ALBERT

Beschreibung: Permafrost warming has the potential to amplify global climate change, because when frozen sediments thaw it unlocks soil organic carbon. Yet to date, no globally consistent assessment of permafrost temperature change has been compiled. Here we use a global data set of permafrost temperature time series from the Global Terrestrial Network for Permafrost to evaluate temperature change across permafrost regions for the period since the International Polar Year (2007–2009). During the reference decade between 2007 and 2016, ground temperature near the depth of zero annual amplitude in the continuous permafrost zone increased by 0.39 ± 0.15 °C. Over the same period, discontinuous permafrost warmed by 0.20 ± 0.10 °C. Permafrost in mountains warmed by 0.19 ± 0.05 °C and in Antarctica by 0.37 ± 0.10 °C. Globally, permafrost temperature increased by 0.29 ± 0.12 °C. The observed trend follows the Arctic amplification of air temperature increase in the Northern Hemisphere. In the discontinuous zone, however, ground warming occurred due to increased snow thickness while air temperature remained statistically unchanged.

Beschreibung: Arctic warming was more pronounced than warming in midlatitudes in the last decades making this region a hotspot of climate change. Associated with this, a rapid decline of sea-ice extent and a decrease of its thickness has been observed. Sea-ice retreat allows for an increased transport of heat and momentum from the ocean up to the tropo- and stratosphere by enhanced upward propagation of planetary-scale atmospheric waves. In the upper atmosphere, these waves deposit the momentum transported, disturbing the stratospheric polar vortex, which can lead to a breakdown of this circulation with the potential to also significantly impact the troposphere in mid- to late-winter and early spring. Therefore, an accurate representation of stratospheric processes in climate models is necessary to improve the understanding of the impact of retreating sea ice on the atmospheric circulation. By modeling the atmospheric response to a prescribed decline in Arctic sea ice, we show that including interactive stratospheric ozone chemistry in atmospheric model calculations leads to an improvement in tropo-stratospheric interactions compared to simulations without interactive chemistry. This suggests that stratospheric ozone chemistry is important for the understanding of sea ice related impacts on atmospheric dynamics.

Beschreibung: The oxygen isotope composition of speleothems is a widely used proxy for past climate change. Robust use of this proxy depends on understanding the relationship between precipitation and cave drip water δ18O. Here, we present the first global analysis, based on data from 163 drip sites, from 39 caves on five continents, showing that drip water δ18O is most similar to the amount-weighted precipitation δ18O where mean annual temperature (MAT) is 〈 10 °C. By contrast, for seasonal climates with MAT 〉 10 °C and 〈 16 °C, drip water δ18O records the recharge-weighted δ18O. This implies that the δ18O of speleothems (formed in near isotopic equilibrium) are most likely to directly reflect meteoric precipitation in cool climates only. In warmer and drier environments, speleothems will have a seasonal bias toward the precipitation δ18O of recharge periods and, in some cases, the extent of evaporative fractionation of stored karst water.

Beschreibung: Stable water isotopes are employed as hydrological tracers to quantify the diverse implications of atmospheric moisture for climate. They are widely used as proxies for studying past climate changes, e.g., in isotope records from ice cores and speleothems. Here, we present a new isotopic dataset of both near-surface vapour and ocean surface water from the North Pole to Antarctica, continuously measured from a research vessel throughout the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans during a period of two years. Our observations contribute to a better understanding and modelling of water isotopic composition. The observations reveal that the vapour deuterium excess within the atmospheric boundary layer is not modulated by wind speed, contrary to the commonly used theory, but controlled by relative humidity and sea surface temperature only. In sea ice covered regions, the sublimation of deposited snow on sea ice is a key process controlling the local water vapour isotopic composition.

Beschreibung: Time-resolved satellite gravimetry has revolutionized understanding of mass transport in the Earth system. Since 2002, the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) has enabled monitoring of the terrestrial water cycle, ice sheet and glacier mass balance, sea level change and ocean bottom pressure variations, as well as understanding responses to changes in the global climate system. Initially a pioneering experiment of geodesy, the time-variable observations have matured into reliable mass transport products, allowing assessment and forecast of a number of important climate trends, and improvements in service applications such as the United States Drought Monitor. With the successful launch of the GRACE Follow-On mission, a multi-decadal record of mass variability in the Earth system is within reach.

Beschreibung: Coeval changes in atmospheric CO2 and 14C contents during the last deglaciation are often attributed to ocean circulation changes that released carbon stored in the deep ocean during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Work is being done to generate records that allow for the identification of the exact mechanisms leading to the accumulation and release of carbon from the oceanic reservoir, but these mechanisms are still the subject of debate. Here we present foraminifera 14C data from five cores in a transect across the Chilean continental margin between ~540 and ~3,100 m depth spanning the last 20,000 years. Our data reveal that during the LGM, waters at ~2,000 m were 50% to 80% more depleted in Δ14C than waters at ~1,500 m when compared to modern values, consistent with the hypothesis of a glacial deep ocean carbon reservoir that was isolated from the atmosphere. During the deglaciation, our intermediate water records reveal homogenization in the Δ14C values between ~800 and ~1,500 m from ~16.5–14.5 ka cal BP to ~14–12 ka cal BP, which we interpret as deeper penetration of Antarctic Intermediate Water. While many questions still remain, this process could aid the ventilation of the deep ocean at the beginning of the deglaciation, contributing to the observed ~40 ppm rise in atmospheric pCO2.

