The LED Paradox: How Light Pollution Challenges Experts to Reconsider Sustainable Lighting

In the 21st century, the notion of “sustainable lighting” is closely associated with LED technology. In the past ten years, municipalities and private light users worldwide have installed light-emitting diodes in urban spaces and public streets to save energy. Yet an increasing body of interdisciplinary research suggests that supposedly sustainable LED installations are in fact unsustainable, because they increase light pollution. Paradoxically, blue-rich cool-white LED lighting, which is the most energy-efficient, also appears to be the most ecologically unfriendly. Biologists, physicians and ecologists warn that blue-rich LED light disturbs the circadian day-and-night rhythm of living organisms, including humans, with potential negative health effects on individual species and whole ecosystems. Can the paradox be solved? This paper explores this question based on our transdisciplinary research project Light Pollution—A Global Discussion. It reveals how light pollution experts and lighting professionals see the challenges and potential of LED lighting from their different viewpoints. This expert feedback shows that “sustainable LED lighting” goes far beyond energy efficiency as it raises complex design issues that imply stakeholder negotiation. It also suggests that the LED paradox may be solved in context, but hardly in principle

Redefining Recon: Bridging Gaps with UAVs, 360 degree Cameras, and Neural Radiance Fields

In the realm of digital situational awareness during disaster situations, accurate digital representations, like 3D models, play an indispensable role. To ensure the safety of rescue teams, robotic platforms are often deployed to generate these models. In this paper, we introduce an innovative approach that synergizes the capabilities of compact Unmaned Arial Vehicles (UAVs), smaller than 30 cm, equipped with 360 degree cameras and the advances of Neural Radiance Fields (NeRFs). A NeRF, a specialized neural network, can deduce a 3D representation of any scene using 2D images and then synthesize it from various angles upon request. This method is especially tailored for urban environments which have experienced significant destruction, where the structural integrity of buildings is compromised to the point of barring entry-commonly observed post-earthquakes and after severe fires. We have tested our approach through recent post-fire scenario, underlining the efficacy of NeRFs even in challenging outdoor environments characterized by water, snow, varying light conditions, and reflective surfaces.Comment: 6 pages, published at IEEE International Symposium on Safety,Security,and Rescue Robotics SSRR2023 in FUKUSHIMA, November 13-15 202

Development of the Topological Trigger for LHCb Run 3

The data-taking conditions expected in Run 3 of the LHCb experiment at CERN are unprecedented and challenging for the software and computing systems. Despite that, the LHCb collaboration pioneers the use of a software-only trigger system to cope with the increased event rate efficiently. The beauty physics programme of LHCb is heavily reliant on topological triggers. These are devoted to selecting beauty-hadron candidates inclusively, based on the characteristic decay topology and kinematic properties expected from beauty decays. The following proceeding describes the current progress of the Run 3 implementation of the topological triggers using Lipschitz monotonic neural networks. This architecture offers robustness under varying detector conditions and sensitivity to long-lived candidates, improving the possibility of discovering New Physics at LHCb

Facets of impulsivity and related aspects differentiate among recreational and unregulated use of Internet pornography

Background and aims: Unregulated Internet pornography (IP) use is discussed as a clinically significant disorder. Because of its primarily rewarding nature, IP is a predestinated target for addictive behaviors. However, not every user develops an unregulated usage pattern. In fact, most users tend to use IP recreationally. Impulsivity-related constructs have been identified as promoters of addictive behaviors. It is unclear whether these impulsivity-related constructs are specific for unregulated IP use or also play a role in recreational but frequent behaviors. In this study, we investigated impulsive tendencies (trait impulsivity, delay discounting, and cognitive style), craving toward IP, attitude regarding IP, and coping styles in individuals with recreational–occasional, recreational–frequent, and unregulated IP use. Methods: A total of 1,498 heterosexual males participated in an online survey. Groups of individuals with recreational–occasional use (n = 333), recreational–frequent use (n = 394), and unregulated use (n = 225) of IP were identified by screening instruments. Results: Craving and attitude regarding IP as well as delay discounting and cognitive and coping styles differed between groups. Individuals with unregulated use showed the highest scores for craving, attentional impulsivity, delay discounting, and dysfunctional coping, and lowest scores for functional coping and need for cognition. Recreational–frequent users had the most positive attitude toward IP. Motor and non-planning impulsivity did not differ between groups. Discussion and conclusions: The results indicate that some facets of impulsivity and related factors such as craving and a more negative attitude are specific for unregulated IP users. The results are also consistent with models on specific Internet use disorders and addictive behaviors

Sentencing as craftwork and the binary epistemologies of the discretionary decision process

