Human Behavior

Global Societal Surveillance Market Research 2021: COVID-19 has Dramatically Reinforced the Notion that Surveilling Citizens Provides a Net Benefit to…

Dublin, Jan. 27, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Global Societal Surveillance Market by Technology, Solution, Applications, and Services 2021 - 2026" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

This research evaluates the companies, strategies, technologies and solutions involved in this emerging surveillance society market. It provides analysis and forecasting for key technologies and solutions including digital identity, tracking, mobile payments, blockchain technology, social credit systems, social distancing solutions, digital twins, augmented and virtual reality.

Based on several key drivers, there is a major cultural shift underway towards a surveillance society, which entails primarily observation, tracking, and analysis of human behaviors. Rapidly becoming a social norm in some parts of the world, surveillance gained substantial societal support due to the need to surveil certain individuals that may be foreign state-actor supported terrorists, or in some cases, domestic enemies of the state.

However, other factors, such as state control over civilian behavior have taken the fore with the rise of social credit monitoring and the advent of COVID-19, which have dramatically reinforced the notion that surveilling citizens provides a net benefit to society. Recent concerns and threats stemming from the pandemic have added a new dimension of safety and security to protect human lives. The new expectation will have a longer-term impact of routine behavior and processes. In addition to physical threats associated with pandemics, bad actors also seize the opportunity to engage in various threats against cyber infrastructure.

By way of example, a recent initiative known as the Vaccination Credential Initiative (VCI), was formed by leading technology companies such as Microsoft, Oracle, Salesforce, and others for purposes of tracking COVID-19 vaccinations. More specifically, the VCI's stated purpose is to empower individuals with digital access to their vaccination records based on open, interoperable standards so they can achieve two things: (1) protect and improve their health, and (2) demonstrate their health status to safely return to travel, work, school and life while protecting their data privacy.

When viewed as a whole as positive, the notion is that societal surveillance provides greater benefits than losses in terms of overall personal privacy. These benefits may include the ability to mitigate the impact of pandemics. On the other hand, the downside of civil surveillance is considered trading safety for liberty. Especially in the United States, the freedom to act anonymously is considered by many to be a core right of democracy in terms of civil liberties identified in the Bill of Rights.

The post-pandemic era provides ample justification for persistent citizen identification and continuous tracking and tracing of location and social interactions. All of the key technologies used are evaluated throughout this research, which includes radio communications with devices, optical analysis via video and still pictures, and even via advanced biometrics such as unique biological signatures and presence as may be detected by ubiquitous sensors with reads transmitted via IoT and evaluated via AI-enabled analytics.

Many of the technologies used for machine-related monitoring and analysis, such as computer vision for autonomous vehicles, shall be augmented for use in the social distancing solutions market in terms of identification, tracking, and tracing human behaviors. For example, real-world physical access is anticipated to be impacted in a big way due to the pandemic. Accordingly, the publisher sees a keen need for physical access controls, transforming how citizens travel, use public places, and interact with other people. These social distancing market technologies will provide the basis for solutions that enable tracking/identifying people for access to airports, parks, sporting venues, and other public places.

The ability to identify, track, and correlate digital and physical identity is of paramount importance to the societal surveillance market. By way of example, digital currencies such as Bitcoin provide for a certain level of anonymity in terms of financial transactions. However, the underlying technology in support of crypto-currencies, blockchain technology, is being adopted by China as it looks to unveil a digital-only version of its currency, which would provide unprecedented governmental oversight and control over transactions. This fits with their drive towards a social credit society in which every citizens' actions are observed and considered.

There is an emerging market for surveilling society, which includes observation, tracking, and data analytics to gather and analyze data. This market also involves the use of additional technologies such as the combination of digital twin technology, augmented and virtual reality to provide an improved means of observing and interacting with citizens. Additionally, governments may leverage the ability to observe citizen behaviors by tracking digital payments in an increasingly cashless global society.

This market also includes the ability to score citizens as part of an overall social credit system that goes beyond "acceptable" and "unacceptable" individual behaviors to focus on government mandates such as compliance with public safety rulings associated with virus outbreaks.

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Target Audience:

Key Topics Covered:

Asset Tracking Market by Technology, Infrastructure, Connection Type, Mobility, Location Determination, Solution Type, and Industry Verticals

1. Executive Summary

2. Asset Tracking Market Segmentation

3. Introduction

4. Asset Tracking Solutions

5. Asset Tracking in Industry Verticals

6. Company Analysis

7. Asset Tracking Market Forecasts 2021 - 2026

8. Conclusions and Recommendations

9. Appendix: Slap-and-Track Asset Tracking Solutions Market 2021 - 2026

Blockchain Technology Market by Service Type, Applications, Solutions, Industry Verticals

1. Executive Summary

2. Introduction

3. Blockchain Ecosystem and Marketplace

4. Blockchain Market Outlook and Forecasts 2021 - 2026

5. Blockchain Vendors

6 Conclusions and Recommendations

Human and Machine Trust/Threat Detection and Damage Mitigation Market by Technology, Solution, Deployment Model, Use Case, Application, Sector (Consumer, Enterprise, Industrial, Government), Industry Vertical, and Region

