Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland

The federal government’s announcement of a A$600 million rescue package for Glencore’s copper smelting and refining operations in Mount Isa and Townsville marks a definitive shift in Australia’s industry policy.

The announcement follows the $2.4 billion rescue of the Whyalla steelworks, and a smaller assistance package for metals smelter Nyrstar.

At the time it was announced, the Whyalla rescue could be seen as a one-off special case. The steelworks’ owner, Sanjeev Gupta, had run into financial difficulties associated with the collapse of its major financier, Greensill Capital. The rescue plan included support for a transition from unsustainable blast furnace technology to “green steel”, though this remains problematic.

By contrast, Swiss giant Glencore is a highly profitable corporation that has made a business decision to close its copper operations. The bailout will keep those operations going for three years, after which the same issue will likely re-emerge.

In combination with the Nyrstar bailout, we now see an expectation that federal and state governments will undertake such rescues regularly, on a 50-50 cost-sharing basis.

A final break with neoliberalism

This shift marks a final break with the policy framework (variously called “neoliberalism” or “economic rationalism”) under which intervention of this kind was seen as an undesirable “distortion” of the market, to be undertaken only in emergencies, if at all. The underlying assumption was that market signals would yield the most efficient allocation of resources.

This shift is not occurring in isolation. Neoliberal ideas have been in retreat since the global financial crisis of 2008.

China has presented its own, state-led model as a superior alternative, and has sought to use control of “critical minerals” as an instrument of geopolitical strategy. Its plan last week to tighten export controls on critical minerals sparked an angry response from US President Donald Trump, who threatened to impose 100% tariffs on China in retaliation.

The US has been backing away from free-trade ideas since the election of the first Trump administration in 2016, and has now abandoned them altogether.

More questions than answers

But it is one thing to abandon the dogmas of neoliberalism. It is quite another to develop a coherent alternative.

A framework that includes bailouts of mineral processing operations as a routine policy tool raises some major questions.

• What are the criteria for such a bailout?
• What, if anything, should the public receive in return?
• What (presumably) unintended consequences arise if failing operations receive assistance, while their competitors do not?

In the light of recent policy discussions, it might seem sensible to focus on minerals deemed “critical” in the context of digital technology and the clean energy transition. Australia maintains a list of these minerals.

However, the recent rescues have been for minerals (iron, lead, zinc and copper) not on this list, although both zinc and copper are classed as as “strategic”.

Looking at evidence from the United States, United Kingdom and European Union, as well as Australia, is unhelpful, as it expands the list of minerals considered “critical” in at least one major jurisdiction to well over 50 elements. Only a handful of naturally occurring metals (including silver, cadmium, gold, mercury and technetium) fail to make at least one of these lists.

Tough choices need to be made

If we are to have a policy based on strategic support of mineral smelting, we will need a much more stringent test, and some hard choices as to which minerals really matter.

In particular, do the aluminium smelters established with substantial government support in the 1980s merit a renewed round in the face of sustained oversupply? Or should we let the US industry, now protected by high tariffs, take the burden of challenging China’s dominance?

Mining giant Rio Tinto is currently in talks with the federal and New South Wales governments to avert the shutdown of the nation’s largest aluminium smelter in the Hunter region. There is also concern the accelerated retirement of the Gladstone power station may imperil Rio Tinto’s Boyne smelter.

The provision of assistance to highly profitable companies such as Glencore and Rio Tinto raises further questions. For example, should such assistance require a return to the public, such as the government taking an equity stake in the company concerned?

Alternatively, we might consider that assistance for mineral processing only makes sense if the minerals in question will one day be more scarce and costly than they are now.

Should we set an advance requirement for a higher return to the public in periods of high prices, as Queensland has done with coal?

Finally, should strategic efforts of this kind be coordinated with allies, and if so, which allies? In the past, it would have been natural to line up with the US against the possibility of trade coercion from China. But now, at least in trade policy, the US is more adversary than ally.

We need to explore regional partnerships with friendly neighbours such as Indonesia and (slightly further afield) South Africa.

Like it or not, the days of free-market trade policy and a rules-based international order are over. If we are not to stumble on with ad hoc bailouts, Australia needs a new strategic vision.

John Quiggin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. If government bailouts of companies are the new normal, we need a better strategic vision – https://theconversation.com/if-government-bailouts-of-companies-are-the-new-normal-we-need-a-better-strategic-vision-267111

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tara Djokic, Scientific Officer, Palaeontology, Australian Museum; UNSW Sydney

Hidden beneath farmland in the central tablelands of New South Wales lies one of Australia’s most extraordinary fossil sites – McGraths Flat. It dates back between 11 million and 16 million years into the Miocene epoch, a time when many of today’s familiar plants and animals evolved.

It is here that palaentologists and geologists from the Australian Museum Research Institute have made remarkable fossil discoveries. Where dust and drought now dominate, a lush rainforest once flourished. In stunning ecological detail, fossils at McGraths Flat reveal this ancient ecosystem.

Strikingly red in appearance, the sedimentary rocks here are composed entirely of goethite – a fine-grained mineral that contains iron. This iron has preserved a range of plants, insects, spiders, fish and feathers with exceptional detail.

Our new study, published in the journal Gondwana Research, shows there’s another reason these rocks are so intriguing. They fundamentally challenge ideas about where well-preserved fossil sites on Earth can be found, and why.

Beyond shale and sandstone

Traditionally, the most exceptionally well-preserved fossil sites are from rocks dominated by shale, sandstone, limestone, or volcanic ash.

Consider Germany’s Messel Pit or Canada’s Burgess Shale. At these sites, organisms were rapidly buried in fine-grained sediments, allowing the exceptional preservation of soft tissues, not just hard parts.

Messel Pit has preserved roughly 47 million-year-old fossils showing the outlines of feathers, fur and skin. Meanwhile, the Burgess Shale contains soft tissues from some of Earth’s earliest animal life, dating back about 500 million years.

By contrast, sedimentary rocks made entirely of iron are the last place you’d expect to find well-preserved remains of land-based (terrestrial) animal and plant life.

That’s because iron-rich sedimentary rocks are predominantly known from banded iron formations. These massive iron deposits largely formed around 2.5 billion years ago in Earth’s ancient oxygen-depleted oceans, long before complex animal and plant life evolved.

In more recent history, iron is considered a mere weathering product, forming rust on the continents when exposed to our oxygen-rich atmosphere. Just look at Australia’s iconic red-rocked outback landscape that preserves these million- to billion-year-old features.

Yet the discovery of McGraths Flat has defied these expectations.

Terrestrial life entombed in iron

McGraths Flat is made from a very fine-grained, iron-rich rock called ferricrete. It’s essentially a cement made from iron.

The ferricrete consists almost entirely of microscopic iron-oxyhydroxide mineral particles, each just 0.005 millimetres across. When an animal died and was buried in the sediment, this minute scale is what allowed the iron particles to fill every cell. The result? Extraordinarily well-preserved soft tissue fossils.

Compared with marine life, fossil sites preserving terrestrial life are notoriously rare. Terrestrial sites that preserve soft tissues? Even rarer. The exceptional detail captured in the McGraths Flat fossils reveals new snapshots of past life we don’t often get to find.

These fossils are so perfectly preserved that individual pigment cells in fish eyes, internal organs of insects and fish, and even delicate spider hairs and nerve cells can be seen.

This level of preservation rivals other well-preserved fossil sites, such as those consisting of shale or sandstone. Except here, they are entombed in iron.

How did McGraths Flat form?

Our new study sheds light on how this fossil site came to be – a crucial step for finding similar terrestrial fossil troves in iron.

McGraths Flat began forming during the Miocene when iron leached from weathering basalt under warm, wet rainforest conditions.

Acidic groundwater then carried the dissolved iron underground until it reached a river system with an oxbow lake – an abandoned river channel. There, the iron became ultra-fine iron-oxyhydroxide sediment.

It rapidly coated dead organisms on the lake floor and replicated their soft tissue structures down to the cellular level.

A new fossil roadmap

Understanding how McGraths Flat formed could provide a roadmap for finding similar iron-rich fossil sites worldwide.

Key features to look for include very fine-grained and finely layered ferricrete in areas where:

• ancient river channels cut through older iron-rich landscapes, such as basaltic rocks from volcanoes

• ancient warm, humid conditions once promoted intense weathering, and

• the surrounding geology lacks significant limestone or sulphur-containing minerals (such as pyrite), because these could interfere with the formation of the iron-oxyhydroxide mineral sediments.

The red rocks of McGraths Flat open an entirely new chapter in our understanding of how exceptionally well-preserved fossil sites can form.

The next breakthrough in understanding ancient terrestrial life might not come from traditional shale or sandstone fossil beds, but from rusty-red rocks hidden beneath our feet.

The study’s authors acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land and waterways on which McGraths Flat is located, the Wiradjuri Nation people.

Tara Djokic and co-authors received funding for this research from the Etheridge family descendants; Australian Museum Research Institute, Australian Museum Trust; and Australian Research Council (ARC). We acknowledge the scientific and technical assistance of Microscopy Australia, especially from the Centre for Advanced Microscopy, ANU (jointly funded by the ANU and the Australian Federal Government).
Tara is affiliated with the not-for-profit organisation Women in Earth and Environmental Sciences Australasia (WOMEESA).

– ref. Unusual red rocks in Australia are rewriting the rules on exceptional fossil sites – https://theconversation.com/unusual-red-rocks-in-australia-are-rewriting-the-rules-on-exceptional-fossil-sites-266904

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Matt McDonald, Professor of International Relations, The University of Queensland

In his rambling speech to the United Nations last month, United States President Donald Trump described climate change as “the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world”.

