Podcasts about defense institute

Dr. C.S. Unnikrishnan is a professor at the School of Quantum Technology at the Defense Institute of Advanced Technology. Unnikrishnan is also a key member of the LIGO-India project and a member of the global LIGO Scientific Collaboration. His work has led him to some revolutionary conclusions about the nature of gravity, light, and the missing medium for these invisible actions. Our conversation gets into the details of his Machian approach to understanding the cosmos, which his calls "cosmic gravity." We discuss Henri Bergson's criticism of relativity, Einstein's transformation into quantum mascot, and issues with simultaneity in cosmic physics. Tell us your thoughts in the comments! Paper discussed in this podcast: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/1466/1/012007 Sign up for our Patreon and get episodes early + join our weekly Patron Chat https://bit.ly/3lcAasB 00:00 Go! 00:04:57 Revisiting old experiments to learn something new 00:13:23 A lack of absolute reference points 00:25:05 Reevaluating Einstein a Century On 00:35:22 Testing the constancy of the speed of light 00:43:25 Why is breaking physics preferred to an undetectable aether? 00:54:36 Evidence of light speed changes 01:04:39 Could Michaelson & Morley have given a different result? 01:21:16 Why was Michaelson's 1925 detection of the aether ignored? 01:25:38 Henri Bergson, Einstein, and Simultaneity 01:33:17 Simultaneity that is experienced 01:42:19 Mathematical elegance in conflict with reality 01:48:59 Is revisiting the constancy of light speed possible? 01:56:08 The solutions offered by a Machian paradigm 02:03:59 One universal frame intro 02:09:10 Are there two theories about light possible, or can only one prevail? 02:20:54 Is there an alternative to fields? 02:29:36 Closing thoughts #sciencepodcast, #QuantumPhysics, #CosmicGravity, #LIGOIndia, #MachianPhysics, #QuantumTechnology, #Einstein, #HenriBergson, #Relativity, #QuantumMascot, #Simultaneity, #GravityTheory, #PhysicsPodcast, #ScientificCollaboration, #Astrophysics, #CosmicPhysics, #ScienceRevolution, #theoreticalphysics , #QuantumMechanics, #LIGOProject, #PhysicsCommunity Check our short-films channel, @DemystifySci: https://www.youtube.com/c/DemystifyingScience AND our material science investigations of atomics, @MaterialAtomics https://www.youtube.com/@MaterialAtomics Join our mailing list https://bit.ly/3v3kz2S PODCAST INFO: Anastasia completed her PhD studying bioelectricity at Columbia University. When not talking to brilliant people or making movies, she spends her time painting, reading, and guiding backcountry excursions. Shilo also did his PhD at Columbia studying the elastic properties of molecular water. When he's not in the film studio, he's exploring sound in music. They are both freelance professors at various universities. - Blog: http://DemystifySci.com/blog - RSS: https://anchor.fm/s/2be66934/podcast/rss - Donate: https://bit.ly/3wkPqaD - Swag: https://bit.ly/2PXdC2y SOCIAL: - Discord: https://discord.gg/MJzKT8CQub - Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/DemystifySci - Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/DemystifySci/ - Twitter: https://twitter.com/DemystifySci MUSIC: -Shilo Delay: https://g.co/kgs/oty671

Dr. Don and Professor Ben talk about the risks from receiving unexpected powder in the mail. Dr. Don - not risky

Today's guest, Nicole Smith is the founder of the Dignity Defense Institute, a nonprofit that is setting out to educate humanity on human value. Their mission is to become an amplifying force for the defense of human dignity.  Join as Nicole shares her story about working on the PR side of human crisis and how that work and the birth of her daughter inspired her to use her voice to help create change.

This edition features stories on a PRT visit to Zabul, Afghanistan, B-1 Bomber upgrades, a shooting competition in Belgium, the Kadena, Japan special olympics and Defense Institute of Medical Operations training. Hosted by Senior Airman Brad Sisson.

This edition features stories on redeploying Army helicopters, the Defense Institute for Medical Operations (DIMO) and upgrading communications equipment on Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany. Hosted by Senior Airman Brad Sisson.

