This article reproduces the contents of the White Paper entitled by the same name submitted to the call issued by the European Space Agency soliciting ideas from the scientific community for the science themes that should be covered during the Voyage 2050 planning cycle. This contribution focus in the investigation of the emergence of life and the role that astronomy has to play in it. Three fundamental areas of activity are identified: [1] measuring the chemical enrichment of the Universe, [2] investigating planet formation and searching for exoplanets with signatures of life and, [3] determining the abundance of amino acids and the chemical routes to amino acid and protein growth in astronomical bodies. This proposal deals with the first two. The building blocks of life in the Universe began as primordial gas processed in stars and mixed at galactic scales. The mechanisms responsible for this development are not well-understood and have changed over the intervening 13 billion years. To follow the evolution of matter over cosmic time, it is necessary to study the strongest (resonance) transitions of the most abundant species in the Universe. Most of them are in the ultraviolet (UV; 950 angstrom - 3000 angstrom ) spectral range that is unobservable from the ground; the "missing" metals problem cannot be addressed without this access. Habitable planets grow in protostellar discs under ultraviolet irradiation, a by-product of the accretion process that drives the physical and chemical evolution of discs and young planetary systems. The electronic transitions of the most abundant molecules are pumped by this UV field that is the main oxidizing agent in the disc chemistry and provides unique diagnostics of the planet-forming environment that cannot be accessed from the ground. Knowledge of the variability of the UV radiation field is required for the astrochemical modelling of protoplanetary discs, to understand the formation of planetary atmospheres and the photochemistry of the precursors of life. Earth's atmosphere is in constant interaction with the interplanetary medium and the solar UV radiation field. The exosphere of the Earth extends up to 35 planetary radii providing an amazing wealth of information on our planet's winds and the atmospheric compounds. To access to it in other planetary systems, observation of the UV resonance transitions is required. The investigation for the emergence of life calls for the development of large astronomical facilities, including instrumentation in optical and UV wavelengths. In this contribution, the need to develop a large observatory in the optical and in the UV is revealed, in order to complete the scientific goals to investigate the origin of life, inaccessible through other frequencies in the electromagnetic spectrum.

The merger of a binary black hole gives birth to a highly distorted final black hole. The gravitational radiation emitted as this black hole relaxes presents us with the unique opportunity to probe extreme gravity and its connection with the dynamics of the black hole horizon. Using numerical relativity simulations, we demonstrate a connection between a concrete observable feature in the gravitational waves and geometrical features on the dynamical apparent horizon of the final black hole. Specifically, we show how the line-of-sight passage of a "cusp"-like defect on the horizon of the final black hole correlates with "chirp"-like frequency peaks in the post-merger gravitational-waves. These post-merger chirps should be observed and analyzed as the sensitivity of LIGO and Virgo increases and as future generation detectors, such as LISA and the Einstein Telescope, become operational.

The investigation of the emergence of life is a major endeavour of science. Astronomy is contributing to it in three fundamental manners: (1) by measuring the chemical enrichment of the Universe, (2) by investigating planet formation and searching for exoplanets with signatures of life and, (3) by determining the abundance of aminoacids and the chemical routes to aminoacid and protein growth in astronomical bodies. This proposal deals with the first two. In the Voyage to 2050, the world-wide scientific community is getting equipped with large facilities for the investigation of the emergence of life in the Universe (i.e. VLT, JWST, ELT, GMT, TMT, ALMA, FAST, VLA, ATHENA, SKA) including the ESA's CHEOPS, PLATO and ARIEL missions. This white paper is a community effort to call for the development of a large ultraviolet optical observatory to gather fundamental data for this investigation that will not be accessible through other ranges of the electromagnetic spectrum. A versatile space observatory with UV sensitivity a factor of 50-100 greater than existing facilities will revolutionize our understanding of the pathway to life in the Universe.

We present the concept of BlueMUSE, a blue-optimised, medium spectral resolution, panoramic integral field spectrograph based on the MUSE concept and proposed for the Very Large Telescope. With an optimised transmission down to 350 nm, a larger FoV (1.4 x 1.4 arcmin$^2$) and a higher spectral resolution compared to MUSE, BlueMUSE will open up a new range of galactic and extragalactic science cases allowed by its specific capabilities, beyond those possible with MUSE. For example a survey of massive stars in our galaxy and the Local Group will increase the known population of massive stars by a factor $>$100, to answer key questions about their evolution. Deep field observations with BlueMUSE will also significantly increase samples of Lyman-alpha emitters, spanning the era of Cosmic Noon. This will revolutionise the study of the distant Universe: allowing the intergalactic medium to be detected unambiguously in emission, enabling the study of the exchange of baryons between galaxies and their surroundings. By 2030, at a time when the focus of most of the new large facilities (ELT, JWST) will be on the infra-red, BlueMUSE will be a unique facility, outperforming any ELT instrument in the Blue/UV. It will have a strong synergy with ELT, JWST as well as ALMA, SKA, Euclid and Athena.

Chris Evans of Rolton Group says civil engineers need a cohesive strategy to cope with the transport and energy infrastructure demands likely to result from a surge in electric vehicle use within the next 7 years.