1. Executive Summary

2. Introduction

3. Technology and Application Analysis

4. Company Analysis

5. Market Analysis and Forecast 2021 - 2026

6. Conclusions and Recommendations

Social Credit Market by Physical and Cyber Infrastructure (Sensors, Cameras, Biometrics, Computer Vision), Software (Machine Learning, Data Analytics, APIs), Use Cases, Applications, Industry Verticals, and Regions

1. Executive Summary

2. Introduction

3. Social Credit System Technologies and Applications

4. Company Analysis

5. Social Credit Systems Market Analysis and Forecasts

6. Conclusions and Recommendations

7. Appendix: Social Credit Market Supporting Technologies

Social Distancing Solutions Market by Technology, Gear, and Applications in Industry Verticals

1.0 Executive Summary

2.0 Introduction

3.0 Technology and Application Analysis

4.0 Social Distancing Solutions Company Analysis

5.0 Social Distancing Market Analysis and Forecasts

6.0 Conclusions and Recommendations

7.0 Appendix

Digital Twins Market by Technology, Solution, Application, and Industry Vertical

1. Executive Summary

2. Introduction

3. Digital Twins Company Assessment

4. Digital Twins Market Analysis and Forecasts

5. Conclusions and Recommendations

Artificial Intelligence in Information and Communications Technology: AI and Cognitive Computing in Communications, Applications, Content, and Commerce

1. Executive Summary

2. Introduction

3. AI Intellectual Property Leadership by Country and Company

4. AI in ICT Market Analysis and Forecasts 2021 - 2026

5. AI in Select Industry Verticals

6. AI in Major Market Segments

7. Important Corporate AI M&A

8. AI in ICT Use Cases

9. AI in ICT Vendor Analysis

10. Summary and Recommendations

11. Appendix: Key AI in ICT Patents

Big Data Market by Leading Companies, Solutions, Use Cases, Business Cases, Infrastructure, Technology Integration, Industry Verticals, Region and Countries

1. Executive Summary

2. Introduction

3. Big Data Challenges and Opportunities

4. Big Data Technologies and Business Cases

5. Key Sectors for Big Data

6. Big Data Value Chain

7. Big Data Analytics

8. Standardization and Regulatory Issues

9. Key Big Data Companies and Solutions

10. Overall Big Data Market Analysis and Forecasts 2021 - 2026

11. Big Data Market Segment Analysis and Forecasts 2021 - 2026

12. Appendix: Big Data Support 0f Streaming IoT Data

Next Generation Mobile Payments by Implantable Technology

1. Executive Summary

2. Introduction

3. Mobile Payment Technologies and Solutions

4. Mobile Payments Ecosystem

5. Regional Mobile Payment Market Analysis and Forecasts 2021 - 2026

6. Conclusions and Recommendations

Augmented and Mixed Reality Market by Technology, Infrastructure, Devices, Solutions, Apps and Services in Industry Verticals

1. Executive Summary

2. Introduction

3. Augmented Reality Ecosystem

4. Augmented and Mixed Reality Market Drivers and Opportunities

5. Company Analysis

6. Market Analysis and Forecast

7. Conclusions and Recommendations

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Global Societal Surveillance Market Research 2021: COVID-19 has Dramatically Reinforced the Notion that Surveilling Citizens Provides a Net Benefit to...

Human Behavior

Verified: More Parking Puts More Cars on the Road – Sightline Institute

Do cities create greener lifestyles? Or do they just enable them?

Its very, very, very clear that people who live closer to other people drive less. But how much of this is due to the fact that people who were already predisposed to driving lessthose of us who dont particularly enjoy driving, for exampleare deliberately living where parking is scarce and buses are frequent?

A forthcoming academic paper finally begins to answer this crucial question. Its breakthrough conclusion: Bigger parking lots make us drive more.

Even if we ignore the breathtaking economic costs of dedicating scarce urban space to car storage, mandatory parking isnt an all of the above strategy that simply lets people choose their favorite mode of transportation. Instead, as UCLA professor Donald Shoup put it in 1997, parking spaces are a fertility drug for cars.

Speaking scientifically, the key to proving a cause-and-effect relationship is finding a randomized sample of human behavior.

And in their new paper, What Do Residential Lotteries Show Us About Transportation Choices?, four Californian academics found such a sample: the free, site-specific lotteries that San Francisco uses to select who gets to live in the price-regulated homes of new apartment and condo buildings. (Because this is San Francisco, a two-person household generally can qualify while earning up to $118,200, equivalent to 120 percent of city median income. So these findings dont apply only to people who would struggle to afford a car.)

Its so hard to do this kind of research, wrote Jessica Roberts, a principal at Portland-based Alta Planning + Design and one of the countrys leading experts on the science of transportation behavior. Their elegant experimental design is a huge breakthrough.

