By Pan Wang, Associate Professor in Chinese and Asian Studies, UNSW Sydney
A Chinese personal safety app called Are You Dead? – recently rebranded as Demumu – has gone viral in recent weeks, attracting widespread media attention. Behind its sudden popularity lie deeper social transformations, including demographic shifts and changing personal and family relationships. At the same time, demand is growing for trust-based, non-medical, easy-to-use care networks tailored to the rapid rise of one-person households. Demumu…
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By Tess Parker, Research Scientist in Climate Variability and Hazards, CSIRO Michael Barnes, Research Fellow, ARC Centre of Excellence for Weather of the 21st Century, Monash University
In 2009, the combination of a cyclone, atmospheric waves and warm moist air triggered a record-breaking heatwave. It’s happening again.
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By A/Prof. Elmira Jamei, Associate professor, Victoria University
Cities swelter in heatwaves - they heat up faster and stay hotter. But Australia has few strategies to cool them. Here’s how we could shift from laggard to leader.
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By Phoebe Hart, Associate Professor, Film Screen & Animation, Queensland University of Technology
Can the diverse pack of dog lovers that gather at the local park draw Roland out of his shell – and deliver some laughs along the way?
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By Joel Lexchin, Associate professor, Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of Toronto; York University, Canada; University of Sydney
Before Canada decides to rely on foreign drug regulators to approve new medicines, Health Canada needs to show that it will improve public health.
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By Allison Creed, Lecturer and Curriculum Designer, Cognitive Linguistics, The University of Melbourne
I recently watched a participant at a wine tasting freeze when asked for their opinion. “It’s … nice?” they ventured, clearly wanting to say more but lacking the specific vocabulary to do so. The sommelier quickly intervened, noting the wine was “quite elegant, with beautiful structure.” The participant simply nodded, and the conversation ended. Wine is a multi-billion-dollar export commodity, yet industry “winespeak” can actually stop people feeling they can join in conversations about wine. And often words…
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By Celine Latulipe, Professor, Computer Science, University of Manitoba
Many Canadians rely on family or friends to file their taxes, but sharing CRA login credentials can be risky. Using a CRA RepID lets helpers access accounts while preventing fraud.
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By Kiffer George Card, Assistant Professor in Health Sciences, Simon Fraser University
Winter shifts people indoors and inward. While this may reduce incidental social contact, connection can be maintained through deliberate routines and low-threshold forms of engagement.
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By Jonathan Este, Senior International Affairs Editor, Associate Editor, The Conversation
This article was first published in The Conversation UK’s World Affairs Briefing email. Sign up to receive weekly analysis of the latest developments in international relations, direct to your inbox. The US government’s reaction to the killing of Alex Pretti last weekend – and of Renée Good a fortnight earlier – was a grim reminder of George Orwell’s dystopian masterpiece Nineteen Eighty-Four, in which: “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It…
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By Laura
Kolwezi in the Lualaba Province of the southeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where tensions are high between artisanal miners and industrial companies, holds 70 percent of the world’s cobalt reserves.
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