Of course, this claim was unfounded, ignoring the overwhelming scientific evidence that climate change is occurring.

It was also unlikely to convince gathered dignitaries, who appeared bemused by a speech better suited to a campaign rally than a presidential address to world leaders.

But coming on the eve of the crucial global COP30 climate talks in Brazil, the speech does raise the question: what does the second Trump administration mean mean for international climate action?

Trump digs coal

Beyond enabling climate denialists and disinformation peddlers, Trump has ultimately delivered on his campaign promise to aggressively support the US fossil fuel sector. In his words: “drill, baby, drill”. Or, more recently: “mine, baby, mine”.

Soon after his inauguration, Trump signed an executive order to withdraw the US from the Paris Agreement, the legally binding UN treaty aimed at limiting global temperature rise well below 2°C degrees over pre-industrial levels.

Last month, Trump announced a plan to open up 13 million acres of federal land for coal mining, and offered hundreds of millions in federal subsidies for coal projects.

He has ordered the removal of climate data from government sites and all but eliminated direct government funding for climate science research and monitoring.

And he has gutted the Inflation Reduction Act, the signature climate initiative of the Biden administration that was designed to stimulate large-scale investment in renewable energy.

All told, Trump’s initiatives are likely to mean an additional 7 billion tonnes of emissions will be created compared to a scenario where the US met its Paris commitments.

This is bad news. But what implications will it have for international climate cooperation?

Dark clouds on the climate horizon

Clearly, 7 billion tonnes of additional emissions is a problem. By some accounts, this represents around one fifth of the global carbon budget if we are to keep to the Paris target of under 2°C.

And when the world’s most powerful state, largest economy and second-largest greenhouse gas emitter walks away from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC), it does not bode well for international climate action.

Of course this raises the question of how the Brazilian climate talks organisers can motivate states to adopt strong emissions targets when wealthy, high-emitting countries walk away. There is a real risk the US position takes the pressure off other high-emitting countries, such as the Gulf States and Russia, who are disproportionately responsible for the problem.

Finally, climate finance – financial resources used to support action on climate change – looms once again as a crucial issue at climate negotiations. Securing sufficient funding will be far more complicated given Trump’s “America First” platform, which prioritises foreign and domestic policies serving US interests.

Despite this, there are still grounds to be optimistic.

Leadership without the US

A first point in the case for cautious optimism is that global emissions have potentially peaked and are on the verge of decline for the first time since the Industrial Revolution.

This has been driven by unprecedented global investment in renewable energy. The energy market is changing rapidly despite aggressive US subsidies for the fossil fuel sector. Global energy investment is likely to top A$1.5 trillion in 2025. Meanwhile, coal, oil and natural gas will see the first decline in global investment since the COVID pandemic.

There are also signs other countries, like China, view the US position as an opportunity. Last month Beijing outlined a target for emissions reduction (7–10% by 2035) for the first time in its history. Even though China is still adding to its fleet of coal-fired power stations, it is also adding more solar and wind capacity than the rest of the world combined.

China may want to make a case for itself as a responsible global leader in contrast to the US. This could in turn advance China’s strategic interests in regions such as the Pacific which are acutely vulnerable to climate effects.

So far, there’s no evidence countries have used US backsliding as an excuse to pull back from international cooperation. No country has left the Paris agreement since Trump’s withdrawal.

In 2001, when the Bush administration signalled the US wouldn’t ratify the Kyoto Protocol, Australia’s Prime Minister John Howard soon followed suit.

But in 2025, only months after the US withdrew from Paris, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese outlined an increased emissions target.

Even at home, Trump’s position has not amounted to a death knell for climate action. California, whose governor Gavin Newsom famously parodied Trump’s communication style on social media, already oversees one of the world’s largest emissions trading schemes and has entered into a climate partnership with Brazil to further cooperation ahead of COP30.

All in all, there are grounds for cautious optimism, even hope, that the rest of the world might band together without US leadership.

Eyes on COP

Negotiators at next month’s COP30 talks will face formidable challenges which have only become more pressing as a result of the Trump administration’s climate stance.

But past experience suggests hard-fought COP negotiations can build strong momentum for global action by focusing international attention.

Perhaps they can build pressure on the US to come back into the fold, or at least enable pro-climate actors within the US to pursue reform despite President Trump’s interference.

Matt McDonald has received funding from the Australian Research Council and the Economic and Social Research Council in the UK.

– ref. Why Trump is not a death knell for global climate action – https://theconversation.com/why-trump-is-not-a-death-knell-for-global-climate-action-266350

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nick Fox, Researcher in Psychology, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa – Massey University

A lot of research has been dedicated to understanding what makes people believe in conspiracies – and how they might be able to climb out of the rabbit hole again.

Conspiracies do happen. The Watergate scandal in the 1970s, which led to the resignation of US President Richard Nixon, is arguably the most infamous example.
The questioning of authority and the official narrative is something that should be encouraged.

But some people believe conspiracy theories that are contrary to evidence. Recent research found 8.9% of New Zealand participants and 10.1% of Australian participants agreed with the (false) claim fluoride is being intentionally added to the water supply by the government to make people less intelligent and easier to control”.

What draws people to conspiracies like these?

One prominent theory is that conspiracy beliefs are linked to psychological distress such as anxiety and depression.

Our new research explores the causal relationship – whether psychological distress actually makes people more likely to believe in conspiracy theories. We found very limited evidence for a link between elevated distress and conspiracy beliefs.

What research suggests about conspiracy beliefs

The existential threat model of conspiracy theories suggests experiences of psychological distress can make people more likely to develop conspiracy beliefs because they search for explanations for distressing events.

This model argues distress actually worsens once a conspiracy belief is formed, creating a vicious cycle where distress breeds conspiracy belief which, in turn, generates more distress.

The model also suggests this belief is exacerbated when a despised outgroup (political elites, for example) becomes salient as people try to make sense of their experience.

However, few have rigorously tested this claim. While substantial evidence for a correlation between psychological distress and belief in conspiracy theories has been established, correlation does not imply a causal link.

Some analyses of longitudinal data haven’t found evidence to support the hypothesis. But no one has directly tested the claims of the existential threat model.

We set out to do this using a longitudinal survey.

A longitudinal study isn’t as conclusive as a true experiment but it can establish the sequence of cause and effect and rule out some alternative explanations for a relationship.

Our sample consisted of 995 participants with representatives groups from New Zealand, Australia and the United Kingdom. Each month from September 2022 to February 2023, we presented participants with a survey, including 11 conspiracy theories and common measures of anxiety, depression and stress. Each month we asked them about their level of agreement with the conspiracy theories, and their levels of psychological distress.

Prior to collecting the data, we specified our hypotheses in our research plan. These boiled down to the ideas that increased distress of different types (anxiety, depression, stress) will subsequently increase belief in conspiracy theories and that such beliefs will subsequently increase distress.

Rethinking the vicious cycle

We found very limited evidence for elevated distress subsequently increasing belief in conspiracy theories.

We also found no evidence to support the converse – that belief in conspiracy theories increases distress.

Our findings suggest beliefs in conspiracy theories may mostly reflect a relatively stable worldview rather than being driven by temporary changes in distress.

This matters because some researchers have suggested interventions that reduce stress could be used to help reduce conspiracy beliefs. However, if stress is not driving conspiracy beliefs, as our results suggest, this approach is unlikely to be effective.

We also found no evidence that conspiracy beliefs cause short-term distress. This challenges the common assumption that beliefs in conspiracy theories inherently cause harm to one’s mental health, particularly stress, anxiety and depression. That said, conspiracy beliefs could still cause harm in other ways – such as by contributing to the flow of misinformation.

Our research challenges the idea of a vicious cycle of conspiracy beliefs. It appears distress may not have a key role in making people “spiral” down the rabbit hole.

Interventions that foster an analytical mindset or include critical thinking skills may be more useful.

The following research is supported by the Marsden Fund, managed by the Royal Society Te Apārangi.

This study was supported by the Marsden Fund, managed by the Royal Society Te Apārangi.

– ref. New research challenges the idea of a ‘vicious cycle’ between psychological distress and conspiracy beliefs – https://theconversation.com/new-research-challenges-the-idea-of-a-vicious-cycle-between-psychological-distress-and-conspiracy-beliefs-266588

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Thomas, Lecturer in Middle East Studies, Deakin University

The first steps of the peace plan for Gaza are underway. Now both parties have agreed to terms, Hamas is obligated to release all hostages within 72 hours and the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) will withdraw to an agreed-upon line within the strip.

Hopes are high, particularly on the ground in Gaza and in Israel after two years of brutal conflict. Some argue the parties are now closer than ever to an end to hostilities, and US President Donald Trump’s 20-point peace plan may be an effective road-map.

But the truth is we have been here before. Hamas and Israel have now agreed to a road-map to peace in principle, but what is in place today is very similar to ceasefire deals in the past, and a ceasefire is not the same as a peace deal or an armistice.

The plan is also very light on specifics, and the devil is definitely in the detail. Will the IDF completely withdraw from Gaza and rule out annexation? Who will take on governance of the strip? Is Hamas going to be involved in this governance? There were signs of disagreement on these issues even before the fighting stopped.

So if the ceasefire steps hold in the short term – then what? What would it take for the peace plan to be successful?