Rob Tibbo is owner and a Certified Instructor at Critical Defense Institute. Rob is in the business of teaching every day people how to be more aware, more prepared and how to protect themselves and others in situations that he hopes they never actually have to encounter. Learn why Rob's approach to preparedness differs from other models, then make a trip to see him at our Made in NH Expo in April! Learn more about Critical Defense Institute  This episode of BizCastNH is sponsored by: McLane Middleton

Ever wonder what it's like to work directly with the U.S. State Department and have the tenacity to fight for what you do best? Hear from Capt. Suzanna Brugler, a U.S. Navy Captain who after five tries got the promotion she desired. Her story is one of determination and one that shows it's never too late to quit on what you really want in life.Capt. Suzanna Brugler, a native of Defiance, Oh., graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1998. Brugler holds a master's degree in Defense and Strategic Studies with a focus on International Relations in African Studies from the U.S. Naval War College. She's a graduate of the Defense Information School (DINFOS), Defense Institute of Security Cooperation Studies (DISCS), Joint Special Operations University (JSOU), and Defense Security Cooperation University (DSCU).Capt. Brugler started her career as a Surface Warfare Officer (SWO) serving aboard USS Mobile Bay (CG 53) in Yokosuka, Japan. After qualifying SWO she lateral transferred to Public Affairs (PA), and in January 2002 deployed to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba to facilitate media coverage of the first detainee flights from Afghanistan. A year later, Capt. Brugler was hand-selected to deploy to Bahrain as part of the Coalition Press Information Center (CPIC Bahrain) and served aboard USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) to assist the first-ever DoD-wide media program for military air strike campaign “Shock and Awe,” marking the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom. She later served as the Media department head aboard USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76).Brugler taught the Public Affairs Qualification Course at DINFOS in Fort Meade, Md. before serving her last tour on active duty as director of the Navy Office of Information, East in New York City. While there, she served as chief of public affairs for the commissioning of USS New York (LPD 21), a ship built with 7.5 tons of steel recovered from the World Trade Center after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.In 2011, Brugler transferred to the Navy Reserves (NR) and served as the Africa Partnership Station PAO for U.S. SIXTH Fleet. Subsequent tours include serving as the congressional liaison coordinator at NATO Headquarters, Supreme Allied Commander Transformation in Norfolk, Va., executive officer of the NR Chief of Navy Information Headquarters unit at the Pentagon, and director of NR Naval Special Warfare PA with NSW Group 11 in Coronado, Calif. In May 2017, Capt. Brugler again lateral-transferred to the NR component of the Foreign Area Officer (FAO) community and served as the NR FAO Africa regional lead assigned to U.S. Africa Command in Stuttgart, Germany. In 2021 she mobilized for one year as the liaison officer for Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Central Command/U.S. FIFTH Fleet. She was called to serve as the Interagency Coordinator for Task Force 58, the contingency task force that was stood up to facilitate 7,079 Afghan refugees from Kabul to the U.S. during the noncombatant emergency operation ALLIES REFUGE. She finished her NAVCENT mobilization this past May serving as an inaugural member of the Commander's Initiatives Group (CIG), advising the CommandeVisit my website: https://thehello.llc/THERESACARPENTERRead my writings on my blog: ...

Joining me today is S.F. Banks, who is doing phenomenal work in our community with our youth. In 2007 he opened up an I.M. Defense Institute, which shows women and men how to defend themselves from attackers. He also has a youth program and is a creator of Camp  Warrior King, exposing youth to upbeat, fun activities. In addition, S.F. founded You Can Have It All, a youth conference, and the accompanying You Can Have It All youth magazine. Lastly, he created Team Hot Sauce, a cartoon storytelling platform for youth.Overcoming Your PastSF is a big believer in taking the pains from your past and making those into the beauty of your future. “Let those things that you've overcome, fuel you towards your future.” Having two aunts - one that was murdered by her husband, along with murdering their child (his cousin), and another aunt who suffered severe brain damage from her husband, S.F. is on a mission to help women defend themselves as a result of these experiences he had as a child. “I still have a toy of my cousin JoJo's in my truck that I keep to help me remember my purpose.” His cousin's truck is a constant reminder of how he can help keep one or more children from the same situation that his aunts went through. Listen in to find out how S.F. started his journey with the I.M. Defense Institute over a decade ago, an example of a client who could protect themselves as a result of his program, and how he provides food and shelter to the children he supports in the African orphanage.Resources MentionedJoin Me on Speak Loud PlatformSpeak Loud Podcast on the webFind SF Banks on the webSpread the message of Speak Loudly Podcast and share this episode with a friend!***Disclaimer: All content found on Speak Loud Podcast, including text, images, audio, or other formats were created for informational purposes only. Material contained on Speak Loud Podcast website, podcast, and social media postings are not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your qualified healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard or delay seeking professional medical advice. Information on this podcast and guest comments, opinions, and content are solely for educational and entertainment purposes. Use of this information is at your own risk.**

The JBS cyberattack that occurred in late May and was resolved in early June garnered national attention well outside the agriculture news channels. Following the SolarWinds, Colonial Pipeline, and now the recent JBS cyberattack, cybersecurity has been headlining the news around the country the last few weeks. With cybersecurity concerns top of mind, the MEAT+POULTRY podcast invited John Hoffman, senior research fellow at the Food Protection and Defense Institute at the University of Minnesota, to discuss the topic. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/meatpoultry-podcast/message

Colonel John Hoffman of the Food Protection and Defense Institute has been advising companies and government on how to harden their cyber functions. Here he deconstructs how JBS came to be hacked and what government and corporations need to do to ensure national food security. Heritage Radio Network is a listener supported nonprofit podcast network. Support What Doesn't Kill You by becoming a member!What Doesn't Kill You is Powered by Simplecast.

