The researchers say their findings are evidence that our morality is shaped by various emotions and intuitions, of which concerns about health and safety are prominent. This means that our judgements of wrongdoing are not completely rational.

The study, published today in the journal Evolutionary Psychology, did not focus on behaviours relating to the pandemic itself - such as social distancing - but considered a wide range of moral transgressions.

Between March and May 2020, over 900 study participants in the USA were presented with a series of scenarios and asked to rate them on a scale from ‘not at all wrong’ to ‘extremely wrong’. This enabled the researchers to measure participants’ responses across five key moral principles: harm, fairness, in-group loyalty, deference to authority, and purity.

Example scenarios include one of loyalty: ‘You see a man leaving his family business to go work for their main competitor’; and one of fairness: ‘You see a tenant bribing a landlord to be the first to get their apartment repainted.’

People who were more worried about catching COVID-19 judged the behaviours in these scenarios to be more wrong than those who were less worried.

“There is no rational reason to be more judgemental of others because you are worrying about getting sick during the pandemic,” said Professor Simone Schnall in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Psychology, senior author of the report.

She added: “These influences on judgements happen outside of our conscious awareness. If we feel that our wellbeing is threatened by the coronavirus, we are also likely to feel more threatened by other people’s wrong-doing – it’s an emotional link.”

The findings contribute to a growing body of evidence of a link between physical disgust – an emotion designed to keep us from harm – and moral condemnation. 

“Disgust is an emotion we think evolved to protect us from harm – avoiding a filthy toilet that might contaminate us with disease, for example. But now we apply it to social situations too, and can feel physically jeopardised by other people’s behaviour,” said Robert Henderson, a PhD student and Gates Scholar in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Psychology and first author of the report.

He added: “The link between being concerned about COVID-19 and moral condemnation is about risks to wellbeing. If you’re more conscious of health risks, you’re also more conscious of social risks – people whose behaviour could inflict harm upon you.”

This research was funded by the Gates Foundation Cambridge and the Bennett Institute for Public Policy.

Reference
Henderson, R.K., & Schnall, S. ‘Disease and Disapproval: COVID-19 Concern is Related to Greater Moral Condemnation.’ Evolutionary Psychology. May 2021. DOI: 10.1177/14747049211021524

To manage the HIV epidemic among men who have sex with men (MSM) in England, enhanced testing and earlier treatment strategies were scaled-up between 2011 and 2015 and supplemented from 2015 by pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). The researchers examined the effect of these interventions on the number of new infections and investigated whether the United Nations (UN) targets for HIV control and elimination of HIV transmission by 2030 might be within reach among MSM in England.

A complexity in this assessment is that HIV infections are not observed. Routine surveillance collects data on new HIV diagnoses, but trends in new diagnoses alone can be misleading as they can represent infections that occurred many years previously and depend on the testing behaviour of infected individuals.

To estimate new HIV infections among adult MSM (age 15 years and above) over a 10-year period between 2009 and 2018, the researchers used a novel statistical model that used data on HIV and AIDS diagnoses routinely collected via the national HIV and AIDS Reporting System in England, and knowledge on the progression of HIV. Estimated trends in new infections were then extrapolated to understand the likelihood of achieving the UN elimination target defined as less than one newly acquired infection per 10,000 MSM per year, by 2030.

The peak in the number of new HIV infections in MSM in England is estimated to have occurred between 2012 and 2013, followed by a steep decrease from 2,770 new infections in 2013 to 1,740 in 2015, and a further steadier decrease from 2016, down to 854. The decline was consistent across all age groups but was particularly marked in MSM aged 25–34 years, and slowest in those aged 45 years or older. Importantly, this decrease began before the widespread roll-out of PrEP in 2016, indicating the success of testing and treatment as infection prevention measures among MSM in England.

Through extrapolation, the researchers calculated a 40% likelihood of England reaching the UN elimination target by 2030 and identified relevant age-specific targeting of further prevention efforts (i.e., to MSM aged ≥45 years) to increase this likelihood.

Senior author, Professor Daniela De Angelis, Deputy Director of the MRC Biostatistics Unit, University of Cambridge, said: “This is very good news and suggests that prevention measures adopted in England from 2011 have been effective. With the rollout of PrEP, England looks on course to meet the goal of zero transmissions by 2030. Our study also shows the value of regular estimation of HIV incidence to recognise and respond appropriately to changes in the current downward trend. The challenge now is to achieve these reductions in all groups at risk for HIV acquisition.”

Valerie Delpech, Head of National HIV Surveillance at Public Health England, said: “We have made good progress towards ending HIV transmission by 2030 in England. Frequent HIV testing and the use of PrEP amongst people most at risk of HIV, together with prompt treatment among those diagnosed, are key to ending HIV transmission by 2030. 

“You can benefit from life-saving HIV treatments if you are diagnosed with HIV and it also means you cannot pass the virus on.

“HIV and STI tests are still available through sexual health clinics during the COVID pandemic. Many clinics offer online testing throughout the year – people can order tests on clinic websites, take them in the privacy of their own home, return by post and receive results via text, phone call or post.”

This research is funded by the UK Medical Research Council, UK National Institute of Health Research Health Protection Unit in Behavioural Science and Evaluation, and Public Health England.

Reference
Brizzi, F et al. Tracking elimination of HIV transmission in men who have sex with men in England: a modelling study. Lancet HIV, 10 June 2021; DOI: 10.1016/ S2352-3018(21)00044-8

The researchers, from the University of Cambridge, created a polymer film by mimicking the properties of spider silk, one of the strongest materials in nature. The new material is as strong as many common plastics in use today and could replace plastic in many common household products.

The material was created using a new approach for assembling plant proteins into materials that mimic silk on a molecular level. The energy-efficient method, which uses sustainable ingredients, results in a plastic-like free-standing film, which can be made at industrial scale. Non-fading ‘structural’ colour can be added to the polymer, and it can also be used to make water-resistant coatings.

The material is home compostable, whereas other types of bioplastics require industrial composting facilities to degrade. In addition, the Cambridge-developed material requires no chemical modifications to its natural building blocks, so that it can safely degrade in most natural environments.

The new product will be commercialised by Xampla, a University of Cambridge spin-out company developing replacements for single-use plastic and microplastics. The company will introduce a range of single-use sachets and capsules later this year, which can replace the plastic used in everyday products like dishwasher tablets and laundry detergent capsules. The results are reported in the journal Nature Communications.

For many years, Professor Tuomas Knowles in Cambridge’s Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry has been researching the behaviour of proteins. Much of his research has been focused on what happens when proteins misfold or ‘misbehave’, and how this relates to health and human disease, primarily Alzheimer’s disease.

“We normally investigate how functional protein interactions allow us to stay healthy and how irregular interactions are implicated in Alzheimer’s disease,” said Knowles, who led the current research. “It was a surprise to find our research could also address a big problem in sustainability: that of plastic pollution.”

As part of their protein research, Knowles and his group became interested in why materials like spider silk are so strong when they have such weak molecular bonds. “We found that one of the key features that gives spider silk its strength is the hydrogen bonds are arranged regularly in space and at a very high density,” said Knowles.

Co-author Dr Marc Rodriguez Garcia, a postdoctoral researcher in Knowles’ group who is now Head of R&D at Xampla, began looking at how to replicate this regular self-assembly in other proteins. Proteins have a propensity for molecular self-organisation and self-assembly, and plant proteins, in particular, are abundant and can be sourced sustainably as by-products of the food industry.

“Very little is known about the self-assembly of plant proteins, and it’s exciting to know that by filling this knowledge gap we can find alternatives to single-use plastics,” said PhD candidate Ayaka Kamada, the paper’s first author.

The researchers successfully replicated the structures found on spider silk by using soy protein isolate, a protein with a completely different composition. “Because all proteins are made of polypeptide chains, under the right conditions we can cause plant proteins to self-assemble just like spider silk,” said Knowles, who is also a Fellow of St John's College. “In a spider, the silk protein is dissolved in an aqueous solution, which then assembles into an immensely strong fibre through a spinning process which requires very little energy.”

“Other researchers have been working directly with silk materials as a plastic replacement, but they’re still an animal product,” said Rodriguez Garcia. “In a way, we’ve come up with ‘vegan spider silk’ – we’ve created the same material without the spider.”

Any replacement for plastic requires another polymer – the two in nature that exist in abundance are polysaccharides and polypeptides. Cellulose and nanocellulose are polysaccharides and have been used for a range of applications, but often require some form of cross-linking to form strong materials. Proteins self-assemble and can form strong materials like silk without any chemical modifications, but they are much harder to work with.

