An on-site installation captures heat generated by a bank of computers, bringing the oil that captures the excess heat.

25-metre swimming pool to the required temperature around 65 percent of the time, cutting reliance on gas boilers.

Deep Green, the UK company behind the project, gives the heat away for free and covers its own electricity costs but charges clients to use its computers that can power machine learning and artificial intelligence.

"It's a symbiotic relationship. We get our computers cooled for free," Deep Green CEO Mark Bjornsgaard told AFP at the Exmouth Leisure Centre, their flagship site.

"The pool is doing an equally big favour as we are."

Bjornsgaard lifted the lid of a white dishwasher-sized box, revealing computers immersed in a mineral

The oil then flows into a heat exchanger where it meets cold water from the pool.

"Normal data centres are simply venting that heat. They use an enormous amount of water to evaporate the heat away," Bjornsgaard said, adding that 99 percent of this heat is wasted into the atmosphere.

According to Bjornsgaard, around half of the cost of running a data centre goes towards keeping the computers cool.

"We don't have those costs. So from an environmental and sustainable point of view, it's a very good thing to do," he said.

- 'Significant savings' -

Peter Gilpin, CEO of LED Community Leisure, which runs the swimming pool, said the deployment of the Deep Green technology has been "very timely" after Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year sent energy prices soaring.

Utilities usually account for about a third of the total costs of running the leisure centre and the swimming pool's annual gas bill had more than tripled to nearly £80,000 ($102,000) before they installed the data centre in March, he added.

"We have been hit quite hard by that rising cost of gas through the winter but hopefully next winter a very large proportion of our heating costs will come through the Deep Green technology," Gilpin said.

While it's early to judge results over a long period of time, they are seeing "reductions in our gas consumption already" and "significant savings" even with energy costs coming down in recent months.

He added that "not only it reduces our energy costs and our gas consumption, which was the primary benefit but... we reduce our carbon footprint".

Gilpin said they are "proud" to have been the first site to deploy Deep Green's technology and are now looking into installing it at the other swimming pools that they run.

But now they might have competition.

Bjornsgaard said they have seen "demand go through the roof", with thousands of potential sites across Europe wanting to deploy their technology, especially swimming pools and district heating systems.

At the same time more and more companies are looking to use Deep Green computers because its "environmentally friendly" and "way cheaper than their normal cloud provider", Bjornsgaard said.

"But also we're doing some social good, right? We're heating a swimming pool and helping swimming pools to stay open," he added.

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Now the self-taught cook -- who was named the world's best woman chef in 2017 -- has her two Michelin stars tattooed on her fingers, and is helping make her small Alpine homeland one of Europe's prime gastronomic destinations.

Ros quickly found she had a talent for "matching crazy flavours", like coffee pasta with sea bass, lemon foam and basil, one of the early dishes that helped make her name.

"Like a painter sees colours, the chef sees flavours, and I was always very well known for using very strong flavour combinations," the 50-year-old told AFP at her restaurant in the Soca valley close to the border with Italy.

Hisa Franko -- which Ros has been running for the last 20 years -- currently ranks 32nd in the World's 50 Best Restaurants list.

But it is not the only restaurant of note in the country sandwiched between Italy, Austria and Croatia.

The Michelin guide recommends 58 there, saying Slovenia "is asserting itself as a gastronomic destination whose potential and quality are constantly improving."

- 'Cooking from scratch' -

And a large part of that is down to innovative chefs like Ros, who has also featured in Netflix's "Chef's Table" series.

Hisa Franko was a family inn serving traditional fare when Ros's partner at the time, Valter Kramer, took it over from his parents in 2002.

Ros decided to join her husband in the restaurant, following her heart rather than pursuing her ambitions to pursue a diplomatic career in Brussels.

"At the beginning, it was just like cooking for survival... I started cooking from scratch," said the chef.

Right from the start, Ros developed a particular way of making "flavours hit your mind".

"Because my food is all about my character. A bit crazy... still childish" to some extent, she said.

Ros said her food is a combination of understanding the regional traditions and seasonality, but also her own personality.

After years of hard work, news about the remote restaurant with a talented woman chef started spreading, and Ros is now regarded as one of the world's best in a field still dominated by men.

