernise. In the coming months and years, the government will need to show it is willing to offer businesses more support – and improve their confidence levels – if there is to be a revival in investment and productivity.

    Phil Tomlinson receives funding from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) for Made Smarter Innovation: Centre for People-Led Digitalisation, and from the Innovation and Research Caucus (IRC).

    David Bailey receives funding from the ESRC’s UK in a Changing Europe Programme.

    – ref. UK businesses face a big tax hike. So what does it mean for workers and the economy? – https://theconversation.com/uk-businesses-face-a-big-tax-hike-so-what-does-it-mean-for-workers-and-the-economy-252325

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Debate over H-1B visas shines spotlight on US tech worker shortages

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Moshe Y. Vardi, Professor of Computer Science, Rice University

    Babson College graduate students from India type on their computers in Wellesley, Mass., on June 30, 2016. AP Photo/Charles Krupa

    A heated debate has recently erupted between two groups of supporters of President Donald Trump. The dispute concerns the H-1B visa system, the program that allows U.S. employers to hire skilled foreign workers in specialty occupations – mostly in the tech industry.

    On the one hand, there are people like Donald Trump’s former strategist Steve Bannon, who has called the H-1B program a “total and complete scam.” On the other, there are tech tycoons like Elon Musk who think skilled foreign workers are crucial to the U.S. tech sector.

    The H-1B visa program is subject to an annual limit of new visas it can issue, which sits at 65,000 per fiscal year. There is also an additional annual quota of 20,000 H-1B visas for highly skilled international students who have a proven ability to succeed academically in the United States.

    The H-1B program is the primary vehicle for international graduate students at U.S. universities to stay and work in the United States after graduation. At Rice University, where I work, much of STEM research is carried out by international graduate students. The same goes for most American research-intensive universities.

    As a computer science professor – and an immigrant – who studies the interaction between computing and society, I believe the debate over H-1B overlooks some important questions: Why does the U.S. rely so heavily on foreign workers for the tech industry, and why is it not able to develop a homegrown tech workforce?

    The US as a global talent magnet

    The U.S. has been a magnet for global scientific talent since before World War II.

    Many of the scientists who helped develop the atomic bomb were European refugees. After World War II, U.S. policies such as the Fulbright Program expanded opportunities for international educational exchange.

    Attracting international students to the U.S. has had positive results.

    Among Americans who have won the Nobel Prize in chemistry, medicine or physics since 2000, 40% have been immigrants.

    In 2023, U.S.-born Louis Brus, left, shared the Nobel Prize in chemistry with U.S. immigrants Alexei Ekimov, born in the former USSR, and Moungi Bawendi, born in France.
    AP Photo

    Tech industry giants Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Google were all founded by first- or second-generation immigrants. Furthermore, immigrants have founded more than half of the nation’s billion-dollar startups since 2018.

    Stemming the inflow of students

    Restricting foreign graduate students’ path to U.S. employment, as some prominent Trump supporters have called for, could significantly reduce the number of international graduate students in U.S. universities.

    About 80% of graduate students in American computer science and engineering programs – roughly 18,000 students in 2023 – are international students.

    The loss of international doctoral students would significantly diminish the research capability of graduate programs in science and engineering. After all, doctoral students, supervised by principal investigators, carry out the bulk of research in science and engineering in U.S. universities.

    It must be emphasized that international students make a significant contribution to U.S. research output. For example, scientists born outside the U.S. played key roles in the development of the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines. So making the U.S. less attractive to international graduate students in science and engineering would hurt U.S. research competitiveness.

    Computing Ph.D. graduates are in high demand. The economy needs them, so the lack of an adequate domestic pipeline seems puzzling.

    Where have US students gone?

    So, why is there such a reliance on foreign students for U.S. science and engineering? And why hasn’t America created an adequate pipeline of U.S.-born students for its technical workforce?

    After discussions with many colleagues, I have found that there are simply not enough qualified domestic doctoral applicants to fill the needs of their doctoral programs.

    In 2023, for example, U.S. computer science doctoral programs admitted about 3,400 new students, 63% of whom were foreign.

    It seems as if the doctoral career track is simply not attractive enough to many U.S. undergrad computer science students. But why?

    The top annual salary in Silicon Valley for new computer science graduates can reach US$115,000. Bachelor’s degree holders in computing from Rice University have told me that until recently – before economic uncertainty shook the industry – they were getting starting annual salaries as high as $150,000 in Silicon Valley.

    Doctoral students in research universities, in contrast, do not receive a salary. Instead, they get a stipend. These vary slightly from school to school, but they typically pay less than $40,000 annually. The opportunity cost of pursuing a doctorate is, thus, up to $100,000 per year. And obtaining a doctorate typically takes six years.

    So, pursuing a doctorate is not an economically viable decision for many Americans. The reality is that a doctoral degree opens new career options to its holder, but most bachelor’s degree holders do not see beyond the economics. Yet academic computing research is crucial to the success of Silicon Valley.

    A 2016 analysis of the information technology sectors with a large economic impact shows that academic research plays an instrumental role in their development.

    Why so little?

    The U.S. is locked in a cold war with China focused mostly on technological dominance. So maintaining its research-and-development edge is in the national interest.

    Yet the U.S. has declined to make the requisite investment in research. For example, the National Science Foundation’s annual budget for computer and information science and engineering is around $1 billion. In contrast, annual research-and-development expenses for Alphabet, Google’s parent company, have been close to $50 billion for the past decade.

    Universities are paying doctoral students so little because they cannot afford to pay more.

    Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai speaks at a Google I/O event in Mountain View, Calif., on May 14, 2024.
    AP Photo/Jeff Chiu

    But instead of acknowledging the existence of this problem and trying to address it, the U.S. has found a way to meet its academic research needs by recruiting and admitting international students. The steady stream of highly qualified international applicants has allowed the U.S. to ignore the inadequacy of the domestic doctoral pipeline.

    The current debate about the H-1B visa system provides the U.S. with an opportunity for introspection.

    Yet the news from Washington, D.C., about massive budget cuts coming to the National Science Foundation seems to suggest the federal government is about to take an acute problem and turn it into a crisis.

    Moshe Y. Vardi receives funding from the National Science Foundation and the US Office of Naval Research.

    – ref. Debate over H-1B visas shines spotlight on US tech worker shortages – https://theconversation.com/debate-over-h-1b-visas-shines-spotlight-on-us-tech-worker-shortages-248711

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI: John Snow Labs Introduces First Commercially Available Medical Reasoning LLM at NVIDIA GTC

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    LEWES, Del., March 20, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — John Snow Labs, the AI for healthcare company, today announced Medical LLM Reasoner, the first commercially available healthcare-specific reasoning large language model (LLM) to date. Rather than simple knowledge recall with traditional LLMs to mimic reasoning [1,2], these models represent a significant advancement in AI-driven medical problem solving with systems that can meaningfully assist healthcare professionals in complex diagnostic, operational, and planning decisions.

    The model was trained using a recipe inspired by that of deepseek-r1 [3], introducing self-reflection capabilities through reinforcement learning. Developed with NVIDIA tools, the company is releasing the Medical LLM Reasoner at the NVIDIA GTC 2025 Conference.

    Clinical reasoning is central to healthcare, encompassing the cognitive processes physicians use to evaluate patients, consider evidence, and make decisions. John Snow Labs’ medical reasoning models are designed to emulate three types of common reasoning patterns in clinical practice [4]:

    • Deductive reasoning – such as systematically applying clinical guidelines, protocols, and established medical knowledge to specific patient scenarios
    • Inductive reasoning – such as identifying patterns across individual patient cases and generating hypotheses about underlying causes or connections
    • Abductive reasoning – making the most plausible inference with limited information, as happens when making time-sensitive decisions about a patient

    These models benefit from a reasoning-optimized training dataset, a hybrid training methodology, medical decision tree integration, and self-consistency verification layers. They are designed to elaborate on their thought processes, consider multiple hypotheses, evaluate evidence systematically, and explain conclusions transparently. The Medical LLM Reasoner can track multiple variables, hypotheses, and evidence points simultaneously without losing context.

    The Medical LLM Reasoner is available in two sizes, 14B and 32B, both with a 32k context window. The 32B model achieves an average score of 82.57% on the OpenMed benchmarks, while the 14B model achieves 80.04% – along with the benefit of verbalizing the chain of thought leading to each answer. These scores outperform the 32B reasoning models by Qwen2.5 (82.02%) and R1 (79.40%). The models also perform well on reasoning benchmarks like Math 500 (81.5% for the 32B model) and BigBench-Hard (64.8% for the 14B model). The Medical Reasoning LLM is designed to run privately inside each customer’s infrastructure, without any calls to third-party APIs, simplifying compliance when reasoning over confidential medical information.

    The training process ran on a cluster of NVIDIA H100-accelerated servers and makes use of a number of NVIDIA software libraries, including NCCL for efficient multi-GPU communication during distributed training and TensorRT for inference optimization and deployment testing.

    While existing benchmarks effectively measure medical knowledge, they inadequately assess the sophisticated reasoning capabilities that are essential for clinical practice. To address this gap, John Snow Labs is developing new specialized benchmarks for clinical reasoning, consistency, safety, and uncertainty quantification, furthering its commitment to responsible AI.

    To learn more about Medical LLM Reasoner, visit: https://www.johnsnowlabs.com/healthcare-llm/.

    About John Snow Labs
    John Snow Labs, the AI for healthcare company, provides state-of-the-art software, models, and data to help healthcare and life science organizations put AI to good use. Developer of Medical LLMS, Healthcare NLP, Spark NLP, Spark NLP, the Generative AI Lab No-Code Platform, and the Medical Chatbot, John Snow Labs’ award-winning medical AI software powers the world’s leading pharmaceuticals, academic medical centers, and health technology companies. Creator and host of The NLP Summit, the company is committed to further educating and advancing the global AI community.

    Contact
    Gina Devine
    Head of Communications
    John Snow Labs
    gina@johnsnowlabs.com 

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI Canada: Government of Canada to celebrate key achievements in support of Canadian marine industry

    Source: Government of Canada News

    March 20, 2025 – Gatineau, Quebec

    The Honourable Ali Ehsassi, Minister of Government Transformation, Public Services and Procurement, alongside the Honourable Anita Anand, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, will speak to key achievements in support of the Canadian marine industry and highlight the important economic contributions of the shipbuilding sector across Canada.

    Please note that all details are subject to change. All times are local.

    Date: March 21, 2025
    Time: 12:15 pm
    Location: St. Catharines, Ontario

    Notes for media

    • Media wishing to attend this event are asked to confirm their participation by sending their full name and the name of the media organization they represent to Public Services and Procurement Canada’s Media Relations team at media@pwgsc-tpsgc.gc.ca by March 20, at 3 pm.
    • Please include “RSVP for March 21 Press Conference” in the subject line of the email.
    • Event location details will be shared once media are registered.
    • Media attending the event are asked to arrive no later than 12 pm.
    • Please note that closed-toe shoes are mandatory.