First, the political pressures to refrain from resuming hostilities will need to hold. Once all the hostages are returned, which is expected to take place by Tuesday Australian time, Hamas effectively loses any remaining leverage for future negotiations if hostilities were to resume.

Once the hostage exchange is complete, it’s likely Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will see some pressure from his right to resume hostilities.

With Hamas relinquishing this leverage, it will be essential for the Israeli government to see these negotiations and the end of the war as fundamental to its long term interests and security for peace to hold. There must be a sincere desire to return to dialogue and compromise, not the pre-October 7 2023 complacency.

Second, Hamas will likely have to relinquish its arms and any political power in Gaza. Previously, Hamas has said it would only do this on the condition of recognition of a sovereign Palestinian state. As recently as October 10, factions in Gaza have said they would not accept foreign guardianship, a key part of the peace plan, with governance to be determined “by the national component of our people directly”.

Related to this, any interim governance or authority that takes shape in Gaza must reflect local needs. The proposed “body of peace” headed by Trump and former UK prime minister Tony Blair, could risk repeating previous mistakes of cutting Palestinians out of discussions over their own future.

Part of the peace deal is the resumption of humanitarian aid flows, but the fate of the Gaza blockade that has been effectively in place since 2007 is unclear. The land, sea and air blockade, which was imposed by Egypt and Israel following Hamas’ political takeover of Gaza, heavily restricts imports and the movement of Gazans.

Prior to October 2023, unemployment in the strip sat at 46%, and 62% of Gazans required food assistance as a result of the limits placed on imports, including basic food and agricultural items such as fertiliser.

Should the blockade continue, at best Israel will create the same humanitarian conditions in Gaza of food, medical and financial insecurity that existed prior to the October 7 attacks. While conditions and restrictions are orders of magnitude worse in Gaza today, NGOs called early incarnations of the blockade “collective punishment”. For peace to hold in the strip, security policy needs to be in line with global humanitarian principles and international law.

Most importantly, however, all parties involved must see peace in Gaza as fundamentally connected to broader peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Seeing the Gaza conflict as discrete and separate from the broader Palestinian-Israeli conflict would be a mistake. Discussions of Palestinian national self-determination in Gaza and the West Bank must be taken seriously and be a central part of the plan for peace to last.

While the 20-point plan mentions a “credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood”“, history tells us these pathways struggle to get past the rhetoric stage.

Many challenges stand in the way, including Israeli settlement and annexation, the status of Jerusalem and the question of demilitarisation.

A meaningful step would be for the US to refrain from using its veto power at the UN Security Council (UNSC) against votes supporting Palestinian statehood. While several states recognised a Palestinian state at the recent UN General Assembly, the US has blocked formal status at the UNSC every time.

Despite all these concerns, any pause in hostilities is undeniably a good thing. Deaths from October 7 2023 number nearly 70,000 in total, with 11% of Gaza’s population killed or injured and 465 Israeli soldiers killed. The resumption of aid delivery alone will go far in addressing the growing famine in the strip.

However, peace deals are incredibly difficult to negotiate at the best of times, requiring good faith, sustained commitment and trust. The roots of this conflict reach back decades, and mutual mistrust has been institutionalised and weaponised. Difficulties in negotiating the Oslo Accords in the 1990s showed just how deep the roots of the conflict are. The situation is now much worse.

It is not clear if any party involved in negotiation possesses the political will needed to reach an accord. However, an opportunity exists to reach one, and it should not be taken for granted.

Andrew Thomas does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Will Trump’s ceasefire plan really lead to lasting peace in the Middle East? There’s still a long way to go – https://theconversation.com/will-trumps-ceasefire-plan-really-lead-to-lasting-peace-in-the-middle-east-theres-still-a-long-way-to-go-267112

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Thompson, Lecturer in Theatre, Australian Catholic University

In the chilling final scene of Francis Ford Coppola’s 1972 masterpiece, The Godfather, the door to Michael Corleone’s office is closed in the face of his wife, Kay. It simultaneously signified the opening of many more doors for the career of actor Diane Keaton.

In that film, so heavily dominated by male actors, Keaton more than holds her own. For someone who would become known for her daffy, comic style, it showed us she also had serious dramatic acting chops.

The multi-award-winning actor, producer and director has died at the age of 79. She leaves behind a legacy of memorable roles in films that include classics such as The Godfather and Annie Hall, spanning genres from comedy to drama.

First steps on stage

Keaton started life in Los Angeles as Diane Hall on January 5 1946. The eldest child of Dorothy and Jack Hall, she was the only one of her siblings – brother Randy and sisters Robin and Dorrie – to show interest in the theatre. It came about in an unconventional way.

When she was “eight or nine”, she told NPR’s Fresh Air in 2004, her mother won “Mrs Los Angeles”

I remember sitting down [in the audience] watching her being crowned. It was that she was the perfect homemaker. […] I did not want to be a happy homemaker, that did not appeal to me. But I did want to go on stage. I saw that that was something that did appeal to me. There she was in the theatre, and I saw the curtain open and there was my mother. And I thought, ‘I think I like that for myself’.

Her career began as a teenage Blanche in Santa Ana High School’s production of A Streetcar Named Desire.

In her 2011 memoir, Then Again, she remembers her father coming backstage:

I could tell he was surprised by his awkward daughter – the one who’d flunked algebra and smashed the new Ford station wagon. For one thrilling moment, I was his Seabiscuit, Audrey Hepburn, and Wonder Woman rolled into one.

She began drama studies at nearby Santa Ana College but soon dropped out, took her mother’s maiden name – Keaton – and travelled to New York to study at the Neighbourhood Playhouse.

In 1968, after a stint in summer stock, she was cast as an understudy in Hair on Broadway. She was 19 and famously refused to do the nude scene.

“It wasn’t for any sort of philosophical reason,” she told the New York Times in 1972, “It was just that I was too scared.”

Silver screen breakout

Her heart was set on the big screen which, of course, meant starting out on the small screen in shows like The FBI (“The worst thing I have ever done,” she told the New York Times. “I was unanimously, resoundingly bad!”) and Night Gallery.

Instead, it was theatre that led to her breakout screen roles.

In 2023, Francis Ford Coppola revealed to Hollywood Reporter he had seen Keaton in Hair.

He later told Keaton he cast her in The Godfather because,

although you were to play the more straight/vanilla wife, there was something more about you, deeper, funnier, and very interesting. (I was right).

Then she auditioned for a new theatrical comedy, Play it Again, Sam, by up-and-coming comedian Woody Allen. That turned out to be what’s known in romantic comedies as a meet cute.

It led not only to their much-publicised relationship, but to a significant collaboration in eight films including the 1977 hit Annie Hall.

For that role, Keaton won the Oscar for best actress. And her costume, designed by Ruth Morley, made her a fashion icon of the 70s. She also gave us the whimsical phrase, “la di dah”.

It’s often thought that Annie Hall was about her relationship with Allen, but as she told the New York Times, “It’s not true, but there are elements of truth in it”.

A force

For the next five decades, Keaton would become a Hollywood force.

She had comic roles in films like The First Wives Club (1996), Something’s Gotta Give (2003) and the Father of the Bride franchise. Alongside these comedies were remarkable dramatic roles in Looking for Mister Goodbar (1977), Reds (1981), The Little Drummer Girl (1984), Crimes of the Heart (1986), Marvin’s Room (1996) and two more Godfather films.

She was also a notable director of films like Unstrung Heroes (1995), Hanging Up (2000), Heaven (1987) and even an episode of Twin Peaks.

In addition to Annie Hall’s Oscar, BAFTA and Golden Globe, she received Oscar nominations for Reds, Marvin’s Room and Something’s Gotta Give (for which she won her second Golden Globe). She was also nominated for a Tony, two Emmys and another seven Golden Globes.

Despite much-publicised relationships with Al Pacino, Woody Allen and Warren Beatty, Keaton chose to remain single her whole life. In her 50s, she adopted two children, Dexter and Duke.

A rich creative life

Keaton made comedy look easy but told the New York Times in 1977 that “both comedy and drama are equally difficult”.

She later told Fresh Air,

You’re constantly battling with yourself when you’re acting in a [dramatic] part, at least I am. Because it’s just not that easy for me. I think I’m more inclined to live comfortably in the world of humour.

Either way, we were the richer for her creative life and are the poorer for her loss.

Chris Thompson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Diane Keaton thrived in the world of humour – and had the dramatic acting chops to back it up – https://theconversation.com/diane-keaton-thrived-in-the-world-of-humour-and-had-the-dramatic-acting-chops-to-back-it-up-267293

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jon C. Day, Adjunct Principal Research Fellow, College of Science and Engineering, James Cook University

Since 2020, the conservation outlook has worsened for four of Australia’s 16 natural World Heritage properties – Ningaloo, Shark Bay, Purnululu National Park and the Australian Fossil Mammal Sites. This means 25% of our natural areas globally recognised as being significant are either in worse health or need better planning to secure their future.

The Great Barrier Reef remains in the lowest rating – “critical” – as one of just 17 natural World Heritage properties globally with this outlook. Only Macquarie Island has improved in its outlook, largely due to the removal of rodents and rabbits. Australia’s 11 other properties have an unchanged outlook.

These findings come from the new independent World Heritage Outlook, published today by the world authority on nature, the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Why the downgrades? Climate change is the biggest threat. Worsening marine heatwaves are hitting coral reefs hard, while land areas are also affected by extreme weather and wildfires. Climate change now poses a severe threat to 12 of Australia’s properties – 75% of the total – more than any other threat.

