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  • MIL-Evening Report: Astronomers have spied an interstellar object zooming through the Solar System

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kirsten Banks, Lecturer, School of Science, Computing and Engineering Technologies, Swinburne University of Technology

    K Ly / Deep Random Survey

    This week, astronomers spotted the third known interstellar visitor to our Solar System.

    First detected by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) on July 1, the cosmic interloper was given the temporary name A11pl3Z. Experts at NASA’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies and the International Astronomical Union (IAU) have confirmed the find, and the object now has an official designation: I3/ATLAS.

    The orbital path of I3/ATLAS through the Solar System.
    NASA/JPL-Caltech, CC BY-NC

    There are a few strong clues that suggest 3I/ATLAS came from outside the Solar System.

    First, it’s moving really fast. Current observations show it speeding through space at around 245,000km per hour. That’s more than enough to escape the Sun’s gravity.

    An object near Earth’s orbit would only need to be travelling at just over 150,000km/h to break free from the Solar System.

    Second, 3I/ATLAS has a wildly eccentric orbit around the Sun. Eccentricity measures how “stretched” an orbit is: 0 eccentricity is a perfect circle, and anything up to 1 is an increasingly strung-out ellipse. Above 1 is an orbit that is not bound to the Sun.

    3I/ATLAS has an estimated eccentricity of 6.3, by far the highest ever recorded for any object in the Solar System.

    Has anything like this happened before?

    An artist’s impression of the first confirmed interstellar object, 1I/‘Oumuamua.
    ESO/M. Kornmesser, CC BY

    The first interstellar object spotted in our Solar System was the cigar-shaped ‘Oumuamua, discovered in 2017 by the Pan-STARRS1 telescope in Hawaii. Scientists tracked it for 80 days before eventually confirming it came from interstellar space.

    The interstellar comet I2/Borisov, imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope.
    NASA, ESA, and D. Jewitt (UCLA), CC BY-NC

    The second interstellar visitor, comet 2I/Borisov, was discovered two years later by amateur astronomer Gennadiy Borisov. This time it only took astronomers a few weeks to confirm it came from outside the Solar System.

    This time, the interstellar origin of I3/ATLAS has been confirmed in a matter of days.

    How did it get here?

    We have only ever seen three interstellar visitors (including I3/ATLAS), so it’s hard to know exactly how they made their way here.

    However, recent research published in The Planetary Science Journal suggests these objects might be more common than we once thought. In particular, they may come from relatively nearby star systems such as Alpha Centauri (our nearest interstellar neighbour, a mere 4.4 light years away).

    Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B, from the triple star system Alpha Centauri.
    ESA/Hubble & NASA, CC BY

    Alpha Centauri is slowly moving closer to us, with its closest approach expected in about 28,000 years. If it flings out material in the same way our Solar System does, scientists estimate around a million objects from Alpha Centauri larger than 100 metres in diameter could already be in the outer reaches of our Solar System. That number could increase tenfold as Alpha Centauri gets closer.

    Most of this material would have been ejected at relatively low speeds, less than 2km/s, making it more likely to drift into our cosmic neighbourhood over time and not dramatically zoom in and out of the Solar System like I3/ATLAS appears to be doing. While the chance of one of these objects coming close to the Sun is extremely small, the study suggests a few tiny meteors from Alpha Centauri, likely no bigger than grains of sand, may already hit Earth’s atmosphere every year.

    Why is this interesting?

    Discovering new interstellar visitors like 3I/ATLAS is thrilling, not just because they’re rare, but because each one offers a unique glimpse into the wider galaxy. Every confirmed interstellar object expands our catalogue and helps scientists better understand the nature of these visitors, how they travel through space, and where they might have come from.

    A swarm of new asteroids discovered by the NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory.

    Thanks to powerful new observatories such as the NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory, our ability to detect these elusive objects is rapidly improving. In fact, during its first 10 hours of test imaging, Rubin revealed 2,104 previously unknown asteroids.

    This is an astonishing preview of what’s to come. With its wide field of view and constant sky coverage, Rubin is expected to revolutionise our search for interstellar objects, potentially turning rare discoveries into routine ones.

    What now?

    There’s still plenty left to uncover about 3I/ATLAS. Right now, it’s officially classified as a comet by the IAU Minor Planet Center.

    But some scientists argue it might actually be an asteroid, roughly 20km across, based on the lack of typical comet-like features such as a glowing coma or a tail. More observations will be needed to confirm its nature.

    Currently, 3I/ATLAS is inbound, just inside Jupiter’s orbit. It’s expected to reach its closest point to the Sun, slightly closer than the planet Mars, on October 29. After that, it will swing back out towards deep space, making its closest approach to Earth in December. (It will pose no threat to our planet.)

    Whether it’s a comet or an asteroid, 3I/ATLAS is a messenger from another star system. For now, these sightings are rare – though as next-generation observatories such as Rubin swing into operation, we may discover interstellar companions all around.

    Kirsten Banks 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. Astronomers have spied an interstellar object zooming through the Solar System – https://theconversation.com/astronomers-have-spied-an-interstellar-object-zooming-through-the-solar-system-260422

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: ER Report: A Roundup of Significant Articles on EveningReport.nz for July 4, 2025

    ER Report: Here is a summary of significant articles published on EveningReport.nz on July 4, 2025.

    Astronomers have spied an interstellar object zooming through the Solar System
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kirsten Banks, Lecturer, School of Science, Computing and Engineering Technologies, Swinburne University of Technology K Ly / Deep Random Survey This week, astronomers spotted the third known interstellar visitor to our Solar System. First detected by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) on July 1, the

    Avoid bad breath, don’t pick partners when drunk: ancient dating tips to find modern love
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Konstantine Panegyres, Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History, The University of Western Australia Henryk Siemiradzki via Wikimedia Commons To love and be loved is something most people want in their lives. In the modern world, we often see stories about the difficulties of finding love and the

    Back to Back Theatre tackles an epic Shakespearian conflict – set in a factory, with cardboard props
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Hunter, Senior Lecturer in Art and Performance, Deakin University Jeff Busby/Back To Back Theatre/ACMI Back to Back Theatre is one of Australia’s national treasures. Over 30 years this dynamic Geelong-based company – an ensemble of actors who are perceived to have intellectual disabilities – has built

    Australia’s new lung cancer screening program has chosen simplicity over equity, and we’re concerned
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa J. Whop, Associate Director of Research and Senior Fellow, Yardhura Walani, National Centre for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Wellbeing Research, Australian National University Thurtell/Getty Images Australia’s lung cancer screening program launched on July 1, and marks real progress and opportunity. It aims to reduce the

    Lost in space: MethaneSat failed just as NZ was to take over mission control – here’s what we need to know now
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicholas Rattenbury, Associate Professor in Physics, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Environmental Defense Fund, CC BY-SA This week’s announcement of the loss of a methane-detecting satellite, just days before New Zealand was meant to take over mission control, is a blow to the country’s space research

    Rare wooden tools from Stone Age China reveal plant-based lifestyle of ancient lakeside humans
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bo Li, Professor, Environmental Futures Research Centre, School of Science, University of Wollongong Excavation at the Gantangqing site. Liu et al. Ancient wooden tools found at a site in Gantangqing in southwestern China are approximately 300,000 years old, new dating has shown. Discovered during excavations carried out

    I’ve seen the brain damage contact sports can cause – we all need to take concussion and CTE more seriously
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alan Pearce, Professor, Adjunct Research Fellow, School of Health Science, Swinburne University of Technology AAP Image/The Conversation, CC BY Concussion in sport continues to make headlines, whether it be class actions, young men flocking to the highly violent “RunIt” activity or debate about whether Australian rules football

    NZ will soon have no real interisland rail-ferry link – why are we so bad at infrastructure planning?
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Welch, Senior Lecturer in Urban Planning, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images) Another week, another Cook Strait ferry breakdown. As the winter maintenance season approaches and the Aratere prepares for its final months of service, New Zealand faces a self-imposed crisis. The government

    Mauna Loa Observatory captured the reality of climate change. The US plans to shut it down
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alex Sen Gupta, Associate Professor in Climate Science, UNSW Sydney Izabela23/Shutterstock The greenhouse effect was discovered more than 150 years ago and the first scientific paper linking carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere with climate change was published in 1896. But it wasn’t until the 1950s that

    6 simple questions to tell if a ‘finfluencer’ is more flash than cash
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dimitrios Salampasis, Associate Professor, Emerging Technologies and FinTech | FinTech Capability Lead, Swinburne University of Technology Oleg Golovnev/Shutterstock Images of flashy sports cars. Lavish lifestyle shots. These are just some of the red flags consumers should watch out for when they turn to social media for financial

    Grattan on Friday: how two once hot-button issues this week barely sparked media and political interest
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Political and news cycles often work in a certain and predictable way. Issues flare like bushfires, then rage for weeks or even months, until they are finally extinguished by action or fade by being overtaken by the next big thing.

    How many serious incidents are happening in Australian childcare centres? We don’t really know
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Erin Harper, Lecturer, School of Education and Social Work, University of Sydney Catherine Delahaye/ Getty Images This week, a Melbourne childcare worker was charged over alleged sexual abuse of young children in his care. Families are justifiably appalled and furious – with 1,200 children urged to be

    Too much vitamin B6 can be toxic. 3 symptoms to watch out for
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nial Wheate, Professor, School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University Selena3726/Shutterstock Side effects from taking too much vitamin B6 – including nerve damage – may be more widespread than we think, Australia’s medicines regulator says. In an ABC report earlier this week, a spokesperson for the Therapeutic Goods

    Too much vitamin B6 can be toxic. 3 symptoms to watch out for
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nial Wheate, Professor, School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University Selena3726/Shutterstock Side effects from taking too much vitamin B6 – including nerve damage – may be more widespread than we think, Australia’s medicines regulator says. In an ABC report earlier this week, a spokesperson for the Therapeutic Goods

    10 steps governments can take now to stamp out child sexual abuse in care settings
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben Mathews, Distinguished Professor, School of Law, Queensland University of Technology Recent cases of prolific alleged child sexual abuse in Melbourne and other Australian early childhood education and care settings have shocked even experienced people who work to prevent child sexual abuse. Parents are right to be

    Tears, trauma and unpaid work: why men in tinnies aren’t the only heroes during a flood disaster
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca McNaught, Research Fellow, Rural and Remote Health, University of Sydney Dan Peled/Getty Images When flooding strikes, our screens fill with scenes of devastated victims, and men performing heroic dinghy rescues in swollen rivers. But another story often goes untold: how women step in, and step up,

    The takeaway from the Venice Biennale saga: the art world faces deep and troubling structural inequality
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Grace McQuilten, Professor of Art and Associate Dean, Research and Innovation, School of Art, RMIT University Creative Australia’s decision earlier this year to rescind the selection of artist Khaled Sabsabi and curator Michael Dagostino as Australia’s 2026 representatives at the Venice Biennale sent shockwaves through the arts

    The Rainbow Warrior saga: 1. French state terrorism and NZ’s end of innocence
    COMMENTARY: By Eugene Doyle Immediately after killing Fernando Pereira and blowing up Greenpeace’s flagship the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour, several of the French agents went on a ski holiday in New Zealand’s South Island to celebrate. Such was the contempt the French had for the Kiwis and the abilities of our police to pursue

    Does eating cheese before bed really give you nightmares? Here’s what the science says
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Charlotte Gupta, Senior Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Appleton Institute, HealthWise Research Group, CQUniversity Australia Phoenixns/Shutterstock, The Conversation, CC BY Have you heard people say eating cheese before bed will cause you to have vivid dreams or nightmares? It’s a relatively common idea. And this week, a new study

    Experiencing extreme weather and disasters is not enough to change views on climate action, study shows
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Omid Ghasemi, Research Associate in Behavioural Science at the Institute for Climate Risk & Response, UNSW Sydney STR / AFP via Getty Images Climate change has made extreme weather events such as bushfires and floods more frequent and more likely in recent years, and the trend is

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: ER Report: A Roundup of Significant Articles on EveningReport.nz for July 4, 2025

    ER Report: Here is a summary of significant articles published on EveningReport.nz on July 4, 2025.

    Astronomers have spied an interstellar object zooming through the Solar System
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kirsten Banks, Lecturer, School of Science, Computing and Engineering Technologies, Swinburne University of Technology K Ly / Deep Random Survey This week, astronomers spotted the third known interstellar visitor to our Solar System. First detected by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) on July 1, the

    Avoid bad breath, don’t pick partners when drunk: ancient dating tips to find modern love
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Konstantine Panegyres, Lecturer in Classics and Ancient History, The University of Western Australia Henryk Siemiradzki via Wikimedia Commons To love and be loved is something most people want in their lives. In the modern world, we often see stories about the difficulties of finding love and the

    Back to Back Theatre tackles an epic Shakespearian conflict – set in a factory, with cardboard props
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Hunter, Senior Lecturer in Art and Performance, Deakin University Jeff Busby/Back To Back Theatre/ACMI Back to Back Theatre is one of Australia’s national treasures. Over 30 years this dynamic Geelong-based company – an ensemble of actors who are perceived to have intellectual disabilities – has built

    Australia’s new lung cancer screening program has chosen simplicity over equity, and we’re concerned
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa J. Whop, Associate Director of Research and Senior Fellow, Yardhura Walani, National Centre for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Wellbeing Research, Australian National University Thurtell/Getty Images Australia’s lung cancer screening program launched on July 1, and marks real progress and opportunity. It aims to reduce the

    Lost in space: MethaneSat failed just as NZ was to take over mission control – here’s what we need to know now
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicholas Rattenbury, Associate Professor in Physics, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Environmental Defense Fund, CC BY-SA This week’s announcement of the loss of a methane-detecting satellite, just days before New Zealand was meant to take over mission control, is a blow to the country’s space research

    Rare wooden tools from Stone Age China reveal plant-based lifestyle of ancient lakeside humans
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bo Li, Professor, Environmental Futures Research Centre, School of Science, University of Wollongong Excavation at the Gantangqing site. Liu et al. Ancient wooden tools found at a site in Gantangqing in southwestern China are approximately 300,000 years old, new dating has shown. Discovered during excavations carried out

    I’ve seen the brain damage contact sports can cause – we all need to take concussion and CTE more seriously
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alan Pearce, Professor, Adjunct Research Fellow, School of Health Science, Swinburne University of Technology AAP Image/The Conversation, CC BY Concussion in sport continues to make headlines, whether it be class actions, young men flocking to the highly violent “RunIt” activity or debate about whether Australian rules football

    NZ will soon have no real interisland rail-ferry link – why are we so bad at infrastructure planning?
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Welch, Senior Lecturer in Urban Planning, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images) Another week, another Cook Strait ferry breakdown. As the winter maintenance season approaches and the Aratere prepares for its final months of service, New Zealand faces a self-imposed crisis. The government

    Mauna Loa Observatory captured the reality of climate change. The US plans to shut it down
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alex Sen Gupta, Associate Professor in Climate Science, UNSW Sydney Izabela23/Shutterstock The greenhouse effect was discovered more than 150 years ago and the first scientific paper linking carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere with climate change was published in 1896. But it wasn’t until the 1950s that

    6 simple questions to tell if a ‘finfluencer’ is more flash than cash
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dimitrios Salampasis, Associate Professor, Emerging Technologies and FinTech | FinTech Capability Lead, Swinburne University of Technology Oleg Golovnev/Shutterstock Images of flashy sports cars. Lavish lifestyle shots. These are just some of the red flags consumers should watch out for when they turn to social media for financial

    Grattan on Friday: how two once hot-button issues this week barely sparked media and political interest
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Political and news cycles often work in a certain and predictable way. Issues flare like bushfires, then rage for weeks or even months, until they are finally extinguished by action or fade by being overtaken by the next big thing.

    How many serious incidents are happening in Australian childcare centres? We don’t really know
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Erin Harper, Lecturer, School of Education and Social Work, University of Sydney Catherine Delahaye/ Getty Images This week, a Melbourne childcare worker was charged over alleged sexual abuse of young children in his care. Families are justifiably appalled and furious – with 1,200 children urged to be

    Too much vitamin B6 can be toxic. 3 symptoms to watch out for
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nial Wheate, Professor, School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University Selena3726/Shutterstock Side effects from taking too much vitamin B6 – including nerve damage – may be more widespread than we think, Australia’s medicines regulator says. In an ABC report earlier this week, a spokesperson for the Therapeutic Goods

    Too much vitamin B6 can be toxic. 3 symptoms to watch out for
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nial Wheate, Professor, School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University Selena3726/Shutterstock Side effects from taking too much vitamin B6 – including nerve damage – may be more widespread than we think, Australia’s medicines regulator says. In an ABC report earlier this week, a spokesperson for the Therapeutic Goods

    10 steps governments can take now to stamp out child sexual abuse in care settings
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben Mathews, Distinguished Professor, School of Law, Queensland University of Technology Recent cases of prolific alleged child sexual abuse in Melbourne and other Australian early childhood education and care settings have shocked even experienced people who work to prevent child sexual abuse. Parents are right to be

    Tears, trauma and unpaid work: why men in tinnies aren’t the only heroes during a flood disaster
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca McNaught, Research Fellow, Rural and Remote Health, University of Sydney Dan Peled/Getty Images When flooding strikes, our screens fill with scenes of devastated victims, and men performing heroic dinghy rescues in swollen rivers. But another story often goes untold: how women step in, and step up,

    The takeaway from the Venice Biennale saga: the art world faces deep and troubling structural inequality
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Grace McQuilten, Professor of Art and Associate Dean, Research and Innovation, School of Art, RMIT University Creative Australia’s decision earlier this year to rescind the selection of artist Khaled Sabsabi and curator Michael Dagostino as Australia’s 2026 representatives at the Venice Biennale sent shockwaves through the arts

    The Rainbow Warrior saga: 1. French state terrorism and NZ’s end of innocence
    COMMENTARY: By Eugene Doyle Immediately after killing Fernando Pereira and blowing up Greenpeace’s flagship the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour, several of the French agents went on a ski holiday in New Zealand’s South Island to celebrate. Such was the contempt the French had for the Kiwis and the abilities of our police to pursue

    Does eating cheese before bed really give you nightmares? Here’s what the science says
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Charlotte Gupta, Senior Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Appleton Institute, HealthWise Research Group, CQUniversity Australia Phoenixns/Shutterstock, The Conversation, CC BY Have you heard people say eating cheese before bed will cause you to have vivid dreams or nightmares? It’s a relatively common idea. And this week, a new study

    Experiencing extreme weather and disasters is not enough to change views on climate action, study shows
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Omid Ghasemi, Research Associate in Behavioural Science at the Institute for Climate Risk & Response, UNSW Sydney STR / AFP via Getty Images Climate change has made extreme weather events such as bushfires and floods more frequent and more likely in recent years, and the trend is

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI USA: In Memoriam: Wes Hildreth, 1938-2025

    Source: US Geological Survey

    Wes receiving a Meritorious Service Award in 2004.

    Wes was born on August 17, 1938, in Newton, MA, and lived most of his early life in the Boston and San Francisco Bay areas. He studied at Harvard, where he majored in geology with a minor in government (BA, 1961). Receiving a Harvard Sheldon Fellowship, he traveled around the world alone in 1961-62. In 1963, he drove his Volkswagen van to Panama and back. After two years at Harvard graduate school in international affairs, he withdrew, alienated by bitterness over the Vietnam War. Between 1966 and 1970, Wes was a National Park Service naturalist at Muir Woods, Glacier Bay, Grand Canyon, Olympic, and Death Valley national parks.  

    Wes returned to graduate school at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1970, intending to map Precambrian stratigraphy in Death Valley. Instead, he met Prof. Ian Carmichael and soon found himself studying igneous petrology and volcanology in an exceptionally fruitful environment with talented fellow students, including his future wife, Gail Mahood (geology professor at Stanford University). That period was characterized by the advent of precise and comprehensive trace-element analyses, the transformation from wet chemistry to X-ray fluorescence, and from mineral picking to the then still-primitive electron microprobe. Wes’s 1977 PhD on the Bishop Tuff ignited a global interest in large-scale silicic volcanism and magmatism that continues undiminished. He joined the USGS in 1977, where he remained a research leader for his whole career.  

    The many outstanding features of Wes’s productive career reflect his intertwined interests in mapping volcanoes and understanding large-scale magmatic processes. He combined the two (with a sometimes-intimidating gravitas) through numerous intensive, field-focused studies mostly in the U.S. and Chile. For more than 45 years, he did so with Judy Fierstein, an indefatigable field collaborator and the artistic talent behind their many geologic maps. Their work made heavy use of USGS analytical facilities and was made possible by the high-quality geochronology provided by the USGS argon dating laboratory.  

    Several facets of Wes’s research, often made with U.S. and international collaborators, stand out:  

    • Wes’s petrologic study of the rhyolitic Bishop Tuff, pioneering in its detail and comprehensiveness, challenged models for generating wide ranges in trace-element abundances in the erupted products. After what Wes himself referred to as “…the wild-goose chase of Soret effects in magma chambers,” his subsequent comparisons with other ignimbrites and related plutonic systems and the efforts of many other workers led to what has become widely known as the “mush model,” which is now a central paradigm for the generation of silicic magmas.  
    • Turning to the ultimate driver of silicic magmatism, Wes recognized the fundamentally basaltic nature of most continental crustal magmatism and developed enduring concepts for what are now termed trans-crustal magmatic systems. His original 1981 concepts were further developed in 1988 to outline (using Chilean examples) the roles of crustal thickness and deep crustal processes (the MASH model) in the generation of arc magmas.  
    • At the Yellowstone Plateau volcanic field, Wes and his colleagues were the first to document the contrast between the narrow ∂18O range in the ignimbrites and the much lighter isotopic values of the earliest post-collapse lavas. His interpretation, that meteoric water was involved, initiated much research on the role of hydrothermally altered crust in the origins of low-d18O rhyolites and influenced the understanding of upper crustal silicic magma bodies.  
    • Studies of the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes in Alaska yielded fundamental insights into how a complicated volcanic plumbing system beneath Novarupta and Katmai caldera led to a remarkable diversity of magmas erupting in the 1912 eruption.  
    • Wes’s contribution to the 1986 geologic map of the island of Pantelleria in Italy stands as the most detailed study of a peralkaline rhyolite volcanic center. It remains an important contribution to understanding the physical volcanology of low-viscosity felsic magmas and their associated calderas, as well as the chronology of volcanic ashes across the Mediterranean.  
    • Late in his career Wes turned to his love of basic field geology and stratigraphy and published compelling studies on the landscape evolution of eastern Sierra Nevada, including the geology and geomorphology of the Long Valley Caldera region, the evolution of the Owens River gorge, and the nature and timing of development of the eastern Sierra Nevada escarpment.  
    • A major legacy of Wes’ productive career at the USGS are the detailed geologic maps and descriptions of volcanic histories for Mount Adams, Mount Baker, Three Sisters, and Simcoe Mountains in the Cascade Range of Washington and Oregon; Mammoth Mountain and Long Valley Caldera in eastern California; Katmai in Alaska; Quizapu-Descabezado and Laguna del Maule in Chile, and Pantelleria in Italy. In Wes’s words: “I’ve emphasized on-foot authentic geologic mapping of blank spots on the map, largely in wilderness or otherwise uninhabited areas.”  

    Wes received wide recognition and awards during his career, including Fellow of the Geological Society of America (1985), Fellow (1995) and Bowen Award (1985) from the American Geophysical Union, Thorarinsson Medalist of the International Association of Volcanology and Chemistry of the Earth’s Interior (2004), and a Meritorious Service Award from the Department of the Interior (2004). Wes and Judy Fierstein jointly received the 2019 Florence Bascom Mapping Award from the Geological Society of America. In response to the award, Wes noted that it “celebrated what I love doing best.”  

    Wes was an avid reader and maintained a broad knowledge of global affairs, which was seeded by his travels through the Harvard Sheldon Fellowship. To colleagues, he offered three-thousand-year perspectives on the roots of conflicts in the Middle East and Europe. Before starting fieldwork each day, he scrutinized and read aloud portions of the daily academic commentary on current domestic affairs.  

    Wes was also a lifelong runner. He ran cross-country for the Harvard Crimson, and he finished in 29th place in the 1960 Boston Marathon. While traveling the world on the Sheldon Fellowship, he spent two months training at an immersion running camp in Australia. Between 1955 and 1972, Wes competed in the Dipsea Race for a grueling 12 km over the flank of Mt. Tamalpais, just north of San Francisco. On June 6, 2025, just two weeks before his death, Wes was inducted into the Dipsea Foundation Hall of Fame. In his acceptance speech, he said, “Distance running can be as much a lifestyle as a competitive sport. At age 87, I still hit the road for an hour every day – 365 days – slower every year, but the mentality and fitness support my geological day job,” and “there’s a spiritual component – the freedom of the hills – the simple gift of communion with the landscape.”  

    Wes was an outstanding geologist who had broad interests, including aspects of regional geology well outside of his recognized specialties in volcanology and igneous petrology. His insights and contributions have been of the highest quality and promise to last over time. At the time of his death, Wes was still carrying out work in the Sierra Nevada, the Mono Basin, the Cima volcanic field (all in California), and the Mina volcanics in western Nevada near where he died. His body of work, meticulously detailed, authoritatively stated, and contained within beautifully written papers, remains as an enduring memorial to his creativity, knowledge, and influence.  

    Contributed by: Charlie Bacon, Andy Calvert, Judy Fierstein, Shaul Hurwitz, Jake Lowenstern, Tom Sisson (all USGS Volcano Science Center), Gail Mahood (Stanford University), and Colin Wilson (Victoria University, NZ) 

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Banking: Panasonic HD develops “SparseVLM” technology that doubles the processing speed of Vision-Language Model

    Source: Panasonic

    Headline: Panasonic HD develops “SparseVLM” technology that doubles the processing speed of Vision-Language Model

    Figure 1: Comparison of “SparseVLM” and existing sparsification methods (quoted from the accepted paper)

    Osaka, Japan, July 4, 2025 – Panasonic R&D Company of America (PRDCA) and Panasonic Holdings Co., Ltd. (Panasonic HD), in collaboration with researchers from Peking University, Fudan University, University of California, Berkeley, and Shanghai Jiao Tong University, have developed “SparseVLM,” a technology that speeds up Vision-Language Models (VLMs), AI models that can understand and process both visual data such as images and videos, and text data.In recent years, VLMs have seen rapid development. These models can process visual and textual information simultaneously and can answer questions about visual content. However, handling a large amount of data, especially high-resolution images and long videos, leads to longer inference times and higher computational complexity for the AI model. “SparseVLM” adopts a novel approach by focusing solely on the visual information relevant to the input prompt (Figure 1), significantly reducing inference time and computational complexity while maintaining high accuracy in answering questions about images.This research has been accepted for presentation at the 42nd International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML2025), one of the premier conferences for AI and machine learning research. The conference will take place in Vancouver, Canada from July 13 to July 19, 2025.

    MIL OSI Global Banks –

  • MIL-OSI Banking: Panasonic HD develops “SparseVLM” technology that doubles the processing speed of Vision-Language Model

    Source: Panasonic

    Headline: Panasonic HD develops “SparseVLM” technology that doubles the processing speed of Vision-Language Model

    Figure 1: Comparison of “SparseVLM” and existing sparsification methods (quoted from the accepted paper)

    Osaka, Japan, July 4, 2025 – Panasonic R&D Company of America (PRDCA) and Panasonic Holdings Co., Ltd. (Panasonic HD), in collaboration with researchers from Peking University, Fudan University, University of California, Berkeley, and Shanghai Jiao Tong University, have developed “SparseVLM,” a technology that speeds up Vision-Language Models (VLMs), AI models that can understand and process both visual data such as images and videos, and text data.In recent years, VLMs have seen rapid development. These models can process visual and textual information simultaneously and can answer questions about visual content. However, handling a large amount of data, especially high-resolution images and long videos, leads to longer inference times and higher computational complexity for the AI model. “SparseVLM” adopts a novel approach by focusing solely on the visual information relevant to the input prompt (Figure 1), significantly reducing inference time and computational complexity while maintaining high accuracy in answering questions about images.This research has been accepted for presentation at the 42nd International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML2025), one of the premier conferences for AI and machine learning research. The conference will take place in Vancouver, Canada from July 13 to July 19, 2025.

    MIL OSI Global Banks –

  • MIL-OSI Russia: Who Reads Russian Literature in China: From “Veteran Classics Lovers” to “Little Fairytale Lovers”

    Translation. Region: Russian Federal

    Source: People’s Republic of China in Russian –

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

    BEIJING, July 4 (Xinhua) — At the recently concluded 31st Beijing International Book Fair held in the Chinese capital, the Russian national stand showcased about 800 of the best new releases from the Russian publishing market, covering various literary genres. Classic works of Russian literature that have had a profound impact on Chinese society, such as “War and Peace,” “Crime and Punishment,” and “How the Steel Was Tempered,” are now creating a new reading landscape for the Chinese audience along with works by contemporary Russian authors.

    THE ETERNAL RELEVANCE OF CLASSICS

    Over the past 100-odd years, a huge number of classic works of Russian literature have been translated and introduced to China. The works of literary titans such as Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Alexander Pushkin, Anton Chekhov have had a lasting and profound influence on Chinese literary circles. Classic works such as How the Steel Was Tempered, War and Peace, and The Seagull were once widely known in China, but their mass recognition has noticeably weakened in our days.

    In Chinese literary studies, the prevailing opinion is that the end of the era of total reception of Russian literature in modern China does not indicate its decline, but rather a transition to a phase of deep artistic reflection, where the aesthetic value of the text dominates over utilitarian functions.

    Speaking about the main readers of Russian classical literature in today’s China, the winner of the international translation prize “Read Russia”, professor of the Capital Normal University Liu Wenfei in an interview with a correspondent of the Xinhua news agency noted that teachers and students of the humanities and Russian language departments are the most devoted readers of Russian classics in China.

    In addition, older Chinese writers and literary scholars have a particular fondness for the realism of the 19th-century “golden age,” while younger poets and prose writers have a clear preference for the modernist literature of the Silver Age—the works of Marina Tsvetaeva, Anna Akhmatova, and other outstanding authors. “It is unlikely that you will find a poet in China today who is not familiar with their legacy,” Liu Wenfei said. According to his observations, these groups form the main readership of Russian classics in the country.

    “But the readership of Russian classics in China is by no means limited to the groups mentioned. Otherwise, it would be difficult to explain the phenomenon of multiple reprints of translations – it is enough to mention that Leo Tolstoy’s novel Anna Karenina has been translated into Chinese at least fifty times, while the works of Fyodor Dostoevsky are constantly present in publishing plans,” emphasized Liu Wenfei, a professor of Russian studies who has been involved in literary translation since the early 1980s.

    THE FLOURISH OF RUSSIAN LITNISHES

    Modern Russian literature is also translated quite fully in China, although classic works such as Tolstoy’s War and Peace, whose reader demand consistently exceeds that of 21st century authors, retain absolute dominance in book retail.

    Contemporary Russian literature is in a phase of dynamic development, which excludes premature final assessments. This context is due to the transformation of reading practices, says Wang Xiaoyu, a junior research fellow at the Institute of World Literature of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

    However, according to her, compared to other languages, the spread of modern Russian literature in China should be recognized as significant – based on the volume of translations into Chinese and the awards received in recent years.

