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Rhonda Olson, Улица Садовая, 73, Kyiv (2024)

02/08/2023

While Iceland today is an ultra-modern place where wi-fi is abundant, credit cards are accepted everywhere, and the majority of the country is powered by geothermal energy, it was only about 90 years ago that 50% of the population lived in turf houses (traditional homes with walls and roofs made of earth and grass) – so these hardships aren’t such a distant memory. Just 45 years ago, the Eldfell volcano exploded on the small island of Heimaey, spewing millions of tons of ash, engulfing 400 buildings and forcing the evacuation of all 5,000 people who lived there. And just 23 years ago, a massive avalanche decimated the town of Flateyri in the Westfjords, burying more than a dozen homes and killing 20 of the town’s 300 residents.

Even on a day without disasters, Iceland is beholden to the forces of nature. The island moves and breathes in a way few others do; fumaroles exhale steam; hot springs gurgle; geysers belch and bubble; waterfalls thunder. The country sits on the rift between the North American and Eurasian tectonic plates, and those plates are slowly moving apart, widening Iceland by about 3cm per year and causing an average of 500 small earthquakes every week.

24/07/2023

Toronto

Canada's largest city ranked a close second in the index in overall safety, with strong scores in infrastructure and environmental security. Residents credit an inclusive culture that values targeted communication across communities, especially when it comes to vaccine awareness and adoption.

Toronto resident Farida Talaat points to how the city initiated a number of community-specific vaccination programmes to help make the city safer. For instance, The Homebound Sprint Vaccination plan worked to complete first doses for residents who couldn't leave their homes; and the Black Scientists' Task Force on Vaccine Equity was established early in the vaccination effort to ensure a more equity-based approach to inoculation.

14/07/2023

Harrington, for one, had followed all of the safe sleep recommendations. To her, and to most SIDS researchers today, there had to be a reason why some babies in distress could rouse themselves, while others, like Damien, could not. (Technically, the diagnosis SIDS is now used only for infants under one. Damien's death today would be ruled "sudden unexplained death in childhood", or SUDC. But many researchers think that both the phenomena and causes could be similar).

"I couldn't understand why these babies don't wake up," Harrington says. "We've got really powerful survival mechanisms. A baby wakes us up pretty quickly when they're not happy."

Damien died in 1991. By 1994, Harrington, who already had a science degree with a major in biochemistry, had quit her job as an attorney to devote her career to researching SIDS. Last year, after more than 25 years, she was ready to give up. In December 2021, she was sure that her latest study, which looked at whether there was any association between a potential biochemical marker called butyrylcholinesterase (BChE) – an enzyme that plays a crucial role in autonomic functions like breathing and sleeping – and SIDS, wasn't going to find anything. She thought about retiring: spending her time painting, or honing her French.

Then she ran the numbers. In a sample size of about 700 babies, including 26 who died from SIDS, the SIDS infants had, on average, decreased BChE activity – as measured in dried blood spots taken two or three days after birth – compared to the babies who didn't die of SIDS.

Boosted by an enthusiastic press release, the findings ricocheted around the world. Headlines consistently oversold Harrington's study, claiming she'd found the "cause" of SIDS – or, alternatively, that a "cure" was imminent. Neither, sadly, is true.

"This is only a biomarker. It's not a cause," says Harrington. "At this stage, what it shows is an increased vulnerability. The study still has to be validated by an independent lab. But the world is so hungry for an answer because we just don't know which babies are going to die."

At first, the answer to what was happening seemed to lie in how babies were put down to sleep

11/07/2023

Once a degraded backwater, Argentina's Iberá Wetlands is home to a stunning collection of wildlife – and one of the continent's most ambitious eco-initiatives.

As the languid waters of the Carambolita stream shimmered in the early morning sun, our small flotilla of kayaks nosed its way against the gentle current. To one side, a cocoi heron picked its way across lilypads in search of frogs, its long-feathered plumes rising and falling in the soft breeze. On the other, a family of capybara stood partly submerged in the mud, while a languid yacaré caiman warmed itself nearby, mouth agape. Here in Iberá, every part of the aquatic landscape is seemingly filled with life.

Located in north-east Argentina, the Iberá Wetlands (Esteros del Iberá) are one of the most important freshwater ecosystems in South America: a 13,000-sq-km wilderness of lakes, floodplains, grassland and subtropical forest tucked into a corner of the nation's Corrientes Province, around 640km north of Buenos Aires. The wetlands, which are home to a stunning array of animals and plants – including more than 360 bird species – are an increasingly popular pilgrimage for wildlife enthusiasts. Yet it hasn't always been this way.

Three decades ago, Iberá (which means "shining waters" in the local Indigenous Guaraní language) was a degraded backwater that was virtually unknown outside Argentina. Years of commercial foresting, illegal hunting and cattle ranching had taken a toll on the land and thrown the ecosystem off balance. Today, thanks to a transformational rewilding initiative, it has become one of South America's premier wildlife-watching destinations.

06/07/2023

Differing obligations

Some workers may be much more inclined to feel grateful for their jobs than others.

Workers who expect to be hired or promoted may express less gratitude than those without systemic advantages. This is often the case for white men, who experience more upward mobility than other groups, and less bias that prevents them from securing jobs, or getting interviews in the first place. For instance, multiple studies have shown résumés with “white-sounding” names, and those that downplay racial cues, are significantly more likely to garner a response

Imposter syndrome may also play a part: workers who aren’t confident they deserve their roles may develop feelings of unworthiness, despite being qualified or skilled. Women are particularly vulnerable to imposter syndrome, and may find themselves giving outsize thanks for their jobs. And, in recent months, Latino and black Americans were significantly more likely to be affected by pandemic-related lay-offs than white Americans. Those among these groups who have kept their jobs are likely feeling pressure to express gratitude – even if they have to force it, and even if their workplace doesn’t inspire much to be thankful for.

03/07/2023

It was a visit to Padstow as a child that sparked Costin's long interest in folk custom. "We spent the holidays in Cornwall," he recalls. "It was May Day, and I was this seven-year-old turning the corner and suddenly seeing this enormous, bizarre, terrifying figure of the 'Oss, swaying above the crowds and the singing and the music. It was so potent. It was a moment of true magic, when people stepped outside the mundane reality of the day-to-day and became something else." At events, participants are "no longer the banker, the baker, the nurse, the schoolteacher," says Costin. "They've taken on this persona and they're engaging in a community-led activity, where all those things are forgotten because they're celebrating something very powerful."

Curiosity in folk customs ebbs and flows but, broadly, surges coincide with periods of deep reflection as well as malaise with current systems. "The first revival was around the Industrial Revolution, with the feeling that big industry was having a negative effect and that this way of life was getting lost and needed re-capturing," explains Hield. The second, better-known, revival took place in the 1960s and 1970s, with a "big rejection of the idea of 'The Man'. The revival of the 1960s was a shared rejection of mass leadership."

As Britons wrestle with a perfect storm of societal challenges – from the fallout of Brexit and economic turmoil, to the rapidly encroaching climate and ecological emergencies – today's revival of interest in folk culture feels like a search for continuity. "In England, there's currently a real confusion about how to be and how to feel English, yet we still want to do it," reflects Hield. "It's a human need to want a sense of pride in our place – and, at the moment, England is an uncomfortable place to be in. People are looking back to an older sense of England in order to reconnect with an identity that's not bound with more recent political histories."

29/06/2023

The first step is probably to find out if you are highly sensitive. A team of psychologists from different universities who study sensitivity have developed a free online test for this. Crucially, being highly sensitive is not a disorder but a personality trait – a certain way of responding to one's environment. In particular, highly sensitive people tend to react especially strongly to sensory stimulation, a characteristic known as sensory processing sensitivity (SPS).

"Generally, sensitive people have heightened perception, they perceive more details," explains Michael Pluess, a developmental psychologist at Queen Mary University of London who specialises in the study of highly sensitive people and co-developed the test. "They will pick up on the moods of other people and have higher empathy. They also process things more deeply so they will pick up more about the environment." That is, they have a tendency to ruminate on what they experience and can be deeply affected by what they see and feel (which explains why I can't watch horror films).

Being highly sensitive involves a brain response to certain events or experiences that is measurably different from that of less sensitive people.

In one study, researchers asked a randomly recruited group of people to take a high-sensitivity test – a set of questionnaires, similar to the online test – then showed them photos of happy and sad people, and monitored their brain activity through fMRI scans. The highly sensitive people in the group, who had scored high in the test, displayed stronger activations of regions of the brain involved in awareness and empathy compared to the less sensitive participants.

Other studies showed similar patterns of people with sensory processing sensitivity displaying especially strong brain activation in regions involved in empathy and reflective thinking.

26/06/2023

The West country aims to "lead the way" in developing hydrogen technology, to help achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

Bristol MP Chris Skidmore said he hoped investment in green technology will reach the region.

"If we do not take action now, that investment will go elsewhere," he said.

At the event Hydrogen Gateway, businesses and governments came together to "fight climate change and create new jobs".

The event held in Newport also displayed new net-zero technology.

One of the technologies showcased was a fully electric car which produces electricity as it drives by using hydrogen and air.

Andy Reynolds, head of hydrogen storage and distribution at Airbus, told BBC West: "We believe we can actually put a hydrogen aircraft in service in 2035.

"We have got a lot of people working on that now."

21/06/2023

Kelly Hoppen has built an international reputation as an interior designer through her work in the homes of celebrities and for corporate clients. A love of music has shaped both her life and her approach to design, she says.

"This morning I went up to my design studio and they were playing heavy rock. I looked up at the girls and said, 'Soz, I'm changing it.'"

Choosing the right music to create the right "buzz" for clients who come to visit her west London studio is of the utmost importance to Kelly Hoppen.

Music sets the mood for them, but it also helps her get creative. "It has to be a certain music for me to get into the zone to design," she explains.

In fact, it's often through discussion of music that the decisive creative breakthroughs with clients are made.

"I say to them, 'If you wanted your room to sound like a piece of music, what would it be?'" she says. "Some don't understand the question, but others say, 'Oh, 100%, Say A Little Prayer for You by Burt Bacharach.' And I get that!

"I can't explain why, but music is design to me."

16/06/2023

A Conservative MP has said delaying climate action risks damaging the UK's economic prospects, in a major review of the government's net zero plans.

The report by Chris Skidmore says the government's climate policies need to be more consistent and ambitious.

The UK is "falling behind" on some targets and needs a "new approach", the report says.

It calls for 25 actions within two years, including food eco-labelling, and phasing out gas boilers by 2033.

Mr Skidmore - the Tory MP who wrote the report - was commissioned by former prime minister Liz Truss to review the government's delivery of net zero, to ensure it was "pro-growth and pro-business".

Some green campaign groups praised the report for focusing on the economic opportunities of net zero and urged the government to heed its recommendations.

Labour's shadow climate secretary, Ed Miliband, said the government's lack of "urgency and consistency" was "depriving our country of the economic opportunities climate action offers".

And Green MP Caroline Lucas said the review itself shied away from calling for "truly transformative measures to end our dependence on dirty, dangerous fossil fuels".

The government said the UK was leading the world on tackling climate change and developing green jobs for the future.

14/06/2023

Prof Tom Pike from Imperial College London, UK, is one of the principal investigators on Insight's seismometer system. He told BBC News: "We've been able for the first time to look inside another planet using seismology, and what we have seen on Mars is that we have a bigger core and a lighter core than what was expected. And that does tell us quite a bit about how the planet evolved over geological time."

Dr Sanne Cottaar from Cambridge University is not on the mission team. She described the Insight results as a tour de force, given just how difficult it is to study the very small quakes that occur on Mars. They never get above a Magnitude 4, which humans would only notice within several kilometres of an event's epicenter.

"Marsquakes are very, very faint," she said. "It's much more challenging than doing seismology on Earth. Mission scientists have also had to develop methods for how to work with just the one seismometer represented by the InSight lander. So to then see this data come out, and for them to actually be able to look inside the planet with that data, is really quite impressive."

Details about the internal structure of Mars are reported in a series of scholarly papers in Science magazine. Dr Cottaar has a perspective published alongside them.

06/06/2023

At the start of May, the UK's Pension Regulator urged hundreds of pension funds to check if client data may have been compromised after Capita was the target of a suspected ransomware attack.

Capita said at the time its investigation suggested the cyber-incident occurred as a result of unauthorised access to its systems.

In an update posted on its website on 10 May, the firm said it had interrupted the attack and "significantly restricted" its impact, so only some data was extracted from "less than 0.1% of its server estate".

It said it had taken steps to recover and secure affected data and was working with necessary regulators, customers and suppliers to alert those affected.