Public Opinions of Unmanned Aerial Technologies in 2014 to 2019: A Technical and Descriptive Report

The primary purpose of this report is to provide a descriptive and technical summary of the results from similar surveys administered in fall 2014 (n = 576), 2015 (n = 301), 2016 (ns = 1946 and 2089), and 2018 (n = 1050) and summer 2019 (n = 1300). In order to explore a variety of factors that may impact public perceptions of unmanned aerial technologies (UATs), we conducted survey experiments over time. These experiments randomly varied the terminology (drone, aerial robot, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), unmanned aerial system (UAS)) used to describe the technology, the purposes of the technology (for economic, environmental, or security goals), the actors (public or private) using the technology, the technology’s autonomy (fully autonomous, partially autonomous, no autonomy), and the framing (promotion or prevention) used to describe the technology’s purpose. Initially, samples were recruited through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, required to be Americans, and paid a small amount for participation. In 2016 we also examined a nationally representative samples recruited from Qualtrics panels. After 2016 we only used nationally representative samples from Qualtrics. Major findings are reported along with details regarding the research methods and analyses

A Method For Cleavage Fracture Testing Of Hardwood Laminated Veneer Lumber

Blackbutt (Eucalyptus Pilularis) is a common plantation hardwood in New South Wales which is highly regarded for its strength and durability but is difficult to laminate. A method was developed to test Blackbutt Laminated Veneer Lumber (LVL) glue-lines for mode I fracture toughness - comparisons were made to similar work in the USA and Australia. The cleavage test method is demonstrated to be more suitable for assessing LVL bond quality than the currently-used Australian Standard chisel test. The test shows that Blackbutt veneer is capable of being glued for application as a durable structural material

High Expression of Glycolytic Genes in Clinical Glioblastoma Patients Correlates With Lower Survival

Glioblastoma (GBM), the most aggressive brain tumor, is associated with a median survival at diagnosis of 16–20 months and limited treatment options. The key hallmark of GBM is altered tumor metabolism and marked increase in the rate of glycolysis. Aerobic glycolysis along with elevated glucose consumption and lactate production supports rapid cell proliferation and GBM growth. In this study, we examined the gene expression profile of metabolic targets in GBM samples from patients with lower grade glioma (LGG) and GBM. We found that gene expression of glycolytic enzymes is up-regulated in GBM samples and significantly associated with an elevated risk for developing GBM. Our findings of clinical outcomes showed that GBM patients with high expression of HK2 and PKM2 in the glycolysis related genes and low expression of genes involved in mitochondrial metabolism-SDHB and COX5A related to tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle and oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS), respectively, was associated with poor patient overall survival. Surprisingly, expression levels of genes involved in mitochondrial oxidative metabolism are markedly increased in GBM compared to LGG but was lower compared to normal brain. The fact that in GBM the expression levels of TCA cycle and OXPHOS-related genes are higher than those in LGG patients suggests the metabolic shift in GBM cells when progressing from LGG to GBM. These results are an important step forward in our understanding of the role of metabolic reprogramming in glioma as drivers of the tumor and could be potential prognostic targets in GBM therapies

A Drone by Any Other Name: Purposes, End-User Trustworthiness, and Framing, but not Terminology, Affect Public Support for Drones

Projections indicate that, as an industry, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs, commonly known as drones) could bring more than 100 000 jobs and $80 billion in economic growth to the U.S. by 2025 [1]. However, these promising projections do not account for how various publics may perceive such technologies. Understanding public perceptions is important because the attitudes of different groups can have large effects on the trajectory of a technology, strongly facilitating or hindering technology acceptance and uptake [2]. To advance understanding of U.S. public perceptions of UAV technologies, we conducted a nationwide survey of a convenience sample of 877 Americans recruited from Amazon’s pool of Mechanical Turk (MTurk) workers. In our surveys, we used short scenarios to experimentally vary UAV characteristics, the end-users of the technology, and certain communication factors (terminology and framing). This allowed us to investigate the impacts of these factors alone and in combination. In addition, given the conflicts that sometimes arise around scientific findings and technologies (e.g., climate change, vaccines, [3], [4]), we also gave explicit attention to whether and how public support for UAVs varied by self-reported political ideology, issue attitudes, and perceptions of end-user trustworthiness. Finally, because UAVs for civilian purposes represented relatively new technologies at the time of the first survey, we examined whether public opinion is changing over time, as more people become aware of UAVs. We thus administered the same survey twice, separated by one year, in the fall of 2014 and 2015. The results of our experimental manipulations revealed a surprising lack of impact of terminology and UAV autonomy, a small impact of message framing and UAV end-user, and a relatively large impact of UAV purpose. We did not find that public attitudes changed much over the year between samples, and perceptions of end-user trustworthiness were strong predictors of public support. Still, our regression models only accounted for about 40% of the variance in public support, suggesting that additional variables should be studied in future work to gain a more complete understanding of public support for UAVs. We also found evidence of a small amount of political polarization of public opinion related to who was using the UAVs for what purpose, and this polarization appeared to be changing over time. Taken together, our results — which may be especially useful to UAV designers, marketers, and policy makers — suggest there is a need to establish that the UAVs are used for valued purposes and by users that publics find to be trustworthy. However, public judgments might be significantly impacted by personal or local ideologies rather than national priorities. In the next section, we describe in more detail prior research on public support for UAVs, and how we formulated our research questions and hypotheses. We then describe our methods, results, and findings in greater detail