Colonel John Hoffman of the Food Protection and Defense Institute has been advising companies and government on how to harden their cyber functions. Here he deconstructs how JBS came to be hacked and what government and corporations need to do to ensure national food security. Heritage Radio Network is a listener supported nonprofit podcast network. Support What Doesn't Kill You by becoming a member!What Doesn't Kill You is Powered by Simplecast.

Join Jose as he Interviews his American Kenpo Karate Instructor Colin Van Deusen.  Colin is an 8th Deg. Black Belt in American Kenpo Karate and Founder of Power of One Self Defense Institute. 8th Deg. Black Belt in American Kenpo Karate35 years of Martial Arts ExperienceUndefeated Head coach of The Los Angeles Stars (Chuck Norris Full Contact World Combat League)Multiple Men's overall sparring grand champion Australian World CupMen's overall Sparring Grand Champion titles in four countriesTeaching seminars around the world for over 30 yearsFounder of Power of One Self Defense Institute (EST. 1992) Click here to train with Colin Van Deusen at his Power of One Kenpo Karate Studio

This meeting of the Commission took place on January 26, 2017, and covers challenges and solutions for agrodefense. See here for more information on this event. Congressional Perspective The Honorable Roger Marshall, United States Representative, Kansas Panel One – Prevention and Deterrence Stephen Higgs, PhD, Associate Vice President for Research and Director, Biosecurity Research Institute Amy Kircher, DrPH, Director, Food Protection and Defense Institute, University of Minnesota Gerald W. Parker, Jr., DVM, PhD, Vice President, Public Health Preparedness and Response, and Interim Director, Institute for Animal Infectious Diseases Defense, Texas A&M University Steve Parker, MBA, MSCM, Head, North America Veterinary Public Health, Merial Panel Two – Surveillance and Detection Tammy R. Beckham, DVM, PhD, Dean, College of Veterinary Medicine, Kansas State University Ali S. Khan, MD, MPH, Dean, College of Public Health, University of Nebraska Medical Center Kelly F. Lechtenberg, DVM, PhD, President, Midwest Veterinary Services/Central States Research Center/Veterinary and Biomedical Research Center Panel Three – Preparedness, Response, Recovery & Mitigation Jackie McClaskey, PhD, Secretary, Kansas Department of Agriculture D. Charles Hunt, MPH, State Epidemiologist and Director, Bureau of Epidemiology and Public Health Informatics, Kansas Department of Health and Environment Curt J. Mann, DVM, Chief Executive, Empryse Group

Jim Maher and Gayle Knutson talk about food security issues during COVID-19 with Dr. Jennifer van de Ligt, Director of the Food Protection and Defense Institute at the University of Minnesota (4:00); how the economy is being managed through the pandemic with Professor V.V. Chari from the Heller-Hurwicz Economics Institute at the Univ. of Minnesota and an advisor to the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis (22:30);  the latest from Washington County with County Board Chair Fran Miron (37:00); and news from around the St. Croix River with Greg Seitz of St. Croix 360 (57:00). Also included are updates on news from the community (18:00 and 49:00).RIVER RADIO show page with links mentioned in this program:https://marinecommunitylibrary.org/event/river-radio-052320/

Fraud. We hear about it a lot. Financial fraud, political fraud, and more, but food fraud? It turns out that this is a more significant issue than one might imagine. Dr Amy Kircher, director of the Food Protection and Defense Institute at the University of Minnesota is a leading voice on this issue. About Amy Kircher Amy Kircher is the Director of the Food Protection and Defense Institute, a Department of Homeland Security Center of Excellence and Co-Director of the Collaboratory at the University of Minnesota. She leads the Institute's initiatives and coordinates a research consortium of experts dedicated to protecting the food system through research and education. Her current research includes identification and warning of food disruptions and emerging disease through data fusion and analysis; supply chains; and delivery of innovative solutions to the professionals in the field. Additionally, she conducts research efforts on global health and pandemic preparedness leveraging expertise and technology that exists in the Institute. Interview Summary You and I had a conversation last year when I was fortunate enough to visit your center at the University of Minnesota in which you described your work on food fraud. I found the topic and your work on it. Absolutely fascinating. I would love to have you share some of your insights with our listeners. I'd like to begin with asking you, what do you mean by food fraud? Thanks Kelly. Food fraud is the misrepresentation of food as expected. And so by that I mean some elements of the food that we're purchasing different than what we think we're paying for. So it might be that a food has been diluted. An example would be adding water to lemon juice, or it could be a complete substitution of a particular either whole part of the product or a component part. So species substitution of fish is a great example where a fillet, a white filet of fish has been substituted for a more expensive filet of fish. I remember a very public example of this when people were talking about olive oil. Could you tell us about that one in particular? Certainly olive oil has gotten a ton of popular press, and certainly has been a real leading issue that we can research and then understand why this food fraud happens in this particular commodity. So olive oil, especially extra virgin olive oil or high end olive oils, come from a particular region or have a particular method upon which they're produced. Now, to make money. Fraudsters might dilute that expensive olive oil with something that's substandard or something that isn't the same caliber of what's being sold as represented on the bottle. So we've seen significant issues in substitution in olive oil and unfortunately in the 1980s it was fatal in that somebody substituted industrial oil for cooking oil and several folks were killed. You just answered the question that I had. I was going to say certainly consumers stand to get ripped off by this, but it also sounds to have health risks. Absolutely. So we sort of park the our work into two camps. The first camp is you're getting, as you said, ripped off. So there's some fraudulent activity, but it doesn't create public health harm. And then the other category where we spend a lot of our time and we're more concerned is where there's an element of public health harm that could result from the fraudulent behavior. Often we see that in products that have substitutions in them or are mislabeled. A great example was several years ago we had Cumin that had peanut protein in it because it was boosting the color of the Cumin, which didn't have a great harvest season. All of a sudden you have an undeclared allergen in a spice that no one expects to be there. Wasn't there a celebrated case of food fraud occurring in infant formula being produced in China? Unfortunately, infant formula has been all too often an example of fraudulent activity. Part of the reason is, especially in food fraud, we see that people enter and become fraudsters because they can make money. So those things that have a high price point is one area that we see a lot of fraudulent activity. So infant formula, spicy spices, seafood, all of those areas because of the higher price point, people think they can make more money. Boy, it's heartbreaking isn't it? To think of groups like infants being affected by this? Absolutely. I think the infant group, certainly. I can't imagine being a parent of a child with allergies like peanut allergies and seemingly harmlessly adding a spice to maybe your family recipe of chili and then all of a sudden having someone go into anaphylactic shock. So it really is challenging in paralyzing to think about the catastrophic outcomes that could result from food fraud. So the discussion you and I had when I was visiting, you said that food fraud can sometimes be precipitated by changes in the world supply, through events such as political unrest or weather disasters in say other parts of the world. How does this happen? We spend a lot of time looking at, for each case that we uncover, what triggered this particular fraud, fraudulent events to happen? So why is there some vulnerability in the system that a fraudster could expose to make money? We often see that there are environmental conditions or current situations that create this opportunity. So perhaps it is an adverse weather event where there's been a frost and we've lost a particular produce. When that happens, someone else will enter the market to fill a void. A lot of times might be a fraudster who's looking to make money. Certainly political unrest is another case where we may see some alteration in the supply and the demand, allowing an opportunity for someone to enter the market. I would also say just human behavior. So what we as consumers demand may create a demand curve that the supply cannot keep up with. And, therefore fraudsters enter the market. A great example is pomegranates and pomegranate juice. So when there was a huge consumer demand by perceived and I think actual health benefits of pomegranates, there was all of a sudden a flood of products available on the market, some of which had no pomegranate in them. It's remarkable to hear about this. It sounds like some of your work then is aimed at producing predictive models or an algorithm, if you will, about what set of conditions might make certain parts of the food supply most vulnerable to this? And you mentioned political changes or weather shocks or things like this. Tell us how you construct a model like that and how it would go about predicting likelihood of food fraud? Thank you for asking. It's a topic I'm super excited about. Certainly we've been very reactionary in our attitude to food events. So if you think about food safety, people have to get sick before we investigate. Well, there's a delay--the event has already happened. My argument is that we can be predictive in our ability to look at where potentially vulnerabilities lie such that we can put mitigation steps in place before a consumer even purchases the food. So when I think about big data and algorithms and this predictive aspect, we need to understand what creates a condition for fraudsters to operate. We know that when there are shifts in supply and demand that happens. And so we look to what creates those shifts. It might be a weather event, potentially it is a trade event. So when we start capturing those triggers that result or have resulted in fraud, we can then proactively look at those triggers in the future. So if we projected there's going to be an adverse weather event or that there'll be a trade situation, we can better understand the cascading effects of that such that we can put mitigation steps in place. So let me give you an example. One would be, we knew that Ebola was in West Africa in 2014-2015. Most of the world's cocoa is also produced there. So we could anticipate that we would have less cocoa coming out of West Africa during that time period for a whole variety of reasons, whether it's transportation or it is harvest. We also know that fraudsters have diluted cocoa with other things like arrowroot or dirt. So for a given period of time, our mitigation step should be test cocoa for purity. And if we don't see it, we know that fraudsters have been involved in that particular commodity, I can imagine the food industry being keenly interested in your predictive models because as they are getting the supply of things that they add to foods to create the finished product. For them to know in advance when to do special testing would be enormously helpful, wouldn't it? It would be. I would argue though, I don't think food companies, unfortunately, are structured to be able to look at this data. So one thing we have to do is we have to work with food companies to understand how best to deliver this information so that it informs not only maybe their food safety teams, but their procurement teams or their supply chain teams so that they understand that this prediction may affect the ingredients that they're sourcing. So we'll have to build a stronger relationship about where do we put and package this data for a company to be most useful in their decision making. Where in government nationally and globally does the watchdog function occur? So unfortunately, because we don't have one central food agency, it sits in multiple locations. So it will sit within the agency that regulates that particular food. Now primarily that would be the USDA or the FDA. However, there are several other departments that regulate different foods. So it is a dispersed regulatory activity and the surveillance also sits within those authorities.