Beschreibung: This review article aims to provide an overview and insight into the most relevant aspects of wind energy development and current state-of-the-art. The industry is in a very mature stage, so it seems to be the right time to take stock of the relevant areas of wind energy use for power generation. For this review, the authors considered the essential aspects of the development of wind energy technology: research, modeling, and prediction of wind speed as an energy source, the technology development of the plants divided into the mechanical and electrical systems and the plant control, and finally the optimal plant operation including the maintenance strategies. The focus is on the development in Europe, with a partial focus on Germany. The authors are employees of the Fraunhofer Institutes, Institute for Energy Economics and Energy Systems Technology and Institute for Wind Energy Systems, who have contributed to the development of this technology for decades.

Beschreibung: Understanding how the Antarctic ice sheet will respond to global warming relies on knowledge of how it has behaved in the past. The use of numerical models, the only means to quantitatively predict the future, is hindered by limitations to topographic data both now and in the past, and in knowledge of how subsurface oceanic, glaciological and hydrological processes interact. Incorporating the variety and interplay of such processes, operating at multiple spatio-temporal scales, is critical to modeling the Antarctic’s system evolution and requires direct observations in challenging locations. As these processes do not observe disciplinary boundaries neither should our future research.

Beschreibung: Natural dissolved organic matter (DOM) comprises a broad range of dissolved organic molecules in aquatic systems and is among the most complex molecular mixtures known. Here we show, by comparing detailed structural fingerprints of individual molecular formulae in DOM from a set of four marine and one freshwater environments, that a major component of DOM is molecularly indistinguishable in these diverse samples. Molecular conformity was not only apparent by the co-occurrence of thousands of identical molecular formulae, but also by identical structural features of those isomers that collectively represent a molecular formula. The presence of a large pool of compounds with identical structural features in DOM is likely the result of a cascade of degradation processes or common synthetic pathways that ultimately lead to the formation of a universal background, regardless of origin and history of the organic material. This novel insight impacts our understanding of long-term turnover of DOM as the underlying mechanisms are possibly universal.

Beschreibung: Traditionally, the description of microorganisms starts with their isolation from an environmental sample. Many environmentally relevant anaerobic microorganisms grow very slowly, and often they rely on syntrophic interactions with other microorganisms. This impedes their isolation and characterization by classic microbiological techniques. We developed and applied an approach for the successive enrichment of syntrophic hydrocarbon-degrading microorganisms from environmental samples. We collected samples from microbial mat-covered hydrothermally heated hydrocarbon-rich sediments of the Guaymas Basin and mixed them with synthetic mineral medium to obtain sediment slurries. Supplementation with defined substrates (i.e., methane or butane), incubation at specific temperatures, and a regular maintenance procedure that included the measurement of metabolic products and stepwise dilutions enabled us to establish highly active, virtually sediment-free enrichment cultures of actively hydrocarbon-degrading communities in a 6-months to several-years' effort. Using methane as sole electron donor shifted the originally highly diverse microbial communities toward defined mixed cultures dominated by syntrophic consortia consisting of anaerobic methane-oxidizing archaea (ANME) and different sulfate-reducing bacteria. Cultivation with butane at 50 °C yielded consortia of archaea belonging to Candidatus Syntrophoarchaeum and Candidatus Desulfofervidus auxilii partner bacteria. This protocol also describes sampling for further molecular characterization of enrichment cultures by fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH), and transcriptomics and metabolite analyses, which can provide insights into the functioning of hydrocarbon metabolism in archaea and resolve important mechanisms that enable electron transfer to their sulfate-reducing partner bacteria.

Beschreibung: The construction of high capacity data sharing networks to support increasing government and commercial data exchange has highlighted a key roadblock: the content of existing Internet-connected information remains siloed due to a multiplicity of local languages and data dictionaries. This lack of a digital lingua franca is obvious in the domain of human food as materials travel from their wild or farm origin, through processing and distribution chains, to consumers. Well defined, hierarchical vocabulary, connected with logical relationships—in other words, an ontology—is urgently needed to help tackle data harmonization problems that span the domains of food security, safety, quality, production, distribution, and consumer health and convenience. FoodOn (http://foodon.org) is a consortium-driven project to build a comprehensive and easily accessible global farm-to-fork ontology about food, that accurately and consistently describes foods commonly known in cultures from around the world. FoodOn addresses food product terminology gaps and supports food traceability. Focusing on human and domesticated animal food description, FoodOn contains animal and plant food sources, food categories and products, and other facets like preservation processes, contact surfaces, and packaging. Much of FoodOn’s vocabulary comes from transforming LanguaL, a mature and popular food indexing thesaurus, into a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) OWL Web Ontology Language-formatted vocabulary that provides system interoperability, quality control, and software-driven intelligence. FoodOn compliments other technologies facilitating food traceability, which is becoming critical in this age of increasing globalization of food networks.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 1287, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-03468-6.

