Human wellbeing on a finite planet towards 2100: new study shows humanity at a crossroads
Peer-Reviewed Publication
Updates every hour. Last Updated: 11-Jul-2025 14:10 ET (11-Jul-2025 18:10 GMT/UTC)
Can cities continue to grow without destroying the planet? A new study from the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (ICTA-UAB), Spain, offers insight into this complex issue. While there is no general answer to the question of whether sustainable urban growth is possible, as it depends on local physical conditions and development levels, what is clear is that continued urban growth is not desirable everywhere. More sustainability will require rigorous planning, effective governance, and a critical reassessment of dominant development narratives.
New research shows that the more we interact with robots, the more human we perceive them to become.
The team carried out a series of experiments with a box-shaped robot called Cozmo. They found that playing games with this little robot to ‘break the ice’ helped bring out its human side.
The implications are significant for the future of robotics. As robots take on roles from care-giving to customer service, designing interactions that promote social engagement could make them more acceptable to humans.
In a Policy Forum, Erin Sorrell and colleagues – a coalition of virologists, veterinarians, and health security experts – argue that the recent proposal to permit the uncontrolled spread of highly pathogenic avian influence (HPAI) among U.S. poultry to identify birds that survive infection is dangerous and unethical. “Allowing a highly lethal, rapidly evolving, and contagious virus to run a natural course of infection in poultry would lead to unnecessary suffering of poultry and put other susceptible animals on and near affected farms at risk,” write Sorrell et al. “It would prolong exposure for farmworkers, which could increase viral adaptation and transmission risks for poultry, other peridomestic animals, and humans.” Since January 2022, over 173 million birds in the U.S. have been infected with highly HPAI. However, despite the risks, key high-ranking federal officials, including Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. and USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins, have suggested allowing HPAI to spread unchecked in poultry flocks to identify and preserve naturally resistant birds.
Here, Sorrell et al. critically evaluate the implications of the proposed strategy. According to the authors, allowing the virus to circulate freely in poultry flocks increases the risk of viral adaptation, which could create long-term reservoirs of infection that raises the risk of a future pandemic with serious public health consequences. The proposal may also have serious economic and food security implications. Poultry and eggs are vital, affordable sources of protein for Americans, and widespread infection would reduce production, increase prices, and disrupt access. Moreover, it could cost billions in animal losses and destabilize trade via global policies restricting the imports of U.S. poultry products. Rural communities would suffer disproportionately, facing economic ripple effects across farms, feed suppliers, processors, and transport networks. Instead of pursuing a high-risk "let-it-spread" strategy, Sorrell et al. suggest that public health and agricultural agencies need to reinforce surveillance, improve outbreak response, and adopt new science-based tools to reduce spillover risks and protect both public and ecological health. “The US is not prepared for uncontrolled spread of H5 in avian species – let alone in mammalian or human hosts,” write the authors. “If this policy is enacted, it will need to be rolled back in favor of collaborative, on-the-ground, and real-time implementation science.”
Texas A&M Engineering joined leading universities in OpenAI’s NexGenAI consortium to foster tech-driven literacy.
Ship traffic in shallow areas, such as ports, can trigger large methane emissions by just moving through the water. The researchers in a study, led by Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden, observed twenty times higher methane emissions in the shipping lane compared to nearby undisturbed areas. Despite the fact that methane is a greenhouse gas that is 27 times as powerful as carbon dioxide, these emissions are often overlooked with today's measurement methods.
"Our measurements show that ship passages trigger clear pulses of high methane fluxes from the water to the atmosphere. This is caused by pressure changes and mixing of the water mass. Even if the pulses are short, the total amount during a day is significant," says Amanda Nylund, researcher at Chalmers University of Technology and the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, SMHI.