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1. Hot-carrier dynamics in catalysis

   https://doi.org/10.1557/mrs.2019.291  

   Harutyunyan, Hayk; Suchanek, Figen; Lemasters, Robert; Foley, Jonathan J. (January 2020, MRS Bulletin)

   null (Ed.)

   Nanoscale materials that contain metallic components can be designed to have excellent light-harvesting capabilities, and can also be used to direct the flow of energy from incident photons into small molecules at or near the surface of metal nanoparticles. One promising route for energy flow is through so-called hot charge carriers, which are optically excited on metal nanoparticles and subsequently transferred to molecules/materials that share an interface with the metal. This article provides an overview of the fundamentals of hot-carrier generation and transfer, discusses both theoretical and experimental means for interrogating these processes, and discusses several potential societally important applications of hot-carrier-driven chemistry to solar fuels and sustainable chemistry. 

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2. Potential for Use of Erythritol as a Socially Transferrable Ingested Insecticide for Ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)

   https://doi.org/10.1093/jee/toaa019  

   Barrett, Meghan; Caponera, Virginia; McNair, Cheyenne; O’Donnell, Sean; Marenda, Daniel R; Cornelius, Mary (February 2020, Journal of Economic Entomology)

   Abstract Ants are significant structural and agricultural pests, generating a need for human-safe and effective insecticides for ant control. Erythritol, a sugar alcohol used in many commercial food products, reduces survival in diverse insect taxa including fruit flies, termites, and mosquitos. Erythritol also decreases longevity in red imported fire ants; however, its effects on other ant species and its ability to be transferred to naïve colony members at toxic doses have not been explored. Here, we show that erythritol decreases survival in Tetramorium immigrans Santschi (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) in a concentration-dependent manner. Access to ad-libitum water reduced the toxic effects of erythritol, but worker mortality was still increased over controls with ad-lib water. Foraging T. immigrans workers transferred erythritol at lethal levels to nest mates that had not directly ingested erythritol. Similar patterns of mortality following erythritol ingestion were observed in Formica glacialis Wheeler (Hymenoptera: Formicidae), Camponotus subarbatus Emery (Hymenoptera: Formicidae), and Camponotus chromaiodes Bolton (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). These findings suggest that erythritol may be a highly effective insecticide for several genera of ants. Erythritol’s potential effectiveness in social insect control is augmented by its spread at lethal levels through ant colonies via social transfer (trophallaxis) between workers. 

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3. A Model of Socially Sustained Self-Tracking for Food and Diet

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3479595  

   Lu, Xi; Chen, Yunan; Epstein, Daniel_A (October 2021, Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction)

   Studies of personal informatics systems primarily examine people's use or non-use, but people often leverage other technology towards their long-term behavior change processes such as social platforms. We explore how tracking technologies and social platforms together help people build healthy eating behaviors by interviewing 18 people who use Chinese food journaling apps. We contribute a Model of Socially Sustained Self-Tracking in personal informatics, building on the past model of Personal Informatics and the learning components of Social Cognitive Theory. The model illustrates how people get advice from social platforms on when and how to track, transfer data to and apply knowledge from social platforms, evolve to use social platforms after tracking, and occasionally resume using tracking tools. Observational learning and enactive learning are central to these processes, with social technologies helping people to gain deeper and more reliable domain knowledge. We discuss how lapsing and abandoning of tracking can be viewed as evolving to social platforms, offering recommendations for how technology can better facilitate this evolution. 

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4. Secondary Mathematics Teachers’ Efforts to Engage Students through Academic and Social Support

   Jansen, A. (January 2019, Proceedings of the 41st annual meeting of the North American Chapter for the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education)

   Teachers' efforts to support students, both academically and socially, can play a role in how high school students productively engage with mathematics in the moment. To examine the connection between teacher support and student engagement, we conducted an exploratory mixed-methods study combining data from 20 high school classroom observations with student self-reports taken during the observed activity. Our findings indicate that when teachers provide academic support to their students during a lesson, they are also likely to provide social support. Higher teacher support of both kinds correlates with higher student self-efficacy, as well as social and cognitive engagement. Investigating relationships between observations of teaching and students' self-reports of engagement in-the-moment is a potentially revealing approach for uncovering engaging instructional strategies in secondary mathematics classrooms. 

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5. The direction and strength of social plasticity in mating signals and mate preferences vary with the life stage of induction

   https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2023.03.008  

   Desjonquères, Camille; Rodríguez, Rafael L. (June 2023, Animal Behaviour)

   Socially induced plasticity in mating signals and mate preferences is widespread in animals. The timing of plasticity induction is key for mating and evolutionary consequences: plasticity induced before and after dispersal often results in different patterns of mate choices. Here we discuss two additional factors that may be of importance: the nature of social interactions that are involved at different stages, and the direction and strength of the effects. We review a case study with the Enchenopa binotata species complex of treehoppers. In spite of a wide scope for social plasticity in E. binotata across life stages, effects of the juvenile social environment were stronger and more common, especially those influencing the signalepreference relationship. These results emphasize the importance of studying variation in plasticity induced along various life stages and of considering all the mating traits that may be socially plastic. We suggest that systematic investigation of these patterns across taxa will help better understand the origin of diversity in animal communication systems. 

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