New Approach Devised to Show How Ghost-Like Neutrinos Helped Shape the Universe

New Approach Devised to Show How Ghost-Like Neutrinos Helped Shape the Universe

By UNIVERSITY OF TSUKUBA DECEMBER 13, 2020

Universe Simulation Concept

Next Step in Simulating the Universe

Researchers led by the University of Tsukuba devise a new approach to show how ghost-like neutrinos helped shape the Universe.

Computer simulations have struggled to capture the impact of elusive particles called neutrinos on the formation and growth of the large-scale structure of the Universe. But now, a research team from Japan has developed a method that overcomes this hurdle.

In a study published recently in The Astrophysical Journal, researchers led by the University of Tsukuba present simulations that accurately depict the role of neutrinos in the evolution of the Universe.

Why are these simulations important? One key reason is that they can set constraints on a currently unknown quantity: the neutrino mass. If this quantity is set to a particular value in the simulations and the simulation results differ from observations, that value can be ruled out. However, the constraints can be trusted only if the simulations are accurate, which was not guaranteed in previous work. The team behind this latest research aimed to address this limitation.

“Earlier simulations used certain approximations that might not be valid,” says lead author of the study Lecturer Kohji Yoshikawa. “In our work, we avoided these approximations by employing a technique that accurately represents the velocity distribution function of the neutrinos and follows its time evolution.”

To do this, the research team directly solved a system of equations known as the Vlasov–Poisson equations, which describe how particles move in the Universe. They then carried out simulations for different values of the neutrino mass and systemically examined the effects of neutrinos on the large-scale structure of the Universe.

The simulation results demonstrate, for example, that neutrinos suppress the clustering of dark matter—the ‘missing’ mass in the Universe—and in turn galaxies. They also show that neutrino-rich regions are strongly correlated with massive galaxy clusters and that the effective temperature of the neutrinos varies substantially depending on the neutrino mass.

“Overall, our findings suggest that neutrinos considerably affect the large-scale structure formation, and that our simulations provide an accurate account for the important effect of neutrinos,” explains Lecturer Yoshikawa. “It is also reassuring that our new results are consistent with those from entirely different simulation approaches.”

This work represents a milestone in simulating the Universe and paves the way for further exploration of how neutrinos influence the formation and growth of the large-scale structure. For instance, the new simulation approach could be used to study the dynamics of neutrinos and unconventional types of dark matter. Ultimately, it might lead to a determination of the neutrino mass.

Next four to six months could be worst of Covid-19 pandemic: Bill Gates

Next four to six months could be worst of Covid-19 pandemic: Bill Gates

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates .

WASHINGTON: Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, whose foundation has been part of the effort to develop and deliver Covid-19 vaccines, has warned that the next four to six months could be the worst of the coronavirus pandemic.

In recent weeks, the US has been experiencing record high cases, deaths and hospitalisations.

"I thought the US would do a better job handling it," Gates, who in 2015 had warned the world of such a pandemic, said on Sunday.

"Sadly, the next four to six months could be the worst of the pandemic. The IHME (Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation) forecast shows over 200,000 additional deaths. If we would follow the rules, in terms of wearing masks and not mixing, we could avoid a large percentage of those deaths,” Gates, the co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, told CNN.

The Covid-19 has so far killed more than 290,000 people in the US.

"Overall, when I did the forecasts in 2015, I talked about the deaths potentially being higher. So, this virus could be more fatal than it is. We didn't get the worst-case. But the thing that has surprised me is that the economic impact in the US and around the world has been much greater than the forecasts that I made five years ago," he said.

Gates said that his foundation had been funding a lot of the research for the vaccines.

"We're very agile. We're a partner in a thing called CEPI, which is the second biggest funder after the US government," he said.

"So, in diagnostics, therapy and vaccines, we know where the science is, we know how the pieces need to come together in an urgent way. And so our expertise in infectious disease, which normally only relates to developing countries, applied to the entire world for this crisis," he added.

The US need to help all of humanity, Gates said when asked of the executive order signed by President Donald Trump which prioritises distribution of the vaccine to Americans before it goes to people in other countries.

