This article combines approaches from critical place-name studies and the ‘imperial turn’ to examine the perception of Vilnius and the so-called Northwestern Region as Russian ‘national territory’ rather than merely an imperial possession. In the second half of the nineteenth century, to counter the significant Polish influence, the tsarist elite intensified the ‘imperialization’ of Vilnius’ cityscape more than in other borderland towns. Meanwhile, the local public, lacking any real influence over place-naming, lived in an alternative reality and continued using old names. The case of Vilnius illustrates the empire’s systematic but largely failed efforts to intervene into subjects’ lives.

The article introduces the special issue by mapping the field of pertinent scholarship and situating the articles with regard to the special angles and contributions they have to offer. As our five articles present case studies from Bulgaria and the GDR, both state socialist countries and their health care systems are portrayed here to provide context. The introduction locates each of the contributions and the overarching aims of the special issue within current scholarly discussions and demonstrates the issue’s innovative potential.

Some philosophers have recently argued that one should not be curious about a question whose answer one knows. This norm is said to follow from the fact that curiosity aims at knowledge. This article contends that the view that curiosity is inappropriate when directed at what is known, though attractive, is false. In fact, we are frequently curious about questions whose answers we know, and this curiosity is entirely appropriate because, along with metacognitive judgments about the contents of memory, it plays an important role in the process by which we successfully retrieve knowledge from memory. If this argument is successful, it reveals that some curiosity-driven inquiries target knowledge that lies within one’s own mind and raises important questions about the status and interpretation of the claim that curiosity aims at knowledge.

In this study, we provide ex post empirical analysis of the effects of climate policies on carbon emissions at the aggregate national level, using a comprehensive database of 121 countries. Carbon taxes and emissions trading systems (ETS), and the overall stringency of climate policies are considered. We use dynamic panel regressions, controlling for macroeconomic factors (economic development, GDP growth, urbanisation and the energy mix). Higher carbon taxes and ETS prices reduce carbon emissions. An increase in carbon taxes by $10 per ton of CO2 reduces CO2 emissions per capita by 1.3% in the short run and by 4.6% in the long run.

This paper investigates the stability of the demand for money in the United States and provides a comparison among the simple-sum monetary aggregates, the original (non-credit-card-augmented) Divisia monetary aggregates, and the credit-augmented Divisia and credit-augmented Divisia inside aggregates. We use quarterly data from the Center for Financial Stability and the Pesaran et al. (2001) bounds test procedure to investigate the long-run relation between the monetary aggregates and their respective user costs. In doing so, we use three classic money demand functions—the log–log, the semi-log, and the Selden and Latané specifications. With quarterly data over the 1967:q1 through 2025:q1 period, for which the original Divisia monetary aggregates are available, we find evidence of a stable money demand function only with the Sum M4 aggregate under all money demand specifications, but not with any of the Divisia aggregates. With quarterly data over the post-2006 period, for which the credit-augmented Divisia monetary aggregates are also available, our findings show that the demand for money is stable across all money demand specifications with all of the original Divisia aggregates and the credit-augmented Divisia aggregates (but not with all of the credit-augmented Divisia inside aggregates). We also find evidence of cointegration with the Sum M3 and Sum M4 aggregates under all three money demand specifications, but not with the Fed’s Sum M2 aggregate.

We demonstrate a high-power, flexibly tunable dual-pulse laser via temporal modulation techniques to overcome conventional systems’ fixed pulse width and temporal interval constraints, enhancing precision micro/nanofabrication and nonlinear photonics applications. By combining dispersion-engineered seed pulse shaping for adjustable pulse widths (5.6 ps and 0.38–0.47 ns) with optical-delay synchronized interval tuning (from –4 to 12.5 ns), the system achieves wide flexibility in pulse configuration. Furthermore, detailed nonlinear dynamics studies reveal the picosecond component exhibits reduced amplifier efficiency versus the nanosecond component, primarily due to peak-power-driven irreversible energy transfer to Raman-shifted wavelengths. This unique combination of features enables remarkable performance: 1092 W average power at 16 MHz with precisely tailored 15.9 ps/0.44 ns pulse widths and 4.2 ns temporal interval. This high-power tunability establishes a transformative material processing paradigm from precision machining to photonics, advancing fundamental nonlinear pulse science and setting new industrial laser standards.

