Book review: In fading light: the films of the Amber Collective by James Leggott

In In Fading Light: The Films of the Amber Collective, James Leggott offers the first full-length scholarly study of the films produced by the Amber Film & Photography Collective through over five decades of engagement with the working-class communities of North East England. This is a valuable and insightful contribution to a neglected area of British film history, writes Tom Draper, that will hopefully inspire further work building on this foundational text

A low molecular weight hydrogel with unusual gel aging

We describe a dipeptide hydrogel with unusual aging characteristics. Over time, a transformation from a turbid gel to a transparent gel occurs which is initiated from the air–water interface. Here, we investigate this transition and discuss the implications of this aging on the bulk properties of the gel

Ethical values and social care robots for older people : an international qualitative study

Values such as respect for autonomy, safety, enablement, independence, privacy and social connectedness should be reflected in the design of social robots. The same values should affect the process by which robots are introduced into the homes of old people to support independent living. These values may, however, be in tension. We explored what potential users thought about these values, and how the tensions between them could be resolved. With the help of partners in the ACCOMPANY project, 21 focus groups (123 participants) were convened in France, the Netherlands and the UK. These groups consisted of: (i) older people, (ii) informal carers and (iii) formal carers of older people. The participants were asked to discuss scenarios in which there is a conflict between older people and others over how a robot should be used, these conflicts reflecting tensions between values. Participants favoured compromise, persuasion and negotiation as a means of reaching agreement. Roles and related role-norms for the robot were thought relevant to resolving tensions, as were hypothetical agreements between users and robot-providers before the robot is introduced into the home. Participants' understanding of each of the values – autonomy, safety, enablement, independence, privacy and social connectedness – is reported. Participants tended to agree that autonomy often has priority over the other values, with the exception in certain cases of safety. The second part of the paper discusses how the values could be incorporated into the design of social robots and operationalised in line with the views expressed by the participants

Comments on the Entanglement Spectrum of de Sitter Space

We argue that the Schwarzschild-de Sitter black hole entropy formula does not imply that the entanglement spectrum of the vacuum density matrix of de Sitter space is flat. Specifically, we show that the expectation value of a random projection operator of dimension $d\gg 1$, on a Hilbert space of dimension $D\gg d$ and in a density matrix $\rho = e^{-K}$ with strictly positive spectrum, is $\frac{d}{D}\left(1 + o(\frac{1}{\sqrt{d}})\right)$, independent of the spectrum of the density matrix. In addition, for a suitable class of spectra the asymptotic estimates ${\rm Tr} (\rho K) \sim {\rm ln}\ D - o(1)$ and ${\rm Tr} [\rho (K - \langle K\rangle)^2] = a \langle K \rangle$ are compatible for any order one constant $a$. We discuss a simple family of matrix models and projections that can replicate such modular Hamiltonians and the SdS entropy formula.Comment: 10 page

The role of South Africa in global structural policy

"In the immediate post-Apartheid period many commentators gave the country, and the newly elected African National Congress (ANC) government, short shrift. Whilst there was a predominant air of hope an underlying 'Afro-pessimism' was prevalent. Now, after more than 10 years of sustained - albeit fairly sedentary - economic expansion and a recent acceleration in the growth trajectory opinions are being revised. This re-evaluation is naturally supported by the government. But significant domestic problems remain. These problems play out in South Africa's approach to global economic and political relations, and underpin the analysis in this report. How might these dynamics play out in specific 'global structural domains' in the future? This report is structured as follows: Part two considers South Africa in the global and African contexts. It begins by reviewing South Africa's integration into and prospects in the global economy. Then it considers the domestic socio-economic dynamics within which economic and social policy is formulated and charts the broad contours of economic policy since 1994. It then considers South Africa's environmental challenges and policy responses as a distinct set of challenges. It ends with a brief assessment of the country's domestic political institutions in light of the policy challenges outlined in the previous sections. Part three considers the South African government's views on and stances towards key global governance issues. It begins with a substantive overview of the country's evolving foreign policy in general, then considers a number of different issues in the global governance terrain. It then focuses specifically on global trade governance via the World Trade Organization, and situates this within a discussion of South Africa's broader trade strategy encompassing regional dynamics and bilateral negotiations. Part four briefly outlines the contours of German-South African relations and highlights some challenges in the relationship moving forward. Part five identifies key risk factors facing the South African government and, via a simple scenario exercise indicates possible avenues for deployment of German development assistance in order to assist the South African government to address those challenges." (excerpt

Graviton-Mediated Scattering Amplitudes from the Quantum Effective Action

We employ the curvature expansion of the quantum effective action for gravity-matter systems to construct graviton-mediated scattering amplitudes for non-minimally coupled scalar fields in a Minkowski background. By design, the formalism parameterises all quantum corrections to these processes and is manifestly gauge-invariant. The conditions resulting from UV-finiteness, unitarity, and causality are analysed in detail and it is shown by explicit construction that the quantum effective action provides sufficient room to meet these structural requirements without introducing non-localities or higher-spin degrees of freedom. Our framework provides a bottom-up approach to all quantum gravity programs seeking for the quantisation of gravity within the framework of quantum field theory. Its scope is illustrated by specific examples, including effective field theory, Stelle gravity, infinite derivative gravity, and Asymptotic Safety

Finite Quantum Gravity Amplitudes -- no strings attached

We study the gravity-mediated scattering of scalar fields based on a parameterisation of the Lorentzian quantum effective action. We demonstrate that the interplay of infinite towers of spin zero and spin two poles at imaginary squared momentum leads to scattering amplitudes that are compatible with unitarity bounds, causal, and scale-free at trans-Planckian energy. Our construction avoids introducing non-localities or the massive higher-spin particles that are characteristic in string theory.Comment: v2: various small improvements/clarifications, version accepted for publicatio

Will the NHS continue to function in an influenza pandemic? A survey of healthcare workers in the West Midlands, UK

If UK healthcare services are to respond effectively to pandemic influenza, levels of absenteeism amongst healthcare workers (HCWs) must be minimised. Current estimates of the likelihood that HCWs will continue to attend work during a pandemic are subject to scientific and predictive uncertainty, yet an informed evidence base is needed if contingency plans addressing the issues of HCW absenteeism are to be prepared