After surveying the auto ownership and basic transportation habits of the residents of 2,654 homes in 197 projects built since 2002, the authors (Adam Millard-Ball, Jeremy West, Nazanin Rezaei, and Garima Desai) found that projects with more on-site parking induce more auto ownership:

Buildings with at least one parking space per unit (as required by zoning codes in most U.S. cities, and in San Francisco until circa 2010) have more than twice the car ownership rate of buildings that have no parking, the authors write.

Do buildings with less parking and car ownership limit the job prospects of their occupants? Apparently not. The team found no correlation between parking supply and employment status at the time of their 2019 survey.

They also found that more parking led to more driving, less transit use, and less walking. And they checked the locations of the 197 projects and found that non-automotive transportation choices seem to be induced by higher AllTransit scores (a measure of nearby mass transit quality by street address), higher WalkScores (a measure of the diversity of destinations within walking distance, inspired in part by an old Sightline blog post), and higher BikeScores (a measure of the quality of nearby bike networks).

Its not just that people who enjoy walking to the store will choose to live near stores. Its that living near stores makes us more inclined to walk, and less inclined to drive.

We shape our buildings, Winston Churchill said. And afterward, our buildings shape us.

This paper doesnt close the book on the questions of how much our buildings shape us, and in which ways, and which of us they shape more or differently. Its one study in one city from one year.

But it is a big new confirmation of one of the central hypotheses of the modern pro-housing movement.

Weve known that Amsterdam, built mostly before the automobile was invented, has much lower energy use per person than Seattle, despite their comparable population and wealth. Weve known that this pattern holds within countries, too. When youre measuring greenhouse emissions per person within a country, density is all but destiny. Weve known that if everyone on the world could consume energy like Netherlanders rather than like Cascadians, it would be far easier to find our way to a planet that can remain both prosperous and habitable for human life.

But at least here in the States, we havent actually had much solid evidence that building cities differently will actually change our behavior enough.

This new study strongly suggests that its possible, all these centuries later, to build new Amsterdams.

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Verified: More Parking Puts More Cars on the Road - Sightline Institute

Immunology

Herd immunity could be reached by end of summer: Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar immunology expert – The Peninsula Qatar

The first COVID-19 vaccines have now been administered in Qatar and around the world, offering hope that an end to the pandemic could be in sight. Professor of Teaching in Microbiology and Immunology at Weill Cornell Medicine in Qatar (WMC-Q), DrAli Sultan, says if the ongoing vaccination campaign goes well, herd immunity could be reached by end of summer and situation closer to normal by the end of 2021.

How would you see the pre-COVID vaccine and post COVID vaccine times?Scientists, including myself, are very excited at the prospect of an effective vaccine and the prospect of returning to normality. Starting a mass vaccination program is an important first step towards ending this pandemic. And it has come relatively quickly. Producing an effective vaccine against an infectious disease is a long process that in the past has usually taken many years. The development of the COVID-19 vaccine within a span of 8-9 months, on the other hand, has been extraordinarily fast. It has shown how quickly scientific development can be achieved via collaborative hard work, and how much the will can produce the means.

In addressing the above question, I will consider the following issues:1: What next after vaccination: One has to remember that COVID-19 vaccine won't be available immediately for everybody. Early evidence suggests that the available vaccines reduce peoples risk of developing COVID-19 by around 80-95 percent. Coronavirus is likely to continue its rapid spread until a large majority of the population is vaccinated or has survived a natural infection. The bottom line is that although an effective vaccine will certainly diminish greatly the relative risk of transmission, we still should not completely abandon basic public health measures, including the wearing of masks, hand hygiene and physical distancing.

2: Another issue to consider is re-infection, though rare, may still occur. Hence, strict practice of physical distancing, wearing a mask when in public, and frequent hand washing remain key. In the winter, it is particularly important to not gather indoors in small or large groups. Also, get a flu shot.

3: Post-COVID effect on the health of those infected: We are just beginning to learn more about the after effects of the infection. Some people, now referred to as long-haulers, are also reporting that their COVID symptoms keep dragging on for weeks. These symptoms include everything from headaches and cognitive problems to mood changes, fatigue, decreased exercise tolerance, and body ache.

4: The most important lessons that that this pandemic taught us are:a) Science and data should guide our decision now and in the future.b) Practicing good hygienic measures in hospitals, schools and other public places, could drastically reduce the spread and thereby eliminate new cases of COVID-19 and help to protect us from other infectionsc) Health authorities and government bodies should have plans and preparedness programs in place in order to avoid future pandemics.d) The COVID-19 pandemic has been a test, demonstrating that multilateral cooperation is the key to overcoming global challenges.

The first COVID-19 vaccines have now been administered in Qatar and around the world, offering hope that an end to the pandemic could be in sight: How long could it take to reach this in reality?If the ongoing vaccination campaign goes well, herd immunity could be reached by end of summer and situation closer to normal by the end of 2021. This estimate is dependent on significant numbers of people in Qatar and around the world being willing to be vaccinated with one of several vaccines in various stages of development.