In another podcast called Food Defense 101, Amy Kircher, director of the Food Protection and Defense Institute at the University of Minnesota, painted a picture of threats the nation faces with intentional contamination of the food supply. A very important part of her work is what to do about this threat. Interview Summary How is food defense being addressed by the food companies? Because of course, they're highly vulnerable to scandals and lawsuits and other things that could happen if their food was intentionally contaminated? You're absolutely correct. And it is a real challenge for food companies. At their core, they make food for consumers to buy. And so the thought of someone intentionally adulterating their product is not something that has been sort of front of mind. Recently, the Food Safety Modernization Act (FMSA) introduced several new rules. The seventh of those rules is on intentional adulteration or food defense. So companies now have to look at food defense from the perspective of how do they mitigate any threats to the foods they produce. So they've started to spend more time in this arena because of that FSMA rule. Let's take Unilever, Nestle, Kraft or a Cargill, any of them, and give us a sense of the number of products such a company might sell and how many constituent things might be going into those products? Are we talking about hundreds, thousands, many more? What do the numbers of like? If we talk about some of these global footprint companies, we're talking thousands of different SKUs (SKU stands for stock keeping units). Each of those food products has multitudes of ingredients that make up a final product. And on top of that, the companies probably have multiple vendors that they source from. So if they sourced a particular product from one area today, they may source it from another area or a different company the next day. So the complication of how we've constructed our food supply is incredible and global, and it is a very complex network of interconnected systems that have to all work together to create a product that we can buy off the grocery shelves. It is really challenging for a food company to understand all of that complexity because they need to know all of the suppliers behind them. Typically a food company has known who they've sourced from--one back--and who they sell to--one forward--in this new rule. And when we think about protecting the food from intentional adulteration, they need to be able to understand their whole supply chain for all ingredients. I imagine that given the complexity of the supply chain, and the number of players that the food companies are getting their constituent ingredients from., it would be impossible to test for safety and all those ingredients. So do They just have to trust their suppliers? Certainly. So when we think about it from food safety perspectives, for instance, there are certificates of authenticity. There are contracts about maybe purity of an ingredient or the spec of the ingredient that's purchased That really does help with food safety. But if we think about food defense and someone intentionally adulterating a raw material or an ingredient, they don't care about that certificate or purity. They will forge, perhaps, those documents to ensure that their product is purchased. So from a food safety perspective, of course, it helps to have those good processes in place, whether they're policy or manufacturing. But when we think about food defense and someone being an intelligent adversary, well they will be fraudulent in the production of documentation or representation of their material because they're trying to do harm in the system. So let's go back to the particular food that you mentioned in the first podcast that we recorded: Worcestershire sauce. And you said it could have as many as 11 different players who might be involved in supplying to the final company, different ingredients. Do the ingredients get tested anywhere along the line or do the final products get tested? Or is it just kind of a matter of faith that everything is going to be safe? That's a great question, Kelly. And so I would argue for all of the ingredients within that bottle of Worcestershire sauce, each of them has a long supply chain. Paprika itself might have 11 steps. So multiply that by the number of ingredients that happen to be in that particular bottle you've purchased. So for each particular ingredient, there might be a set of tests that happen because it's good practice or because there's been an issue in the past. So perhaps they're testing for purity or for safety reasons. But there isn't a standard way to test all ingredients. So I think that's challenge one. And as food moves throughout the world where we source these ingredients from, until it gets to final product may span multiple countries. We also don't have a standard system globally for testing each of these particular products. This just adds to the complexity of protecting the food supply. What's the role of government in all this? So there are multiple roles, I would argue, in this space. One is that we need to set up good guidance of how we look at vulnerability and then prepare against that. So that good guidance comes out of, at least in the United States, may come out of Congress and then rules are implemented by our departments about how to build a framework and structure a program to make sure that we understand vulnerabilities and food and how to protect against it. The other role in government, in food defense, in particular, is that of intelligence or knowledge gathering. Where do we have disruptions in the system where somebody may be wanting to do harm? So is there information about a particular group that wants to do harm on another entity, either a company, a brand, a particular sector, maybe like agriculture, production, animal agriculture perhaps? And then is there an avenue for them to execute in that area? So when we talk about food defense, it's not just the traditional food regulation departments that are in our government, but it also is those security and intelligence and law enforcement elements. Intentional contamination of food is a crime. And when it's a crime, we need to ensure that law enforcement is an active partner. One could imagine a lot of different government agencies having an interest in this. The Department of Homeland Security obviously, and your center is affiliated with that department. The Defense Department, the US Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration, and there are more. Where does authority lie on this and is there a lead player? How do these organizations work together--these parts of government? So personally I think this is a significant challenge we face. There is not a lead player for food defense. As you've already mentioned, there are several departments and agencies within the government that own a piece of this puzzle. And unfortunately, there's not one group that's been knighted as the lead. This creates a significant challenge in unifying the effort. Now have we overcome that? To some extent? Yes, we do it through working groups. We do it with relationships between entities and organizations that may either regulate food or regulate investigation of food or do protection of the homeland. So there are groups that come together that attempt to tackle food defense, but I would argue there is no lead or central policy for food defense, making it really challenging from a consistency, a perspective to get the work done. I think what we see is inconsistency in roles, duplication of effort, and often gaps in food defense. If there are challenges organizing and harmonizing things just in the US, you can imagine how that would be even more complex on a global level. And given that the food system is so global, how, how are things being coordinated around the world? So food safety has done a great job of harmonizing the globe around what does it mean to have safe food and how do we protect our food supply. Food defense has not culminated in that global harmonization yet. We see individual countries, sometimes regions coming together to start to tackle food defense, but yet we're inconsistent in how we're doing it. What we see is it's often that any effort has been motivated by some attack. So in New Zealand, they had a sabotage incident which motivated them to start building food defense programs. In the UK we saw the horsemeat scandal, and that was very much a food fraud issue. So their motivation is around food fraud. In parts of Africa, they culminate all of this work under food safety. So you can see where the lack of standardization becomes a significant challenge in that our food, our global plate at dinner, comes from around the world and may not have had the same food defense programs for each of the things that we're eating. If our listeners wanted to learn more about this topic, where would you suggest to go? There are a couple of interesting places that I think you could go to. Certainly, there are research and academic publications on food defense and how to protect the food system. So you can come to our website at Food Protection and Defense Institute. You can certainly look at our government programs, both the FDA and the USDA has food defense websites. You can read more about policy and program implementation. I also would say there is some popular press and maybe we would call it entertainment opportunities to learn more about it as well. Netflix has produced a series called rotten that talks about food fraud, for instance.  