What’s changed?

The new IUCN report shows six Australian World Heritage properties have a “significant concern” rating, while four are rated “good with some concerns” and five are rated as “good”. The Great Barrier Reef is the only one rated “critical”.

Reefs on the frontline

The Great Barrier Reef recently suffered its sixth mass bleaching since 2016. Recent surveys show this is the first time very high (61-90% of corals) and extreme (over 90%) bleaching has been observed across all three regions of the reef.

The world’s largest coral reef complex is considered in critical condition, as it is severely threatened and deteriorating.

Climate change is driving intensifying heat in the oceans, which can trigger coral bleaching and other adverse impacts. Climate change is only one of many threats facing the reef, alongside poor water quality, unsustainable fishing and coastal development.

Western Australia’s Ningaloo Reef is now listed as “significant concern”. Climate change is the biggest threat to this area, known for its whale sharks and manta rays.

Five marine heatwaves have hit Ningaloo over the last 15 years. But the worst by far was this year’s intense marine heatwave, which was off the charts. Major bleaching has been seen along the full length of the reef, inside the shallow lagoon and on the deeper reef slopes.

Western Australia’s Shark Bay has also deteriorated due to escalating climate threats.

The damage done by this year’s marine heatwave is yet to be fully understood. But we do know Shark Bay’s ancient stromatolites are vulnerable to rising sea levels and extreme climate events. A major dieback of enormous seagrass beds occurred during an earlier heatwave in 2010-11.

Under a business as usual scenario for carbon emissions, coral bleaching is expected to intensify to the point where coral reefs disappear by the end of the century.

Land-based parks are also under threat

Most of Australian natural World Heritage areas on land have also been hit by extreme weather events. Severe and widespread bushfires have hit the Tasmanian Wilderness, Gondwana Rainforests, Greater Blue Mountains, K’gari, Wet Tropics of Queensland and Kakadu National Park at some point over the past decade.

The intensity and frequency of such events, compounded by extreme weather, are expected to increase and threaten the resilience of all these areas.

Downgrades due to lack of planning

Two more natural properties have been downgraded from “Good” to “Good with some concerns” due to concerns over planning for the future.

Western Australia’s Purnululu National Park protects the Bungle Bungle Range. IUCN considers updated management planning is needed to address the main challenges facing the area’s ecology, especially given the intensifying threats from climate change.

The Australian Fossil Mammal Site was downgraded for a similar reason. This site consists of two separate areas with rich fossil histories – South Australia’s Naracoorte Caves and Queensland’s Riversleigh.

The downgrade here reflects the assessment that both areas need to be better protected with updated plans, more effective management, regular monitoring of Naracoorte caves and sustained funding for protection, staff training and scientific research.

Good news: Macquarie Island is rebounding

Australia’s Macquarie Island lies halfway between New Zealand and Antarctica. Its isolation made it perfect for seabirds and unusual megaherb plant species. But introduced rats, mice and rabbits did real damage.

The reason Macquarie has been upgraded to a good outlook is due to a highly successful pest eradication and recovery program. Since these pests have been wiped out, plants have regrown and seabirds such as albatross and burrowing petrels have returned in large numbers to breed.

In other good news, the site protection and management of 14 of Australia’s natural properties have been rated as either mostly or highly effective. This is welcome praise for the dedicated work of the staff.

The question now is whether these efforts will be enough to protect these globally important sites against threats from outside the property boundaries, such as climate change, mining and infrastructure and invasive species. These threats are occurring as many properties face budgetary constraints.

Australia at the front of globally worrying trends

Australia isn’t alone in witnessing natural World Heritage properties deteriorate. Since 2020, 10% of the world’s 271 natural and mixed World Heritage areas have deteriorated, while 5% have shown improvement.

Regrettably, Australia is still punching below its weight, given 25% of its natural properties face a worse outlook than they did five years ago and only one has improved.

The threats facing these famous natural places are escalating. Halting the decline will require good management of all types of pressures.

Read more:
The Great Barrier Reef is in trouble. There are a whopping 45 reasons why

.

Given climate change is the single biggest threat, it would make sense for policymakers to be as ambitious as possible on climate action to help preserve what makes these places so special.

Jon Day previously worked for the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority between 1986 and 2014, and was one of the Directors at GBRMPA between 1998 and 2014. He also represented Australia as one of the formal delegates to the World Heritage Committee between 2007-2011.

– ref. Since 2020, 4 of Australia’s natural World Heritage properties have deteriorated – https://theconversation.com/since-2020-4-of-australias-natural-world-heritage-properties-have-deteriorated-266578

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Woinarski, Professor of Conservation Biology, Charles Darwin University

It’s official: the only Australian shrew is no more.

The latest edition of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Red List, the world’s most comprehensive global inventory on extinction risk, has declared the Christmas Island shrew is extinct.

The news may not seem momentous. After all, most Australians know nothing of shrews and would be unaware this one species counted among our native fauna.

But the shrew’s extinction increases the tally of Australian mammals extinct since 1788 to 39 species. This is far more than for any other country. These losses represent about 10% of all Australia’s land mammal species before colonisation. It is a deplorable record of trashing an extraordinary legacy.

So, what are shrews?

Shrews are small, long-nosed, insect-eating mammals, with many species widely distributed across Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas. On mainland Australia, similar roles are filled by unrelated small marsupials such as dunnarts, antechinuses, planigales and ningauis, which are themselves not writ large on our national consciousness.

Many people will know of shrews only courtesy of Shakespeare. Combining misogyny and zoophobia (an intense fear of animals) he used the name of this inoffensive animal to describe a shrill, ever-complaining, grating caricature of women. The offensive term has stuck through the ages, draining sympathy for and interest in the animal.

The history of Australia’s shrew

It must have been a harrowing voyage. Tens of thousands of years ago, a small family of shrews (or a pregnant female) rafted on floating vegetation, from islands of what is now Indonesia. Haphazardly, they landed on uninhabited Christmas Island, now an Australian territory about 1,500 kilometres west of the mainland. These lucky or reckless pioneers gave rise to Australia’s only shrew species.

For many years the Christmas Island shrew prospered. When European naturalists first visited Christmas Island in the 1890s, at the time of its settlement, they remarked:

[…] this little animal is extremely common all over the island, and at night its shrill shriek, like the cry of a bat, can be heard on all sides.

Change came quickly thereafter. In 1900, black rats were accidentally introduced, stowaways on hay bales. Worse, these rats were infested with trypanosomes, a cellular parasite. These trypanosomes spread rapidly to the island’s two species of native rats (and presumably the shrew).

The long isolation of Christmas Island had cocooned its native mammals, leaving them with no resistance to new diseases. Within a year, island residents began seeing many dying rats stumbling across the forest floor.

By the time naturalists next visited the island in 1908, the two species of native rats and the Christmas Island shrew were thought to have become extinct. Subsequently, many other endemic animals were also lost or suffered serious declines due to the introduction of cats and invasive species of ants, snails, plants, giant centipedes, birds and snakes.

It is a pattern that has occurred repeatedly across the world’s islands. Introductions of plants and animals have subverted island ecosystems and, as a consequence, endemic island species represent a disproportionately high number of the world’s extinctions.

Defying extinction?

But the shrew lived on. After not being seen for more than 50 years, two survivors were caught in the 1950s as bulldozers cleared a patch of rainforest for mining. The shrews were released and the find was not reported until many years later.

Then, nothing for another 30 years. In December 1984, biologists Hugh Yorkston and Jeff Tranter were clearing a rainforest track and came across a live female shrew in a clump of fallen birds’ nest fern. They kept the shrew in a terrarium for 12-18 months, industriously catching grasshoppers to feed it.

At the time, they didn’t consider this a final opportunity to conserve the species through a captive breeding program. When, with extraordinary serendipity, a male shrew was found alive only a few months later in March 1985, it was kept in a separate terrarium. The female was docile but the male was aggressive. It also appeared unwell.

Whatever the reason, there was no introduction, no consummation and no baby shrews. The male died about three weeks after capture while the female lingered on, alone.

No shrews left

Since 1984, there have been no recorded sightings. This means only four Christmas Island shrews have been reported in over 120 years.

Almost no information on the biology of this species has been published, other than the single sentence written by naturalist Charles Andrews in 1900:

[…] it lives in holes in rocks and roots of trees, and seems to feed mainly on beetles.

There are few pictures. However, inklings of the nature of the last known shrew can be seen in a beautiful sketch by the park ranger, naturalist and artist Max Orchard.

In the nearly 40 years since the death of the last known individual, two recovery plans have been compiled, outlining the actions needed to conserve the species. There have been targeted searches. But no shrews have turned up to benefit from those plans.

The most telling evidence of their extinction is the absence of any shrews in the stomach contents of hundreds of feral cats culled over the past few decades.

While the shrew clearly survived until the 1980s, this decade saw the arrival of yet another threat, the Asian wolf snake. This snake quickly spread across the island, most likely causing the extinction of the island’s endemic microbat, the Christmas Island pipistrelle, in 2009 and most of the endemic lizards. The snake’s arrival also probably marked the death knell for any remaining shrews.

We must try harder to prevent extinctions

Extinction can be difficult to prove, especially for a species as cryptic as the shrew. There is peril in categorising a species as extinct when it still survives. This misclassification has been termed the “Romeo error”, where formal recognition of a species as extinct can result in the withdrawal of funding or protection, and hence increase likelihood of actual extinction.