    MIL OSI Canada News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: A Tradition of Stewardship, A Future of Innovation: Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation’s Agricultural Leadership

    Source: US State of Connecticut

    Laughter fills the air as children explore agriculture in the greenhouse with controlled environment agriculture systems at Meechooôk Farm, part of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation. For some, it’s their first time tasting lettuce and tomatoes despite their parents’ best efforts—and they’re pleasantly surprised.

    Through this program, led by the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation and supported by UConn Extension, youth are discovering the connections between innovation, tradition, and community.

    “This is about more than growing food; it’s about feeding our future,” says Tribal Chairman Rodney Butler ‘99 (BUS). “Controlled environment agriculture allows us to take control of our health and sustainability in ways our ancestors never could have imagined, all while staying true to who we are.”

    Agricultural and youth education at the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation integrates three key goals: agricultural production, cultural heritage, and nutrition. This program was co-designed by the Nation and UConn Extension with support from USDA’s Federally-Recognized Tribes Extension Program. The eight-year partnership began when Tribal members sought Extension’s expertise to enhance their agricultural practices.

    Controlled environment agriculture enables food production in small, non-traditional spaces, including shipping containers and urban centers. These systems embody the spirit of innovation, merging technology and sustainability to tackle critical global challenges like food security and climate resilience. The UConn team, led by Shuresh Ghimire, associate extension educator for vegetable crops, collaborates closely with Jeremy Whipple, farm manager of Meechooôk Farm, and Marissa Turnbull, director of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation Department of Agriculture.

    By incorporating freight farming, the Nation grows crops year-round, regardless of weather conditions. Shipping containers transform into efficient growing spaces equipped with climate control, LED lighting, and automated irrigation. These LED lights provide precise wavelengths to optimize plant growth, enhancing productivity.

    Tomatoes, lettuce, herbs, and other crops thrive in the farm’s hydroponic greenhouses, ensuring year-round access to fresh, nutritious food within the community. Beyond meeting local needs, these crops contribute to economic viability through sales to restaurants, schools, and other partners.

    With 90% less water usage and crops growing up to four times faster, controlled environment agriculture is remarkably efficient. It reduces reliance on chemical pesticides, ensuring safer, higher-quality produce. By shifting to indoor farming, the Nation strengthens food security, lowers transportation costs, and minimizes waste—improving both human health and environmental sustainability.

    “This partnership is a model for how education can drive meaningful change—benefiting communities while preserving cultural heritage,” says Indrajeet Chaubey, dean of the College of Agriculture, Health and Natural Resources (CAHNR). “It goes to the heart of what we do in CAHNR: training the future workforce, equipping youth with leadership and life skills for any career path and using research to create knowledge that directly benefits the communities we serve.”

    Together, the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation and UConn Extension are building a vibrant, sustainable agricultural program to enhance food security and Tribal health. The Nation employs youth and adults from their community on the farm, while Extension provides agricultural, business, and nutrition expertise. Additionally, weekly community food boxes support those in need.

    “I think one of the special things about UConn is that we’re engaged in every single community in this state,” says Provost Anne D’Alleva. “We hold so much precious, valuable, transformational knowledge embedded in our communities, and UConn serves as the vehicle for ensuring that knowledge has an impact across our state and beyond. The Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation’s work with UConn Extension demonstrates the power of learning—blending traditional knowledge with modern science to create sustainable solutions.”

    Work at Meechooôk Farm continues to evolve as the Nation and UConn Extension expand the agricultural and community components of the program. Innovation remains a driving force as the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation balances health and sustainability.

    “Every decision we make as a Tribal Nation reflects our responsibility to the land, our ancestors, and future generations,” Butler concludes. “Controlled environment agriculture is one way we uphold that responsibility—combining technology with tradition to grow not just food, but opportunity.”

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Upcoming Discussions on Public Health, Ecology Designed to Get People ‘Thinking Globally’

    Source: US State of Connecticut

    A series of virtual panel discussions this semester from the Office of Global Affairs and International Studies Association aims to prompt students, faculty, and the community to think bigger than themselves, even bigger than UConn, when considering issues that touch nearly every corner of the world.

    “Thinking Globally in 2025” is tackling such topics as public health and ecology in March and April, after having looked at media and misinformation in late February.

    “In some ways, I see this as curating the relevant expertise that’s out there to help people begin to make sense of an incredibly confusing and quite scary world,” says Jane Anna Gordon, a political science professor and series co-organizer. “We want people to come away with the sense that we need a big, broad, diverse community of people if we have any hope of understanding the globe.”

    Sarah W. Dorr, director of professional development at the International Studies Association (ISA) and a research scholar in Global Affairs, says she conceived of the series after noting that ISA members and UConn faculty have vast expertise in a variety of fields, but hadn’t come together for interdisciplinary discussions.

    After developing the idea for a speaker series that would draw from UConn’s faculty and ISA’s national and international network, Dorr approached Global Affairs and connected with Allison Casaly ’12 (CLAS), who serves as its global partnerships manager.

    Casaly says her office also was looking to begin a speaker series, as was Gordon, who had put together a fall-time faculty seminar around the theme of thinking globally. With combined efforts, the three planned for “Thinking Globally” to kick off this semester, featuring three topics they considered particularly impactful in the contemporary world.

    The first, “Our Digital World: Media and Misinformation,” featured UConn journalism assistant professor Amanda J. Crawford as moderator, and as panelists UConn journalism department head and professor Marie K. Shanahan and UConn communication assistant professor Jiyoun Suk, along with Dmitry Chernobrov from the University of Sheffield, England.

    About 80 people registered for the virtual discussion, Dorr says, about half from UConn. The event was open to anyone affiliated with the University or ISA, or from the wider community.

    “With all of the uncertainty going on in the country and in the world, it’s valuable to provide a forum where people can gather and learn about issues, while having the opportunity to ask questions of the experts that we bring in,” Casaly says.

    Dorr adds, “In addition to promoting interdisciplinary discussion, one of the main aims of the series is to get academic expertise down the pipeline and make it available to the wider public in this age of misinformation.”

    The second discussion, “Our World: Public Health,” will happen March 25, featuring Joy Elwell from the UConn schools of Nursing and Medicine as moderator, and as panelists Fumilayo Showers, an assistant professor of sociology and Africana Studies at UConn; Elsio A. Wunder, an assistant professor of pathobiology and veterinary science at UConn; and Stevan M. Weine from the University of Illinois.

    “Our Ecological World: Oceans & Waterways” will happen April 22, featuring Matthew McKenzie, a history professor at UConn; Carmel Christy K.J., a postdoctoral research associate at the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute at UConn; James O’Donnell, a UConn professor and executive director of the Connecticut Institute for Resilience and Climate Adaptation; Eduardo Urios-Aparisi, an associate professor of Spanish studies and applied linguistics and discourse studies at UConn, along with Neil Oculi from the University Portland and Henry Carey from Georgia State University as moderators.

    While the three organizers say promoting and engaging people with the series is the primary goal, they hope to expand it in the fall and offer it as a for-credit class to UConn students, similar to the online, asynchronous popup course on antisemitism that’s been held since 2022.

    For this course, they expect to require students not just to learn but take that learning and think about what they can do with it through some sort of public project.

    “We want students to take away a holistic understanding of the issue,” Casaly says. “By having people from different disciplines talk about the same broad theme, we’re hoping people can appreciate the diversity of perspectives that exist and the value those different perspectives bring to understanding the issue.”

    Dorr also suggests there may be an opportunity to expand the series into a podcast or abbreviated video format, sort of a here’s-what-you-need-to-know-from-the-experts.

    Snapshots like this might be good teaching tools too, Gordon says.

    “I’m open to any ideas that people may have about how to further all this fantastic content,” Dorr adds.

    While they understand some topics might be more attractive draws for audiences, ideally, they hope to develop a core group that shows up regularly and can take what they learn each month back to their personal and professional contacts.

    “We’re in such a confusing time,” Gordon says. “On the one hand, we’re part of a globe – think about COVID, the transmission of information, election meddling. But at the same time, we’re in a period in which those who are ascending politically are trying to deglobalize or at least become much more exclusionary. That becomes very contradictory and makes people feel nihilistic and isolated. Being able to talk with other people about this, how to work through it, and what to do in response is really urgent.”

    Registration for the March 25 and April 22 events can be done online from the ISA website. The ISA is an interdisciplinary association with more than 7,000 members dedicated to international, transnational, and global affairs. While it’s work spans international borders, it is based at UConn.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Scientists in Antarctica: why they’re there and what they’ve found

    Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By David William Hedding, Associate Professor in Geography, University of South Africa

    A media storm blew up in mid-March 2025 when a researcher at South Africa’s isolated Sanae IV base in Antarctica accused one of its nine team members of becoming violent.

    The Conversation Africa asked geomorphologist David William Hedding, who has previously carried out research from the frozen continent, about the work researchers do in Antarctica, what conditions are like and why it matters.

    What do researchers focus on when they’re working in Antarctica?

    Currently, the main focus of research in the Antarctic revolves around climate change because the White Continent is a good barometer for changes in global cycles. It has a unique and fragile environment. It’s an extreme climate which makes it highly sensitive to any changes in global climate and atmospheric conditions. Importantly, the Antarctic remains relatively untouched by humans, so we are able to study processes and responses of natural systems.

    Also, the geographic location of Antarctic enables science that is less suitable elsewhere on the planet. An example of this is the work on space weather (primarily disturbances to the Earth’s magnetic field caused by solar activity). Studying space weather is significant because the magnetic field of the Earth can impact communication platforms, technology, infrastructure and even human health.

    How many countries have teams working there? Where does South Africa fit in?

    Currently, about 30 countries have research stations in the Antarctic but these bases serve a far wider community of researchers. Collaboration is a key component of research in the Antarctic because many study sites are isolated, logistics are a challenge and resources are typically limited.

    The South African base in Antarctica, named SANAE IV usually has between 10 and 12 researchers and base personnel. This research station is situated on a nunatak (a mountain piercing through the ice) in Western Dronning Maud Land. It is an extremely remote location approximately 220km inland from the ice-shelf.

    The researchers and base personnel remain in Antarctica for approximately 15 months working through the cold and dark winter months.

    What have been some of the biggest ‘finds’?

    The biggest research finding from the Antarctic was the discovery of the ozone hole in 1985 by scientists from the British Antarctic Survey. This discovery led to the creation and implementation of the Montreal Protocol, a treaty to phase out chlorofluorocarbons (synthetic chemical compounds composed of chlorine, fluorine, and carbon) which destroy ozone. This was a major breakthrough in terms of slowly healing the ozone layer.

    The second most significant piece of research to come from the Antarctic has been the use of ice cores to reconstruct past climates. Ice cores preserve air bubbles which provide a wealth of information about the conditions of the atmosphere over time. Importantly, ice cores provide an uninterrupted and detailed window into the past 1.2 million years. This is important because only by understanding past climates and the earth’s responses to those changes are we able to predict future responses. This is significant because of the imminent threats resulting from anthropogenic (human-induced) climate change.

    What conditions do scientists work under?

    Conducting research in the Antarctic is extremely difficult for three primary reasons: remoteness, the cold and daylight.

    The remoteness of many study sites makes it difficult to reach. Distances are vast from the limited number of bases in the Antarctic. Thus, logistics for science in the Antarctic is a major challenge and requires collaboration and planning. For example, the geologists from the University of Johannesburg, who work from the SANAE IV base in Antarctica, often spend weeks in the field collecting samples. They travel significant distances via snow mobile and remain self-sufficient while conducting science in tough conditions.

    These tough conditions relate specifically to the cold. Most science only occurs in the austral summer months when temperatures become marginally bearable. Also, the summer season only provides a short window in which to operate because access to Antarctic by sea is limited by extent and thickness of the sea ice.

    Lastly, during summer there is 24 hours of daylight which lengthens the working day but these conditions are also short-lived.

    Why it is important to do scientific work in the area?

    The Antarctic is intricately linked to global systems and plays a major role in influencing these systems.

    For example, climate change will cause significant melting of land-based ice in Antarctica which when added to the oceans will cause sea-level rise and disruptions to global oceanic currents. Therefore, it is critical that we obtain a better understanding of how responses of terrestrial systems, such as the Antarctic, will impact oceanic systems because ultimately changes in ocean currents will impact the oceanic food web.

    In the context of climate change, sea-level rise is a major concern as it will have global impacts for society, so it is critical that the impacts are investigated to enable society to build resilience and adapt.

    David William Hedding receives funding from the National Research Foundation.

    – ref. Scientists in Antarctica: why they’re there and what they’ve found – https://theconversation.com/scientists-in-antarctica-why-theyre-there-and-what-theyve-found-252752

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Trump’s phone call with Putin fails to deliver a full ceasefire – here’s what could happen next

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Stefan Wolff, Professor of International Security, University of Birmingham

    After more than two hours on the phone on Tuesday, March 17, the US president, Donald Trump, and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, agreed only to confidence-building measures, not a ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia. The two leaders came away from the call having agreed on a limited prisoner exchange, a suspension of attacks on energy infrastructure, and the creation of working groups to explore further steps towards a ceasefire and ultimately a peace agreement, a proposal which Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky has since agreed to in his call with the US president.

    A less charitable way of looking at the outcome of the second call between the two presidents since Trump returned to the White House would be that the ball is now back in America’s court. Putin made it crystal clear to Trump that he is not (yet) in the mood for any compromise.

    This is hardly surprising given recent events.

    The US has pressured Ukraine mercilessly into accepting a proposal for a 30-day ceasefire, which Trump hoped Russia would also agree to. But apart from a vague statement by Trump that he might consider sanctions against Russia, he has so far seemed unwilling to contemplate putting any meaningful equivalent pressure on Putin.

    Sign up to receive our weekly World Affairs Briefing newsletter from The Conversation UK. Every Thursday we’ll bring you expert analysis of the big stories in international relations.

    On the ground, Russia has gained the upper hand in the Kursk region where Ukrainian troops have ceded most of the territory they captured after a surprise offensive last summer. Once Putin’s forces, assisted by thousands of North Korean soldiers, have succeeded in driving the Ukrainians out of Russia, Kyiv will have lost its most valuable bargaining chip in negotiations with Moscow.

    Meanwhile, Russia has also made further gains on the frontlines inside Ukraine especially in parts of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia. These are two of the four regions (the other two are Donetsk and Luhansk) that Putin has claimed for Russia in their entirety since sham referendums in September 2022, despite not yet having full control of them.

    If Russia were to capture yet more Ukrainian territory, Putin would probably find it even easier to convince Trump that his demands are reasonable. The fact that Trump already hinted at a “dividing of assets”, including the nuclear power plant at Zaporizhzhia – Europe’s largest before its forced shutdown in September 2022 – is a worrying indication of how far the Russian president has already pushed the envelope.

    Ukraine war: territory occupied by Russia as at March 18 2025.
    Institute for the Study of War

    But a deal solely between Russia and the US is not going to work. In that sense, time is not only on Putin’s side but also on Zelensky’s.

    The Russian readout of the call between the two presidents claimed that they had discussed “the complete cessation of foreign military assistance and the provision of intelligence information to Kyiv” as a key condition for moving forward – something that Trump subsequently denied in an interview with Fox. This means that, for now, Kyiv is likely to continue to receive US aid.

    Europe at the ready

    Perhaps more importantly in the long term, Europe is also doubling down on support for Ukraine. While Trump and Putin were discussing a carve-up of Ukraine over the phone, the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, left no doubt on where the EU stands.

    In a speech at the Royal Danish Military Academy foreshadowing the publication of the commission’s Readiness 2030 white paper on bolstering European defences, she recommitted to developing European “capabilities to have credible deterrence” against a hostile Russia.

    A few hours later, the German parliament passed a multi-billion Euro package that loosens the country’s tight borrowing rules to enable massive investments in defence. This follows announcements of increased defence elsewhere on the continent, including in the UK, Poland, and by the EU itself.

    Meanwhile, the UK and France are leading efforts to assemble a coalition of the willing to help Ukraine. Representatives of the 30-member group gathered in London on March 15 for further talks.

    Afterwards, the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, released a statement saying that Ukraine’s western partners “will keep increasing the pressure on Russia, keep the military aid flowing to Ukraine and keep tightening the restrictions on Russia’s economy”.

    Undoubtedly, these measures would be more effective if they had Washington’s full buy-in – but they send a strong signal to both the Kremlin and the White House that Ukraine is not alone in its fight against Russia’s continuing aggression.

    Putin’s options

    Putin, meanwhile, may have time on his side in the short term – but he should take note of this. Russian manpower and firepower may dwarf that of Ukraine, but it would be no match for a Ukraine backed by such a coalition of the willing.

    Putin’s apparent plan to drag Trump into the minutiae of negotiating a comprehensive deal may eventually backfire in more ways than one. For a start, really detailed discussions will test the US president’s notoriously short attention span.

    But this will also buy time for Ukraine and its supporters to strengthen Kyiv’s position in future negotiations. And it will continue to strain – but not immediately break – Russia’s economy.

    For now, Trump’s efforts to end the war in Ukraine have stalled. He is attempting to broker a complex ceasefire deal that involves separate agreements with Kyiv and Moscow, pressure on Nato allies, and an attempt to drive a wedge between Russia and China. It’s not clear how this will succeed or indeed where it will end.

    The only certainty is that they are not bringing a just and stable peace for Ukraine any closer.

    Stefan Wolff is a past recipient of grant funding from the Natural Environment Research Council of the UK, the United States Institute of Peace, the Economic and Social Research Council of the UK, the British Academy, the NATO Science for Peace Programme, the EU Framework Programmes 6 and 7 and Horizon 2020, as well as the EU’s Jean Monnet Programme. He is a Trustee and Honorary Treasurer of the Political Studies Association of the UK and a Senior Research Fellow at the Foreign Policy Centre in London.

    Tetyana Malyarenko 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. Trump’s phone call with Putin fails to deliver a full ceasefire – here’s what could happen next – https://theconversation.com/trumps-phone-call-with-putin-fails-to-deliver-a-full-ceasefire-heres-what-could-happen-next-252417

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Trump administration seeks to starve libraries and museums of funding by shuttering this little-known agency

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Devon Akmon, Director of the MSU Museum and CoLab Studio, Michigan State University

    ExplorationWorks, a children’s museum in Helena, Mont., received $151,946 in 2024 from the IMLS to expand its early childhood programs. Lisa Wareham

    On March 14, 2025, the Trump administration issued an executive order that called for the dismantling of seven federal agencies “to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law.” They ranged from the United States Agency for Global Media, which oversees Voice of America, to the Minority Business Development Agency.

    The Institute of Museum and Library Services was also on the list. Congress created the IMLS in 1996 through the Museum and Library Services Act. The law merged the Institute of Museum Services, which was established in 1976, with the Library Programs Office of the Department of Education.

    By combining these two departments, Congress sought to create an overarching agency that could more cohesively and strategically support American museums and libraries. The agency’s mission, programs and funding have been reaffirmed through subsequent legislation, such as the Museum and Library Services Act of 2003.

    The Conversation U.S. interviewed Devon Akmon, who is the director of the MSU Museum at Michigan State University. He explained how the agency supports the nation’s cultural institutions and local communities – and what could be lost if the agency were dissolved.

    What does the Institute of Museum and Library Services do?

    The agency provides financial support to a wide array of cultural and educational institutions, including art, science and history museums, zoos, aquariums, botanical gardens and historic sites. Libraries of all types – public, academic, school and research – also benefit from the agency’s funding.

    Through grants, research and policy initiatives, the IMLS helps these institutions better serve their communities.

    Anne-Imelda Radice, right, former director of the Institute of Museum and Library Services, inspects Denver city records and neighborhood histories in 2008. The volumes were digitized to make them more accessible to the public.
    Brian Brainerd/The Denver Post via Getty Images

    In the 2019 fiscal year, for example, the IMLS awarded funds to libraries in Nebraska to support economic development in 30 rural communities. The project created rotating “innovation studios” in local libraries and provided residents with tools, instructional materials and programming to foster entrepreneurship and creativity. More recently, IMLS awarded a grant to the Hands On Children’s Museum to develop a toolkit that museums across the country can use to support families with relatives who are in prison.

    For libraries, the IMLS might fund technology upgrades, such as virtual reality learning stations, AI-assisted research aids or digitization of rare books. The agency also pays for community programs that take place in libraries, from early childhood reading initiatives to workshops that help people land jobs.

    How has the Institute of Museum and Library Services supported your work at the MSU Museum?

    IMLS grants have played a vital role in enabling the MSU Museum to preserve, enhance and expand access to its collections.

    For example, we’ve used IMLS grants to develop high-quality audio aids for museum visitors who are blind or have poor vision. Recent funding has supported the digitization of over 2,000 vertebrate specimens, including rare and endangered species.

    Beyond financial support, the MSU Museum benefits from IMLS policy papers, professional training opportunities and resources developed through the National Leadership Grants for Museums program. Our staff members also contribute to national campaigns spearheaded by the IMLS, such as its Strategies for Countering Antisemitism & Hate initiative.

    Through these efforts, the IMLS, alongside the American Alliance of Museums, operate as cornerstones of learning and innovation within the museum field.

    Looking beyond Michigan State, what might be lost with its shuttering?

    The IMLS is more than a grantmaking entity – it is the only federal agency dedicated to sustaining the entire museum and library ecosystem in the United States.

    Its funding has sustained museums, advanced digital preservation, expanded accessibility for low-income communities and fueled innovation in educational programming. In 2024 alone, the agency distributed US$266.7 million through grants, research initiatives and policy development. For example, ExplorationWorks, a children’s museum in Helena, Montana, received $151,946 in 2024 from the IMLS to expand its early childhood programs that serve low-income and rural families.

    Without this support, many institutions will struggle to hire and retain qualified staff, leading to fewer exhibitions, stalled research and reduced educational outreach.

    The consequences would be particularly severe for small museums and rural museums, which lack the fundraising capacity of larger urban institutions. They’re often the only sources of cultural and historical education in their regions, and their loss would create cultural voids that cannot easily be filled.