If 75% to 80% of people are vaccinated, then we should reach the herd immunity threshold by the end of summer and by the time we may actually have enough herd immunity protecting our society that as we get to the end of 2021. This may allow us to reach some degree of normality that is close to where we were before the pandemic. If vaccination levels are significantly lower, (for example less than 50%), it could take a very long time to reach that level of protection and herd immunity.

Confidence in the COVID-19 vaccine grows, but at same time global concerns about side effects are on the rise: How could the confidence be built in people?There are number of surveys done on vaccine confidence, which showed that strong intent to get a COVID-19 vaccine has risen in countries like USA, UK, China, Brazil, Australia and South Korea. One of the main reasons for people who dont want to get a COVID-19 vaccine is concern about side effects. Even in countries where vaccines available to wider sections of the population, one hurdle will be public resistance to vaccination, or what is known as vaccine hesitancy or anti-vaxxers. Through the following facts and information we can build the people confidence in taking the COVID-19 vaccine:1. The first fact is that the public health authority in each country and the media have important role to play by explaining that there are some temporary side effects that happen with any vaccine injection such as pain at the site of the injection, mild fever, aches and sometimes headaches. These temporary side effects are good news because it means that the vaccine is doing its job by stimulating the immune system to fight. So it is common for highly effective vaccines to give people some symptoms. This is a sign the vaccine is doing what it was meant to do: Wake up the immune system and prepare it to fight off an infection in the future.2. The second fact is that COVID-19 vaccines do not contain a live or whole coronavirus, so the vaccinated person cant get COVID-19 from the vaccine.3. COVID-19 vaccines do not contain microchips or tracer technology.

There has been a lot of debate on whether people who had COVID-19 shall/shall not take the vaccine, whats your intake on that?The current data pointing to the fact that the people who have become sick with COVID-19 have some immunity, but we don't have enough evidence about antibody persistence to confidently say recovered patients are protected. Data suggest that immunity to SARS-CoV-2 from infection lasts at least 6-8 months, but we don't know enough yet about the degree to which previous infection confers immunity.We know that cases of reinfection have been documented; they appear to be rare. Likewise, an asymptomatic reinfection may go unnoticed, yet the individual may still transmit it to others. It would not be good if that person happens to be a healthcare worker. So, there is an argument to vaccine healthcare workers, even if they got infected because vaccines provide more robust immune protection than natural infection. Those at the highest risk of spreading the virus and those who might be tipping ICU capacity over the limit, are the ones who should be first in line for immunization.

Regarding the new COVID-19 variants that appeared in some countries, will the vaccine be effective in stopping them?New mutations of the coronavirus have been reported, which may change the nature of the proteins on its surface. This has led to fears that the vaccines developed so far may or may not work against these new variants because vaccines are based on teaching the body to recognize those proteins and attack them in future.The new mutations in the SARS-CoV-2 virus detected in UK created a new variant that is more transmissible than the earlier variants. However, there is no evidence that the new mutations seen in the SARS-CoV-2 will affect the vaccine efficacy or increase the severity of COVID-19.The vaccines teach the body about multiple spike proteins on the virus surface, and those spikes are also what the virus uses to get inside our cells. So a change in one protein because of a mutation doesnt automatically make the whole vaccine useless. But its important to keep looking for mutations in the coronavirus thats infecting people now. This will help researchers working on the vaccine field to know if we need to change the current vaccines or make new vaccines against COVID-19.Meanwhile, scientists are still studying whether changes in the coronavirus are making it more likely to infect children and teenagers. It will take time to find all these things out. Thats why its important to continue to wear masks in public, and stay away from large gatherings and unmasked interactions with people who dont live with you.

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Herd immunity could be reached by end of summer: Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar immunology expert - The Peninsula Qatar

Immunology

Delaying the second Covid dose in the UK is controversial, but it’s the right decision – The Guardian

A recent YouGov poll shows that the British are among the most willing in the world to take the Covid-19 vaccine. This is good news. But there are still questions about the vaccines and the way theyre being deployed, especially after the government decided to spread out the time between the two doses from three weeks to 12 weeks. The confusion is understandable, as we are in a developing situation. Clear messages about why tough decisions are made can get lost in the noise.

First, it is absolutely clear that the two Covid-19 vaccines that are being deployed in the UK will save lives. Moreover, they will reduce the burden on hospitals. The Pfizer data, measured from day 14 post-vaccination, showed only one severe case of Covid-19 in 21,000 vaccinated people. The AstraZeneca data showed no hospitalisations or severe disease in 6,000 vaccinated trial participants. The caveat to this was that there were a small number of cases in the first two weeks after the first vaccine dose. This brings me to an important point.

The vaccines need time to work. Vaccines prepare our immune system to defend against infection by showing it a small part of the virus, in this instance a spike protein that appears on the outside of the Sars-CoV-2 virus. Our immune system produces a bespoke response to this protein, making antibodies and memory cells which it stores away against future need. Creating these initial antibodies and memory cells can take a couple of weeks, so there is a lag time before you start to be protected. If our immune system later sees the spike protein again, it can bring out all its pre-made resources to act immediately.

