We review impacts of climate change, energy scarcity, and economic frameworks on sustainability of natural and human systems in coastal zones, areas of high biodiversity, productivity, population density, and economic activity. More than 50% of the global population lives within 200 km of a coast, mostly in tropical developing countries. These systems developed during stable Holocene conditions. Changes in global forcings are threatening sustainability of coastal ecosystems and populations. During the Holocene, the earth warmed and became wetter and more productive. Climate changes are impacting coastal systems via sea level rise, stronger tropical cyclones, changes in basin inputs, and extreme weather events. These impacts are passing tipping points as the fossil fuel-powered industrial-technological-agricultural revolution has overwhelmed the source–sink functions of the biosphere and degraded natural systems. The current status of industrialized society is primarily the result of fossil fuel (FF) use. FFs provided more than 80% of global primary energy and are projected to decline to 50% by mid-century. This has profound implications for societal energy requirements, including the transition to a renewable economy. The development of the industrial economy allowed coastal social systems to become spatially separated from their dominant energy and food sources. This will become more difficult to maintain with the fading of cheap energy. It seems inevitable that past growth in energy use, resource consumption, and economic growth cannot be sustained, and coastal areas are in the forefront of these challenges. Rapid planning and cooperation are necessary to minimize impacts of the changes associated with the coming transition. There is an urgent need for a new economic framework to guide society through the transition as mainstream neoclassical economics is not based on natural sciences and does not adequately consider either the importance of energy or the work of nature.

Within the last two decades, theories about world systems have played a decisive role in shifting the boundaries of discourse on long-term social change. The triumph of world-system analysis was nearly a “bloodless coup”: few scholars were terribly anxious to defend the theoretical bastion of modernization theory that it supplanted; at best they reinterpreted the old theory within the new framework (for example, Rostow, 1975, 1978; Parsons 1977, 213; Moore 1979).

The first demonstration of laser action in ruby was made in 1960 by T. H. Maiman of Hughes Research Laboratories, USA. Many laboratories worldwide began the search for lasers using different materials, operating at different wavelengths. In the UK, academia, industry and the central laboratories took up the challenge from the earliest days to develop these systems for a broad range of applications. This historical review looks at the contribution the UK has made to the advancement of the technology, the development of systems and components and their exploitation over the last 60 years.

Coinfection with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and viral hepatitis is associated with high morbidity and mortality in the absence of clinical management, making identification of these cases crucial. We examined characteristics of HIV and viral hepatitis coinfections by using surveillance data from 15 US states and two cities. Each jurisdiction used an automated deterministic matching method to link surveillance data for persons with reported acute and chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) or hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections, to persons reported with HIV infection. Of the 504 398 persons living with diagnosed HIV infection at the end of 2014, 2.0% were coinfected with HBV and 6.7% were coinfected with HCV. Of the 269 884 persons ever reported with HBV, 5.2% were reported with HIV. Of the 1 093 050 persons ever reported with HCV, 4.3% were reported with HIV. A greater proportion of persons coinfected with HIV and HBV were males and blacks/African Americans, compared with those with HIV monoinfection. Persons who inject drugs represented a greater proportion of those coinfected with HIV and HCV, compared with those with HIV monoinfection. Matching HIV and viral hepatitis surveillance data highlights epidemiological characteristics of persons coinfected and can be used to routinely monitor health status and guide state and national public health interventions.

Bermudagrass [Cynodon dactylon (L.) Pers. ♯ CYNDA ‘Vamont’, ‘Midiron’, and Cynodon dactylon X Cynodon transvaalensis Burlt-Davy ♯ CYNTR ‘Tifway’] cultivars were tolerant to oxadiazon [2-tert-butyl-4(2,4-dichloro-5-isopropoxyphenyl)-Δ2-1, 3,4-oxadiazolin-5-one] applied at rates up to 4.5 kg ai/ha during sprig establishment. The rate of shoot growth from sprigs after oxadiazon treatment was excellent and provided adequate ground cover within 3 months. Oxadiazon applications adversely affected root development of the Midiron cultivar as measured by the force required to uproot the sod. Root development of Vamont and Tifway after oxadiazon application was equal to that of untreated bermudagrass. Oxadiazon plus bensulide [O,O-diisopropyl phosphorodithioate S-ester with N-(2-mercaptoethyl)benzenesulfonamide] was inhibitory to both root and shoot growth of all cultivars. Metribuzin [4-amino-6-tert-butyl-3-(methylthio)-as-triazin-5(4H)-one] applications at 3 and 5 weeks after sprigging caused severe root injury to Vamont and Midiron bermudagrass.

Multibeam bathymetry and 3.5-kHz sub-bottom profiler data collected from the US icebreaker Healy in 2003 provide convincing evidence for grounded ice on the Chukchi Borderland off the northern Alaskan margin, Arctic Ocean. The data show parallel, glacially induced seafloor scours, or grooves, and intervening ridges that reach widths of 1000 m (rim to rim) and as much as 40 m relief. Following previous authors, we refer to these features as “megascale glacial lineations (MSGLs).” Additional support for ice grounding is apparent from stratigraphic unconformities, interpreted to have been caused by ice-induced erosion. Most likely, the observed sea-floor features represent evidence for massive ice-shelf grounding. The general ESE/WNW direction of the MSGLs, together with sediment, evidently bulldozed off the Chukchi Plateau, that is mapped on the western (Siberian) side of the plateau, suggests ice flow from the Canada Basin side of Chukchi Borderland. Two separate generations of glacially derived MSGLs are identified on the Chukchi Borderland from the Healy geophysical data. The deepest and oldest extensive MSGLs appear to be draped by sediments less than 5 m thick, whereas no sediment drape can be distinguished within the resolution of the sub-bottom profiles on the younger generation.

The plans of JACARA, the Joint Australian Centre for Astrophysical Research in Antarctica, for Australian involvement in future astronomical activities on the antarctic plateau, are outlined.

Properties of the microwave emission from HR1099 are examined in an attempt to determine whether the emission arises as gyro-synchrotron radiation from mildly relativistic electrons trapped in magnetic fields above starspots on the active K subgiant component. It is shown that radio curves do not exhibit a systematic variation in phase with the rotation rate, as one might expect for emission from a source situated above a long-lived starspot. However, there is some evidence that the radio flaring occurs at two preferred longitude zones. Whether these zones agree with starspot locations remains to be determined by light curve modelling. What we can say with confidence is that the measured spectral index of the microwave emission does not fit a simple gyro-synchrotron source model, such as that proposed to explain the observed reversal with frequency of the sense of circular polarization.

Produce growers in Kentucky, North Carolina, and Tennessee were surveyed in 2002 to gather information about their decision making in the areas of planting, postharvest handling, marketing, and expected changes. North Carolina has proportionately more respondents with large operations, and Kentucky and Tennessee were more similar and concentrated in smaller farms. Tennessee and Kentucky respondents were less likely to have engaged in activities that were associated with the commercial distribution system. Greater reliance on the commercial distribution system on the part of North Carolina growers is consistent with more produce export activity.