Fraud. We hear about it a lot. Financial fraud, political fraud, and more, but food fraud? It turns out that this is a more significant issue than one might imagine. Dr Amy Kircher, director of the Food Protection and Defense Institute at the University of Minnesota is a leading voice on this issue. About Amy Kircher Amy Kircher is the Director of the Food Protection and Defense Institute, a Department of Homeland Security Center of Excellence and Co-Director of the Collaboratory at the University of Minnesota. She leads the Institute's initiatives and coordinates a research consortium of experts dedicated to protecting the food system through research and education. Her current research includes identification and warning of food disruptions and emerging disease through data fusion and analysis; supply chains; and delivery of innovative solutions to the professionals in the field. Additionally, she conducts research efforts on global health and pandemic preparedness leveraging expertise and technology that exists in the Institute. Interview Summary You and I had a conversation last year when I was fortunate enough to visit your center at the University of Minnesota in which you described your work on food fraud. I found the topic and your work on it. Absolutely fascinating. I would love to have you share some of your insights with our listeners. I'd like to begin with asking you, what do you mean by food fraud? Thanks Kelly. Food fraud is the misrepresentation of food as expected. And so by that I mean some elements of the food that we're purchasing different than what we think we're paying for. So it might be that a food has been diluted. An example would be adding water to lemon juice, or it could be a complete substitution of a particular either whole part of the product or a component part. So species substitution of fish is a great example where a fillet, a white filet of fish has been substituted for a more expensive filet of fish. I remember a very public example of this when people were talking about olive oil. Could you tell us about that one in particular? Certainly olive oil has gotten a ton of popular press, and certainly has been a real leading issue that we can research and then understand why this food fraud happens in this particular commodity. So olive oil, especially extra virgin olive oil or high end olive oils, come from a particular region or have a particular method upon which they're produced. Now, to make money. Fraudsters might dilute that expensive olive oil with something that's substandard or something that isn't the same caliber of what's being sold as represented on the bottle. So we've seen significant issues in substitution in olive oil and unfortunately in the 1980s it was fata in that somebody substituted industrial oil for cooking oil and several folks were killed. You just answered the question that I had. I was going to say certainly consumers stand to get ripped off by this, but it also sounds to have health risks. Absolutely. So we sort of park the our work into two camps. The first camp is you're getting, as you said, ripped off. So there's some fraudulent activity, but it doesn't create public health harm. And then the other category where we spend a lot of our time and we're more concerned is where there's an element of public health harm that could result from the fraudulent behavior. Often we see that in products that have substitutions in them or are mislabeled. A great example was several years ago we had Cumin that had peanut protein in it because it was boosting the color of the Cumin, which didn't have a great harvest season. All of a sudden you have an undeclared allergen in a spice that no one expects to be there. Wasn't there a celebrated case of food fraud occurring in infant formula being produced in China? Unfortunately, infant formula has been all too often an example of fraudulent activity. Part of the reason is, especially in food fraud, we see that people enter and become fraudsters because they can make money. So those things that have a high price point is one area that we see a lot of fraudulent activity. So infant formula, spicy spices, seafood, all of those areas because of the higher price point, people think they can make more money. Boy, it's heartbreaking isn't it? To think of groups like infants being affected by this? Absolutely. I think the infant group, certainly. I can't imagine being a parent of a child with allergies like peanut allergies and seemingly harmlessly adding a spice to maybe your family recipe of chili and then all of a sudden having someone go into anaphylactic shock. So it really is challenging in paralyzing to think about the catastrophic outcomes that could result from food fraud. So the discussion you and I had when I was visiting, you said that food fraud can sometimes be precipitated by changes in the world supply, through events such as political unrest or weather disasters in say other parts of the world. How does this happen? We spend a lot of time looking at, for each case that we uncover, what triggered this particular fraud, fraudulent events to happen? So why is there some vulnerability in the system that a fraudster could expose to make money? We often see that there are environmental conditions or current situations that create this opportunity. So perhaps it is an adverse weather event where there's been a frost and we've lost a particular produce. When that happens, someone else will enter the market to fill a void. A lot of times might be a fraudster who's looking to make money. Certainly political unrest is another case where we may see some alteration in the supply and the demand, allowing an opportunity for someone to enter the market. I would also say just human behavior. So what we as consumers demand may create a demand curve that the supply cannot keep up with. And, therefore fraudsters enter the market. A great example is pomegranates and pomegranate juice. So when there was a huge consumer demand by perceived and I think actual health benefits of pomegranates, there was all of a sudden a flood of products available on the market, some of which had no pomegranate in them. It's remarkable to hear about this. It sounds like some of your work then is aimed at producing predictive models or an algorithm, if you will, about what set of conditions might make certain parts of the food supply most vulnerable to this? And you mentioned political changes or weather shocks or things like this. Tell us how you construct a model like that and how it would go about predicting likelihood of food fraud? Thank you for asking. It's a topic I'm super excited about. Certainly we've been very reactionary in our attitude to food events. So if you think about food safety, people have to get sick before we investigate. Well, there's a delay--the event has already happened. My argument is that we can be predictive in our ability to look at where potentially vulnerabilities lie such that we can put mitigation steps in place before a consumer even purchases the food. So when I think about big data and algorithms and this predictive aspect, we need to understand what creates a condition for fraudsters to operate. We know that when there are shifts in supply and demand that happens. And so we look to what creates those shifts. It might be a weather event, potentially it is a trade event. So when we start capturing those triggers that result or have resulted in fraud, we can then proactively look at those triggers in the future. So if we projected there's going to be an adverse weather event or that there'll be a trade situation, we can better understand the cascading effects of that such that we can put mitigation steps in place. So let me give you an example. One would be, we knew that Ebola was in West Africa in 2014-2015. Most of the world's cocoa is also produced there. So we could anticipate that we would have less cocoa coming out of West Africa during that time period for a whole variety of reasons, whether it's transportation or it is harvest. We also know that fraudsters have diluted cocoa with other things like arrowroot or dirt. So for a given period of time, our mitigation step should be test cocoa for purity. And if we don't see it, we know that fraudsters have been involved in that particular commodity, I can imagine the food industry being keenly interested in your predictive models because as they are getting the supply of things that they add to foods to create the finished product. For them to know in advance when to do special testing would be enormously helpful, wouldn't it? It would be. I would argue though, I don't think food companies, unfortunately, are structured to be able to look at this data. So one thing we have to do is we have to work with food companies to understand how best to deliver this information so that it informs not only maybe their food safety teams, but their procurement teams or their supply chain teams so that they understand that this prediction may affect the ingredients that they're sourcing. So we'll have to build a stronger relationship about where do we put and package this data for a company to be most useful in their decision making. Where in government nationally and globally does the watchdog function occur? So unfortunately, because we don't have one central food agency, it sits in multiple locations. So it will sit within the agency that regulates that particular food. Now primarily that would be the USDA or the FDA. However, there are several other departments that regulate different foods. So it is a dispersed regulatory activity and the surveillance also sits within those authorities.