The researchers used soy protein isolate (SPI) as their test plant protein, since it is readily available as a by-product of soybean oil production. Plant proteins such as SPI are poorly soluble in water, making it hard to control their self-assembly into ordered structures.

The new technique uses an environmentally friendly mixture of acetic acid and water, combined with ultrasonication and high temperatures, to improve the solubility of the SPI. This method produces protein structures with enhanced inter-molecular interactions guided by the hydrogen bond formation. In a second step, the solvent is removed, which results in a water-insoluble film.

The material has a performance equivalent to high-performance engineering plastics such as low-density polyethylene. Its strength lies in the regular arrangement of the polypeptide chains, meaning there is no need for chemical cross-linking, which is frequently used to improve the performance and resistance of biopolymer films. The most commonly used cross-linking agents are non-sustainable and can even be toxic, whereas no toxic elements are required for the Cambridge-developed technique.

“This is the culmination of something we’ve been working on for over ten years, which is understanding how nature generates materials from proteins,” said Knowles. “We didn’t set out to solve a sustainability challenge -- we were motivated by curiosity as to how to create strong materials from weak interactions.”

“The key breakthrough here is being able to control self-assembly, so we can now create high-performance materials,” said Rodriguez Garcia. “It’s exciting to be part of this journey. There is a huge, huge issue of plastic pollution in the world, and we are in the fortunate position to be able to do something about it.”

Xampla's technology has been patented by Cambridge Enterprise, the University's commercialisation arm. Cambridge Enterprise and Amadeus Capital Partners co-led a £2 million seed funding round for Xampla, joined by Sky Ocean Ventures and the University of Cambridge Enterprise Fund VI, which is managed by Parkwalk.

Reference:
A. Kamada et al. ‘Self-assembly of plant proteins into high-performance multifunctional nanostructured films.’ Nature Communications (2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-23813-6

An international team of astronomers observed the star, VVV-WIT-08, decreasing in brightness by a factor of 30, so that it nearly disappeared from the sky. While many stars change in brightness because they pulsate or are eclipsed by another star in a binary system, it’s exceptionally rare for a star to become fainter over a period of several months and then brighten again.

The researchers believe that VVV-WIT-08 may belong to a new class of ‘blinking giant’ binary star system, where a giant star ⎼ 100 times larger than the Sun ⎼ is eclipsed once every few decades by an as-yet unseen orbital companion. The companion, which may be another star or a planet, is surrounded by an opaque disc, which covers the giant star, causing it to disappear and reappear in the sky. The study is published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

The discovery was led by Dr Leigh Smith from Cambridge’s Institute of Astronomy, working with scientists at the University of Edinburgh, the University of Hertfordshire, the University of Warsaw in Poland and Universidad Andres Bello in Chile.

“It’s amazing that we just observed a dark, large and elongated object pass between us and the distant star and we can only speculate what its origin is,” said co-author Dr Sergey Koposov from the University of Edinburgh.

Since the star is located in a dense region of the Milky Way, the researchers considered whether some unknown dark object could have simply drifted in front of the giant star by chance. However, simulations showed that there would have to be an implausibly large number of dark bodies floating around the Galaxy for this scenario to be likely.

One other star system of this sort has been known for a long time. The giant star Epsilon Aurigae is partly eclipsed by a huge disc of dust every 27 years, but only dims by about 50%. A second example, TYC 2505-672-1, was found a few years ago, and holds the current record for the eclipsing binary star system with the longest orbital period ⎼ 69 years ⎼ a record for which VVV-WIT-08 is currently a contender.

The UK-based team has also found two more of these peculiar giant stars in addition to VVV-WIT-08, suggesting that these may be a new class of ‘blinking giant’ stars for astronomers to investigate.

VVV-WIT-08 was found by the VISTA Variables in the Via Lactea survey (VVV), a project using the British-built VISTA telescope in Chile and operated by the European Southern Observatory, that has been observing the same one billion stars for nearly a decade to search for examples with varying brightness in the infrared part of the spectrum.

Project co-leader Professor Philip Lucas from the University of Hertfordshire said, “Occasionally we find variable stars that don’t fit into any established category, which we call ‘what-is-this?’, or ‘WIT’ objects. We really don’t know how these blinking giants came to be. It’s exciting to see such discoveries from VVV after so many years planning and gathering the data.”

While VVV-WIT-08 was discovered using VVV data, the dimming of the star was also observed by the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE), a long-running observation campaign run by the University of Warsaw. OGLE makes more frequent observations, but closer to the visible part of the spectrum. These frequent observations were key for modelling VVV-WIT-08, and they showed that the giant star dimmed by the same amount in both the visible and infrared light.

There now appear to be around half a dozen potential known star systems of this type, containing giant stars and large opaque discs. “There are certainly more to be found, but the challenge now is in figuring out what the hidden companions are, and how they came to be surrounded by discs, despite orbiting so far from the giant star,” said Smith. “In doing so, we might learn something new about how these kinds of systems evolve.”

Reference:
Leigh C. Smith et al. ‘VVV-WIT-08: the giant star that blinked.’ Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society (2021). DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stab1211

Sir John Aston, Harding Professor of Statistics in Public Life, has been knighted for services to Statistics and Public Policymaking.

A world-renowned statistician working in the Department of Pure Maths and Mathematical Statistics, Sir John has worked to promote trust in the use of statistics and quantitative evidence. As Home Office Chief Scientific Adviser, he championed the use of science and research across the department, and his work has contributed to both national security and public safety. He has played a central role in the Home Office’s response to COVID-19, ensuring the Home Secretary was briefed and the latest scientific advice was available to be used. 

Sir John’s analysis of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data, which gives information about brain activity, has become a standard reference, supporting scientific research.

Sir Andy Hopper, Professor of Computer Technology in the Department of Computer Science and Technology, has been knighted for services to Computer Technology. He is Treasurer and Vice-President of the Royal Society, and has made a major impact on the modern digital world through pioneering work in computer systems and architectures.

The work of Sir Andy and his team on computing and sustainability is helping to tackle global problems such as biodiversity and climate change. He has a strong commitment to diversity: as Head of the Department of Computer Science and Technology in Cambridge for 14 years, he helped increase the number of women appointed to the staff from a handful to over half. The culture that was created also helped to establish more than 200 start-up businesses. 

“The University of Cambridge and the Cambridge Cluster have provided a wonderfully collaborative and flexible framework within which I have had the good fortune to work for 47 years,” he said.

Professor William Sutherland, who holds the Miriam Rothschild Chair in Conservation Biology in the Department of Zoology, and is a Professorial Fellow at St Catharine’s College, has been awarded a CBE for services to Evidence-based Conservation.

Professor Sutherland is one of the world’s leading conservation scientists, carrying out extensive research on ecological processes, predicting the impacts of environmental change, horizon scanning to identify forthcoming issues and developing novel processes for integrating science and policy. He runs the Biosecurity Research Initiative (BioRISC) at St Catharine's, and regularly advises government as well as conservation organisations, such as Natural England and The National Trust. Professor Sutherland, who was President of the British Ecological Society, was also part of a team that created the Cambridge Conservation Initiative, which works to identify and research global environmental problems, finding solutions and delivering on-the-ground improvements for species and habitats worldwide.

Professor James Wood, Head of the Department of Veterinary Medicine, Alborada Professor of Equine and Farm Animal Science, and Fellow of Wolfson College, has been awarded an OBE for services to Veterinary Science. 

Professor Wood’s research focuses on zoonoses - diseases transmissible from animals to humans – in particular bovine tuberculosis in the UK, Ethiopia and India, and its impact on milk-producing cattle and buffalo. His work also focuses on wildlife-associated emerging viral infections in sub-Saharan Africa, particularly Ghana. Professor Wood is on Defra’s Science Advisory Council and he is a Fellow of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons.

Dr Shaun Fitzgerald, Director at the Centre for Climate Repair at Cambridge, and Fellow of Girton College, has received an OBE for services to the COVID-19 Response.

Dr Fitzgerald was called upon in Spring 2020 to help with the SAGE Environmental Modelling Group. He co-authored the CIBSE Emerging from Lockdown guidance, which included advice on ventilation in buildings. He is also serving on a range of other government bodies as part of the response to COVID-19, such as the DCMS Venues Steering Group, the Science Board to the Events Research Programme (which included the 2021 events at the Circus Nightclub in Liverpool and FA Cup Final), and the Aerosol Generating Procedures panel.

Dr Arif Ahmed, University Reader in Philosophy, and Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, has received an MBE for services to Education.

Dr Ahmed is recognised for his contribution to the University Statement on Freedom of Speech. He raised concerns that including a requirement to be respectful of people's opinions and identities risked legitimising future censorship, which he saw as a threat to the free speech the University was trying to protect. An amendment was put forward stating that free speech should operate without fear of intolerance, which, along with other amendments, was passed by the Regent House - the University's governing body. Cambridge’s Vice-Chancellor Professor Stephen Toope said the outcome was an emphatic reaffirmation of free speech in the University. 

Amika George, a History undergraduate at Murray Edwards College, received an MBE for services to Education. Amika started the not-for-profit Free Periods campaign group, having read that some girls in the UK were missing school because they could not afford to buy sanitary products. She launched an online petition lobbying the government to provide free tampons and sanitary pads for girls from low income families. The campaign has gained considerable momentum and support, and in 2019, the government committed to funding period products in every single state school and college in England. The scheme began in 2020.

Aimee Durning, a Teaching Assistant at the University of Cambridge Primary School, has received an MBE for services to Education.

Aimee used the power of stories and reading to help young people and their families cope during the pandemic, through a book club she had previously set up, making sure they had teaching resources, including – of course – books. Aimee also set up a regional network for TAs in the East of England to share best practices and develop their skills, particularly in helping vulnerable children, and has written a series of books on the subject.  She plans to use her MBE as a platform to extend the TA network to a national level, to help support their work in hundreds more schools.

The risk calculator, SCORE2, will be adopted by the upcoming European Guidelines on Cardiovascular Disease Prevention in Clinical Practice, and enables doctors across Europe to predict who’s at risk of having a heart attack or stroke in the next 10 years with greater accuracy.

The researchers say this new prediction tool will help save many more people across Europe from having a potentially deadly heart attack or stroke, ultimately saving lives. People who are flagged as having an increased risk can be put on personalised preventative treatment, such a statins, or will receive lifestyle advice to lower their risk.

Researchers from the University of Cambridge played a leading role in a major collaborative effort involving around 200 investigators to develop SCORE2. Researchers across Europe analysed data from nearly 700,000 participants - mostly middle-aged - from 45 different studies. The tool has also been tailored for use in different European countries.

Participants had no prior history of heart and circulatory disease when they were recruited to the studies, and in the 10 years they were followed up, 30,000 had a ‘cardiovascular event’ – including fatal or non-fatal heart attack or stroke.

The risk tool was then statistically ‘recalibrated’, by using regional-specific cardiovascular and risk factor data from 10.8 million people, to more accurately estimate cardiovascular risk for populations split into four European risk regions. The tool uses known risk factors for heart and circulatory diseases such as age, sex, cholesterol levels, blood pressure and smoking.

This is a much-needed upgrade from the previous prediction tool that was developed using data before 1986 and underestimated the cardiovascular risk in some countries. The new SCORE2 risk calculator now accounts for current trends in heart and circulatory diseases, can predict both fatal and non-fatal conditions and is adaptable to countries with different levels of risk.

The researchers say that this upgrade will better estimate the cardiovascular risk amongst younger people, and will improve how treatment is tailored for older people and those in high-risk regions across Europe.

Professor Emanuele Di Angelantonio at the University of Cambridge British Heart Foundation (BHF) Centre of Research Excellence, said: “This risk tool is much more powerful and superior than what doctors have used for decades. It will fit seamlessly into current prevention programmes with substantial real-world impact by improving the prevention of cardiovascular diseases across Europe before they strike.”

Dr Lisa Pennells, also at Cambridge’s BHF Centre of Research Excellence, said: “This project was a highly collaborative effort that has brought together key experts and extensive data sources to develop improved risk prediction tools for cardiovascular disease for use across the UK and Europe.

“A key feature is that our calculators are relevant to current day rates of cardiovascular disease in different regions of Europe. Importantly, our methods allow them to be easily updated using routinely collected data in the future to ensure they stay relevant as trends in heart and circulatory diseases change.”

This study was carried out by the SCORE2 Working Group and the European Society of Cardiology Cardiovascular Risk Collaboration. It was supported by organisations including the British Heart Foundation, the Medical Research Council, National Institute for Health Research Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre and Health Data Research UK.

Professor Sir Nilesh Samani, Medical Director at the BHF and cardiologist, said: “Heart and circulatory diseases are the world’s biggest killers, impacting the lives of 7.6 million people across the UK alone.

“This new risk tool is a major advance and will save many more people from developing heart attacks, stroke and heart disease, all of which develop silently over many years and strike without warning. It will be the new gold standard for doctors to determine which patients are at the highest risk of these conditions, and enable tailored treatment and lifestyle advice to be given much earlier.”

Reference
SCORE2 risk prediction algorithms: revised models to estimate 10-year risk of cardiovascular disease in Europe. European Heart Journal; 14 June 2021; DOI: 10.1093/eurheartj/ehab309

Adapted from a press release from the British Heart Foundation

The team, based at the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, University of Cambridge, found that while sleep problems and low self-esteem were common risk factors, there were two distinct profiles of young people who self-harm – one with emotional and behavioural difficulties and a second group without those difficulties, but with different risk factors.

Between one in five and one in seven adolescents in England self-harms, for example by deliberately cutting themselves. While self-harm is a significant risk factor for subsequent suicide attempts, many do not intend suicide but face other harmful outcomes, including repeatedly self-harming, poor mental health, and risky behaviours like substance abuse. Despite its prevalence and lifelong consequences, there has been little progress in the accurate prediction of self-harm.

The Cambridge team identified adolescents who reported self-harm at age 14, from a nationally representative UK birth cohort of approximately 11,000 individuals. They then used a machine learning analysis to identify whether there were distinct profiles of young people who self-harm, with different emotional and behavioural characteristics. They used this information to identify risk factors from early and middle childhood. The results are published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

Because the data tracked the participants over time, the researchers were able to distinguish factors that appear alongside reported self-harm behaviour, such as low self-esteem, from those that precede it, such as bullying.

The team identified two distinct subgroups among young people who self-harm, with significant risk factors present as early as age five, nearly a decade before they reported self-harming. While both groups were likely to experience sleep difficulties and low self-esteem reported at age 14, other risk factors differed between the two groups.

The first group showed a long history of poor mental health, as well as bullying before they self-harmed. Their caregivers were more likely to have mental health issues of their own.

For the second group, however, their self-harming behaviour was harder to predict early in childhood. One of the key signs was a greater willingness to take part in risk-taking behaviour, which is linked to impulsivity. Other research suggests these tendencies may predispose the individual towards spending less time to consider alternate coping methods and the consequences of self-harm. Factors related to their relationships with their peers were also important for this subgroup, including feeling less secure with friends and family at age 14 and a greater concern about the feelings of others as a risk factor at age 11.

Stepheni Uh, a Gates Cambridge Scholar and first author of the study, said: “Self-harm is a significant problem among adolescents, so it’s vital that we understand the nuanced nature of self-harm, especially in terms of the different profiles of young people who self-harm and their potentially different risk factors.

“We found two distinct subgroups of young people who self-harm. The first was much as expected – young people who experience symptoms of depression and low self-esteem, face problems with their families and friends, and are bullied. The second, much larger group was much more surprising as they don’t show the usual traits that are associated with those who self-harm.”

The researchers say that their findings suggest that it may be possible to predict which individuals are most at risk of self-harm up to a decade ahead of time, providing a window to intervene.

Dr Duncan Astle said: “The current approach to supporting mental health in young people is to wait until problems escalate. Instead, we need a much better evidence base so we can identify who is at most risk of mental health difficulties in the future, and why. This offers us the opportunity to be proactive, and minimise difficulties before they start.

“Our results suggest that boosting younger children’s self-esteem, making sure that schools implement anti-bullying measures, and providing advice on sleep training, could all help reduce self-harm levels years later.

“Our research gives us potential ways of helping this newly-identified second subgroup. Given that they experience difficulties with their peers and are more willing to engage in risky behaviours, then providing access to self-help and problem-solving or conflict regulation programmes may be effective.”

Professor Tamsin Ford from the Department of Psychiatry added: “We might also help at-risk adolescents by targeting interventions at mental health leaders and school-based mental health teams. Teachers are often the first people to hear about self-harm but some lack confidence in how to respond. Providing them with training could make a big difference.”

The research was supported by the Gates Cambridge Trust, Templeton World Charity Foundation, and the UK Medical Research Council.

Reference
Uh, S et al. Two pathways to self-harm in adolescence. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry; 14 June 2021; DOI: 10.1016/j.jaac.2021.03.010

A pioneering collaboration to speed development of breakthrough medical discoveries—devised by the University of Cambridge, Imperial College London, University College London and embraced by pharmaceutical giants AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, and Johnson & Johnson Innovation—launched on Thursday as a £100 million biopharmaceutical company.

Apollo Therapeutics, a portfolio-based biopharmaceutical company rapidly advancing potentially transformative treatments, has completed a £100 million financing led by Patient Square Capital and joined by Rock Springs Capital, Reimagined Ventures, and UCL Technology Fund.

The investment will support advancement of Apollo’s robust pipeline into development; expansion of the company’s operations, including establishment of a presence in the Boston, Massachusetts area in the USA; and pursuit of new collaborations globally. Each of the joint venture founders will retain a minority stake in the company.

Conceived in 2011 by the technology transfer offices of three world-leading universities (University of Cambridge, Imperial College London, University College London), Apollo was created to speed the development of therapeutics based on cutting-edge discoveries at the three universities. In 2014, the team pitched the pioneering model to AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, and Johnson & Johnson Innovation, which embraced the model.

Professor Andy Neely, Cambridge Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Enterprise and Business Relations said: “Apollo’s expanding pipeline of treatments across oncology, major inflammatory disorders and rare disease is an excellent demonstration of why funding, collaboration and the commercialisation of research at UK global research universities is so crucial for the future care of patients, the treatment of disease and the economy.” 

Finalised in late 2015, the joint venture launched in early 2016. In the ensuing years Apollo has sought the best science with the potential to help patients. By bringing funding and industry expertise together with University breakthroughs, Apollo has developed projects to industrial standards and exceeded traditional development benchmarks of capital- and time-efficiency. It has now invested in over 30 projects, some of which have already been successfully licensed. Apollo now launches its next phase as a multinational company.

Established to bridge the gap between deep academic science and eventual patient benefit, the Apollo model will function well as a company. By fostering relationships with top academic scientists and leveraging insights from partners with late-stage development and commercial expertise, Apollo works to develop therapeutics that have transformative potential. It evaluates breakthrough scientific discoveries across multiple criteria, including having a compelling and testable biological hypothesis or having a differentiated mechanism or technology compared to other therapeutics in development or on the market.

Iain Thomas, Head of Life Sciences at Cambridge Enterprise said: “Apollo’s unique, innovative and hugely capital efficient model has been validated by this very significant investment.  Apollo has advanced a fantastic portfolio of programmes more cost effectively and quickly than could have been achieved by traditional grant and single asset investment routes.  PSC’s partners have real knowledge and success in investing in portfolio opportunities, we are delighted they can bring their expertise to Apollo and are joining us as we take science from the bench to patients.”

To advance programmes efficiently, Apollo leverages a portfolio-based model with a centralized team of drug development ‘architects’ working alongside asset-level teams of subject matter experts. Together, these teams are able to evaluate therapeutic programmes rigorously, in an objective, data-driven fashion—prioritising critical experiments to de-risk programmes early. The model allows the company to evaluate programmes comprehensively, while committing minimal spend until biological validation is demonstrated. This capital efficiency allows Apollo to focus on scaling a robust and potentially transformative pipeline, with over 15 therapeutic programmes currently in development.

With proceeds from this financing, Apollo plans to advance its lead therapeutic programmes into clinical development as well as identify new programmes. In addition, the company plans to expand its UK operations in the Cambridge area, as well as in the United States with a new facility in Boston/Cambridge. Apollo’s growing team will also explore additional collaborative relationships with leading academic researchers around the world.

The second week of gestation represents a critical stage of embryo development, or embryogenesis. Failure of development during this time is one of the major causes of early pregnancy loss. Understanding more about it will help scientists to understand how it can go wrong, and take steps towards being able to fix problems.

The pre-implantation period, before the developing embryo implants into the mother’s womb, has been studied extensively in human embryos in the lab. On the seventh day the embryo must implant into the womb to survive and develop. Very little is known about the development of the human embryo once it implants, because it becomes inaccessible for study.

Pioneering work by Professor Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz and her team developed a technique, reported in 2016, to culture human embryos outside the body of the mother beyond implantation. This enabled human embryos to be studied up to day 14 of development for the first time. 

In a new study, the team collaborated with colleagues at the Wellcome Sanger Institute to reveal what happens at the molecular level during this early stage of embryogenesis. Their findings provide the first evidence that a group of cells outside the embryo, known as the hypoblast, send a message to the embryo that initiates the development of the head-to-tail body axis. 

When the body axis begins to form, the symmetrical structure of the embryo starts to change. One end becomes committed to developing into the head end, and the other the ‘tail’. 

The new results, published today in the journal Nature Communications, reveal that the molecular signals involved in the formation of the body axis show similarities to those in animals, despite significant differences in the positioning and organisation of the cells.

“We have revealed the patterns of gene expression in the developing embryo just after it implants in the womb, which reflect the multiple conversations going on between different cell types as the embryo develops through these early stages,” said Professor Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience, and senior author of the report.

She added: “We were looking for the gene conversation that will allow the head to start developing in the embryo, and found that it was initiated by cells in the hypoblast – a disc of cells outside the embryo. They send the message to adjoining embryo cells, which respond by saying ‘OK, now we’ll set ourselves aside to develop into the head end.’”

The study identified the gene conversations in the developing embryo by sequencing the code in the thousands of messenger RNA molecules made by individual cells. They captured the evolving molecular profile of the developing embryo after implantation in the womb, revealing the progressive loss of pluripotency (the ability of the embryonic cells to give rise to any cell type of the future organism) as the fates of different cells are determined.

“By creating an atlas of the cells involved in human development and how they communicate with other cells, we can start to understand more about the cellular processes and mechanisms behind very early embryo growth, which has been much harder to study compared to other mammals. This freely available information can now be used by researchers around the world to help inform future studies,” said Dr Roser Vento-Tormo, one of the senior authors and Group Leader at the Wellcome Sanger Institute. 

“Our goal has always been to enable insights to very early human embryo development in a dish, to understand how our lives start. By combining our new technology with advanced sequencing methods we have delved deeper into the key changes that take place at this incredible stage of human development, when so many pregnancies unfortunately fail,” said Zernicka-Goetz.

This research was funded by Wellcome. It was carried out with the oversight of the UK Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority, and with permission from a local research ethics committee.

Reference: Mole, M.A. et al: ‘A single cell characterisation of human embryogenesis identifies pluripotency transitions and putative anterior hypoblast centre.’ Nature Communications, June 2021. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-23758-w 

When a person is infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, it invades their cells and uses them to replicate - which puts the cells under stress. Current approaches to dealing with infection target the virus itself with antiviral drugs. But Cambridge scientists have switched focus to target the body’s cellular response to the virus instead. 

In a new study, published today in the journal PLOS Pathogens, they found that all three branches of a three-pronged signalling pathway called the ‘unfolded protein response’ (UPR) are activated in lab-grown cells infected with SARS-CoV-2. Inhibiting the UPR to restore normal cell function using drugs was also found to significantly reduce virus replication.

“The virus that causes COVID-19 activates a response in our cells - called the UPR - that enables it to replicate,” said Dr Nerea Irigoyen in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Pathology, senior author of the report.

She added: “Using drugs we were able to reverse the activation of this specific cellular pathway, and remarkably this reduced virus production inside the cells almost completely, which means the infection could not spread to other cells. This has exciting potential as an anti-viral strategy against SARS-CoV-2.” 

Treatment with a drug that targets one prong of the UPR pathway had some effect in reducing virus replication. But treatment with two drugs together - called Ceapin-A7 and KIRA8 - to simultaneously target two prongs of the pathway reduced virus production in the cells by 99.5%. This is the first study to show that the combination of two drugs has a much greater effect on virus replication in cells than a single drug. 

The approach would not stop a person getting infected with the coronavirus, but the scientists say symptoms would be much milder, and recovery time would be quicker.

Anti-viral drugs currently in use to treat COVID-19, such as remdesivir, target replication of the virus itself. But if the virus develops resistance to these drugs they will no longer work. In contrast, the new treatment targets the response of the infected cells; this will not change even if new variants emerge, because the virus needs this cellular response in order to replicate.

The next step is to test the treatment in mouse models. The scientists also want to see whether it works against other viruses, and illnesses such as pulmonary fibrosis and neurological disorders that also activate the UPR response in cells. 

“We hope this discovery will enable the development a broad-spectrum anti-viral drug, effective in treating infections with other viruses as well as SARS-CoV-2. We’ve already found it has an effect on Zika virus too. It has the potential to have a huge impact,” said Irigoyen.

SARS-CoV-2 is the novel coronavirus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. Since the end of 2019 there have been over 150 million cases of the disease worldwide, and over 3 million people have died. 

This research was funded by an Isaac Newton Trust/Wellcome Trust ISSF/University of Cambridge Joint Research Grant.

Reference
Echavarria-Consuegra, L. et al: ‘Manipulation of the unfolded protein response: a pharmacological strategy against coronavirus infection.’ PLOS Pathogens. May 2021. DOI:10.1371/journal.ppat.1009644

The new scheme is being made possible through the generosity of philanthropic donations from alumni and friends of the collegiate University. The Harding Challenge, established by David and Claudia Harding as part of their £100 million gift to Cambridge and St Catharine’s College in February 2019, was designed to underpin this expansion in bursary provision. Far more students will qualify for support since the threshold for eligibility will rise from the current maximum household income of £42,620 to £62,215. The University expects 25 – 30% of students will be eligible for the enhanced support (currently it’s around 20%). Once fully rolled out, around 700 students will also qualify for an additional £1,000 because they were eligible for free school meals.

UK students can apply to the Student Loans Company for a maintenance loan to cover basic living costs. There is widespread take-up of these loans: repayments are linked to future earnings which means they are more like a tax than conventional debt, and they are an invaluable support to making University more affordable for as many students as possible. However, research conducted by the University suggests many students struggle to meet all their expenses because parents often can’t afford to contribute to the extent that these means-tested loans assume they will. It’s these financial gaps that the new bursary scheme will help to alleviate.

Vice-Chancellor, Professor Stephen J Toope, said:

"This new enhanced bursary scheme, which wouldn’t be possible without the generosity of donors, will help to ease some of our students' financial worries. The scheme’s launch means far more students will be eligible for support. This is particularly relevant now, at a time when many families’ incomes have been affected adversely by the COVID-19 pandemic."

The launch of the enhanced bursary scheme follows a pilot scheme involving 20 Colleges established and largely funded by Trinity College. Students in receipt of these bursaries said they were able to participate more fully in the academic and wider student activities Cambridge has to offer. The awards also had a positive impact on their mental well-being, reducing the anxieties they had about finances. Colleges also noted that there was a marked reduction in applications for hardship funding in-year.

Professor Catherine Barnard, Senior Tutor at Trinity College, said:

"The enhanced bursary scheme is about removing barriers, and helping students fully participate in University life. Our evidence suggests supporting students in this way not only improves their wellbeing but ensures they can thrive while studying at Cambridge."

The University’s Faculty of Education has conducted research to find out how effective this level of support is for students. This found it contributes substantially to their wellbeing, participation in academic life and student societies, and overall student experience.

Under the new scheme, bursaries of up to £3,500 per year will be given to students from households with an assessed income of up to £62,215, without any application needed. Previously students were given support if the assessed income rose to £42,620. The bursary will be tapered so those at the lower end will receive more. For example, all undergraduates from households with assessed incomes below £25,000 will receive the full amount. Those at the top end will receive £100. The amount they receive is a grant and so is non-repayable. Awards will be further enhanced for students who join the University from local authority care or who have been classed as independent by their regional funding body. In addition, the scheme will include a supplementary award of £1,000 per year to all low-income students who qualified for free school meals, contributing to a bursary of £4,500 in each year of their undergraduate studies. Mature students (aged 21+) are also eligible for both the enhanced and supplementary awards.

Further details on how the scheme will work

The researchers, from the University of Cambridge, found that the part of the brain which interprets physical signals from the body behaves differently in people with a range of mental health disorders, suggesting that it could be a target for future treatments.

The researchers studied ‘interoception’ – the ability to sense internal conditions in the body – and whether there were any common brain differences during this process in people with mental health disorders. They found that a region of the brain called the dorsal mid-insula showed different activity during interoception across a range of disorders, including depression, schizophrenia, eating disorders and anxiety disorders.

Many people with mental health disorders experience physical symptoms differently, whether that’s feeling uncomfortably full in anorexia, or feeling like you don’t have enough air in panic disorder.

The results, reported in The American Journal of Psychiatry, show that activity in the dorsal mid-insula could drive these different interpretations of bodily sensations in mental health. Increased awareness of the differences in how people experience physical symptoms could also be useful to those treating mental health disorders.

We all use exteroception – sight, smell, hearing, taste and touch – to navigate daily life. But interoception – the ability to interpret signals from our body – is equally important for survival, even though it often happens subconsciously.

“Interoception is something we are all doing constantly, although we might not be aware of it,” said lead author Dr Camilla Nord from the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit. “For example, most of us are able to interpret the signals of low blood sugar, such as tiredness or irritability, and know to eat something. However, there are differences in how our brains interpret these signals.”

Differences in interoceptive processes have previously been identified in people with eating disorders, anxiety and depression, panic disorder, addiction and other mental health disorders. Theoretical models have suggested that disrupted cortical processing drives these changes in interoceptive processing, conferring vulnerability to a range of mental health symptoms.

Nord and her colleagues combined brain imaging data from previous studies and compared differences in brain activity during interoception between 626 patients with mental health disorders and 610 healthy controls. “We wanted to find out whether there is something similar happening in the brain in people with different mental disorders, irrespective of their diagnosis,” she said.

Their analysis showed that for patients with bipolar, anxiety, major depression, anorexia and schizophrenia, part of the cerebral cortex called the dorsal mid-insula showed different brain activation when processing pain, hunger and other interoceptive signals when compared to the control group.

The researchers then ran a follow-up analysis and found that the dorsal mid-insula does not overlap with regions of the brain altered by antidepressant drugs or regions altered by psychological therapy, suggesting that it could be studied as a new target for future therapeutics to treat differences in interoception.

“It’s surprising that in spite of the diversity of psychological symptoms, there appears to be a common factor in how physical signals are processed differently by the brain in mental health disorders,” said Nord. “It shows how intertwined physical and mental health are, but also the limitations of our diagnostic system – some important factors in mental health might be ‘transdiagnostic’, that is, found across many diagnoses.”

In future, Dr Nord is planning studies to test whether this disrupted activation could be altered by new treatments for mental health disorders, such as brain stimulation.

The research was supported by NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre.

Reference:
Camilla L. Nord, Rebecca P. Lawson and Tim Dalgleish. ‘Disrupted dorsal mid-insula activation during interoception across psychiatric disorders.’ The American Journal of Psychiatry (2021). DOI: 10.1176/appi.ajp.2020.20091340

Grey pioneered the optimisation of batteries with the help of NMR spectroscopy –similar to MRI technology – a method that allows non-invasive insights into the inner workings of batteries.

Her NMR studies have helped to significantly increase the performance of lithium-ion batteries, which power mobile phones, laptops and electric cars. She has been instrumental in the development of next-generation batteries and cost-effective, durable storage systems for renewable energy. She sees her fundamental research as an important contribution to achieving net-zero emissions by 2050.

“There have been significant advances in lithium-ion batteries since they were commercialised in the 1990s,” said Grey. “Their energy density has tripled and prices have fallen by 90 percent.”

Grey’s research has made key contributions to these developments. She is a pioneer in the study of solids with the help of NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) spectroscopy, which she has developed and applied to allow researchers to observe the electrochemical processes at work during charging and discharging of batteries.

Clare Grey, 56, studied chemistry at the University of Oxford. At the age of 22, she published her first scientific article in the journal Nature. After completing her doctoral studies in 1991, she went to Radboud University in Nijmegen, the Netherlands, and has also worked as a visiting scientist at the US chemical company Dupont.

In 1994, she joined the State University of New York at Stony Brook as an assistant professor, and she became a full professor in 2001. In 2009, she became Geoffrey Moorhouse Gibson Professor at the University of Cambridge’s Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry. She is a Fellow of Pembroke College, and has been a Fellow of the Royal Society since 2011.

At the time Grey was still a student, most chemist and physicists used X-rays to determine the internal structure of solids. Grey was one of the first in her field to use solid state NMR instead: during her time in the USA, she met researchers from the Duracell company who inspired her to use the technology to study materials in batteries.

“Previously, the usual investigations with X-rays only provided an average picture,” Grey said. “With the help of NMR, I was able to detect the local structural details in these often-disordered materials.”

Initially, she examined individual materials by opening the batteries at a certain stage of their charging and discharging cycle. The aim was to find out which chemical processes cause the batteries to age and how their lifespan and capacity could be increased. Later, she improved the NMR technology so that she could use it to examine batteries during operation without destroying them, which helped speed up the studies enormously.

Now, in addition to her work improving lithium-ion batteries, Grey is developing a range of different next-generation batteries, including lithium-air batteries (which use oxidation of lithium and reduction of oxygen to induce a current), sodium, magnesium and redox flow batteries.

Her NMR studies allow her to follow the processes at work inside these batteries in real time and help determine the processes that cause batteries to degrade. She is working on further optimising the NMR method to design even more powerful, faster-charging and more environmentally friendly batteries.

In 2019, Grey co-founded a company, (Nyobolt), for ultra-fast charging batteries. Another company supplies the NMR measurement technology she designed to laboratories around the world.

To achieve climate goals and transition away from fossil fuels, Grey believes it is vital that “basic research into new battery technologies is already in full swing today – tomorrow will be too late.”

The Körber European Science Prize 2021 will be presented to Professor Clare Grey on 10 September in the Great Festival Hall of Hamburg City Hall. Since 1985, the Körber Foundation has honoured a breakthrough in the physical or life sciences in Europe with the Körber Prize. It is awarded for excellent and innovative research approaches with high application potential. To date, six Körber Prize winners have been awarded the Nobel Prize.

Now in its sixth year, the 2021 WE50 celebrates the wealth of female talent within engineering and related disciplines. The annual celebration is aligned with International Women in Engineering Day (INWED) which takes place on 23 June.

Some of Kar-Narayan’s happiest childhood memories involved taking apart cassette players and VCR recorders, and that curiosity is what drew her to her current role. Her research involves developing new polymeric materials for harvesting energy to power health monitoring devices and integrating materials into versatile sensors. She has also been working on developing self-powered devices for patients.

“I am absolutely thrilled by this award, and to be recognised as an ‘Engineering Hero’ will go down well with my kids,” said Kar-Narayan, who is a Fellow of Clare Hall. “My late father was diabetic and suffered from heart disease, and this played a role in my desire to use science and engineering to improve patient care by developing self-powered devices that can offer personalised healthcare and remote health monitoring, and new technologies to study and manage the progression of disease at a cellular level. I am so grateful to WES for this award, and of course, to all the people who have supported me over the years, including my brilliant research group without whom this would not have been possible.”

One of the aims of Kar-Narayan’s research is the development of early-stage prototypes and eventual commercialisation of energy harvesting and self-powered sensing technologies. An example is the spin-out company ArtioSense Ltd that she has recently co-founded, which seeks to deliver low-cost conformable sensors that can aid orthopaedic surgery through real-time force monitoring in joints.

Even in the current climate, the number and standard of nominations were high, emphasising the exceptional achievements made by women in this field. The WE50 awards were judged by a panel of industry experts.

“It was wonderful to read about the achievements of these extraordinary women and the impact that they are making on society with their talent, hard work and dedication,” said Head Judge Professor Catherine Noakes OBE CEng FIMechE FIHEEM. “The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted how truly important science, technology and engineering are to the health of our planet. The 2021 WE50 personify the inventive and inclusive thinking needed to build a sustainable future. If there was ever a time that we needed these heroes in engineering, it is now.”

INWED celebrates the achievements of women in engineering and related roles and highlights the opportunities available to engineers of the future. The WE50 was created to raise awareness of the skills shortage facing the industry, highlighting the huge discrepancy between the number of men vs. women currently in engineering professions. The theme of WE50 changes each year to recognise women working in different fields and from varying routes into engineering. This year’s theme is ‘Engineering Heroes.’

Using the low-cost technique, the researchers identified the speed-limiting processes which, if addressed, could enable the batteries in most smartphones and laptops to charge in as little as five minutes.

The researchers, from the University of Cambridge, say their technique will not only help improve existing battery materials, but could accelerate the development of next-generation batteries, one of the biggest technological hurdles to be overcome in the transition to a fossil fuel-free world. The results are reported in the journal Nature.

While lithium-ion batteries have undeniable advantages, such as relatively high energy densities and long lifetimes in comparison with other batteries and means of energy storage, they can also overheat or even explode, and are relatively expensive to produce. Additionally, their energy density is nowhere near that of petrol. So far, this makes them unsuitable for widespread use in two major clean technologies: electric cars and grid-scale storage for solar power.

“A better battery is one that can store a lot more energy or one that can charge much faster – ideally both,” said co-author Dr Christoph Schnedermann, from Cambridge’s Cavendish Laboratory. “But to make better batteries out of new materials, and to improve the batteries we’re already using, we need to understand what’s going on inside them.”

To improve lithium-ion batteries and help them charge faster, researchers need to follow and understand the processes occurring in functioning materials under realistic conditions in real time. Currently, this requires sophisticated synchrotron X-ray or electron microscopy techniques, which are time-consuming and expensive.

“To really study what’s happening inside a battery, you essentially have to get the microscope to do two things at once: it needs to observe batteries charging and discharging over a period of several hours, but at the same time it needs to capture very fast processes happening inside the battery,” said first author Alice Merryweather, a PhD student at Cambridge’s Cavendish Laboratory.

The Cambridge team developed an optical microscopy technique called interferometric scattering microscopy to observe these processes at work. Using this technique, they were able to observe individual particles of lithium cobalt oxide (often referred to as LCO) charging and discharging by measuring the amount of scattered light.

They were able to see the LCO going through a series of phase transitions in the charge-discharge cycle. The phase boundaries within the LCO particles move and change as lithium ions go in and out. The researchers found that the mechanism of the moving boundary is different depending on whether the battery is charging or discharging.

“We found that there are different speed limits for lithium-ion batteries, depending on whether it’s charging or discharging,” said Dr Akshay Rao from the Cavendish Laboratory, who led the research. “When charging, the speed depends on how fast the lithium ions can pass through the particles of active material. When discharging, the speed depends on how fast the ions are inserted at the edges. If we can control these two mechanisms, it would enable lithium-ion batteries to charge much faster.”

“Given that lithium-ion batteries have been in use for decades, you’d think we know everything there is to know about them, but that’s not the case,” said Schnedermann. “This technique lets us see just how fast it might be able to go through a charge-discharge cycle. What we’re really looking forward to is using the technique to study next-generation battery materials – we can use what we learned about LCO to develop new materials.”

“The technique is a quite general way of looking at ion dynamics in solid-state materials, so you can use it on almost any type of battery material,” said Professor Clare Grey, from Cambridge’s Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry, who co-led the research.

The high throughput nature of the methodology allows many particles to be sampled across the entire electrode and, moving forward, will enable further exploration of what happens when batteries fail and how to prevent it.

“This lab-based technique we’ve developed offers a huge change in technology speed so that we can keep up with the fast-moving inner workings of a battery,” said Schnedermann. “The fact that we can actually see these phase boundaries changing in real time was really surprising. This technique could be an important piece of the puzzle in the development of next-generation batteries.”

Reference:
Alice J. Merryweather et al. ‘Operando optical tracking of single-particle ion dynamics in batteries.’ Nature (2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-03584-2

The stresses resulting from these defects – which are small enough to disrupt the atomic building blocks of a crystal – can transform how hot rocks beneath Earth’s crust move and in turn transfer stress back to Earth’s surface, starting the countdown to the next earthquake. 

The new study, published in Nature Communications, is the first to map out the crystal defects and surrounding force fields in detail. “They’re so tiny that we’ve only been able to observe them with the latest microscopy techniques,” said lead author Dr David Wallis from Cambridge's Department of Earth Sciences, “But it’s clear that they can significantly influence how deep rocks move, and even govern when and where the next earthquake will happen.”

By understanding how these crystal defects influence rocks in the Earth’s upper mantle, scientists can better interpret measurements of ground motions following earthquakes, which give vital information on where stress is building up - and in turn where future earthquakes may occur.

Earthquakes happen when pieces of Earth’s crust suddenly slip past each other along fault lines, releasing stored-up energy which propagates through the Earth and causes it to shake. This movement is generally a response to the build-up of tectonic forces in the Earth’s crust, causing the surface to buckle and eventually rupture in the form of an earthquake.

Their work reveals that the way Earth’s surface settles after an earthquake, and stores stress prior to a repeat event, can ultimately be traced to tiny defects in rock crystals from the deep.

“If you can understand how fast these deep rocks can flow, and how long it will take to transfer stress between different areas across a fault zone, then we might be able to get better predictions of when and where the next earthquake will strike,” said Wallis.

The team subjected olivine crystals – the most common component of the upper mantle -- to a range of pressures and temperatures in order to replicate conditions of up to 100 km beneath Earth’s surface, where the rocks are so hot (roughly 1250^oC) they move like syrup.

Wallis likens their experiments to a blacksmith working with hot metal – at the highest temperatures, their samples were glowing white-hot and pliable.

They observed the distorted crystal structures using a high-resolution form of electron microscopy, called electron backscatter diffraction, which Wallis has pioneered on geological materials.

Their results shed light on how hot rocks in the upper mantle can mysteriously morph from flowing almost like syrup immediately after an earthquake to becoming thick and sluggish as time passes.

This change in thickness -- or viscosity – transfers stress back to the cold and brittle rocks in the crust above, where it builds up – until the next earthquake strikes.

The reason for this switch in behaviour has remained an open question, “We’ve known that microscale processes are a key factor controlling earthquakes for a while, but it’s been difficult to observe these tiny features in enough detail,” said Wallis. “Thanks to a state-of-the-art microscopy technique, we’ve been able to look into the crystal framework of hot, deep rocks and track down how important these miniscule defects really are”.

Wallis and co-authors show that irregularities in the crystals become increasingly tangled over time; jostling for space due to their competing force fields – and it’s this process that causes the rocks to become more viscous.

Until now it had been thought that this increase in viscosity was because of the competing push and pull of crystals against each other, rather than being caused by microscopic defects and their stress fields inside the crystals themselves.

The team hope to apply their work to improving seismic hazard maps, which are often used in tectonically active areas like southern California to estimate where the next earthquake will occur. Current models, which are usually based on where earthquakes have struck in the past, and where stress must therefore be building up, only take into account the more immediate changes across a fault zone and do not consider gradual stress changes in rocks flowing deep within the Earth.

Working with colleagues at Utrecht University, Wallis also plans to apply their new lab constraints to models of ground movements following the hazardous 2004 earthquake which struck Indonesia, and the 2011 Japan quake – both of which triggered tsunamis and lead to the loss of tens of thousands of lives.

Reference:
David Wallis et al. 'Dislocation interactions in olivine control postseismic creep of the upper mantle.' Nature Communications (2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-23633-8

The study, published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, suggests that the NASA James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), scheduled to launch in November 2021, will be sensitive enough to observe the birth of galaxies directly.

The UK-led research team examined six of the most distant galaxies currently known, whose light has taken most of the universe’s lifetime to reach us. They found that the distance of these galaxies away from Earth corresponded to a ‘look back’ time of more than 13 billion years ago, when the universe was only 550 million years old.

Analysing images from the Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes, the researchers calculated the age of these galaxies as ranging from 200 to 300 million years, allowing an estimate of when their stars first formed. 

"Theorists speculate that the universe was a dark place for the first few hundred million years, before the first stars and galaxies formed," said lead author Dr Nicolas Laporte from Cambridge's Institute of Astronomy. "Witnessing the moment when the universe was first bathed in starlight is a major quest in astronomy. 

"Our observations indicate that cosmic dawn occurred between 250 and 350 million years after the beginning of the universe, and, at the time of their formation, galaxies such as the ones we studied would have been sufficiently luminous to be seen with the James Webb Space Telescope." 

The researchers analysed starlight from the galaxies as recorded by the Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes, examining a marker in their energy distribution indicative of the presence of atomic hydrogen in their stellar atmospheres. This provides an estimate of the age of the stars they contain. 

This hydrogen signature increases in strength as the stellar population ages but diminishes when the galaxy is older than a billion years. The age-dependence arise because the more massive stars that contribute to this signal burn their nuclear fuel more rapidly and therefore die first. 

"This age indicator is used to date stars in our own neighbourhood in the Milky Way but it can also be used to date extremely remote galaxies, seen at a very early period of the universe," said co-author Dr Romain Meyer from UCL and the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy. "Using this indicator we can infer that, even at these early times, our galaxies are between 200 and 300 million years old."

In analysing the Hubble and Spitzer data, the researchers needed to estimate the 'redshift' of each galaxy, which indicates their cosmological distance and hence the look-back time at which they are being observed. To achieve this, they undertook spectroscopic measurements using the full armoury of ground-based telescopes - the Chilean Atacama Large Millimetre Array (ALMA), the European Very Large Telescope, the twin Keck telescopes in Hawai'i, and Gemini-South telescope. 

These measurements enabled the team to confirm that looking at these galaxies corresponded to looking back to a time when the universe was 550 million years old. 

"Over the last decade, astronomers have pushed back the frontiers of what we can observe to a time when the universe was only 4% of its present age," said co-author Professor Richard Ellis from UCL. "However, due to the limited transparency of Earth's atmosphere and capabilities of the Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes, we have reached our limit. 

"We now eagerly await the launch of the James Webb Space Telescope, which we believe has the capability to directly witness cosmic dawn. The quest to see this important moment in the universe's history has been a holy grail in astronomy for decades. Since we are made of material processed in stars, this is in one sense the search for our own origins." 

The new study involved astronomers from the University of California-Santa Cruz, the University of California, and the University of Texas. 

The researchers received support from the Kavli Foundation, the European Research Council, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and the National Science Foundation (NSF) in the United States. 

The NASA-led James Webb Space Telescope, the successor to the Hubble observatory, is scheduled to be launched into space in November. It will be the premier observatory over the next decade, serving thousands of astronomers worldwide. 

Reference:
N Laporte et al. 'Probing Cosmic Dawn: Ages and Star Formation Histories of Candidate z ≥ 9 Galaxies.' The Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society (2021). 

Adapted from a UCL press release. 

The study, published today in the journal Neuron, found that marmoset monkeys could no longer make an association between their behaviour and a particular outcome when a region of their brain called the anterior cingulate cortex was temporarily switched off.

This finding is important because the compulsive behaviours in OCD and addiction are thought to result from impairments in the 'goal-directed system' in the brain. In these conditions worrying, obsessions or compulsive behaviour such as drug seeking may reflect an alternative, habit-based system at work in the brain in which behaviours are not correctly linked with their outcomes.

It also sheds more light on how healthy people behave in a goal-directed way, which is needed to respond to changing environments and goals.

“We have identified the very specific region of the brain involved in goal-directed behaviour. When we temporarily turned this off, behaviour became more habitual - like when we go onto autopilot,” said Lisa Duan in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Psychology, first author of the report.

Marmosets were used because their brains share important similarities with human brains, and it is possible to manipulate specific regions of their brains to understand causal effects.

In the experiment, marmosets were first taught a goal-directed behaviour: by tapping a coloured cross when it appeared on a touchscreen, they were rewarded with their favourite juice to drink. But this connection between action and reward was randomly uncoupled so that they sometimes received the juice without having to respond to the image. They quickly detected this change and stopped responding to the image, because they saw they could get juice without doing anything.

Using drugs, the researchers temporarily switched off the anterior cingulate cortex including its connections with another brain region called the caudate nucleus. Repeating the experiment, they found when the connection between tapping the cross and receiving juice was randomly uncoupled, the marmosets did not change their behaviour but kept tapping the cross when it appeared.

Such habitual responding to the coloured cross was not observed when several other neighbouring regions of the brain’s prefrontal cortex - known to be important for other aspects of decision-making - were switched off. This shows the specificity of the anterior cingulate region for goal-directed behaviour.

A similar effect has been observed in computer-based tests on patients with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) or addiction - when the relationship between an action and an outcome is uncoupled the patients continue to respond as though the connection is still there.

Previous evidence from patients suffering brain damage, and from brain imaging in healthy volunteers, shows that part of the brain called the prefrontal cortex is involved in goal-directed behaviour. However, the prefrontal cortex is a complex structure with many regions, and it has not previously been possible to identify the specific part responsible for goal-directed behaviour from human studies alone.

“We think this is the first study to have established the specific brain circuitry that controls goal-directed behaviour in primates, whose brains are very similar to human brains,” said Professor Angela Roberts in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience, joint senior author of the report.

“This is a first step towards identifying suitable molecular targets for future drug treatments, or other forms of therapy, for devastating mental health disorders such as OCD and addiction,” added Professor Trevor Robbins in the University of Cambridge’s Department of Psychology, joint senior author of the report.

This research was conducted in the University of Cambridge’s Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, and was funded by Wellcome.

Reference

Duan, L.Y. et al. ‘Controlling one’s world: identification of sub-regions of primate PFC underlying goal-directed behaviour.’ Neuron, June 2021. DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2021.06.003

The eight winners have been selected by an international panel of expert judges, out of a total of 340 applications from 61 countries. The competition has seen unprecedented collaborations between the private, public, charitable and academic sectors, and will drive a step-change in using data and analytics for pandemic preparedness.

The University of Cambridge joined a coalition of some of the world’s leading businesses and academic and tech institutions to launch The Trinity Challenge in September 2020. The global challenge, convened by Dame Sally Davies, Master of Trinity College, provides a £10m prize fund for breakthrough solutions to make sure one billion more people are better protected against health emergencies.

Participatory One Health Disease Detection (PODD), which empowers farmers to identify and report zoonotic diseases that could potentially pass from animals to humans, has been named the grand prize winner at the inaugural awards ceremony. The organisation is being awarded £1.3 million (US$1.8 million) in pledged funding.

Led by Susumpat Patipow, General Director at OpenDream, PODD has developed a platform for livestock owners to report suspected animal illness, and in return receive veterinary care to improve animal health. If it appears a disease outbreak is likely, local health officials will quarantine the sick animals, saving the remaining livestock and possibly preventing the next COVID-19-type outbreak.

Having already achieved significant success in Thailand, with a network of 20,000 farmers helping to detect and control disease outbreaks, PODD is looking to expand its operations to Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Laos, Uganda and Vietnam over the next three years.

BloodCounts! - an international consortium of scientists, led by Professor Carola-Bibiane Schönlieb from Cambridge’s Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics (DAMTP) that has developed an innovative infectious disease outbreak detection system, was one of two second-prize winners, each awarded £1 million in pledged funding.

Developed by Dr Michael Roberts and Dr Nicholas Gleadall, the BloodCounts! Solution uses data from routine blood tests and powerful AI-based techniques to provide a ‘tsunami-like’ early warning system for new disease outbreaks.

“Since the beginning of the pandemic I have been developing AI-based methods to aid in medical decision making for COVID-19 patients, starting with analysis of Chest X-ray data,” said Roberts, who is affiliated with DAMTP and the Cambridge Mathematics of Information in Healthcare (CMIH) Hub. “Echoing the observations made by the clinical teams, we saw profound and unique differences in the medical measurements of infected individuals, particularly in their full blood count data. It is these changes that we can train models to detect at scale.”

Unlike many current test methods, their approach doesn't require any prior knowledge of a specific pathogen to work, instead, they use full blood count data to exploit the pathogen detecting abilities of the human immune system by observing changes in the blood measurements associated with infection.

As the full blood count is the world’s most common medical laboratory test, with over 3.6 billion being performed worldwide each year, the BloodCounts! team can rapidly apply their methods to scan for abnormal changes in the blood cells of large populations - alerting public health agencies to potential outbreaks of pathogen infection.

This solution is a demonstration of how the application of AI-based methods can lead to healthcare benefits. It also highlights the importance of strong collaboration between leading organisations, as the development of these algorithms was only possible due the EpiCov data sharing initiative pioneered by Cambridge University Hospitals. 

“Hundreds of millions of full blood count tests are being performed every day worldwide, and this meant that we could apply our AI methods at population scale,” said Gleadall, from the University of Cambridge and NHS Blood and Transplant. “Usually the rich measurement data are discarded after summary results have been reported, but by working with Cambridge University, Barts Health London, and University College London NHS Hospitals we have rescued throughout the pandemic the rich data from 2.8 million full blood count tests.”

The Sentinel Forecasting System is the other second-prize winner, and will explore the emergence of new infectious diseases in West Africa, beginning with Lassa fever. The system will combine data from ecology, social science, genomics and epidemiology to provide real-time disease risk for haemorrhagic fevers, such as Lassa and Ebola.

Lassa is a virus usually passed to humans through exposure to food or household items contaminated by infected rats. It is endemic in West African countries including Benin, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Mali, Sierra Leone, Togo and Nigeria.

Around 80% of people who become infected with Lassa virus have no symptoms, and the overall case-fatality rate is 1%. 1 in 5 infections can result in severe disease affecting the liver, spleen and kidneys.

The UCL team will partner with the African Centre of Excellence for Genomics of Infectious Diseases in Nigeria, Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, Zoological Society of London, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Microsoft, and Cambridge’s Laboratory of Viral Zoonotics (LVZ) to produce the system.

“This Trinity Challenge project brings new multidisciplinary technologies together to anticipate climatic, human, animal population, agricultural impacts on the likelihood of spill overs of infections from animals to humans,” said Professor Jonathan Heeney, who leads LVZ at Cambridge’s Department of Veterinary Medicine.

Additionally, five 3rd prize winners are each being awarded £480,000 (US$ 660,000) in pledged funding.

Dame Sally Davies said: “It was crystal clear at the beginning of this pandemic that the world had a lack of data, a lack of access to data, and a lack of interoperability of data, presenting a challenge. While others talked, we took action. The solutions we have discovered in the course of the Challenge will be a link between systems and countries.”

In addition to financial support, The Trinity Challenge will provide connections to the right organisations to maximise the impact of these solutions. Since its inception nine months ago, TTC has united early applicants with partners from the private, academic and social sectors to receive access to digital platforms, data, and technical advice, to scale-up the use of data and analytics to protect the world from future health emergencies. The Trinity Challenge has helped form over 200 connections between applicants and its members.

The findings are reported by a team at the University of Cambridge and Cambridge University Hospitals (CUH) NHS Foundation Trust. The research has not yet been peer-reviewed, but is being released early because of the urgent need to share information relating to the pandemic.

Until recently UK Infection Protection Control guidance recommended that healthcare workers caring for patients with COVID-19 should use fluid resistant surgical masks type IIR (FRSMs) as respiratory protective equipment; if aerosol-generating procedures were being carried out (for example inserting a breathing tube into the patient’s windpipe), then the guidance recommended the use of an FFP3 respirator. The guidance has recently been updated to oblige NHS organisations to assess the risk that COVID-19 poses to staff and provide FFP3 respirators where appropriate.

Since the start of the pandemic, CUH has been screening its healthcare workers regularly for SARS-CoV-2, even where they show no symptoms. They found that healthcare workers caring for patients with COVID-19 were at a greater risk of infection than staff on non-COVID-19 wards, even when using the recommended respiratory protective equipment. As a result, its infection control committee implemented a change in respiratory protective equipment for staff on COVID-19 wards, from FRSMs to FFP3 respirators.

Prior to the change in respiratory protective equipment, cases were higher on COVID-19 wards compared with non-COVID-19 wards in seven out of the eight weeks analysed by the team. Following the change in protective equipment, the incidence of infection on the two types of ward was similar.

The results suggest that almost all cases among healthcare workers on non-COVID-19 wards were caused by community-acquired infection, whereas cases among healthcare workers on COVID-19 wards were caused by both community-acquired infection and direct, ward-based infection from patients with COVID-19 – but that these direct infections were effectively mitigated by the use of FFP3 respirators.

To calculate the risk of infection for healthcare workers working on COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 wards, the researchers developed a simple mathematical model.

Dr Mark Ferris from the University of Cambridge’s Occupational Health Service, one of the study’s authors, said: “Healthcare workers – particularly those working on COVID-19 wards – are much more likely to be exposed to coronavirus, so it’s important we understand the best ways of keeping them safe.

“Based on data collected during the second wave of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic in the UK, we developed a mathematical model to look at the risks faced by those staff dealing with COVID-19 patients on a day to day basis. This showed us the huge effect that using better PPE could have in reducing the risk to healthcare workers.”

According to their model, the risk of direct infection from working on a non-COVID-19 ward was low throughout the study period, and consistently lower than the risk of community-based exposure.

By contrast, the risk of direct infection from working on a COVID-19 ward before the change in respiratory protective equipment was considerably higher than the risk of community-based exposure: staff on COVID-19 wards were at 47 times greater risk of acquiring infection while on the ward than staff working on a non-COVID-19 ward.

Crucially, however, the model showed that the introduction of FFP3 respirators provided up to 100% protection against direct, ward-based COVID-19 infection.

Dr Chris Illingworth from the MRC Biostatistics Unit at the University of Cambridge, said: “Before the face masks were upgraded, the majority of infections among healthcare workers on the COVID-19 wards were likely due to direct exposure to patients with COVID-19.

“Once FFP3 respirators were introduced, the number of cases attributed to exposure on COVID-19 wards dropped dramatically – in fact, our model suggests that FFP3 respirators may have cut ward-based infection to zero.”

Dr Nicholas Matheson from the Department of Medicine at the University of Cambridge, said: “Although more research will be needed to confirm our findings, we recommend that, in accordance with the precautionary principle, guidelines for respiratory protective equipment are further revised until more definitive information is available.”

Dr Michael Weekes from the Department of Medicine at the University of Cambridge, added: “Our data suggest there’s an urgent need to look at the PPE offered to healthcare workers on the frontline. Upgrading the equipment so that FFP3 masks are offered to all healthcare workers caring for patients with COVID-19 could reduce the number of infections, keep more hospital staff safe and remove some of the burden on already stretched healthcare services caused by absence of key staff due to illness. Vaccination is clearly also an absolute priority for anyone who hasn’t yet taken up their offer.”

The research was funded by Wellcome, the Addenbrooke’s Charitable Trust, UK Research and Innovations, and the NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre.

Reference
Ferris, M, Ferris, R et al. FFP3 respirators protect healthcare workers against infection with SARS-CoV-2. DOI: 10.22541/au.162454911.17263721/v1