Fault analysis at the early design stages of an engineering system is crucial for ensuring reliability and safety during operation. Given the limited information on system components and configurations available at this stage, such analysis heavily relies on historical data and expert knowledge. Traditional methods like Fault Tree, Bayesian networks, and Markov chains depend on manually established causality models for system failures. In complex systems with numerous components, creating these causality models becomes increasingly time-consuming and susceptible to human-error in identifying potential causal relationships. One of the major reasons for the modeling errors is that the causality models lack the support of physics. To address these limitations, this article introduces a novel approach for formally establishing causal relations between faults and system failures and calculating the probabilities of each cause. Even at conceptual design stage, the proposed method can automatically deduce all possible causes and fault propagation paths for each system failure corresponding to the physics modeled by the analyst. The entire approach is divided into two major steps: the first step identifies the system trajectories for a known condition using qualitative physics and symbolic AI, and the second step calculates the conditional probabilities of the causes outlined in the first step for a given initial condition. Knowledge about the probabilistically weighted causes of system failures allows designers to identify potential issues that have a relatively high likelihood of occurrence and severe consequences. The article demonstrates the method’s application by analyzing a simplified secondary loop of a nuclear power plant.

Over 15 million children in the United States have been infected with COVID-19; nearly 2,000 have died. Approval of COVID-19 vaccines for children enabled reductions in disease severity and mortality. Disparities in vaccine adoption exist along racial, ethnic, and rural–urban lines, with lower uptake among medically underserved populations (e.g. Black, non-Hispanic White rural populations) compared to urban White populations. This study examined efforts to recruit and engage a diverse cohort as part of a vaccine communication randomized trial conducted across 15 states and compared demographic characteristics of the enrolled cohort to the broader US population. To enhance recruitment of diverse populations, eligible clinics had to serve a significant proportion of medically underserved individuals based on race, ethnicity, or geographic location. Coordinators used both traditional (in-person daily clinic schedule review) and retrospective (EHR and billing data review) recruitment methods adapted to enrich engagement with focus populations. Demographic characteristics were compared to national statistics obtained from the CDC’s Household Pulse Survey. In total, 2999 parents/caregivers were screened; 725 were randomized (24.1%). Comparing enrolled subjects to the demographics of participating states, 17.3% vs 9.8% self-identified as Hispanic, 39.6% vs 13.0% as Black. Additionally, 34.3% self-described as living in a rural area. Of the 725 randomized, 512 (70.6%) completed the baseline survey. Of these 512, 422 (82.4%) also completed the final survey of the 24-week study. This analysis demonstrates the Institutional Development Award States Pediatric Clinical Trials Network can successfully recruit and engage populations from diverse and underrepresented populations in research.

Imprecise Bayesianism has been proposed as an alternative to Standard Bayesianism, partly because of its tools for representing ambiguity. Instead of representing credences via precise probabilities, a set of probability distributions is used to model belief states. However, there are criticisms of Imprecise Bayesianism’s update rule. A recent alternative update rule is Alpha Cut, which evades some of the primary criticisms of Imprecise Bayesian updating. We compare Alpha Cut with Imprecise Bayesianism and another alternative update approach called Calibration. We find that Alpha Cut has problems with respect to ambiguity, coherence, and performance qualities, whereas there are more promising alternatives.

