Research Partnerships for Addressing Global Challenges: Opening Speech

Humankind today is challenged by numerous threats brought about by global change. Climate has been and is being modified by human activities, which calls for mitigation and adaptation measures at an unprecedented scale. Natural resources have been degraded by human development by means of land cover and land use changes, for which protective and restoration measures have to be taken by land users and governments in most countries of the North and South. Low levels of economic development and insufficient policies in most developing countries have led to widespread poverty, which affects nearly half of the world’s population and directly threatens almost one billion people. Finally, uncontrolled economic growth has increased disparities between and within populations and has led to widespread environmental problems in many nations. Generating and sharing knowledge is a key to addressing such global challenges. Knowledge can be used to develop the best solutions and to avoid or repair threats. Research partnerships have proven to be suitable means to bridge the divides and disparities between knowledge societies and developing countries, thereby reducing gaps. Research partnerships are tools for further capacity development and thereby lead to societal empowerment. Institutional settings allowing for research partnerships are needed both in the North and the South, so that the different networks can work together in a long-term enabling environment.

Common Social Work Education Standards in the Nordic Countries - opening an issue

The article analyses the option of common Nordic Standards for social work education in these countries. The option is viewed through the lens of trends in education in the different countries. In the article the notion of an Integrated Field Model is used to indicate the starting point for a common model of education. This model covers the field characteristics of Denmark and Norway and their current move towards a more research-based education. It also covers the research characteristics of education in Finland, Iceland and Sweden and their current move towards a new field connection based on research-oriented education. Some thoughts on international requirements on comparability and compatibility in this setting are addressed in the final section.

Open Data and Earth Observations The Case of Opening Up Access to and Use of Earth Observation Data Through the Global Earth Observation System of Systems

Earth observations (EO) represent a growing and valuable resource for many scientific, research and practical applications carried out by users around the world. Access to EO data for some applications or activities, like climate change research or emergency response activities, becomes indispensable for their success. However, often EO data or products made of them are (or are claimed to be) subject to intellectual property law protection and are licensed under specific conditions regarding access and use. Restrictive conditions on data use can be prohibitive for further work with the data. Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS) is an initiative led by the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) with the aim to provide coordinated, comprehensive, and sustained EO and information for making informed decisions in various areas beneficial to societies, their functioning and development. It seeks to share data with users world-wide with the fewest possible restrictions on their use by implementing GEOSS Data Sharing Principles adopted by GEO. The Principles proclaim full and open exchange of data shared within GEOSS, while recognising relevant international instruments and national policies and legislation through which restrictions on the use of data may be imposed.The paper focuses on the issue of the legal interoperability of data that are shared with varying restrictions on use with the aim to explore the options of making data interoperable. The main question it addresses is whether the public domain or its equivalents represent the best mechanism to ensure legal interoperability of data. To this end, the paper analyses legal protection regimes and their norms applicable to EO data. Based on the findings, it highlights the existing public law statutory, regulatory, and policy approaches, as well as private law instruments, such as waivers, licenses and contracts, that may be used to place the datasets in the public domain, or otherwise make them publicly available for use and re-use without restrictions. It uses GEOSS and the particular characteristics of it as a system to identify the ways to reconcile the vast possibilities it provides through sharing of data from various sources and jurisdictions on the one hand, and the restrictions on the use of the shared resources on the other. On a more general level the paper seeks to draw attention to the obstacles and potential regulatory solutions for sharing factual or research data for the purposes that go beyond research and education.

Irrigated-tip catheter ablation of intraatrial reentrant tachycardia in patients late after surgery of congenital heart disease.

OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to evaluate irrigated-tip catheter for ablation of intraatrial reentrant tachycardias late after surgical repair of congenital heart disease. BACKGROUND In congenital heart disease patients, the right atrium can be markedly enlarged with areas of low blood flow. Radiofrequency (RF) lesion creation may be hampered by insufficient electrode cooling at sites with low blood flow. METHODS Thirty-six consecutive patients with intraatrial reentrant tachycardia refractory to antiarrhythmic therapy from two centers were included in the study. Entrainment pacing and electroanatomic mapping (CARTO) were used to delineate reentrant circuits and critical isthmus sites. RF ablation was performed using an irrigated-tip catheter (Navistar Thermocool). RESULTS Fifty-two intraatrial reentrant tachycardia circuits were identified, and 48 were targeted with RF ablation. RF ablation was performed using a mean of 13 +/- 11 irrigated RF applications per tachycardia isthmus with a mean power of 36 +/- 8 W. In a historical control group of congenital heart disease patients managed with conventional catheter ablation, the number of lesions per isthmus was higher (23 +/- 11) and mean power was lower (27 +/- 14 W). Acute success was achieved in 45 intraatrial reentrant tachycardias (94% of targeted tachycardias and 87% of all tachycardias). After a mean follow-up of 17 +/- 7 months, 33 (92%) of 36 patients were free of recurrence. Five patients (14%) developed paroxysmal atrial fibrillation. CONCLUSIONS The combination of modern techniques including electroanatomic mapping and catheter irrigation allows safe and highly effective ablation of intraatrial reentrant tachycardia in patients with surgically repaired congenital heart disease.

Changing climates, moving people: framing migration, displacement and planned relocation

Different policies are required for different types of human mobility related to climatic changes. Hence, it is necessary to distinguish between migration, displacement and planned relocation in climate policy and operations. The purpose of this Policy Brief is to help distinguish between human migration, displacement and planned relocation and present state-of-the-art thinking about some of the key issues related to addressing these in the context of climate policy.

Internal displacement and the Kampala Convention: an opportunity for development actors

According to the African Union (AU), Africa is "a continent disproportionately affected by internal displacement". The African region, with almost 10 million people internally displaced in 22 countries by armed conflict and other forms of violence, hosts more than one third of the 26.4 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) worldwide at the end of 2011. Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Somalia rank globally among the states with the five biggest displacement situations. Even in African countries with smaller figures, very large percentages of people may be in displacement in regions primarily affected by violence. Such violence has multiple causes, including the long-lasting consequences of colonial heritage, outside intervention, crises of identity in multi-ethnic countries and conflicts over resources. Today, political exclusion and inequality between ethnic, regional or religious groups are particularly important drivers of violence.

Male-male competition and nuptial-colour displacement as a diversifying force in Lake Victoria cichlid fishes

We propose a new mechanism for diversification of male nuptial–colour patterns in the rapidly speciating cichlid fishes of Lake Victoria. Sympatric closely related species often display nuptial colours at opposite ends of the spectrum with males either blue or yellow to red. Colour polymorphisms within single populations are common too. We propose that competition between males for breeding sites promotes such colour diversification, and thereby speciation. We hypothesize that male aggression is primarily directed towards males of the common colour, and that rare colour morphs enjoy a negatively frequency–dependent fitness advantage. We test our hypothesis with a large dataset on the distributions and nuptial colorations of 52 species on 47 habitat islands in Lake Victoria, and with a smaller dataset on the within–spawning–site distributions of males with different coloration. We report that territories of males of the same colour are negatively associated on the spawning site, and that the distribution of closely related species over habitat islands is determined by nuptial coloration in the fashion predicted by our hypothesis. Whereas among unrelated species those with similar nuptial colour are positively associated, among closely related species those with similar colour are negatively associated and those with different colour are positively associated. This implies that negatively frequency–dependent selection on nuptial coloration among closely related species is a sufficiently strong force to override other effects on species distributions. We suggest that male–male competition is an important and previously neglected agent of diversification among haplochromine cichlid fishes.

Behavioral and psychosocial factors associated with sexual risk in a population of crack cocaine users

The purpose of this dissertation was to examine the relationship between key psychosocial and behavioral components of the Transtheoretical Model and the Theory of Reasoned Action for sexual risk reduction in a population of crack cocaine smokers and sex workers, not in drug treatment. ^ The first study examined the results of an analysis of the association between two principal constructs in the Transtheoretical Model, the processes of change and the stages of change for condom use, in a high risk population. In the analysis of variance for all respondents, the overall F-test revealed that people in different stages have different levels of experiential process use, F(3,317) = 17.79, p = 0.0001 and different levels of behavioral process use, F(3,317) = 28.59, p = .0001. For the experiential processes, there was a significant difference between the precontemplation/contemplation stage, and both the action, and maintenance, stages.^ The second study explored the relationship between the Theory of Reasoned Action “beliefs” and the stages-of-change in the same population. In the analysis of variance for all participants, the results indicate that people in different stages did value the positive beliefs differently, F(3,502) = 15.38, p = .0001 but did not value the negative beliefs differently, F(3,502) = 2.08, p = .10. ^ The third study explored differences in stage-of-change by gender, partner type drug use, and HIV status. Three discriminant functions emerged, with a combined χ2(12) = 139.57, p = <.0001. The loading matrix of correlations between predictors and discriminant functions demonstrate that the strongest predictor for distinguishing between the precontemplation/contemplation stage and the preparation, action, and maintenance stages (first function) is partner type (.962). The loadings on the second discriminant function suggest that once partner type has been accounted for, ever having HIV/AIDS (.935) was the best predictor for distinguishing between the first three stages and the maintenance stage. ^ These studies demonstrate that behavioral change theories can contribute important insight to researchers and program planners attempting to alter HIV risk behavior in high-risk populations. ^