The Pearl River Basin, one of southern China’s most vital water ecosystems, has experienced significant changes in ecosystem service values (ESV) due to rapid urbanization, posing challenges to water resource management and governance. Despite the importance of water-related ecosystem services (WES) in the region, comprehensive assessments of their spatiotemporal dynamics and drivers remain scarce. This study addresses this gap by employing Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and a human disturbance index to evaluate the spatiotemporal evolution of ESV in the basin from 2000 to 2020, with a focus on water resources. Using the ecosystem service value equivalent approach, adjusted for biomass factors, we assess the impacts of land use/cover changes—particularly in water bodies, forests, and croplands—on ESV. The findings reveal an overall decline in ESV by approximately 15 %, with water-related ecosystem services showing marked sensitivity to human activity, especially in urbanizing areas, where declines of up to 30 % were observed in some regions. Geographic detector analysis highlights that population density, GDP, vegetation cover, and human activity collectively drive changes in water-linked ESV. These findings underscore the need for sustainable water resource management strategies that balance ecological stability with socio-economic development, offering critical guidance for integrated water-ecology-society governance in the Pearl River Basin.
This study, which bridges the disciplines of archaeology and microbiology, examines the ancient bacterial communities and antibiotic-resistance genes in soil samples collected from İnönü Cave in Zonguldak, Turkiye. Our aim is to provide a comprehensive understanding of historical human activities and their influence on microbial communities. Soil samples were gathered from four distinct cultural levels from the Chalcolithic Age to the Early Iron Age. The microbial communities were characterized, and antibiotic-resistance genes were identified using high-throughput sequencing of 16S rRNA genes and metagenomic studies. This interdisciplinary approach not only enriches our understanding of ancient microbial communities but also opens up new avenues for research and collaboration. The results of our study showed a wide range of microorganisms, including prominent bacterial groups such as Acidobacteriota, Actinobacteriota, Bacteroidota, Chloroflexi, Cyanobacteria, Firmicutes, Myxococcota, and Proteobacteria. The study identified the presence of the tetracycline resistance gene tetA in Chalcolithic samples, the class 1 integron intl1 in Early Bronze Age samples, and the oxacillinase gene OXA58 in Late Bronze Age samples. These findings underscore the long-term impact of human activities on microbial communities, as antibiotic-resistance genes have been present and have remained over various historical periods, perhaps influenced by both human activities and environmental variables. This knowledge is crucial for understanding the resilience and adaptability of microbial communities in the face of human-induced changes. The coexistence of these resistance genes and alterations in the microbial population suggest substantial connections between human activities and soil microbiota. This study, which draws on the fields of archaeology, microbiology, and environmental science, offers valuable insights into the ancient microbial ecology and underscores the enduring presence of antibiotic resistance. It emphasizes the necessity of a comprehensive, interdisciplinary approach, spanning multiple fields, to comprehend microbial communities' evolution and resistance mechanisms in archaeological settings.
This article deals with the profound shifts that are taking place in light of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, in which
humanity’s future is highly topical. The article engages Thomas Merton’s re-evaluation of Anselm’s Cur Homo Deo with Harari’s book Homo Deus (2015) and argues that, while we must take Harari’s views seriously, thefuture evolution of humanity is not the human godsuggested by Harari, but that suggested by Merton, who argues that the incarnation shows God’s love for creation; shows Christ as the pattern of what it means to live a holy life, and, ultimately, shows the future of both the cosmos and humanity, where all is taken into the very heart of God. Harari views the future as the creation of a benevolent human god; Merton views the future as a place where all of creation is divinised.
Christianity, Practical religion. The Christian life
Mohammad Jalali, Mahdi Mahmoodzadeh Vashan, Nour Mohammad Yaghoubi
et al.
AbstractIn recent years, the emphasis on community-oriented capacities as one of the important approaches to the resilience of societies in crisis conditions has attracted the attention of many experts and researchers. Therefore, the present research was conducted with the aim of identifying factors affecting resilience based on community-oriented capacities in crisis conditions and providing a model in this field using the meta-synthesis method.IntroductionToday, societies have been exposed to different types of crises, each of which has brought unfortunate consequences to societies, including threats to human health and security, destruction of resources and biological facilities, and people's activity centers (Sajadi, 2019). Therefore, nowadays, mainly the view that exists towards crisis management is to increase "resilience" in the face of various crises (Rafieiyan et al., 2011). On the other hand, experiences from crisis management in different societies show that governments alone are not able to increase the resilience of societies in crisis situations, and individual and group participation in these situations is mandatory and very effective in increasing their resilience. On the other hand, experiences from crisis management in different societies show that governments alone are not able to increase the resilience of societies in crisis situations, and individual and group participation in these situations is mandatory and very effective in increasing their resilience. (Motahari & Rafieiyan, 2016). Therefore, strategies to increase the resilience of societies are changing. In this change and evolution of the view towards resilience, the "state-oriented" and "centralist" view, which tries to formulate and implement strategies from the top down, has been replaced by a "community-oriented" view that relies on attracting participation. public and social data (Ghorbani et al., 2017). But in Iran, the evidence indicates that this change of approach and outlook has not yet happened in the country, and currently the government-oriented approach is trying to formulate and implement centralized and downward strategies to increase resilience in crisis situations. In addition, few studies have been conducted in the field of identifying and explaining factors affecting resilience based on community-oriented capacities in crisis conditions in our country; So far, a comprehensive model has not been presented as a road map for the country's crisis management managers. Therefore, the current research seeks to identify the factors affecting resilience based on community-oriented capacities in crisis situations using the meta-synthesis method and finally presenting a model in this field.Case studyThe statistical population of this research includes all articles published in domestic and foreign scientific databases between 2000 and 2023, and finally 56 studies that were closely related to the subject under study were selected as a sample.Materials and Methods The research is of an applied type with an exploratory nature, in order to collect data, a meta-synthesis method was used. The analysis of the texts was also done based on the content analysis and the dimensions and codes of the desired pattern were extracted.Discussion and ResultsBased on the analyzes carried out with the help of content analysis method on the 56 final selected researches, a total number of 3 categories, 18 concepts and 66 indicators as effective factors on resilience based on community-oriented capacities in crisis conditions were discovered in this research. and were tagged.ConclusionAccording to the studies conducted in this field and also according to the extraction of 66 indicators through the application of meta-synthesis method, it was determined that the effective factors to increase resilience in crisis situations, which are based on community-oriented capacities, are in three categories of organizational factors. , group factors and individual factors are placed, and the use of these factors in the country's crisis conditions can provide a suitable basis for reducing the incidence of negative consequences caused by it. Further, the findings of the research showed that 7 components of the institutional platform, institutional governance, institutional performance, financial and physical resource management, human resource management and information management in the form of organizational factors; 6 components of common valuation, social infrastructure, collective action and participation, social capital, acculturation and social cohesion in the form of group factors; And 5 components of knowledge, skill, awareness, attitude and capacity and ability in the form of individual factors formed the foundations of the model of factors affecting resilience based on community-oriented capacities in crisis conditions.
Political institutions and public administration (General)
In the digital era, the (r)evolution of neural machine translation (NMT) has reshaped both the market and translators’ workflow. However, the adoption of this technology has not fully reached the creative field of literary translation. Against this background, this study aims to explore to what extent NMT systems can be used to translate the creative challenges posed by idioms, specifically manipulated multiword expressions (MWEs) found in literary texts. To carry out this pilot study, five manipulated MWEs were selected from a fantasy novel and machine-translated (English > Spanish) by four NMT systems (DeepL, Google Translate, Bing Translator, and Reverso). Then, each NMT output as well as a human translation are assessed by six professional literary translators by using a human evaluation sheet. Based on these results, the creativity obtained in each translation method was calculated. Despite the satisfactory performance of both DeepL and Google Translate, HT creativity was highly superior in almost all manipulated MWEs. To the best of our knowledge, this paper not only contributes to the ongoing study of NMT applied to literature, but it is also one of the few studies that delve into the almost unexplored field of assessing creativity in neural machine-translated MWEs.
Evolutionary analyses suggest that the human social brain and sociality appeared together. The two fundamental tools that accelerated the concurrent emergence of the social brain and sociality include learning and plasticity. The prevailing core idea is that the primate brain and the cortex in particular became reorganised over the course of evolution to facilitate dynamic adaptation to ongoing changes in physical and social environments. Encouraged by computational or survival demands or even by instinctual drives for living in social groups, the brain eventually learned how to learn from social experience via its massive plastic capacity. A fundamental framework for modeling these orchestrated dynamic responses is that social plasticity relies upon neuroplasticity. In the present article, we first provide a glimpse into the concepts of plasticity, experience, with emphasis on social experience. We then acknowledge and integrate the current theoretical concepts to highlight five key intertwined assumptions within social neuroscience that underlie empirical approaches for explaining the brain-social dynamics. We suggest that this epistemological view provides key insights into the ontology of current conceptual frameworks driving future research to successfully deal with new challenges and possible caveats in favour of the formulation of novel assumptions. In the light of contemporary societal challenges, such as global pandemics, natural disasters, violent conflict, and other human tragedies, discovering the mechanisms of social brain plasticity will provide new approaches to support adaptive brain plasticity and social resilience.
Plant foods reduces the risks of both chronic and infectious diseases in humans. Fruit peel is still frowned upon
as part of a normal healthy diet. This study aims at ascertaining consumer fruit peel preferences, perceptions and acceptability to enable the production of processed fruit peel sprinkles that will be accepted by consumers as food additives. An online questionnaire was used for this cross-sectional survey and was circulated in South African
provinces. Information gathered include sociodemographic data, overall perception/consumer choices of
processed fruit peels and factors that influence choices of dietary products. Chi square test was used to check
association between some sociodemographic variables and consumer preferences. ‘Sweetened’ was the most
suggested flavour for the proposed product, followed by ‘Natural’ i.e. no flavor additives and ‘Chilli’ third most
suggested. the participants were interested in processing of fruit peels for consumption. The responses showed
general acceptability of the proposed fruit sprinkles, with citrus fruit peels (oranges, grapes and lemons) as most
preferred. No association was observed between gender/income and certain consumer preferences for fruit peels. Educational level affected the priority factors of the respondents. Processing and consumption of fruit peels should be encouraged in order to strengthen the immune system especially during this pandemic. Increased consumption of fruit peels will also contribute to a reduction of food waste.
Hospitality industry. Hotels, clubs, restaurants, etc. Food service, Business