Physiology

Non-invasive, low-cost ventilator developed for regions with limited means – News-Medical.Net

Researchers from the Biophysics and Bioengineering Unit of the UB have created a non-invasive low-cost ventilator, to support patients with respiratory diseases in areas with limited means.

Researchers published the results of the study in the European Respiratory Journal together with open source technical features to build it.

Non-invasive ventilators are usually used to treat patients with respiratory failure: for instance, those with severe symptoms with COVID-19.

Non-invasive ventilation is administrated through facial masks that bring pressured air to the lungs. This support to the natural breathing process, when the disease causes the lungs to fail, enables the body to fight the infection and therefore improve.

The study was carried out in the Biophysics and Bioengineering Unit of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences of the University of Barcelona, led by Ramono Farr, professor of Physiology and member of the August Pi i Sunyer Biomedical Research Institute (IDIBAPS) and the Respiratory Diseases Networking Biomedical Research Centre (CIBERES).

Considering the growing need for ventilator support devices everywhere due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we designed a ventilator that can be built with commercial elements at a low cost. The ventilator is aimed at hospitals and health systems to help cover the demand of respiratory equipment due to the coronavirus and other severe lung diseases."

Ramono Farr, Professor of Physiology, University of Barcelona.

The article describes how to build the ventilator in open code, and it can be copied in areas with limited means.

The research team has designed, built and carried out the tests for the ventilator using a small high-pressure turbine, two pressure transducer and a monitor with digital screen.

In order to build it one needs a basic knowledge on engineering, but no previous knowledge on ventilation, although the application in patients requires a medical supervision.

To assess the efficiency of the prototype of the ventilator compared to a commercial device, the research team tested it in twelve healthy volunteers.

The participants' breathing was obstructed to simulate different levels of lung rigidity and respiratory obstruction.

Participants wore facial masks over their nose to ease breathing and marked their feeling of comfort or discomfort, both with and without a respiratory support.

The tests showed the ventilator adapted to the spontaneous breathing rhythm and provided a feeling of breathing relief similar to a commercial ventilator.

The team carried out a respiratory test bank, in which they used lung simulators to assess the response of the ventilator in patients with different levels of air flow obstruction and lung rigidity.

The test was carried out in sixteen different simulation situations, covering conditions of real life in which non-invasive ventilation is usually used in clinical practices.

In all the simulated cases, the prototype of the ventilator was efficient so that lungs could efficiently breath.

"Our tests showed the prototype could behave similarly to a high-quality conventional device providing support to patients who, with difficulties, can try to breathe by themselves", notes Farr.

The prototype is a non-invasive ventilator that provides respiratory support; therefore, it is not aimed at those patients with severe cases who are intubated and need a mechanical ventilator in the intensive care unit.

The Biophysics and Bioengineering Unit of the UB has experience on instrumentation to treat respiratory diseases, specially in the field of sleep apnoea.

Recently, Farr and his team provided advice on the design of emergency ventilator device prototypes from Protofy.xyz, GPA Innova and GAS N2.

The three devices, built with the support from the Hospital Clnic and Can Ruti, and the UB, are under clinical studyu with patients, after the initial approval to conduct the study given by the Spanish Agency of Medicines and Medical Products (AEMPS).

Farr's team has also provided support to the device carried out by the Technical University of Valencia, now in its final phase of development.

Source:

Journal reference:

Garmendia, O. et al. (2020) Low-cost, easy-to-build non-invasive pressure support ventilator for under-resourced regions: open source hardware description, performance and feasibility testing. European Respiratory Journal. doi.org/10.1183/13993003.00846-2020.

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Non-invasive, low-cost ventilator developed for regions with limited means - News-Medical.Net

Physiology

Opening up the conversation on female athlete health – Athletics Weekly

Understanding our body is key if we are to get the most out of it, but some natural functions still dont get discussed so how do we know if what were experiencing is normaland use it to our advantage?

Athletes Dr Jess Piasecki and Dr Georgie Bruinvels have come together with journalist Lucy Lomax to launch theFemale Athlete Podcast a place for conversation and education ontopics relating to the female body, sport and exercise.

As well as being a lecturer in exercise physiology at Nottingham Trent University, Piasecki is one of the UKs top marathon runners, havingstormed to a 2:25:28 Florence Marathon win last November.