This article contends that it is time to take a critical look at a series of binary categories which have dominated the scholarly and reform epistemologies of the sentencing decision process. These binaries are: rules versus discretion; reason versus emotion; offence versus offender; normative principles versus incoherence; aggravating versus mitigating factors; and aggregate/tariff consistency versus individualized sentencing. These binaries underpin both the 'legal-rational' tradition (by which I mean a view of discretion as inherently suspect, a preference for the use of philosophy of punishment justifications and an explanation of the decision process through factors or variables), and also the more recent rise of the 'new penology'. Both approaches tend to rely on 'top-down' assumptions of change, which pay limited attention to the agency of penal workers. The article seeks to develop a conception of sentencing craftwork as a social and interpretive process.1 In so doing, it applies and develops a number of Kritzer's observations (in this issue) about craftwork to sentencing. These craftwork observations are: problem solving (applied to the rules - discretion and reason - emotion dichotomies); skills and techniques (normative penal principles and the use of cognitive analytical assumptions); consistency (tariff versus individualized sentencing); clientele (applied to account giving and the reality of decision making versus expression). By conceiving of sentencing as craftwork, the binary epistemologies of the sentencing decision process, which have dominated (and limited) the scholarly and policy sentencing imaginations, are revealed as dynamic, contingent, and synergistic. However, this is not to say that such binaries are no more than empty rhetoric concealing the reality of the decision process. Rather, these binaries serve as crucial legitimating reference points in the vocabulary of sentencing account giving

The HII Regions of the Damped Lyman alpha Absorber SBS 1543+593

We report new imaging and spectroscopic observations of the damped Ly alpha (DLA) galaxy SBS 1543+593, a nearby dwarf galaxy whose stellar disk is intersected by the sightline to the bright background QSO HS 1543+5921. Hubble Space Telescope imaging observations with WFPC2 in the F450W and F702W bands are used to measure the DLA galaxy's properties and compile a catalog of its (candidate) HII regions. Ground-based long-slit spectroscopy of the brightest HII region in the galaxy yields estimates of the star formation rate (SFR) and of chemical abundances in the galaxy's interstellar medium. We find that SBS 1543+593 exhibits a SFR $\approx 0.006 h^{-2}_{70} M_{\odot}$ yr$^{-1}$, or a SFR per unit area of $\approx 1.4 \times 10^{-4} h^{-2}_{70} M_\odot$ yr$^{-1}$ kpc$^{-2}$. We derive gas-phase abundances in the ionized gas of $12 + \log {\rm (O/H)} = 8.2 \pm 0.2$, which is about 1/3 of the solar value, and $\log {\rm (N/O)} = -1.40^{+0.2}_{-0.3}$. These values are consistent with the morphologial appearance of SBS 1543+593, an Sm dwarf of $M_B -5 \log h_{70} = -16.8\pm0.2$ and of intermediate surface brightness. SBS 1543+593 is the first {\it bona fide} DLA for which abundances have been measured using emission-line diagnostics. When compared with future, high-resolution, ultraviolet spectroscopy, our results should prove key for interpreting abundance determinations in high redshift DLAs.Comment: ApJ, accepte

High-Redshift Starbursting Dwarf Galaxies Revealed by GRB Afterglows

We present a study of 15 long-duration gamma-ray burst (GRB) host galaxies at z>2. The GRBs are selected with available early-time afterglow spectra in order to compare interstellar medium (ISM) absorption-line properties with stellar properties of the host galaxies. In addition to five previously studied hosts, we consider new detections for the host galaxies of GRB050820 and GRB060206 and place 2-sigma upper limits to the luminosities of the remaining unidentified hosts. We examine the nature of the host galaxy population and find that (1) the UV luminosity distribution of GRB host galaxies is consistent with expectations from a UV luminosity weighted random galaxy population with a median luminosity of =0.1 L*; (2) there exists a moderate correlation between UV luminosity and SiII 1526 absorption width, which together with the observed large line widths of W(1526)>1.5 Ang for a large fraction of the objects suggests a galactic outflow driven velocity field in the host galaxies; (3) there is tentative evidence for a trend of declining ISM metallicity with decreasing galaxy luminosity in the star-forming galaxy population at z=2-4; (4) the interstellar UV radiation field is found ~ 35-350 times higher in GRB hosts than the Galactic mean value; and (5) additional galaxies are found at < 2" from the GRB host in all fields with known presence of strong MgII absorbers, but no additional faint galaxies are found at < 2" in fields without strong MgII absorbers. Our study confirms that the GRB host galaxies (with known optical afterglows) are representative of unobscured star-forming galaxies at z>2, and demonstrates that high spatial resolution images are necessary for an accurate identification of GRB host galaxies in the presence of strong intervening absorbers.Comment: 24 emulateapj pages, 24 figures, ApJ in press; full-resolution version available at http://lambda.uchicago.edu/public/tmp/ghost.pd

The effect of correctional facility programming on nonviolent beliefs

Gemstone Team Peace in PrisonsTo date, little research has made an effort to pinpoint measurable changes in beliefs resulting from correctional facility programming. Peace in Prisons studied the effects of the programs at the Montgomery County Correctional Facility on the inmates' beliefs regarding violence. It was hypothesized that inmates participating in programs would undergo a greater reduction in violent beliefs over time than those not in programs. The team administered the Nonviolence Test to inmates three times over a 3-month period. The primary purpose was to observe differences between those in programs and those not in programs. The team also sought to analyze the effects of other factors, including type of program, age, education, and race. The results demonstrate changes in violent beliefs due to a variety of factors, including involvement in certain types of programs, age, and the jail setting itself. What is more, these findings suggest numerous avenues for further research