    For example, Renmin Wenxue Chubanshe Publishing House launched the project “Mutual Translations of Chinese and Foreign Authors on a Single Theme”. The Chinese magazine “October” regularly publishes works by contemporary Russian writers first. In 2022, Professor Chen Fang from Renmin University of China received the Lu Xun Prize in the Best Literary Translation category for her translation work on Guzel Yakhina’s novel “My Children”, which contributes to the promotion of contemporary Russian literature in China.

    Thus, Chinese youth born after the 1990s have begun to pay more attention to the works of contemporary Russian authors. As demonstrated by the activities of Russian language clubs in Beijing universities in recent years, Chinese youth interest in contemporary Russian literature has evolved from “exoticization” to “analytical discourse” – as evidenced by the academic debate on postmodern narratology in the novels of Viktor Pelevin. And the number of participants in the “Russian-Language Literature” group on the Douban review platform increased by 46 percent in the 2023 annual report.

    DETLIT-REVANCE

    A significant place in the exposition of the Russian stand at the 31st PMCF was given to children’s books, which clearly demonstrates the desire to strengthen the position of Russian children’s publishers in close cooperation with Chinese partners.

    Let us recall that the 1950s were the “golden age” for the introduction and translation of Russian children’s literature in China. Such outstanding works as Pushkin’s fairy tale poem “The Tale of the Fisherman and the Fish”, Bianki’s “Forest Newspaper”, Gaidar’s “Distant Countries” and “Chuk and Gek”, and many other wonderful examples of Russian children’s literature were translated and published in China.

    However, in recent decades, attention to contemporary Russian children’s literature has noticeably weakened. “This is a serious and unacceptable omission,” says Zhu Ziqiang, director of the Xingyuan Institute at the Ocean University of China.

    This omission is now being actively corrected. In order to introduce outstanding Russian children’s books of recent decades to Chinese readers on a large scale, the Chinese publishing house “Jely” initiated and released the series “Golden Russian Children’s Books”. According to information, as of the end of June 2024, 11 titles with a total circulation of 147 thousand copies have been published within this series, including novels, fairy tales, prose and other works.

    These books have firmly gained recognition in the Chinese children’s and adolescent literature market. Some of them, including “Visiting the Polar Bear” by Oleg Bundur, “Theo, the Theater Captain” by Nina Dashevskaya, were included in the reading list recommended by teachers of a Chinese school for students. “Theo teaches us that even a small role is important. Now I also want to create a puppet theater in the classroom – like Theo!” wrote an 11-year-old schoolboy surnamed Li from Beijing in a review of the book he read “Theo, the Theater Captain”, which became one of the “Top 10 Best Children’s Books of 2023” at the “Reading Month” festival in the city of Shenzhen, Guangdong Province /South China/.

    At the Shanghai International Children’s Literature Fair held in November 2024, the China Literary Authors’ Society (CLAS) and the Association of Writers’ and Publishers’ Unions of Russia agreed to cooperate in acquiring numerous rights to Russian children’s publications.

    According to KLAO, as of June 2024, over the past decade, Chinese publishers have translated more than 700 books from Russia, and about 400 Chinese books have been translated in Russia. Literary exchange between the two countries is gradually moving from “one-way borrowing” to “two-way exchange”. In the future, with the deep introduction of digital technology and the involvement of young people, Russian literature will continue to write new pages in China’s cultural landscape.

    MIL OSI Russia News –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Australia’s new lung cancer screening program has chosen simplicity over equity, and we’re concerned

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa J. Whop, Associate Director of Research and Senior Fellow, Yardhura Walani, National Centre for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Wellbeing Research, Australian National University

    Thurtell/Getty Images

    Australia’s lung cancer screening program launched on July 1, and marks real progress and opportunity.

    It aims to reduce the number of people dying from lung cancer by offering regular low-dose CT scans to people who smoke, and those who have quit. The aim is to detect and treat cancer early before it has spread.

    But the program’s design may further disadvantage Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, who are disproportionately affected by lung cancer.

    So Australia’s first new cancer screening program in almost 20 years risks entrenching health inequities rather than addressing them.

    Lung cancer is a particular burden

    Lung cancer is the most common cancer and the leading cause of cancer death for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

    Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are 2.1 times more likely to be diagnosed with lung cancer, and 1.8 times likely to die from it, compared with non-Indigenous Australians.

    Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are also more likely to be diagnosed with lung cancer at a younger age than non-Indigenous Australians.

    Understanding the broader context of lung cancer risk among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples is crucial.

    Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have been paid in tobacco rations rather than wages up until the 1960s, excluded from economic and health systems, and targeted by tobacco industry marketing.

    Indigenous-led tobacco control and quit-smoking programs, such as the Tackling Indigenous Smoking program, have made significant progress in reducing smoking rates. Indigenous communities are leading the resistance against tobacco industry harms.

    However, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples face major barriers to lung cancer screening. This is particularly in rural and remote areas where access to GPs, radiology services and culturally safe care is limited.

    Lung cancer screening should account for this

    Initially, the lung cancer screening program was designed with a lower screening age for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples – 50 years compared with 55 years for non-Indigenous Australians. This made sense in the face of the earlier and higher risk of lung cancer.

    However, the Medical Services Advisory Committee, the body responsible for assessing applications for public funding, removed this risk-based distinction. Now there’s a general age eligibility of 50-70 years.

    This is a shift from equity (fairness) to equality (sameness). In health, treating everyone equally deepens inequities.

    By contrast, many public health programs strive for equity and reflect the differing needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. For instance, heart health checks and many vaccines are offered to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples at a younger age.

    There are also possible consequences of lowering the screening age for non-Indigenous Australians from 55 (as originally intended) to 50. Cancer Australia’s report warned this would not provide a favourable balance of benefits and harms, nor would it be cost-effective.

    In this lower-risk population, this could increase the likelihood of detecting slow-growing lung nodules unlikely to cause harm. This can lead to unnecessary tests and procedures, anxiety, psychological distress, overtreatment and even harm.

    While Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples can also experience these potential harms, the higher risk of lung cancer earlier means the potential benefit from early detection outweighs these risks.

    Let’s call it for what it is – structural racism

    So current eligibility criteria expands the eligibility for lower risk groups. Yet it ignores Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ higher risk and cumulative impacts of remoteness, limited access to health services and other health conditions.

    This decision significantly increases the number of people accessing the program. While this may appear equal on the surface, it risks a misallocation of limited health system resources, particularly in an already overstretched health system.

    That’s a clear example of structural racism – when policies that seem neutral actually uphold longstanding inequities, and reinforce disadvantages.

    This has parallels with concerns raised in the United States. Screening guidelines there have been criticised for failing to account for higher rates of lung cancer in African Americans.

    What should we do next?

    If we’re serious about a commitment to equity in cancer outcomes – as outlined in the Australian Cancer Plan and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cancer Plan – we must ensure screening policies do not inadvertently widen inequities.

    We must revisit who’s eligible for screening and how eligibility is determined. This may mean not only considering age and smoking history, but other factors such as a family history of cancer.

    It might also mean predicting lung cancer risk using models such as the PLCOm2012 risk prediction model. However, this particular model has not been validated in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, which needs to be a priority.

    Instead, the Medical Services Advisory Committee has prioritised the same screening age for all – administrative simplicity over this more sensitive way of assessing risk.

    We must prioritise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples on screening waitlists and follow-up, and strengthen the cultural safety of services.

    We must ensure robust data collection and reporting to evaluate the screening program. Evaluation needs to assess if the program delivers equitable access and outcomes, as well as delivering on effectiveness, safety and cost.

    All these actions are essential to address the higher burden of lung cancer among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and uphold equity and the right to health over administrative simplicity.

    This is the final article in our ‘Finding lung cancer’ series, which explores Australia’s first new cancer screening program in almost 20 years. Read other articles in the series.

    More information about the program is available, including for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. If you need support to quit smoking, see your doctor or call Quitline on 13 78 48.

    Lisa J. Whop has received funding from Australian government National Health and Medical Research Council, Cancer Australia, and the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. Whop is the Chair of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Leadership Group of Cancer Australia and has been an investigator on lung cancer screening consultation projects funded by Cancer Australia. The views in this article are their own.

    Alison Brown has been a co-investigator on lung cancer screening consultation projects funded by Cancer Australia.

    Raglan Maddox has received funding from Australian government National Health and Medical Research Council, Cancer Australia, and the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. Maddox has been an investigator on lung cancer screening consultation projects funded by Cancer Australia. The views in this article are their own.

    – ref. Australia’s new lung cancer screening program has chosen simplicity over equity, and we’re concerned – https://theconversation.com/australias-new-lung-cancer-screening-program-has-chosen-simplicity-over-equity-and-were-concerned-253614

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Australia’s new lung cancer screening program has chosen simplicity over equity, and we’re concerned

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa J. Whop, Associate Director of Research and Senior Fellow, Yardhura Walani, National Centre for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Wellbeing Research, Australian National University

    Thurtell/Getty Images

    Australia’s lung cancer screening program launched on July 1, and marks real progress and opportunity.

    It aims to reduce the number of people dying from lung cancer by offering regular low-dose CT scans to people who smoke, and those who have quit. The aim is to detect and treat cancer early before it has spread.

    But the program’s design may further disadvantage Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, who are disproportionately affected by lung cancer.

    So Australia’s first new cancer screening program in almost 20 years risks entrenching health inequities rather than addressing them.

    Lung cancer is a particular burden

    Lung cancer is the most common cancer and the leading cause of cancer death for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

    Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are 2.1 times more likely to be diagnosed with lung cancer, and 1.8 times likely to die from it, compared with non-Indigenous Australians.

    Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are also more likely to be diagnosed with lung cancer at a younger age than non-Indigenous Australians.

    Understanding the broader context of lung cancer risk among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples is crucial.

    Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have been paid in tobacco rations rather than wages up until the 1960s, excluded from economic and health systems, and targeted by tobacco industry marketing.

    Indigenous-led tobacco control and quit-smoking programs, such as the Tackling Indigenous Smoking program, have made significant progress in reducing smoking rates. Indigenous communities are leading the resistance against tobacco industry harms.

    However, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples face major barriers to lung cancer screening. This is particularly in rural and remote areas where access to GPs, radiology services and culturally safe care is limited.

    Lung cancer screening should account for this

    Initially, the lung cancer screening program was designed with a lower screening age for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples – 50 years compared with 55 years for non-Indigenous Australians. This made sense in the face of the earlier and higher risk of lung cancer.

    However, the Medical Services Advisory Committee, the body responsible for assessing applications for public funding, removed this risk-based distinction. Now there’s a general age eligibility of 50-70 years.

    This is a shift from equity (fairness) to equality (sameness). In health, treating everyone equally deepens inequities.

    By contrast, many public health programs strive for equity and reflect the differing needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. For instance, heart health checks and many vaccines are offered to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples at a younger age.

    There are also possible consequences of lowering the screening age for non-Indigenous Australians from 55 (as originally intended) to 50. Cancer Australia’s report warned this would not provide a favourable balance of benefits and harms, nor would it be cost-effective.

    In this lower-risk population, this could increase the likelihood of detecting slow-growing lung nodules unlikely to cause harm. This can lead to unnecessary tests and procedures, anxiety, psychological distress, overtreatment and even harm.

    While Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples can also experience these potential harms, the higher risk of lung cancer earlier means the potential benefit from early detection outweighs these risks.

    Let’s call it for what it is – structural racism

    So current eligibility criteria expands the eligibility for lower risk groups. Yet it ignores Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ higher risk and cumulative impacts of remoteness, limited access to health services and other health conditions.

    This decision significantly increases the number of people accessing the program. While this may appear equal on the surface, it risks a misallocation of limited health system resources, particularly in an already overstretched health system.

    That’s a clear example of structural racism – when policies that seem neutral actually uphold longstanding inequities, and reinforce disadvantages.

    This has parallels with concerns raised in the United States. Screening guidelines there have been criticised for failing to account for higher rates of lung cancer in African Americans.

    What should we do next?

    If we’re serious about a commitment to equity in cancer outcomes – as outlined in the Australian Cancer Plan and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cancer Plan – we must ensure screening policies do not inadvertently widen inequities.

    We must revisit who’s eligible for screening and how eligibility is determined. This may mean not only considering age and smoking history, but other factors such as a family history of cancer.

    It might also mean predicting lung cancer risk using models such as the PLCOm2012 risk prediction model. However, this particular model has not been validated in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, which needs to be a priority.

    Instead, the Medical Services Advisory Committee has prioritised the same screening age for all – administrative simplicity over this more sensitive way of assessing risk.

    We must prioritise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples on screening waitlists and follow-up, and strengthen the cultural safety of services.

    We must ensure robust data collection and reporting to evaluate the screening program. Evaluation needs to assess if the program delivers equitable access and outcomes, as well as delivering on effectiveness, safety and cost.

    All these actions are essential to address the higher burden of lung cancer among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and uphold equity and the right to health over administrative simplicity.

    This is the final article in our ‘Finding lung cancer’ series, which explores Australia’s first new cancer screening program in almost 20 years. Read other articles in the series.

    More information about the program is available, including for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. If you need support to quit smoking, see your doctor or call Quitline on 13 78 48.

    Lisa J. Whop has received funding from Australian government National Health and Medical Research Council, Cancer Australia, and the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. Whop is the Chair of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Leadership Group of Cancer Australia and has been an investigator on lung cancer screening consultation projects funded by Cancer Australia. The views in this article are their own.

    Alison Brown has been a co-investigator on lung cancer screening consultation projects funded by Cancer Australia.

    Raglan Maddox has received funding from Australian government National Health and Medical Research Council, Cancer Australia, and the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing. Maddox has been an investigator on lung cancer screening consultation projects funded by Cancer Australia. The views in this article are their own.

    – ref. Australia’s new lung cancer screening program has chosen simplicity over equity, and we’re concerned – https://theconversation.com/australias-new-lung-cancer-screening-program-has-chosen-simplicity-over-equity-and-were-concerned-253614

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI China: 13th World Peace Forum held in Beijing

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

    More than 1,200 guests from 86 countries and regions have gathered in Beijing to exchange views on maintaining global peace and addressing conflicts at the ongoing 13th World Peace Forum (WPF).

    Themed “advancing global peace and prosperity: shared responsibility, benefit and achievement,” the forum, which runs from July 2 to 4, brings together leading strategists, senior policymakers and former political leaders.

    “In the face of serious and complex international developments and escalating regional conflicts, global peace and development face unprecedented challenges,” said Li Luming, president of Tsinghua University and chairman of the WPF, told the forum at the opening ceremony on Thursday.

    Li noted that amid a turbulent international landscape and rising geopolitical tensions, fostering unity and dialogue is more important than ever.

    Addressing the opening ceremony, former Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama emphasized that peace can be achieved not by using force, but through dialogue, and the forum bears great significance in this regard.

    Hatoyama said that it is essential for Japan to work closely with its East Asian neighbors, ASEAN, middle powers in Europe, and the Global South to strengthen its independence from the United States. He emphasized that enhancing trilateral collaboration among Japan, China and the Republic of Korea is particularly important.

    He called on Japan to reduce the potential for conflicts in the region by more clearly stating that it does not support Taiwan independence, and by restraining moves toward Taiwan independence, adding that the Taiwan issue is China’s internal matter.

    The forum comprises four plenary sessions and 18 panel discussions, where participants will share their perspectives on subjects including the international order and world peace, pan-securitization and the global security predicament, the role of the Global South in achieving world peace and prosperity, and major power coordination and conflict resolution.

    Beginning in 2012, Tsinghua University has been co-hosting the forum with the Chinese People’s Institute of Foreign Affairs. The forum aims to provide a platform of communication and exchange for strategists and think tanks worldwide.

    MIL OSI China News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: NEA awards public school advocate and national expert on private education vouchers with its highest honor

    Source: US National Education Union

    PORTLAND, Ore.—The National Education Association today awarded Dr. Josh Cowen—distinguished author, professor, researcher, and national expert on private school vouchers—with its highest honor, the Friend of Education Award. Cowen received the award in front of nearly 7,000 educators gathered in Portland, Oregon, during the 2025 NEA Representative Assembly. 

