Equity and Resilience: Can Cities of the Future Achieve Both?

Within the concept of city resilience lies an opportunity to transform current systems of power and oppression that perpetuate social inequities and deny basic human rights to much of the world’s population. This research examines how current resilience practices, if left unchecked, might affect the future equity of a city’s neighbourhoods and communities by fortifying oppressive power structures and systems dominant in today’s society. It questions how we might use systems thinking and foresight tools to re-engineer processes for building resilience that supports the transition to more equitable and just cities. A design research methodology was used to explore 1) what makes a future equitable; 2) the process by which we define a term, in this case, resilience; and 3) how this definition might hold power to inform how resilience is built, distributed, and regulated in the future. The methodology consists of field observation and semi-structured subject matter expert interviews while employing foresight methods, systems analysis, and generative design research techniques to facilitate multi-stakeholder engagements. Contributions of this research include recommendations on how we might re-engineer foundational processes for building definitions of resilience that consider equity and support the building and repairing of a just city. Additionally, this study introduces a conceptual tool, Dream Capital, for adapting and designing more equitable approaches to building resilience that can aid cities in overcoming social, political, economic, and cultural inequities in the future

Characterizing User Behavior and Information Propagation on a Social Multimedia Network

An increasing portion of modern socializing takes place via online social networks. Members of these communities often play distinct roles that can be deduced from observations of users' online activities. One such activity is the sharing of multimedia, the popularity of which can vary dramatically. Here we discuss our initial analysis of anonymized, scraped data from consenting Facebook users, together with associated demographic and psychological profiles. We present five clusters of users with common observed online behaviors, where these users also show correlated profile characteristics. Finally, we identify some common properties of the most popular multimedia content.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figures, 2 tables, to be published in the proceedings of the Int. Workshop on Social Multimedia Research (SMMR) 2013. 2013 IEE

Impact of home food production on nutritional blindness, stunting, wasting, underweight and mortality in children: a systematic review and meta-analysis of controlled trials

Vitamin A deficiency is highly prevalent and remains the major cause of nutritional blindness in children in low-and middle-income countries, despite supplementation programmes. Xeropthalmia (severe drying and thickening of the conjunctiva) is caused by vitamin A deficiency and leads to irreversible blindness. Vitamin A supplementation programmes effectively reduce vitamin A deficiency but many rural children are not reached. Home food production may help prevent rural children’s vitamin A deficiency. We aimed to systematically review trials assessing effects of home food production (also called homestead food production and agricultural interventions) on xeropthalmia, night blindness, stunting, wasting, underweight and mortality (primary outcomes).. We searched Medline, Embase, Scopus, Cochrane CENTRAL and trials registers to February 2019. Inclusion of studies, data extraction and risk of bias were assessed independently in duplicate. Random-effects meta-analysis, sensitivity analyses, subgrouping and GRADE were used. We included 16 trials randomizing 2498 children, none reported xerophthalmia, night-blindness or mortality. Home food production may slightly reduce stunting (mean difference (MD) 0.13 (z-score), 95% CI 0.01 to 0.24), wasting (MD 0.05 (z-score), 95% CI -0.04 to 0.14) and underweight (MD 0.07 (z-score), 95% CI -0.01 to 0.15) in young children (all GRADE low-consistency evidence), and increase dietary diversity (standardized mean difference (SMD) 0.24, 95% CI 0.15 to 0.34). Home food production may usefully complement vitamin A supplementation for rural children. Large, long-duration trials with good randomization, allocation concealment and correct adjustment for clustering are needed to assess effectiveness of home food production on nutritional blindness in young children. Prospero registration: CRD42019126455 (https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?ID=CRD42019126455

Towards a science of climate and energy choices

The linked problems of energy sustainability and climate change are among the most complex and daunting facing humanity at the start of the twenty-first century. This joint Nature Energy and Nature Climate Change Collection illustrates how understanding and addressing these problems will require an integrated science of coupled human and natural systems; including technological systems, but also extending well beyond the domain of engineering or even economics. It demonstrates the value of replacing the stylized assumptions about human behaviour that are common in policy analysis, with ones based on data-driven science. We draw from and engage articles in the Collection to identify key contributions to understanding non-technological factors connecting economic activity and greenhouse gas emissions, describe a multi-dimensional space of human action on climate and energy issues, and illustrate key themes, dimensions and contributions towards fundamental understanding and informed decision making

A multi-center prospective study of plant-based nutritional support in adult community-based patients at risk of disease-related malnutrition