So why do we need two jabs? Immunity elicited by the vaccine can be boosted. When the spike protein appears a second time and the immune system brings its armoury out, the immune memory cells will rapidly increase in number and more antibody will be produced to neutralise the virus. This will happen whether the spike protein is in the vaccine or on a live virus. To get the best response possible, the current vaccines were designed to have a second boosting dose after the first priming dose.

The UK governments decision to change the timing of the second vaccine dose has been controversial. After all, if you have evidence that scheme A works, why would you use an untested scheme B? But the decision will not have been taken lightly and there is some basis in the current data available. AstraZeneca trials reported early indications that a longer interval between doses is beneficial. Pfizer trials did not have such data, but the similar Moderna vaccine elicited immunity lasting just under two months after one dose. It boiled down to simple sums based on real-world scarcity: if a vaccine protects people from disease by 89% after one dose and 95% after two doses, and someone gives you just 200 doses this month, you can choose to protect 95 people after three weeks or 178 people for 12 weeks.

One worry is that the change in timing could encourage virus escape, resulting in worrisome new variants. The rationale is that if you dont kill off a virus immediately, mutations will enable the virus to survive better. But it has equally been argued that allowing natural infection would also be a reason to cause mutations. After all, the new variants that concern us now from England, Brazil and South Africa appeared before vaccines were rolled out. Also, simply by fighting the virus with these vaccines we are putting it under pressure to evolve. An optimistic view is that our immune memory is diverse and dynamic enough to adapt and counter any viral escape. It is encouraging that early data from the mRNA vaccines show they work against some of these variants. Close monitoring of the situation is necessary, but in the face of the current emergency we should try to save as many lives as we can as soon as possible.

This is why its crucial that we do not change our good social behaviour just because of vaccination. Even with 95% vaccine efficacy, one in 20 people could get Covid-19. We also need to consider virus carriage and transmission. When we catch the virus, our immune systems immediately roll out to fight it. The response may be so effective that we dont have any symptoms or even realise that the virus has briefly inhabited our bodies, yet we could still have passed it on to others.

We do not yet know to what extent the vaccines block this type of virus transmission. The recent reports from Israel of up to 60% protection after just one dose do not really contradict the Pfizer study data (which show 89%), because the former measured the presence of the virus and the latter measured disease symptoms they may simply illustrate the point that protection from disease is not the same as protection from having the virus, and 60% protection from carrying the virus is encouraging.

Immunity is not all or nothing. There are degrees of protection depending how good the vaccine is and how good your immune system is in responding to it. Some factors, such as age, health status, and type of virus variant, may mean that immunity is reduced. What we urgently need now is robust monitoring of the vaccine rollout to help us understand how different individuals immune systems respond to the vaccine, how the vaccines work against the different variants, and how the changes in dosing schedule affect the efficacy of responses. This will help us be more certain of our answers in the future.

Deborah Dunn-Walters is professor of immunology at University of Surrey and chair of the British Society for Immunologys Covid-19 and Immunology taskforce

This article was amended on 27 January 2021. There were a small number of cases in the first two weeks after the first vaccine dose, not two months as an earlier version stated due to an editing error.

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Delaying the second Covid dose in the UK is controversial, but it's the right decision - The Guardian

Immunology

Samsung Bioepis Opens the New State-of-the-Art Headquarters to Accommodate Next Stage of Growth and Innovation – BioSpace

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/370961b4-344f-49bf-86e4-e882f7265b1c

INCHEON, Korea, Jan. 25, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Samsung Bioepis Co., Ltd. today announced the opening of its new headquarters in Koreas Bio Cluster of Songdo, located in the Incheon Free Economic Zone (IFEZ), a specially-designated economic zone in the city of Incheon. The new site is approximately 52,000 square feet, and will be the hub of Samsung Bioepis drive for development of next-generation biologic medicines. Construction of the new building was completed in December 2020.

We are very excited to be opening our new headquarters which will serve as the foundation for the companys next stage of growth. Our colleagues who were previously stationed in two campuses in Korea will be working together at the new headquarters to accelerate our passion for health, said Christopher Hansung Ko, President and Chief Executive Officer, Samsung Bioepis. With the new office equipped with the state-of-the-art laboratories, we look forward to providing our high-quality biologic medicines with more agility and with stringent quality control so that patients around the world can have access to our proven medicines more quickly and more widely available.

The newly established 12-story building will house approximately 1,000 employees, who will be working at the 17,300-square-foot laboratory space and 15,200-square-foot office space. Attached to the main building is a three-story Welfare Center which includes 4,750-square-foot cafeteria, a gymnasium and a fitness center for employees to enjoy. Furthermore, the company has an onsite childcare center to support employees with young children.

