Towards understanding interactions between Sustainable Development Goals: the role of environment–human linkages

Only 10 years remain to achieve all Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) globally, so there is a growing need to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of action by targeting multiple SDGs. The SDGs were conceived as an ‘indivisible whole’, but interactions between SDGs need to be better understood. Several previous assessments have begun to explore interactions including synergies and possible conflicts between the SDGs, and differ widely in their conclusions. Although some highlight the role of the more environmentally-focused SDGs in underpinning sustainable development, none specifically focuses on environment-human linkages. Assessing interactions between SDGs, and the influence of environment on them, can make an important contribution to informing decisions in 2020 and beyond. Here, we review previous assessments of interactions among SDGs, apply an influence matrix to assess pairwise interactions between all SDGs, and show how viewing these from the perspective of environment-human linkages can influence the outcome. Environment, and environment-human linkages, influence most interactions between SDGs. Our action-focused assessment enables decision makers to focus environmental management to have the greatest impacts, and to identify opportunities to build on synergies and reduce trade-offs between particular SDGs. It may enable sectoral decision makers to seek support from environment managers for achieving their goals. We explore cross-cutting issues and the relevance and potential application of our approach in supporting decision making for progress to achieve the SDGs

Global goals mapping: the environment-human landscape

The UK Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), The Rockefeller Foundation (RF), and the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) recognise that the development challenges of the 21st century require both a shift in thinking and actions that prepare us for the future, while enabling more effective development interventions today. These organisations are establishing a new initiative: 'Towards a Sustainable Earth: Environment-human Systems and the UN Global Goals' (TaSE) as part of their commitment to seeing the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (also known as Global Goals) become a reality. The core premise of the TaSE initiative is that environment-human interactions must be central to all development. The TaSE initiative is convening a meeting at The Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Centre (7-11 November 2016) to identify the major research and innovation questions relevant to the achievement of the overarching ambition of this initiative. To help focus discussions during this meeting, NERC commissioned the Sussex Sustainability Research Programme (SSRP) at the University of Sussex and the UN Environment World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC) to produce a “synthesis of past and current research and innovation relating to the policy landscape surrounding the environment-human relationships and systems that interact across the UN Global Goals”. The commissioned work is encapsulated in this report, Global Goals mapping: the environment-human landscape. For each Goal, the first part of this report summarises the role of environment-human interactions and synthesises relevant research evidence, key innovations and policies, and knowledge and research gaps. The syntheses of research evidence, key innovations and policies presented for individual Global Goals show that environment-human interactions are important for the achievement of all of the Goals. However, the number of environment-human interactions, and the extent to which these interactions need to be considered for achieving each Goal, varies among Global Goals. Although research, innovation and policy have advanced substantially since the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, knowledge and research gaps related to environment-human interactions remain for all Goals. The Global Goals were conceived as an 'indivisible whole'. The Goals relate to and depend on each other, but relationships between Goals need to be better understood. Previous analyses have begun to explore relationships including synergies and possible conflicts between the Goals from a number of different perspectives and differ widely in their conclusions. While many highlight the role of the more environmentally-focused Goals in underpinning sustainable development, none specifically focuses on environment-human interactions, which are the focus of the TaSE initiative and crucial to the achievement of the Goals. This report uses a new analysis to suggest which relationships between Global Goals may be most influenced by environment-human interactions. It is based on a pairwise view of relationships between Goals, assessing the influence that action (research, policy, innovation and/or management) towards one Goal may have on the potential for achieving others. It highlights 20 pairwise relationships between Goals where these influences may be especially strong, and illustrates for some of these how the knowledge and research gaps identified in Part 1 are relevant to the relationships between the Goals. In reality relationships among Goals are more complex and multidimensional than a pairwise analysis can illustrate, but visualising all connections among them is challenging. Further knowledge gaps and challenges related to the trade-offs, synergies and unintended consequences of the relationships among Goals will need to be addressed to achieve all 17 Goals. In order to understand relationships among Global Goals and prioritize action, including research, it is essential to consider multiple cross-cutting factors, including: temporal and spatial scales of action and impact; context for the action, whether local or other; the (multi) directionality of the relationships among Goals; thresholds and tipping points; number and types of people affected; human behaviour; governance, institutions and power; existence and accessibility of different types of knowledge; and the feasibility of obtaining and scaling-up research results and innovations by 2030. Several approaches have attempted to tackle interconnected challenges, including nexus thinking, pathways, leverage points, indigenous and local knowledge, integrated environmental assessments and integrated modelling. However, there is a need for more work and holistic approaches to achieve all 17 Goals. The syntheses of research evidence, innovations and policies regarding environment-human interactions relevant to each Global Goal and the analysis of the relationships among Goals provide a basis for identifying priority areas for new research, innovation and policy. The Bellagio Group has a vital role to play in building on this to help the TaSE initiative identify a research, innovation and research translation agenda in support of the Global Goals

Ten-year assessment of the 100 priority questions for global biodiversity conservation

In 2008, a group of conservation scientists compiled a list of 100 priority questions for the conservation of the world's biodiversity ?Sutherland et al. (2009) Conservation Biology, 23, 557?567?. However, now almost a decade later, no one has yet published a study gauging how much progress has been made in addressing these 100 high?priority questions in the peer?reviewed literature. Here we take a first step toward re?examining the 100 questions and identify key knowledge gaps that still remain. Through a combination of a questionnaire and a literature review, we evaluated each of the 100 questions on the basis of two criteria: relevance and effort. We defined highly?relevant questions as those which ? if answered ? would have the greatest impact on global biodiversity conservation, while effort was quantified based on the number of review publications addressing a particular question, which we used as a proxy for research effort. Using this approach we identified a set of questions that, despite being perceived as highly relevant, have been the focus of relatively few review publications over the past ten years. These questions covered a broad range of topics but predominantly tackled three major themes: the conservation and management of freshwater ecosystems, the role of societal structures in shaping interactions between people and the environment, and the impacts of conservation interventions. We see these questions as important knowledge gaps that have so far received insufficient attention and may need to be prioritised in future research

Multidifferential study of identified charged hadron distributions in ZZ-tagged jets in proton-proton collisions at s=\sqrt{s}=13 TeV

Jet fragmentation functions are measured for the first time in proton-proton collisions for charged pions, kaons, and protons within jets recoiling against a $Z$ boson. The charged-hadron distributions are studied longitudinally and transversely to the jet direction for jets with transverse momentum 20 $< p_{\textrm{T}} < 100$ GeV and in the pseudorapidity range $2.5 < \eta < 4$. The data sample was collected with the LHCb experiment at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.64 fb$^{-1}$. Triple differential distributions as a function of the hadron longitudinal momentum fraction, hadron transverse momentum, and jet transverse momentum are also measured for the first time. This helps constrain transverse-momentum-dependent fragmentation functions. Differences in the shapes and magnitudes of the measured distributions for the different hadron species provide insights into the hadronization process for jets predominantly initiated by light quarks.Comment: All figures and tables, along with machine-readable versions and any supplementary material and additional information, are available at https://cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/p/LHCb-PAPER-2022-013.html (LHCb public pages

Study of the B−→Λc+Λˉc−K−B^{-} \to \Lambda_{c}^{+} \bar{\Lambda}_{c}^{-} K^{-} decay

The decay $B^{-} \to \Lambda_{c}^{+} \bar{\Lambda}_{c}^{-} K^{-}$ is studied in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of $\sqrt{s}=13$ TeV using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 5 $\mathrm{fb}^{-1}$ collected by the LHCb experiment. In the $\Lambda_{c}^+ K^{-}$ system, the $\Xi_{c}(2930)^{0}$ state observed at the BaBar and Belle experiments is resolved into two narrower states, $\Xi_{c}(2923)^{0}$ and $\Xi_{c}(2939)^{0}$, whose masses and widths are measured to be $$m(\Xi_{c}(2923)^{0}) = 2924.5 \pm 0.4 \pm 1.1 \,\mathrm{MeV}, \\ m(\Xi_{c}(2939)^{0}) = 2938.5 \pm 0.9 \pm 2.3 \,\mathrm{MeV}, \\ \Gamma(\Xi_{c}(2923)^{0}) = \phantom{000}4.8 \pm 0.9 \pm 1.5 \,\mathrm{MeV},\\ \Gamma(\Xi_{c}(2939)^{0}) = \phantom{00}11.0 \pm 1.9 \pm 7.5 \,\mathrm{MeV},$$ where the first uncertainties are statistical and the second systematic. The results are consistent with a previous LHCb measurement using a prompt $\Lambda_{c}^{+} K^{-}$ sample. Evidence of a new $\Xi_{c}(2880)^{0}$ state is found with a local significance of $3.8\,\sigma$, whose mass and width are measured to be $2881.8 \pm 3.1 \pm 8.5\,\mathrm{MeV}$ and $12.4 \pm 5.3 \pm 5.8 \,\mathrm{MeV}$, respectively. In addition, evidence of a new decay mode $\Xi_{c}(2790)^{0} \to \Lambda_{c}^{+} K^{-}$ is found with a significance of $3.7\,\sigma$. The relative branching fraction of $B^{-} \to \Lambda_{c}^{+} \bar{\Lambda}_{c}^{-} K^{-}$ with respect to the $B^{-} \to D^{+} D^{-} K^{-}$ decay is measured to be $2.36 \pm 0.11 \pm 0.22 \pm 0.25$, where the first uncertainty is statistical, the second systematic and the third originates from the branching fractions of charm hadron decays.Comment: All figures and tables, along with any supplementary material and additional information, are available at https://cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/p/LHCb-PAPER-2022-028.html (LHCb public pages

Measurement of the ratios of branching fractions R(D∗)\mathcal{R}(D^{*}) and R(D0)\mathcal{R}(D^{0})

The ratios of branching fractions $\mathcal{R}(D^{*})\equiv\mathcal{B}(\bar{B}\to D^{*}\tau^{-}\bar{\nu}_{\tau})/\mathcal{B}(\bar{B}\to D^{*}\mu^{-}\bar{\nu}_{\mu})$ and $\mathcal{R}(D^{0})\equiv\mathcal{B}(B^{-}\to D^{0}\tau^{-}\bar{\nu}_{\tau})/\mathcal{B}(B^{-}\to D^{0}\mu^{-}\bar{\nu}_{\mu})$ are measured, assuming isospin symmetry, using a sample of proton-proton collision data corresponding to 3.0 fb${ }^{-1}$ of integrated luminosity recorded by the LHCb experiment during 2011 and 2012. The tau lepton is identified in the decay mode $\tau^{-}\to\mu^{-}\nu_{\tau}\bar{\nu}_{\mu}$. The measured values are $\mathcal{R}(D^{*})=0.281\pm0.018\pm0.024$ and $\mathcal{R}(D^{0})=0.441\pm0.060\pm0.066$, where the first uncertainty is statistical and the second is systematic. The correlation between these measurements is $\rho=-0.43$. Results are consistent with the current average of these quantities and are at a combined 1.9 standard deviations from the predictions based on lepton flavor universality in the Standard Model.Comment: All figures and tables, along with any supplementary material and additional information, are available at https://cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/p/LHCb-PAPER-2022-039.html (LHCb public pages

A marker for the end of adolescence

AbstractBetween childhood and adulthood, we go through puberty and adolescence. While the end of puberty is defined as the point of cessation of bone growth (epiphyseal closure; girls: 16 y; boys: 17.5 y), the end of adolescence (∼19 y) is defined less clearly, by a mixture of physical, psychological, social, and mental measures [1]. One conspicuous property of adolescence is the apparently unsaturable capacity to stay up late and to sleep in. Investigating ‘chronotypes’ we observed an abrupt change in the timing of sleep at around the age of 20 and propose this change as the first biological marker of the end of adolescence

Steps to diversify priority-setting research in conservation: reflections on de Gracia 2021.

There is growing awareness across many branches of science of the need to decolonize research practices and curricula (Aikenhead, 2006; Radcliffe, 2017), and the fields of ecology and conservation are no exception (Baker et al., 2019). Although conservation scientists and practitioners from the Global North are gradually waking up to the fact that local knowledge and agency––including that of Indigenous people––are essential for social justice and to achieving conservation outcomes, the road to decolonizing conservation science remains a long one (Baker et al., 2019). As a discipline, conservation has a long colonial history and remains heavily dominated by institutions in the Global North when it comes to publications, funding, and research networks (Maas et al., 2021)

How Ecotheological Beliefs Vary Among Australian Churchgoers and Consequences for Environmental Attitudes and Behaviors

A growing literature has sought to understand the relationships between religion, politics and views about climate change and climate change policy in the United States. However, little comparative research has been conducted in other countries. This study draws on data from the 2011 Australian National Church Life Survey to examine the beliefs of Australian churchgoers from some 20 denominations about climate change—whether or not it is real and whether it is caused by humans—and political factors that explain variation in these beliefs. Pentecostals, Baptist and Churches of Christ churchgoers, and people from the smallest Protestant denominations were less likely than other churchgoers to believe in anthropogenic climate change, and voting and hierarchical and individualistic views about society predicted beliefs. There was some evidence that these views function differently in relation to climate change beliefs depending on churchgoers’ degree of opposition to gay rights. These findings are of interest not only for the sake of international comparisons, but also in a context where Australia plays a role in international climate change politics that is disproportionate to its small population