"We want the world economy be going. We want to minimize the deaths. And, you know, the basic technology is a German company. And so blocking international sharing and cooperation has been disruptive and a mistake during this entire pandemic," he said.

"So, we need to ramp up the capacity of all the vaccines. There will be some additional ones approved in the months ahead that are easier to scale up the manufacturing. But the US has benefited from other countries' work care, and we shouldn't be entirely selfish in how we go forward," he added.

Responding to a question, Gates said that he will take the vaccine publicly as former US presidents, Bill Clinton, George Bush and Barack Obama, have said to increase the confidence of the people in the vaccine.

"I will do the same. When it's my turn -- I'm not going to budge, but when my turn comes up, I will visibly take the vaccine, because I think that it's a benefit to all people to not be transmitting," he said.

Gates said that access to the vaccine should be based on medical need, not wealth at all.

"After all, this epidemic has been awful in the way that it's exacerbated inequities. It's been worse for Hispanics, worse for blacks, worse for low-income service workers, multigenerational households, a number of things that mean that, in terms of picking who gets the vaccine, we better be using equity to drive all those decisions," he said.

Despite the availability of the vaccine, Gates said that the next four to six months really call on Americans to do their best.

"Because we can see that this will end, and you don't want somebody you love to be the last to die of coronavirus," he said.

"Certainly, mask-wearing has essentially no downside. They're not expensive. Bars and restaurants in most of the country will be closed as we go into this wave. And I think, sadly, that's appropriate. Depending on how severe it is, the decision about schools is much more complicated, because, there, the benefits are pretty high, the amount of transmission is not the same as in restaurants and bars,” Gates said.

In response to another question, Gates said that the "transition is complicating" the fight against coronavirus pandemic.

" But ut the new administration is willing to rely on actual experts, and not attack those experts. They're laying out clear plans. So, I think we will get through this in a positive way. I'm pleased with the people and the priority that the president-elect, Biden, and his team are bringing to bear on this problem,” he said.

Biden'sen's doing his best to retain Francis Collins and Tony Fauci and add them to that strong group of people. These are people who are willing to admit when things aren't going well and deliver tough messages, particularly about the next four to six months. And so I do think the US will not be one of the worst performers as the team comes into office," Gates said.

The periodic table is 150 – but it could have looked very different

The periodic table is 150 – but it could have looked very different

The periodic table stares down from the walls of just about every chemistry lab. The credit for its creation generally goes to Dimitri Mendeleev, a Russian chemist who in 1869 wrote out the known elements (of which there were 63 at the time) on cards and then arranged them in columns and rows according to their chemical and physical properties. To celebrate the 150th anniversary of this pivotal moment in science,

The UN has proclaimed 2019 to be the International year of the Periodic Table.

But the periodic table didn’t actually start with Mendeleev. Many had tinkered with arranging the elements. Decades before, chemist John Dalton tried to create a table as well as some rather interesting symbols for the elements (they didn’t catch on). And just a few years before Mendeleev sat down with his deck of homemade cards, John Newlands also created a table sorting the elements by their properties.

Mendeleev’s genius was in what he left out of his table. He recognised that certain elements were missing, yet to be discovered. So where Dalton, Newlands and others had laid out what was known, Mendeleev left space for the unknown. Even more amazingly, he accurately predicted the properties of the missing elements.

Notice the question marks in his table above? For example, next to Al (aluminium) there’s space for an unknown metal. Mendeleev foretold it would have an atomic mass of 68, a density of six grams per cubic centimetre and a very low melting point. Six years later Paul Émile Lecoq de Boisbaudran, isolated gallium and sure enough it slotted right into the gap with an atomic mass of 69.7, a density of 5.9g/cm³ and a melting point so low that it becomes liquid in your hand. Mendeleev did the same for scandium, germanium and technetium (which wasn’t discovered until 1937, 30 years after his death).

At first glance Mendeleev’s table doesn’t look much like the one we are familiar with. For one thing, the modern table has a bunch of elements that Mendeleev overlooked (and failed to leave room for), most notably the noble gases (such as helium, neon, argon). And the table is oriented differently to our modern version, with elements we now place together in columns arranged in rows.

But once you give Mendeleev’s table a 90-degree turn, the similarity to the modern version becomes apparent. For example, the halogens – fluorine (F), chlorine (Cl), bromine (Br), and Iodine (I) (the J symbol in Mendeleev’s table) – all appear next to one another. Today they are arranged in the table’s 17th column (or group 17 as chemists prefer to call it).

Period of experimentation

It may seem a small leap from this to the familiar diagram but, years after Mendeleev’s publications, there was plenty of experimentation with alternative layouts for the elements. Even before the table got its permanent right-angle flip, folks suggested some weird and wonderful twists.

One particularly striking example is Heinrich Baumhauer’s spiral, published in 1870, with hydrogen at its centre and elements with increasing atomic mass spiralling outwards. The elements that fall on each of the wheel’s spokes share common properties just as those in a column (group) do so in today’s table. There was also Henry Basset’s rather odd “dumb-bell”formulation of 1892.

Nevertheless, by the beginning of the 20th century, the table had settled down into a familiar horizontal format with the strikingly modern looking version from Alfred Wernerin 1905. For the first time, the noble gases appeared in their now familiar position on the far right of the table. Werner also tried to take a leaf out of Mendeleev’s book by leaving gaps, although he rather overdid the guess work with suggestions for elements lighter than hydrogen and another sitting between hydrogen and helium (none of which exist).

Despite this rather modern looking table, there was still a bit of rearranging to be done. Particularly influential was Charles Janet’s version. He took a physicist’s approach to the table and used a newly discovered quantum theory to create a layout based on electron configurations. The resulting “left step” table is still preferred by many physicists. Interestingly, Janet also provided space for elements right up to number 120 despite only 92 being known at the time (we’re only at 118 now).

SETTLING ON A DESIGN

The modern table is actually a direct evolution of Janet’s version. The alkali metals (the group topped by lithium) and the alkaline earth metals (topped by beryllium) got shifted from far right to the far left to create a very wide looking (long form) periodic table. The problem with this format is that it doesn’t fit nicely on a page or poster, so largely for aesthetic reasons the f-block elements are usually cut out and deposited below the main table. That’s how we arrived at the table we recognise today.

That’s not to say folks haven’t tinkered with layouts, often as an attempt to highlight correlations between elements that aren’t readily apparent in the conventional table. There are literally hundreds of variations (check out Mark Leach’s database) with spirals and 3D versions being particularly popular, not to mention more tongue-in-cheek variants.

Or the dizzy array of imitations that aim to give a science feel to categorising everything from beer to Disney characters, and my particular favourite “irrational nonsense”. All of which go to show how the periodic table of elements has become the iconic symbol of science.

Education Resources for World Schoolers

Education Resources for World Schoolers

I am happy to welcome any guest blogs which may be of interest to readers & relate to either travel and/or world schooling.

As a world schooler who is always on the look out for new and enjoyable learning resources for my 7 yr old son I was delighted to recently receive an email from Kat Lerner, Community Manager from www.education.com introducing the company and website to me.

Kat said:

“Education.com aims to empower parents, teachers, and homeschoolers to help their children build essential skills and excel. With over 12 million members, Education.com provides educators of all kinds with high-quality learning resources, including worksheets, lesson plans, digital games, an online guided learning platform, and more”

Education.com is an American company which has many excellent resources covering a whole range of topics and subjects. They provide over 30,000 printable worksheets (some free and some chargeable) for both parents and teachers. Below is just one crossword example which Kat sent me demonstrating both the worksheet and the answer sheet.

She says “Hop aboard to learn about figurative language with this crossword puzzle worksheet! Visit education.com to find more fun learning resourc

There is also an example of a simple multiplication math sheet:

My only comment as a world schooling parent who is on the move a lot and doesn’t often have ready access to a printer is that I would love to see the service enhanced to enable completion of many of this worksheets available online so that they could be done on an ipad of suchlike.

These worksheets certainly help make learning fun though which I know is one of the primary objectives of the company.

They also have two separate Twitter accounts which can be found at: education_com and for younger children preschoolers.

Auto-antibodies' make some people more likely to suffer severe coronavirus symptoms and cause 'long Covid', scientists says

Auto-antibodies' make some people more likely to suffer severe coronavirus symptoms and cause 'long Covid', scientists says

People with coronavirus have high numbers of 'autoantibodies' in their blood

Block body's Covid-tackling antibodies and attack several areas, including brain 

Could account for why some Covid sufferers experience long-lasting symptoms 

Extreme levels of 'friendly fire' antibodies in the immune system could trigger severe coronavirus symptoms and cause 'long Covid', scientists say.

Coronavirus patients have high numbers of 'autoantibodies' in their blood which block the body's Covid-tackling antibodies and attack several areas, including the brain, blood vessels and liver.

This could account for why some Covid sufferers experience long-lasting symptoms - such as fatigue, breathlessness and brain problems, a study found. 

Extreme levels of 'friendly fire' antibodies in the immune system could trigger severe coronavirus symptoms and cause 'long Covid', scientists say .

LONG COVID: WHAT IS IT AND COULD IT BE FOUR DIFFERENT SYNDROMES? 

Covid-19 is described as a short-term illness caused by infection with the novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. Public health officials tend to say people will recover within two weeks or so. 

However it's become increasingly clear that this is not the case for everyone, and that the two-week period is only the 'acute illness' phase.

The North Bristol NHS Trust's Discover project, which is studying the longer-term effects of coronavirus, found that out of a total of 110 patients given a three-month check up, most (74 per cent) had at least one persistent symptom after twelve weeks. The most common were:

Excessive fatigue: 39%

Breathlessness: 39%

Insomnia: 24%  

Muscle pain: 23%

Chest pain: 13%

Cough: 12%

Loss of smell: 12%

Headache, fever, joint pain and diarrhoea: Each less than 10% 

Other long term symptoms that have been reported by Covid-19 survivors, both suspected and confirmed, anecdotally, include hearing problems, 'brain fog', memory loss, lack of concentration, mental health problems and hair loss.

The impact of Long Covid on people who had mild illness have not been studied in depth yet.  

Data from the King's College London symptom tracking app shows that up to 500,000 people in the UK are currently suffering from the long-term effects of Covid-19.

In October, scientists claimed Long Covid could actually be split into four different syndromes.  

Academics at the National Institute for Health Research — headed up by Professor Chris Whitty — were asked to review the limited evidence on long Covid to help both patients and doctors understand the 'phenomenon'. 

Their findings warned that even children can suffer and it can't be assumed that people who are at lower risk of severe illness and death from Covid-19 are also at low risk of lasting side effects.

Doctors cautioned some mental health problems such as anxiety and depression in 'long-haulers', as they are known, could be down to lockdowns, as opposed to the virus itself. 

The experts also claimed that the symptoms could be grouped into four different groups: 

Post intensive care syndrome (PICS)

Post viral fatigue syndrome (PVFS) 

Permanent organ damage (POD)  

Long term Covid syndrome (LTCS) 

Researchers at Yale University counted the number of 'autoantibodies' in the blood of 194 hospital workers and patients with Covid - compared to 30 healthy staff members.

They found that non-infected people had far fewer autoantibodies than those who had the virus. 

Another set of tests discovered that people with more autoantibodies - which attack the same organs known to be damaged in Covid sufferers - experienced worse Covid-19 symptoms.

Scientists fear the negative effects of the 'friendly fire' could continue for an extended period of time, causing long Covid.

Covid-19 is described as a short-term illness caused by infection with the novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. Public health officials tend to say people will recover within two weeks or so. 

However it's become increasingly clear that this is not the case for everyone, and that the two-week period is only the 'acute illness' phase.

The North Bristol NHS Trust's Discover project, which is studying the longer-term effects of coronavirus, found that out of a total of 110 patients given a three-month check up, most (74 per cent) had at least one persistent symptom after twelve weeks.

Yale immunobiologist and the study's senior author Aaron Ring told The Guardian: 'Covid-19 patients make autoantibodies that actually interfere with immune responses against the virus.  

'We certainly believe that these autoantibodies are harmful to patients with Covid-19,'Becauseantibodies can persist for a long time, it's conceivable that they may contribute to the development of long-Covid diseases.'

Antibodies are disease-fighting proteins made and stored by the immune system to fight off invaders in the future by latching onto their spike proteins.

Autoantibodies, on the other hand, are the incorrect shape to bind, instead attaching to proteins on human cells. 

In the study, Dr Ring - along with immunobiology professor Akiko Iwasaki - conducted the study which has not yet been peer reviewed or published.

It follows the news that the chances of the University of Oxford's Covid-19 vaccine being rolled out by the end of this year are 'pretty high'.

The vaccine from Oxford and pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca is yet to be approved for use in the UK - with the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) still reviewing trial data.

The Government has secured 100 million doses of the vaccine, with four million ready for key workers once approval is given.

Oxford University vaccinology professor Sarah Gilbert said the chances of getting the jab - which is 90 per cent effective and costs just £2 per dose - before the end of 2020 'are pretty high'.

But she stressed that multiple vaccines - made using different technologies - will be needed to tackle the pandemic. 

Professor Gilbert told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show: 'It depends on the age group you're in and the JCVI (Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation) prioritisations.

Oxford University vaccinology professor Sarah Gilbert (pictured) said the chances of getting the jab before the end of 2020 'are pretty high'

'I think the chances are pretty high. But we do need multiple vaccines, all countries need multiple vaccines, the world needs multiple vaccines and we need vaccines made using different technologies, if that's possible.'

She said this was due to companies potentially encountering problems with the supply of raw materials as doses are produced, which could slow down vaccine rollout if other jabs are not available.

'So having multiple shots on goal, multiple irons in the fire, is what we really need,' she added.

Professor Gilbert's optimistic assessment comes as the UK's coronavirus case load continues to rise - with a further 18,447 coronavirus cases recorded today, up 1,175 on last Sunday.  

Karachi Univeristy announces schedule for reserved seats 2021

Karachi Univeristy announces schedule for reserved seats 2021

The reserved seats are for sports, University of Karachi employees, special persons, armed forces, lawyers' offspring, among others.

The deadline for the submission is December 24

The fee of the processing fee is Rs2,000

The University of Karachi on Monday announced the schedule for submission of online admission forms for the reserved seats in morning program 2021, a statement from the varsity said.

The reserved seats are for sports, University of Karachi employees, special persons, armed forces, lawyers' offspring, FATA, Northern Areas, and Azad Jammu Kashmir, rural Sindh, and Balochistan.

The in-charge KU Directorate of Admissions Dr Saima Akhtar said that the online admissions forms for reserved seats are available at the varsity's website.

The candidates will pay Rs2,000 as the processing fee, while they can submit their admission forms by December 24, 2020.

She informed that if a candidate has appeared in the entry test held on December 12 and 13, 2020, he/she would be eligible to apply for the admissions on a reserved seat in those departments.

Academic dishonesty is eating away at Pakistan’s higher education. But professors are happy

 Academic mic dishonesty is eating away at Pakistan’s higher education. But professors are happy

Quaid-e-Azam University’s department of mechanical engineering was rated better than Oxford in Shanghai Academic Ranking. Just that QAU does not have any engineering department.

Over half a dozen international “well-reputed” university ranking organisations annually publish their ratings. They tell you which university or department is better than which other, both within a country as well as between countries. Feel free to swallow their poisonous bait but do so at your own risk. These cunning ones easily take simpletons for a ride. At best, you will get questionable stuff. More likely, it will be meaningless nonsense or a fat bunch of lies.

An example: from the website of Shanghai Academic Ranking of World Universities — which ranks thousands of universities globally — the department of mechanical engineering at Quaid-e-Azam University was rated 76-100 in 2017. This placed it just below Tokyo University and just above Manchester University. Wow! Thereafter every year QAU improved its score and in 2020 it jumped into the 51-75 range putting it under McGill University but higher than Oxford University. The reader can google this and may discover other such gems too.

Better than Oxford? Having taught at QAU for the greater part of my life, I could jump for joy. But let the truth be told: QAU does not have a mechanical engineering department! In fact, it does not offer engineering of any kind and none is planned. A clerical mistake might explain a one-off report. But what software generated the precise numbers charting QAU’s progress year after year?

Laugh if you want but not too loudly. Save some breath for Times Higher Education which declared Abdul Wali Khan University in Mardan as Pakistan’s top university. Unknown for research or teaching, AWKUM is top-most for violent intolerance. In April 2017 a 23-year-old AWKUM student, Mashal Khan, was accused of blasphemy then beaten with sticks and bricks before finally being shot to death. Hundreds of students cheered as he was dragged naked across the campus. They video-recorded the murder with smartphones, then posted it onto their FB pages.

A week later, yet another university ranking organisation called QS put Nust (Islamabad) at Pakistan’s number one and drove AWKUM off the scene. Such fatuous fabrications are galore. These commercial organisations never send inspectors to the thousands of overseas universities they rank. Instead, they simply email forms to university officials who fill them at will. The ranking criteria are adjusted to benefit the client. Everyone (except the student) makes a fast buck.

Across the world, ranking organisations have been exposed as inconsistent, changing metrics from year to year, and omitting critical pieces of information. Crooked university professors have also learned to game the system. This speeds up their promotions and brings in cash. In countries with strong academic ethics, success is partial. But in Pakistan, where academic honesty has been in free fall since 2002, it has worked better and better.

Consider: three weeks ago, newspaper headlines across Pakistan blazed with soul-lifting news. Eighty-one Pakistani scientists had been chosen from 159,683 scientists in universities across the world, ranked by their number of research publications and how often they were cited. Stanford University reportedly declared these 81 luminaries in the world’s top two per cent of scientists.

That’s a total lie! Stanford University has not sanctioned any such report. This doctored news wrongly draws upon the enormous prestige of Stanford. Only one of the four authors, John P.A. Ioannidis, has a Stanford affiliation. He is a professor of medical statistics while the other three authors are from the private sector. Their published work inputs numbers from an existing database into a computer that crunches them into a list.

That list is meaningless for Pakistan. It does not represent scientific acumen or achievement. Here’s why: generating scientific research papers without knowing any science or doing actual research has been honed into a fine art by academic crooks at home and abroad. At the second stage, the stuff produced has to be published, for which clever professors have developed 99 tricks. The third — and most difficult stage — is to generate citations after the paper is published.

At this point, the crooked professor relies upon crooked friends to cite him and boost his ratings. Those friends have their friends in India, China, South Africa, or elsewhere. This international web of connections is known as a citation cartel. Cartel members generate reams of scientific gibberish that the world of mainstream science pays no heed to. But in Pakistan the rewards are handsome — you soon become chairman, dean, vice-chancellor, or influence peddler. These gatekeepers shunt out all genuine academics lest they be challenged from below.

Knowing a few individuals who made it to the exalted ‘Stanford scientist list’, I would be surprised if they could pass a tough high-school-level exam for entering undergraduate studies in a decent university like Stanford. Others I cannot judge: some could certainly be genuine. But for one scientist to judge across fields has become harder in the age of super specialisation. So how to tell?

Given what few genuine academics Pakistan has, no satisfactory answer exists. One can expect nothing from the present gatekeepers of academia because fraud is a way of life for most. To spot even 100 genuine academics from among thousands is hard. Pakistan’s university system may well have crossed the point of no return and be beyond repair. But suppose one refuses to accept this pessimistic conclusion. How to separate the wheat from the chaff?

Simple: every university and HEC must demand that any professor claiming credit for a scientific paper must present that work before an informed audience and be appropriately questioned. Credible foreign specialists should be included. Technology allows this to be done remotely (Zoom, Skype, Webex, etc) and to preserve videos for later viewing. Each presentation must explain what that paper has contributed to knowledge production.

This has many pitfalls. Transparency is not a magic wand. Still, it will whittle down the so-called Stanford list by 80pc to 100pc. Self-congratulations, and official policies that encourage academic dishonesty, have inflicted massive damage upon Pakistan’s higher education system. Without extreme measures, the rot will continue forever. We must begin now.