The 30-year-oldhasspoken openly about her struggles with injuries related to RED-S (relative energy deficiency in sport)in the past and is passionate about passing on her knowledge and experience.

I just want to raise awareness and enhance that communication amongst all females, says Piasecki. Weve called it theFemale Athlete Podcast but for me a female athlete is anyone who is female and who exercises and the majority of those will have some kind of menstrual cycle, whether its through an oral contraceptive or not, and they will have their own stories and experiences.

If we can open up that conversation then hopefully we can keep more women in sport and promote females competing at recreational right the way through to elite level.

READ MORE |RED-S: Jessica Piasecki shares her story

Bruinvels is an applied physiologist and research scientist for sport science and data analytics companyOrreco and is also an accomplished marathoner with a PB of2:37:03 andGreater Manchester Marathon wins on her CV.

My real aim and passion is to drive education, drive awareness and break down barriers across the board, says Bruinvels. That was a massive motivation for doing this.

I really feel that a lot of the reasons why people dont want to talk about it and feel embarrassed to talk about it is because they dont really understand. I think that is because the education that you might get in schools around this is relatively limited.

Some work I have done has found that 82% of exercising women have never been educated around their menstrual cycle. If they dont have the understanding about it, they dont know why they might feel as they do, why are they going to suddenly start talking to their coach or other people about it if they feel almost embarrassed, they are almost internalising it.

I think theres a large part of us as women who just think its normal and think okay, Im a really heavy bleeder, thats normal or I experience loads of pain, well its my period, thats just me. Because we dont share that information, we dont know that it might be abnormal.

I definitely think the education side is so important to help break those taboos.

Lomax is ajournalist andcommentator who is also on her own running journey as she prepares for an autumn marathon.

Its so embarrassing how little research there is out there and how little female athletes actually know about their own bodies, she says. This is a great platform to be able to talk about things and have a question time at the end for people to ask questions.

Our mantra is breaking down the taboos and opening up conversation and helping women learn more about their bodies. But we want to have males learn about what were talking about as well and have an awareness.

On her own experiences, Piasecki adds:I dont want anyone to go through what I went through in terms of athletics and I want people to have a healthy, successful career. By just making my story available and also through the means of this podcast, we just again raise the awareness.

I didnt know at a younger age that never having started a period from the age of 12 to 18 naturally was not a normal thing. There are other things that could have been addressed perhaps at that time but we didnt have that education.

The full 40-minute interview is available to watch below and via the AW YouTube channel, as Piasecki, Bruinvels and Lomax give an introduction to theFemale Athlete Podcast and discuss the importance of shining light on topics that usually go under the radar.

They highlight the biggest misconceptions they have needed to address, the impact of stress and other factors, the key lessons learned and how athletes can use the menstrual cycle to their advantage, as well as sharing insight into their own running journeys and how they are coping given the current coronavirus restrictions.

Find theFemale Athlete Podcastat femaleathletepodcast.buzzsprout.com as well as via Apple Podcasts,Google Podcasts and Spotify. Follow@female_pod on Twitter andfemaleathletepod on Instagram for updates

For more on the latest athletics news, athletics events coverage and athletics updates, check out theAW homepageand our social media channels onTwitter,FacebookandInstagram

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Opening up the conversation on female athlete health - Athletics Weekly

Physiology

$1.6 million NIH-funded study focuses on gut-brain clues to disease cures – Rowan Today

A National Institutes of Health grant secured this month by Rowan University School of Osteopathic Medicine researcher Dr. Howard Chang could help unlock some of the biggest mysteries facing modern science including the connection between healthy gut flora and diseases like ALS.

Chang, who came to Rowan from the State University of New York Binghamton in December, said ALS, more commonly known as Lou Gehrigs Disease, is a progressive neurodegenerative condition in which patients lose muscle control and are ultimately rendered unable to move, eat, even breath on their own.

The NIH funding, $1.6 million over five years, enables Changs study, The role of superoxide dismutase SOD-1 in microbe-gut-brain interaction, to examine the role of an intestinal gene that can mutate and affect the normally healthy relationship between the human gut and the neural system. That mutation that can lead to the development of diseases like ALS, Parkinsons and Alzheimers, for which there are no cures.

With a personal connection to ALS his uncle died of the disease and he believes others in his family may carry the unexpressed mutated gene Chang hopes that a cure to it and similar diseases may one day develop, at least in part, through his research.