"Sometimes you look like an exotic animal," she said. "But of course, the picture is changing with the new generation, who are super talented and super ambitious."

Hisa Franko now has a team of 40 people from around 20 countries working in her kitchen and she plans to open a bistro in the Slovenian capital Ljubljana.

The day she talked to AFP, her kitchen was turning out a starter of deer heart, oyster, kiwi and beetroot with mountain greens.

- 'Like a big family' -

The country's cuisine "is one of a kind" and deserves a place on the culinary map, according to Lior Kochavy, a founder of a weekly street food festival in the capital that also brings together leading restaurants.

"You will never be bored. There is all the time something new to try," he said.

With Slovenia a melting pot of Latin, Slavic and Germanic influences, other chefs also say they attract diners by honouring traditions, seasonality and sourcing food locally.

"We've always tried to make sure the distance between the field and the plate is as short as possible," said Tomaz Kavcic, who runs the one-star Michelin Gostilna pri Lojzetu (Lojze's Inn).

"In the past that might not have been appreciated much, but now it is very valued," he told AFP. His menu "writes itself with just the products we see" from the restaurant's terrace on a vineyard-covered hill.

Ros, too, said Slovenians have "always been using nature as their market".

"Farmers and foragers -- you grow with them, you learn from them, you teach them. It's kind of like a big family," she said.

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As in several parts of the world, the use of "night soil" to fertilise crops was once common in Japan.

However, the advent of sewage systems and treatment facilities, as well as chemical fertilisers, saw it fall out of fashion.

About a decade ago, Japanese treatment facilities wondered if they could revive interest to avoid sewage sludge disposal -- a costly and potentially environmentally damaging process.

But enthusiasm was limited until Russia's invasion of Ukraine sent the cost of chemical fertilisers soaring.

That has been a bonanza for a facility in northern Japan's Tome, where sales of shimogoe were up 160 percent year-on-year by March 2023.

For the first time since the city began producing the fertiliser in 2010, it has sold out.

The demand is easy to explain, said facility vice president Toshiaki Kato.

"Our fertiliser is popular because it is cheap, and it is helping farmers cut soaring costs," he told AFP.

"It is also good for the environment."

Made of a combination of treated sewage sludge from septic tanks and human waste from cesspits, the fertiliser goes for 160 yen ($1.10) per 15 kilos.

That's about a tenth of the price of products made from imported raw materials.

In southwestern Japan's Saga too, officials report sales are up two to three times.

And dozens of tour groups from municipalities elsewhere in the country have visited, eager to replicate their programme.

- Historic origins -

Shimogoe was a key fertiliser in Japan's pre-modern Edo era, said Arata Kobayashi, a fertiliser specialist who has written journal articles on the subject.

In the early 18th century, the one million residents of Tokyo -- then called Edo -- "produced" an estimated 500,000 tonnes of fertiliser a year.

It was big business, involving gatherers, transporters and farmers, "and all of them benefited from the recycling system," Kobayashi said.

They "didn't create a recycling system on purpose... it was the result of everyone pursuing profit."

Japan's government has encouraged the revival, citing environmental benefits, and concerns about food security since Russia's invasion.

The ministry of agriculture, forestry, and fisheries hopes to double animal manure and human waste use by 2030, with a goal of them accounting for 40 percent of all fertiliser use in Japan.

In Miura outside Tokyo, vacuum trucks carrying human waste arrive one after another at a treatment facility.

Water is removed and then bacteria ferment the remaining solids in huge tanks.

Methane produced during the process is burned to supply the facility's hot water and electricity, and the final product is a soil-like powder that can be spread on fields.

"We produce 500 tonnes of fertiliser annually," said Kenichi Ryose, facility manager at Miura Biomass Centre.

"This fertiliser is particularly good for leaf vegetables, like cabbage," he added.

Ryose said "harmful materials like heavy metals are removed from processed sewage sludge before arriving" at the plant.

In the United States, there have been recent concerns about the levels of so-called forever chemicals (PFAS) in fertiliser made from sewage.

