This forum continues the Journal of Public Policy’s series for debate and discussion of important ideas in the scholarly study of public policy. This exchange is anchored with an essay by Christopher Wlezien entitled, “On Policy Responsiveness: Conditions for Effective Demand and Supply.” Understanding the connection between the public and the officials meant to represent them is fundamental to democratic governance. While there is a voluminous literature from across the political science and policy studies spectrum, Wlezien offers a new framework for examining the “theoretical conditions for effective policy representation.” He develops the concepts of “input” as a function of public demand, and “output” as the result of policy supplied. Wlezien concludes that we observe a surprising amount of congruence between what the public wants and the policy it receives. This conclusion is in stark contrast to more pessimistic views prominent in the recent literature.

In this paper, we develop canonical bundle formulas for fibrations of relative dimension one in characteristic $p>0$. For such a fibration from a log pair $f\colon (X, \Delta ) \to S$, if f is separable, we can obtain a formula similar to the one due to Witaszek [36]; if f is inseparable, we treat the case when S is of maximal Albanese dimension. As an application, we prove that for a klt pair $(X,\Delta )$ with $-(K_X+\Delta )$ nef, if the Albanese morphism $a_X\colon X \to A$ is of relative dimension one, then X is a fiber space over A.

The Bennettitales, a group of extinct gymnosperms, had outstanding species diversity throughout the Mesozoic and were abundant during the Jurassic. They were key components of terrestrial ecosystems, thriving in diverse climates and environmental conditions. However, a deeper understanding of the ecological strategies exhibited by this extinct lineage across time and space within a well-characterized geological context is still lacking for the region. Here, we examine bennettitalean assemblages from the Middle Jurassic Otlaltepec Formation (Otlaltepec Basin) and compare them with floras from two other rift basins (Tlaxiaco and Ayuquila) in low latitudes. Based on morphological features, we propose the new species Zamites ambigua, and identify the following additional taxa: Zamites lucerensis, Zamites oaxacensis, Zamites tribulosus, cf. Zamites diquiyui, Zamites sp. 1, Zamites sp. 2, Bennettitcarpus sp. 1, Bennettitcarpus sp. 2, and cf. Weltrichia xochitetlii, along with two types of gymnosperm foliage of uncertain affinities.

Our findings on bennettitalean diversity in the Otlaltepec Formation reveal the presence of foliage across all three basins in both time and space, indicating a generalist element among these rift environments. In contrast, other foliage and reproductive structures exhibit two distinct distributional patterns: some are confined to a single basin over time, while others appear only during specific intervals in each basin’s history. Our findings highlight that some Bennettitales exhibited ecological resilience, maintaining their morphology and distribution despite the shifting environmental conditions caused by tectonic activity. This suggests that certain generalist taxa persisted across varying moisture regimes and depositional settings, while others displayed more localized or temporally restricted distributions.

Carbonaceous chondrites contain various organic compounds, including amino acids (AAs), which may have contributed to the emergence of life on Earth. However, their origin remains debated. Previous studies have shown that amino acid precursors (AAPs) can form in ice mantles of interstellar dust particles within molecular clouds. These AAs and AAPs could have been incorporated into small celestial bodies during the formation of the solar system. It has been suggested that interstellar AAs and AAPs underwent aqueous alteration due to heat and radiation from the decay of radioactive nuclides such as 26Al. To test this hypothesis, we combined experiments simulating interstellar chemical reactions with those mimicking conditions inside meteorite parent bodies. We subjected AAs and interstellar AAP analogs to gamma irradiation in mixtures of formaldehyde (HCHO), methanol (CH3OH), ammonia (NH3) and water (H2O). The resulting products were analyzed by cation-exchange high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and gas chromatography-quadrupole mass spectrometry (GC/MS). Our results demonstrated that interstellar AAP analogs were more resistant to gamma irradiation than free AAs. Among the free AAs, glycine exhibited the highest stability, while AAs lacking α-hydrogens were more stable than their isomeric counterparts with α-hydrogens. Additionally, gamma irradiation not only degraded AAs but also generated new ones. The yield and diversity of newly formed AAs depended on the specific AAPs or AAs present in the system. Notably, systems containing interstellar AAP analogs produced a greater variety and higher quantity of AAs than those containing free AAs or none at all. These findings suggest that interstellar organic matter, including AAPs, delivered to asteroids could have contributed to the formation of the diverse organic compounds observed in asteroids and meteorites.

Drought is a critical issue for global agriculture making the development of drought-resilient crop varieties crucial. Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench is a highly drought tolerant cereal crop with the potential to serve as a model for identifying drought-tolerant genes. Investigating drought-induced gene expression changes in S. bicolor can inform breeding strategies aimed at enhancing resilience in other crops in the Poaceae family. Our aim was to identify the genes and networks that are differentially expressed in drought stressed sorghum across multiple tissue types, not just leaves. Previously, we reported differences in phenotype in terms of biomass, photosynthetic traits and the concentration of specialized metabolites (dhurrin and phenolics) between well-watered and water-limited plants. Here, differential gene expression analysis was conducted for drought-stressed S. bicolor variety BTx623 using edgeR. Gene ontology enrichment analysis and Weighted Gene Correlation Network Analysis (WGCNA) were conducted to identify the over-represented functions of the differentially expressed genes and to identify clusters of genes that behave together as a response to drought, respectively. Gene expression changes were largely confined to the root (56 genes were found to be differentially expressed), with little differential expression in the leaves or sheaths and no significant differences in expression of key dhurrin pathway genes. Together, these results indicate that drought tolerance in the cultivated sorghum reference genotype BTx623 is associated primarily with root-specific transcriptional responses and provide a tissue-resolved baseline for future comparative analyses across sorghum genotypes and wild relatives differing in drought sensitivity and HCN potential.