In 2022, the Australian government through then-Minister for the Environment Tanya Plibersek pledged, admirably, to preventing any more extinctions. Although today’s formal recognition of the shrew’s extinction comes after that pledge, the last shrew probably died one to two decades beforehand.

The shrew’s loss is a reminder of the enormity of the challenge of preventing further extinctions, of the diverse ways these losses can happen, of the need to seize opportunities to protect rare species, and of the importance of a national and political commitment to prevent extinction.

I hope the Christmas Island shrew is not extinct; after all it has defied previous calls of its demise. Perhaps somewhere, a small furtive family of shrews are hanging on, elusive survivors, secure in the knowledge of their own existence and waiting to prove the pessimists wrong.

Hugh Yorkston, Jeff Tranter and Paul Meek helped with this article.

John Woinarski is a director of the Australian Wildlife Conservancy, a member of the Biodiversity Council, and co-chair of the IUCN Australasian Marsupials and Monotremes Specialist Species Group.

– ref. And then there were none: Australia’s only shrew declared extinct – https://theconversation.com/and-then-there-were-none-australias-only-shrew-declared-extinct-265988

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

Independent senator David Pocock, a former captain of the Wallabies, has been declared persona non grata by the Parliament Sports Club, after he complained about its sponsors including a gambling lobbyist.

Pocock, who represents the ACT, said on Friday he had recently brought to light that lobbyists were “buying access to parliamentarians” through $2500 club sponsorships. The club was on the official lobbyists register, he said.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is the club’s president, Special Minister of State Don Farrell is its chairman, and it has an executive officer, Andy Turnbull. It organises social sporting events for parliamentarians, including touch football and soccer when parliament is sitting.

Pocock said the club’s sponsors included peak industry body Responsible Wagering Australia, “whose CEO is a regular participant in matches with parliamentarians”.

He said he first raised his concerns privately with Turnbull. He subsequently went public, including at this week’s Senate estimates hearings. Late Thursday, he was told he was out.

In a message to Pocock, Turnbull criticised his handling of the matter and said in the circumstances it was “inappropriate for you to remain a member of the Club”.

“You haven’t actually paid your subs this Parliament so no further action is required,” Turnbull wrote.

“I will remove you from the lists and you are not welcome to attend fixtures operated by the Club.”

He accused Pocock of a “cheap shot that will have no effect on the outcome of your anti gambling campaign”.

At Senate estimates, Pocock questioned whether it was appropriate for Albanese to be “the president of a lobbying firm”.

In reply, Foreign Minister Penny Wong accused him of wanting “to get a grab up” but admitted she did not even know there was such a club.

Asked on Friday whether he should be president, Albanese said that “as prime minister it comes with the gig”, and accused Pocock of seeking publicity.

“I think that’s David Pocock being David Pocock, getting himself in a story. You know, this is a voluntary organisation that raises money for charity.

“The amount of time I have spent on the Australian Parliament Sports Club this year is zero. I have participated in zero events in terms of sports, just because I’m a bit busy.”

Pocock said he was dismayed by the club’s decision to remove a parliamentarian “rather than tighten the criteria of companies who can sponsor the club, or reconsider whether the parliamentary sports club should have corporate sponsors at all”.

“Being kicked out of the club for raising concerns around gambling lobbyists buying access to the club shows the influence vested interests have here in parliament and just how normalised this has become.

“It’s no wonder we haven’t seen the action to end gambling advertising the majority of Australians are desperate to see when gambling lobbyists are calling the shots in Canberra,” Pocock said.

Crossbencher Allegra Spender, who left the club this week over the gambling link, said on Friday it was “an absolute disgrace” Pocock had been excluded.

“To see the parliamentary sports club operating as a front for a gambling industry that spreads so much misery, breaks my heart. I can’t be part of a club that promotes the gambling lobby.”

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Senator David Pocock thrown out of Parliament Sports Club after criticising gambling link – https://theconversation.com/senator-david-pocock-thrown-out-of-parliament-sports-club-after-criticising-gambling-link-267219

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hannah Dahlen, Professor of Midwifery, Associate Dean Research and HDR, Midwifery Discipline Leader, Western Sydney University

Baby boy Cassian is an internet sensation. He was born in the United States weighing 5.8 kilograms in recent weeks. After his mum and the hospital shared the news, it wasn’t long before headlines about the “giant” baby spread around the world. These included:

‘Are you OK’?: Woman breaks record with giant newborn baby

Record-breaking baby tips the scales at almost double the average size of a newborn

While baby Cassian was born heavier than average, he’s not unique. There have been other examples in the news of babies born heavier. That includes a baby boy born in Brazil in 2023 who weighed 7.3kg.

These stories might make women all over the world cross their legs. But how common are big babies, and does their birth always lead to complications?

What are big babies?

Macrosomia describes babies born over 4kg or 4.5kg, depending on the definition.

A big baby can also be defined as having a birth weight over the 90th percentile at a particular gestational age. In other words, more than 90% of babies have a lower birth weight at this particular stage of the pregnancy. The term “large for gestational age” is probably a more accurate term as the weeks of gestation is used alongside the weight.

There has been little change overall in the percentage of large babies in the past decade in Australia. While stories of such births hit the media, their proportion hovers around 9–10% of births.

What are the problems for big babies and their mums?

We don’t know the specific circumstances of Cassian’s birth, his health or that of his mother. And we don’t know whether common reasons for larger babies are relevant in this situation.

But, generally speaking, birth complications can be higher for mothers and babies when the baby is big, especially if more than 4.5kg. This is certainly not always the case, however.

There is an increased need for interventions during the birth, such as forceps or vacuum delivery, or a caesarean section the bigger the baby is. Having these interventions can impact a women’s recovery after the birth, and options for the next birth.

For the baby there are higher risks of the shoulders getting stuck in the birth canal during the birth (known as shoulder dystocia).

Midwives and obstetricians also may need to make extra manoeuvres for the baby to be safely delivered. For instance, they may need to try and bring down one shoulder if it’s stuck behind the mother’s pubic bone.

These manoeuvres can damage the baby or lead to oxygen restrictions, with the baby needing to be resuscitated. However, these complications are rare and can occur when a big baby was not expected.

What leads to a big baby?

Big babies are most often healthy babies, and there are a number of reasons for them.

Genetic factors mean babies are always big in some families.

Babies that go over their due dates tend to be a bit bigger as they have more time to grow inside their mothers.

Having diabetes, especially if this is poorly controlled, can lead to larger babies. This is because the mother’s higher blood sugar leads to the baby receiving more energy than it needs, so it stores this extra energy as fat.

Babies of mothers with diabetes diagnosed for the first time in pregnancy (gestational diabetes) are at increased risk of being obese and developing diabetes in the future.

Mothers who are larger before pregnancy, or when pregnant, may also be more likely to have big babies. This is mostly due to the increased likelihood of developing diabetes in pregnancy, and perhaps poorer nutrition choices.

Can you predict a big baby?

Estimations of babies’ weights before they are born are imprecise. That’s why so many women are told they are going to have a big baby and don’t, and others are surprised by a big baby when it arrives.

Midwives and obstetricians routinely feel a woman’s growing uterus when they provide antenatal check-ups. They are looking at the position the baby is lying in the uterus as well as where the top of the uterus is compared to the woman’s belly button. This gives an idea of whether the baby is growing as you would expect at that time.

They also measure from the top of a woman’s belly to the top of her pubic bone with a tape measure. The weeks of pregnancy usually correspond to the measurement within a couple of centimetres.

For example, at 36 weeks of pregnancy the tape measurement would be somewhere between 34cm and 38cm. If there is more or less than a 3cm difference between the measurement and the numbers of weeks of pregnancy then an ultrasound would be offered to look at how the baby’s growing and to estimate the size.

But ultrasounds are poor predictors of actual birth weight. The Big Baby Trial was published earlier this year. It randomised nearly 3,000 women in the United Kingdom to being induced at 39 weeks if suspected to be having a big baby (according to an ultrasound) or waiting for labour to start.

There was little difference in birth weight or poor outcomes, such as shoulder dystocia for the baby, leading to the trial being stopped early. Around 60% of babies screened as being big babies were not actually big at birth, showing the inaccuracy of ultrasounds in predicting birth weight.

What can women do?

The best health advice for women is to try to be a healthy weight (under a BMI of 30) before getting pregnant.

Eat a balanced diet and limit your intake of foods and drinks high in saturated fats and sugar. Try not to put too much weight on during pregnancy and exercise regularly. Talk to your midwife or obstetrician for advice and support about this.

If you have diabetes, or if this has been diagnosed during the pregnancy, close monitoring of your blood sugar and baby’s growth is important.

Read more:
How pregnant women are tested for gestational diabetes is changing. Here’s what this means for you

Hannah Dahlen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. News of a ‘giant’ baby boy is all over TikTok. Here’s what women really need to know – https://theconversation.com/news-of-a-giant-baby-boy-is-all-over-tiktok-heres-what-women-really-need-to-know-267207

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hannah Dahlen, Professor of Midwifery, Associate Dean Research and HDR, Midwifery Discipline Leader, Western Sydney University

Baby boy Cassian is an internet sensation. He was born in the United States weighing 5.8 kilograms in recent weeks. After his mum and the hospital shared the news, it wasn’t long before headlines about the “giant” baby spread around the world. These included:

‘Are you OK’?: Woman breaks record with giant newborn baby

Record-breaking baby tips the scales at almost double the average size of a newborn

While baby Cassian was born heavier than average, he’s not unique. There have been other examples in the news of babies born heavier. That includes a baby boy born in Brazil in 2023 who weighed 7.3kg.