    Cowen is at the forefront of the fight against school privatization and holding billionaire-run organizations accountable for the ineffective voucher policies they have promoted through lobbying efforts in multiple states and Congress. His book, The Privateers: How Billionaires Created a Culture War and Sold School Vouchers, lays out the dishonest, money-driven, and faux-researched lobby effort used to support voucher policies by monied interests. He also explains how vouchers have negatively impacted the overall educational outcomes in the United States. Across the country, voters continue to reject vouchers, most recently seen as voters in Colorado, Kentucky, and Nebraska all rejected ballot measures related to school vouchers. 

    “Dr. Cowen is a leading voice in the work of advocating for our nation’s public schools and the well-being of our students. America’s educators are proud to bestow him with NEA’s highest honor, the Friend of Education award,” said NEA President Becky Pringle. “Through his research and in his advocacy, Dr. Cowen is tireless in his commitment to America’s public schools. He speaks truth to power, and at a time when anti-public education politicians push harmful voucher schemes and try to steal opportunities from our students, our families, and our communities, we need more voices like his.” 

    “I’m accepting this Friend of Education Award on behalf of all the public school educators, middle-class families, and everyone else out there who’s been standing up to right-wing billionaires like Betsy DeVos for years. My life’s work has been fighting for public schools and making sure every student gets the education they deserve. Now more than ever, we’re going to need the same commitment in the fight to defend our democracy. And when it comes to that fight, I’m just getting started.”  

    Cowen has been a leader in educational research, teacher mobility, teacher attrition, and interpreting educational outcomes. In 2016, he founded the Education Policy Innovation Collaborative (EPIC), a think tank designed to partner with policymakers to improve educational outcomes for students and educators alike. He has also been a national director for the National Center for Research on Education Access and Choice (REACH), which is based at Tulane University. 

    “Vouchers are the education equivalent of predatory lending. The right-wing markets vouchers specifically to families of color, to low-income families, as if there are a whole lot of high-quality private school providers that will take all of these children in mass amounts. We know that doesn’t happen. We know the schools that do accept them tend to be barely hanging on, tend to be subprime, as I call them, as the academic results show,” Cowen said in an interview with NEAToday. 

    The NEA Friend of Education Award is presented during NEA’s annual convention and recognizes a person or organization whose leadership has significantly contributed to improving American public education. Past recipients include activists Judith Heumann, Greta Thunberg, Dolly Parton, and Quinta Brunson. 

    # # # 

    Follow us on Bluesky at https://bsky.app/profile/neapresident.bsky.social and https://bsky.app/profile/neatoday.bsky.social 

    The National Education Association is the nation’s largest professional employee organization, representing more than 3 million elementary and secondary teachers, higher education faculty, education support professionals, school administrators, retired educators, students preparing to become teachers, healthcare workers, and public employees. Learn more at www.nea.org. 

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Australia: Desert retrofit housing project boosts energy efficiency and comfort in APY Lands

    Source:

    04 July 2025

    A local tradesmen laying insulation in the roof of an existing home in the APY Lands.

    An ambitious housing project led by the University of South Australia, the SA Government and industry partners is making homes in the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) Lands more comfortable and energy efficient.

    The APY Lands Energy Efficiency Retrofit Pilot, part of the national RACE for 2030 Cooperative Research Centre, is improving energy efficiency in desert housing, where summer temperatures soar above 45°C and winter nights plunge below freezing.

    Since launching the pilot in December 2023, the project team has installed energy monitoring devices in 12 households and completed retrofits on six homes in an APY community. The homes are managed by key project delivery partner, the SA Housing Trust.

    The trial retrofits are targeted solutions to reduce air leakage, increase insulation, and reduce thermal bridging – where heat or cold bypasses insulation through the steel building frames.

    With 15 project and industry partners, the team has assessed 20 homes, interviewed residents, installed monitoring equipment, built two test rooms in Adelaide, and modelled over 100 retrofit scenarios.

    In addition to the retrofit work, the team has produced household energy efficiency and trade training education materials in consultation with the community, to ensure residents know how to get the best outcomes in their homes. Local trades will take part in rolling out the retrofits to remaining APY households.

    Lead investigator, UniSA Sustainable Engineering Systems researcher Professor Ke Xing, says the project combines scientific rigour with practical on-the-ground training.

    Local tradespeople were trained on site, supported by housing retrofit experts.

    “This pilot is not only improving living conditions in one of the toughest climates in Australia; it’s also creating a blueprint for future upgrades in remote and regional communities across the country,” Prof Xing says.

    “In the past year we have collaborated closely with the community, local maintenance workers and our industry partners, all of whom have shown an extraordinary commitment.”

    Key findings so far show that addressing uncontrolled air leakage delivers the greatest improvements in thermal comfort and energy efficiency.

    Currently winter – more so than summer – is the most uncomfortable period for APY communities. Households rely heavily on inefficient electric radiant heaters, with some resorting to ovens for warmth – an unsafe and costly practice.

    Upgrades so far include new bulk insulation in the roof and adding continuous insulation to external walls, self-closing exhaust fans, evaporative cooling dampers, and sealing common air leakage points throughout the homes.

    Local tradespeople were trained on-site, supported by custom training resources and guidance from retrofit experts.

    Importantly, residents themselves are noticing the difference.

    “Common feedback from residents was that their homes were cooler this summer, due to the retrofits. That anecdotal feedback supports our early testing, and we are in the process of conducting full evaluations over the 2025 winter,” says Prof Xing.

    UniSA researchers partnered with the SA Department for Energy and Mining, the SA Housing Trust, and community focused organisations such as Healthabitat and Nganampa Health Council. They worked closely with the Iwantja Community Council and local residents, including Aṉangu Energy Education Workers supported by MoneyMob Talkabout.

    The project also involves organisations with technical expertise who have provided knowledge and product support, including the Insulation Council of Australia and New Zealand (ICANZ), Kingspan, Sika Australia, Powertech Energy, Efficiency Matrix, and the Air Tightness Testing and Measurement Association (ATTMA).

    Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation in the Attorney-General’s Department has also partnered and contributed to the project, and TAFE SA, CodeSafe Solutions and Pointsbuild have contributed the development to the trade training program.

    As part of the Pilot’s legacy, trade training programs have been developed to support a broader rollout of housing retrofit skills in remote communities. A “train-the-trainer” event was held in Adelaide in 2024, involving TAFE, SA Housing Trust, Renewal SA and Building Contractor (Furnell’s) staff. Local TAFE students were provided with Net Zero Energy Builder Scholarships to support energy efficient construction in the APY Lands.

    The next steps include re-testing the retrofitted homes and expanding the model to other APY communities.

    “Ultimately, we want this project to inform national guidelines for remote housing upgrades, tailored to the needs and voices of Aboriginal communities,” says SA Department for Energy and Mining Project Manager Lynda Curtis.

    “Aboriginal people have lived in Australia’s desert regions for tens of thousands of years, but temperature extremes have become more pronounced due to climate change,” Ms Curtis says.

    “With broader climate extremes and overall hotter summers predicted for the future, how people are living and maintaining healthy communities on Country is of growing concern, and we are invested in providing solutions to those challenges.”

    Notes for editors

    RACE for 2030 (Reliable, Affordable Clean Energy) is an innovative, collaborative research centre for energy and carbon transition. The Federal Government has provided $68.5 million, supplemented by $280 million in cash and in-kind contributions from partners. Its aim is to deliver $3.8 billion of cumulative energy productivity benefits and 20 megatons of cumulative carbon emission savings by 2030.

    …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

    Contact for interview: Professor Ke Xing E: ke.xing@unisa.edu.au

    Media contact: Candy Gibson M: +61 434 605 142 E: candy.gibson@unisa.edu.au

    MIL OSI News –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Lost in space: MethaneSat failed just as NZ was to take over mission control – here’s what we need to know now

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicholas Rattenbury, Associate Professor in Physics, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

    Environmental Defense Fund, CC BY-SA

    This week’s announcement of the loss of a methane-detecting satellite, just days before New Zealand was meant to take over mission control, is a blow to the country’s space research sector.

    New Zealand invested NZ$29 million in the MethaneSat mission, built and operated by the US nonprofit Environmental Defense Fund, with a goal of growing the nation’s space industry.

    This would have been accomplished through gaining experience in operating a satellite at the University of Auckland’s Te Pūnaha Ātea Space Institute, and through research led by a team at Earth Sciences New Zealand to use the satellite to measure agricultural sources of methane.

    But on June 20, the satellite lost power and contact with the ground, and appears to be irrecoverable. This is disappointing for everyone on the mission development and operations teams.

    Having been in that position personally when my team lost a miniature satellite after a successful launch, I sympathise. But the benefits New Zealand hoped to gain from the MethaneSat mission will now be limited, at best, and questions need to be asked to learn from the failure.

    Early issues and delays

    The MethaneSat satellite launched in March 2024. New Zealand was meant to take over mission control by the end of last year, but problems with the satellite’s thrusters meant this was delayed to June this year.

    The satellite’s main mission was to detect methane leaks from oil and gas production, but it was also used to track methane sources from agriculture.

    New Zealand was not likely involved in the chain of events leading to the under-performance and delays, nor the eventual loss of the satellite. But as investors in the project, we are entitled to an explanation.

    That a spacecraft fails in orbit is not surprising. The space environment is unforgiving. But there is a question about whether New Zealand should have taken a closer look “under the hood” before investing in MethaneSat.

    The principle of caveat emptor (buyer beware) applies to spacecraft as much as to purchasing a car. While we were not involved in the MethaneSat mission design, satellite construction and testing, we were certainly entitled to relevant information to make a fully informed decision on whether or not to invest.

    Questions remain. During the MethaneSat post-mortem, one could reasonably ask to what extent experts were consulted during the decision-making process to invest in the satellite mission, and who was applying due diligence on behalf of New Zealand taxpayers.

    When earlier issues emerged, to what extent should New Zealand taxpayers, as investors, have been happy with explanations veiled in reported obligations of confidentiality or commercial sensitivity?

    Lessons for future space missions

    New Zealand has scientists and engineers working at publicly-funded universities who can contribute to future decision-making processes for the next taxpayer-funded space mission.

    New Zealand scientists working in the space sector do so knowing full well that the nation’s capacity to fund space missions is limited. Apart from being hard, frustrating, rewarding and unforgiving, working in space is expensive – and there are often delays and setbacks.

    Some of us working in New Zealand space research have been trying to work through how best to advise government on where to spend limited public funding. This will not be an easy task.

    The Committee on Space Research (COSPAR) is an international organisation established in 1958 to promote global cooperation in space research. It provides a forum for the exchange of scientific results, sets standards for space data sharing, and advises on space policy and planetary protection.

    New Zealand participates in COSPAR as a national member and its committee comprises space science researchers from across the country. As chair of the New Zealand COSPAR committee, I sent a letter to Minister of Space Judith Collins last year offering our services:

    I believe closer collaboration between COSPAR’s initiatives and New Zealand’s aerospace goals would enhance our mutual objectives and strengthen our contribution to the global aerospace community. Specifically, we are uniquely placed to advise on the range of scientific endeavours currently underway […] that could be at the heart of a national space mission.

    Close scrutiny needed

    New Zealand has more talent and good research ideas than funding to support them. So there has to be a way of choosing between competing ideas.

    Crucially, that selection process has to be fully transparent so the investors – New Zealand taxpayers – can have confidence their investment is being safely bestowed.

    My vision is for a funding process for future space missions that addresses scientific goals relevant to New Zealand and takes advantage of the talent we have.
    There will be applicants who miss out, as there always are in any competitive process. But I would like to see support given to unsuccessful applicants to improve their chances in subsequent attempts.

    I work towards fostering the New Zealand space sector, especially in the areas where we can push back the boundaries of human knowledge via the safe, peaceful and sustainable use of space. This is the excitement I see reflected in the students I teach.

    For a nation with ambitions to utilise space for science, technological development and commercial gain, we also have to acknowledge that failure is a part of that journey. To make the best use of our very limited resources, we must examine our processes in the fullest light of disclosure – regardless of whether the failure was technological or in our decision-making processes.

    Nicholas James Rattenbury works for The University of Auckland. He has received funding from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) and Royal Society Te Apārangi. He is affiliated with Te Pūnaha Ātea Space Institute. He is the current Chair of the New Zealand Committee of COSPAR.

    None of the viewpoints expressed in this article necessarily reflect those held by any of the abovementioned organisations or any other organisation or entity mentioned in the article.

    – ref. Lost in space: MethaneSat failed just as NZ was to take over mission control – here’s what we need to know now – https://theconversation.com/lost-in-space-methanesat-failed-just-as-nz-was-to-take-over-mission-control-heres-what-we-need-to-know-now-260407

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI New Zealand: Educational performance indicator reports – current methodology

    Source: Tertiary Education Commission

    Last updated 4 July 2025
    Last updated 4 July 2025

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    Educational performance indicator (EPI) reports for work-based learning providers reporting in the industry training register (ITR) are now available for the 2024 reporting year.
    Educational performance indicator (EPI) reports for work-based learning providers reporting in the industry training register (ITR) are now available for the 2024 reporting year.

    This page relates to EPI reports using the current methodology. You can also view the EPI reports for individual TEOs using our previous methodology.
    More detail about what each of the indicators show is also available on our Educational performance indicators for TEOs page.
    Viewing the reports
    Use the dropdown boxes below to look up the EPI report for each TEO. 
    Reports are available for TEOs arranging industry training from 2016 to 2024.
    Note that EPI reports are also available for TEOs reporting in the SDR for reporting years 2015 to 2017 only. From 2018 onwards the EPIs of TEOs reporting in the SDR are found in the Provider-based Education Performance Indicator interactive charts below.
    Select an organisation and year
    Something went wrong. Please try again.
    Organisation type
    Organisation
    Year

    Provider-based Educational Performance Indicator interactive charts
    For universities, Te Pūkenga, wānanga and private training establishments, EPIs can be viewed through interactive charts (2018 onwards). You can decide what data to view and how to display it.
    Note: The EPI report data for TEOs arranging industry training is currently unavailable to view as interactive charts.
    Where to go for additional information
    The New Zealand Qualifications Authority (NZQA) and the Academic Quality Agency for New Zealand Universities (AQA) undertake external reviews of the quality of tertiary providers and publish review reports on their websites.

    MIL OSI New Zealand News –

  • MIL-OSI New Zealand: Educational performance indicator reports – previous methodology

    Source: Tertiary Education Commission

    Last updated 4 July 2025
    Last updated 4 July 2025

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    We publish information on the performance of tertiary education organisations (TEOs) based on agreed educational performance indicators (EPIs). Our EPI reports are designed to help TEOs manage and monitor their own performance and to deliver on their agreed tertiary education services.
    We publish information on the performance of tertiary education organisations (TEOs) based on agreed educational performance indicators (EPIs). Our EPI reports are designed to help TEOs manage and monitor their own performance and to deliver on their agreed tertiary education services.

    This page relates to EPI reports using our previous methodology. You can also view the EPI reports for individual TEOs using our current methodology.
    The information in the EPI reports provides a snapshot of selected performance indicators and does not give a comprehensive picture of a TEO’s overall performance.
    What funds are reported on
    The information published here is based only on tertiary education funded by:

    the Student Achievement Component funds – SAC Levels 3 and above, SAC Levels 1 and 2 (competitive) and SAC Levels 1 and 2 (non-competitive)
    Youth Guarantee
    the Industry Training Fund.

