Piloting Citizen Science Methods to Measure Perceptions of Carbon Footprint and Energy Content of Food

© Copyright © 2020 Armstrong, Bridge, Oakden, Reynolds, Wang, Panzone, Rivera, Kause, Ffoulkes, Krawczyk, Miller and Serjeant. There is a food knowledge disconnect between the food research community, and the general population. Food experts know detailed information about foods, but there is a lack of understanding about what citizens know. Citizen science has been used successfully in various fields however, is virtually absent from food research. This pilot study explores the efficacy of Zooniverse citizen science platform as a method of food citizen research, and assesses the impact of response method, food type, portion size and weight information, on estimates of carbon footprint and energy content. Estimates of the carbon footprint (grams of carbon dioxide equivalent) and energy content (Kcal) of 10 foods were measured in a 3 (Between: Response Method; multiple-choice, slider, text box) × 3 (Within: portion size; small, medium, large) × 2 (Between: weight information; present, absent) observational survey. Citizens (N = ~516, unique IP addresses) were recruited via informal email networks. Kruskal–Wallis and Chi-square analyses compared citizen estimations with validated values, and assessed the impact of the variables on estimations. The majority of carbon footprint and energy content estimates were inaccurate, with citizens typically overestimating values. We observe an unexpected correlation between carbon footprint and energy content estimates. Portion size impacts perceptions, with estimations increasing with larger portion sizes. Weight information impacts perceptions, with estimations of carbon footprint being lower, and estimates of energy content being higher when weight information is present. Input method significantly affects observed values, estimates of carbon footprint and energy content estimates were lowest using the text box, followed by the slider tool, highest estimates were given using multiple choice. Citizens are unable to accurately estimate the carbon footprint and energy content of foods, though citizens may possess understanding of the hierarchy of values. These compelling findings highlight the need for consumer education, with a focus on carbon footprint, to precede interventions intended to move consumers toward more sustainable and healthy diets. We have demonstrated that citizen science can be used to measure food carbon footprint and energy content perceptions, and the slider tool offers greater sensitivity of estimation and functionality than other input methods

Multiplexed detection and applications for separations on parallel microchips

Much work has been performed since the development of the lab-on-a-chip concept that has brought microfabricated systems to the forefront of bioanalytical research. The success of using these microchips for performing complicated biological assays faster and cheaper than conventional methods has facilitated their emerging popularity among researchers. A recently exploited advantage of microfabricated technology has led to the creation of single wafers with multiple channel manifolds for high-throughput experiments. Efforts toward parallel microchip development have yielded fascinating new devices for chemical separations showing the potential for replacing conventional multiplexing techniques. This review will focus on recent work toward multiplexed separations on microdevices and complementary detection instrumentation.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/60902/1/3296_ftp.pd

The Phase II Murchison Widefield Array: Design overview

We describe the motivation and design details of the "Phase II" upgrade of the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) radio telescope. The expansion doubles to 256 the number of antenna tiles deployed in the array. The new antenna tiles enhance the capabilities of the MWA in several key science areas. Seventy-two of the new tiles are deployed in a regular configuration near the existing MWA core. These new tiles enhance the surface brightness sensitivity of the MWA and will improve the ability of the MWA to estimate the slope of the Epoch of Reionisation power spectrum by a factor of ~3.5. The remaining 56 tiles are deployed on long baselines, doubling the maximum baseline of the array and improving the array u,v coverage. The improved imaging capabilities will provide an order of magnitude improvement in the noise floor of MWA continuum images. The upgrade retains all of the features that have underpinned the MWA's success (large field-of-view, snapshot image quality, pointing agility) and boosts the scientific potential with enhanced imaging capabilities and by enabling new calibration strategies

Evolution of Disease Response Genes in Loblolly Pine: Insights from Candidate Genes

BACKGROUND: Host-pathogen interactions that may lead to a competitive co-evolution of virulence and resistance mechanisms present an attractive system to study molecular evolution because strong, recent (or even current) selective pressure is expected at many genomic loci. However, it is unclear whether these selective forces would act to preserve existing diversity, promote novel diversity, or reduce linked neutral diversity during rapid fixation of advantageous alleles. In plants, the lack of adaptive immunity places a larger burden on genetic diversity to ensure survival of plant populations. This burden is even greater if the generation time of the plant is much longer than the generation time of the pathogen. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Here, we present nucleotide polymorphism and substitution data for 41 candidate genes from the long-lived forest tree loblolly pine, selected primarily for their prospective influences on host-pathogen interactions. This dataset is analyzed together with 15 drought-tolerance and 13 wood-quality genes from previous studies. A wide range of neutrality tests were performed and tested against expectations from realistic demographic models. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: Collectively, our analyses found that axr (auxin response factor), caf1 (chromatin assembly factor) and gatabp1 (gata binding protein 1) candidate genes carry patterns consistent with directional selection and erd3 (early response to drought 3) displays patterns suggestive of a selective sweep, both of which are consistent with the arm-race model of disease response evolution. Furthermore, we have identified patterns consistent with diversifying selection at erf1-like (ethylene responsive factor 1), ccoaoemt (caffeoyl-CoA-O-methyltransferase), cyp450-like (cytochrome p450-like) and pr4.3 (pathogen response 4.3), expected under the trench-warfare evolution model. Finally, a drought-tolerance candidate related to the plant cell wall, lp5, displayed patterns consistent with balancing selection. In conclusion, both arms-race and trench-warfare models seem compatible with patterns of polymorphism found in different disease-response candidate genes, indicating a mixed strategy of disease tolerance evolution for loblolly pine, a major tree crop in southeastern United States

Comprehensive transcriptome analysis of the highly complex Pisum sativum genome using next generation sequencing

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The garden pea, <it>Pisum sativum</it>, is among the best-investigated legume plants and of significant agro-commercial relevance. <it>Pisum sativum </it>has a large and complex genome and accordingly few comprehensive genomic resources exist.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We analyzed the pea transcriptome at the highest possible amount of accuracy by current technology. We used next generation sequencing with the Roche/454 platform and evaluated and compared a variety of approaches, including diverse tissue libraries, normalization, alternative sequencing technologies, saturation estimation and diverse assembly strategies. We generated libraries from flowers, leaves, cotyledons, epi- and hypocotyl, and etiolated and light treated etiolated seedlings, comprising a total of 450 megabases. Libraries were assembled into 324,428 unigenes in a first pass assembly.</p> <p>A second pass assembly reduced the amount to 81,449 unigenes but caused a significant number of chimeras. Analyses of the assemblies identified the assembly step as a major possibility for improvement. By recording frequencies of Arabidopsis orthologs hit by randomly drawn reads and fitting parameters of the saturation curve we concluded that sequencing was exhaustive. For leaf libraries we found normalization allows partial recovery of expression strength aside the desired effect of increased coverage. Based on theoretical and biological considerations we concluded that the sequence reads in the database tagged the vast majority of transcripts in the aerial tissues. A pathway representation analysis showed the merits of sampling multiple aerial tissues to increase the number of tagged genes. All results have been made available as a fully annotated database in fasta format.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>We conclude that the approach taken resulted in a high quality - dataset which serves well as a first comprehensive reference set for the model legume pea. We suggest future deep sequencing transcriptome projects of species lacking a genomics backbone will need to concentrate mainly on resolving the issues of redundancy and paralogy during transcriptome assembly.</p

An analysis of the halo and relic radio emission from Abell 3376 from Murchison Widefield Array observations

This article has been accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. © 2015 The Authors. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society.We have carried out multiwavelength observations of the near-by ($z=0.046$) rich, merging galaxy cluster Abell 3376 with the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA). As a part of the GaLactic and Extragalactic All-sky MWA survey (GLEAM), this cluster was observed at 88, 118, 154, 188 and 215 MHz. The known radio relics, towards the eastern and western peripheries of the cluster, were detected at all the frequencies. The relics, with a linear extent of $\sim$ 1 Mpc each, are separated by $\sim$ 2 Mpc. Combining the current observations with those in the literature, we have obtained the spectra of these relics over the frequency range 80 -- 1400 MHz. The spectra follow power laws, with $\alpha$ = $-1.17\pm0.06$ and $-1.37\pm0.08$ for the west and east relics, respectively ($S \propto \nu^{\alpha}$). Assuming the break frequency to be near the lower end of the spectrum we estimate the age of the relics to be $\sim$ 0.4 Gyr. No diffuse radio emission from the central regions of the cluster (halo) was detected. The upper limit on the radio power of any possible halo that might be present in the cluster is a factor of 35 lower than that expected from the radio power and X-ray luminosity correlation for cluster halos. From this we conclude that the cluster halo is very extended ($>$ 500 kpc) and/or most of the radio emission from the halo has decayed. The current limit on the halo radio power is a factor of ten lower than the existing upper limits with possible implications for models of halo formation.Peer reviewe

GLEAM : The GaLactic and Extragalactic All-sky MWA survey

© Astronomical Society of Australia 2015; published by Cambridge University Press. This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt and build upon this work, for commercial use, provided the original work is properly cited. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/GLEAM, the GaLactic and Extragalactic All-sky MWA survey, is a survey of the entire radio sky south of declination +25 deg at frequencies between 72 and 231 MHz, made with the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) using a drift scan method that makes efficient use of the MWA's very large field-of-view. We present the observation details, imaging strategies and theoretical sensitivity for GLEAM. The survey ran for two years, the first year using 40 kHz frequency resolution and 0.5 s time resolution; the second year using 10 kHz frequency resolution and 2 s time resolution. The resulting image resolution and sensitivity depends on observing frequency, sky pointing and image weighting scheme. At 154 MHz the image resolution is approximately 2.5 x 2.2/cos(DEC+26.7) arcmin with sensitivity to structures up to ~10 deg in angular size. We provide tables to calculate the expected thermal noise for GLEAM mosaics depending on pointing and frequency and discuss limitations to achieving theoretical noise in Stokes I images. We discuss challenges, and their solutions, that arise for GLEAM including ionospheric effects on source positions and linearly polarised emission, and the instrumental polarisation effects inherent to the MWA's primary beam.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

On the detection and tracking of space debris using the Murchison Widefield Array. I. Simulations and test observations demonstrate feasibility

The Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) is a new low-frequency interferometric radio telescope, operating in the benign radio frequency environment of remote Western Australia. The MWA is the low-frequency precursor to the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) and is the first of three SKA precursors to be operational, supporting a varied science mission ranging from the attempted detection of the Epoch of Reionization to the monitoring of solar flares and space weather. In this paper we explore the possibility that the MWA can be used for the purposes of Space Situational Awareness (SSA). In particular we propose that the MWA can be used as an element of a passive radar facility operating in the frequency range 87.5-108 MHz (the commercial FM broadcast band). In this scenario the MWA can be considered the receiving element in a bi-static radar configuration, with FM broadcast stations serving as non-cooperative transmitters. The FM broadcasts propagate into space, are reflected off debris in Earth orbit and are received at the MWA. The imaging capabilities of the MWA can be used to simultaneously detect multiple pieces of space debris, image their positions on the sky as a function of time and provide tracking data that can be used to determine orbital parameters. Such a capability would be a valuable addition to Australian and global SSA assets, in terms of southern and eastern hemispheric coverage. We provide a feasibility assessment of this proposal, based on simple calculations and electromagnetic simulations, that shows that the detection of sub-meter size debris should be possible (debris radius of &#62;0.5 m to &#8764;1000 km altitude). We also present a proof-of-concept set of observations that demonstrate the feasibility of the proposal, based on the detection and tracking of the International Space Station via reflected FM broadcast signals originating in southwest Western Australia. These observations broadly validate our calculations and simulations. We discuss some significant challenges that need to be addressed in order to turn the feasible concept into a robust operational capability for SSA. The aggregate received power due to reflections off space debris in the FM band is equivalent to a &#60;1 mJy increase in the background confusion noise for the long integrations needed for Epoch of Reionization experiments, which is insignificant

Ionospheric modelling using GPS to calibrate the MWA. 1 : Comparison of first order ionospheric effects between GPS models and MWA observations

This document is the Accepted Manuscript version of the following article: B. S. Arora, et al, ‘Ionospheric Modelling using GPS to Calibrate the MWA. I: Comparison of First Order Ionospheric Effects between GPS Models and MWA Observations’, Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia, Vol. 32, e029, August 2015. The final, published version is available online at doi: https://doi.org/10.1017/pasa.2015.29. COPYRIGHT: © Astronomical Society of Australia 2015.We compare first order (refractive) ionospheric effects seen by the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) with the ionosphere as inferred from Global Positioning System (GPS) data. The first order ionosphere manifests itself as a bulk position shift of the observed sources across an MWA field of view. These effects can be computed from global ionosphere maps provided by GPS analysis centres, namely the Center for Orbit Determination in Europe (CODE), using data from globally distributed GPS receivers. However, for the more accurate local ionosphere estimates required for precision radio astronomy applications, data from local GPS networks needs to be incorporated into ionospheric modelling. For GPS observations, the ionospheric parameters are biased by GPS receiver instrument delays, among other effects, also known as receiver Differential Code Biases (DCBs). The receiver DCBs need to be estimated for any non-CODE GPS station used for ionosphere modelling, a requirement for establishing dense GPS networks in arbitrary locations in the vicinity of the MWA. In this work, single GPS station-based ionospheric modelling is performed at a time resolution of 10 minutes. Also the receiver DCBs are estimated for selected Geoscience Australia (GA) GPS receivers, located at Murchison Radio Observatory (MRO1), Yarragadee (YAR3), Mount Magnet (MTMA) and Wiluna (WILU). The ionospheric gradients estimated from GPS are compared with the ionospheric gradients inferred from radio source position shifts observed with the MWA. The ionospheric gradients at all the GPS stations show a correlation with the gradients observed with the MWA. The ionosphere estimates obtained using GPS measurements show promise in terms of providing calibration information for the MWA.Peer reviewe

Decoding verbal working memory representations of Chinese characters from Broca's area

Representations of sensory working memory can be found across the entire neocortex. But how are verbal working memory (VWM) contents retained in the human brain? Here we used fMRI and multi-voxel pattern analyses to study Chinese native speakers (15 males, 13 females) memorizing Chinese characters. Chinese characters are uniquely suitable to study VWM because verbal encoding is encouraged by their complex visual appearance and monosyllabic pronunciation. We found that activity patterns in Broca's area and left premotor cortex carried information about the memorized characters. These language-related areas carried (1) significantly more information about cued characters than those not cued for memorization, (2) significantly more information on the left than the right hemisphere and (3) significantly more information about Chinese symbols than complex visual patterns which are hard to verbalize. In contrast, early visual cortex carries a comparable amount of information about cued and uncued stimuli and is thus unlikely to be involved in memory retention. This study provides evidence for verbal working memory maintenance in a distributed network of language-related brain regions, consistent with distributed accounts of WM. The results also suggest that Broca's area and left premotor cortex form the articulatory network which serves articulatory rehearsal in the retention of verbal working memory contents