Beschreibung: Warm subtropical-origin Atlantic water flows northward across the Greenland-Scotland Ridge into the Nordic Seas, where it relinquishes heat to the atmosphere and gradually transforms into dense Atlantic-origin water. Returning southward along east Greenland, this water mass is situated beneath a layer of cold, fresh surface water and sea ice. Here we show, using measurements from autonomous ocean gliders, that the Atlantic-origin water was re-ventilated while transiting the western Iceland Sea during winter. This re-ventilation is a recent phenomenon made possible by the retreat of the ice edge toward Greenland. The fresh surface layer that characterises this region in summer is diverted onto the Greenland shelf by enhanced onshore Ekman transport induced by stronger northerly winds in fall and winter. Severe heat loss from the ocean offshore of the ice edge subsequently triggers convection, which further transforms the Atlantic-origin water. This re-ventilation is a counterintuitive occurrence in a warming climate, and highlights the difficulties inherent in predicting the behaviour of the complex coupled climate system.

Beschreibung: Support for this work was provided by the Norwegian Research Council under Grant agreement no. 231647 (L.H. and K.V.), the Bergen Research Foundation under Grant BFS2016REK01 (K.V.), and the Centre for Climate Dynamics at the Bjerknes Centre through the FRESHWATER project (K.V.). Additional funding was provided by the Swiss National Science Foundation grants P2EZP2162267 and P300P2174307 (L.P.), the National Science Foundation grant OCE-1558742 (M.A.S.), the Norway Fulbright Foundation (K.V.), the Canada Fulbright Foundation (G.W.K.M.), and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (G.W.K.M.).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 4917, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-23167-y.

Beschreibung: Intertidal inhabitants are exposed to the 24-hour solar day, and the 12.4 hour rising and falling of the tides. One or both of these cycles govern intertidal organisms’ behaviour and physiology, yet little is known about the molecular clockworks of tidal rhythmicity. Here, we show that the limpet Cellana rota exhibits robust tidally rhythmic behaviour and gene expression. We assembled a de-novo transcriptome, identifying novel tidal, along with known circadian clock genes. Surprisingly, most of the putative circadian clock genes, lack a typical rhythmicity. We identified numerous tidally rhythmic genes and pathways commonly associated with the circadian clock. We show that not only is the behaviour of an intertidal organism in tune with the tides, but so too are many of its genes and pathways. These findings highlight the plasticity of biological timekeeping in nature, strengthening the growing notion that the role of ‘canonical’ circadian clock genes may be more fluid than previously thought, as exhibited in an organism which has evolved in an environment where tidal oscillations are the dominant driving force.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 8128, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-26484-4.

Beschreibung: The kakapo is a critically endangered, herbivorous parrot endemic to New Zealand. The kakapo hindgut hosts a dense microbial community of low taxonomic diversity, typically dominated by Escherichia fergusonii, and has proven to be a remarkably stable ecosystem, displaying little variation in core membership over years of study. To elucidate mechanisms underlying this robustness, we performed 16S rRNA gene-based co-occurrence network analysis to identify potential interactions between E. fergusonii and the wider bacterial community. Genomic and metagenomic sequencing were employed to facilitate interpretation of potential interactions observed in the network. E. fergusonii maintained very few correlations with other members of the microbiota, and isolates possessed genes for the generation of energy from a wide range of carbohydrate sources, including plant fibres such as cellulose. We surmise that this dominant microorganism is abundant not due to ecological interaction with other members of the microbiota, but its ability to metabolise a wide range of nutrients in the gut. This research represents the first concerted effort to understand the functional roles of the kakapo microbiota, and leverages metagenomic data to contextualise co-occurrence patterns. By combining these two techniques we provide a means for studying the diversity-stability hypothesis in the context of bacterial ecosystems.

Beschreibung: This work was supported by funding from the Department of Conservation (DOC) as well as a University of Auckland Faculty Research Development Fund grant (9841 3626187) to MWT, and a University of Auckland Doctoral Scholarship to DWW.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 7363, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-25565-8.