Established in 2012, Samsung Bioepis has rapidly grown to have five biologic products in immunology and oncology with more than 215,000 patients treated with the companys immunology products in Europe alone. The company is continuing its work to improve access to medicines through its unique process innovation development platform and currently has five biologic candidates in its pipeline ranging from hematology and ophthalmology.

About Samsung Bioepis Co., Ltd.

Established in 2012, Samsung Bioepis is a biopharmaceutical company committed to realizing healthcare that is accessible to everyone. Through innovations in product development and a firm commitment to quality, Samsung Bioepis aims to become the world's leading biopharmaceutical company. Samsung Bioepis continues to advance a broad pipeline of biosimilar candidates that cover a spectrum of therapeutic areas, including immunology, oncology, ophthalmology and hematology. Samsung Bioepis is a joint venture between Samsung Biologics and Biogen. For more information, please visit: http://www.samsungbioepis.com and follow us on social media Twitter, LinkedIn.

MEDIA CONTACTYoon Kim: yoon1.kim@samsung.com

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Samsung Bioepis Opens the New State-of-the-Art Headquarters to Accommodate Next Stage of Growth and Innovation - BioSpace

Physiology

11 MSU employees found in violation of OIE policy are still affiliated, LSJ reports – The State News

Content warning: This story contains descriptions of sexual abuse and sexual harassment.

Out of 49 Michigan State faculty and staff in violation of university sexual misconduct policy since 2015, at least 11 are still affiliated with the university in some way, according to an 18-month Lansing State Journal investigation.

At least 14 people had multiple people accuse them of sexual harassment or sexual assault, five of which remain employed: marketing Professor Tomas Hult, criminal justice Professor David Foran, anatomic pathology Professor Matti Kiupel, communications Professor William Donohue and physiology Professor Robert Wiseman.

Despite being found responsible for sexual harassment of a coworker and being accused of sexual misconduct two other times, Hult was a member of the presidential search committee that brought in current MSU President Samuel L. Stanley Jr.

The former Osteopathic Medicine Dean William Strampel as well as political science professor William Jacoby, were allowed to retire prior to the completion of the investigation or any punishment. According to the report, this allowed them to keep some retirement benefits, such as health and life insurance.

Strampel was arrested and jailed in 2019 for his willful neglect of the ongoing abuse committed by former MSU doctor Larry Nassar, as well as 11 months of misconduct in office.

Two retired professors lost their emeritus title, two are under review and while four others were allowed to keep them, according to the report.

Much work has been done to change the culture of Michigan State University," Deputy Spokesperson Dan Olsen said. "To foster culture change, we continue to make broad-based systemic improvements to our handling of any behavioral issues of our faculty and staff. We have strengthened compliance through our changes to the Discipline and Dismissal of Tenured Faculty for Cause Policy, Consensual Amorous or Sexual Relationships with Students Policy, Travel Policy and Emeritus Policy. Communication and collaboration have increased with Human Resources and the accountable administrators at all levels to address any and all behavioral issues. We review and investigate all reports of misconduct. Notice and transparency has strengthened the universitys ability to address behaviors, apply interim measures, and improve the quality of the working environment for the students, faculty, and staff. Culture change does not happen with one individual, it takes the whole system to work collectively to achieve the same goal ofpreventinginappropriate behaviorand creating a culture where the behavior is not tolerated. Theres no mistake we have more work to do and the university is committed to that work.

Olsen also confirmed that the contents of the report are accurate.

University administrators sent a preemptive response to MSU faculty, staff and students Friday, Jan. 15, outlining policy and procedure changes surrounding relationship violence and sexual misconduct three years after 204 women provided nine days of impact statements in Ingham and Eaton Counties in the wake of Nassar's abuse.

"Their powerful testimonies continue to remind us that MSU failed survivors and our community," the email said. "Their stories and voices challenge us to create culture change at MSU, and we know we have more work still to do."

Lansing State Journal made 25 public records requests to Michigan State University over the course of the investigation, spending nearly $2,000 for public documents.

Stanley, along with Provost Teresa Woodruff, Executive Vice President for Administration and Chief Information Officer Melissa Woo and Executive Vice President for Health Sciences Norman Beauchamp, signed the message.

"We are sharing this with you not to excuse past decisions; rather, we want you to know the actions we have taken the past few years and continue to take will improve our consistency and accountability," the email said. "Changes have been made, and more work will be completed soon to address inequities in the disciplinary outcomes and further strengthen our disciplinary actions."

Wendy Guzman contributed to the reporting in this article.

Editor's note: This article was updated to properly aggregate reporting by The Lansing State Journal.

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11 MSU employees found in violation of OIE policy are still affiliated, LSJ reports - The State News

Physiology

Taking temperature is not a reliable way of detecting Covid-19 – The Star Online

Making people stand in front of a scanner to have their body temperature read can result in a large number of false negatives, allowing people with Covid-19 to pass through airports and hospitals undetected.

Leading experts in physiology have suggested that taking temperature readings of a persons fingertip and eye instead would give a significantly better and more reliable reading, and help identify those with fever.

The study, co-led by human physiologist and expert in temperature regulation Professor Mike Tipton, was published in the journal Experimental Physiology.

Prof Tipton from the University of Portsmouth in the United Kingdom says: If scanners are not giving an accurate reading, we run the risk of falsely excluding people from places they may want or need to go, and we also risk allowing people with the virus to spread the undetected infection they have.

The study found four key factors:

Prof Tipton says: Using a surface temperature scanner to obtain a single surface temperature, usually the forehead, is an unreliable method to detect the fever associated with Covid-19.

Too many factors make the measurement of a skin temperature a poor surrogate for deep body temperature skin temperature can change independently of deep body temperature for lots of reasons.

Even if such a single measure did reflect deep body temperature reliably, other things, such as exercise, can raise deep body temperature.

The pandemic has had a devastating global effect on all aspects of our lives, and unfortunately, its unlikely to be the last pandemic we face.

Its critical we develop a method of gauging if an individual has a fever thats accurate and fast.

A change in deep body temperature is a critical factor in diagnosing disease with as little as a one degree increase indicating a potential disease.

The most common symptom of 55,924 confirmed cases of Covid-19 reported in China up to Feb 22, 2020, was fever, followed by other symptoms, including dry cough, sputum production, shortness of breath, muscle or joint pain, sore throat, headache, chills, nausea or vomiting, nasal congestion, and diarrhoea.

However, the researchers say a significant proportion (at least 11%) of those with Covid-19 do not have a fever, and that fewer than half of those admitted to hospital with suspected Covid-19 had a fever.

Although the majority of positive cases go on to develop a high temperature after being admitted to hospital, they were infectious before their temperature soared.

Prof Tipton says: We think we can improve the identification of the presence of fever using the same kit, but looking at the difference between eye and finger temperature its not perfect, but it is potentially better and more reliable.

He adds: During the SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) epidemic in 2003, there was a need for a fast and effective mass-screening method and infrared thermography became, and remains, the cornerstone measurement, despite concerns over its reliability.

A 2005 study of 1,000 people comparing forehead temperature with three different infrared thermometers gave different temperatures, ranging from 31C to 35.6 C.

The same infrared thermometer alone varied by as much as 2C.

In another study, more than 80% of the 500 people tested using infra-red thermometers, gave a false negative result.

Such differences in skin temperature could be due to a range of reasons, including whether the individual has recently exercised, has an infection, sunburn or recently drunk alcohol, how close they stand to the scanner, the air temperature, how much fat they have, and even their blood pressure.

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Taking temperature is not a reliable way of detecting Covid-19 - The Star Online

Physiology

Women temporarily synchronize their menstrual cycles with the luminance and gravimetric cycles of the Moon – Science Advances

Many species synchronize reproductive behavior with a particular phase of the lunar cycle to increase reproductive success. In humans, a lunar influence on reproductive behavior remains controversial, although the human menstrual cycle has a period close to that of the lunar cycle. Here, we analyzed long-term menstrual recordings of individual women with distinct methods for biological rhythm analysis. We show that womens menstrual cycles with a period longer than 27 days were intermittently synchronous with the Moons luminance and/or gravimetric cycles. With age and upon exposure to artificial nocturnal light, menstrual cycles shortened and lost this synchrony. We hypothesize that in ancient times, human reproductive behavior was synchronous with the Moon but that our modern lifestyles have changed reproductive physiology and behavior.

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Women temporarily synchronize their menstrual cycles with the luminance and gravimetric cycles of the Moon - Science Advances

Genetics

Genetic analysis of symptoms yields new insights into PTSD – Yale News

Attempts to identify the genetic causes of neuropsychiatric diseases such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) through large-scale genome-wide analyses have yielded thousands of potential links. The challenge is further complicated by the wide range of symptoms exhibited by those who have PTSD. For instance, does extreme arousal, anger, or irritation experienced by some have the same genetic basis as the tendency to re-experience traumatic events, another symptom of the disorder?

A new study led by researchers at Yale and the University of California-San Diego (UCSD) provides answers to some of these questions and uncovers intriguing genetic similarities between PTSD and other mental health disorders such as anxiety, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia.

The findings also suggest that existing drugs commonly used for other disorders might be modified to help treat individual symptoms of multiple disorders.

The complexity is still there, but this study helped us chip away at it, said co-senior author Joel Gelernter, theFoundations Fund Professor of Psychiatry and professor of genetics and neurobiology at Yale.

The study was publishedJan. 28 in the journal Nature Genetics.

For the study, the researchers analyzed the complete genomes of more than 250,000 participants in theMillion Veteran Program, a national research program of the U.S. Veterans Administration that studies how genes, lifestyle, and military experiences affect the health and illness of military veterans. Among those participants were approximately 36,000 diagnosed with PTSD.

But instead of looking just for gene variants shared by PTSD patients, they also searched for variants that have been linked to three kinds of clinical symptoms that are experienced, to varying degrees, by those diagnosed with the disorder. These symptom groups, or subdomains, include the re-experience of a traumatic event, hyperarousal or acute anger and irritability, and the avoidance of people or subjects that might be related to past trauma.

While the researchers found underlying genetic commonalities among all three symptom groups, they also discovered specific variants linked to only one or two of the symptoms.

We found a remarkably high degree of genetic relatedness between these three symptom subdomains. But we also wouldnt expect them to be genetically identical, and they are not, Gelernter said. We found biological support for different clinical presentations of PTSD.

The research also showed that some these variants found in subgroups of patient symptoms are also linked to other disorders such as major depression. The results suggest drugs used to treat other disorders might also help treat of PTSD.

Our research pointed to some medications that are currently marketed for other disease states and could be repurposed for PTSD, said co-senior author Murray Stein, Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry and Public Health at UC-San Diego.

Intriguingly, some of the variants linked to all PTSD symptoms have been associated with other neuropsychiatric disorders. For instance, PTSD-associated variants of the geneMAD1L1,which helps regulate cell cycling, have also been linked to schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

These observations, and the recent finding of GWS [genomewide-significant] association with anxietysuggest thatMAD1L1may be a general risk factor for psychopathology, the authors write.

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Genetic analysis of symptoms yields new insights into PTSD - Yale News

Genetics

Deep Learning Shows How Genetic Motifs Conduct the Music of Life – Technology Networks

Our genetic codes control not only which proteins our cells produce, but also to a great extent in what quantity. This ground-breaking discovery, applicable to all biological life, was recently made by systems biologists at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, using supercomputers and artificial intelligence. Their research, which could also shed new light on the mysteries of cancer, was recently published in the scientific journal Nature Communications.

DNA molecules contain instructions for cells for producing various proteins. This has been known since the middle of the last century when the double helix was identified as the information carrier of life.

But until now, the factor which determines what quantity of a certain protein will be produced has been unclear. Measurements have shown that a single cell can contain anything from a few molecules of a given protein, up to tens of thousands.

With this new research, our understanding of the mechanisms behind this process, known as gene expression, has taken a big step forward. The group of Chalmers scientists have shown that most of the information for quantity regulation is also embedded in the DNA code itself. They have demonstrated that this information can be read with the help of supercomputers and AI.

You could compare this to an orchestral score. The notes describe which pitches the different instruments should play. But the notes alone do not say much about how the music will sound, he explains.

Information for the tempo and dynamics of the music are also required, for example. But instead of written instructions such asallegroorfortein connection with the notation, the language of genetics spreads this information over large areas of the DNA molecule. Previously, we could read the notes, but not how the music should be played. Now we can do both, states Aleksej Zelezniak.

Another comparison could be that now we have found the grammar rules for the genetic language, where perhaps before we only knew the vocabulary.

What then is this grammar, which determines the quantity of gene expression? According to Aleksej Zelezniak, it takes the form of reoccurring patterns and combinations of the four notes of genetics the molecular building blocks designated A, C, G and T. These patterns and combinations are known as motifs.

The crucial factors are the relationships between these motifs how often they repeat and at exactly which positions in the DNA code they appear.

We discovered that this information is distributed over both the coding and non-coding parts of DNA meaning, it is also present in the areas that used to be referred to as junk DNA.

The researchers tested the method in seven different model organisms from yeast and bacteria to fruit flies, mice, and humans and found that the mechanism is the same. The discovery they have made is universal, valid for all biological life.

According to Aleksej Zelezniak, the discovery would have not been possible without access to state-of-the-art supercomputers and AI. The research group conducted huge computer simulations both at Chalmers University of Technology and other facilities in Sweden.

This tool allows us to look at thousands of positions at the same time, creating a kind of automated examination of DNA. This is essential for being able to identify patterns from such huge amounts of data.

Jan Zrimec, postdoctoral researcher in the Chalmers group and first author of the study, agrees, saying:

With previous technologies, researchers had to tell the system which motifs in the DNA code to search for. But thanks to AI, the system can now learn on its own, identifying different motifs and motif combinations relevant to gene expression.

He adds that the discovery is also due to the fact they were examining a much larger part of DNA in a single sweep than had previously been done.

The new knowledge could also make it possible to better understand how mutations can affect gene expression in the cell and therefore, eventually, how cancers arise and function. The applications which could most rapidly be significant for the wider public are in the pharmaceutical industry.

It is conceivable that this method could help improve the genetic modification of the microorganisms already used today as biological factories leading to faster and cheaper development and production of new drugs, he speculates.

Reference: Zrimec J, Brlin CS, Buric F, et al. Deep learning suggests that gene expression is encoded in all parts of a co-evolving interacting gene regulatory structure. Nat Commun. 2020;11(1):6141. doi:10.1038/s41467-020-19921-4.

This article has been republished from the following materials. Note: material may have been edited for length and content. For further information, please contact the cited source.

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Deep Learning Shows How Genetic Motifs Conduct the Music of Life - Technology Networks