IntroductionThere is an emerging need for plant-based, vegan options for patients requiring nutritional support.MethodsTwenty-four adults at risk of malnutrition (age: 59 years (SD 18); Sex: 18 female, 6 male; BMI: 19.0 kg/m2 (SD 3.3); multiple diagnoses) requiring plant-based nutritional support participated in a multi-center, prospective study of a (vegan suitable) multi-nutrient, ready-to-drink, oral nutritional supplement (ONS) [1.5 kcal/mL; 300 kcal, 12 g protein/200 mL bottle, mean prescription 275 mL/day (SD 115)] alongside dietary advice for 28 days. Compliance, anthropometry, malnutrition risk, dietary intake, appetite, acceptability, gastrointestinal (GI) tolerance, nutritional goal(s), and safety were assessed.ResultsPatients required a plant-based ONS due to personal preference/variety (33%), religious/cultural reasons (28%), veganism/reduce animal-derived consumption (17%), environmental/sustainability reasons (17%), and health reasons (5%). Compliance was 94% (SD 16). High risk of malnutrition (‘MUST’ score ≥ 2) reduced from 20 to 16 patients (p = 0.046). Body weight (+0.6 kg (SD 1.2), p = 0.02), BMI (+0.2 kg/m2 (SD 0.5), p = 0.03), total mean energy (+387 kcal/day (SD 416), p < 0.0001) and protein intake (+14 g/day (SD 39), p = 0.03), and the number of micronutrients meeting the UK reference nutrient intake (RNI) (7 vs. 14, p = 0.008) significantly increased. Appetite (Simplified Nutritional Appetite Questionnaire (SNAQ) score; p = 0.13) was maintained. Most GI symptoms were stable throughout the study (p > 0.06) with no serious adverse events related.DiscussionThis study highlights that plant-based nutrition support using a vegan-suitable plant-based ONS is highly complied with, improving the nutritional outcomes of patients at risk of malnutrition

Is Insect Protein a Sustainable Alternative to Soy and Fishmeal in Poultry Feed?

This thesis describes a research experiment examining the potential of Black Soldier Fly larvae (Hermetia illucens) (Diptera: Stratidomyidae) reared on local food waste to effectively feed poultry. Significantly less water and land is required to raise Black Soldier Fly larvae and fewer greenhouse gas emissions are generated, relative to the production of soy and fishmeal for animal feed industry. In order to account for the environmental pressure meat production puts on our environment, chickens were raised on Black Cat Farm in Longmont, CO using a more sustainable, insect-based, feed. At seven weeks of age, 127 chickens were randomly assigned to three dietary treatments (3 replicates and 14-15 birds per pen). Each chicken was weighed every three days using a fish scale and weighing basket. Feed weight was recorded using the same method; food and water were supplied ad libitum. Weights of chickens were averaged before analysis to overwrite inevitable variation between chicken and enclosure environments. An analysis of variance (ANOVA) was conducted on growth data to identify significant between treatments. After three weeks, there was no significant difference in growth rate, feed conversion, or mortality between the three feed types. Healthy growth was observed among all chickens, suggesting that Black Soldier Fly larvae can effectively replace soy and fishmeal in poultry feed. This confirmation of alternative feed has the potential to influence approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of insect based protein once analysis is conducted throughout the chicken’s lifetime for the next 2-6 weeks

Identification of species related to Anopheles (Nyssorhynchus)albitarsis by random amplified polymorphic DNA-polymerase chain reaction (Diptera: Culicidae)

Species-specific Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA-Polymerase Chain Reaction (RAPD-PCR) markers were used to identify four species related to Anopheles (Nyssorhynchus) albitarsis Lynch-Arribalphalzaga from 12 sites in Brazil and 4 in Venezuela. In a previous study (Wilkerson et al. 1995), which included sites in Paraguay and Argentina, these four species were designated "A", "B", "C" and "D". It was hypothesized that species A is An. (Nys.) albitarsis, species B is undescribed, species C is An. (Nys.) marajoara Galvpio and Damasceno and species D is An. (Nys.) deaneorum Rosa-Freitas. Species D, previously characterized by RAPD-PCR from a small sample from northern Argentina and southern Brazil, is reported here from the type locality of An. (Nys.) deaneorum, Guajarbeta-Mirim, State of Rondnia, Brazil. Species C and D were found by RAPD-PCR to be sympatric at Costa Marques, State of Rondonia, Brazil. Species A and C have yet to be encountered at the same locality. The RAPD markers for species C were found to be conserved over 4,620 km; from Iguape, State of Spio Paulo, Brazil to Rio Socuavo, State of Zulia, Venezuela. RAPD-PCR was determined to be an effective means for the identification of unknown specimens within this species complex