Emerging Technologies: Innovation, Demassification, Effectiveness, Revolutions In Military Affairs

While emerging technologies are generally incipient technologies, still under development, whose competitive impact is expected to be quite high and may have long-term strategic significance, by replacing current technologies with the potential to become key technologies, “emerging destructive technologies”designates the set of emerging technologies that are meant to be destructive and be used as methods, systems and techniques specific to war. And, since the great powers do not seem too willing to bury the hatchett of war, but use it in all geopolitical discourses, the destructive component of emerging technologies has become a catalyst for the innovative efforts of companies and states, which leave open great prospects for success in the lucrative business. The practice of emerging technologies so far has led to a change in the paradigm of warfare for many countries, to the conduct of remote warfare, to simultaneous and rather complicated hybrid actions, to the transformation of radio and television into modern instruments of psychological warfare. Emerging technologies with a destructive role are in the process of triggering new revolutions in the field of military affairs, resulting in the privatization of quality ideas incorporated in the means of combat, but also to dominate the market competition. Emerging technologies with a destructive effect propose for political decision makers: the decrease of human density on the battlefield, a modular articulated army with the possibility of ad-hoc summoning, a modern vision of the super-soldier, robotization and miniaturization of combat technique.

Human density is associated with the increased prevalence of a generalist zoonotic parasite in mammalian wildlife

Macroecological approaches can provide valuable insight into the epidemiology of globally distributed, multi-host pathogens. Toxoplasma gondii is a zoonotic protozoan that infects any warm-blooded animal, including humans, in almost every ecosystem worldwide. There is substantial geographical variation in T. gondii prevalence in wildlife populations and the mechanisms driving this variation are poorly understood. We implemented Bayesian phylogenetic mixed models to determine the association between species’ ecology, phylogeny and climatic and anthropogenic factors on T. gondii prevalence. Toxoplasma gondii prevalence data were compiled for free-ranging wild mammal species from 202 published studies, encompassing 45 079 individuals from 54 taxonomic families and 238 species. We found that T. gondii prevalence was positively associated with human population density and warmer temperatures at the sampling location. Terrestrial species had a lower overall prevalence, but there were no consistent patterns between trophic level and prevalence. The relationship between human density and T. gondii prevalence is probably mediated by higher domestic cat abundance and landscape degradation leading to increased environmental oocyst contamination. Landscape restoration and limiting free-roaming in domestic cats could synergistically increase the resiliency of wildlife populations and reduce wildlife and human infection risks from one of the world's most common parasitic infections.

Semantic-Linked Data Ontologies for Indoor Navigation System in Response to COVID-19

Indoor navigation has become more important these days due to the current situation worldwide in the aftermath of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, posing an unparalleled threat amounting to a humanitarian crisis on a global scale. Indoor navigation employs a variety of technologies, including Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and RFID. Support for these technologies requires accurate information and appropriate processing and modeling to help and direct users of the optimal route to desired destinations and to monitor crowd density in order to maintain social distancing. This research will present a semantic indoor ontology model for indoor navigation and the reduction of human density in indoor space to ensure social distancing and prevent transmission. The proposed system is based on semantic representations of the components of navigation paths which, in turn, enable reasoning functionality. Despite the system’s complexity, the evaluation revealed that it functions well.

Infrastructure of life: public address, listening and crowds in the Delhi metro and Kumbh

Through an ethnographic study of the Delhi metro and Kumbh fair, this article explores the public address system as an infrastructure of life in urban India. Amplified sound is the singular means to address crowds during emergencies which makes it significant for understanding mass mediation and public safety. Since millions of people travel in the Delhi metro every day, and the Kumbh fair is the largest human gathering in the world, human density and scale as a predominant Southern reality is the premise of this research. It offers an intersubjective understanding of crowds through empathy and care, and reveals the life-saving potentiality of infrastructures when the masses are at risk.

Men and wolves: are anthropogenic causes the main driver of wolf mortality in human-dominated landscapes in Italy?

Over the last 40 years the gray wolf (Canis lupus) re-colonized its historical range in Italy increasing human-predator interactions. However, temporal and spatial trends in wolf mortality, including direct and indirect persecution, were never summarized. This study aims to fill this gap by focusing on the situation of Tuscany and Emilia-Romagna regions, believed to host a significant proportion of the Italian wolf population, by: (i) identifying the prevalent causes of wolf mortality, (ii) summarizing their temporal and spatial patterns and (iii) applying spatially-explicit Generalized Linear Models to predict wolf persecution. Between October 2005 and February 2021, 212 wolf carcasses were collected and subjected to necropsy, being involved in collisions with vehicles (n = 104), poisoned (n = 45), wounded with gunshot (n = 24) or blunt objects (n = 4) and being hanged (n = 2). The proportion of illegally killed wolves did not increase through time. Most persecution events occurred between October and February. None of our candidate models outperformed a null model and covariates such as the density of sheep farms, number of predations on livestock, or human density were never associated to the probability of having illegally killed wolves, at the municipal scale. Our findings show that conventional correlates of wolf persecution, combined with a supposedly high proportion of non-retrieved carcasses, fail to predict illegal wolf killings in areas where the species have become ubiquitous. The widespread spatial distribution of illegal killings indicates that persecution probably arises from multiple kinds of conflicts with humans, beyond those with husbandry. Wolf conservation in Italy should thus address cryptic wolf killings with multi-disciplinary approaches, such as shared national protocols, socio-ecological studies, the support of experts’ experience and effective sampling schemes for the detection of carcasses.

