Implementation represents the most crucial step in the policy process; it is at this stage where the hardest battles for policy success are fought. Implementation is also the most complex of the policy cycle stages, with the largest amount of resources and highest number of actors involved in it. In the realm of social policy, outputs and outcomes determined during the implementation stage have a direct impact on the welfare of the population. However, in both political and academic domains, the analysis of implementation activities commonly receives less attention than the other stages. This article seeks to address this gap by reviewing and comparing relevant issues of social policy implementation in Latin America and Southern Europe, regions that share similar historical and political legacies. Research on these two regions enables the identification of many critical obstacles that social policy implementation faces today in these and other contexts and of opportunities for its improvement.

The extent to which continental acidity during the Early Triassic varied with latitude remains insufficiently constrained, despite its relevance for understanding environmental stress and biotic recovery patterns across the Smithian–Spathian boundary (SSB). We examined the abundance, textures and compositions of strontium-rich hydrated aluminium phosphate–sulphate (APS) minerals in 179 continental samples spanning tropical to high paleolatitudes in both hemispheres. APS minerals display broadly comparable early-diagenetic features across sections, indicating formation shortly after deposition under acidic meteoric conditions. Their distribution suggests a latitudinal trend: APS contents commonly exceed 0.1 vol.% in equatorial western peri-Tethyan basins, where faunal and floral records are sparse during the SSB, whereas concentrations decrease towards higher latitudes and are rare beyond ∼40° in both hemispheres. This pattern does not appear to correlate with lithological or textural variability and may reflect spatial differences in the intensity or duration of acidification linked to Siberian Traps volcanism. Equatorial basins thus likely experienced more prolonged or recurrent acidic episodes, whereas higher-latitude areas may have been subject to comparatively attenuated effects, potentially contributing to earlier ecological recovery. These results provide a useful framework for evaluating continental acidification and its environmental implications during the interval following the end-Permian mass extinction (EPME).

We have been conducting mass-balance monitoring on Aldegondabreen since the early 21st century. Over the most recent five year period (2019/20–2023/24), the glacier has experienced its most negative mass balance, averaging −2.0 m w.e. a−1. This dramatic loss is linked to rising air temperatures, with several of the warmest years on record for the Arctic land occurring during this interval. In 2024, for the first time, the critical threshold of 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels was exceeded globally, and this resulted in the lowest annual balance observed since the beginning of our monitoring program (−2.48 m w.e. a−1). Archival evidence indicates that such intense melting is unprecedented since at least 1911, which marked the end of the Little Ice Age in the region. As of 2025, the glacier’s mean ice thickness has been estimated at 39 m (33 m w.e.) meaning that the loss of 10 m w.e. in just the last five years is an enormous change.

The purpose of this work is to develop a version of Forman’s discrete Morse theory for simplicial complexes, based on internal strong collapses. Classical discrete Morse theory can be viewed as a generalization of Whitehead’s collapses, where each Morse function on a simplicial complex $K$ defines a sequence of elementary internal collapses. This reduction guarantees the existence of a CW-complex that is homotopy equivalent to $K$, with cells corresponding to the critical simplices of the Morse function. However, this approach lacks an explicit combinatorial description of the attaching maps, which limits the reconstruction of the homotopy type of $K$. By restricting discrete Morse functions to those induced by total orders on the vertices, we develop a strong discrete Morse theory, generalizing the strong collapses introduced by Barmak and Minian. We show that, in this setting, the resulting reduced CW-complex is regular, enabling us to recover its homotopy type combinatorially. We also provide an algorithm to compute this reduction and apply it to obtain efficient structures for complexes in the library of triangulations by Benedetti and Lutz.

