Memory is a problem for many people as they age. To combat this, wearable devices may help older adults recall precious memories through what is called 'life-logging', despite these technologies raising significant privacy concerns. Researchers at Singapore Management University, led by Thivya Kandappu, have developed PrivacyPrimer , a tool designed to protect sensitive information captured by wearable cameras. Their approach uses selective image obfuscation to safeguard privacy, while preservin...
Jan 08, 2025•9 min
While we may associate Messenger RNA (mRNA for short) with the COVID-19 pandemic vaccination programme, its study in fact began over 60 years ago. Born in 1955 in rural Hungary, Katalin Karikó battled critics and scepticism for her research into mRNA for over 30 years before its role in the COVID-19 vaccination programme gained her recognition and, in 2023, a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. In this interview, Karikó tells us about this journey and why she loves biochemistry, what it’s lik...
Dec 18, 2024•27 min
While the management of papillary thyroid cancer (PTC) is guided by recurrence risk assessment, current methods cannot accurately predict disease recurrence. Professor Oliver Bathe and his collaborators at the University of Calgary, Canada, have developed a test that includes genetic data linked to recurrence. Together, they identified three molecular PTC subtypes, allowing more accurate risk assessment to guide clinical decision-making and treatment. Read more in Research Features Read the orig...
Dec 16, 2024•10 min
The COVID-19 pandemic was a wake-up call for governments and their global stakeholders to reform the management processes of infectious disease outbreaks. Dr Stella Chungong and Dr Landry Ndriko Mayigane of the Health Security Preparedness Department of the World Health Organization’s Health Emergencies Programme are encouraging countries to implement early action reviews (EARs) for disease outbreaks to assess their vigilance and planning, the responsiveness of their health systems, and to bette...
Dec 13, 2024•12 min
Almost every city in the modern world faces the difficult challenge of understanding its citizens’ opinions and turning them into meaningful decisions. Miloš Švaňa, a PhD student at Technical University of Ostrava, has decided to focus on this topic in his dissertation, with an aim to develop a framework for social media data analysis. By using fuzzy logic and fuzzy set theory to help municipalities understand the needs of their citizens, Švaňa uses this information to inform better decision mak...
Dec 11, 2024•13 min
The actions of humans are typically influenced by societal norms and mainstream trends that are passed down from generation to generation, shaping our life choices and behavioural patterns. Jean-Paul Close, founder of the STIR Foundation and AiREAS, experienced the breaking of heritage and the revival of core human values first-hand, after he chose to resign from an international executive job at a multinational company to stay close to his children. In his recent publications, he reflects on th...
Dec 09, 2024•8 min
Joint manipulation, applying a manipulation force to the spine to improve joint mobility and reduce pain, often comes with an audible pop. Patients and some practitioners often regard this audible sound as a sign of a successful treatment, but is that necessarily true? Dr Rob Sillevis at Florida Gulf Coast University conducted a comprehensive investigation to find out whether this audible pop has a clinical significance and an actual or perceived benefit on the body. Read the original article: h...
Dec 06, 2024•10 min
We increasingly rely on electronic communications across society. You may have heard privacy protection methods for those messages, such as end-to-end encryption. However, can that protection be guaranteed against governments, industries or bad actors? How can we ensure privacy, but at the same time have the means to enforce laws and prevent malicious behaviour, and how do we develop cryptography law? Professor Moti Yung and colleagues at the Privacy, Security, and Safety Research Group at Googl...
Dec 02, 2024•10 min
Helium nanodroplets are fascinating objects that can be used as microscopic laboratories to form new types of nanomaterials. Researchers in COSY COST Action’s Working Group 4 , which recently celebrated its second anniversary, combine quantum, semiclassical and classical methods to investigate the physico-chemical properties of these droplets under extremely well-controlled conditions Visit their site: https://cost-cosy.eu/ Read the original research: https://doi.org/10.1039/D3CP00489A https://d...
Nov 27, 2024•9 min
A nanoparticle is a tiny particle typically in the size range of one to one hundred nanometres. Nano-scale systems can exhibit unique quantum mechanical properties due to their size. The European Association for Cooperation in Science and Technology, which recently celebrated its second anniversary, focuses on the science of confined molecular systems . In this episode, we hear about their works to uncover the properties and behaviours of metal nanoparticles and clusters. Visit their site: https...