These stories might make women all over the world cross their legs. But how common are big babies, and does their birth always lead to complications?

What are big babies?

Macrosomia describes babies born over 4kg or 4.5kg, depending on the definition.

A big baby can also be defined as having a birth weight over the 90th percentile at a particular gestational age. In other words, more than 90% of babies have a lower birth weight at this particular stage of the pregnancy. The term “large for gestational age” is probably a more accurate term as the weeks of gestation is used alongside the weight.

There has been little change overall in the percentage of large babies in the past decade in Australia. While stories of such births hit the media, their proportion hovers around 9–10% of births.

What are the problems for big babies and their mums?

We don’t know the specific circumstances of Cassian’s birth, his health or that of his mother. And we don’t know whether common reasons for larger babies are relevant in this situation.

But, generally speaking, birth complications can be higher for mothers and babies when the baby is big, especially if more than 4.5kg. This is certainly not always the case, however.

There is an increased need for interventions during the birth, such as forceps or vacuum delivery, or a caesarean section the bigger the baby is. Having these interventions can impact a women’s recovery after the birth, and options for the next birth.

For the baby there are higher risks of the shoulders getting stuck in the birth canal during the birth (known as shoulder dystocia).

Midwives and obstetricians also may need to make extra manoeuvres for the baby to be safely delivered. For instance, they may need to try and bring down one shoulder if it’s stuck behind the mother’s pubic bone.

These manoeuvres can damage the baby or lead to oxygen restrictions, with the baby needing to be resuscitated. However, these complications are rare and can occur when a big baby was not expected.

What leads to a big baby?

Big babies are most often healthy babies, and there are a number of reasons for them.

Genetic factors mean babies are always big in some families.

Babies that go over their due dates tend to be a bit bigger as they have more time to grow inside their mothers.

Having diabetes, especially if this is poorly controlled, can lead to larger babies. This is because the mother’s higher blood sugar leads to the baby receiving more energy than it needs, so it stores this extra energy as fat.

Babies of mothers with diabetes diagnosed for the first time in pregnancy (gestational diabetes) are at increased risk of being obese and developing diabetes in the future.

Mothers who are larger before pregnancy, or when pregnant, may also be more likely to have big babies. This is mostly due to the increased likelihood of developing diabetes in pregnancy, and perhaps poorer nutrition choices.

Can you predict a big baby?

Estimations of babies’ weights before they are born are imprecise. That’s why so many women are told they are going to have a big baby and don’t, and others are surprised by a big baby when it arrives.

Midwives and obstetricians routinely feel a woman’s growing uterus when they provide antenatal check-ups. They are looking at the position the baby is lying in the uterus as well as where the top of the uterus is compared to the woman’s belly button. This gives an idea of whether the baby is growing as you would expect at that time.

They also measure from the top of a woman’s belly to the top of her pubic bone with a tape measure. The weeks of pregnancy usually correspond to the measurement within a couple of centimetres.

For example, at 36 weeks of pregnancy the tape measurement would be somewhere between 34cm and 38cm. If there is more or less than a 3cm difference between the measurement and the numbers of weeks of pregnancy then an ultrasound would be offered to look at how the baby’s growing and to estimate the size.

But ultrasounds are poor predictors of actual birth weight. The Big Baby Trial was published earlier this year. It randomised nearly 3,000 women in the United Kingdom to being induced at 39 weeks if suspected to be having a big baby (according to an ultrasound) or waiting for labour to start.

There was little difference in birth weight or poor outcomes, such as shoulder dystocia for the baby, leading to the trial being stopped early. Around 60% of babies screened as being big babies were not actually big at birth, showing the inaccuracy of ultrasounds in predicting birth weight.

What can women do?

The best health advice for women is to try to be a healthy weight (under a BMI of 30) before getting pregnant.

Eat a balanced diet and limit your intake of foods and drinks high in saturated fats and sugar. Try not to put too much weight on during pregnancy and exercise regularly. Talk to your midwife or obstetrician for advice and support about this.

If you have diabetes, or if this has been diagnosed during the pregnancy, close monitoring of your blood sugar and baby’s growth is important.

Read more:
How pregnant women are tested for gestational diabetes is changing. Here’s what this means for you

Hannah Dahlen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. News of a ‘giant’ baby boy is all over TikTok. But here’s what women really need to know – https://theconversation.com/news-of-a-giant-baby-boy-is-all-over-tiktok-but-heres-what-women-really-need-to-know-267207

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marika Sosnowski, Senior research fellow, The University of Melbourne

There are jubilant scenes in both Gaza and Israel after both sides in the war have agreed to another ceasefire. If all goes well, this will be only the third ceasefire to be implemented by Israel and Hamas, despite there being numerous other agreements to try to stop the violence.

There is a lot to be happy about here. Most notably, this ceasefire will bring a halt to what has now been established as a genocidal campaign of violence against Palestinians in Gaza, the release of all hostages held by Hamas, and the resumption of aid into Gaza to alleviate the famine conditions there.

However, a lot of unknowns remain. While the terms of the “first phase” of this ceasefire have been rehearsed in previous ceasefires in November 2023 and January 2025, many other terms remain vague. This makes their implementation difficult and likely contested.

After this phase is complete, a lot will depend on domestic Israeli politics and the Trump administration’s willingness to follow through on its guarantor responsibilities.

Immediate positives for both sides

The ceasefire agreement appears to be based on the 20-point plan US President Donald Trump unveiled in the White House alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on September 29.

What will be implemented in what is being called the “first phase” are the practical, more detailed and immediate terms of the ceasefire.

In the text of the peace plan released to the public, these terms are stipulated in:

• Point 3 – an “immediate” end to the war and Israeli troop withdrawal to an “agreed upon line”.

• Points 4 and 5 – the release of all living and deceased hostages by Hamas in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.

• Point 7 – full aid to flow into the strip, consistent with the January ceasefire agreement terms.

While these steps are positive, they are the bare minimum you would expect both sides to acquiesce to as part of a ceasefire deal.

Over the past two years, Gaza has been virtually demolished by Israel’s military and the population of the strip is starving. There is also great domestic pressure on the Israeli government to bring the hostages home, while Hamas has no cards left to play besides their release.

The text of these particular terms has been drafted in a way that means both Israel and Hamas know what to do and when. This makes it more likely they will abide by the terms.

Both sides also have a vested interest in these terms happening. Further, both parties have taken these exact steps before during the November 2023 and January 2025 Gaza ceasefires.

Given this, I expect these terms will be implemented in the coming days. It is less clear what will happen after that.

What comes next: the great unknown

After the first phase of the ceasefire has been implemented, Hamas will find itself in a situation very similar to ceasefire agreements that occurred during the Syrian civil war that began in 2011 and only recently ended with the downfall of the Assad regime in late 2024. I call these strangle contracts.

These type of ceasefire agreements are not like bargains or contracts negotiated between two equal parties. Instead, they are highly coercive agreements that enable the more powerful party to force the weaker party into agreeing to anything in order for them to survive.

Once the hostages are released, Hamas will go back to having negligible bargaining power of its own. And the group, along with the people of Gaza themselves, will once again be at the mercy of Israeli military might and domestic and international politics.

Other terms of the Trump peace plan relating to Hamas’ demilitarisation (Points 1 and 13), the future governance of Gaza (Points 9 and 13) and Gaza’s redevelopment (Points 2, 10 and 11) are also extremely vague and offer little guidance on what exactly should occur, when or how.

Under such a strangle contract, Hamas will have no leverage after it releases the hostages. This, together with the vague terms of the ceasefire agreement, will offer Israel a great deal of manoeuvrability and political cover.

For example, the Israeli government could claim Hamas is not abiding by the terms of the agreement and then recommence bombardment, curtail aid or further displace the Palestinians in Gaza.

While Point 12 rightly stipulates that “no one will be forced to leave Gaza”, Israel could make conditions there so inhospitable and offer enough incentives to Gazans, they might have little choice other than to leave if they want to survive.

Points 15 and 16 stipulate that the United States (along with Arab and other international partners) will develop a temporary International Stabilisation Force to deploy to Gaza to act as guarantors for the agreement. The Israel Defence Force (IDF) will also withdraw “based on standards, milestones, and timeframes linked to demilitarization”.

But these “standards, milestones and timeframes” have been left unspecified and will be hard for the parties to agree on.

It is also possible Israel could use the vagueness of these terms to its advantage by arguing Hamas has failed to meet certain conditions in order to justify restarting the war.

Knowing it has no leverage after the first phase, Hamas has explicitly said it is expecting the US to fulfil its guarantor role. It is certainly a good sign the US has pledged 200 troops to help support and monitor the ceasefire, but at this stage, Hamas has little choice other than to pray the US’ deeds reflect its words.

While the ceasefire has now been passed by a majority of the Knesset (Israel’s parliament), five far-right ministers voted against the deal. These include Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who said the ceasefire is akin to “a deal with Adolf Hitler”.

This opposition bloc will no doubt be making more threats – and could potentially act – to bring down Netanyahu’s government after the first phase is implemented.

The problem with ceasefires

The first phase of this ceasefire will offer Hamas and Israel key items – a hostage-prisoner swap, a halt to violence and humanitarian aid.

After that, rather than a bargaining process with trade-offs between negotiating partners operating on a relatively even playing field, without US opprobrium, the ceasefire could easily devolve into an excuse for further Israeli domination of Gaza.