A healthy gut microbiome helps maintain immunity but in addition to the immune system a healthy microflora improves your psychological status, helps influence aging and can influence the development of dementia and neurodegeneration, Chang said. Were trying to figure out how a microbe in the gut influences the physiology in the brain.

He said though the gene, superoxide dismutase SOD-1, was discovered in the 1990s, his research into the connection between gut microbiomeand brain diseases could be transformative.

We hope to identify new layers, different genes and proteins, that will hopefully lead to some kind of therapeutic target to improve the condition of ALS, he said.

Chang said the mutated gene is present in a small segment of the general population but the number of people affected by ALS is determined not by the presence of that mutation, which may be tested for, but through a clinical evaluation of symptoms.

It is estimated that at least 16,000 Americans may be living with ALS at any given time, he said. Familial ALS, a hereditary form of the disease caused by SOD-1 and other mutations, accounts for ten percent of cases, whereas the remaining sporadic cases have no clearly defined etiology.

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$1.6 million NIH-funded study focuses on gut-brain clues to disease cures - Rowan Today

Physiology

Physicians Push Back on Treating COVID-19 as HAPE – Medscape

Editor's note: Find the latest COVID-19 news and guidance in Medscape's Coronavirus Resource Center.

For Luanne Freer, MD, an expert in high-altitude pulmonary edema (HAPE) and founder and director of Everest ER, a nonprofit seasonal clinic at the Mt. Everest base camp in Nepal (elevation, 17,600 ft), a sudden flurry of messages and questions she received about a possible COVID-19/HAPE link was startling.

"That's why it kind of poked me in the eye," she said, referencing her extensive experience treating HAPE, which she described as a pressure-related phenomenon. "My goodness, they are so completely different."

Dr Luanne Freer

Dr. Freer, an emergency physician, reached out to several pulmonary intensivists with experience treating both HAPE and COVID-19 to gauge their reactions, and within 36 hours, they had drafted their response. In the commentary, published in High Altitude Medicine & Biology, the clinicians note that the comparison between HAPE and COVID-19 is potentially risky.

"As a group of physicians who have in some cases cared for patients with COVID-19 and in all cases cared for patients with HAPE and studied its pathophysiology and management, we feel it important to correct this misconception, as continued amplification of this message could have adverse effects on management of these patients," they wrote.

The suggestion that COVID-19 lung injury sometimes looks more like HAPE than like acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) appeared in a journal review article in late March and was put forth by medical professionals on social media where it gained traction in recent weeks and was amplified in multiple media outlets, including this one.

"With COVID, we don't understand everything that's going on, but we know for sure it's an inflammatory process not a pressure-related problem," Dr. Freer said. "I thought ... this could be so dangerous to load the medicines that we use when we're treating HAPE onto patients with COVID-19."

The pathophysiological mechanisms in HAPE are different than those in other respiratory syndromes, including those associated with COVID-19, said Andrew M. Luks, MD, of the UW Medicine, Seattle, and the first author on the commentary.

"HAPE is a noncardiogenic form of pulmonary edema, as are ARDS due to bacteria or viral pneumonia, re-expansion pulmonary edema, immersion pulmonary edema, negative pressure pulmonary edema, and neurogenic pulmonary edema," Dr. Luks, Dr. Freer, and colleagues wrote in the commentary, explaining that all of these entities cause varying degrees of hypoxemia and diffuse bilateral opacities on chest imaging. "Importantly, in all of these cases, edema accumulates in the interstitial and alveolar spaces of the lung as a result of imbalance in Starling forces."

A difference between these entities, however, is "the mechanism by which that imbalance develops," they noted.

The excessive and uneven hypoxic pulmonary vasoconstriction that leads to a marked increase in pulmonary artery pressure, subsequent lung overperfusion, increased pulmonary capillary hydrostatic pressure, and leakage of fluid from the vascular space into the alveolar space as seen in HAPE, is a "fundamentally different phenomenon than what is seen in COVID-19-related ARDS, which involves viral-mediated inflammatory responses as the primary pathophysiological mechanism," they added.

The authors described several other differences between the conditions, ultimately noting that "understanding the distinction between the pathophysiological mechanisms of these entities is critical for patient management."