Advanced oxygen recovery life support for Martian transit and surface missions constitutes a variety of possible architectures. Over the last several years, NASA has pursued development of a two-step Bosch-based system called Series-Bosch (S-Bosch) to enable maximum recovery of oxygen from metabolic carbon dioxide. The first step of the process involves the Reverse Water-Gas Shift (RWGS) reaction. Two RWGS reactors, one developed at NASA and the other developed at Precision Combustion, Inc. have been assembled for the S-Bosch. The RWGS reactors were each tested to evaluate and compare general operational performance and fouling resistance. A down-select was completed to identify the reactor to be used in an integrated S-Bosch system. The second step in the S-Bosch process is carbon deposition. A carbon formation reactor (CFR) based on Martian regolith simulant as a catalyst was designed and tested for performance. Because the regolith will only be available once the crew arrives on the Martian surface, a second catalyst was evaluated for transit phases. Finally, integrated testing of an S-Bosch system was completed, leading to a technology readiness level (TRL) advancement of the S-Bosch system to TRL 4. The results of the RWGS down-select, CFR testing, and TRL evaluation are reported and discussed.

The central goal of ECLAIRE is to assess how climate change will alter the extent to which air pollutants threaten terrestrial ecosystems. Particular attention has been given to nitrogen compounds, especially nitrogen oxides (NOx) and ammonia (NH3), as well as Biogenic Volatile Organic Compounds (BVOCs) in relation to tropospheric ozone (O3) formation, including their interactions with aerosol components. ECLAIRE has combined a broad program of field and laboratory experimentation and modelling of pollution fluxes and ecosystem impacts, advancing both mechanistic understanding and providing support to European policy makers. The central finding of ECLAIRE is that future climate change is expected to worsen the threat of air pollutants on Europe’s ecosystems. Firstly, climate warming is expected to increase the emissions of many trace gases, such as agricultural NH3, the soil component of NOx emissions and key BVOCs. Experimental data and numerical models show how these effects will tend to increase atmospheric N deposition in future. By contrast, the net effect on tropospheric O3 is less clear. This is because parallel increases in atmospheric CO2 concentrations will offset the temperature-driven increase for some BVOCs, such as isoprene. By contrast, there is currently insufficient evidence to be confident that CO2 will offset anticipated climate increases in monoterpene emissions. Secondly, climate warming is found to be likely to increase the vulnerability of ecosystems towards air pollutant exposure or atmospheric deposition. Such effects may occur as a consequence of combined perturbation, as well as through specific interactions, such as between drought, O3, N and aerosol exposure. These combined effects of climate change are expected to offset part of the benefit of current emissions control policies. Unless decisive mitigation actions are taken, it is anticipated that ongoing climate warming will increase agricultural and other biogenic emissions, posing a challenge for national emissions ceilings and air quality objectives related to nitrogen and ozone pollution. The O3 effects will be further worsened if progress is not made to curb increases in methane (CH4) emissions in the northern hemisphere. Other key findings of ECLAIRE are that: 1) N deposition and O3 have adverse synergistic effects. Exposure to ambient O3 concentrations was shown to reduce the Nitrogen Use Efficiency of plants, both decreasing agricultural production and posing an increased risk of other forms of nitrogen pollution, such as nitrate leaching (NO3-) and the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N2O); 2) within-canopy dynamics for volatile aerosol can increase dry deposition and shorten atmospheric lifetimes; 3) ambient aerosol levels reduce the ability of plants to conserve water under drought conditions; 4) low-resolution mapping studies tend to underestimate the extent of local critical loads exceedance; 5) new dose-response functions can be used to improve the assessment of costs, including estimation of the value of damage due to air pollution effects on ecosystems, 6) scenarios can be constructed that combine technical mitigation measures with dietary change options (reducing livestock products in food down to recommended levels for health criteria), with the balance between the two strategies being a matter for future societal discussion. ECLAIRE has supported the revision process for the National Emissions Ceilings Directive and will continue to deliver scientific underpinning into the future for the UNECE Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution.

Traceability requires an unbroken chain of intercomparisons to a reference (often a national measurement institution such as NIST), each with stated uncertainties. However, traceable dimensional measurements of optics can be made by any competent metrologist

To understand and manage risks from climate change and extreme weather, infrastructure designers, owners, and operators need to know where vulnerabilities exist in the system, including how asset-specific vulnerabilities relate to systemwide vulnerabilities. This is harder than it seems: practitioners are faced with several barriers to effectively assess vulnerability, including the resources and time required for detailed studies, limitations in climate and asset information, and challenges in translating climate information at an appropriate level of detail to inform investment, design, and maintenance decisions. This paper presents an indicator-based vulnerability screening approach and discusses practical steps for data collection, scoring and weighting, and validation of results. The benefits of this approach are that it leverages existing information on climate and assets to save time and cost, and relies on metrics that can be applied as part of benchmarking, performance measurement and evaluation, risk assessment, asset management, and prioritization strategies. Moreover, the paper discusses efforts underway to leverage this approach, applications for mainstreaming climate change considerations in infrastructure decision making in developing and developed nations, and limitations of this approach that are ripe for further research.

Can social media be used to enhance the process of learning by students in higher education? Social media have become widely adopted by students in their personal lives. However, the application of social media to teaching and learning remains to be fully explored. In this study, the use of the social media tool Twitter for teaching was considered. Undergraduate students in Business and Management ( n  = 252) were encouraged to use Twitter for communicating with their tutor and each other during a 12-week course. Their involvement was evaluated using a survey considering amount of Twitter usage and students' attitudes and experiences. The data were analysed using factor analyses, which revealed a single usage construct and three attitudinal factors. Three findings emerged. Firstly, a positive correlation was found between amount of Twitter usage and student engagement in university-associated activities including organising their social lives and sharing information. Secondly, course-related tweeting was not related to interpersonal relationships between students and their tutor. Thirdly, Twitter usage did not impact class attendance. The results are salient for educational practitioners wishing to introduce social media into their teaching.