A ceasefire was always going to be a very small step forward in a long road towards peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Without meaningful engagement with Palestinians in their self-determination, we can only hope the future for Gazans will not get any worse.

As a Palestinian leader from Yarmouk camp in Syria told me back in 2018: “If there is a ceasefire, people know the devil is coming.”

Marika Sosnowski does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. The Gaza ceasefire deal could be a ‘strangle contract’, with Israel holding all the cards – https://theconversation.com/the-gaza-ceasefire-deal-could-be-a-strangle-contract-with-israel-holding-all-the-cards-267208

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Annesley, Senior Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Cell and Molecular Biology, La Trobe University

Scientists in the United Kingdom say they have developed a blood test that can diagnose myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) with 96% accuracy – the first of its kind.

For many who live with the debilitating condition, this will be exciting news.

Despite affecting millions of people worldwide, this condition remains poorly understood. It is characterised by unrelenting fatigue that doesn’t improve with rest, and post-exertional malaise – a worsening of symptoms after even minor physical or mental activity.

Yet with no reliable test, many people wait years for a diagnosis. This usually depends on symptoms meeting certain clinical criteria. But diagnostic criteria can be controversial as they vary worldwide and many are outdated.

An accurate blood test could be a game changer for diagnosis.

So, how excited should we get? Here’s what we know.

How diagnosis works without a test

Currently, you can only receive a diagnosis if you experience disabling fatigue – one of the key symptoms according to most clinical criteria – for at least six months, accompanied by post-exertional malaise.

But people with the condition often experience a wide range of other symptoms, including headaches, muscle or joint pain, sleep disturbances, dizziness, a racing heart, and problems with memory, thinking and decision making.

So, clinicians must also rule out other conditions with overlapping symptoms.

This means diagnosis relies heavily on clinicians’ knowledge of ME/CFS and their willingness to listen to the patient’s complex symptom history. This process can take years – and the delay in diagnosis has real consequences.

Evidence suggests early intervention is key to recovery. Rest during the early stages of the illness likely results in better long-term outcomes, as has been suggested for the clinically similar disease long COVID.

One study showed a delayed ME/CFS diagnosis was linked to poorer outcomes, meaning recovery was less likely and the chance of developing more severe symptoms increased.

Without a definitive diagnosis, patients regularly face disbelief about their illness and have limited access to information, health-care services and medical benefits.

Frequent delays in diagnosis may contribute to the condition’s low recovery rate, which is estimated at just 1–10%.

What the new study looked at

To develop a diagnostic test, the new study identified biomarkers that may be specific to people with this condition.

In this case, the biomarkers relate to epigenetics – changes in the structure of a person’s chromosomes, influencing which genes can be turned on or off.

These changes occur due to environmental influences such as stress, infection and exercise. So, when someone develops ME/CFS, the illness may change the structure of their chromosomes – but until now researchers hadn’t identified what this would look like.

The researchers examined blood samples from people they knew had ME/CFS and identified around 200 such biomarkers. These changes formed a distinct biological “signature” that was not present in the blood of healthy participants in the comparison group.

This signature was very accurate in correctly identifying which samples were from people with the condition and which were from the comparison group.

According to the researchers, the test’s sensitivity was 92% – this is the probability a positive result will show when someone has the condition. It had a specificity of 98%, meaning the probability it can rule out negative cases.

This combined to an overall diagnostic accuracy of 96%.

So, is this a breakthrough?

This research is promising, but it’s still very early days. It was a proof-of-concept study, meaning small-scale research to initially test whether an idea might work.

In this case, researchers explored the idea that structural changes in chromosomes could be used as biomarkers of ME/CFS. Their results suggest they can.

However, there were several limitations. The study involved a relatively small number of people: 47 participants with severe ME/CFS and 61 in the healthy “control” group.

The ME/CFS group had more females, and its participants were so severely affected they were housebound. So they presumably had lower activity levels than the control group.

We know a person’s sex and activity levels can influence these chromosomal changes, so this may have affected the results.

To develop a diagnostic test that can be used widely, several crucial steps remain.

How much a person’s sex and exercise levels influence these biomarkers needs to be determined. The biomarkers will also need to be validated in larger, more diverse groups, which include people with less and more severe symptoms than in this study and those from different backgrounds.

To confirm these biomarkers are truly specific to ME/CFS, they need to be compared with other conditions that share similar symptoms, such as multiple sclerosis and fibromyalgia.

Finally, it’s also important that a test, if developed, should be affordable and accessible.

ME/CFS remains a severely underdiagnosed condition, and the lack of a reliable test continues to delay care and worsen outcomes. Identifying biomarkers, as this study aimed to do, is a promising first step.

Sarah Annesley receives funding from ME Research UK, The Judith Jane Mason & Harold Stannett Williams Memorial Foundation and the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF035120).

– ref. Can a new blood test really detect ME/CFS? An expert unpacks new research – https://theconversation.com/can-a-new-blood-test-really-detect-me-cfs-an-expert-unpacks-new-research-267099

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Myra Williamson, Senior Lecturer in Law, Auckland University of Technology

Despite the International Criminal Court (ICC) being under immense pressure right now, its first conviction for crimes in Darfur, and the first for gender-based persecution as a crime against humanity, is a major win.

On October 6, a senior leader of the Sudanese pro-government militia known as the Janjaweed, Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman, was found guilty on 27 charges of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity. The court rejected his defence of mistaken identity.

From around August 2003, Sudanese government forces and the Janjaweed carried out large-scale attacks on civilians in the Darfur region. This included targeted killings, summary executions, assaults, rapes, theft of livestock and the forced displacement of more than two million people.

The targets of this violence were mostly communities who shared the ethnicity of various rebel groups, and later other Arab and non-Arab tribes.

It has taken over 20 years, but the delivery of justice is a major development for international law, for Sudan and for the ICC itself. The case demonstrates that while the wheels of international criminal justice turn slowly, they do turn.

A milestone conviction

The case marks the first conviction arising out of Darfur, and the first from a referral to the ICC by the United Nations Security Council.

It was also the first investigation of a non-state party, meaning the accused was from a country that hasn’t signed the Rome Statute, the treaty that established the ICC.

Abd-Al-Rahman (sometimes known as Ali Kushayb or Ali Kosheib) was convicted for crimes committed between August 2003 and March 2004. Human Rights Watch published a report in December 2005 calling for accountability.

The ICC started investigating in 2005. An arrest warrant for Abd-Al-Rahman was issued that year, and a second one in 2020. He eventually surrendered himself to the ICC’s custody in 2020 and the trial began in 2022.

There are four other individuals yet to be arrested and tried. Notably, the former president of Sudan, Omar al-Bashir (the first sitting president to be indicted by the ICC), is still at large despite warrants for his arrest issued in 2009 and 2010.

Al-Bashir is wanted on five charges of crimes against humanity: murder, extermination, forcible transfer, torture and rape. He is also accused of genocide, as well as two counts of war crimes, including intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population.

Arrest warrants have also been issued for three former government ministers, with reports that one of them, along with al-Bashir, is in military custody in northern Sudan.

Justice for women and girls

With Sudan not a party to the Rome Statute, the conviction of Abd-Al-Rahman was only possible because the Security Council established an international commission of inquiry on Darfur. This reported that war crimes and crimes against humanity had likely been committed.

The Security Council then referred the Darfur situation to the prosecutor of the ICC as a threat to international peace and security, with the investigation starting on June 6 2005. A “confirmation of charges” hearing was held in May 2021.

This is an important precedent. It demonstrates why the Security Council should use its referral power under Article 13(b) of the Rome Statute to send cases to the ICC, even when accused individuals are from states that don’t want anything to do with the court.

The judges also ruled the attacks caused profound physical, cultural and social harm to women and girl victims. The transcript of the judgment contains harrowing testimony about the Janjaweed’s heinous actions.

This conviction signals the ICC’s commitment to pursuing justice for girls and women who are brutalised during conflicts. It also fulfils one of the goals of the late Cherif Bassiouni, the international law scholar who helped set up the ICC and pushed for a greater focus on punishing rape and gender-based crimes.

The ICC under pressure

Finally, this conviction comes at a time when the ICC itself is under significant pressure, internally and externally.

The court’s chief prosecutor is subject to an internal investigation for sexual misconduct, and the ICC itself was sanctioned by US President Donald Trump in February.

The US has also issued sanctions against the chief prosecutor and individual judges for investigating US forces in Afghanistan, and for issuing arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

In August, the US went even further, sanctioning two more judges and two deputy prosecutors. This included Nazhat Shameem Khan, who issued statements on behalf of the court in the Darfur case.

In August, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the ICC a “national security threat”. The ICC has strongly condemned the sanctions, as have many other organisations and countries.

Nonetheless, with Abd-Al-Rahman’s sentencing still to come, the Darfur case represents a much-needed win for international law and for the ICC. For the victims, however, real justice will have to include a comprehensive and funded plan for compensation and rehabilitation.

Myra Williamson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. A landmark conviction for war crimes in Sudan shows the wheels of global justice do turn – albeit slowly – https://theconversation.com/a-landmark-conviction-for-war-crimes-in-sudan-shows-the-wheels-of-global-justice-do-turn-albeit-slowly-267090

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Hart, Emeritus Faculty, US government and politics specialist, Australian National University

US President Donald Trump’s efforts to deploy the military for law enforcement duties in selected American cities is likely to end up before the US Supreme Court.

If it does, the nine justices will be faced with sorting out a dog’s breakfast of constitutional and statutory laws full of contradictions and ambiguities.

