Ecologies of participation in socio-technical change: The case of energy system transitions

Studies of societal engagement with socio-technical change are undergoing a systemic turn. Rather than simply viewing public engagement in science, policy and behavioural change in terms of discrete cases, key social theories in deliberative democracy, practice theory, socio-technical transitions and co-productionist scholarship in science and technology studies (STS) are moving to consider how diverse forms of participation interrelate in wider systems. In this paper we take stock of these advances to develop a conceptual framework for understanding ecologies of participation in socio-technical and democratic systems, grounded in relational co-productionist theory in STS. The framework is illustrated through empirical analysis of a systematic mapping of participation in UK energy system transitions between 2010 and 2015. This provides the first insights into system-wide patternings, diversities and inequalities of energy participation, the significant types of interrelation between practices of public engagement within wider ecologies of participation, and their mutual construction with political cultures and constitutions. The value and implications of adopting an ecologies of participation approach are considered with respect to the theoretical, empirical and practical challenges of understanding and building more inclusive, responsible and just socio-technical (energy) transitions

Agronomic processes to optimise galanthamine content of daffodil biomass (AGROGAL)

The objective of the research is to identify individual agronomically-relevant processes and treatments that would increase the production of the anti-Alzheimer drug, Galanthamine, in daffodils (to identify the basis of the so called Black Mountain Effect observed in the field). The data was generated by extensive and reproducible analysis of 18 different treatments applied individually under laboratory and greenhouse conditions

Reporting of health estimates prior to GATHER: a scoping review

Background: Generating estimates of health indicators at the global, regional, and country levels is increasingly in demand in order to meet reporting requirements for global and country targets, such as the sustainable development goals (SDGs). However, such estimates are sensitive to availability of input data, underlying analytic assumptions, variability in statistical techniques, and often have important limitations. From a user perspective, there is often a lack of transparency and replicability. In order to define best practices in reporting data and methods used to calculate health estimates, the Guidelines for Accurate and Transparent Health Estimates Reporting (GATHER) working group developed a minimum checklist of 18 items that must be reported within each study publishing health estimates, so that users may make an assessment of the quality of the estimate. Objective: We conducted a scoping review to assess the state of reporting amongst a cross-sectional sample of studies published prior to the publication of GATHER. Methods: We generated a sample of UN reports and journal articles through a combination of a Medline search and hand-searching published health estimates. From these studies we extracted the percentage of studies correctly reporting each item on the checklist, the proportion of items reported per study (the GATHER performance score), and how this score varied depending on study type. Results: The average proportion of items reported per study was 0.47, and the poorest-performing items related to documentation and availability of input data, availability of the statistical code used and the subsequent output data, and a complete detailed description of all the steps of the data analysis. Conclusions: Methods for health estimates are not currently fully reported, and the implementation of the GATHER guidelines will improve the availability of information required to make an assessment of study quality

Postharvest losses of fruit and vegetables during retail and in consumers’ homes: Quantifications, causes, and means of prevention

The issue of food loss and waste (FLW) reduction has recently achieved much public attention as part of worldwide efforts to combat global hunger and improve food security. Studies conducted by various international and national organizations led by the FAO indicated that about one third of all food produced on the planet and about a half of all fruit and vegetables (F&V) are lost and not consumed. FLW occurs during five key stages of the food supply chain: agricultural production, postharvest handling and storage, processing, distribution, and consumption. Large portions of FLW in developed countries occur during retail and consumption, and are largely related to logistic management operations and consumer behaviors. In light of the great importance of FLW reduction, the United Nations set up in September 2015 an ambitious goal to halve per capita global food waste by 2030, and this decision was adapted by the US Federal Government, the EU Parliament, and many other countries. This first Adel Kader review article is dedicated to the subject of F&V losses during retail and consumption, and contains the following chapters: 1) Introduction of the problem of global food losses; 2) Quantifications of F&V losses during retail and consumption in the UK, US and other countries; 3) Causes and consumer decisions related to F&V wastage; 4) Emerging new technologies for prevention of F&V losses, including advances in logistics and cold chain management, retail packaging and technological innovations; 5) Other means to reduce F&V losses, including consumer awareness campaigns, advertisement of home storage instructions and policy and legislative measures. Due to the great importance of reducing F&V losses, we encourage postharvest researchers to become more engaged with logistics and food supply-chain operations, and to conduct multidisciplinary research incorporating consumer behavior studies into postharvest research

Fuel cells for clean power generation and transport

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:GPC/05571 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo