Many young people feel distressed about climate change, and pessimistic about what the future holds. Gaps in education about climate change contribute to limited understanding of opportunities for climate mitigation and adaptation, and to a pervasive “discourse of doom.” Here we describe a “game for change” co-designed by climate and education researchers and young people, that aims to shift narratives about climate changed futures toward an active, adaptation-oriented focus.

The Heat Is On is designed to be played by high school classes. Set in 2050, the game takes place on a fictional island called “Adaptania.” Teams of students play the role of town councillors in communities facing the same challenges that Australian towns are experiencing as the climate heats up, including flooding, heatwaves, bushfires, inequality, health issues and economic challenges. By focussing on decision-making for adaptation and resilience, The Heat Is On enables participants to envision climate-changed futures in which communities can thrive. Students learn how to plan and collaborate to prepare for diverse and cascading impacts of climate hazards. We explore the potential for games in climate education, focussing on The Heat Is On as a case study, and share initial learnings from its development and implementation in schools.

The Hippoboscidae are ectoparasites of birds and mammals, which, as a group, are known to vector multiple diseases. Avipoxvirus (APV) is mechanically vectored by various arthropods and causes seasonal disease in wild birds in the United Kingdom (UK). Signs of APV and the presence of louse flies (Hippoboscidae) on Dunnocks Prunella modularis were recorded over a 16·5-year period in a rural garden in Somerset, UK. Louse flies collected from this site and other sites in England were tested for the presence of APV DNA and RNA sequences. Louse flies on Dunnocks were seen to peak seasonally three weeks prior to the peak of APV lesions, an interval consistent with the previously estimated incubation period of APV in Dunnocks. APV DNA was detected on 13/25 louse flies, Ornithomya avicularia and Ornithomya fringillina, taken from Dunnocks, both with and without lesions consistent with APV, at multiple sites in England. Collectively these data support the premise that louse flies may vector APV. The detection of APV in louse flies, from apparently healthy birds, and from sites where disease has not been observed in any host species, suggests that the Hippoboscidae could provide a non-invasive and relatively cheap method of monitoring avian diseases. This could provide advanced warnings of disease, including zoonoses, before they become clinically apparent.

The success of clinical research studies depends on effective recruitment and retention of study participants, yet only a small fraction of patients engage in research studies, even in academic health systems. Increasing awareness of research opportunities and facilitating connections with clinical research study teams would help to improve the success of research programs. In this Special Communications, we describe the creation and evolution of and tools used for the My Research Partners Concierge Service (MRPcs) of an academic health system. The MRPcs provides a centralized point of contact or hub for patients and community members, as well as clinical research organizations and academic partners, who have research-related questions or interests. The MRPcs helps to connect the users of the service with relevant research study teams, personnel, or resources to facilitate their engagement in a clinical research program. Our experience with the MRPcs informs our recommendation that peer institutions organize similar research service hubs for their clinical research programs to help increase awareness of and participation in clinical research by the public and to help increase the success of research programs at fulfilling their ultimate goal of improving the health of their population.

As the Arctic warms and growing seasons start to lengthen, governments and producers are speculating about northern “climate-driven agricultural frontiers” as a potential solution to food insecurity. One of the central ecological factors in northern spaces, however, is permafrost (perennial frozen ground), which can drive cascading environmental changes upon thaw. Considering the land requirements for expanded agriculture and the unique challenges of northern farming, national and subnational governments are grappling with and facilitating this speculative boom in different ways. Analysing agricultural land use policy instruments from the US State of Alaska and the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) in Russia, this paper investigates if and how permafrost factors into their legal frameworks and what impacts this has on agricultural development, conservation, and food security. Alaska and the Republic of Sakha were chosen for reasons including both having at least 100 years of agricultural history on permafrost soils, both containing extensive amounts of permafrost within their landmasses and both containing permafrost that is ice-rich. Comparing legal texts as indicative of state capacities and strategies to govern, the paper finds that the two regions diverge in how they understand and regulate permafrost, and suggests that these approaches could benefit from one another. Bringing together geoclimatic and sociocultural concerns to problematise static policy divisions, this paper gestures to a path forward wherein subnational policy can balance needs for food, environmental, and cultural security in the North.

Stibbard-Hawkes's detailed demonstration that in the case of hunter-gatherer artifacts, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence must never be forgotten. The belief that there is a single coherent “human cognitive capacity” difference between modern humans and some unspecified earlier form should be rigorously re-examined.

Plateau icefields are large stores of fresh water, preconditioned to enhanced mass loss due to their gently sloping accumulation areas. Accurate modelling of their mass balance is therefore crucial for sea-level rise projections. Here, we use the COupled Snowpack and Ice surface energy and mass-balance model in PYthon (COSIPY) to simulate historical and future mass balance of the Juneau Icefield, Alaska – a high elevation (>1200 m) plateau icefield. We force the model with dynamically downscaled climate simulations, for both past and future (RCP 8.5) conditions. The icefield's mass balance decreased from a mean of −0.22 ± 0.38 m w.e. a−1 (1981–2019) to −1.52 ± 0.27 m w.e. a−1 (2031–2060), with many glaciers shifting from positive to negative mass balances at the start of the 21st century. This mass loss is attributed to projected rising air temperatures and reduced snowfall, causing the equilibrium line altitude to rise and triggering albedo and melt-elevation feedbacks. These processes exacerbate melt, potentially leading to increased glacier disconnections at icefalls.

This editorial summarises the clinical relevance of ‘chronopsychiatry’, defined as the interface between circadian science and mental health science. Chronopsychiatry represents a move towards time-variable perspectives on neurobiology and symptoms, with a greater emphasis on chronotherapeutic interventions.

The Planetary Nebula Luminosity Function (PNLF) remains an important extragalactic distance indicator despite a still limited understanding of its most important feature - the bright cut-off. External galaxies benefit from consistent distance and extinction, which makes determining the PNLF easier but detailed study of individual objects much more difficult. Now, the advent of parallaxes from the Gaia mission has dramatically improved distance estimates to planetary nebulae (PNe) in the Milky Way. We have acquired ground-based narrowband imagery and measured the [OIII] fluxes for a volume-limited sample of hundreds of PNe whose best distance estimates from Gaia parallaxes and statistical methods place them within 3 kpc of the Sun. We present the first results of our study, comparing the local PNLF to other galaxies with different formation histories, and discussing how the brightness of the PNe relates to the evolutionary state of their central stars and the properties of the nebula.

Recent arguments claim that behavioral science has focused – to its detriment – on the individual over the system when construing behavioral interventions. In this commentary, we argue that tackling economic inequality using both framings in tandem is invaluable. By studying individuals who have overcome inequality, “positive deviants,” and the system limitations they navigate, we offer potentially greater policy solutions.

The sicklefin devil ray (Mobula tarapacana) is a large, pelagic ray which is listed as Endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Mobula tarapacana is thought to have a circumglobal, yet patchy distribution, and has not been verified extant off the eastern USA. Here, we report 180 sightings of M. tarapacana with a total of 361 individuals, collated across five datasets from aerial survey operations and incidental sightings in the waters off the US East Coast and Gulf of Mexico, between 1996 and 2022. This study extends the northern range of M. tarapacana in the Gulf of Mexico to 29°N, and in the Atlantic to 40°N. Seasonal trends were observed off the north-eastern coast of the USA, with M. tarapacana only present in the summer months. Measurements from high resolution digital aerial imagery found M. tarapacana off the New York coast to be adults and subadults with an average disc width of 268 cm (±25, range 232–316 cm). This study provides important spatial and temporal data for management, as well as informing areas for future research on M. tarapacana in the western Atlantic.

The Doctor of Myddfai (1995), Peter Maxwell Davies's third full-scale opera and his first collaboration with David Pountney, is a work that occupies an important position within the composer's output for the opera house and theatre. However, whereas a significant amount of scholarly attention has been afforded to Davies's music-theatre works of the 1960s and the operas Taverner (1962–8) and Resurrection (1986–7), The Doctor of Myddfai has been somewhat neglected by comparison. This article examines the opera from two perspectives. The first addresses the work's dystopian setting and argues that key issues highlighted in the libretto – especially in relation to certain political concerns and environmental anxieties – have a strong contemporary resonance. The second focuses on the opera's articulation of Welsh identity, particularly through the use of Welsh folklore, native landscape and place, and indigenous musical signifiers. The intersection of these two elements – the work's celebration of Welshness and its dystopian qualities – imbues the opera with an intrinsic yet highly productive sense of tension and opposition: characteristics that drive the work towards its compelling conclusion.

An abnormal Zn status has been suggested to play a role in the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes. However, epidemiological studies of the relationship between plasma Zn concentrations and diabetes are sparse and inconclusive. We aimed to investigate the association between plasma Zn concentrations and glycaemic markers (fasting glucose, 2-h glucose and homeostatic model assessment of insulin resistance) in rural and urban Cameroon. We studied 596 healthy adults (63·3 % women) aged 25–55 years in a population-based cross-sectional study. The mean plasma Zn concentration was 13·7 ± 2·7 µmol/L overall, with higher levels in men (14·4 ± 2·9 µmol/l) than in women (13·2 ± 2·6 µmol/l), P-value < 0·0001. There was an inverse relationship between tertiles of plasma Zn and 2-h glucose concentrations (P-value for linear trend = 0·002). The difference in 2-h glucose between those in the highest tertile of plasma Zn compared to the lowest was −0·63 (95 % CI − 1·02, −0·23) mmol/l. This remained significant after adjusting for age, sex, smoking status, alcohol intake, education level, area of residence, adiposity and objectively measured physical activity −0·43(–0·82, −0·04). Similar inverse associations were observed between plasma Zn concentrations and fasting glucose and homeostatic model assessment of insulin resistance when adjusted for socio-demographic and health-related behavioural characteristics. The current findings of an inverse association between plasma Zn concentrations and several markers of glucose homeostasis, together with growing evidence from intervention studies, suggest a role for Zn in glucose metabolism. If supported by further evidence, strategies to improve Zn status in populations may provide a cheap public health prevention approach for diabetes.