    Trump’s executive order dictated that the Institute of Museum and Library Services and other agencies be eliminated “to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law.” What is the applicable law in this case?

    I’m not a lawyer. But my understanding is that the “applicable law” in this case primarily refers to the Museum and Library Services Act, which, as I noted earlier, was created in 1996 and has been reauthorized multiple times since then.

    Since the IMLS was created through this congressional legislation, it cannot simply be eliminated by an executive order. Congress would need to pass a law to repeal or defund it.

    President George W. Bush signs into law the Museum and Library Services Act on Sept. 25, 2003.
    Tina Hager/White House via Getty Images

    Additionally, the Antideficiency Act prohibits federal agencies from operating without appropriated funding. If Congress were to defund the IMLS rather than repeal its authorizing statute, the agency would be forced to cease operations due to a lack of money, even if the legal framework for its existence remained intact.

    Is there anything else you’d like to add?

    Museums are among the most trusted institutions in the country. They are rare bipartisan beacons of credibility in an era of deep division.

    A 2021 American Alliance of Museums report found that 97% of Americans view museums as valuable educational assets, while 89% consider them trustworthy sources of information. A 2022 American Library Association survey revealed that 89% of voters and 92% of parents believe local public libraries have an important role to play in communities.

    More than just cultural repositories, museums and libraries bring together citizens and offer learning opportunities for everyday people. By presenting science and history through engaging, evidence-based storytelling, museums help bridge ideological divides and encourage informed discourse. People of all political stripes rely on libraries for free internet access, job searches and literacy programs.

    The Institute of Museum and Library Services is central to this work. The agency provides leadership, while funding programs and research that help museums and libraries expand their offerings to reach all Americans.

    Stripping this support would threaten the sustainability of these institutions and weaken their ability to serve as pillars of education, civic engagement and truth. I see it as a disinvestment in an informed, connected and resilient society.

    Devon Akmon receives funding from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. He also serves as the vice chair and secretary of the board of directors for the American Alliance of Museums.

    – ref. Trump administration seeks to starve libraries and museums of funding by shuttering this little-known agency – https://theconversation.com/trump-administration-seeks-to-starve-libraries-and-museums-of-funding-by-shuttering-this-little-known-agency-252455

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: What causes the powerful winds that fuel dust storms, wildfires and blizzards? A weather scientist explains

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Chris Nowotarski, Associate Professor of Atmospheric Science, Texas A&M University

    When huge dust storms like this one in the Phoenix suburbs in 2022 hit, it’s easy to see the power of the wind. Christopher Harris/iStock Images via Getty Plus

    Windstorms can seem like they come out of nowhere, hitting with a sudden blast. They might be hundreds of miles long, stretching over several states, or just in your neighborhood.

    But they all have one thing in common: a change in air pressure.

    Just like air rushing out of your car tire when the valve is open, air in the atmosphere is forced from areas of high pressure to areas of low pressure.

    The stronger the difference in pressure, the stronger the winds that will ultimately result.

    On this forecast for March 18, 2025, from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, ‘L’ represents low-pressure systems. The shaded area over New Mexico and west Texas represents strong winds and low humidity that combine to raise the risk of wildfires.
    NOAA Weather Prediction Center

    Other forces related to the Earth’s rotation, friction and gravity can also alter the speed and direction of winds. But it all starts with this change in pressure over a distance – what meteorologists like me call a pressure gradient.

    So how do we get pressure gradients?

    Strong pressure gradients ultimately owe their existence to the simple fact that the Earth is round and rotates.

    Because the Earth is round, the sun is more directly overhead during the day at the equator than at the poles. This means more energy reaches the surface of the Earth near the equator. And that causes the lower part of the atmosphere, where weather occurs, to be both warmer and have higher pressure on average than the poles.

    Nature doesn’t like imbalances. As a result of this temperature difference, strong winds develop at high altitudes over midlatitude locations, like the continental U.S. This is the jet stream, and even though it’s several miles up in the atmosphere, it has a big impact on the winds we feel at the surface.

    Wind speed and direction in the upper atmosphere on March 14, 2025, show waves in the jet stream. Downstream of a trough in this wave, winds diverge and low pressure can form near the surface.
    NCAR

    Because Earth rotates, these upper-altitude winds blow from west to east. Waves in the jet stream – a consequence of Earth’s rotation and variations in the surface land, terrain and oceans – can cause air to diverge, or spread out, at certain points. As the air spreads out, the number of air molecules in a column decreases, ultimately reducing the air pressure at Earth’s surface.

    The pressure can drop quite dramatically over a few days or even just a few hours, leading to the birth of a low-pressure system – what meteorologists call an extratropical cyclone.

    The opposite chain of events, with air converging at other locations, can form high pressure at the surface.

    In between these low-pressure and high-pressure systems is a strong change in pressure over a distance – a pressure gradient. And that pressure gradient leads to strong winds. Earth’s rotation causes these winds to spiral around areas of high and low pressure. These highs and lows are like large circular mixers, with air blowing clockwise around high pressure and counterclockwise around low pressure. This flow pattern blows warm air northward toward the poles east of lows and cool air southward toward the equator west of lows.

    A map illustrates lines of surface pressure, called isobars, with areas of high and low pressure marked for March 14, 2025. Winds are strongest when isobars are packed most closely together.
    Plymouth State University, CC BY-NC-SA

    As the waves in the jet stream migrate from west to east, so do the surface lows and highs, and with them, the corridors of strong winds.

    That’s what the U.S. experienced when a strong extratropical cyclone caused winds stretching thousands of miles that whipped up dust storms and spread wildfires, and even caused tornadoes and blizzards in the central and southern U.S. in March 2025.

    Whipping up dust storms and spreading fires

    The jet stream over the U.S. is strongest and often the most “wavy” in the springtime, when the south-to-north difference in temperature is often the strongest.

    Winds associated with large-scale pressure systems can become quite strong in areas where there is limited friction at the ground, like the flat, less forested terrain of the Great Plains. One of the biggest risks is dust storms in arid regions of west Texas or eastern New Mexico, exacerbated by drought in these areas.

    A dust storm hit Albuquerque, N.M., on March 18, 2025. Another dust storm a few dats earlier in Kansas caused a deadly pileup involving dozens of vehices on I-70.
    AP Photo/Roberto E. Rosales

    When the ground and vegetation are dry and the air has low relative humidity, high winds can also spread wildfires out of control.

    Even more intense winds can occur when the pressure gradient interacts with terrain. Winds can sometimes rush faster downslope, as happens in the Rockies or with the Santa Ana winds that fueled devastating wildfires in the Los Angeles area in January.

    Violent tornadoes and storms

    Of course, winds can become even stronger and more violent on local scales associated with thunderstorms.

    When thunderstorms form, hail and precipitation in them can cause the air to rapidly fall in a downdraft, causing very high pressure under these storms. That pressure forces the air to spread out horizontally when it reaches the ground. Meteorologists call these straight line winds, and the process that forms them is a downburst. Large thunderstorms or chains of them moving across a region can cause large swaths of strong wind over 60 mph, called a derecho.

    Finally, some of nature’s strongest winds occur inside tornadoes. They form when the winds surrounding a thunderstorm change speed and direction with height. This can cause part of the storm to rotate, setting off a chain of events that may lead to a tornado and winds as strong as 300 mph in the most violent tornadoes.

    How a tornado forms. Source: NOAA.

    Tornado winds are also associated with an intense pressure gradient. The pressure inside the center of a tornado is often very low and varies considerably over a very small distance.

    It’s no coincidence that localized violent winds from thunderstorm downbursts and tornadoes often occur amid large-scale windstorms. Extratropical cyclones often draw warm, moist air northward on strong winds from the south, which is a key ingredient for thunderstorms. Storms also become more severe and may produce tornadoes when the jet stream is in close proximity to these low-pressure centers. In the winter and early spring, cold air funneling south on the northwest side of strong extratropical cyclones can even lead to blizzards.

    So, the same wave in the jet stream can lead to strong winds, blowing dust and fire danger in one region, while simultaneously triggering a tornado outbreak and a blizzard in other regions.

    Chris Nowotarski receives funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and theDepartment of Energy (DOE).

    – ref. What causes the powerful winds that fuel dust storms, wildfires and blizzards? A weather scientist explains – https://theconversation.com/what-causes-the-powerful-winds-that-fuel-dust-storms-wildfires-and-blizzards-a-weather-scientist-explains-252639

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Insomnia can lead to heart issues − a psychologist recommends changes that can improve sleep

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Julio Fernandez-Mendoza, Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health, Neuroscience, and Public Health Sciences, Penn State

    Better sleep hygiene habits may help with insomnia. Tetra Images via Getty Images

    About 10% of Americans say they have chronic insomnia, and millions of others report poor sleep quality. Ongoing research has found that bad sleep could lead to numerous health problems, including heart disease.

    Dr. Julio Fernandez-Mendoza is a professor of psychiatry and behavioral health, neuroscience and public health sciences at Penn State College of Medicine. He discusses the need for sleep, why teenagers require more sleep than adults, and how you can get a good night’s sleep without medications.

    Julio Fernandez-Mendoza discusses heart health and sleep.

    The Conversation has collaborated with SciLine to bring you highlights from the discussion that have been edited for brevity and clarity.

    How much sleep is enough for adults and for adolescents?

    Julio Fernandez-Mendoza: Adults who report getting about seven to eight hours of sleep per night generally have the best health, in terms of both physical and mental health, and longevity.

    But that recommendation changes with age. Adults over age 65 may need just six to seven hours of sleep per night. So older people, if otherwise healthy, should not feel anxious if they’re getting just six hours. Young people need the most – at least nine hours – and some younger children may need more.

    How can insufficient sleep harm our health?

    Fernandez-Mendoza: Our team was the first to show that those complaining about insomnia – difficulty falling or staying asleep – were more likely to have high blood pressure and be at risk for heart disease.

    In both teens and adults, we found that insomnia and shortened sleep may lead to elevated stress, hormone levels and inflammation. These problems tend to show up before you develop heart disease.

    As we age, the recommended amount of sleep declines.
    National Sleep Foundation Copyright 2025 National Sleep Foundation, all rights reserved

    What about people who have more serious sleep problems?

    Fernandez-Mendoza: Good sleep hygiene habits include cutting down on caffeine and alcohol, quitting smoking and exercising regularly. I also recommend not skipping meals, not eating too late at night and not eating too much.

    But people with a persistent sleep problem may need to make more behavioral changes. Research studies point to a set of six rules that can improve your sleep. You can follow these changes consistently in the short term, and then choose how to adapt them into your lifestyle down the road.

    First, get up at the same time no matter what. No matter how much sleep you get. This will anchor your sleep/wake cycle, called your circadian rhythm.

    Second, do not use your bed for anything except sleep and sexual activity.

    Third, when you can’t sleep, don’t lie in bed awake. Instead, get out of bed, go into another room if you can, and do an activity that’s enjoyable or relaxing. Go back to bed only when you’re ready to sleep.