After a month-long hiatus, Yin & Young are back with an interview with actor George Q. Nguyen discussing his path from SF to LA and balancing a day job with an acting career. - Young met George in the Bay Area for a screening of "The Grandmaster." - George's parents used to teach language for the Defense Institute in Monterey. Was born in El Paso, but grew up in San Francisco. Started as a film major as an undergrad and filmed in 8mm. - Took one acting class as undergrad. Realized was more passionate about being in front of the camera or on stage then behind the camera. - Changed his major to Cellular & Molecular Biology, wanted a more practical major. - Got a job at ACT selling tickets to upcoming shows and was able to take ACT classes at night. Started working at a biotech before graduation. - "Whenever a director asks you to audition, you audition," was one of the first great acting lessons he learned. - Continued working both at a biotech firm and at ACT doing sales. - Biotech pays the bills to allow George to pursue his creative endeavors. - George got hit by a car not too long ago. Broke his leg in different parts and as gone through multiple operations to fix things. Rough start to 2018. - Being a consultant/contractor allows for some flexibility to go to auditions. - Tried various martial arts in SF such as Wing Chun where he learned in a garage. - Oscar Corner: Yin and Young and George discuss some Best Films from 2017. "Coco", "Three Billboards", "I, Tonya", "The Shape of Water." LANGUAGE CORNER Mandarin - 清明節 - Qīngmíng Jié - Tomb Sweeping Day Vietnamese - đám giỗ - death anniversary. Japanese (slang) - yankee - delinquent George’s Links: website: https://sites.google.com/site/geogenes/ films: https://sites.google.com/site/geogenes/george%27sfilms imdb: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm2852475/?ref_=nv_sr_4 ––– Yin & Young links: * Main Website: http://www.jamesyshih.com/yin-young-podcast/ * iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/yin-young-podcast-jys/id1185421015?mt=2 * Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/yinyoungpodcast/ * YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkvtVW6pVPeKFn7H_6ai8lA? * Stitcher - https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/yin-young-podcast

