In recent decades, deliberative practices have increasingly been used around the world by local, regional, and national institutions (Caluwaerts and Reuchamps 2018; Gherghina, Soare, and Jacquet 2020; Michels 2011). In Romania, most examples of deliberative practices revolve around local-level practices, including participatory budgeting and citizen councils, and focus on how they function and influence the communities (Gherghina and Tap 2021; Schiffbeck 2019).

Isaac Newton spent some four decades researching “chymistry,” the early modern equivalent of our chemistry. Although his laboratory notebooks survive, his experimental goals remain obscure to the present day. Our work reveals that Newton was engaged in fruitful chemical research even by modern standards. Replication of his experiments, involving Newton’s “vitriol” (from his “liquor of antimony,” NH4Cl, HNO3, and Sb2S3) and verdigris (Cu(CH3COO)2), produced a variety of NH4+-, Cl−-, SO4−2-, NO3−-, and Cu-containing crystallization products. We analyzed these products using powder X-ray diffraction (XRD) (Cu Kα radiation) and Rietveld refinement, which revealed a complex mixture of (NH4)2Cu(SO4)2(H2O)6, NH4NO3, NH4Cl, (NH4)2CuCl4(H2O)2, and (NH4)[Cu(NH3)2Cl3]⋅2H2O. The XRD data also consistently showed a suite of peaks unmatched by any phase in the PDF-5 database. A crystal of the unknown product was analyzed using single-crystal X-ray methods (Mo Kα radiation), revealing a previously unknown compound, (NH4)2[Cu2Cl2(C2H3O2)4]·2NH4Cl, with space group Pmna and room-temperature unit-cell parameters of a = 14.550(3) Å, b = 8.850(1) Å, and c = 9.116(2) Å. The inclusion of this phase in the Rietveld refinements yielded a satisfactory fit. Our ongoing replications of Newton’s crystallization experiments reveal that his research produced a complex, unusual suite of phases, including the aforementioned previously unknown compound.

Disasters and emergencies, from natural hazards to complex crises, demand a fundamental shift in traditional management paradigms. At all levels of disaster and emergency management, from frontline responders to high-level policymakers, 2 integrated concepts—situational awareness and a disaster mindset—are critical for effective response and resilience. Situational awareness is not merely the collection of data; it’s the dynamic and continuous process of perceiving, comprehending, and projecting a holistic understanding of the operational environment, including evolving threats, available resources, and stakeholder dynamics. When fused with a disaster mindset—a psychological and strategic posture characterized by proactive anticipation, radical adaptability, and decisive action under pressure—it creates a powerful framework for navigating uncertainty. This paper, presented as the Frederick M. (“Skip”) Burkle lecture, proposes a new, integrated framework that systematically applies these concepts to enhance decision-making and operational effectiveness across all managerial tiers, enabling a transition from a reactive to a proactive and resilient posture in the face of escalating global complexities.

A growing literature examines why and under what conditions citizens are willing to fight for their country, yet it often overlooks societal heterogeneity. In multiethnic states, ethnic minorities may hold fundamentally different views about defending a majority-dominated nation-state. We argue that in divided societies, citizens’ willingness to fight is deeply shaped by cultural identity and historical narratives, which influence threat perceptions and, ultimately, readiness to fight. We test our argument in the crucial case of Latvia, a country with a sizable Russian-speaking minority and heightened security concerns about neighbouring Russia. Using three waves of original survey data (2022–2024) and logistic regression models, we find evidence of a ‘minority effect’: On average, Russian speakers are less willing to fight for Latvia than ethnic Latvians. A mediation analysis shows that this disparity is substantially driven by divergent historical memories. Russian speakers display greater Soviet nostalgia and are less likely to perceive Russia as responsible for the war in Ukraine, which in turn reduces their willingness to fight. Our findings have important implications for defence planning and resilience in multiethnic states facing external threats.