    Fourth, get going with daily activities even after a poor night’s sleep. Don’t try to compensate for sleep loss. If you have chronic insomnia, don’t nap, sleep in, or doze during the day or evening even after poor sleep the previous night.

    Fifth, go to bed only when you’re actually sleepy enough to fall asleep.

    And sixth, start with the amount of sleep you’re now getting – with the lowest limit at five hours – and then increase it weekly by 15 minutes.

    These six rules are evidence-based and go above and beyond simple sleep hygiene habits. If they don’t work, see a provider who can help you.

    Your teen isn’t lazy. There are reasons why adolescents sleep in.

    Do you have advice specifically for adolescents?

    Fernandez-Mendoza: Adolescence is a unique developmental period. It’s not just the obvious physical, emotional and behavioral changes that occur during adolescence and puberty – there are changes in a teenager’s brain that can alter their sleep patterns.

    When an adolescent goes through puberty, their internal clock changes so that their sleep schedule shifts to later hours. While it’s true that adolescents are more engaged at night because of their social relationships, there’s also biology behind why they want to stay up late – their internal clocks have shifted. It’s not just choice.

    School start times for most adolescents are at odds with that biological shift. So they don’t get enough sleep, which affects their performance in school. Research suggests that schools with later start times are more closely aligned with the science on child development and don’t put adolescents at risk by making them wake up earlier than their bodies are biologically inclined to.

    Parents can help their teens get better sleep. Set a time for kids to stop doing homework and put away electronics. Instead, they can watch TV with the family or read – something relaxing and enjoyable that will help them wind down before bed.

    You can also gradually move back their wake-up time. Start on weekends, waking them up 30 minutes earlier every day, including school days, until the child reaches the desired wake-up time. Don’t try to reshift them suddenly – for example, waking up a teenager at 5 a.m. like it’s the military – because that doesn’t work. They won’t get used to it, since it’s at odds with their internal clock. So, do it little by little. If that doesn’t work, see a clinical provider.

    What kind of treatments can a sleep clinician provide?

    Fernandez-Mendoza: People should get help if they feel they sleep poorly, if they’re fatigued during the day, or if they snore or grind their teeth. All these issues deserve attention.

    Some people may think a sleep provider just prescribes expensive medication, but that’s not true. There are behavioral, non-drug-based treatments that work. Cognitive behavioral therapy is the first-line treatment recommended for insomnia. Light therapy may also help, which is the use of a bright light therapy lamp at a given time during the day or evening, depending on the person’s sleep problem.

    Watch the full interview to hear more.

    SciLine is a free service based at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a nonprofit that helps journalists include scientific evidence and experts in their news stories.

    Julio Fernandez-Mendoza currently receives funding from the National Institutes of Health. He sits on the Board of Directors of the Sleep Research Society, a US-based not-for-profit professional association of sleep and circadian scientists.

    – ref. Insomnia can lead to heart issues − a psychologist recommends changes that can improve sleep – https://theconversation.com/insomnia-can-lead-to-heart-issues-a-psychologist-recommends-changes-that-can-improve-sleep-251017

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: 5 years on, true counts of COVID-19 deaths remain elusive − and research is hobbled by lack of data

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Dylan Thomas Doyle, Ph.D. Candidate in Information Science, University of Colorado Boulder

    National COVID-19 memorial wall for the five-year anniversary on March 11, 2025, in London, England. Andrew Aitchison/In Pictures via Getty Images

    In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers struggled to grasp the rate of the virus’s spread and the number of related deaths. While hospitals tracked cases and deaths within their walls, the broader picture of mortality across communities remained frustratingly incomplete.

    Policymakers and researchers quickly discovered a troubling pattern: Many deaths linked to the virus were never officially counted. A study analyzing data from over 3,000 U.S. counties between March 2020 and August 2022 found nearly 163,000 excess deaths from natural causes that were missing from official mortality records.

    Excess deaths, meaning those that exceed the number expected based on historical trends, serve as a key indicator of underreported deaths during health crises. Many of these uncounted deaths were later tied to COVID-19 through reviews of medical records, death certificates and statistical modeling.

    In addition, lack of real-time tracking for medical interventions during those early days slowed vaccine development by delaying insights into which treatments worked and how people were responding to newly circulating variants.

    Five years since the beginning of COVID-19, new epidemics such as bird flu are emerging worldwide, and researchers are still finding it difficult to access the data about people’s deaths that they need to develop lifesaving interventions.

    How can the U.S. mortality data system improve? I’m a technology infrastructure researcher, and my team and I design policy and technical systems to reduce inefficiency in health care and government organizations. By analyzing the flow of mortality data in the U.S., we found several areas of the system that could use updating.

    Critical need for real-time data

    A death record includes key details beyond just the fact of death, such as the cause, contributing conditions, demographics, place of death and sometimes medical history. This information is crucial for researchers to be able to analyze trends, identify disparities and drive medical advances.

    Approximately 2.8 million death records are added to the U.S. mortality data system each year. But in 2022 – the most recent official count available – when the world was still in the throes of the pandemic, 3,279,857 deaths were recorded in the federal system. Still, this figure is widely considered to be a major undercount of true excess deaths from COVID-19.

    In addition, real-time tracking of COVID-19 mortality data was severely lacking. This process involves the continuous collection, analysis and reporting of deaths from hospitals, health agencies and government databases by integrating electronic health records, lab reports and public health surveillance systems. Ideally, it provides up-to-date insights for decision-making, but during the COVID-19 pandemic, these tracking systems lagged and failed to generate comprehensive data.

    Getting real-time COVID-19 data from hospitals and other agencies into the hands of researchers proved difficult.
    Gerald Herbert/AP Photo

    Without comprehensive data on prior COVID-19 infections, antibody responses and adverse events, researchers faced challenges designing clinical trials to predict how long immunity would last and optimize booster schedules.

    Such data is essential in vaccine development because it helps identify who is most at risk, which variants and treatments affect survival rates, and how vaccines should be designed and distributed. And as part of the broader U.S. vital records system, mortality data is essential for medical research, including evaluating public health programs, identifying health disparities and monitoring disease.

    At the heart of the problem is the inefficiency of government policy, particularly outdated public health reporting systems and slow data modernization efforts that hinder timely decision-making. These long-standing policies, such as reliance on paper-based death certificates and disjointed state-level reporting, have failed to keep pace with real-time data needs during crises such as COVID-19.

    These policy shortcomings lead to delays in reporting and lack of coordination between hospital organizations, state government vital records offices and federal government agencies in collecting, standardizing and sharing death records.

    History of US mortality data

    The U.S. mortality data system has been cobbled together through a disparate patchwork of state and local governments, federal agencies and public health organizations over the course of more than a century and a half. It has been shaped by advances in public health, medical record-keeping and technology. From its inception to the present day, the mortality data system has been plagued by inconsistencies, inefficiencies and tensions between medical professionals, state governments and the federal government.

    The first national efforts to track information about deaths began in the 1850s when the U.S. Census Bureau started collecting mortality data as part of the decennial census. However, these early efforts were inconsistent, as death registration was largely voluntary and varied widely across states.

    In the early 20th century, the establishment of the National Vital Statistics System brought greater standardization to mortality data. For example, the system required all U.S. states and territories to standardize their death certificate format. It also consolidated mortality data at the federal level, whereas mortality data was previously stored at the state level.

    However, state and federal reporting remained fragmented. For example, states had no unifom timeline for submitting mortality data, resulting in some states taking months or even years to finalize and release death records. Local or state-level paperwork processing practices also remained varied and at times contradictory.

    Death record processing varies by state.
    eric1513/iStock via Getty Images Plus

    To begin to close gaps in reporting timelines to aid medical researchers, in 1981 the National Center for Health Statistics – a division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – introduced the National Death Index. This is a centralized database of death records collected from state vital statistics offices, making it easier to access death data for health and medical research. The system was originally paper-based, with the aim of allowing researchers to track the deaths of study participants without navigating complex bureaucracies.

    As time has passed, the National Death Index and state databases have become increasingly digital. The rise of electronic death registration systems in recent decades has improved processing speed when it comes to researchers accessing mortality data from the National Death Index. However, while the index has solved some issues related to gaps between state and federal data, other issues, such as high fees and inconsistency in state reporting times, still plague it.

    Accessing the data that matters most

    With the Trump administration’s increasing removal of CDC public health datasets, it is unclear whether policy reform for mortality data will be addressed anytime soon.

    Experts fear that the removal of CDC datasets has now set precedent for the Trump administration to cross further lines in its attempts to influence the research and data published by the CDC. The longer-term impact of the current administration’s public health policy on mortality data and disease response are not yet clear.

    What is clear is that five years since COVID-19, the U.S. mortality tracking system remains unequipped to meet emerging public health crises. Without addressing these challenges, the U.S. may not be able to respond quickly enough to public health crises threatening American lives.

    Dylan Thomas Doyle 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. 5 years on, true counts of COVID-19 deaths remain elusive − and research is hobbled by lack of data – https://theconversation.com/5-years-on-true-counts-of-covid-19-deaths-remain-elusive-and-research-is-hobbled-by-lack-of-data-244799

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI: NANO Nuclear Energy Adds Two Additional Senior Nuclear Engineers to its Technical Team

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    NANO Nuclear Continues to Attract Top Tier talent to Propel the Development of its Innovative Microreactor Technologies

    New York, N.Y., March 20, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — NANO Nuclear Energy Inc. (NASDAQ: NNE) (“NANO Nuclear” or “the Company”), a leading advanced nuclear energy and technology company focused on developing clean energy solutions, today announced the additions of James Leybourn and Simon Boddington as Senior Nuclear Engineers. Both Mr. Leybourn and Mr. Boddington are based in the U.K. and recently joined NANO Nuclear’s U.K.-based nuclear science and engineering partner Cambridge AtomWorks, led by Professors Ian Farnan and Eugene Shwageraus.

    The additions of Mr. Leybourn and Mr. Boddington build upon the recently announced appointment of Andrew Steer, Ph.D. as NANO Nuclear’s Head of Regulatory Engagement. Their addition to the team brings extensive knowledge in molten salt reactor physics, deep understanding of nuclear safety cases, advanced reactor engineering and innovative fuel system design, all of which will be essential for the ongoing development of NANO Nuclear’s proprietary ‘ZEUS’ and ‘ODIN’ microreactors, as well as the KRONOS MMRTMEnergy System and the LOKI MMRTM.

    Mr. Leybourn is a Chartered Physicist with over 12 years’ experience of Physics and Engineering within the U.K. nuclear industry. He has a proven track record of leading diverse projects, including thermal hydraulics, engineering design and safety case preparation. Prior to joining Cambridge AtomWorks, Mr. Leybourn played a key role in leading the development of a risk-informed work program and introducing systems engineering practices, including fuel route development, at MoltexFLEX, a British nuclear energy company developing advanced small modular molten salt reactors. He is a fuel route expert, having spent much of his career supporting the fuel route of the U.K. Advanced Gas-Cooled Reactor (AGR) fleet. He also led significant projects supporting the AGR defueling programs and has provided support to the Rolls-Royce small modular reactor project.