An environment ministry official said similar concerns had not been reported in Japan, but noted there are no current guidelines for PFAS levels in soil.

"We're in the process of developing a scientifically reliable way to measure PFAS and studying how to regulate it," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

- 'Dirty mud' -

The sun is shining as the trucks arrive, and despite the facility's odour-absorbing machines, a distinct aroma fills the air.

The smell has proved something of a problem, admitted Nobuyoshi Fujiwara, 41, who runs a lettuce farm in Yokosuka, north of Miura.

He started using shimogoe last year, "because I wanted to cut costs, and for the social good" of recycling waste.

But "we can't use it in fields near houses, because there are complaints about the smell".

"Also, you have to spread four or five times the volume that you use with regular chemical fertilisers," he explained.

That's the case for any type of manure, but can be a turn-off for some farmers because it is more work.

He concedes that the fertiliser faces something of a branding issue.

"The Chinese characters that are used for sludge -- 'dirty mud' -- are not great," he said.

"Even though we produce safe food, I imagine that for those who don't know much about it, the impressions people have of fertiliser made from human faeces might not be good."

He doesn't want to hide his use of the fertiliser though. In fact, he would like to see it publicised.

"An official certification system would be helpful to promote our produce," he said.

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The condition often only hits the headlines after violent attacks by sufferers, such as a schizophrenic patient who stabbed a nurse to death last week in the French city of Reims.

But French psychiatrist Sonia Dollfus emphasised that such cases of violence by people with schizophrenia are "extremely rare".

"All the work done over the years trying to de-stigmatise this disease -- it is swept away in 24 hours," Dollfus told AFP.

Around one in every 300 people worldwide are affected by schizophrenia, according to the World Health Organization.

It causes a wide range of distressing delusional disorders, which vary in intensity between patients but often hugely disrupts their lives.

At least five percent of schizophrenia patients are estimated to die by suicide.

The condition is usually treated with a combination of anti-psychotic drugs, social support for reintegration, and psychological therapy.

Scottish psychiatrist Robin Murray, who has spent decades researching schizophrenia, told AFP that when it came to medication, "treatment has not changed dramatically" over the last 20 or 30 years.

He added that psychological therapy had improved in that time.

But unlike numerous other mental disorders -- particularly neurotic conditions -- taking serious drugs remains the cornerstone in treating schizophrenia.

- Innovation -

For drugs, there has been a "blank period since the 2010s, when pharmaceutical laboratories really withdrew from psychiatry," Dollfus said.

But there has been some innovation recently, she added.

One development have been apps that can track patients' progress, ensure timely follow-up sessions and contact psychiatrists if necessary.

Another is a new treatment approved by the US Food and Drug Administration last month.

The treatment, developed by the Israeli pharmaceutical firm Teva and France's MedinCell, involves the drug risperidone which has long been used for schizophrenia.

It has traditionally been prescribed as a daily pill, but the new treatment is administered via injection, allowing the drug to be gradually released in the body over several weeks.

This makes it impossible for patients to miss a daily pill.

Interruptions to medication, often brought about by the psychosis the illness causes, are a common problem in treating schizophrenia.

For example, the attacker in Reims had been off his medication, according to several sources.

- 'Really promising' -

This new way of administering an old medication is not the kind of revolution that a new drug would represent. But progress may soon be made in that area.

Dollfus said that some drugs currently being investigated are "really interesting" because they work in a different way than those of the past.

Traditionally, anti-psychotic drugs used to treat schizophrenia aim to block the action of dopamine, a molecule that acts as a chemical messenger in the brain.

However, dopamine seems to play a complex role in schizophrenia -- some patients can have excessive levels in some respects and insufficient levels in others.

Traditional anti-psychotic drugs, which tend to work well at stopping certain symptoms such as hallucinations, do not help in other areas, such as the loss of willpower or struggles with language and speech.

Recent research has focused on finding other molecules which regulate rather than block dopamine, while also acting on other areas thought to be involved in schizophrenia.

These treatments, such as one that targets a protein called TAAR1, are still some way away from being available to patients.

But the TAAR1 drug has had positive results from the most advanced stage of trials, known as phase 3.

"This is a really promising avenue," Dollfus said.

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