Beschreibung: Satellite-tracking of mature white sharks (Carcharodon carcharias) has revealed open-ocean movements spanning months and covering tens of thousands of kilometers. But how are the energetic demands of these active apex predators met as they leave coastal areas with relatively high prey abundance to swim across the open ocean through waters often characterized as biological deserts? Here we investigate mesoscale oceanographic variability encountered by two white sharks as they moved through the Gulf Stream region and Sargasso Sea in the North Atlantic Ocean. In the vicinity of the Gulf Stream, the two mature female white sharks exhibited extensive use of the interiors of clockwise-rotating anticyclonic eddies, characterized by positive (warm) temperature anomalies. One tagged white shark was also equipped with an archival tag that indicated this individual made frequent dives to nearly 1,000 m in anticyclones, where it was presumably foraging on mesopelagic prey. We propose that warm temperature anomalies in anticyclones make prey more accessible and energetically profitable to adult white sharks in the Gulf Stream region by reducing the physiological costs of thermoregulation in cold water. The results presented here provide valuable new insight into open ocean habitat use by mature, female white sharks that may be applicable to other large pelagic predators.

Beschreibung: This work was supported by the WHOI Ocean Life Institute and awards from NASA and NSF.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 2398, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-04809-1.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 10610, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-28871-3.

Beschreibung: Foraminifera in sediments exposed to gas-hydrate dissociation are not expected to have cellular adaptations that facilitate inhabitation of chemosynthesis-based ecosystems because, to date, there are no known endemic seep foraminifera. To establish if foraminifera inhabit sediments impacted by gas-hydrate dissociation, we examined the cellular ultrastructure of Melonis barleeanus (Williamson, 1858) from the Vestnesa gas hydrate province (Arctic Ocean, west of Svalbard at ~79 °N; ~1200-m depth; n = 4). From sediments with gas hydrate indicators, living M. barleeanus had unusual pore plugs composed of a thick, fibrous meshwork; mitochondria were concentrated at the cell periphery, under pore plugs. While there was no evidence of endosymbioses with prokaryotes, most M. barleeanus specimens were associated with what appear to be Type I methanotrophic bacteria. One foraminifer had a particularly large bolus of these microbes concentrated near its aperture. This is the first documented instance of bona fide living M. barleeanus in gas-hydrate sediments and first documentation of a foraminifer living in close association with putative methanotrophs. Our observations have implications to paleoclimate records utilizing this foundational foraminiferal species.

Beschreibung: JMB was funded by a WHOI Independent Study Award (Mellon Grant), with partial support from NSF grant OCE-1634469. GP and CAGE 15-2 cruise were supported by the Research Council of Norway through CAGE Center for Excellence in Arctic Gas Hydrate Environment and Climate project 223259 and NORCRUST (project number 255150).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 2809, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-05253-x.

Beschreibung: Voltage-sensing (VSD) and cyclic nucleotide-binding domains (CNBD) gate ion channels for rapid electrical signaling. By contrast, solute carriers (SLCs) that passively redistribute substrates are gated by their substrates themselves. Here, we study the orphan sperm-specific solute carriers SLC9C1 that feature a unique tripartite structure: an exchanger domain, a VSD, and a CNBD. Voltage-clamp fluorimetry shows that SLC9C1 is a genuine Na+/H+ exchanger gated by voltage. The cellular messenger cAMP shifts the voltage range of activation. Mutations in the transport domain, the VSD, or the CNBD strongly affect Na+/H+ exchange, voltage gating, or cAMP sensitivity, respectively. Our results establish SLC9C1 as a phylogenetic chimaera that combines the ion-exchange mechanism of solute carriers with the gating mechanism of ion channels. Classic SLCs slowly readjust changes in the intra- and extracellular milieu, whereas voltage gating endows the Na+/H+ exchanger with the ability to produce a rapid pH response that enables downstream signaling events.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 14955, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-33021-w.

Beschreibung: Glomeruli are the functional units of olfactory information processing but little remains known about their individual unit function. This is due to their widespread activation by odor stimuli. We expressed channelrhodopsin-2 in a single olfactory sensory neuron type, and used laser stimulation and simultaneous in vivo calcium imaging to study the responses of a single glomerulus to optogenetic stimulation. Calcium signals in the neuropil of this glomerulus were representative of the sensory input and nearly identical if evoked by intensity-matched odor and laser stimuli. However, significantly fewer glomerular layer interneurons and olfactory bulb output neurons (mitral cells) responded to optogenetic versus odor stimuli, resulting in a small and spatially compact optogenetic glomerular unit response. Temporal features of laser stimuli were represented with high fidelity in the neuropil of the glomerulus and the mitral cells, but not in interneurons. Increases in laser stimulus intensity were encoded by larger signal amplitudes in all compartments of the glomerulus, and by the recruitment of additional interneurons and mitral cells. No spatial expansion of the glomerular unit response was observed in response to stronger input stimuli. Our data are among the first descriptions of input-output transformations in a selectively activated olfactory glomerulus.

Beschreibung: Funded by the World Class Institute/National Research Foundation of Korea (KRF: WCI 2009-003) and NIH: DC005259 and NS099691 grants.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 15517, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-33610-9.