    Mr. Boddington is a reactor physicist with over 10 years of industry experience covering pressurized water reactors as well as thermal and fast spectrum molten salt reactor designs. Much of his experience is focused on reactor physics and he has assembled, managed and technically led the physics team that designed and delivered the molten salt MolexFLEX and SSR-W reactor concepts, with a focus on maintaining economic design objectives. He has extensive experience in applying analytical and stochastic reactor physics methods to develop core designs, including validation and verification. He graduated with an MPhys from the University of Southampton in 2014, then, completed the nuclear graduate’s scheme, before joining the Core Physics Group at Rolls-Royce.

    “NANO Nuclear continues to expand its technical teams with top professionals and innovators with diverse reactor engineering expertise that we will need to propel our programs forward. These hires also reflect our commitment to becoming a global leader in advanced nuclear energy solutions,” said Professor Ian Farnan, Lead of Nuclear Fuel Cycle, Radiation and Materials of NANO Nuclear. “With expertise spanning molten salt reactor physics, fuel handling, and high-temperature thermal-hydraulics, James and Simon will significantly strengthen NANO Nuclear’s ability to develop, demonstrate, gain regulatory approval, and, eventually commercialize and deploy its next-generation microreactors.”

    Figure 1 – NANO Nuclear Energy Inc. Appoints James Leybourn and Simon Boddington as Senior Nuclear Engineers.

    “The talent we’ve attracted speaks volumes about the progress we’re making,” said Professor Eugene Shwageraus, Lead of Nuclear Reactor Engineering of NANO Nuclear. “NANO Nuclear’s success in recruiting top engineering minds with such outstanding credentials and experience from world-class companies underscores our leadership in next-generation nuclear energy development.”

    “It is essential for us to strengthen our technical capabilities as we enter the next phase of development for our portfolio of energy systems,” said James Walker, Chief Executive Officer of NANO Nuclear. “Bringing Mr. Leybourn and Mr. Boddington on board demonstrates NANO Nuclear’s ambitions of being an innovative and global leader in the industry. Their extensive experience will be invaluable, and I welcome them to NANO Nuclear.”

    About NANO Nuclear Energy, Inc.

    NANO Nuclear Energy Inc. (NASDAQ: NNE) is an advanced technology-driven nuclear energy company seeking to become a commercially focused, diversified, and vertically integrated company across five business lines: (i) cutting edge portable and other microreactor technologies, (ii) nuclear fuel fabrication, (iii) nuclear fuel transportation, (iv) nuclear applications for space and (v) nuclear industry consulting services. NANO Nuclear believes it is the first portable nuclear microreactor company to be listed publicly in the U.S.

    Led by a world-class nuclear engineering team, NANO Nuclear’s reactor products in development include patented KRONOS MMR™ Energy System, a stationary high-temperature gas-cooled reactor that is in construction permit pre-application engagement U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission in collaboration with University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, “ZEUS”, a portable solid core battery reactor, “ODIN”, a portable low-pressure coolant reactor, and the space focused, portable LOKI MMR™, each representing advanced developments in clean energy solutions that are portable, on-demand capable, advanced nuclear microreactors.

    Advanced Fuel Transportation Inc. (AFT), a NANO Nuclear subsidiary, is led by former executives from the largest transportation company in the world aiming to build a North American transportation company that will provide commercial quantities of HALEU fuel to small modular reactors, microreactor companies, national laboratories, military, and DOE programs. Through NANO Nuclear, AFT is the exclusive licensee of a patented high-capacity HALEU fuel transportation basket developed by three major U.S. national nuclear laboratories and funded by the Department of Energy. Assuming development and commercialization, AFT is expected to form part of the only vertically integrated nuclear fuel business of its kind in North America.

    HALEU Energy Fuel Inc. (HEF), a NANO Nuclear subsidiary, is focusing on the future development of a domestic source for a High-Assay, Low-Enriched Uranium (HALEU) fuel fabrication pipeline for NANO Nuclear’s own microreactors as well as the broader advanced nuclear reactor industry.

    NANO Nuclear Space Inc. (NNS), a NANO Nuclear subsidiary, is exploring the potential commercial applications of NANO Nuclear’s developing micronuclear reactor technology in space. NNS is focusing on applications such as the LOKI MMR™ system and other power systems for extraterrestrial projects and human sustaining environments, and potentially propulsion technology for long haul space missions. NNS’ initial focus will be on cis-lunar applications, referring to uses in the space region extending from Earth to the area surrounding the Moon’s surface.

    For more corporate information please visit: https://NanoNuclearEnergy.com/

    For further NANO Nuclear information, please contact:

    Email: IR@NANONuclearEnergy.com
    Business Tel: (212) 634-9206

    PLEASE FOLLOW OUR SOCIAL MEDIA PAGES HERE:

    NANO Nuclear Energy LINKEDIN
    NANO Nuclear Energy YOUTUBE
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    Cautionary Note Regarding Forward Looking Statements

    This news release and statements of NANO Nuclear’s management in connection with this news release contain or may contain “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. In this context, forward-looking statements mean statements related to future events, which may impact our expected future business and financial performance, and often contain words such as “expects”, “anticipates”, “intends”, “plans”, “believes”, “potential”, “will”, “should”, “could”, “would” or “may” and other words of similar meaning. In this press release, forward-looking statements includes those related to the anticipated benefits to NANO Nuclear of the appointment of the senior nuclear engineers, as well as the Company’s regulatory plans in general, as described herein. These and other forward-looking statements are based on information available to us as of the date of this news release and represent management’s current views and assumptions. Forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance, events or results and involve significant known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which may be beyond our control. For NANO Nuclear, particular risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual future results to differ materially from those expressed in our forward-looking statements include but are not limited to the following: (i) risks related to our U.S. Department of Energy (“DOE”) or related state or non-U.S. nuclear fuel licensing submissions, (ii) risks related the development of new or advanced technology and the acquisition of complimentary technology or businesses, including difficulties with design and testing, cost overruns, regulatory delays, integration issues and the development of competitive technology, (iii) our ability to obtain contracts and funding to be able to continue operations, (iv) risks related to uncertainty regarding our ability to technologically develop and commercially deploy a competitive advanced nuclear reactor or other technology in the timelines we anticipate, if ever, (v) risks related to the impact of U.S. and non-U.S. government regulation, policies and licensing requirements, including by the DOE and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, including those associated with the recently enacted ADVANCE Act, and (vi) similar risks and uncertainties associated with the operating an early stage business a highly regulated and rapidly evolving industry. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which apply only as of the date of this news release. These factors may not constitute all factors that could cause actual results to differ from those discussed in any forward-looking statement, and NANO Nuclear therefore encourages investors to review other factors that may affect future results in its filings with the SEC, which are available for review at www.sec.gov and at https://ir.nanonuclearenergy.com/financial-information/sec-filings. Accordingly, forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as a predictor of actual results. We do not undertake to update our forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date of this news release, except as required by law.

    Attachment

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI: Safe Harbor Financial Names Mike Regan as Head of Investor Relations and Data Science

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    GOLDEN, Colo., March 20, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — SHF Holdings, Inc., d/b/a Safe Harbor Financial (“Safe Harbor” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ: SHFS), a fintech leader in facilitating financial services and credit facilities to the regulated cannabis industry, is proud to announce that Michael (Mike) Regan has joined the team as Head of Investor Relations and Data Science.

    In this role, Mike will help investors gain a deeper understanding of the Company’s growth initiatives, while also spearheading the development of innovative, differentiated new products leveraging Safe Harbor’s extensive databases. He earned an MBA from MIT Sloan, where he was the TA for a class on creating and quantitatively analyzing new institutional investment strategies, and a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration majoring in Finance from Georgetown University. His career spans research roles at Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, hedge funds Roubaix Capital and Hawkshaw Capital, as well as product innovation at Liberty Mutual. Since 2019, Mike has focused on the legal cannabis sector, most recently as Founder and Director of Research at Excelsior Equities, an investment bank and broker-dealer that provided research, custody, and trading of cannabis equities.

    “We are thrilled to welcome Mike Regan to Safe Harbor as Head of Investor Relations and Data Science,” said Terry Mendez, CEO of Safe Harbor. “Mike’s exceptional track record in investment analysis, product innovation, and his thorough understanding of the legal cannabis sector make him uniquely qualified to advance our growth initiatives. His expertise will be instrumental in developing new solutions for our growth strategies Safe Harbor Protects, Safe Harbor Lends, Safe Harbor Connects, and Safe Harbor Enables programs, ensuring we continue to lead and grow in this evolving industry.”

    “I am excited to join Safe Harbor and contribute to its mission of driving innovation and growth to better serve operators in the legal cannabis sector and beyond,” said Mike Regan. “I see tremendous potential to create meaningful value for our shareholders and clients, and to develop solutions that will shape the future of this industry.”

    About Safe Harbor
    Safe Harbor is among the first service providers to offer compliance, monitoring and validation services to financial institutions, providing traditional banking services to cannabis, hemp, CBD and ancillary operators, making communities safer, driving growth in local economies and fostering long-term partnerships. Safe Harbor, through its financial institution clients, implements high standards of accountability, transparency, monitoring, reporting and risk mitigation measures while meeting Bank Secrecy Act obligations in line with FinCEN guidance on cannabis-related businesses. Over the past decade, Safe Harbor has facilitated more than $25 billion in deposit transactions for businesses with operations spanning more than 41 states and US territories with regulated cannabis markets. For more information, visit www.shfinancial.org.

    Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

    Certain information contained in this press release may contain “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Statements other than statements of historical facts included herein may constitute forward-looking statements and are not guarantees of future performance or results and involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Forward-looking statements may include, but are not limited to, statements with respect to trends in the cannabis industry, including proposed changes in U.S and state laws, rules, regulations and guidance relating to Safe Harbor’s services; Safe Harbor’s growth prospects and Safe Harbor’s market size; Safe Harbor’s projected financial and operational performance, including relative to its competitors and historical performance; success or viability of new product and service offerings Safe Harbor may introduce in the future; the impact volatility in the capital markets, which may adversely affect the price of Safe Harbor’s securities; the outcome of any legal proceedings that have been or may be brought by or against Safe Harbor; and other statements regarding Safe Harbor’s expectations, hopes, beliefs, intentions or strategies regarding the future. In addition, any statements that refer to projections, forecasts or other characterizations of future events or circumstances, including any underlying assumptions, are forward-looking statements. The words “anticipate,” “believe,” “continue,” “could,” “estimate,” “expect,” “intends,” “outlook,” “may,” “might,” “plan,” “possible,” “potential,” “predict,” “project,” “should,” “would,” and similar expressions may identify forward-looking statements, but the absence of these words does not mean that a statement is not forward-looking. Forward-looking statements are predictions, projections and other statements about future events that are based on current expectations and assumptions and, as a result, are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements as a result of a number of factors, including those described from time to time in Safe Harbor’s filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Safe Harbor undertakes no duty to update any forward-looking statement made herein. All forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this press release.