In HAPE, supplemental oxygen alone may be sufficient; in COVID-19, it may improve hypoxemia but won't resolve the underlying inflammation or injury, they explained, adding that "only good supportive care including mechanical ventilation, quite often for long periods of time, allows some patients to survive until their disease resolves."

Further, HAPE can be prevented or treated with pulmonary vasodilators such a nifedipine or sildenafil, which decrease pulmonary artery pressure and, as a result lower pulmonary capillary hydrostatic pressure, they said.

Use of such medications for COVID-19 might decrease pulmonary artery pressure and improve right ventricular function in COVID-19, but "by releasing hypoxic pulmonary vasoconstriction and increasing perfusion to nonventilated regions of the lung, they could also worsen ventilation-perfusion mismatch" and thereby worsen hypoxemia, they explained, adding that the treatments can also cause or worsen hypotension.

Efforts to share observations and experience are important in medicine, but sometimes, as in this circumstance, "they get out there, spread around like a brushfire almost and get [unwarranted] face validity," Dr. Luks said, noting that in response to information circulating about COVID-19 and HAPE, he has already heard medical professionals floating the idea of treating COVID-19 with treatments used for HAPE.

It's true that some COVID-19 lung injury cases are behaving differently than typical ARDS, he said, adding that presentation can vary.

"But trying to equate HAPE and COVID-19 is just wrong," he said. "HAPE and COVID-19 may share several features ...but those are features that are shared by a lot of different forms of respiratory failure."

In a recent video interview, WebMD's chief medical officerJohn Whyte, MD, spoke with a New York City physician trained in critical care and emergency medicine, Cameron Kyle-Sidell, MD, who raised the need to consider different respiratory protocols for COVID-19, noting that standard protocols were falling short in many cases.

"What we're seeing ... is something unusual, it's something that we are not used to," Dr. Kyle-Sidell of Maimonides Medical Center said in that interview, stressing that the presentation differed from that seen in typical ARDS. "The patterns I was seeing did not make sense."

Like others, he noted that COVID-19 patients were presenting with illness that clinically looked more like HAPE, but that the pathophysiology is not necessary similar to HAPE.

At around the same time, Luciano Gattinoni, MD, of the Medical University of Gttingen in Germany and colleagues, published a letter to the editor in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine stressing that the ARDS presentation in COVID-19 patients is atypical and requires a patient physiologydriven treatment approach, rather than a standard protocoldriven approach. Dr. Gattinoni and colleagues suggested that instead of high positive end-expiratory pressure (PEEP), physicians should consider the lowest possible PEEP and gentle ventilation.

Dr. Luks agreed that "some patients with COVID-19 do not have the same physiologic derangements that we see in a lot of other people with ARDS."

"[Dr. Gattinoni] is making the point that we need to treat these people differently ... and I think that's a valid point, and honestly, that's a point that applied even before COVID-19," he said. "Most of the things that we see in clinical practice there's a lot of heterogeneity between patients, and you have to be prepared to tailor your therapy in light of the differences that you're picking up from your observations at the bedside and other data that you're getting on the patient."

The main concern Dr. Luks and his coauthors wanted to convey, they said, is making sure that the anecdotal experiences and observations of clinicians struggling to find answers don't spiral out of control without proper vetting, thereby leading to patient harm.

"In this challenging time, we must identify the best means to care for these critically ill patients. That approach should be grounded in sound pulmonary physiology, clinical experience and, when available, evidence from clinical studies," they concluded.

Dr. Luks and Dr. Freer reported having no financial disclosures.

This story originally appeared on MDedge.com.

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Physicians Push Back on Treating COVID-19 as HAPE - Medscape

Human Behavior

Here’s what COVID-19 teaches us about ‘social learning’ and the environment – World Economic Forum

- The dire social and economic impact of COVID-19 could worsen environmental destruction in the long run.

- But the pandemic is also teaching us how to use individual choices to tackle a global disaster.

- Social learning is a powerful tool for lasting change. It involves people learning from each other and adapting their behaviour as a result.

The horrors of the global human death toll of COVID-19 confront me daily in the news and through my concern for my own vulnerable parents. The economic and other hardships so many are facing due to physical distancing measures also deeply disturb me. Moreover, as a global change ecologist whose lens has been the whole wide world and everything in it the millions of other species, the air we all share, and the water we all depend onthe environmental dimensions of COVID-19 are impossible for me to ignore.