Systematic reviews play a critical role in evidence-based research but are labor-intensive, especially during title and abstract screening. Compact large language models (LLMs) offer potential to automate this process, balancing time/cost requirements and accuracy. The aim of this study is to assess the feasibility, accuracy, and workload reduction by three compact LLMs (GPT-4o mini, Llama 3.1 8B, and Gemma 2 9B) in screening titles and abstracts. Records were sourced from three previously published systematic reviews and LLMs were requested to rate each record from 0 to 100 for inclusion, using a structured prompt. Predefined 25-, 50-, 75-rating thresholds were used to compute performance metrics (balanced accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive value, and workload-saving). Processing time and costs were registered. Across the systematic reviews, LLMs achieved high sensitivity (up to 100%) and low precision (below 10%) for records included by full text. Specificity and workload savings improved at higher thresholds, with the 50- and 75-rating thresholds offering optimal trade-offs. GPT-4o-mini, accessed via application programming interface, was the fastest model (~40 minutes max.) and had usage costs ($0.14–$1.93 per review). Llama 3.1-8B and Gemma 2-9B were run locally in longer times (~4 hours max.) and were free to use. LLMs were highly sensitive tools for the title/abstract screening process. High specificity values were reached, allowing for significant workload savings, at reasonable costs and processing time. Conversely, we found them to be imprecise. However, high sensitivity and workload reduction are key factors for their usage in the title/abstract screening phase of systematic reviews.

This study aims to understand how cross-linguistic influence (CLI) and heritage language (HL) use influence children’s HL acquisition of vocabulary, reference, and word order. To this end, we compared elicited production data collected from two groups of child heritage speakers: a group of Greek-English bilingual children (Mean Age: 10;11) residing in North America and a group of Greek-Spanish bilingual children (Mean Age: 10;09) residing in South America. Because Greek is closer to Spanish than to English in all three domains of interest, the ‘Greek-English’ and ‘Greek-Spanish’ dyads are ideal for the study of CLI and its role on HL acquisition. Regression analyses revealed that the South American group outperformed the North American group, despite receiving an overall lower amount of Greek input. Thus, above and beyond input, the typological proximity with the ML may boost children’s HL performance across domains of HL development.

Ophiuroids have been major components of marine seafloor communities since the early Paleozoic. Past paleontological studies, especially those dealing with Paleozoic specimens, have based taxonomic descriptions on whole-skeleton morphology while mostly overlooking disarticulated ossicles, causing a large gap in our knowledge of Paleozoic ophiuroids. Recent studies of Mesozoic and Cenozoic ophiuroids, however, have examined the fine-scale morphological details of ophiuroid arm plates and have documented useful characters for taxonomic assignment. Here, we use similar methods for examining disarticulated ophiuroids to describe a Late Mississippian (Serpukhovian) ophiuroid fauna based solely on dissociated ossicles, preserved as microfossils and sieved from shale samples collected from the Indian Springs Shale Member of the Big Clifty Formation in Sulphur, Indiana, USA. We describe 11 species in total, 10 of which are new to science: Umerophiura daki n. sp., Strataster lisae n. sp., Schoenaster limbeckae n. sp., Vandelooaster douglasi n. sp., Furcaster wardi n. sp., Furcaster mccantae n. sp., Furcaster coulombeae n. sp., Sulphaster odellettorum n. gen. n. sp., Covidaster medicus n. gen. n. sp., and Suchaster granulosus n. gen. n. sp. Also present are ossicles of Cholaster sp. indet. The assemblage described in this paper significantly increases the known ophiuroid diversity in the Mississippian, yielding more species than all previous reports on Mississippian ophiuroids combined. Furthermore, our study shows that the evolution of the modern ophiuroid clade began much earlier than expected. Our results imply that the microfossil record of ophiuroids is paramount to unveiling the true paleobiodiversity of this evolutionarily important echinoderm clade.

UUID: http://zoobank.org/21fc0302-5a9f-41de-b1e3-6972de4b57bc

In this paper, we study the validity of the sub-supersolution method for the equation

\begin{equation*}\begin{cases}-\mbox{div}(K(x)\nabla u)=K(x)|x|^{\alpha-2}f(x,u) \,\mbox{in } {\mathbb{R}}^{N},\\u \gt 0 \,\mbox{in } {\mathbb{R}}^{N},\end{cases}\end{equation*}

$N \geq 3$

$K(x)=exp(|x|^{\alpha}/4)$

$\alpha\geq 2$

$f$

$f$

$f$