Beschreibung: Subduction zones impose an important control on the geochemical cycling between the surficial and internal reservoirs of the Earth. Sulphur and carbon are transferred into Earth’s mantle by subduction of pelagic sediments and altered oceanic lithosphere. Release of oxidizing sulphate- and carbonate-bearing fluids modifies the redox state of the mantle and the chemical budget of subduction zones. Yet, the mechanisms of sulphur and carbon cycling within subduction zones are still unclear, in part because data are typically derived from arc volcanoes where fluid compositions are modified during transport through the mantle wedge. We determined the bulk rock elemental, and sulphur and carbon isotope compositions of exhumed ultramafic and metabasic rocks from Syros, Greece. Comparison of isotopic data with major and trace element compositions indicates seawater alteration and chemical exchange with sediment-derived fluids within the subduction zone channel. We show that small bodies of detached slab material are subject to metasomatic processes during exhumation, in contrast to large sequences of obducted ophiolitic sections that retain their seafloor alteration signatures. In particular, fluids circulating along the plate interface can cause sulphur mobilization during several stages of exhumation within high-pressure rocks. This takes place more pervasively in serpentinites compared to mafic rocks.

Beschreibung: This project was supported by NSF-EAR grant 1324566 to E.M.S. and B.C.G., and NSF EAR award 1250470 to M.J.C. We acknowledge support by the German Research Foundation and the Open Access Publication Fund of the Freie Universität Berlin.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 3077, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-05574-x.

Beschreibung: Paleoclimate reconstructions are only as good as their chronology. In particular, different chronological assumptions for marine sediment cores can lead to different reconstructions of ocean ventilation age and atmosphere−ocean carbon exchange history. Here we build the first high-resolution chronology that is free of the dating uncertainties common in marine sediment records, based on radiocarbon dating twigs found with computed tomography scans in two cores from the Eastern Equatorial Pacific (EEP). With this accurate chronology, we show that the ventilation ages of the EEP thermocline and intermediate waters were similar to today during the Last Glacial Maximum and deglaciation, in contradiction with previous studies. Our results suggest that the glacial respired carbon pool in the EEP was not significantly older than today, and that the deglacial strengthening of the equatorial Pacific carbon source was probably driven by low-latitude processes rather than an increased subsurface supply of upwelled carbon from high-latitude oceans.

Beschreibung: The lab work at NOSAMS was supported by Ocean Ventures Fund from WHOI and an NOSAMS graduate internship granted to N.Z

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 15219, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-33283-4.

Beschreibung: This Article corrects an error in Equation 1

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 15740, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-33640-3.

Beschreibung: Hurricanes passing over the ocean can mix the water column down to great depths and resuspend massive volumes of sediments on the continental shelves. Consequently, organic carbon and reduced inorganic compounds associated with these sediments can be resuspended from anaerobic portions of the seabed and re-exposed to dissolved oxygen (DO) in the water column. This process can drive DO consumption as sediments become oxidized. Previous studies have investigated the effect of hurricanes on DO in different coastal regions of the world, highlighting the alleviation of hypoxic conditions by extreme winds, which drive vertical mixing and re-aeration of the water column. However, the effect of hurricane-induced resuspended sediments on DO has been neglected. Here, using a diverse suite of datasets for the northern Gulf of Mexico, we find that in the few days after a hurricane passage, decomposition of resuspended shelf sediments consumes up to a fifth of the DO added to the bottom of the water column during vertical mixing. Despite uncertainty in this value, we highlight the potential significance of this mechanism for DO dynamics. Overall, sediment resuspension likely occurs over all continental shelves affected by tropical cyclones, potentially impacting global cycles of marine DO and carbon.

Beschreibung: Support for J. Moriarty was provided by the USGS Mendenhall Program.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 2864, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-05313-2.

Beschreibung: The mechanisms of transfer of crustal material from the subducting slab to the overlying mantle wedge are still debated. Mélange rocks, formed by mixing of sediments, oceanic crust, and ultramafics along the slab-mantle interface, are predicted to ascend as diapirs from the slab-top and transfer their compositional signatures to the source region of arc magmas. However, the compositions of melts that result from the interaction of mélanges with a peridotite wedge remain unknown. Here we present experimental evidence that melting of peridotite hybridized by mélanges produces melts that carry the major and trace element abundances observed in natural arc magmas. We propose that differences in nature and relative contributions of mélanges hybridizing the mantle produce a range of primary arc magmas, from tholeiitic to calc-alkaline. Thus, assimilation of mélanges into the wedge may play a key role in transferring subduction signatures from the slab to the source of arc magmas.

Beschreibung: This project was supported by the WHOI Ocean Exploration Institute (OEI) 27071178 to V.L.R.; Previous related projects were supported by NSF EAR-1348063 and WHOI OEI to H.R.M.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Cell Death and Disease 9 (2018): 663, doi:10.1038/s41419-018-0704-9.

Beschreibung: The poor regenerative capacity of descending neurons is one of the main causes of the lack of recovery after spinal cord injury (SCI). Thus, it is of crucial importance to find ways to promote axonal regeneration. In addition, the prevention of retrograde degeneration leading to the atrophy/death of descending neurons is an obvious prerequisite to activate axonal regeneration. Lampreys show an amazing regenerative capacity after SCI. Recent histological work in lampreys suggested that GABA, which is massively released after a SCI, could promote the survival of descending neurons. Here, we aimed to study if GABA, acting through GABAB receptors, promotes the survival and axonal regeneration of descending neurons of larval sea lampreys after a complete SCI. First, we used in situ hybridization to confirm that identifiable descending neurons of late-stage larvae express the gabab1 subunit of the GABAB receptor. We also observed an acute increase in the expression of this subunit in descending neurons after SCI, which further supported the possible role of GABA and GABAB receptors in promoting the survival and regeneration of these neurons. So, we performed gain and loss of function experiments to confirm this hypothesis. Treatments with GABA and baclofen (GABAB agonist) significantly reduced caspase activation in descending neurons 2 weeks after a complete SCI. Long-term treatments with GABOB (a GABA analogue) and baclofen significantly promoted axonal regeneration of descending neurons after SCI. These data indicate that GABAergic signalling through GABAB receptors promotes the survival and regeneration of descending neurons after SCI. Finally, we used morpholinos against the gabab1 subunit to knockdown the expression of the GABAB receptor in descending neurons. Long-term morpholino treatments caused a significant inhibition of axonal regeneration. This shows that endogenous GABA promotes axonal regeneration after a complete SCI in lampreys by activating GABAB receptors.

Beschreibung: Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and the European Regional Development Fund 2007–2013 (Grant number: BFU2014-56300-P) and Xunta de Galicia (Grant number: GPC2014/030). D.R.-S. was supported by a fellowship from EMBO (Ref.: 7010) to carry out a short-term stay at the laboratory of JRM. A.B.-I. was supported by a grant from the Xunta de Galicia (Grant number: 2016-PG008) and a grant from the crowdfunding platform Precipita (FECYT; Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness; grant number 2017-CP081).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 2431, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-04421-3.

Beschreibung: Tectonic landforms reveal that the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) lies atop a major volcanic rift system. However, identifying subglacial volcanism is challenging. Here we show geochemical evidence of a volcanic heat source upstream of the fast-melting Pine Island Ice Shelf, documented by seawater helium isotope ratios at the front of the Ice Shelf cavity. The localization of mantle helium to glacial meltwater reveals that volcanic heat induces melt beneath the grounded glacier and feeds the subglacial hydrological network crossing the grounding line. The observed transport of mantle helium out of the Ice Shelf cavity indicates that volcanic heat is supplied to the grounded glacier at a rate of ~ 2500 ± 1700 MW, which is ca. half as large as the active Grimsvötn volcano on Iceland. Our finding of a substantial volcanic heat source beneath a major WAIS glacier highlights the need to understand subglacial volcanism, its hydrologic interaction with the marine margins, and its potential role in the future stability of the WAIS.

Beschreibung: This research was supported by the NSF Antarctic program through Award #1341630.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 11997, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-30091-8.

Beschreibung: The abundance of organic carbon (OC) in vegetation and soils (~2,600 PgC) compared to carbon in the atmosphere (~830 PgC) highlights the importance of terrestrial OC in global carbon budgets. The residence time of OC in continental reservoirs, which sets the rates of carbon exchange between land and atmosphere, represents a key uncertainty in global carbon cycle dynamics. Retention of terrestrial OC can also distort bulk OC- and biomarker-based paleorecords, yet continental storage timescales remain poorly quantified. Using “bomb” radiocarbon (14C) from thermonuclear weapons testing as a tracer, we model leaf-wax fatty acid and bulk OC 14C signatures in a river-proximal marine sediment core from the Bay of Bengal in order to constrain OC storage timescales within the Ganges-Brahmaputra (G-B) watershed. Our model shows that 79–83% of the leaf-waxes in this core were stored in continental reservoirs for an average of 1,000–1,200 calendar years, while the remainder was stored for an average of 15 years. This age structure distorts high-resolution organic paleorecords across geologically rapid events, highlighting that compound-specific proxy approaches must consider storage timescales. Furthermore, these results show that future environmental change could destabilize large stores of old - yet reactive - OC currently stored in tropical basins.

Beschreibung: We acknowledge funding support from the Agouron Institute Postdoctoral Fellowship (K.L.F), the US National Science Foundation (Awards: OCE-1333387 and OCE-13333826), the Investment in Science Fund given primarily by WHOI Trustee and Corporation Members, and the Swiss National Science Foundation (Award: 200020_163162).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 13478, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-31175-1.

