Students Shine a Light on Syrian Civil War

A course examining human behavior through the lens of the Syrian conflict inspires students to raise awareness on campus

Funny Business: Susan Bedusa ’01 Helms National Lampoon Documentary

The moose out front should’ve told you – go see alumna Susan Bedusa’s new film, Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Story of the National Lampoon

Raising an “Amoeba Army” to Fight a Deadly Intestinal Parasite

Senior biology and chemistry major Joshua Leitao investigates amebiasis via American Society of Microbiology research fellowship

Fun, Functional Fabric: SAAHP Students Sweep Competition in Fabric Structures Challenge

Projects by architecture graduate students claim first, second and third at the Industrial Fabrics Association International’s Student Design Challenge

Magnified Clam Image Captures Top Award in NOAA Photo Contest

Aquatic Diagnostic Technician Kathryn Markey Lundgren’s carefully constructed image of a tiny Northern quahog wins first place in National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s aquaculture photo contest

Trip to NYC Prepares, Tests RWU Journalism Students

From workshops led by expert journalists to reporting on-assignment, students learn new skills in New York City

Student Research Digs Up Dirt on Newport’s Pre-Revolution Historic Properties

Historic preservation students uncover hidden truths behind seven colonial buildings

Absolute poverty and the cost of living: an experimental analysis for italian households

Our paper contains an investigation on poverty based on the absolute approach. Actually, absolute poverty has not been totally eliminated, also in developed countries and particularly in Italy. Moreover, this method has poverty levels not depending on income distribution: on the contrary, specific situations of real need are identified. In doing so, different price levels are taken into account, emphasising the possible effects of different costs of living in various geographical areas; for Italy, this issue seems crucial, owing to dramatic economic gaps between Northern and Southern areas. Yet, there are few data available on this, so that only a pioneering study may be carried out. Therefore, we estimate absolute poverty thresholds both for regions and macro areas. General results show a partial narrowing in the geographical gap in favour of the South, with respect to traditional approaches. The analysis is performed using several indicators (i.e. head-count, poverty gap and Sen index). Moreover, income inequalities between regions could turn out to be less obvious by considering different cost of living indices than it is the case if the same level of prices is used. The analysis is based on static micro simulation models that make use of both consumption and income data from ISTAT and Bank of Italy surveys. Thus, several data sources are used: in fact, it is known that income, even though it seems more appropriate in evaluating resources to purchase goods and services, can be sensitive to unexpected and temporary shocks, whereas consumption represents a proxy of the so-called “permanent income”. Finally, some light is also shed on the measurement of the efforts of public policies aimed at poverty alleviation. To this end, it is possible to examine the impact of public taxes and transfers on wellbeing, with particular attention to the effects of a “minimum income” scheme allowing for the different price levels.Absolute poverty; Cost of living; Minimum income

A brief introduction to the model microswimmer {\it Chlamydomonas reinhardtii}

The unicellular biflagellate green alga {\it Chlamydomonas reinhardtii} has been an important model system in biology for decades, and in recent years it has started to attract growing attention also within the biophysics community. Here we provide a concise review of some of the aspects of {\it Chlamydomonas} biology and biophysics most immediately relevant to physicists that might be interested in starting to work with this versatile microorganism.Comment: 16 pages, 7 figures. To be published as part of EPJ S

Universal entrainment mechanism governs contact times with motile cells

Contact between particles and motile cells underpins a wide variety of biological processes, from nutrient capture and ligand binding, to grazing, viral infection and cell-cell communication. The window of opportunity for these interactions is ultimately determined by the physical mechanism that enables proximity and governs the contact time. Jeanneret et al. (Nat. Comm. 7: 12518, 2016) reported recently that for the biflagellate microalga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii contact with microparticles is controlled by events in which the object is entrained by the swimmer over large distances. However, neither the universality of this interaction mechanism nor its physical origins are currently understood. Here we show that particle entrainment is indeed a generic feature for microorganisms either pushed or pulled by flagella. By combining experiments, simulations and analytical modelling we reveal that entrainment length, and therefore contact time, can be understood within the framework of Taylor dispersion as a competition between advection by the no slip surface of the cell body and microparticle diffusion. The existence of an optimal tracer size is predicted theoretically, and observed experimentally for C. reinhardtii. Spatial organisation of flagella, swimming speed, swimmer and tracer size influence entrainment features and provide different trade-offs that may be tuned to optimise microbial interactions like predation and infection.Comment: New analytical entrainment theory; includes Supplementary informations as Appendix; Supplementary movies available upon reques