Estimation and Optimal Control of the Multiscale Dynamics of Covid-19: A Case Study From Cameroon

This work aims at a better understanding and the optimal control of the spread of the new severe acute respiratory corona virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). We first propose a multi-scale model giving insights on the virus population dynamics, the transmission process and the infection mechanism. We consider 10 compartments in the human population in order to take into accounts the effects of different specific mitigation policies. The population of viruses is also partitioned into 10 compartments corresponding respectively to each of the first nine human population compartments and the free viruses available in the environment. We show the global stability of the disease free equilibrium if a given threshold T0 is less or equal to 1 and we provide how to compute the basic reproduction number R0. A convergence index T1 is also defined in order to estimate the speed at which the disease extincts and an upper bound to the time of extinction is given. The existence of the endemic equilibrium is conditional and its description is provided. We evaluate the sensitivity of R0, T0 and T1 to control parameters such as the maximal human density allowed per unit of surface, the rate of disinfection both for people and environment, the mobility probability, the wearing mask probability or efficiency, and the human to human contact rate which results from the previous one. According to a functional cost taking into consideration economic impacts of SARS-CoV-2, we determine and discuss optimal fighting strategies. The study is applied to available data from Cameroon.

Geographic patterns of seed trait variation in an invasive species: how much can close populations differ?

Seeds play a major role in plant species persistence and expansion, and therefore they are essential when modeling species dynamics. However, homogeneity in seed traits is generally assumed, underestimating intraspecific trait variability across the geographic space, which might bias species success models. The aim of this study was to evaluate the existence and consequences of interpopulation variability in seed traits of the invasive species Carpobrotus edulis at different geographical scales. We measured seed production, morphology, vigour and longevity of nine populations of C. edulis along the Catalan coast (NE Spain) from three differentiated zones with a human presence gradient. Geographic distances between populations were contrasted against individual and multivariate trait distances to explore trait variation along the territory, evaluating the role of bioclimatic variables and human density of the different zones. The analysis revealed high interpopulation variability that was not explained by geographic distance, as regardless of the little distance between some populations (< 0.5 km), significant differences were found in several seed traits. Seed production, germination, and persistence traits showed the strongest spatial variability up to 6000% of percent trait variability between populations, leading to differentiated C. edulis soil seed bank dynamics at small distances, which may demand differentiated strategies for a cost-effective species management. Seed trait variability was influenced by human density but also bioclimatic conditions, suggesting a potential impact of increased anthropogenic pressure and climate shifts. Geographic interpopulation trait variation should be included in ecological models and will be important for assessing species responses to environmental heterogeneity and change.

Estimation and optimal control of the multi-scale dynamics of the Covid-19

This work aims at a better understanding and the optimal control of the spread of the new severe acute respiratory corona virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). We first propose a multi-scale model giving insights on the virus population dynamics, the transmission process and the infection mechanism. We consider 10 compartments in the human population in order to take into accounts the effects of different specific mitigation policies. The population of viruses is also partitioned into 10 compartments corresponding respectively to each of the first nine human population compartments and the free viruses available in the environment. We show the global stability of the disease free equilibrium if a given threshold T_0 is less or equal to 1 and we provide how to compute the basic reproduction number R_0. A convergence index T_1 is also defined in order to estimate the speed at which the disease extincts and an upper bound to the time of extinction is given. The existence of the endemic equilibrium is conditional and its description is provided. We evaluate the sensitivity of R_0, T_0 and T_1 to control parameters such as the maximal human density allowed per unit of surface, the rate of disinfection both for people and environment, the mobility probability, the wearing mask probability or efficiency, and the human to human contact rate which results from the previous one. Except the maximal human density allowed per unit of surface, all those parameters have significant effects on the qualitative dynamics of the disease. The most significant is the probability of wearing mask followed by the probability of mobility and the disinfection rate. According to a functional cost taking into consideration economic impacts of SARS-CoV-2, we determine and discuss optimal fighting strategies. The study is applied to real available data from Cameroon and an estimation of model parameters is done. After several simulations, social distancing and the disinfection frequency appear as the main elements of the optimal control strategy.

Estimation and optimal control of the multi-scale dynamics of the Covid-19

This work aims at a better understanding and the optimal control of the spread of the new severe acute respiratory corona virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). We first propose a multi-scale model giving insights on the virus population dynamics, the transmission process and the infection mechanism. We consider 10 compartments in the human population in order to take into accounts the effects of different specific mitigation policies: susceptible, infected, infectious, quarantined, hospitalized, treated, recovered, non-infectious dead, infectious dead, buried. The population of viruses is also partitioned into 10 compartments corresponding respectively to each of the first nine human population compartments and the free viruses available in the environment. Indeed, we have human to human virus transmission, human to environment virus transmission, environment to human virus transmission and self infection by susceptible individuals. We show the global stability of the disease free equilibrium if a given threshold 𝒯0 is less or equal to 1 and we provide how to compute the basic reproduction number ℛ0. A convergence index 𝒯1 is also defined in order to estimate the speed at which the disease extincts and an upper bound to the time of extinction is given. The existence of the endemic equilibrium is conditional and its description is provided. We evaluate the sensitivity of ℛ0, 𝒯0 and 𝒯1 to control parameters such as the maximal human density allowed per unit of surface, the rate of disinfection both for people and environment, the mobility probability, the wearing mask probability or efficiency, and the human to human contact rate which results from the previous one. Except the maximal human density allowed per unit of surface, all those parameters have significant effects on the qualitative dynamics of the disease. The most significant is the probability of wearing mask followed by the probability of mobility and the disinfection rate. According to a functional cost taking into consideration economic impacts of SARS-CoV-2, we determine and discuss optimal fighting strategies. The study is applied to real available data from Cameroon and an estimation of model parameters is done. After several simulations, social distancing and the disinfection frequency appear as the main elements of the optimal control strategy.