Let me be clear: COVID-19 itself is not good for any of the seventeen UN Sustainable Development Goals. Human wellbeing, the economy and the environment are all interrelated, and the pandemic is certainly not helping us achieve our goals for protecting them. However, the pandemic is teaching us lessons in human behaviour that could bring us closer to these goals in the future.

A mere year and a half ago, in October 2018, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published an alarming Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5 degrees C. It started with a quote from The Wisdom of the Sands, by Antoine de Saint-Exupry: Your task is not to foresee the future, but to enable it.

The report called for rapid, far-reaching, and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society to avert the worst disasters of climate change. It predicted dire consequences for human well-being, the economy and the environment if those warnings were not heeded. Despite the shift in language from climate change to climate emergency over the past year by many institutions, we have not seen these recommendations being implemented.

And yet, COVID-19 has forced us to make dramatic changes in every area of life in the space of only a few weeks. Cities and entire countries were shut down overnight, leaders declared national and international emergencies, people and institutions adapted to unprecedented societal change.

The pandemic is a challenge for all the SDGS

Image: UN

COVID-19 is also transforming our relationship to the environment. The origins of emerging infectious diseases, including COVID-19 but also HIV, Ebola, Nipah, SARS, pandemic influenza and others, are at least partly linked to the growing human impact on the environment. Acknowledging this is crucial as we try to address the root causes of pandemics. These days, many cities are reporting cleaner air and lower pollution. In some places, this is literally changing how we perceive nature. Some communities in India are able to see the snow-capped Himalayas for the first time in their lives. However, these changes are also revealing the magnitude of these chronic problems, and the importance of tackling them. As the pandemic limits access to green spaces such as parks and conservation areas, many are becoming painfully aware of how fundamental these natural oases are to their wellbeing.

It appears that in times of crisis, we connect even more strongly with our natural surroundings. In the short term, this may well have a beneficial impact on some aspects on the environment. However, in the long term, the picture is more complex. Economic recession could exacerbate environmental degradation, as resources are diverted from efforts to protect and restore habitats. It could also worsen existing poverty traps. As the UN Climate Change Executive Secretary said: COVID-19 is the most urgent threat facing humanity today, but we cannot forget that climate change is the biggest threat facing humanity over the long term." The acting executive secretary of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity put it bluntly: The message we are getting is if we dont take care of nature, it will take care of us.

Consider the quote from Antoine de Saint Exupry, however: we need not foresee the future, we just need to enable it. This is where the lessons on human behaviour come in.

The power of "social learning": when people learn from each other and change their behaviour accordingly.

Some of my own research on the power of human behavior to shape environmental trajectories, such as biodiversity loss and climate change, suggests social learning is a significant factor in changing systems. That is to say, people learn from each other, and change their behaviour accordingly.

Right now, we are learning valuable lessons in resilience and human adaptability. We are learning how quickly humans can respond when faced with a common enemy, be it a novel virus or the well-established physics of climate change. Let us examine these lessons, reflect on our new respect for the natural world, and consider what enabled us to adjust to such profoundly challenging and unfamiliar new norms. Let us take note of how some of the ideas put forward by different countries now are very much in line with UN sustainable development goals, such as the elimination of poverty, good health and wellbeing, reduced inequality, and responsible production and consumption. And lets imagine how we might be able to harness these lessons to reduce the risk of catastrophes - disease, climate change or other threats - in the future.

License and Republishing

World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with our Terms of Use.

Written by

Madhur Anand, Associate Professor, University of Guelph

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

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Here's what COVID-19 teaches us about 'social learning' and the environment - World Economic Forum

Human Behavior

Why Jane Goodall says human disregard for nature led to the coronavirus pandemic – PBS NewsHour

Jane Goodall sees a direct line between the global coronavirus pandemic and humanitys disregard for and mistreatment of nature.

We are all interconnected, the famed primatologist, and a leading voice in conservation efforts, told the PBS NewsHour. And if we dont get that lesson from this pandemic, then maybe we never will.

Goodalls decades of research into chimpanzees in Africa is the subject of a new documentary, Jane Goodall: The Hope, which will air April 22 on the National Geographic Channel. Goodall has also been a tireless advocate for animals and environmental issues, particularly when it comes to how human behavior can disrupt wildlife habitats.