    Contact Information
    Mike Regan, Head of Safe Harbor Investor Relations
    ir@SHFinancial.org
    (720) 826-6282

    KCSA Strategic Communications
    Ellen Mellody
    safeharbor@kcsa.com

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Australia’s PBS means consumers pay less for expensive medicines. Here’s how this system works

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bonny Parkinson, Associate Professor, Macquarie University Centre for the Health Economy, Macquarie University

    The United States pharmaceutical lobby has complained to US President Donald Trump that Australia’s Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) is damaging their profits and has urged Trump to put tariffs on pharmaceutical imports from Australia.

    Prime Minister Anthony Albanese defended the scheme, saying Australia’s pharmaceutical subsidy scheme was “not up for negotiation”. Opposition Leader Peter Dutton said he would also protect the PBS, which was the “envy of the world”.

    But what exactly is the PBS, and why does it matter?

    How did the PBS start?

    In the early 1900s, Australians had to pay for medicines out-of-pocket. Some could get free or cheap medicines at public hospitals or through Friendly Society Dispensaries, but otherwise access was restricted to those who could afford to pay.

    At the time, few effective medicines were available. But the development of insulin and penicillin in the 1920s made access to medicines much more important.

    The Constitution gave the federal government limited powers in the provision of health and welfare, which were largely the responsibility of the states. After World War II, the federal government wanted to expand these powers but it encountered several constitutional roadblocks.

    A rare successful referendum in 1946 changed that, enabling the National Health Act 1953 to pass. This established the PBS as we know it today.

    How does the PBS work in practice?

    The PBS covers the cost of medicines prescribed by doctors. Most are dispensed at community pharmacies (such as treatments for heart disease, the pill and antibiotics), but some more expensive ones are available at public hospitals or specialist treatment centres (such as chemotherapies and IVF medicines).

    In 2023–24 there were 930 different medicines and 5,164 brands listed on the PBS, costing the government $17.7 billion.

    The government negotiates the price of each medicine with the pharmaceutical company. Pharmacies then buy these medicines from wholesalers or companies.

    When a patient fills a prescription at a pharmacy, they pay a co-payment. The government pays the difference between the agreed price and the co-payment to the pharmacy – costs that may amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

    There are two co-payments: one for concession card holders ($7.70) and one for the general consumer ($31.60). When a patient hits the annual spending limit (safety net threshold), the co-payment falls to $0 for concession patients and $7.70 for the general consumer.

    Overall, patients contribute 8.4% to the total cost of the PBS, while the government pays the rest.

    How are medicine prices set?

    The PBS is split into two categories:

    – F1: new, patent-protected medicines with no competition

    – F2: medicines with multiple brands, including generics.

    F1 medicines

    To be listed on the PBS, a new medicine goes through the following process:

    1. It’s evaluated for safety, efficacy and quality.

    2. A panel of experts (including doctors, pharmacists, epidemiologists, health economists, health consumer advocates and a pharmaceutical industry representative) recommends which medicines should be listed on the PBS, based on effectiveness, safety, cost-effectiveness and the total cost on the budget of the medicine versus alternative treatments.

    3. If the panel recommends a medicine, the price and details of the listing may be further negotiated with the government. (If the panel rejects a medicine, companies may revise their application and re-submit.)

    4. Finally, the health minister, and subsequently the Cabinet, formally approves or rejects the panel’s recommendation. If approved, the medicine is listed on the PBS.

    F2 medicines

    Generic medicine companies may apply to list another brand on the PBS after a medicine loses patent protection. When this happens, the medicine moves from F1 to F2. Immediately, it incurs a mandatory price discount.

    Generic medicine companies may offer pharmacists discounts on the PBS list price (for example, ten for the price of nine). Pharmacists then encourage patients to switch to the cheaper medicine.

    Companies must disclose these discounts to the government, resulting in further price reductions.

    Is the PBS system unique?

    Australia is not special. Many countries use similar assessments to determine whether governments should subsidise new medicines, including the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) in the United Kingdom, Canada’s Drug Agency, and Pharmac in New Zealand.

    Small differences exist, including whether the list of medicines is a positive (and they’re subsidised) or negative (meaning they’re not subsidised), whether the lists are established at the central level (such as the PBS in Australia) or local level (such as by province in Canada) or a mixture, and how co-payments are set.

    Generic medicine companies in Australia may offer pharmacists discounts on their products.
    National Cancer Institute/Unsplash

    The biggest outlier is the US. Similar to its health system, the medicines system is a complex and decentralised mix of public and private organisations, including government agencies, independent organisations, health-care providers and payers such as health insurers.

    What are the benefits of the PBS?

    The PBS ensures all Australian patients have access to highly effective medicines. This contributes to a high life expectancy, while keeping health-care costs low relative to other developed countries.

    This has been achieved by keeping prices down for both F1 and F2 medicines. By doing so, it creates room in the government budget to fund other new medicines.

    Without the PBS, either taxes or co-payments would have to increase, or fewer medicines funded.

    Other benefits include having a level playing field for all medicines, while maintaining flexibility to fund highly effective medicines for patients with unmet needs.

    What are the drawbacks of the PBS system?

    No system is without its drawbacks and risks. The PBS’s drawbacks include:

    • limited patient involvement in the process
    • the high frequency of re-submissions and delays to PBS listing
    • companies being unwilling to submit off-patent medicines for PBS listing due to high costs and low rewards
    • the ongoing lack of high-quality clinical evidence about medicines to treat rare diseases and certain patient populations, such as children.

    Another issue is medicine shortages. When PBS-listed brands aren’t available due to supply chain issues, other non-PBS listed brands may be available at full cost to the patient. Increased medicine costs can discourage patients from filling necessary prescriptions, which can have longer-term impacts on health and health expenditure.

    Finally, companies have argued Australia’s small market size plus low PBS prices can make it financially unviable to bring new medicines to Australia.

    The PBS is a crucial part of Australia’s health system, making essential medicines affordable, while keeping costs down. Like any system, it has its challenges and there is ongoing debate about whether and how the system should change.



    Read more:
    Will the US trade war push up the price of medicines in Australia? Will there be drug shortages?

    Bonny Parkinson receives funding from the Australian government to conduct evaluations of medicines to be listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. She also supervises students funded by PhD scholarships (received by the student, not Bonny Parkinson), including the Macquarie University Research Excellence Scholarship and Macquarie University Australian Pharmaceutical Scholarship, with support from six pharmaceutical companies: Amgen Australia, Janssen Australia, MSD Australia, Pfizer Australia, Roche Australia, and Abbvie Australia.

    – ref. Australia’s PBS means consumers pay less for expensive medicines. Here’s how this system works – https://theconversation.com/australias-pbs-means-consumers-pay-less-for-expensive-medicines-heres-how-this-system-works-252736

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Spring Equinox at the Lincoln Memorial: Pic of the Week

    Source: US Global Legal Monitor

    If you visit Washington, D.C., during either the spring or fall equinox, I recommend taking the opportunity to wake up early and watch the sunrise over the National Mall. On the days surrounding each equinox, the tilt of the Earth’s axis causes the sun to rise in a position along the horizon that illuminates the Lincoln Memorial’s central chamber, which usually remains dark throughout the year.

    Exterior of the Lincoln Memorial during an equinox sunrise. Photograph by Anna Price.

    In anticipation of this year’s spring equinox on March 20, I was curious to see if federal legislation has discussed this annual transition from winter to spring. It turns out that several bills and resolutions have been introduced involving this topic, ranging from designating the vernal (spring) equinox as Earth Day to recognizing Nowruz, a holiday celebrating the Persian new year.

    View of the National Mall from the Lincoln Memorial at sunrise. Photograph by Anna Price.

    During my research, I found other legislation involving celestial events, including an 1875 statute addressing the transit of Venus (Jan. 22, 1875, ch. 23, 18 Stat. 303). Documenting the transit of Venus, which occurs when “Venus is seen in silhouette against the bright face of the Sun,” was a major event used by 18th and 19th century astronomers to determine the distance between the Earth and the Sun. With these initial measurements, astronomers could more accurately determine the size of the solar system, which was a significant advancement in the fields of physics and astronomy.

    If you want to learn more, here are some Library resources on topics where law and science intersect:

    Subscribe to In Custodia Legis – it’s free! – to receive interesting posts drawn from the Law Library of Congress’s vast collections and our staff’s expertise in U.S., foreign, and international law.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Africa: Islamic State in Somalia: the terrorist group’s origins, rise and recent battlefield defeats

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Stig Jarle Hansen, Professor of International Relations, Norwegian University of Life Sciences

    The Islamic State in Somalia is an affiliate of the transnational jihadist group Islamic State, known in short as ISIS. Based in the semi-autonomous northern Somalia territory of Puntland, the terrorist group was the target of the first foreign combat operation of the Trump administration in February 2025. Previously, the group has been linked to planned terror attacks on the Vatican and on the Israeli embassy in Stockholm. Stig Jarle Hansen, a researcher and author of several books on jihadism in Africa, examines its origins, rise and recent battlefield defeats in the mountains of Puntland.

    1. The rise of the Islamic State

    Before the establishment of the Islamic State in Somalia in 2015, the Somali jihadist group al-Shabaab had established itself in the north. The small group had extensive connections to smuggling networks. It later split into two and the future leader of the Islamic State in Somalia, Sheikh Abdulqader Muumin, emerged from one of the splinter groups.

    In Somalia, clans define the relationship between people and all actors in the society. The connections of the new group to the Ali Suleiban sub-clan enabled it to profit from the clan’s links to smuggling and maritime piracy groups.

    Puntland is the hub of communication and maritime trade between Somalia and Yemen, as well as the wider Middle East. Smuggling has gone on in the region for centuries. The rugged terrain is ideal for piracy, illegal smuggling and insurgents.

    Puntland has been more or less autonomous from the rest of Somalia for more than three decades, and the Somali government has little influence there today.

    2. The jihadist behind the Islamic State in Somalia

    Muumin lived in Sweden through the 1990s and early 2000s and later moved to the UK. Back in Somalia, he joined al-Shabaab and became a prominent figure in the group’s jihadist videos. Such videos aim to maintain morals, attract new recruits and create sympathy for the group.

    In 2015, Muumin defected to lead the Islamic State in Somalia. His second-in-command was another Ali Suleiban clansman, Mahad Moalim. In 2016, the first video of the group was circulated through Islamic State media outlets.

    A milestone for the group followed its 2017 suicide bombing of the Juba Hotel in Bosaso, Puntland’s commercial capital and sea port. This enabled the Islamic State in Somalia to pressure Bossaso-based businesses to pay it protection money, the single most important source of income. In 2017-2018, the group is believed to have been behind as many as 50 assassinations in central Somalia. The killings were a forceful tool to generate protection money.

    On 27 July 2018, the Somali group was officially designated as a full province by the Islamic State, also known as ISIS. The Maktab al-Karrar regional office was based in the small Puntland chapter, giving it global responsibilities.

    The Somali group was made responsible for the central African and the Mozambique provinces of the Islamic State. Money flowed to the group from the Islamic State, as did extortion money from Bossaso, other northern Puntland cities and more infrequently from Mogadishu.