Research into the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) has established links between environmental exposures in early life and later-life health outcomes. Emerging interventions typically focus on improving maternal nutrition and neonatal healthcare practices yet often neglect to assess or enhance subject understanding of potential long-term impacts or to communicate the benefits of maximising parental health prior to conception. This study critically evaluates a survey tool developed to measure knowledge of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and early-life contributors to lifelong health. The rationale behind the wording and format of the questions is examined alongside options for coding and statistical interpretation of the data. Considerations for implementation are discussed, illustrated by key findings arising from tracking of the tool’s application in Aotearoa New Zealand over ten years. We demonstrate that the survey tool can be adapted for use in a variety of contexts, producing both quantitative and qualitative baseline data suitable for informing health promotion interventions and monitoring changes in population knowledge. This research also highlights a key difference between awareness of and understanding of scientific concepts and the importance of distinguishing between these when considering public engagement with science.

Englacial layers are a product of historic accumulation and are reshaped by ice deformation. Hence, radio-echo sounding (RES), which can resolve englacial layering, has been adopted as an observational tool to infer ice age and ice dynamics from ice stratigraphy. However, the commonly applied synthetic aperture radar focusing algorithms, used to improve image resolution, are either i) incoherent or ii) optimized for the ice-bed interface. Dipping specular reflectors, such as englacial layers, are then lost during focusing. Instead, we focus the RES measurements using subapertures, synthetically squinting the radar beam toward orthogonal incidence for every dipping layer. We then either recombine all subapertures or reject those with low signal to generate an image that resolves all englacial targets together. We apply these methods to both along- and across-flow RES images at Academy Glacier, East Antarctica, which has significant englacial layer relief, especially perpendicular to the ice-flow direction. Our method significantly elevates signal power for dipping englacial layers ($ \gt $15 dB), and quantifiably improves layer continuity compared to other processed data products. This squinted focusing approach enables novel studies of ice deformation (as recorded in englacial layering) in the presence of complex basal topography and heterogeneous substrate properties.

Relying on a variety of archival sources, including the recently discovered private correspondence of the Uruguayan diplomat Enrique Buero, this article demonstrates that a Latin American bloc with a common agenda emerged in Geneva during the 1920s and transformed the codification of international law in both the League of Nations and the Pan-American Union. Key pressure groups previously thought to have operated exclusively in the Americas were created in the League by Latin American diplomats who wanted to reform international law to protect small states but had lost faith in Pan-Americanism. The article examines the ideological origins of this bloc and the obstacles that it encountered, including an initial tendency among some diplomats to prioritize status-seeking. It charts the Latin American bloc’s success in dismantling obstacles to the League’s involvement in the Americas. Finally, the article demonstrates that the bloc was able to leverage its influence beyond the League, including during the run-up to the 1933 Montevideo Conference.

As an essential trace element, iron is indispensable for oxygen transport, energy metabolism, and other physiological processes. During the physiological stage of gestation, the iron demand of sows increases substantially. Iron deficiency anemia is highly prevalent in pregnant sows, adversely affecting their reproductive performance and potentially inducing growth retardation, weakened immunity, and compromised health in piglets. Consequently, these adverse outcomes can ultimately compromise the sustainable production of sows. To address this issue, dietary iron supplements have evolved from inorganic forms like ferrous sulfate through organic salts such as ferrous fumarate to the current chelated iron, which is currently known for its high bioavailability. This paper reviews the relationship between iron metabolism and anemia in pregnant sows, analyzes the negative impacts of anemia on sow reproductive performance and piglet health, and discusses nutritional strategies for iron regulation within the context of sustainable swine production. This review aims to provide a theoretical basis for improving sow productivity and promoting sustainable development in the swine industry.

This paper argues that recategorizing Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking-Glass (1872) as humane children’s literature exposes a nineteenth-century humane education that was based in human exceptionalism, while the narratives also push for a conception of subjectivity that would include the child and nonhuman-animal. The Alice books overturn the popular nineteenth-century views that children were inferior British subjects and that nonhumans lacked subjectivity altogether (even as this era saw an upsurge in legal protections for children and animals alike). I argue that Carroll’s work satirizes, not just children’s literature, but humane children’s literature, imagining a revised form of humane education that resisted a speciesist indoctrination of the Victorian child. In the Alice books, humane education leads to positive interspecies relationships and provides children and animals with opportunities to model a robust humane framework for Victorian adult society, ultimately pushing for a view of children and animals not as subordinate to their adult (human) counterparts but as autonomous beings not lacking in subjectivity.