I just hope that when this is over, were wiser.

Many infectious diseases that have emerged in our lifetime Zika virus, MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome), AIDS and Ebola, among them have stemmed in some way from human interference with wildlife and their habitats, creating the conditions that allow new viruses, like COVID-19, to spill over from animals to people.

MORE: I toured this exhibit on epidemics before the coronavirus pandemic shut it down

Initial evidence about how the novel coronavirus first spread pointed to wet markets where live animals are sold in Wuhan, China. Goodall said its our interactions with animals and the environment that had led to the global pandemic, and I just hope that when this is over, were wiser.

Goodall also said she hopes that Chinas ban on wet markets holds and is extended to prohibit the sale of wild animals for medicine, like pangolin scales and bear bile.

We mark this 50th anniversary of Earth Day with Jane Goodall, one of the worlds most renowned scientists and environmentalists. Jeffrey Brown talks to Goodall about her career and mission and the pandemic that has brought modern civilization to its knees.

MORE: Understanding the origins of the coronavirus

Goodall also said officials ought to tamp down animal trafficking because that brings animals in close contact with people at the markets theyre sold.

Its mistreatment of animals and exactly where the next pandemic might come from, if we dont pay attention to our behavior, she said. I pray that we will this time take heed of the message that were being given, because this pandemic has been predicted for many, many, many years.

Watch the Newshours full interview with Goodall here.

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Why Jane Goodall says human disregard for nature led to the coronavirus pandemic - PBS NewsHour

Human Behavior

An inclusive computer science education starts with a culture of affirmation, Amy Ko says – Dailyuw

Amy J. Ko was inspired to study computer science after finding out she could play Tetris on her graphing calculator. While the original game was incredibly slow you could watch the pieces move by the pixel Ko and a group of friends were inspired to code a faster version.

She eventually majored in computer science, but her interests in human behavior led to a double degree in psychology. While many of Kos peers wanted to be software engineers, she paved her own academic path to study how people solve computing problems.

In a way, I was trying to construct this informatics degree at my university, smashing together computer science and behavioral sciences, she said.

Today, Ko is a professor at the Information School, directing the Code & Cognition Lab and researching how people of different backgrounds make sense of computer education. She has worked with students from colleges and K-12 schools, as well as learners from coding bootcamps.

Most students approached computer science with a fixed mindset of who is or isnt a programmer. If a student doesnt look like the stereotypical geek, they are likely to believe that their capabilities make them not destined to be a software engineer.

However, Ko challenged this preconceived thinking by focusing on the current coding pedagogy. She discovered that the factors that make a successful programmer depend on the strategies the students were taught.

Ko led a study that divided participants into two groups. One was taught computing the conventional way, similar to the education in CSE 142, and the other was given a strategy to think through a coding problem.

Every week, students were asked to journal on whether they thought they were capable of programming. The results found that the group with the intervention increased their self-belief, thinking that they could be a developer one day, while that of the conventional group decreased over time.

Its not so much about whether or not somebody is smart enough, Ko said. Its much more about whether or not they have good teachers who are teaching good strategies and structuring peoples learning successfully.

Ko conducted interviews with participants to qualitatively assess the learners understanding of the process. The difference between the two groups was judged based on the questions that students asked when seeking help.

In the control group, participants asked more disempowered questions, such as how do I do this? and solve this problem for me, because they didnt know where to start. Meanwhile, participants in the intervention group asked questions that showed more creative problem-solving skills.

Their questions were much more like I can do this, I just dont know which approach to take, give me a better approach, Ko said.

The research concluded that, while teaching correct strategies is important in computing education, self-belief is powerful in driving students to succeed as software engineers. In her work, Ko thinks carefully about how to communicate these strategies effectively, signaling to students that everybody will be successful regardless of who they are.

Her research views diversity as the cultures and signals in a learning community that establish a notion of belonging. Sadly, computing education across the world has an elitist and tribal culture of judging who is good enough.

Wired reported that white men have continually dominated computer science departments in the United States since 1991. Even Stack Overflow, an online computing forum, pervades an idle boys club chatter that discourages women and novice developers from feeling welcomed in the culture.

Since the K-12 learning environment is open to new discoveries, Ko hopes that her research can help educators make computing education more focused on teamwork and inclusion. For anybody who is starting to program, Ko finds the best way to succeed in this field is to learn with others.

You need to create your own culture of affirmation and belonging, Ko said. If you can create a community of people of your own making, thats a space for you to thrive in.

Reach reporter Anh Nguyen at science@dailyuw.com. Twitter: @thedailyanh

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An inclusive computer science education starts with a culture of affirmation, Amy Ko says - Dailyuw

Human Behavior

Fifty years of Earth Day where did we go wrong? | TheHill – The Hill

Earth Day turns 50 today. This is a milestone in the environmental movement and should be a cause for celebration. But since 1970, our global carbon emissions have increased by 146 percent and our per capita emissions have increased from 4 to 4.9 metric tons.

How did we go awry in our effort to save our Earth? Quite simply, we focused our attention in the wrong place.

Science proves that climate change is real and that we are in an environmental crisis caused by human behavior. As individuals, we are advised to reduce our carbon footprints, reduce our waste and water consumption, switch to plant-based diets, choose local foods, make low-carbon choices, reduce, reuse and recycle. There is no end to the recommended actions for individuals to do their part in reducing our human impact on the planet.

This is where we went wrong; these recommendations are misplaced. While these recommendations can help, these are not the most effective actions you can take to produce the change that is needed to save our planet. The source of our environmental problem is the activities of business and industry and the most effective actions you can take are those that will force positive change within business and industry.

Industries that produce our goods are the largest contributors to the greenhouse gas emissions that are polluting our air and causing climate change. Research has determined that just 100 companies are responsible for 71 percent of global emissions and just 25 companies are responsible for 52 percent of global emissions. These companies are primarily gas and oil companies that emit significant greenhouse gasses during the fossil fuel exploration and drilling stages of production. Emissions continue when those fossil fuels are burned for energy.

Industries are the largest producers of solid waste in the U.S. Although data is not tracked, industrial solid waste is estimated to account for 97 percent of U.S. national trash, while municipal solid waste accounts for 3 percent. Industrial wastewater is also not tracked but it is estimated that as much as 80 percent of global wastewater is not treated before being released back into the environment.

Industries use the most freshwater in the United States. Industrial, commercial and agricultural activities account for 87 percent of U.S. freshwater usage while domestic and public activities account for 13 percent. Most freshwater in the U.S. is used by the thermoelectric-power industry to cool equipment and by the agricultural industry for irrigation.

To be sure, I am not encouraging you to abandon efforts to reduce your impact on the environment. While doing your part will help, the most influential actions you can take are to insist that business and industry take responsibility and make positive social and environmental change; you can do this through shareholder and stakeholder activism and through voting.

If you own stock, you can demand more responsible activities from the company. If you have a retirement account, you can pressure your employer and investment firm to adopt socially responsible investing. If you are a concerned citizen, you can pressure industry regulators and certifying bodies to require business and industry to adopt socially and environmentally responsible operations. If you are a consumer, you can pressure businesses to have responsible operations and supply chains.

But the fastest way to ensure change is through government legislation. Legislators can reallocate subsidies, implement taxes, or use other incentives to force positive social and environmental change for businesses and industries. You can vote for policymakers who will support this change.

You can make a difference for the future of our planet and help us get on track for the next Earth Day. But your impact can be far greater than simply reducing, reusing and recycling. The greatest impacts you can have are to put pressure on businesses and industries to take responsibility and you can vote for politicians who will ensure positive social and environmental change.

Nancy E. Landrum, Ph.D., is a professor of Sustainability Management at Loyola University Chicago and a Fulbright Specialist in sustainability.

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Fifty years of Earth Day where did we go wrong? | TheHill - The Hill

Human Behavior

Earth Day panel: UWO experts talk ties between coronavirus and climate crises – UW Oshkosh Today

Theres reason for concernand some hopewhen considering what the coronavirus crisis can teach us about what needs to be done about our role in climate change.

The topic of the pandemic and its intersection with sustainability was the subject of a virtual panel held Wednesday afternoon as part of University of Wisconsin Oshkoshs series of Earth Week events.

Brad Spanbauer

Stephanie Spehar, associate anthropology professor, moderated the interdisciplinary discussion that included assistant sociology professor Jeremiah Bohr, associate English professor Stewart Cole, environmental studies and history professor Jim Feldman, associate biology professor Sabrina Mueller-Spitz and campus sustainability officer Brad Spanbauer.

