American and Chinese scientists are decoupling, too - The Economist | Like human armies, army ants trail crowds of hangers-on - The Economist | A flying car that anyone can use will soon go on sale - The Economist | Glaciers on volcanoes could serve as early-warning systems

View online | Unsubscribe (one-click).
For inquiries/unsubscribe issues, Contact Us

?

?

?

?

?

?

You Might Like

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

Want to accelerate software development at your company? See how we can help.

Want to accelerate software development at your company? See how we can help.

American and Chinese scientists are decoupling, too - The Economist

Cause for celebration, no doubt, in Beijing. In Washington, though, the news may have been less welcome. America is increasingly dismayed by China’s rise—and especially its growing scientific and technological prowess. Under Donald Trump, the previous Republican president, and Joe Biden, the current Democratic one, it has imposed tariffs, rules and subsidies designed to hobble China’s high-tech firms while boosting its own. China has retaliated, moving against some big American tech companies. Twenty years ago, politicians endorsed globalisation and free trade. Now “decoupling”, national security and “friend-shoring” are the hot topics.

Academia is not immune. New rules and chilly politics in both countries are making it harder for researchers to collaborate. In August America agreed on a temporary, six-month extension for a landmark scientific co-operation agreement signed in 1979. Several American politicians want the deal scrapped entirely, claiming in an open letter that, by collaborating with Chinese researchers, America was “fuelling its own destruction.”

The strains can be seen in the figures. In 2020 the number of papers jointly written by American and Chinese researchers fell for the first time. It fell again the following year, the most recent for which data are available, though it is still rising for some other countries, such as Britain. The number of visas America awards to Chinese students and academics is down as well, to around a third of its peak in 2015 (see chart 2). Scientifically as well as politically, the countries are drawing apart.

Continued here

?

?

?

?

?

?

You Might Like

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

Want to accelerate software development at your company? See how we can help.

Want to accelerate software development at your company? See how we can help.

Like human armies, army ants trail crowds of hangers-on - The Economist

Like human armies, army ants spell trouble for anything that finds itself in their path. The insects make a habit of killing organisms, often much larger than themselves, breaking them into pieces and dragging the morsels back to their bivouacs. But they do not eat everything. Rubbish piles full with discarded bits of prey are a feature of army ant bases.

Where there is carrion, there are usually scavengers. But little is known about which animals scavenge on army ant leavings. As recounted in a paper in Ecology & Evolution, Christoph von Beeren at the Technical University of Darmstadt and Daniel Kronauer at the Rockefeller University in New York, both entomologists, went to the rainforests of Costa Rica to find out. They found an entire ecosystem in miniature thriving among the leftovers.

Tracking scavengers such as vultures or hyenas on the savannah can be done with a folding chair and a pair of binoculars. Monitoring tiny insects in a rainforest is much trickier—one reason why ant scavengers had not been examined before. But the researchers hoped modern DNA analysis techniques might make the job manageable. Working with a team of colleagues, they followed ant trails back to their bivouacs, finding 34 sites in total.

Continued here

?

?

?

?

?

?

You Might Like

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

Don't like ads? Go ad-free with TradeBriefs Premium

Want to accelerate software development at your company? See how we can help.

A flying car that anyone can use will soon go on sale - The Economist

Electrically powered vertical-take-off-and-landing (eVTOL) aircraft—flying cars, to the layman—are an idea whose time has not quite yet come, but is fast approaching. Many firms are jostling with each other, offering designs that range from scaled-up multirotor drones, via things which resemble rigid spiders’ webs, to fixed-wing/helicopter hybrids. None of these, however, will be Jetson-like family saloons with dad (or even mum) at the controls. Those flying them will require a pilot’s licence. Most will probably be used initially as sky-going taxis.

One company has, by contrast, stuck to its guns and carried through its original project to create something which people can purchase and pilot themselves. Helix is a single-seat vehicle, so “flying motorbike” might be a more accurate appellation. It has, however, been carefully crafted by its maker, Pivotal, based in Silicon Valley, to be within America’s rules for microlight aircraft. That means anyone, pilot’s licence or not, can fly it over non-built-up areas. As a result, from next year those with $190,000 stuffed down the back of the sofa will be able to order one for personal use—though they will not be able to take delivery until June.

It has been a hairy ride. Pivotal, known as Opener until October 5th, the day Helix was announced, was founded by Marcus Leng, a Canadian. Mr Leng is a mechanical engineer. In 2011, having built up and sold a manufacturing company, he found himself at a loose end. He had, he says, always been interested in flight, and some back-of-the-envelope calculations he made suggested that electric lift-off of a human-carrying craft, using motors powered by the lithium-ion batteries that were then becoming fashionable, ought to work.

Continued here

?

?

?

?

?

?

You Might Like

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

Glaciers on volcanoes could serve as early-warning systems - The Economist

Mapping glaciers was once a difficult and arduous job. So was monitoring volcanoes for the grumblings and rumblings that might herald an eruption. In recent decades, the old methods of hiking boots and mountaineering gear have been joined by satellites and remote sensing, making things both easier and safer.

But looking from afar has its drawbacks too. If a volcano is high enough to sport glaciers on its flanks (and many are), then the thick layer of ice can make it harder, or impossible, to get accurate temperature readings from the rock beneath.

And that is a particular problem, for glacier-topped volcanoes are some of the most dangerous of all. If they do erupt, the heat can melt the glaciers, forming torrents of fast-moving mud called lahars that can flatten anything in their path. In 1985 the Nevado del Ruiz volcano in western Colombia erupted. The glaciers on its summit and flanks formed several gigantic lahars, one of which buried the nearby town of Armero, killing more than 20,000 of its inhabitants. It remains the worst natural disaster in the country’s history.

Continued here

?

?

?

?

?

?

You Might Like

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

?

You are receiving this mailer as a TradeBriefs subscriber.
We fight fake/biased news through human curation & independent editorials.
Your support of ads like these makes it possible. Alternatively, get TradeBriefs Premium (ad-free) for only $2/month
If you still wish to unsubscribe, you can unsubscribe from all our emails here
Our address is 309 Town Center 1, Andheri Kurla Road, Andheri East, Mumbai 400059 - 93544947