Everybody loves slime molds, nature's gift to urban planning, so let's start there.
Evidently efficient - Self-organization of informal bus lines in the Global South
July 2024, phys.org
The Global North usually have centrally planned public transport systems, and the Global South has it provided by informal services and ad hoc routes. They studied 7,000 formal and informal bus lines across 36 cities and 22 countries using open GPS data.The routes of informal transport self-organize in a way that reaches or even exceeds the efficiency level of centralized services. The findings call into question the general perception of informal transport as an "inferior alternative" to centrally organized services."Informal transport, however, has fewer detours and more uniform routes than centrally planned services, so the routes are efficient - and profitable even without the extensive subsidies that are common in the Global North"
Ah yes, the transfer of money from public funds to private funds, where the public gets a less efficient, lower quality system, and rich people who own the private entities get a nice, consistent, government-guaranteed source of income for their (dis)service.
via Dresden University of Technology: Kush Mohan Mittal et al, Efficient self-organization of informal public transport networks, Nature Communications (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-49193-1
Image credit: AI Art - Man Watching a Conveyor Belt - 2025
Study explores the link between stock market fluctuations and emergency room visits in China
Jul 2024, phys.org
Using daily emergency room visit records from the three largest hospitals in Beijing from 2009 to 2012, we find that a one percentage point decrease in daily market returns is associated with 0.185 increased cases of cardiovascular diseases and 0.020 increased cases of mental disorders on that day. Moreover, a one percentage point increase in daily market returns is associated with 0.035 increase in cases of alcohol abuse on that day. By contrast, diseases that are less related to psychological stress (infections, parasitic diseases, etc) are not significantly affected by market fluctuations.
via National University of Singapore, Jinan University, Peking University and Sun Yat-sen University: Sumit Agarwal et al, Associations between stock market fluctuations and stress-related emergency room visits in China, Nature Mental Health (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s44220-024-00267-5
Women's education influences fertility rates in sub-Saharan Africa, forecasting model finds
Nov 2024, phys.org
So it's not just GDP but also women's education that lowers fertility:
They developed a fertility forecasting model based on education levels of 138 demographic and health surveys conducted in 39 sub-Saharan African countries between 1986 and 2022, and found not only the education of the individual women matters, but also the average education of the environment in which the women live. Higher average educational attainment is significantly correlated with lower ideal family size and lower actual fertility for women in each separate education category."Educated women are leading the shift towards smaller family sizes in high-fertility communities, even influencing the choices of women with less education around them."
via International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, University of Vienna, and the Wittgenstein Center for Demography and Global Human Capital: Saroja Adhikari et al, Forecasting Africa's fertility decline by female education groups, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2024). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2320247121
Researchers propose a mathematical definition of cell death
Nov 2024, phys.org
"My long-term scientific goal is to understand the inherent difference between life and nonlife, mathematically; why the transition from nonlife to life is so difficult, while the other way around is so easy."This led them to develop a computational method for quantifying the life-death boundary, which they call "stoichiometric rays." The method was developed by focusing on enzymatic reactions and the second law of thermodynamics, which states that systems naturally move from ordered to disordered states."We naively believe that death is irreversible, but it is not so trivial and does not have to be the case. I believe that should death come more under our control, human beings, our understanding of life, and society will change completely. In this sense, to understand death is crucial in terms of science and also in terms of social implications."
via University of Tokyo: Yusuke Himeoka et al, A theoretical basis for cell deaths. Physical Review Research (2024). On arXiv. DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2403.02169
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