This article addresses the doctrine of remoteness in tort in light of the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Armstead v Royal & Sun Alliance Insurance Co. Ltd. Armstead further attenuates an already weak control on tortious liability. In outline, it does so in two ways: first, by establishing that contractual liabilities incurred as a result of tortiously caused property damage comprise non-remote damage provided that those liabilities represent a reasonable pre-estimate of the counterparty’s loss; and, secondly, by allocating the burden of proof in respect of remoteness to defendants. This article explores these rules. It contends, in particular, that the first collides with the fundamental principle that the extent of the claimant’s loss in tort is irrelevant to the issue of remoteness while the second means that, oddly, the onus of proof in relation to remoteness in tort differs from that in contract.

The extracellular matrices, such as the haemolymph, in insects are at the centre of most physiological processes and are protected from oxidative stress by the extracellular antioxidant enzymes. In this study, we identified two secreted superoxide dismutase genes (PxSOD3 and PxSOD5) and investigated the oxidative stress induced by chlorpyrifos (CPF) in the aquatic insect Protohermes xanthodes (Megaloptera: Corydalidae). PxSOD3 and PxSOD5 contain the signal peptides at the N-terminus. Structure analysis revealed that PxSOD3 and PxSOD5 contain the conserved CuZn-SOD domain, which is mainly composed of β-sheets and has conserved copper and zinc binding sites. Both PxSOD3 and PxSOD5 are predicted to be soluble proteins located in the extracellular space. After exposure to different concentrations of sublethal CPF, MDA content in P. xanthodes larvae were increased in a dose-dependent manner; SOD and CAT activities were also higher in CPF-treated groups than that in the no CPF control, indicating that sublethal CPF induces oxidative stress in P. xanthodes larvae. Furthermore, PxSOD3 and PxSOD5 expression levels and haemolymph SOD activity in the larvae were downregulated by sublethal CPF at different concentrations. Our results suggest that the PxSOD3 and PxSOD5 are putative extracellular antioxidant enzymes that may play a role in maintaining the oxidative balance in the extracellular space. Sublethal CPF may induce oxidative stress in the extracellular space of P. xanthodes by reducing the gene expression and catalytic activity of extracellular SODs.

Mr. President, we remain resolute in our commitment to combating all forms of racism, racial discrimination and xenophobia and related intolerance whether that be at home or abroad…. Nonetheless, we have a number of concerns with this text….

Cut finite element methods (CutFEM) extend the standard finite element method to unfitted meshes, enabling the accurate resolution of domain boundaries and interfaces without requiring the mesh to conform to them. This approach preserves the key properties and accuracy of the standard method while addressing challenges posed by complex geometries and moving interfaces.

In recent years, CutFEM has gained significant attention for its ability to discretize partial differential equations in domains with intricate geometries. This paper provides a comprehensive review of the core concepts and key developments in CutFEM, beginning with its formulation for common model problems and the presentation of fundamental analytical results, including error estimates and condition number estimates for the resulting algebraic systems. Stabilization techniques for cut elements, which ensure numerical robustness, are also explored. Finally, extensions to methods involving Lagrange multipliers and applications to time-dependent problems are discussed.

The article examines the widespread practice of using extended judicial formations to decide certain types of cases in higher courts, a practice present in many jurisdictions—whether appellate, apex or supranational. While the use of these formations, often considered the ‘most important’, is frequently debated within individual countries, a conceptual and comparative analysis providing a firmer theoretical foundation for these discussions is currently lacking. Departing from existing scholarship, which often assumes a universal purpose for these bodies, this article argues that jurisdictions tend to adopt one of two models of extended formations: the collective control model or the jurisprudential model. These models reflect divergent sources of legitimacy for the enlarged formations—either rooted in the broader participation of judges in the court’s decision-making process (input or procedural legitimacy), or in the doctrinal quality of the decisions that the grand chamber produces and their resulting consequences (output or performance-based legitimacy). These distinctions help to explain differences in how extended formations are composed, the types of cases they hear, the procedures they follow and how their decisions are drafted and subsequently used within the court. The article ultimately demonstrates that the choice between the two models reflects broader assumptions within different judicial systems about the nature of law and judging.

Ensemble Kalman methods, introduced in 1994 in the context of ocean state estimation, are now widely used for state estimation and parameter estimation (inverse problems) in many arenae. Their success stems from the fact that they take an underlying computational model as a black box to provide a systematic, derivative-free methodology for incorporating observations; furthermore the ensemble approach allows for sensitivities and uncertainties to be calculated. Analysis of the accuracy of ensemble Kalman methods, especially in terms of uncertainty quantification, is lagging behind empirical success; this paper provides a unifying mean-field-based framework for their analysis. Both state estimation and parameter estimation problems are considered, and formulations in both discrete and continuous time are employed. For state estimation problems, both the control and filtering approaches are considered; analogously for parameter estimation problems, the optimization and Bayesian perspectives are both studied. As well as providing an elegant framework, the mean-field perspective also allows for the derivation of a variety of methods used in practice. In addition it unifies a wide-ranging literature in the field and suggests open problems.