Nov 20, 2024•14 min
On most days, a weather forecast is a convenient answer to simple questions, like : do I need an umbrella? How windy will it be? For high stakes questions around landslide hazards, how do we deal with slope failure forecast? And are there any new tools improving our capabilities without waiting to learn from another disaster? Andrea Manconi, research scientist at the WSL Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research SLF joins us to discuss new satellite dataand methods to get ahead of the next slope...
Nov 18, 2024•27 min
Osteoarthritis is the most common disease in the world, characterised by the progressive degeneration of cartilage in the joints. Dr Torbjörn Ogéus from the Stockholms led- & smärtspecialist clinic in Sweden, who is pioneering regenerative medicine approaches to treating osteoarthritis using patients’ stem cells. These treatments show significant improvements in pain and joint function, with possible cartilage regeneration, offering a potential cure and vast improvement in the quality of lif...
Nov 13, 2024•14 min
Transportation is a key part of our life, either travelling ourselves or in transporting goods. Fossil fuels are still the most widely applied fuel for transportation purposes, given that the vast majority of engines are traditional combustion engines. The harmful emissions from these engines are well researched, and their direct or indirect contributions to climate change are well documented. Alternative fuels from renewable sources such as biomass can be part of the solution. Dr Ruoyang Yuan a...
Nov 08, 2024•11 min
For millennia, humans and horses have enjoyed a special relationship. Recent research shows that working with horses can improve human mental health and wellbeing. Professor Ann Hemingway is part of a multidisciplinary team that has demonstrated that equine-assisted services can improve outcomes for families impacted by domestic abuse and mitigate the conditions that fuel it, and believes that the benefits of such an intervention could be delivered through virtual reality technology. Read the or...
Nov 06, 2024•11 min
We humans share over 99% of our DNA with each other. This means personalised therapies for diseases such as cancer or neurodegenerative conditions have to be tailored to the most minute differences between us - or even between our own cells. Professor Mark Ebbert of the Sanders-Brown Center on Aging at the University of Kentucky leads a lab focusing on isoforms of RNA - tiny, short lived molecules - that could open whole new avenues for detection, diagnosis, and treatments of otherwise incurable...
Nov 06, 2024•27 min
‘We few, we happy few, we band of brothers’ – King Henry’s speech to rouse his troops before the Battle of Agincourt is one of the most famous in Shakespeare. But what does ‘Henry V’ tell us about theories of war in Elizabethan England? Professor Anne-Marie Walkowicz of Ohio’s Central State University in the USA argues that the play explores the just war tradition – the counsel rulers should seek before engaging in military action – and class conflict. Read more in Research Outreach Read the ori...
Nov 01, 2024•10 min
What happens when CEOs are shielded by employment and severance agreements? Researchers from Singapore Management University, University of Hong Kong, Boston College, and led by Dr. Xia Chen put forward this critical question. The study investigates how CEO contractual protection impacts corporate debt contracting. With insights from a comprehensive analysis of loans from major publicly traded companies, the team explore how these protections can influence CEO behavior, risk-taking, and the fina...
Oct 30, 2024•10 min
As part of the European Cooperation in Science and Technology, or COST Action, Working Group 2 of the COSY network focuses on developing efficient methods for describing the motion of molecules in confined systems. Their work covers four key areas, ranging from toxic gas separation to tumour biomarker detection. Find out more about the COSY COST Action network on cost-cosy.eu Read the original research: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/sstr.202400147 https://doi.org/10.1039/D2CP04...
Oct 28, 2024•11 min
CBD has emerged as a non-psychoactive agent in cannabis, stimulating a boom of boutique cannabis products into the medicinal and adult use markets . The innovative CannaMetrix EC50 Array™ offers a solution to traditional chemical methods of testing cannabis potency, which often fall short in accurately capturing the complex interactions between cannabinoids and the human body. Find more at https://cannametrix.org/ Read more in Research Outreach...
Oct 23, 2024•15 min
The global business landscape has undergone a profound transformation in recent decades. As sustainability, energy transition, and climate change have taken center stage, the need for a paradigm shift in strategic management has become increasingly apparent. Jean Garner Stead and Edward Stead from East Tennessee State University argue that traditional strategic management models, particularly the Porterian models, are no longer sufficient in the face of modern challenges. They emphasize the nece...
Oct 21, 2024•12 min
Traumatic brain injury remains a major cause of disability and death worldwide, and timely detection of the injury could lead to early intervention and save lives. Professor Pola Goldberg Oppenheimer at the University of Birmingham, UK, has developed a novel handheld device that helps detect and classify brain injury by scanning the back of the eyes. Read more in Research Features Read the original research: doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adg5431...
Oct 16, 2024•13 min
Barcodes and QR codes have become ubiquitous sights in our current information age. Soorya Annadurai, an independent researcher and software engineer at Microsoft in the USA, has developed a solution for these situations: audible barcodes, or ‘AuraCodes’, enabling the encoding and decoding of digital information through the medium of sound. Read more in Research Outreach Read the original research: doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-3758-5_9...
Oct 09, 2024•8 min
In an age of academies and free schools, secondary schools in England have never had more freedom over their admissions rules. But how do they decide who gets in and who doesn’t? And does it really matter? These are the issues explored in this podcast, featuring Professor Simon Burges (Professor of Economics at the University of Bristol) and Dr Ellen Greaves (Honorary Research Associate at the University of Bristol). Discussing their research, Simon and Ellen shed light on the complexities of En...
Oct 04, 2024•23 min
In conflict zones, businesses are widely seen as a positive force that promotes peace. Dr Jay Joseph at the American University of Beirut, Lebanon, and colleagues have studied micro and small enterprises, identifying their often contradictory impact on a conflict zone. Read more in Research Features Read the original research: doi.org/10.1177/00076503221084638...
Oct 02, 2024•12 min
It is believed that being more porous in nature will enable universities to create a talent pool of graduates with en entrepreneurial mindset and access to the very latest thinking, technology and innovation. But is this enough to stem the tide of talent leaving Malaysia for opportunities elsewhere? Featuring Professor Datuk Dr Paul Chan (HELP University), Professor Veronica Hope-Hailey and Professor Brian Squire (University of Bristol Business School) Find out more about the 'Open for Business'...
Sep 30, 2024•51 min
The government of Malaysia has set a target of making Malaysia a regional hub for startups by 2025. As of 2022, there were approximately 3,000 active startups in Malaysia, a stark increase from around 300 in 2013. However, whilst 30% of Malaysian startups have displayed consistent growth and profitability, about 1,800 startups struggle, with a 60% failure rate, especially within the first three years. The failure is majorly attributed to lack of market need affecting 42% or approximately 756 sta...
Sep 30, 2024•41 min
Malaysia welcomes far more international students than any other country in SE Asia, yet it is losing talent faster than most with its brightest minds leaving the country to pursue careers overseas. With Malaysia’s Higher Education Plan due to expire in 2025, this episode sets the scene for a series of podcasts that will explore how universities could turn the situation around – particularly the role supercomputers, spin outs and a more porous campus could play in reshaping the sector to positio...
Sep 30, 2024•29 min
As the rate of climate events increases, how do businesses respond, adapt and keep their staff safe? In this episode of Responsible Business: Leading the Way, Professor Veronica Hope Hailey, Dean of the University of Bristol Business School is joined by Sarah Kenny, CEO of BMT to discuss how businesses rise to modern challenges. Find out more - https://www.bristol.ac.uk/campaigns/responsible-business...
Sep 30, 2024•26 min
Trust, from employees, customers and other stakeholders, is core to responsible business. And since the pandemic, people expect even more from businesses, which are – according to the latest Edelman Trust Barometer -- the only institution trusted by the global public. In this episode Veronica and her guest, Brad Greve, Chief Financial Officer at BAE Systems, discuss what the pandemic has taught us about building and maintaining trust. Find out more: https://www.bristol.ac.uk/campaigns/responsibl...
Sep 30, 2024•24 min
The psychological contract has changed dramatically since the start of the pandemic, with the balance of power swinging towards the employee. In this episode, Professor Veronica Hope Hailey and her guest, Jane Cathrall, Executive Director, People Directorate at the Bank of England, discuss how leaders should respond to the new challenges of engaging employees and creating a sense of ‘community’ around work. Find out more: https://www.bristol.ac.uk/campaigns/responsible-business/...
Sep 30, 2024•25 min