Wednesday marked the 50th anniversary of Earth Day. UW Oshkosh typically celebrates with a week of on-campus activities and events, but this years slate moved online because of the ongoing public health crisis. Programming continues through Friday.

Among the running themes in the discussion was the need for a communal response. Much like the way our day-to-day lives have been significantly altered to slow the spread of COVID-19, major changes to our daily lives are necessary to slow the warming of the planet.

What I think COVID is showing me is in some ways we are prepared and in many ways we are incredibly unprepared, Spanbauer said. Not just for something like a global pandemic, but we are incredibly not prepared for climate change and for all the things that come with climate change.

Mueller-Spitz, an environmental microbiologist, stressed the need for microbial literacy moving forward. She also suggested that maybe younger generations experiencing the events of 2020 will better prepare them for whats necessary in terms of sustainability.

Sabrina Mueller-Spitz

Bohr pointed out the parallels in how COVID-19 and climate change both disproportionately impact vulnerable populations, and how in both cases state and institutional intervention are necessary to save lives.

Cole explained how human behavior likely caused the pandemic in the first place. Some of the first people infected with COVID-19 were linked to a large live animal market in China, suggesting animal-to-human spread, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

One of the things that I think that we can learn from this is that viruses like this are not a random occurrence, he said. Theyre a result of our reconfiguring our interfaces with non-human animal populations usually in exploitative ways, in ways that treat animals as biological matter to be manipulated as opposed to beings in their own right.

Late in the hour-long discussion, Feldman gave a reminder of a reason for optimism.

Its really striking how quickly people were able to change their behavior in really profound ways, really quickly, he said of the nationwide response of the past two months. If youd have told me this was going to happen and happen in this way before it happened, I wouldnt have believed you.

I think theres for sure some hope there.

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Earth Day panel: UWO experts talk ties between coronavirus and climate crises - UW Oshkosh Today

Human Behavior

#WeThePlanet – Thrive Global

Each time I travel internationally, the first thing I notice is the state of youth and animals in urban environments. How are human beings and other species navigating urban landscapes? Did long-term thinking go into the design of the city with architects, urban planners, entrepreneurs, youth, and key stakeholders? Do the pigeons have all their toes?

I first travelled to France and Germany to learn about social business, and to attend the 2017 Global Social Business Summit in Paris. On the first day, I was invited to walk through the fourth arrondissement with Professor Yunus Bangladeshi delegation. I was inspired by these women and men, and the tremendous change and reach of social business in Bangladesh, France, and globally.

Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus is actively creating A World of Three Zeros. This is the title of his extraordinary book, a call to action to design the world you want to create with zero poverty, zero unemployment, and zero net carbon emissions. A human being is born to be active, creative, energetic, and a problem solver, always seeking new ways to unleash his or her unlimited potential, shares Yunus.

Today, on the 50th Anniversary of Earth Day in the midst of the COVID-19 global pandemic, We The Planet is taking action to make the impossible possible. Humanity is at an inflection point. I have been reading and re-reading the books of the most inspiring writers, my personal heroes and some of our partners. These icons for the planet all have something to say about protecting cities, nations, and life on the planet.

When we founded We The Planet and launched the #WeThePlanet campaign at the United Nations during UNGA Week in 2019, we considered our own species global triumphs and failures. Humanity can do better to protect all life on land. All species. We as humans must go beyond We The People, and focus on something that is larger than ourselves. As a collective, we must be focused on We The Planet, states Sood.

The great leaders of ancient civilizations shared a profound understanding of human behavior. Marcus Aurelius (A.D. 121-180) provided Rome and the world at large with wisdom on every facet of life, from coping with adversity to interacting with others. In Meditations, he states,

Dont ever forget these things:

The nature of the world.

My nature.

How I relate to the world.

What proportion of it I make up.

That you are part of nature, and no one can prevent you from speaking and acting in harmony with it, always.

The nature of human beings is inextricably tied to the state of the planet, yet many people forget this crucial link. We can be fearless while acting with integrity. Lets make the impossible possible. Everybody can do something to improve life on land and life under the sea. To act without fear or favor indeed, the very language in the founding documents of The New York Times is at the heart of We The Planet. Everybody can do something to protect all life on the planet, and we must prepare ourselves to make it happen. We are ready. We are one.

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#WeThePlanet - Thrive Global