    In the first half of 2022, the US Treasury claimed that the organisation generated US$2.3 million from extortion payments, related imports, livestock and agriculture. The regional office and Muumin emerged as key financial players in east Africa, and even outside it, from their base in Buur Dexhtaal in Bari Puntland. Indeed, unnamed US officials claimed in 2023 that Muumim had been made the transnational leader of the Islamic State.

    3. An overblown reputation

    The Islamic State’s reputation in Somalia is often overstated. The group has never captured or held large territories. Its numbers in 2024 were estimated to be between 600 and 1,600. That pales in comparison to al-Shabaab in the south of Somalia.

    Its links to a planned attack on the Israeli embassy in Stockholm 2024 were probably weak and failed to hold up in court. And the jihadist linked to a planned attack in the Vatican 2018 seems to have left Islamic State prior to the planning.

    It is also doubtful that Muumin is the global leader of the Islamic State as claimed by some. That’s for two main reasons. First, an Islamic State leader has to be drawn from a tribe related to the prophet (Qureshi). Muumin is not. Second, the Islamic State in Somalia is the smallest of the Islamic State provinces in Africa. It is likely that a leader of a stronger province would have ranked higher.

    Although the income-gathering capacities of the Puntland-based group give it prominence in the Islamic State media, the Islamic State in Somalia does not rank higher than the Islamic State in the Sahara and Mozambique.

    4. Down but not out

    The Puntland authorities launched a relatively successful counter-offensive against the Islamic State in January 2025. This was combined with air support by the US and the United Arab Emirates.

    Puntland won important battles in January and February, including an attack in which it killed 70 Islamic State fighters.

    By late February, the morale of the Islamic State fighters seemed to break. With the fall of Buur Dexhtaal, the main base, in March, all the larger known bases had fallen. Many of the fleeing foreign fighters were captured.

    But the Islamic State is not defeated. The terrain enabled some of the fighters to hide. Neither Muumin, who is in his 70s, nor his second-in-command Abdirahman Fahiye have been reported killed. There are at least several hundred fighters left.

    If the Islamic State is still able to extort money from the northern business community, it could recruit from the large numbers of Oromo Ethiopian refugees in and around Bosaso, as well as locals who need jobs.

    – Islamic State in Somalia: the terrorist group’s origins, rise and recent battlefield defeats
    – https://theconversation.com/islamic-state-in-somalia-the-terrorist-groups-origins-rise-and-recent-battlefield-defeats-252303

    MIL OSI Africa –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Islamic State in Somalia: the terrorist group’s origins, rise and recent battlefield defeats

    Source: The Conversation – Africa – By Stig Jarle Hansen, Professor of International Relations, Norwegian University of Life Sciences

    The Islamic State in Somalia is an affiliate of the transnational jihadist group Islamic State, known in short as ISIS. Based in the semi-autonomous northern Somalia territory of Puntland, the terrorist group was the target of the first foreign combat operation of the Trump administration in February 2025. Previously, the group has been linked to planned terror attacks on the Vatican and on the Israeli embassy in Stockholm. Stig Jarle Hansen, a researcher and author of several books on jihadism in Africa, examines its origins, rise and recent battlefield defeats in the mountains of Puntland.

    1. The rise of the Islamic State

    Before the establishment of the Islamic State in Somalia in 2015, the Somali jihadist group al-Shabaab had established itself in the north. The small group had extensive connections to smuggling networks. It later split into two and the future leader of the Islamic State in Somalia, Sheikh Abdulqader Muumin, emerged from one of the splinter groups.

    In Somalia, clans define the relationship between people and all actors in the society. The connections of the new group to the Ali Suleiban sub-clan enabled it to profit from the clan’s links to smuggling and maritime piracy groups.

    Puntland is the hub of communication and maritime trade between Somalia and Yemen, as well as the wider Middle East. Smuggling has gone on in the region for centuries. The rugged terrain is ideal for piracy, illegal smuggling and insurgents.

    Puntland has been more or less autonomous from the rest of Somalia for more than three decades, and the Somali government has little influence there today.

    2. The jihadist behind the Islamic State in Somalia

    Muumin lived in Sweden through the 1990s and early 2000s and later moved to the UK. Back in Somalia, he joined al-Shabaab and became a prominent figure in the group’s jihadist videos. Such videos aim to maintain morals, attract new recruits and create sympathy for the group.

    In 2015, Muumin defected to lead the Islamic State in Somalia. His second-in-command was another Ali Suleiban clansman, Mahad Moalim. In 2016, the first video of the group was circulated through Islamic State media outlets.

    A milestone for the group followed its 2017 suicide bombing of the Juba Hotel in Bosaso, Puntland’s commercial capital and sea port. This enabled the Islamic State in Somalia to pressure Bossaso-based businesses to pay it protection money, the single most important source of income. In 2017-2018, the group is believed to have been behind as many as 50 assassinations in central Somalia. The killings were a forceful tool to generate protection money.

    On 27 July 2018, the Somali group was officially designated as a full province by the Islamic State, also known as ISIS. The Maktab al-Karrar regional office was based in the small Puntland chapter, giving it global responsibilities.

    The Somali group was made responsible for the central African and the Mozambique provinces of the Islamic State. Money flowed to the group from the Islamic State, as did extortion money from Bossaso, other northern Puntland cities and more infrequently from Mogadishu.

    In the first half of 2022, the US Treasury claimed that the organisation generated US$2.3 million from extortion payments, related imports, livestock and agriculture. The regional office and Muumin emerged as key financial players in east Africa, and even outside it, from their base in Buur Dexhtaal in Bari Puntland. Indeed, unnamed US officials claimed in 2023 that Muumim had been made the transnational leader of the Islamic State.

    3. An overblown reputation

    The Islamic State’s reputation in Somalia is often overstated. The group has never captured or held large territories. Its numbers in 2024 were estimated to be between 600 and 1,600. That pales in comparison to al-Shabaab in the south of Somalia.

    Its links to a planned attack on the Israeli embassy in Stockholm 2024 were probably weak and failed to hold up in court. And the jihadist linked to a planned attack in the Vatican 2018 seems to have left Islamic State prior to the planning.

    It is also doubtful that Muumin is the global leader of the Islamic State as claimed by some. That’s for two main reasons. First, an Islamic State leader has to be drawn from a tribe related to the prophet (Qureshi). Muumin is not. Second, the Islamic State in Somalia is the smallest of the Islamic State provinces in Africa. It is likely that a leader of a stronger province would have ranked higher.

    Although the income-gathering capacities of the Puntland-based group give it prominence in the Islamic State media, the Islamic State in Somalia does not rank higher than the Islamic State in the Sahara and Mozambique.

    4. Down but not out

    The Puntland authorities launched a relatively successful counter-offensive against the Islamic State in January 2025. This was combined with air support by the US and the United Arab Emirates.

    Puntland won important battles in January and February, including an attack in which it killed 70 Islamic State fighters.

    By late February, the morale of the Islamic State fighters seemed to break. With the fall of Buur Dexhtaal, the main base, in March, all the larger known bases had fallen. Many of the fleeing foreign fighters were captured.

    But the Islamic State is not defeated. The terrain enabled some of the fighters to hide. Neither Muumin, who is in his 70s, nor his second-in-command Abdirahman Fahiye have been reported killed. There are at least several hundred fighters left.

    If the Islamic State is still able to extort money from the northern business community, it could recruit from the large numbers of Oromo Ethiopian refugees in and around Bosaso, as well as locals who need jobs.

    Stig Jarle Hansen 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. Islamic State in Somalia: the terrorist group’s origins, rise and recent battlefield defeats – https://theconversation.com/islamic-state-in-somalia-the-terrorist-groups-origins-rise-and-recent-battlefield-defeats-252303

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: The PKK says it will lay down its arms. What are the chances of lasting peace between Turkey and the Kurds? Podcast

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Gemma Ware, Host, The Conversation Weekly Podcast, The Conversation

    For over 40 years, the Kurdistan Workers Party, the PKK, has waged an armed insurgency against Turkey, fighting for Kurdish rights and autonomy.

    But in late February, Abdullah Öcalan, the PKK’s imprisoned founder, called for the group to lay down its arms and dissolve itself. Days later, the PKK, which is labelled as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, Europe and the US, declared a ceasefire with Turkey.

    In this episode of The Conversation Weekly podcast, we speak to political scientist Pinar Dinc about what’s led to this moment and whether it could be the beginning of a lasting peace between Turkey and the Kurds.

    Despite being imprisoned in solitary confinement since his capture in 1999, Öcalan has remained a central figure in the Kurdish movement, both in Turkey and across the region.

    His call for the PKK to abandon its armed struggle came months after the leader of a Turkish ultra-nationalist political party launched an initiative to bring an end to the conflict.

    Over the past few decades, previous rounds of peace talks between the PKK and Turkey, most notably in 2009 and 2013-15, have collapsed.

    But Pinar Dinc, an associate professor of political science at Lund University in Sweden, says that since the Hamas-led October 7 attacks on Israel and the war in Gaza, the situation in the Middle East has rapidly changed. “It’s mutually beneficial to put an end to this war,” she says. “Both groups recognise the necessity of addressing regional tensions.”

    Dinc says international support for the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in north-eastern Syria, and its Rojava revolution, means that Turkey has been forced to recognise a new “Syrian Kurdish reality”. At the same time, she says, the Kurdish movement has also reached a limit in what it can achieve in an era of modern warfare.

     Turkey has a huge army. It’s one of the biggest armies of Nato. Now we see increased use of drones surveillance and advanced weaponry, and I think the PKK guerrillas in the Qandil mountains, what they refer to as the medya defence zones, they’re also realising that this is getting more and more difficult.

    Limited discussions began in March between the Turkish government and Kurdish political parties on a way forward in peace negotiations. Dinc says this is a real opportunity for a broader reconciliation process, but there will be real challenges in the detail of what it means for Turkey’s Kurdish population.

     The PKK is an outcome of structural problems arising from the longstanding oppression and marginalisation of Kurds in Turkey, and addressing these root causes is essential for achieving lasting peace.

    Listen to the conversation with Dinc on The Conversation Weekly podcast.

    This episode of The Conversation Weekly was written and produced by Mend Mariwany. Sound design was by Eloise Stevens and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Gemma Ware is the executive producer.

    Newsclips in this episode from AP Archive, AFP News Agency, Sky News, Med TV, Gazete Duvar, DW News, Al Jazeera English and France 24 English.

    Listen to The Conversation Weekly via any of the apps listed above, download it directly via our RSS feed or find out how else to listen here.

    Pinar Dinc is the principal investigator of the ECO-Syria project, which receives funding from the Strategic Research Area: The Middle East in the Contemporary World (MECW) at the Centre for Advanced Middle Eastern Studies, Lund University, Sweden.

    – ref. The PKK says it will lay down its arms. What are the chances of lasting peace between Turkey and the Kurds? Podcast – https://theconversation.com/the-pkk-says-it-will-lay-down-its-arms-what-are-the-chances-of-lasting-peace-between-turkey-and-the-kurds-podcast-252646

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –