PATH-SAFE consortium recommendations for genomic surveillance of foodborne diseases, using Salmonella as an exemplar

Whole-genome sequencing (WGS) for foodborne disease (FBD) surveillance provides many benefits, including new insights in disease transmission, virulence and antimicrobial resistance (AMR), fast and precise outbreak tracing and source attribution, as well as, enabling streamlined and reproducible analysis through digital data that from a technical point of view can be easily shared. The National foodborne disease genomic data platform, developed as part of the PATH-SAFE programme, will offer a trusted environment for WGS data sharing and analysis for UK agencies involved in FBD surveillance. The platform has initially been built for Salmonella with the intention to expand it to other organisms later. Where possible, the platform has drawn on existing and validated solutions as implemented in EnteroBase, PubMLST and Pathogenwatch. The platform is hosted on CLIMB-BIG-DATA and has been built to enable interoperability between analytical tools and databases. Although a fully interoperable bioinformatics system for FBD and AMR surveillance is not practically feasible at this time, it should be a long-term goal. Recommendations on which tools to use for molecular surveillance of Salmonella have been developed in consultation with Community Input Advisory Groups (CIAGs) on 1) technical aspects of FBD surveillance, 2) AMR risk determinants, 3) data standards for FBD surveillance, 4) considerations for international molecular FBD surveillance. The purpose of this document is to act as a standard reference for methodologies for genomic surveillance of FBD to support FSA goals and achieve the benefits laid out above. The recommendations have been developed using non-typhoidal Salmonella as an example

The sword and the cane: martial arts weapons and the boundaries of cognition

In martial arts, pedagogical approaches have tended to conceptualise weapons training as the imbuing of technique through imitation coupled with extensive practice, rendering the weapon an external implement and the learner a static recipient of knowledge. I propose that weapons learning is an emergent, enactive development resulting from the dynamic coupling of body, artefact, and environment. In this light, weapons are not passive tools but cognitive artefacts shaping perception, constraining action, and guiding skill development. Learning emerges from situated interaction, perceptual attunement, and the adoption of the weapon into the practitioner's suite of skilled actions. This shift repositions martial arts pedagogy as a primarily transformational rather than transmissional process. Weapons participate directly in processes of embodiment, transforming movement, awareness, and intention. From this perspective, martial arts practices exemplify paradigmatically material-mediated cognition, where learning occurs not solely through imagination but through active participation and situated attunement

Probability of ruin within finite time and Cramér–Lundberg inequality for fractional risk processes

While the interarrival times of the classical Poisson process are exponentially distributed, complex systems often exhibit non-exponential patterns, motivating the use of the fractional Poisson process, in which interarrival times follow a Mittag–Leffler distribution. This paper investigates the associated risk process, describes its Cramér–Lundberg formula and establishes a relationship between the continuous premium rate and the fractional claim frequency. For a compound fractional risk process with exponential claims, we derive closed-form expressions for the finite-time ruin probability. Furthermore, for a general claim distribution, we provide ruin probability estimates that can serve as a basis for developing reinsurance strategies

A survey of the special care specialist workforce and its speciality trainees.

Objectives 1) To explore the professional careers of the target population, including location; 2) to investigate their current role and working patterns; and 3) to explore the perceptions of the speciality and its future direction from the perspective of its workforce.Methods An online questionnaire survey of the special care dentistry workforce nationally was conducted in 2022 (MRA-21/22-29397) using Qualtrics Software. Participants were recruited via multiple professional routes. Data were exported and analysed in Microsoft Excel Version 16.77.Results Approximately half the target population responded (n = 164; 51%), comprising consultants (n = 50; 30%), specialist trainees (n = 23; 14%) and others (n = 91; 56%), such as specialists (Band C) and senior dental officers. Three-quarters of participants were female (n = 122; 75%), with over half working part-time (n = 94; 58%). Most practised in the community dental service (n = 83; 51%), followed by a combination of both hospital and community dental services (n = 32; 20%), and hospital dental service (n = 25; 16%).Specialists raised concerned about poor access to care for people with special care needs and the volume of inappropriate referrals to their services. Given an increasingly ageing and medically complex population nationally, almost all raised concerns about inadequate workforce capacity and coverage. Specific concerns related to training pathway provisions and the limited availability and accessibility of appropriately remunerated specialist roles.Conclusion The special care dentistry workforce is female-dominated with many part-time workers. Participants reported concerns regarding the size of the specialty, patient needs and training opportunities. Workforce planning, informed by modelling of anticipated population needs, and innovation care pathways are recommended to ensure an equitable future service. [Abstract copyright: © 2025. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to the British Dental Association.

Experts’ insights on physical environmental factors impacting the use of urban public open spaces for physical activity

Studies on physical activity (PA) in urban public open spaces (UPOS) have explored the individual, social, physical, and environmental factors influencing PA engagement. However, there is a lack of focus on identifying the factors that attract users to open spaces for PA. This gap is significant, especially given the declining health patterns among young adults due to insufficient PA and rapid urbanization in the 21st century. Consequently, there is increasing interest in identifying the physical and environmental factors that positively impact the use of open spaces for PA. This study aimed to identify the key physical and environmental factors influencing young adults' use of publicly accessible open spaces in urban settings for PA. Online semi-structured interviews with 18 experts in architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, and public health were conducted between May and September 2023. Interviews were transcribed and analyzed using NVivo 14 software, and thematic analysis was applied to derive categories and subcategories. This study validated broader concepts of physical and environmental factors affecting the use of UPOS for PA, highlighting perceived safety as a significant social and physical factor. This research identified both compositional (within) and contextual (outside) attributes as fundamental in attracting users to urban open spaces for PA. Other important subfactors that supported visiting the UPOS to perform PA included trees and vegetation, destinations within walking distance, mixed-use neighborhoods, proximity, and connectivity to open spaces. A combination of these physical and environmental factors was found to positively influence the use of UPOS for PA

Ecological drivers of parasite genetic diversity: evidence for dilution effects in a single strongylid species infecting sympatric Bornean primates

Biodiversity loss and emerging diseases threaten ecosystem and human health. Identifying ecological drivers of host-parasite dynamics in human-altered landscapes is crucial, including at the scale of parasite genetic diversity. We investigated genetic diversity and ecological drivers of gastrointestinal strongylid nematodes infecting a primate community in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo. We surveyed primates in the Lower Kinabatangan Wildlife Sanctuary, and used high-throughput sequencing (HTS) of ITS2 rDNA from 250 fecal samples (five out of ten sympatric primates). Through boat-surveys and remote sensing, we assessed habitat quality, host diversity, and density effects on parasite genetic alpha and beta diversity—i.e., sample amplicon sequence variant (ASV) richness, evenness and composition. Matching previous reports, HTS confirmed Oesophagostomum aculeatum as the sole strongylid species, exhibiting variable ASV diversity. Primate host diversity exerted a negative effect—a.k.a. a dilution effect—on O. aculeatum ASV richness during the wet season, controlling for strong seasonality. Effects of habitat quality and host density were inconsistent on ASV richness. No effect was found on ASV evenness. ASV composition varied by host species, season, and habitat quality, but not primate diversity or density. By demonstrating a local dilution effect at a small spatial and phylogenetic scale, our findings emphasize the importance of integrating ecological and molecular approaches. This study provides a baseline for future research on host-parasite co-evolution in Southeast Asian primates, ecological drivers of parasite genetic diversity, and insights into how phenomena like the diversity-disease relationship can operate across nested scales, with implications for disease emergence risks

A physics-informed demonstration-guided learning framework for granular material manipulation

Due to the complex physical properties of granular materials, research on robot learning for manipulating such materials predominantly either disregards the consideration of their physical characteristics or uses surrogate models to approximate their physical properties. Learning to manipulate granular materials based on physical information obtained through precise modeling remains an unsolved problem. In this article, we propose to address this challenge by constructing a differentiable physics-based simulator for granular materials using the Taichi programming language and developing a learning framework accelerated by demonstrations generated through gradient-based optimization on nongranular materials within our simulator, eliminating the costly data collection and model training of prior methods. Experimental results show that our method, with its flexible design, trains robust policies that are capable of executing the task of transporting granular materials in both simulated and real-world environments, beyond the capabilities of standard reinforcement learning (RL), imitation learning (IL), and prior task-specific granular manipulation methods