The World Trauma Symposium:  https://www.naemt.org/events/world-trauma-symposium NAEMT:  http://naemt.org/ EMS World Expo: http://www.emsworldexpo.com/   Episode #66 Latest on Pelvic Binders from Both Military and Civilian Perspectives #WTS17 #PHTLS #EMSWorldExpo17 with Col. Stacy Shackelford, MD Col. Shackelford is the chief of performance improvement at the Joint Trauma System Defense Center of Excellence for Trauma Joint Base in San Antonio, Texas.  She is also an attending trauma surgeon at the San Antonio Military Medical Center. Col. Shackelford is a member of the Committee on Tactical Combat Casualty Care, led the TCCC guideline review and update for pelvic binders, and has deployed four times as a combat surgeon and as the director of the Joint Theater Trauma System.  Col. Shackelford was commissioned through the U.S. Air Force Academy, attended medical school at Tulane University and general surgery residency at the University of Utah.  After completing a Trauma and Critical Care fellowship at the University of Southern California, Col. Shackelford was assigned as Director of Education at the Air Force Center for Sustainment of Trauma and Readiness Skills at the R. Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center.  She is an instructor for the Defense Institute for Medical Operations.   Query us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/EMS_Nation Like us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/prehospitalnation   Wishing everyone a safe tour! ~Faizan H. Arshad, MD @emscritcare www.emsnation.org  

The guys from Rock and Roll Over interview Dr. Amy Kircher from the Food Protection and Defense Institute.

The guys from Rock and Roll Over interview Dr. Amy Kircher from the Food Protection and Defense Institute.