This Research Note is based on interviews with stakeholders and advocates for child safeguarding in Japan’s entertainment industries conducted by the researchers in Tokyo in July 2024. We argue that, if, as suggested by new legislation, there is an intention to apply UK-style “safeguarding” understandings to prevent reoccurrence of child sexual abuse such as that perpetrated by Johnny Kitagawa in Japan, there are four key barriers to overcome that necessitate increased information-sharing and cooperation between stakeholders in government and industry: precarious work, a reluctance to regulate, a lack of industry accountability, and a lack of societal awareness of child sexual abuse and its impacts.

Direklerarası Street was a popular promenade and entertainment hub in late Ottoman Istanbul. It was constructed in the arasta form along the historical Divanyolu in the 1720s and largely retained its spatial configuration until the 1880s. This article examines the spatial transformation of Direklerarası Street from the 1880s to the 1910s, situating it within the broader dynamics of late Ottoman urban reform. It investigates urban interventions such as the demolition and reconstruction of arcade columns, street lighting, pavement reconfigurations and square design, not merely as outcomes of modern urban regulations but also as processes intricately linked to the various dynamics shaped by the sociopolitical and cultural contexts of the late Ottoman capital.

Les enjeux éthiques de la pratique de l’ergothérapie auprès de personnes aînées en centre hospitalier n’ont pas été à ce jour documentés d’une manière large et globale. L’objectif de l’étude était de décrire ces enjeux suivant la perspective d’ergothérapeutes du Québec. Des entrevues individuelles ont été réalisées avec des ergothérapeutes dans le cadre d’une étude qualitative d’inspiration phénoménologique. Trois analystes se sont concertées lors de l’analyse des verbatims des entretiens. Vingt ergothérapeutes ont pris part à l’étude. Sept unités de sens émergent des données, lesquelles attestent que plusieurs valeurs sont bafouées dans le quotidien de la pratique, telles que l’autonomie décisionnelle des personnes aînées, leur autonomie fonctionnelle, leur dignité, l’accessibilité et la qualité des services ergothérapiques, la reconnaissance de la profession ergothérapique, la collaboration interprofessionnelle et la bientraitance des personnes aînées. Les résultats rejoignent ceux documentés dans les écrits, tout en identifiant plusieurs enjeux éthiques non documentés à ce jour.

Environmental protection is widely considered a core function of the state. Yet more than 210 million people currently live under the control of armed non-state actors (ANSAs), many of whom exercise state-like authority over vast, environmentally important territories. Despite growing legal and political science scholarship on ANSAs, their role in environmental protection remains largely unexplored. International law, shaped by conflict-centric frameworks, often fails to account for ANSAs’ non-military dimensions – especially those related to environmental service provision. Similarly, theories of rebel governance have yet to meaningfully incorporate environmental service provision as a governance facet. The article addresses this gap by examining the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People’s Army (FARC-EP) in Colombia, drawing on documentary analysis and interviews with former combatants. It shifts the limited ecological perspective on war, arguing that the FARC-EP’s environmental practices amounted to a form of rebel environmental governance – structured, intentional and legally plural. Through this case study, the article challenges dominant narratives that view ANSAs solely as environmental spoilers or incidental protectors and instead advocates for a more comprehensive understanding of their impact as environmental service providers and lawmakers. In doing so, the paper reframes ANSAs as socio-legal actors whose environmental practices merit scholarly attention – particularly in ongoing debates around accountability and transitional justice in conflict-affected regions.

How do women’s pre-election experiences influence their behavior in government? We examine women’s participation in rebel groups as a form of masculine socialization and theorize that former rebel women elected in the national legislature will continue to defy gender norms by being more active than their other women colleagues and more frequently discussing topics that are male-dominated and relate to their wartime experience. Using novel datasets of parliamentary speeches and rebel ties of elected MPs in Uganda and Zimbabwe, we find that women ex-rebels make more legislative speeches, including speeches on topics related to wartime experience. We find mixed evidence for speeches on ‘hard’ topics. These findings contribute to theoretical debates on women’s political representation, gender and conflict, and legislative politics.