    Note that the effects of the Canterbury earthquakes may have had an impact on student performance for Canterbury-based TEOs.
    More detail about what each of the indicators show is also available.
    Viewing the reports
    Use the dropdown boxes below to look up the EPI report for each TEO.
    Note. We have completed the upload of all remaining EPI reports (covering 2009 to 2016) to this page. 
    Select an organisation and year
    Something went wrong. Please try again.
    Organisation type
    Organisation
    Year

    2016 educational performance for individual tertiary providers
    The two Excel reports below provide a summary of 2016 performance information for Student Achievement Component (SAC) and Youth Guarantee (YG) for individual tertiary providers, broken down by:

    grouped qualification register level
    Tertiary Education Strategy priority groups of Māori and Pasifika students
    students under 25.

    2016 SAC EPI summary by individual tertiary provider (XLSX 101 KB) (XLS, 103 Kb)
    2016 YG EPI summary by individual tertiary provider (XLSX 56 KB) (XLS, 58 Kb) 
    Where to go for additional information
    New Zealand Qualifications Authority and the Academic Quality Agency for New Zealand Universities (AQA) undertake external reviews of the quality of tertiary providers and publish review reports on their websites.
    Note about EFTS
    Where an organisation is funded for fewer than five Equivalent Full Time Students (EFTS), there is no individual data available for them. This is to ensure individual students cannot be identified.
    Where an organisation has fewer than 30 EFTS at a level of study, no information will be available for that level of study. This is to ensure statistically robust sample sizes that allow for comparison.

    MIL OSI New Zealand News –

  • MIL-OSI Australia: Albanese Government backs bold ideas to solve real-world challenges

    Source: Murray Darling Basin Authority

    From solar-powered hydrogen reactors to wi-fi that works deep underground, 39 research projects have been awarded support through the Albanese Government’s Australia’s Economic Accelerator (AEA) Innovate program.

    More than $93 million in grants has been awarded to projects including:

    • A cleaner energy future – The University of Adelaide is working with industry to develop a solar hydrogen reactor that could dramatically cut the cost of green hydrogen production.
    • Smarter farming – The University of Melbourne is developing an affordable soil monitoring system for shallow and deep-rooted crops, helping farmers grow more with less.
    • Safer mining – The University of Sydney is creating a long-range wi-fi system to keep underground workers connected in real time.
    • High-tech weed control – Central Queensland University is teaming up with Aussie businesses to create an innovative weed management system that reduces the need for chemicals.

    These projects are part of a broader push to fast-track commercialisation of Australian research in critical areas like renewables, agriculture, medical technology, defence and critical minerals.

    AEA is designed to bridge the gap between research and real-world application and help researchers partner with industry to take ideas out of the lab and into the economy.

    The Olives the Australian Way project from the University of South Australia is an example of AEA in action. Starting in the Seed round and now progressing to Innovate, the project aims to double Australia’s olive plantations by 2035 and create new jobs in rural and regional areas.

    More than $178 million has now been awarded to Australian innovators through AEA Seed, Ignite and Innovate rounds as part of the $1.6 billion AEA program.

    The next round of Ignite and Innovate grants will open on 23 July, making an additional $150 million available to projects with potential to deliver the next wave of breakthroughs.

    Quotes attributable to Minister for Education Jason Clare:

    “These investments allow our world-class universities and researchers to work on game-changing projects that are good for our economy and good for Australia. 

    “This is a strategic investment that will help to deliver the solutions we need for the challenges ahead.”

    MIL OSI News –

  • MIL-OSI NGOs: Landmark decision on the human right to a healthy climate delivered by the highest court in the Americas

    Source: Greenpeace Statement –

    Amsterdam, Netherlands – The Inter-American Court of Human Rights just delivered a landmark decision on the obligations of States in the face of the climate emergency.[1] The Court established that governments must take “urgent and effective actions” to safeguard the right to a healthy climate, and that companies have obligations with regard to climate change and its impacts on human rights. This decision unequivocally puts the rights of people and nature above the interests of polluters.

    In an unprecedented move, the Court also recognised the right to nature and ecosystems to maintain their essential ecological processes, as a crucial part in the effort to address the triple planetary crisis [2] and to achieve a truly sustainable development model that respects planetary boundaries and guarantees the rights of present and future generations. 

    Pablo Ramírez, Climate Campaigner, Greenpeace Mexico, said: “This is a life-changing decision for thousands of communities that are impacted by climate change on our continent. The highest court in the Americas is providing us with a pathway to climate justice, obliging States to guarantee human rights, address climate impacts and force polluting industries to repair the damage they have caused.”

    The Court’s decision puts powerful legal tools to secure climate accountability and justice in the hands of more than 300 million people in 20 states that are party to the American Convention on Human Rights, including Indigenous Peoples, civil society organisations and individuals. 

    The advisory opinion was requested in January 2023 by the governments of Chile and Colombia. [3] It was followed by the most participatory process in the history of the Court, with 150 oral interventions from States, international organisations, Indigenous Peoples, and civil society, as well as 265 written submissions, including from Greenpeace International.

    Latin America and the Caribbean are highly affected by air pollution,[4] rising sea levels and extreme weather events,[5] fuelled by emissions from oil and gas corporations and other polluting industries.[6] 

    The Court’s decision is grounded in clear scientific evidence that attributes large emissions from corporations to impacts such as loss of life and livelihoods from climate disasters. This Court decision will directly assist individuals and communities in pushing back against corporate polluters and corporate violations of human rights.

    Maria Alejandra Serra, Legal Counsel, Greenpeace International, said: “For too long, politicians and corporations have gotten away with profiting from the destruction of our environment and from harming the lives of ordinary people. This decision marks the beginning of the era of corporate accountability and a big step towards dismantling the colonial legacy of systemic impunity in our region.”

    The decision builds on the growing global momentum in courts tasked with interpreting international law facing the climate crisis.[7] It is expected to be used by governments to present more ambitious climate action plans and shape future decisions by other international human rights courts, setting the stage for a forthcoming historic advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice – the world’s highest court – on the responsibilities of States to mitigate climate impacts. 

    ENDS 

    Notes:

    Photos and videos of Greenpeace International and its allies in the process at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights on the Greenpeace Media Library. 

    [1] The Inter-American Court of Human Rights, one of three regional human rights courts in the world, has the role to interpret and clarify the obligations of States. Its decisions inform national governments and courts. Read the full decision in Spanish here.

    [2] As established by the United Nations, “[t]he triple planetary crisis refers to the interconnected challenges of climate change, pollution, and biodiversity loss”. See here 

    [3] Read the Advisory Opinion Request here. 

    [4] A review on the impact of climate change and air pollution in the region, particularly in the Caribbean, is detailed in a Columbia University publication authored by Muge Akpinar-Elci and Olaniyi Olayinka.

    [5] As recently as 2024, the Americas region faced devastating effects from multiple extreme weather events, which continued to impact lives, livelihoods, and food supply chains long after the events had passed, according to a publication by the World Meteorological Organization. 

    [6] Written observation on the request for an advisory opinion on the climate emergency and human rights by Greenpeace International, the Center for International Environmental Law, the NYU Climate Law Accelerator, the Union of Concerned Scientists, and the Open Society Justice Initiative.

    [7] Some examples are the recent decisions from the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, which classified greenhouse gas emissions as marine pollution, and the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights against Switzerland, a State failing to set adequate climate targets.

    Contacts:

    Tal Harris, Greenpeace International, Global Media Lead – Stop Drilling Start Paying campaign, +41-782530550, [email protected]

    Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0) 20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), [email protected]Follow @greenpeacepress on X/Twitter for our latest international press release

    Follow @greenpeacepress on X/Twitter for our latest international press release

    MIL OSI NGO –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Discovery Alert: Scientists Spot a Planetary Carousel

    Source: NASA

    KOI-134 b and KOI-134 c 

    A new investigation into old Kepler data has revealed that a planetary system once thought to house zero planets actually has two planets which orbit their star in a unique style, like an old-fashioned merry-go-round. 

    The KOI-134 system contains two planets which orbit their star in a peculiar fashion on two different orbital planes, with one planet exhibiting significant variation in transit times. This is the first-discovered system of its kind. 

    Over a decade ago, scientists used NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope to observe the KOI-134 system and thought that it might have a planet orbiting, but they deemed this planet candidate to be a false positive, because its transits (or passes in front of its star) were not lining up as expected. These transits were so abnormal that the planet was actually weeded out through an automated system as a false positive before it could be analyzed further. 
    However, NASA’s commitment to openly sharing scientific data means that researchers can constantly revisit old observations to make new discoveries. In this new study, researchers re-analyzed this Kepler data on KOI-134 and confirmed that not only is the “false positive” actually a real planet, but the system has two planets and some really interesting orbital dynamics! 
    First, the “false positive” planet, named KOI-134 b, was confirmed to be a warm Jupiter (or a warm planet of a similar size to Jupiter). Through this analysis, researchers uncovered that the reason this planet eluded confirmation previously is because it experiences what are called transit timing variations (TTVs), or small differences in a planet’s transit across its star that can make its transit “early” or “late” because the planet is being pushed or pulled by the gravity from another planet which was also revealed in this study. Researchers estimate that KOI-134 b transits across its star as much as 20 hours “late” or “early,” which is a significant variation. In fact, it was so significant that it’s the reason why the planet wasn’t confirmed in initial observations. 
    As these TTVs are caused by the gravitational interaction with another planet, this discovery also revealed a planetary sibling: KOI-134 c. Through studying this system in simulations that include these TTVs, the team found that KOI-134 c is a planet slightly smaller than Saturn and closer to its star than KOI-134 b. 

    KOI-134 c previously eluded observation because it orbits on a tilted orbital plane, a different plane from KOI-134 b, and this tilted orbit prevents the planet from transiting its star. The two orbital planes of these planets are about 15 degrees different from one another, also known as a mutual inclination of 15 degrees, which is significant. Due to the gravitational push and pull between these two planets, their orbital planes also tilt back and forth. 
    Another interesting feature of this planetary system is something called resonance. These two planets have a 2 to 1 resonance, meaning within the same time that one planet completes one orbit, the other completes two orbits. In this case, KOI-134 b has an orbital period (the time it takes a planet to complete one orbit) of about 67 days, which is twice the orbital period of KOI-134 c, which orbits every 33-34 days. 
    Between the separate orbital planes tilting back and forth, the TTVs, and the resonance, the two planets orbit their star in a pattern that resembles two wooden ponies bobbing up and down as they circle around on an old-fashioned merry go round. 

    While this system started as a false positive with Kepler, this re-analysis of the data reveals a vibrant system with two planets. In fact, this is the first-ever discovered compact, multiplanetary system that isn’t flat, has such a significant TTV, and experiences orbital planes tilting back and forth. 
    Also, most planetary systems do not have high mutual inclinations between close planet pairs. In addition to being a rarity, mutual inclinations like this are also not often measured because of challenges within the observation process. So, having measurements like this of a significant mutual inclination in a system, as well as measurements of resonance and TTVs, provides a clear picture of dynamics within a planetary system which we are not always able to see. 

    A team of scientists led by Emma Nabbie of the University of Southern Queensland published a paper on June 27 on their discovery, “A high mutual inclination system around KOI-134 revealed by transit timing variations,” in the journal “Nature Astronomy.” The observations described in this paper and used in simulations in this paper were made by NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope and the paper included collaboration and contributions from institutions including the University of Geneva, University of La Laguna, Purple Mountain Observatory, the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, the Georgia Institute of Technology, the University of Southern Queensland, and NASA’s retired Kepler Space Telescope.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI United Nations: Secretary-General Appoints Carlos G. Ruiz Massieu of Mexico Special Representative for Haiti, Integrated Office Chief

    Source: United Nations General Assembly and Security Council

    United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres announced today the appointment of Carlos G. Ruiz Massieu of Mexico as his new Special Representative for Haiti and Head of the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH).  He succeeds María Isabel Salvador of Ecuador, to whom the Secretary-General is grateful for her dedication and service.

    Mr. Ruiz Massieu brings to this position over 30 years of experience in public service and diplomacy, both in bilateral and multilateral contexts.  As Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Colombia since 2019, he led the United Nations Verification Mission in Colombia, monitoring the implementation of the Peace Agreement between the Government of Colombia and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia–People’s Army (FARC-EP) guerrilla.  He provided good offices and political leadership in the recent peace dialogues of the Government of Colombia and the National Liberation Army, as well as with other illegal armed groups.  Prior to this assignment, he served as the Chairperson of the General Assembly’s Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions from 2013 to 2018.

    A distinguished career diplomat, Mr. Ruiz Massieu served in different positions in the Mexican Government prior to joining the United Nations, including at the Permanent Mission of Mexico to the United Nations.  Mr. Ruiz Massieu is a graduate in law from the Universidad Iberoamericana, Mexico City, and holds a Master of Arts in politics from the University of Essex in the United Kingdom, with a focus on Latin America.  In addition to Spanish, he speaks English and French.

    __________

    * This supersedes Press Release SG/A/1844-BIO/5164 of 10 December 2018.

    MIL OSI United Nations News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Rep. Scott Peters Votes NO on Disastrous Republican Tax Plan

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Congressman Scott Peters (52nd District of California)

    Washington, D.C – Today, Representative Scott Peters (CA-50) voted against the Republican tax plan to cut healthcare and food assistance for millions of vulnerable Americans to pay for tax cuts for wealthy individuals and corporations that don’t need them. The Republican plan would kick 17 million people off their Medicaid and Affordable Care Act health plans, according to an analysis by the independent Congressional Budget Office. The bill also cuts short programs that encourage clean energy development that would produce enough energy to power 227 million homes. This will increase electricity bills by up to 29% and cost millions of construction jobs. And the non-partisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget has found that the bill could add more than $4 trillion to the national debt over the next 10 years.

    After the House voted 218-214 to pass the measure, Representative Peters released the following statement:

    “Today, Congressional Republicans put President Trump’s cruel, reckless agenda above the good of the American people. They will have to answer to the people they represent on how forcing millions off their health coverage will make America healthy again, how higher energy prices, fewer jobs, and more pollution will help our communities, and how they can support the biggest ever addition to the national debt.

    “All of this is to pay for tax cuts for people and corporations that don’t need them. We can all agree that to get our fiscal house in order, there should be compromise and shared sacrifice. But this partisan bill asks only those with the least to sacrifice while giving tax breaks to those with the most. It is obscene.

    “The fight for more affordable and accessible healthcare, a cleaner environment, and responsible fiscal policy is not over. I will continue to work to minimize the harm of this disastrous bill on San Diegans.”

    Read more about Rep. Peters’ opposition to the bill here.

    CA-50 Medicaid Facts: 

    • 156,100 people in the district rely on Medicaid for health coverage—that’s 20 percent of all district residents. 
      • 34,700 children in the district are covered by Medicaid. 
      • 17,700 seniors in the district are covered by Medicaid. 
      • 64,900 adults in the district have Medicaid coverage through Medicaid expansion—that includes pregnant women who are able to access prenatal care sooner because of Medicaid expansion, parents, caretakers, veterans, people with substance use disorder and mental health treatment needs, and people with chronic conditions and disabilities. 
    • At least five hospitals in the district had negative operating margins in 2022. These hospitals would be especially hard-hit by cuts to Medicaid. For example: 
      • Scripps Mercy Hospital had a negative 25.3 percent operating margin—and nearly 22 percent of its revenue came from Medicaid. 
      • Sharp Coronado Hospital had a negative 3.5 percent operating margin—and over 36 percent of its revenue came from Medicaid. 
      • University of California San Diego Medical Center had a negative 2.4 percent operating margin—and nearly 19 percent of its revenue came from Medicaid. 
    • There are 54 health center delivery sites in the district that serve 529,944 patients. 
    • Those health centers and patients rely on Medicaid—statewide, 69 percent of health center patients rely on Medicaid for coverage. 
    • Health centers will not be able to stay open and provide the same care that they do today, with more uninsured and underinsured patients. They are already operating on thin margins—in 2023, nationally, nearly half of health centers had negative operating margins. 
    • Medicaid cuts put health centers at risk, including: 
      • Family Health Centers of San Diego 
      • Neighborhood Healthcare 
      • North County Health Project 
      • San Diego American Indian Health Centers 
      • St. Vincent De Paul Village 

    Representative Peters is the co-author of the Fiscal Commission Act, legislation to create a bicameral and open-door commission to tackle our nation’s long-term debt, help us avoid automatic and across-the-board cuts to Social Security and Medicare, and secure a more prosperous future for our children. 

     

    ###

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-Evening Report: 6 simple questions to tell if a ‘finfluencer’ is more flash than cash

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dimitrios Salampasis, Associate Professor, Emerging Technologies and FinTech | FinTech Capability Lead, Swinburne University of Technology

    Oleg Golovnev/Shutterstock

    Images of flashy sports cars. Lavish lifestyle shots. These are just some of the red flags consumers should watch out for when they turn to social media for financial advice.

    Consumers should not believe everything they see on Instagram, TikTok or YouTube from the growing numbers of “finfluencers” – content creators who build their audience by giving out financial advice.

    The regulator responsible for financial products and advice, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), has issued warning notices to 18 social media finfluencers. ASIC said it suspects they have broken the law by promoting high-risk financial products or providing unlicensed financial advice. ASIC did not name them.

    So, why is regulated financial advice important and what are some of the common practices finfluencers use to attract followers and customers?

    Financial advice rules explained

    Australian Financial Services laws are designed to protect consumers and investors, while promoting the integrity of financial markets. It is both unethical and illegal to promote financial products without proper authorisation.

    In Australia, it is an offence under the Corporations Act to provide financial advice without an Australian Financial Services licence. Penalties include up to five years’ imprisonment or fines of A$1 million or more.

    ASIC issued a similar warning to online finfluencers in 2022. Since then, the number of social media posts by unauthorised finfluencers have substantially reduced.

    Many finfluencers became licensed or authorised representatives of a licensee, along with being more diligent about what they were posting online. Natasha Etschmann, with 300,000 Instagram and TikTok followers at @TashInvests, became licensed immediately after the 2022 warning.

    Some other finfluencers were arrested, issued fines or ordered to take down their websites.

    High-risk products

    However, some finfluencers who style themselves as “trading experts” continue to provide unauthorised financial advice, usually for a fee or commission. They promote high-risk, complex investment products that can cause consumers substantial harm.

    These products include contracts-for-difference
    and over-the-counter derivative products that do not trade on an exchange. ASIC says its current concerns lie with these content creators:

    Their social media content is often accompanied by misleading or deceptive representations about the prospects of success from the products or trading strategies they promote, sharing images of lavish lifestyles, sports cars and other luxury goods.

    What to watch on socials

    About 41% of young Australians aged 18 to 30 look online for financial information or advice.

    While budgeting tips can be helpful, it’s important to be extra careful with online financial advice. Consumers should not believe everything they see on social media.

    Conducting due diligence and checking finfluencers’ credentials on ASIC’s Professional Registers search tool is crucial. Choose expert and licensed finfluencers rather than accounts with large followings and exaggerated or misleading claims. Popularity does not always mean credibility.

    There are certain red flags to watch out for. Some finfluencers use pseudonyms. They promote “exclusive” financial advice content and access to “invitation-only” online communities for a fee. In many cases, they lack credible experience or certified financial planning training to provide financial advice.

    Your finfluencer vetting toolkit

    When choosing to follow or acquire the services of a finfluencer, ask:

    1. is this finfluencer licensed or authorised?

    2. how realistic are the promised financial outcomes? Are they too good to be true?

    3. does the finfluencer disclose their personal financial position or investments when discussing financial products or strategies?

    4. are they transparent about? their track record of accuracy or accountability?

    5. do they address publicly a case when their audience lost money from a strategy they recommended?

    6. does the finfluencer tailor content to different investment risk profiles or financial maturity levels in their audiences?

    Are you being sold a dream?

    Social media finfluencer content can often come with misleading or deceptive representations (such as the sports cars and luxury goods that ASIC has warned about). Content may overstate the prospects of success and potential profits.

    Some – usually unlicensed – finfluencers use social media content as “proof” of their financial expertise. One common practice is to try to lure consumers by creating a hyped world around their own personal lifestyle. Many finfluencers often extend invitations to consumers to join closed forums to “learn” their hidden secrets to success or copy their “famous” trading practices.

    These finfluencers usually try to convince consumers they can achieve a similar lifestyle by following their advice.

    Finfluencers are global

    ASIC issued the warnings as part of a recent global week of action. ASIC and eight regulators from the United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates, Italy, Hong Kong and Canada took coordinated action to disrupt unlawful finfluencer activity.
    The global campaign aims to raise awareness about unlawful finfluencer activity, protect consumers, and prevent them from investing after encountering misleading content.

    Consumers need to distinguish between credible financial advice and self-serving or misleading content before trusting their money to anyone.

    Spotted unlicensed influencer activity? Report this misconduct to ASIC.

    Dimitrios Salampasis is a Fellow of the Financial Services Institute of Australasia (FINSIA), member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD) and member of the Singapore Institute of Directors (SID).

    – ref. 6 simple questions to tell if a ‘finfluencer’ is more flash than cash – https://theconversation.com/6-simple-questions-to-tell-if-a-finfluencer-is-more-flash-than-cash-259906

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: 6 simple questions to tell if a ‘finfluencer’ is more flash than cash

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dimitrios Salampasis, Associate Professor, Emerging Technologies and FinTech | FinTech Capability Lead, Swinburne University of Technology

    Oleg Golovnev/Shutterstock

    Images of flashy sports cars. Lavish lifestyle shots. These are just some of the red flags consumers should watch out for when they turn to social media for financial advice.

    Consumers should not believe everything they see on Instagram, TikTok or YouTube from the growing numbers of “finfluencers” – content creators who build their audience by giving out financial advice.

    The regulator responsible for financial products and advice, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), has issued warning notices to 18 social media finfluencers. ASIC said it suspects they have broken the law by promoting high-risk financial products or providing unlicensed financial advice. ASIC did not name them.

    So, why is regulated financial advice important and what are some of the common practices finfluencers use to attract followers and customers?

    Financial advice rules explained

    Australian Financial Services laws are designed to protect consumers and investors, while promoting the integrity of financial markets. It is both unethical and illegal to promote financial products without proper authorisation.

    In Australia, it is an offence under the Corporations Act to provide financial advice without an Australian Financial Services licence. Penalties include up to five years’ imprisonment or fines of A$1 million or more.

    ASIC issued a similar warning to online finfluencers in 2022. Since then, the number of social media posts by unauthorised finfluencers have substantially reduced.

    Many finfluencers became licensed or authorised representatives of a licensee, along with being more diligent about what they were posting online. Natasha Etschmann, with 300,000 Instagram and TikTok followers at @TashInvests, became licensed immediately after the 2022 warning.

    Some other finfluencers were arrested, issued fines or ordered to take down their websites.

    High-risk products

    However, some finfluencers who style themselves as “trading experts” continue to provide unauthorised financial advice, usually for a fee or commission. They promote high-risk, complex investment products that can cause consumers substantial harm.

    These products include contracts-for-difference
    and over-the-counter derivative products that do not trade on an exchange. ASIC says its current concerns lie with these content creators:

    Their social media content is often accompanied by misleading or deceptive representations about the prospects of success from the products or trading strategies they promote, sharing images of lavish lifestyles, sports cars and other luxury goods.

    What to watch on socials

    About 41% of young Australians aged 18 to 30 look online for financial information or advice.

    While budgeting tips can be helpful, it’s important to be extra careful with online financial advice. Consumers should not believe everything they see on social media.

    Conducting due diligence and checking finfluencers’ credentials on ASIC’s Professional Registers search tool is crucial. Choose expert and licensed finfluencers rather than accounts with large followings and exaggerated or misleading claims. Popularity does not always mean credibility.

    There are certain red flags to watch out for. Some finfluencers use pseudonyms. They promote “exclusive” financial advice content and access to “invitation-only” online communities for a fee. In many cases, they lack credible experience or certified financial planning training to provide financial advice.

    Your finfluencer vetting toolkit

    When choosing to follow or acquire the services of a finfluencer, ask:

    1. is this finfluencer licensed or authorised?

    2. how realistic are the promised financial outcomes? Are they too good to be true?

    3. does the finfluencer disclose their personal financial position or investments when discussing financial products or strategies?

    4. are they transparent about? their track record of accuracy or accountability?

    5. do they address publicly a case when their audience lost money from a strategy they recommended?

    6. does the finfluencer tailor content to different investment risk profiles or financial maturity levels in their audiences?

    Are you being sold a dream?

    Social media finfluencer content can often come with misleading or deceptive representations (such as the sports cars and luxury goods that ASIC has warned about). Content may overstate the prospects of success and potential profits.

    Some – usually unlicensed – finfluencers use social media content as “proof” of their financial expertise. One common practice is to try to lure consumers by creating a hyped world around their own personal lifestyle. Many finfluencers often extend invitations to consumers to join closed forums to “learn” their hidden secrets to success or copy their “famous” trading practices.

    These finfluencers usually try to convince consumers they can achieve a similar lifestyle by following their advice.

    Finfluencers are global

    ASIC issued the warnings as part of a recent global week of action. ASIC and eight regulators from the United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates, Italy, Hong Kong and Canada took coordinated action to disrupt unlawful finfluencer activity.
    The global campaign aims to raise awareness about unlawful finfluencer activity, protect consumers, and prevent them from investing after encountering misleading content.

    Consumers need to distinguish between credible financial advice and self-serving or misleading content before trusting their money to anyone.

    Spotted unlicensed influencer activity? Report this misconduct to ASIC.

    Dimitrios Salampasis is a Fellow of the Financial Services Institute of Australasia (FINSIA), member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD) and member of the Singapore Institute of Directors (SID).

    – ref. 6 simple questions to tell if a ‘finfluencer’ is more flash than cash – https://theconversation.com/6-simple-questions-to-tell-if-a-finfluencer-is-more-flash-than-cash-259906

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: NZ will soon have no real interisland rail-ferry link – why are we so bad at infrastructure planning?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Welch, Senior Lecturer in Urban Planning, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

    Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images)

    Another week, another Cook Strait ferry breakdown. As the winter maintenance season approaches and the Aratere prepares for its final months of service, New Zealand faces a self-imposed crisis.

    The government has spent NZ$507.3 million on cancelled iReX ferry plans, the country’s fleet has an average age of 28 years, and the earliest New Zealanders can hope for promised replacements is 2029.

    The Marlborough Chamber of Commerce warns unreliable ferries already shake tourist confidence. Several more years of duct-tape solutions won’t help.

    The recent pattern of breakdowns and cancellations has become so routine that New Zealand risks normalising what should be viewed as a national crisis: a serious infrastructure failure.

    It is also a textbook example of how short-term political cycles, coupled with chronic under-investment, create far more expensive problems than the ones they promise to solve.

    Cost blowouts

    While ministers claim to have spared taxpayers a $4 billion blowout on new ferries, Treasury papers show almost 80% of the cost escalation lay in seismic upgrades for wharves, not in the vessels themselves. Those land-side works will be required no matter what ferries the country eventually orders.

    Justifying the original contract cancellation, Finance Minister Nicola Willis quipped that iReX was a Ferrari when a Toyota Corolla would do. But the cost of finding a suitable Corolla is adding up fast.

    Annual maintenance costs are projected to nearly double to $65 million, just to keep the existing ageing ferries running. Additionally, $300 million had to be earmarked to cover fees for breaking the original ferry replacement contract.

    By retiring the Aratere this year – New Zealand’s only rail-capable ferry – the government is also severing the interisland rail link for almost five years.

    KiwiRail will “road-bridge” rail freight, an expensive workaround that involves loading train cars onto trucks, putting those trucks on ferries, then reversing the process at the other end. This will increase truck traffic, produce more emissions and add more wear to already strained infrastructure.

    Forcing more than $14 billion worth of annual freight from rail to road could also negatively affect New Zealand’s climate change commitments. Freight moved by rail generates only about 25% of the CO₂ per tonne-kilometre of the same load produced when hauled by truck.

    The cancelled hybrid ferries would have also cut emissions by 40%. Instead, New Zealand is locking in higher emissions for another half decade or longer.

    Unrealistic timelines

    The ferry saga reflects New Zealand’s infrastructure problem in a nutshell. The country tends to underestimate costs, create unfeasible timelines, then shows dismay when projects blow up or limp home at double the price.

    Auckland exemplifies the pattern. The city has seen decades of cancelled harbour crossing proposals and a scrapped light rail project, with nothing to show but consultancy fees.

    When New Zealand does build –Transmission Gully, for example – the final bill bears little resemblance to initial quotes. The 27 kilometre motorway north of Wellington was nearly 50% over budget and took eight years to build – two years longer than promised.

    The systematic underestimation of costs reflects a flawed approach to infrastructure planning. Politicians need quick wins within three-year electoral cycles, while infrastructure projects take decades to deliver.

    Projects are approved based on lowball estimates, with the outcome inherited by another administration. This has crossed party lines and created a system that rewards short-term thinking and punishes long-term planning.

    Just consider the second crossing for Auckland Harbour. For 35 years, the government has commissioned study after study – from the 1988 tunnel plans to the 2010 business cases – each time backing away when the price tag appeared, or the government changed.

    The iReX cancellation marks the first time the government has actually signed contracts and then walked away. As with the second Auckland Harbour crossing, each delay has only made the inevitable solution more expensive.

    Other countries have, to a degree, addressed this problem. Infrastructure Australia, for example, provides independent cost assessments and long-term planning that transcends political cycles. New Zealand’s Infrastructure Commission, established in 2019, lacks similar teeth and independence.

    Ultimately this isn’t really about ferries. It’s about how New Zealand consistently fails to deliver, on time and at cost, the infrastructure that keeps its economy moving.

    Timothy Welch 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. NZ will soon have no real interisland rail-ferry link – why are we so bad at infrastructure planning? – https://theconversation.com/nz-will-soon-have-no-real-interisland-rail-ferry-link-why-are-we-so-bad-at-infrastructure-planning-260279

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: NZ will soon have no real interisland rail-ferry link – why are we so bad at infrastructure planning?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Timothy Welch, Senior Lecturer in Urban Planning, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

    Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images)

    Another week, another Cook Strait ferry breakdown. As the winter maintenance season approaches and the Aratere prepares for its final months of service, New Zealand faces a self-imposed crisis.

    The government has spent NZ$507.3 million on cancelled iReX ferry plans, the country’s fleet has an average age of 28 years, and the earliest New Zealanders can hope for promised replacements is 2029.

    The Marlborough Chamber of Commerce warns unreliable ferries already shake tourist confidence. Several more years of duct-tape solutions won’t help.

    The recent pattern of breakdowns and cancellations has become so routine that New Zealand risks normalising what should be viewed as a national crisis: a serious infrastructure failure.

    It is also a textbook example of how short-term political cycles, coupled with chronic under-investment, create far more expensive problems than the ones they promise to solve.

    Cost blowouts

    While ministers claim to have spared taxpayers a $4 billion blowout on new ferries, Treasury papers show almost 80% of the cost escalation lay in seismic upgrades for wharves, not in the vessels themselves. Those land-side works will be required no matter what ferries the country eventually orders.

    Justifying the original contract cancellation, Finance Minister Nicola Willis quipped that iReX was a Ferrari when a Toyota Corolla would do. But the cost of finding a suitable Corolla is adding up fast.

    Annual maintenance costs are projected to nearly double to $65 million, just to keep the existing ageing ferries running. Additionally, $300 million had to be earmarked to cover fees for breaking the original ferry replacement contract.

    By retiring the Aratere this year – New Zealand’s only rail-capable ferry – the government is also severing the interisland rail link for almost five years.

    KiwiRail will “road-bridge” rail freight, an expensive workaround that involves loading train cars onto trucks, putting those trucks on ferries, then reversing the process at the other end. This will increase truck traffic, produce more emissions and add more wear to already strained infrastructure.

    Forcing more than $14 billion worth of annual freight from rail to road could also negatively affect New Zealand’s climate change commitments. Freight moved by rail generates only about 25% of the CO₂ per tonne-kilometre of the same load produced when hauled by truck.

    The cancelled hybrid ferries would have also cut emissions by 40%. Instead, New Zealand is locking in higher emissions for another half decade or longer.

    Unrealistic timelines

    The ferry saga reflects New Zealand’s infrastructure problem in a nutshell. The country tends to underestimate costs, create unfeasible timelines, then shows dismay when projects blow up or limp home at double the price.

    Auckland exemplifies the pattern. The city has seen decades of cancelled harbour crossing proposals and a scrapped light rail project, with nothing to show but consultancy fees.

    When New Zealand does build –Transmission Gully, for example – the final bill bears little resemblance to initial quotes. The 27 kilometre motorway north of Wellington was nearly 50% over budget and took eight years to build – two years longer than promised.

    The systematic underestimation of costs reflects a flawed approach to infrastructure planning. Politicians need quick wins within three-year electoral cycles, while infrastructure projects take decades to deliver.

    Projects are approved based on lowball estimates, with the outcome inherited by another administration. This has crossed party lines and created a system that rewards short-term thinking and punishes long-term planning.

    Just consider the second crossing for Auckland Harbour. For 35 years, the government has commissioned study after study – from the 1988 tunnel plans to the 2010 business cases – each time backing away when the price tag appeared, or the government changed.

    The iReX cancellation marks the first time the government has actually signed contracts and then walked away. As with the second Auckland Harbour crossing, each delay has only made the inevitable solution more expensive.

    Other countries have, to a degree, addressed this problem. Infrastructure Australia, for example, provides independent cost assessments and long-term planning that transcends political cycles. New Zealand’s Infrastructure Commission, established in 2019, lacks similar teeth and independence.

    Ultimately this isn’t really about ferries. It’s about how New Zealand consistently fails to deliver, on time and at cost, the infrastructure that keeps its economy moving.

    Timothy Welch 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. NZ will soon have no real interisland rail-ferry link – why are we so bad at infrastructure planning? – https://theconversation.com/nz-will-soon-have-no-real-interisland-rail-ferry-link-why-are-we-so-bad-at-infrastructure-planning-260279

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: I’ve seen the brain damage contact sports can cause – we all need to take concussion and CTE more seriously

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alan Pearce, Professor, Adjunct Research Fellow, School of Health Science, Swinburne University of Technology

    AAP Image/The Conversation, CC BY

    Concussion in sport continues to make headlines, whether it be class actions, young men flocking to the highly violent “RunIt” activity or debate about whether Australian rules football should remove the “bump” once and for all.

    Bringing this weighty issue to greater prominence are the former athletes who bravely share their long-term health struggles after careers in sport – cognitive impairments, mental health issues or concerns about neurodegenerative disease, specifically chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE).

    Yet for all the progress made by many sports in recent years, it feels like we still have not fully grasped the understanding of CTE – or maybe we don’t want to.

    Remind me again, what is CTE?

    CTE is a neurodegenerative brain disease, just like dementia, motor neurone disease (MND) and Parkinson’s disease.

    Expert groups agree on the links between traumatic brain injury and increased risk of Alzheimer’s disease (and other dementias), and the growing evidence of links to MND and Parkinson’s.

    People who have never had a traumatic brain injury can still regrettably suffer from these diseases. However, while CTE is rare in the general population, those with a history of repetitive impacts to the brain are more at risk.

    These impacts may not be diagnosed brain injuries or concussions, but rather non-concussive impacts (smaller hits that do not produce signs or symptoms of concussion).

    Contrary to anecdotal opinion, an athlete’s concussion history is not the crucial variable in risk and severity of CTE.

    Emerging international evidence, including my own recently published studies, show the risk of developing CTE (and its severity) is linked to exposure: the age a person starts full contact sport and the length of a playing career.

    The grey area of concussion, CTE and mental health

    Currently, CTE cannot be diagnosed in living people.

    However in understanding the progression of the disease in those who have passed away with CTE, families have described signs and symptoms including cognitive impairments such as:

    • Parkinsonism
    • memory loss
    • trouble with planning and organising tasks
    • impulsive behaviours
    • anger and irritability
    • emotional instability
    • substance misuse
    • suicidal thoughts/behaviour.

    While these signs and symptoms can overlap with those we associate with mental health, this does not necessarily mean the affected person had “mental health concerns”.

    The continued awareness in men’s mental health is a good thing broadly but it has sometimes misappropriated CTE as a mental health issue. For example, some fundraising games in the names of athletes who have died with CTE are being channelled to mental health charities and institutes, confusing the wider community.

    Consequently two recent tragic stories, one from the family of deceased former AFL player Shane Tuck and the other from Amanda Green, the widow of the late NRL player and coach Paul Green, needed to be told.

    Their stories contradicted widely held beliefs in the media and among fans that Tuck or Green were suffering with a psychiatric disease prior to their untimely deaths. In fact, they had CTE.

    An uncomfortable conversation

    So, why aren’t we talking about CTE more?

    The answer is, unfortunately it is an inconvenient truth.

    Considering CTE is entirely preventable if we remove exposure risk of repetitive hits to the head, the solution is to further modify many of our most popular sports to make head impacts much rarer.

    There is sizeable opposition to this idea.

    “Now is not the time to discuss such ‘political’ issues,” is the response I usually get from academics and colleagues involved in these sports, and even football loving friends, when I try to raise awareness.

    This continued hesitation only slows the science of CTE further.

    If an athlete’s family has been courageous in donating their brain to the Australian Sports Brain Bank and CTE has been found, the standard response from sports organisations is:

    the (insert sport here) takes athlete health and wellbeing as its greatest priority […] the (insert sport here) has implemented strict concussion protocols and continues research into athletes’ brain health.

    Even a Senate parliamentary inquiry has done little to change the situation.

    In fact, while most sports have tried to become safer through rule changes, progress more broadly has plateaued or even regressed in recent years.

    Take one recent example in the NRL, when some in the rugby league community made light of the multiple concussions suffered by Victor Radley. After playing his 150th game, he posed smiling with a t-shirt detailing the number of concussions he had suffered during his career. His club, the Sydney Roosters, posted the photo on Instagram before it was later removed.

    Even more worrying is a new controversial activity called “RunIt”, which involves two men running full speed at each other with the intention of knocking over (or more aptly knocking out) the opponent.

    A recent death of a New Zealand teenager playing RunIt has highlighted the dangers.



    Read more:
    Head knocks and ultra-violence: viral games Run It Straight and Power Slap put sports safety back centuries

    What more can be done?

    With the help of the Concussion Legacy Foundation, experts around the world, including myself, have produced a CTE prevention protocol. This does not mean banning any sports but rather modifying components that will reduce exposure risk.

    Here are five ideas I believe would make a difference.

    1. Reducing contact loads in training, particularly in pre-season training.

    2. Modify contact sports for children until the age of 14. This potentially removes six to eight years of incidental and unnecessary hits to kids’ heads. They can still play and learn all the fundamental motor skills and enjoy the psychological benefits of sport before graduating to the full version of the game at 14.

    3. Influential media commentators need to upskill themselves around CTE and to not be afraid to mention CTE rather than deferring to “concussion protocols”.

    4. Medical and allied health practitioners do not regularly screen for concussion or contact sport playing history when assessing a patient who is struggling with movement disorders, chronic headaches/fatigue or cognitive/behavioural impairments. Repetitive head impact history should be screened just like alcohol and drug use history.

    5. When an athlete suddenly and tragically dies, we need to include, along with emergency help lines, information for help and support for those unsure about CTE.

    Unfortunately, if we don’t have the political will to acknowledge CTE and act, more families will be grieving tragic deaths of athletes. These families may not even be aware of CTE.

    This does not make me anti-sport, but pro-athlete. Let’s all become pro-athlete for the sake of our sports and the people who play them.

    Alan Pearce is currently unfunded. Alan is a non-executive director for the Concussion Legacy Foundation (unpaid position) and Adjunct research manager for the Australian Sports Brain Bank (unpaid position). He has previously received funding from Erasmus+ strategic partnerships program (2019-1-IE01-KA202-051555), Sports Health Check Charity (Australia), Australian Football League, Impact Technologies Inc., and Samsung Corporation, and is remunerated for expert advice to medico-legal practices.

    – ref. I’ve seen the brain damage contact sports can cause – we all need to take concussion and CTE more seriously – https://theconversation.com/ive-seen-the-brain-damage-contact-sports-can-cause-we-all-need-to-take-concussion-and-cte-more-seriously-259785

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Rare wooden tools from Stone Age China reveal plant-based lifestyle of ancient lakeside humans

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bo Li, Professor, Environmental Futures Research Centre, School of Science, University of Wollongong

    Excavation at the Gantangqing site. Liu et al.

    Ancient wooden tools found at a site in Gantangqing in southwestern China are approximately 300,000 years old, new dating has shown. Discovered during excavations carried out in 2014–15 and 2018–19, the tools have now been dated by a team of archaeologists, geologists, chronologists (including me) and paleontologists.

    The rare wooden tools were found alongside an assortment of animal and plant fossils and stone artifacts.

    Taken together, the finds suggest the early humans at Gantangqing were surprisingly sophisticated woodworkers who lived in a rich tropical or subtropical environment where they subsisted by harvesting plants from a nearby lake.

    The location of the Gantangqing site and excavation trenches.
    Liu et al. / Science

    Why ancient wooden tools are so rare

    Wood usually decomposes relatively rapidly due to microbial activity, oxidation, and weathering. Unlike stone or bone, it rarely survives more than a few centuries.

    Wood can only survive for thousands of years or longer if it ends up buried in unusual conditions. Wood can last a long time in oxygen-free environments or extremely dry areas. Charred or fire-hardened wood is also more durable.

    At Gantangqing, the wooden objects were excavated from low-oxygen clay-heavy layers of sediment formed on the ancient shoreline of Fuxian Lake.

    Wooden implements are extremely rare from the Early Palaeolithic period (the first part of the “stone age” from around 3.3 million years ago until 300,000 years ago or so, in which our hominin ancestors first began to use tools). Indeed, wooden tools more than even 50,000 years old are virtually absent outside Africa and western Eurasia.

    As a result, we may have a skewed understanding of Palaeolithic cultures. We may overemphasise the role of stone tools, for example, because they are what has survived.

    What wooden tools were found at Gantangqing?

    The new excavations at Gantangqing found 35 wooden specimens identified as artificially modified tools. These tools were primarily manufactured from pine wood, with a minority crafted from hardwoods.

    Some of the tools had rounded ends, while others had chisel-like thin blades or ridged blades. Of the 35 tools, 32 show marks of intentional modification at their tips, working edges, or bases.

    Two large digging implements were identified as heavy-duty digging sticks designed for two-handed use. These are unique forms of digging implements not documented elsewhere, suggesting localised functional adaptations. There were also four distinct hook-shaped tools — likely used for cutting roots — and a series of smaller tools for one-handed use.

    Nineteen of the tools showed microscopic traces of scraping from shaping or use, while 17 exhibit deliberately polished surfaces. We also identified further evidence of intensive use, including soil residues stuck to tool tips, parallel grooves or streaks along working edges, and characteristic fracture wear patterns.

    The tools from Gantangqing are more complete and show a wider range of functions than those found at contemporary sites such as Clacton in the UK and Florisbad in South Africa.

    The wooden tools from Gantangqing took a variety of forms.
    Liu et al. / Science

    How old are the Gantangqing wooden tools?

    The team used several techniques to figure out the age of the wooden tools. There is no way to determine their age directly, but we can date the sediment in which they were found.

    Using a technique called infrared stimulated luminescence, we analysed more than 10,000 individual grains of minerals from different layers. This showed the sediment was deposited roughly between 350,000 and 200,000 years ago.

    Dating the different layers of sediment excavated at the site produced a detailed timeline.
    Liu et al. / Science

    We also used different techniques to date a mammal tooth found in one of the layers to roughly 288,000 years old. This was consistent with the mineral results.

    Next we used mathematical modelling to bring all the dating results together. Our model indicated that the layers containing stone tools and wooden implements date from 360–300,000 years ago to 290–250,000 years ago.

    What was the environment like?

    Our research indicates the ancient humans at Gantangqing inhabited a warm, humid, tropical or subtropical environment. Pollen extracted from the sediments reveals 40 plant families that confirm this climate.

    Plant fossils further verify the presence of subtropical-to-tropical flora dominated by trees, lianas, shrubs and herbs. Wet-environment plants show the local surroundings were a lakeside or wetlands.

    Animal fossils also fit this picture, including rhinoceros and other mammals, turtles and various birds. The ecosystem was likely a mosaic of grassland, thickets and forests. Evidence of diving ducks confirms the lake must have been at least 2–3 metres deep during human occupation.

    Examples of stone and bone tools found at Gantangqing.
    Liu et al. / Science

    What were the Gantangqing wooden tools used for?

    The site contained evidence of plants such as storable pine nuts and hazelnuts, fruit trees such as kiwi, raspberry-like berries, grapes, edible herbs and fern fronds.

    There were also aquatic plants that would have provided edible leaves, seeds, tubers and rhizomes. These were likely dug up from shallow mud near the shore, using wooden tools.

    These findings suggest the Gantangqing hominins may have made expeditions to the lake shore, carrying purpose-made wooden digging sticks to harvest underground food sources. To do this, they would have had to anticipate seasonal plant distributions, know exactly what parts of different plants were edible, and produce specialised tools for different tasks.

    Why the Gantangqing site is important

    The wooden implements from Gantangqing represent the earliest known evidence for the use of digging sticks and for the exploitation of underground plant storage organs such as tubers within the Oriental biogeographic realm. Our discovery shows the use of sophisticated wood technology in a very different environmental context from what has been seen at sites of similar age in Europe and Africa.

    The find significantly expands our understanding of early hominin woodworking capabilities.

    The hominins who lived at Gantangqing appear to have lived a heavily plant-based subsistence lifestyle. This is in contrast to colder, more northern settings where tools of similar age have been found (such as Schöningen in Germany), where hunting large mammals was the key to survival.

    The site also shows how important wood – and perhaps other organic materials – were to “stone age” hominins. These wooden artifacts show far more sophisticated manufacturing skill than the relative rudimentary stone tools found at sites of similar age across East and Southeast Asia.

    The excavation, curation, and research of the Gantangqing site were supported by
    National Cultural Heritage Administration (China), Yunnan Provincial Institute of
    Cultural Relics and Archaeology, Yuxi Municipal Bureau of Culture and Tourism,
    Chengjiang Municipal Bureau of Culture and Tourism, Australian Research Council
    (ARC) Discovery Projects, Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese
    Academy of Sciences, Hong Kong Research Grants Council (RGC), National Natural
    Science Foundation of China (NSFC).

    – ref. Rare wooden tools from Stone Age China reveal plant-based lifestyle of ancient lakeside humans – https://theconversation.com/rare-wooden-tools-from-stone-age-china-reveal-plant-based-lifestyle-of-ancient-lakeside-humans-260204

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI Russia: Sobyanin opened an exhibition about Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich at the Museum of Moscow

    Translation. Region: Russian Federal

    Source: Moscow Government – Government of Moscow –

    Sergei Sobyanin opened the exhibition “The August Master of Moscow”. It is dedicated to Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich (1857-1905) – the first and only representative of the imperial house of Romanov, who headed the First Throne (from 1891 to 1905).

    “The current exhibition at the Museum of Moscow, of course, cannot fail to attract attention and touch the hearts of Muscovites. Because the period when Sergei Alexandrovich was the Governor-General of Moscow is one of the best periods of the city’s development. I would call it a revolutionary period in general, because it was during his time that such an impetus was given to the development of Moscow, when it began to transform from a provincial, to put it mildly, not very comfortable and clean city into one of the best European cities. During this period, something was done that had not been done for a whole century before,” said Sergei Sobyanin.

    The exhibition at the Museum of Moscow (Zubovsky Boulevard, Building 2, Block 3) was prepared by the Elisabeth-Sergius Educational Society Foundation with the support of the Moscow Government for the 120th anniversary of the death of the Grand Duke. More than 30 leading museums, archives, libraries, and private collectors are participating in the exhibition.

    Statesman, military leader, manager

    Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich was one of the outstanding statesmen of the Russian Empire. He was a skilled military leader and a talented manager.

    While holding the post of Moscow Governor-General, Sergei Alexandrovich made a huge contribution to the development of all spheres of the city economy. Under his rule, water supply and sewerage systems were modernized, street lighting was carried out, the transport network was improved, and new buildings and structures were erected. In addition, the first stage of the city power plant was opened, and electric tram lines were built.

    With the direct participation of Sergei Alexandrovich, the project was developed and construction of the Small Ring of the Moscow Railway began.

    “Thanks to the active development of those times, the historical center of the city was significantly transformed,” wrote Sergei Sobyanin in

    on your telegram channel.

    Source: Sergei Sobyanin’s Telegram channel @mos_sobyanin.

    The Grand Duke headed many scientific societies and institutions, patronized cultural and artistic figures, and supported creative educational institutions. With his personal assistance, a new building for the Moscow Conservatory was built and the Bolshoi Theater was restored. He also took care of students. For example, in 1899, a dormitory for Moscow University was built.

    The Grand Duke, who created for the benefit of the people, was killed by terrorists in the very heart of Russia – at the Nikolsky Gate of the Moscow Kremlin.

    What the exhibition will tell about

    Based on documents and materials from the state archives of Russia, and on numerous studies, the authors of the exhibition tell about the bright personality of the Grand Duke, his devoted service to the Fatherland and fruitful work as the Moscow Governor-General and commander of the troops of the Moscow Military District.

     

    The exhibition presents over 500 items, documents, photographs and other artifacts dedicated to the life, state, military and public service of the august master of Moscow. These are books from his library, letters, photographs, portraits of members of the imperial family and personal belongings, awards of charitable institutions and societies. In addition, rare archival documents on the activities of the Grand Duke as Governor-General and Commander of the Moscow Military District, his correspondence with family members and statesmen, military uniform, weapon models and much more are on display.

    Visitors to the exhibition will also learn about the charitable service of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich and his wife, Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna. They supervised over 100 charitable societies and associations that helped those in need in Moscow and other cities of the empire. The exhibition tells about the activities of the Moscow branch of the Russian Red Cross Society, the Elizabethan Charity Society, and many other areas of charitable work. One of the sections is dedicated to the history of the development of Russian Palestine — the activities of the Grand Duke as the first chairman of the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society.

    The authors of the project recreated a fragment of the furnishings of Sergei Alexandrovich’s living room in the Governor-General’s house on Tverskaya Street (house 13), where the grand ducal couple lived from 1892.

    “It’s great that we were able to show all the main areas of activity of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich on this platform. Not only to highlight his work as Governor-General of Moscow and Commander-in-Chief of the Moscow Military District, but also to tell a little about his and Elizaveta Feodorovna’s personalities and spiritual appearance. And it seems to me that this Christian image of people who truly lived according to the Gospel, it inspires our contemporaries,” said Anna Gromova, PhD in History, leading researcher at the Institute of General History of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

    In the cinema hall, guests will be able to watch a documentary about Sergei Alexandrovich and the history of the Chudov Monastery. It was there in 1905 that the Grand Duke was laid to rest by decision of his wife, Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna.

    In addition, the exhibition tells about the legacy of the Grand Duke, the work of the Elisabeth-Sergius Educational Society Foundation to restore the memorial cross in the Kremlin at the site of the murder of the august martyr, and the revival of the Moscow region residence of the Moscow Governor-General — the imperial estate of Ilyinskoye-Usovo. In addition, visitors to the exhibition will learn about the creation of museums by the foundation in the historic buildings of the estate, the installation of a monument to the Grand Duke’s couple in Klimentovsky Lane in Moscow, and educational work to preserve the memory of them in different regions of Russia.

    The exhibition will also feature an educational program with lectures, overview and author’s excursions. The exhibition will run until September 21, 2025.

    Museum association “Moscow Museum”

    The Museum of Moscow was founded in 1896. It is one of the oldest museums in the capital and one of the largest in Russia. Its collection numbers 891,558 items, including a rich collection of archaeological artefacts.

    The Museum of Moscow is located on the territory and in the premises of the federal cultural heritage site “Provision Stores” (1832–1835, architect V.P. Stasov) on Zubovsky Boulevard (building 2).

    In addition, the museum association includes seven structural divisions, including the Moscow Archaeology Museum, the Lefortovo History Museum, the V.A. Gilyarovsky Center, the Garden Ring Museum, the Zelenograd Museum, the N.A. Dobrolyubov Library, and the Heraldic Hall of the City of Moscow.

    The total area of the territory is 1.76 hectares, and the premises are 31,335 square meters, of which 8,127 square meters are exhibition areas.

    Every year, the Museum of Moscow hosts dozens of exhibitions and events, festivals, seasonal and book fairs, theatrical and musical events. A children’s center, a lecture hall, a school of tour guides “Moskvagid” and a city excursion bureau, as well as a cinema for special screenings, are open on a permanent basis.

    In the first half of 2025, the Museum of Moscow was visited by 600 thousand residents and guests of the capital.

    Moscow Museums to Host International and National Projects — SobyaninBy 2026, all collections of Moscow museums will be digitized — Moscow Mayor

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

    Please Note; This Information is Raw Content Directly from the Information Source. It is access to What the Source Is Stating and Does Not Reflect

    https: //vv.mos.ru/mayor/tkhemes/1302505/

    MIL OSI Russia News –

  • MIL-OSI United Nations: Announcing winners of The Equalizer Challenge

    Source: United Nations Population Fund

    UNFPA Announces Winners of the Equalizer Challenge to Scale Breakthrough Women’s Health Innovations. Winners include an AI health tracker for pregnant women, a digital menopause platform and a speculum that detects cervical cancer.

    New York, 3 July 2025 – UNFPA, the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency, today announced the six winners of the Equalizer Challenge: Scaling Women’s Health Innovations. The initiative supports women-led health enterprises in moving beyond the pilot stage and achieving transformative impact at scale.

    Launched in collaboration with MIT Solve, IE University, and Women of Wearables, and enabled by generous support from the Governments of Luxembourg and Germany, the challenge seeks to close the gender health gap by investing in innovations that reach the most underserved.

    The six winners were selected from 350 submissions across 72 countries, with entries spanning six global regions. Each will receive up to US$ 20,000 in catalytic equity-free funding, along with a six-month capacity development programme that includes biweekly mentorship, expert coaching, and strategic connections to global health and investment networks.

    The selected innovations address a wide range of women’s health challenges, including cervical cancer, menopause, maternal mental health, and digital access to sexual and reproductive health care.

    The six winning solutions are:

    • GICMED (Cameroon) – A smart gynecological speculum device that enables early detection and remote diagnosis of cervical cancer and female genital schistosomiasis through telemedicine in low-resource settings.
    • Take Care Mom (Kazakhstan) – An AI-powered platform providing pregnant women with continuous health tracking, early risk detection, and 24/7 expert support to improve maternal and neonatal health and well-being.
    • Maisha Mothers (Kenya) – A mobile-based maternal health innovation by Thalia Psychotherapy that integrates mental health, family planning, and financial wellness into routine antenatal and postnatal care.
    • OMGYNO (Lebanon) – A femtech platform offering anonymous at-home testing, telemedicine services, and sexual and reproductive health education for women in underserved communities across the Middle East and North Africa.
    • SinReglas (Mexico) –  A digital menopause platform, offering personalized care and workplace services responsive to the health needs of millions of women during all stages of their life cycle, including menopause.
    • Smart Scope® CX (India) – An AI-powered portable device from Periwinkle Technologies that enables community health care workers to detect early-stage cervical cancer and certain benign conditions within 60 seconds without the need for electricity or internet, and facilitates remote triaging.

    These women-led solutions were selected for their scale potential and demonstrated impact. The Equalizer Challenge shows UNFPA’s commitment to supporting women-centric health solutions by closing funding gaps, and helping them develop, gain visibility, and reach the market.Through targeted innovation challenges, UNFPA transforms community-led innovations into high-impact, investable solutions spearheaded by women and young people.

    UNFPA Press Contact: media@unfpa.org 

    Disclaimer: UNFPA is providing support for the Equalizer Challenge with a view to furthering the development and availability of women’s health innovations. UNFPA has not or may not have evaluated, assessed, or tested the innovative solutions or products included or presented in this Challenge. In particular, the inclusion or presentation of any solution or product in this Challenge does not constitute an endorsement or recommendation by UNFPA.

    MIL OSI United Nations News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: UConn Hosts Sustainability Summit for Northeast Higher Education

    Source: US State of Connecticut

    Nearly all higher education institutions in the Northeast have demonstrated a commitment to sustainability, and most have an Office of Sustainability. While each university has its own unique challenges in pursuing environmental progress, many of these offices face similar issues – How do we get students prepared for green careers? What’s the most efficient way to run a move-out donation program?

    UConn Office of Sustainability Director, Patrick McKee, welcomes guests to the NECSC Summit.

    That’s where the Northeast Campus Sustainability Consortium (NECSC) comes in! The NECSC was established in 2004 to support sustainability officers in advancing progress on university campuses in the northeast and Canadian maritime region. The NECSC is an informal group, but commits to hosting an annual meeting to provide members close networking opportunities, professional development and access to the area’s vibrant sustainability practitioner community. Hosts of the annual gathering are leaders of sustainability in the region.

    Following 2024’s annual summit at Southern New Hampshire University, UConn’s Office of Sustainability and Connecticut College agreed to co-host the event for 2025. The NECSC conference is also an opportunity to highlight the hosts’ sustainability progress and leadership regionally. UConn’s Avery Point Campus was the perfect location – not only is it a gorgeous waterfront campus, it also plays an outsize role in environmental progress for Connecticut.

    In 2021, Avery Point upgraded 121 of their outdoor light fixtures with LED lights which saved 25 tons of carbon dioxide over the course of a year. The Student Center secured LEED Silver Certification in recognition of its energy efficiency in 2023. Avery Point is also home to the Connecticut Institute for Resilience and Climate Adaptation (CIRCA) and Connecticut Sea Grant which act as research hubs for climate resilience, coastal ecosystems, and aquaculture within Long Island Sound. Faculty and students are collaborating with Eversource and Orsted on a $1.25m grant to understand the impact of offshore wind projects on marine habitats, including project Starboard Wind. EcoHusky is the student-run organization that organizes yearly sustainability events for faculty and students including the Earth Day Event, supported by the Office of Sustainability in 2025. EcoHusky was also a part of securing an Environmental and Sustainability Small Grant from the Office of Sustainability in 2022 to install a solar panel and wind turbine on the sailing shed to provide independent, renewable-energy sources for campus buildings. In December of 2024, UConn entered a historical memorandum with CT’s five recognized tribes to establish Avery Point as a Native-American Serving, Nontribal Intuition (NASNTI) to reach at least 10% Native American enrollment and supporting tribal education through academics and community engagement.

    Nearly 100 higher education sustainability staff and faculty members attended the NECSC summit, held June 9-11, 2025. Ranging from Maryland to Maine, attendees hailed from Ivies, state universities and private liberal arts schools. The event kicked off with a keynote address by Dr. Annemarie Seifert, Dean of UConn Avery Point, and was followed by engaging sessions on creating circular economies on campus, geothermal buildings, decarbonization communications and more.

    Leaders of higher ed’s preeminent sustainability networks provided global perspectives on shifting political landscapes for sustainability. Megan Fay Zahniser, Executive Director of the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education, and Tim Carter, President of Second Nature, urged attendees to work together and with their home communities to push for continued environmental progress.

    Throughout the event, UConn Dining provided excellent food and low-waste catering. Mike White, Executive Director of UConn Dining Services, spoke about their team’s dedication to reducing food waste, using local and organic produce, and UConn’s partnership with Quantum Biopower which converts food scraps into energy. All attendees enjoyed menus featuring cheese from local farms like Cato Corner in Colchester, and greens from Full Moon Farm in Hampton.

    Guests participated in marine research in Long Island Sound with Project Oceanology.

    The NECSC summit concluded with a marine biology excursion on Long Island Sound. Project Oceanology, a nonprofit marine education and research facility, took guests out on a ship to catch, record, and measure sea life from the sound. They also took the crew up the Thames River for a closer look at the offshore wind assembly pier.

    “It is always uplifting to network, share stories, insights, and best practices as we work to collectively make a larger impact on the planet and in the lives of students,” shares Patrick McKee, Director of the UConn Office of Sustainability. “It was a pleasure co-hosting the NECSC Summit at UConn Avery Point, and we look forward to visiting Rutgers in 2026.”

    To learn more about NECSC and join the mailing list, click here.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: New project to protect Cambridge’s chalk streams

    Source: Anglia Ruskin University

    The Granta, a tributary of the river Cam

    A new project dedicated to studying and preserving Cambridge’s chalk streams is being launched at Anglia Ruskin University’s East Road campus on Wednesday, 16 July.

    It is estimated that 85% of the world’s chalk streams are found in the UK, with the majority located in the south of England and East Anglia. These streams, fed by springs in chalk bedrock, provide clean and clear water that supports a huge variety of wildlife.

    However, once pristine, many local chalk streams are being degraded by a range of factors including water extraction, pollution, the erosion of riverbanks, and invasive species.

    The Greater Cambridge Chalk Stream Project is a collaboration between Cambridge City Council and Anglia Ruskin University (ARU), and is bringing together experts to study the threats faced by local chalk streams, such as Hobson’s Brook and Cherry Hinton Brook in Cambridge, and highlight practical ways to protect them.

    The project kicks off with a free conference at ARU, running from 10am-4pm on 16 July, featuring presentations by leading environmental scientists. Topics will range from groundwater depletion and sediment loading to aquatic biodiversity and emerging contaminants.

    Geologist and ecologist Dr Steve Boreham will focus on the pressure chalk aquifers are facing from water extraction, while Dr Mike Foley of Cam Valley Forum will share insights from his citizen science water quality monitoring work.

    Dr Tory Milner of Keele University will examine the impact of sediment and gravel accumulation on chalk streams, while Professor Angela Gurnell will cover the important role of submerged aquatic plants.

    From ARU, Dr Toby Carter will discuss the connection between brown trout populations and the health of chalk streams, Dr Alvin Helden will demonstrate how monitoring aquatic macroinvertebrates, such as mayflies and caddisflies, can indicate water quality and habitat condition, and Dr Bas Boots will address the risks posed by new pollutants, including PFAS “forever chemicals” and microplastics.

    The conference will also introduce the Greater Cambridge Chalk Stream Project’s citizen science programme, offering opportunities to participate in water quality testing, photography, sediment trapping and the monitoring of riverbank erosion. Taking place weekly over two years, the citizen science monitoring will be co-ordinated by ARU.

    “Chalk streams are globally rare freshwater habitats and we’re fortunate to have them in and around the city. However, many of these precious ecosystems are now significantly degraded and at risk.

    “The Greater Cambridge Chalk Stream Project will investigate local sites to understand habitat loss, biodiversity reduction, and water quality issues. By bringing everyone together, including involving local community volunteers, we hope to obtain detailed information about each stream to help inform Cambridge City Council’s restoration strategies and safeguard our chalk streams for future generations.”

    Emma Dominic, research assistant at ARU for the Greater Cambridge Chalk Stream Project

    To register for the free event at ARU’s East Road campus on Wednesday, 16 July, please visit https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/greater-cambridge-chalk-stream-project-gccsp-launch-conference-tickets-1407358650609

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –