30 research outputs found
Assessing the activity of faults in continental interiors: Palaeoseismic insights from SE Kazakhstan
The presence of fault scarps is a first-order criterion for identifying active faults. Yet the preservation of these features depends on the recurrence interval between surface rupturing events, combined with the rates of erosional and depositional processes that act on the landscape. Within arid continental interiors single earthquake scarps can be preserved for thousands of years, and yet the interval between surface ruptures on faults in these regions may be much longer, such that the lack of evidence for surface faulting in the morphology may not preclude activity on those faults. In this study we investigate the 50 km-long âToraigyrâ thrust fault in the northern Tien Shan. From palaeoseismological trenching we show that two surface rupturing earthquakes occurred in the last BP, but only the most recent event (3.15â3.6 ka BP) has a clear morphological expression. We conclude that a landscape reset took place in between the two events, likely as a consequence of the climatic change at the end of the last glacial maximum. These findings illustrate that in the Tien Shan evidence for the most recent active faulting can be easily obliterated by climatic processes due to the long earthquake recurrence intervals. Our results illustrate the problems related to the assessment of active tectonic deformation and seismic hazard assessments in continental interior settings.This study was financed by NERC and ESRC (Earthquakes without Frontiers project, Grant code: EwF_NE/J02001X/1_1), and the Centre for Observation and Modelling of Earthquakes and Tectonics (COMET). KOMPSAT-2 imagery was obtained through a category-1 award to RTW. EJC thanks St. Edmund Hall for travel support. RTW was supported during this research by a University Research Fellowship from the Royal Society of London
Meta-analysis of type 2 Diabetes in African Americans Consortium
Type 2 diabetes (T2D) is more prevalent in African Americans than in Europeans. However, little is known about the genetic risk in African Americans despite the recent identification of more than 70 T2D loci primarily by genome-wide association studies (GWAS) in individuals of European ancestry. In order to investigate the genetic architecture of T2D in African Americans, the MEta-analysis of type 2 DIabetes in African Americans (MEDIA) Consortium examined 17 GWAS on T2D comprising 8,284 cases and 15,543 controls in African Americans in stage 1 analysis. Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) association analysis was conducted in each study under the additive model after adjustment for age, sex, study site, and principal components. Meta-analysis of approximately 2.6 million genotyped and imputed SNPs in all studies was conducted using an inverse variance-weighted fixed effect model. Replications were performed to follow up 21 loci in up to 6,061 cases and 5,483 controls in African Americans, and 8,130 cases and 38,987 controls of European ancestry. We identified three known loci (TCF7L2, HMGA2 and KCNQ1) and two novel loci (HLA-B and INS-IGF2) at genome-wide significance (4.15 Ă 10(-94)<P<5 Ă 10(-8), odds ratio (OR)â = 1.09 to 1.36). Fine-mapping revealed that 88 of 158 previously identified T2D or glucose homeostasis loci demonstrated nominal to highly significant association (2.2 Ă 10(-23) < locus-wide P<0.05). These novel and previously identified loci yielded a sibling relative risk of 1.19, explaining 17.5% of the phenotypic variance of T2D on the liability scale in African Americans. Overall, this study identified two novel susceptibility loci for T2D in African Americans. A substantial number of previously reported loci are transferable to African Americans after accounting for linkage disequilibrium, enabling fine mapping of causal variants in trans-ethnic meta-analysis studies.Peer reviewe
Discursive opportunities and the transnational diffusion of ideas: âbrainwashingâ and âmind controlâ in Japan after the Aum Affair
A case study in the sociology of ideas, this article refines the theory of âdiscursive opportunitiesâ to examine how intellectual claims cross national and linguistic boundaries to achieve public prominence despite lacking academic credibility. Theories of âbrainwashingâ and âmind controlâ originally began in the United States in the 1960s as a response to the growth of new religious movements. Decades later in Japan, claims that so-called âcultsâ âbrainwashedâ or âmind controlledâ their followers became prominent after March 1995, when new religion Aum ShinrikyĹ gassed the Tokyo subway using sarin, killing thirteen. Since then, brainwashing/mind control have both remained central in public discourse surrounding the âAum Affairâ despite their disputed status within academic discourse. This article advances two arguments. Firstly, the transnational diffusion of brainwashing/mind control from the US to Japan occurred as a direct result of the 1995 Tokyo sarin attack, which acted as a âdiscursive opportunityâ for activists to successfully disseminate the theories in public debate. Secondly, brainwashing/mind control became successful in Japanese public discourse primarily for their normative content, as the theories identified âbrainwashing/mind controlling cultsâ as evil, violent, and profane threats to civil society.British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship
Cambridge International Trus