Given the propensity of the current Supreme Court to support and even extend the scope of presidential authority, it could very well rule in Trump’s favour. And this would have far-reaching implications for civil liberties and democracy in the United States.

How did we get to this point, and what does the law actually say about using the National Guard in US cities?

What is Trump attempting to do?

The National Guard is made up of part-time reservists assigned to units in each state. These soldiers are typically called into service by the governors of the states where they serve to respond to disasters or large protests.

In certain circumstances, presidents can also “federalise” National Guard troops, though it rarely happens against a governor’s wishes. Before this year, the last time this happened was in Selma, Alabama, in 1965, to protect civil rights protesters.

In recent months, Trump has attempted to “federalise” the National Guard units belonging to several states and dispatch them to cities (Los Angeles, Memphis, Washington DC, Portland and Chicago) that he claims are out of control.

The troop deployments have been opposed by the Democratic governors in some of these states, then blocked or restricted by temporary restraining orders issued by federal district court judges. (The order in California was subsequently stayed by the US Court of Appeals, pending a further appeal).

There are several issues being contested:

• the conditions under which the National Guard can be mobilised by the federal government
• the degree of collaboration between federal and state governments in issuing orders to the National Guard, and
• the prohibition on the military being used for domestic law enforcement purposes.

Trump’s moves are testing the uncertain boundaries of all these constraints on executive power. But, more significantly, he is also challenging the long-standing American tradition of keeping the military out of domestic politics.

What are the legal issues at play?

The constitutional authority to deploy the National Guard is actually assigned to Congress, not the president. Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution gives Congress the power to “provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions”. Militias have been interpreted to include the National Guard.

However, the Constitution also charges the president with two very significant duties. The first is to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States”; the second is to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed”. These two duties can amount to a significant grant of power in times of crisis.

The Trump administration will almost certainly argue he is deploying the National Guard in these US cities to carry out these duties.

There’s a bigger issue for Trump, though. Another law, the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, makes it illegal for federal troops to engage in civilian law enforcement unless expressly authorised by the Constitution or the law.

Trump is currently acting without this explicit legal authorisation. However,
as the Brennan Center for Justice has recently pointed out, there are 26 different laws that allow for the military to execute the law in specific situations. These exceptions undermine the purpose of the Posse Comitatus Act, making the case for urgent reform of the law.

What about the Insurrection Act?

One of these exceptions is the Insurrection Act of 1807, which gives the president the power to use the military or federalise National Guard troops to put down domestic uprisings. Since the civil rights movement in the 1960s, the act has seldom been used.

Trump said this week he would consider invoking the act to “get around” any court decisions blocking his move to deploy National Guard troops in US cities.

He also claimed the demonstrations against the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) building in Portland amounted to a “criminal insurrection”.

Trump then ramped up the rhetoric and the hyperbole even further by calling for the jailing of Illinois Governor JB Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson for failing to protect ICE agents in that city.

The demonstrations against Trump’s immigration policies in Los Angeles, Portland, and Chicago are nowhere near meeting the definition of insurrection.

But, as the president told the meeting of military generals in Virginia last week, he is keen to push the bounds on using the military in domestic affairs. Or, as he put it, to use these cities as “training grounds” for the armed forces.

If the Supreme Court rules in Trump’s favour on this issue, it would be tantamount to saying the president is the only arbiter on whether a political protest amounts to an insurrection and when it’s necessary to use the military to quell it.

It would also expand the scope for Trump to use the military in other areas of domestic politics.

The president has already deployed the military for border protection, so patrolling universities or even the lines outside polling stations on election day could be next.

John Hart does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Explainer: what powers does Trump actually have to deploy the military to US cities? – https://theconversation.com/explainer-what-powers-does-trump-actually-have-to-deploy-the-military-to-us-cities-267109

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael J. I. Brown, Associate Professor in Astronomy, Monash University

A proposed constellation of satellites has astronomers very worried. Unlike satellites that reflect sunlight and produce light pollution as an unfortunate byproduct, the ones by US startup Reflect Orbital would produce light pollution by design.

The company promises to produce “sunlight on demand” with mirrors that beam sunlight down to Earth so solar farms can operate after sunset.

It plans to start with an 18-metre test satellite named Earendil-1 which the company has applied to launch in 2026. It would eventually be followed by about 4,000 satellites in orbit by 2030, according to the latest reports.

So how bad would the light pollution be? And perhaps more importantly, can Reflect Orbital’s satellites even work as advertised?

Bouncing sunlight

In the same way you can bounce sunlight off a watch face to produce a spot of light, Reflect Orbital’s satellites would use mirrors to beam light onto a patch of Earth.

But the scale involved is vastly different. Reflect Orbital’s satellites would orbit about 625km above the ground, and would eventually have mirrors 54 metres across.

When you bounce light off your watch onto a nearby wall, the spot of light can be very bright. But if you bounce it onto a distant wall, the spot becomes larger – and dimmer.

This is because the Sun is not a point of light, but spans half a degree in angle in the sky. This means that at large distances, a beam of sunlight reflected off a flat mirror spreads out with an angle of half a degree.

What does that mean in practice? Let’s take a satellite reflecting sunlight over a distance of roughly 800km – because a 625km-high satellite won’t always be directly overhead, but beaming the sunlight at an angle. The illuminated patch of ground would be at least 7km across.

Even a curved mirror or a lens can’t focus the sunlight into a tighter spot due to the distance and the half-degree angle of the Sun in the sky.

Would this reflected sunlight be bright or dim? Well, for a single 54 metre satellite it will be 15,000 times fainter than the midday Sun, but this is still far brighter than the full Moon.

The balloon test

Last year, Reflect Orbital’s founder Ben Nowack posted a short video which summarised a test with the “last thing to build before moving into space”. It was a reflector carried on a hot air balloon.

In the test, a flat, square mirror roughly 2.5 metres across directs a beam of light down to solar panels and sensors. In one instance the team measures 516 watts of light per square metre while the balloon is at a distance of 242 metres.

For comparison, the midday Sun produces roughly 1,000 watts per square metre. So 516 watts per square metre is about half of that, which is enough to be useful.

However, let’s scale the balloon test to space. As we noted earlier, if the satellites were 800km from the area of interest, the reflector would need to be 6.5km by 6.5km – 42 square kilometres. It’s not practical to build such a giant reflector, so the balloon test has some limitations.

So what is Reflect Orbital planning to do?

Reflect Orbital’s plan is “simple satellites in the right constellation shining on existing solar farms”. And their goal is only 200 watts per square metre – 20% of the midday Sun.

Can smaller satellites deliver? If a single 54 metre satellite is 15,000 times fainter than the midday Sun, you would need 3,000 of them to achieve 20% of the midday Sun. That’s a lot of satellites to illuminate one region.

Another issue: satellites at a 625km altitude move at 7.5 kilometres per second. So a satellite will be within 1,000km of a given location for no more than 3.5 minutes.

This means 3,000 satellites would give you a few minutes of illumination. To provide even an hour, you’d need thousands more.

Reflect Orbital isn’t lacking ambition. In one interview, Nowack suggested 250,000 satellites in 600km high orbits. That’s more than all the currently catalogued satellites and large pieces of space junk put together.

And yet, that vast constellation would deliver only 20% of the midday Sun to no more than 80 locations at once, based on our calculations above. In practice, even fewer locations would be illuminated due to cloudy weather.

Additionally, given their altitude, the satellites could only deliver illumination to most locations near dusk and dawn, when the mirrors in low Earth orbit would be bathed in sunlight. Aware of this, Reflect Orbital plan for their constellation to encircle Earth above the day-night line in sun-synchronous orbits to keep them continuously in sunlight.

Bright lights

So, are mirrored satellites a practical means to produce affordable solar power at night? Probably not. Could they produce devastating light pollution? Absolutely.

In the early evening it doesn’t take long to spot satellites and space junk – and they’re not deliberately designed to be bright. With Reflect Orbital’s plan, even if just the test satellite works as planned, it will sometimes appear far brighter than the full Moon.

A constellation of such mirrors would be devastating to astronomy and dangerous to astronomers. To anyone looking through a telescope the surface of each mirror could be almost as bright as the surface of the Sun, risking permanent eye damage.

The light pollution will hinder everyone’s ability to see the cosmos and light pollution is known to impact the daily rhythms of animals as well.

Although Reflect Orbital aims to illuminate specific locations, the satellites’ beams would also sweep across Earth when moving from one location to the next. The night sky could be lit up with flashes of light brighter than the Moon.

The company did not reply to The Conversation about these concerns within deadline. However, it told Bloomberg this week it plans to redirect sunlight in ways that are “brief, predictable and targeted”, avoiding observatories and sharing the locations of the satellites so scientists can plan their work.

The consequences would be dire

It remains to be seen whether Reflect Orbital’s project will get off the ground. The company may launch a test satellite, but it’s a long way from that to getting 250,000 enormous mirrors constantly circling Earth to keep some solar farms ticking over for a few extra hours a day.

Still, it’s a project to watch. The consequences of success for astronomers – and anyone else who likes the night sky dark – would be dire.

Michael J. I. Brown receives research funding from the Australian Research Council.

Matthew Kenworthy receives research funding from the Dutch Research Council (NWO).

– ref. A US startup plans to deliver ‘sunlight on demand’ after dark. Can it work – and would we want it to? – https://theconversation.com/a-us-startup-plans-to-deliver-sunlight-on-demand-after-dark-can-it-work-and-would-we-want-it-to-264323