Beschreibung: Agricultural intensification offers potential to grow more food while reducing the conversion of native ecosystems to croplands. However, intensification also risks environmental degradation through emissions of the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N2O) and nitrate leaching to ground and surface waters. Intensively-managed croplands and nitrogen (N) fertilizer use are expanding rapidly in tropical regions. We quantified fertilizer responses of maize yield, N2O emissions, and N leaching in an Amazon soybean-maize double-cropping system on deep, highly-weathered soils in Mato Grosso, Brazil. Application of N fertilizer above 80 kg N ha−1 yr−1 increased maize yield and N2O emissions only slightly. Unlike experiences in temperate regions, leached nitrate accumulated in deep soils with increased fertilizer and conversion to cropping at N fertilization rates 〉80 kg N ha−1, which exceeded maize demand. This raises new questions about the capacity of tropical agricultural soils to store nitrogen, which may determine when and how much nitrogen impacts surface waters.

Beschreibung: This project was supported by grants from NSF (DEB-1257944, DEB-1257391, DEB1457017, EF-1541770, EF-1655432, EF-1519342, IOS-1660034, IOS-1457662, and EAR-1739724) to M. Macedo, C. Neill, and M.T. Coe.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 10140, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-28455-1.

Beschreibung: Haynesina germanica, an ubiquitous benthic foraminifer in intertidal mudflats, has the remarkable ability to isolate, sequester, and use chloroplasts from microalgae. The photosynthetic functionality of these kleptoplasts has been demonstrated by measuring photosystem II quantum efficiency and O2 production rates, but the precise role of the kleptoplasts in foraminiferal metabolism is poorly understood. Thus, the mechanism and dynamics of C and N assimilation and translocation from the kleptoplasts to the foraminiferal host requires study. The objective of this study was to investigate, using correlated TEM and NanoSIMS imaging, the assimilation of inorganic C and N (here ammonium, NH4+) in individuals of a kleptoplastic benthic foraminiferal species. H. germanica specimens were incubated for 20 h in artificial seawater enriched with H13CO3− and 15NH4+ during a light/dark cycle. All specimens (n = 12) incorporated 13C into their endoplasm stored primarily in the form of lipid droplets. A control incubation in darkness resulted in no 13C-uptake, strongly suggesting that photosynthesis is the process dominating inorganic C assimilation. Ammonium assimilation was observed both with and without light, with diffuse 15N-enrichment throughout the cytoplasm and distinct 15N-hotspots in fibrillar vesicles, electron-opaque bodies, tubulin paracrystals, bacterial associates, and, rarely and at moderate levels, in kleptoplasts. The latter observation might indicate that the kleptoplasts are involved in N assimilation. However, the higher N assimilation observed in the foraminiferal endoplasm incubated without light suggests that another cytoplasmic pathway is dominant, at least in darkness. This study clearly shows the advantage provided by the kleptoplasts as an additional source of carbon and provides observations of ammonium uptake by the foraminiferal cell.

Beschreibung: This work was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (grant no. 200021_149333) and was part of the CNRS EC2CO-Lefe project ForChlo. It was also supported by the Region Pays de la Loire (Post-doc position of TJ, on FRESCO project) as well as the WHOI Robert W. Morse Chair for Excellence in Oceanography and The Investment in Science Fund at WHOI.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 13556, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-31710-0.

Beschreibung: In mammals, a complex array of oral sensors assess the taste, temperature and haptic properties of food. Although the representation of taste has been extensively studied in the gustatory cortex, it is unclear how the somatosensory cortex encodes information about the properties of oral stimuli. Moreover, it is poorly understood how different oral sensory modalities are integrated and how sensory responses are translated into oral motor actions. To investigate whether oral somatosensory cortex processes food-related sensations and movements, we performed in vivo whole-cell recordings and motor mapping experiments in rats. Neurons in oral somatosensory cortex showed robust post-synaptic and sparse action potential responses to air puffs. Membrane potential showed that cold water evoked larger responses than room temperature or hot water. Most neurons showed no clear tuning of responses to bitter, sweet and neutral gustatory stimuli. Finally, motor mapping experiments with histological verification revealed an initiation of movements related to food consumption behavior, such as jaw opening and tongue protrusions. We conclude that somatosensory cortex: (i) provides a representation of the temperature of oral stimuli, (ii) does not systematically encode taste information and (iii) influences orofacial movements related to food consummatory behavior.

Beschreibung: This work was supported by the Marine Biological Laboratory, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin and Neurocure.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 3500, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-05804-2.

Beschreibung: Subduction zone magmas are more oxidised on eruption than those at mid-ocean ridges. This is attributed either to oxidising components, derived from subducted lithosphere (slab) and added to the mantle wedge, or to oxidation processes occurring during magma ascent via differentiation. Here we provide direct evidence for contributions of oxidising slab agents to melts trapped in the sub-arc mantle. Measurements of sulfur (S) valence state in sub-arc mantle peridotites identify sulfate, both as crystalline anhydrite (CaSO4) and dissolved SO42− in spinel-hosted glass (formerly melt) inclusions. Copper-rich sulfide precipitates in the inclusions and increased Fe3+/∑Fe in spinel record a S6+–Fe2+ redox coupling during melt percolation through the sub-arc mantle. Sulfate-rich glass inclusions exhibit high U/Th, Pb/Ce, Sr/Nd and δ34S (+ 7 to + 11‰), indicating the involvement of dehydration products of serpentinised slab rocks in their parental melt sources. These observations provide a link between liberated slab components and oxidised arc magmas.

Beschreibung: We acknowledge financial support by the Australian Research Council (DE120100513 and DP120104240) and the ESRF for beam time (EC1061 and ES238).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 9478, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-26948-7.

Beschreibung: Tidal wetlands produce long-term soil organic carbon (C) stocks. Thus for carbon accounting purposes, we need accurate and precise information on the magnitude and spatial distribution of those stocks. We assembled and analyzed an unprecedented soil core dataset, and tested three strategies for mapping carbon stocks: applying the average value from the synthesis to mapped tidal wetlands, applying models fit using empirical data and applied using soil, vegetation and salinity maps, and relying on independently generated soil carbon maps. Soil carbon stocks were far lower on average and varied less spatially and with depth than stocks calculated from available soils maps. Further, variation in carbon density was not well-predicted based on climate, salinity, vegetation, or soil classes. Instead, the assembled dataset showed that carbon density across the conterminous united states (CONUS) was normally distributed, with a predictable range of observations. We identified the simplest strategy, applying mean carbon density (27.0 kg C m−3), as the best performing strategy, and conservatively estimated that the top meter of CONUS tidal wetland soil contains 0.72 petagrams C. This strategy could provide standardization in CONUS tidal carbon accounting until such a time as modeling and mapping advancements can quantitatively improve accuracy and precision.

Beschreibung: Synthesis efforts were funded by NASA Carbon Monitoring System (CMS; NNH14AY67I), USGS LandCarbon and the Smithsonian Institution. J.R.H. was additionally supported by the NSF-funded Coastal Carbon Research Coordination Network while completing this manuscript (DEB-1655622). J.M.S. coring efforts were funded by NSF (EAR-1204079). B.P.H. coring efforts were funded by Earth Observatory (Publication Number 197).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Communications Biology 1 (2018): 177, doi:10.1038/s42003-018-0183-7.

Beschreibung: The oceans are warming and coral reefs are bleaching with increased frequency and severity, fueling concerns for their survival through this century. Yet in the central equatorial Pacific, some of the world’s most productive reefs regularly experience extreme heat associated with El Niño. Here we use skeletal signatures preserved in long-lived corals on Jarvis Island to evaluate the coral community response to multiple successive heatwaves since 1960. By tracking skeletal stress band formation through the 2015-16 El Nino, which killed 95% of Jarvis corals, we validate their utility as proxies of bleaching severity and show that 2015-16 was not the first catastrophic bleaching event on Jarvis. Since 1960, eight severe (〉30% bleaching) and two moderate (〈30% bleaching) events occurred, each coinciding with El Niño. While the frequency and severity of bleaching on Jarvis did not increase over this time period, 2015–16 was unprecedented in magnitude. The trajectory of recovery of this historically resilient ecosystem will provide critical insights into the potential for coral reef resilience in a warming world.

Beschreibung: Funding for this study was provided by National Science Foundation awards OCE 1537338, OCE 1605365, and OCE 1031971 to A.L.C., and the Robertson Foundation to A.L.C., National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships to T.M.D. and A.E.A., and a National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship to H.E.R.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 17437, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-35309-3.

Beschreibung: During recent years, rapid seasonal growth of macroalgae covered extensive areas within the Yellow Sea, developing the world’s most spatially extensive “green tide”. The remarkably fast accumulation of macroalgal biomass is the joint result of high nitrogen supplies in Yellow Sea waters, plus ability of the macroalgae to optionally use C4 photosynthetic pathways that facilitate rapid growth. Stable isotopic evidence shows that the high nitrogen supply is derived from anthropogenic sources, conveyed from watersheds via river discharges, and by direct atmospheric deposition. Wastewater and manures supply about half the nitrogen used by the macroalgae, fertiliser and atmospheric deposition each furnish about a quarter of the nitrogen in macroalgae. The massive green tides affecting the Yellow Sea are likely to increase, with significant current and future environmental and human consequences. Addressing these changing trajectories will demand concerted investment in new basic and applied research as the basis for developing management policies.

Beschreibung: This work was supported by the State Key Project of Research and Development Plan (2016YFC1402106).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 5179, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-07346-z.

Beschreibung: Sunlight is the dominant control on phytoplankton biosynthetic activity, and darkness deprives them of their primary external energy source. Changes in the biochemical composition of phytoplankton communities over diel light cycles and attendant consequences for carbon and energy flux in environments remain poorly elucidated. Here we use lipidomic data from the North Pacific subtropical gyre to show that biosynthesis of energy-rich triacylglycerols (TAGs) by eukaryotic nanophytoplankton during the day and their subsequent consumption at night drives a large and previously uncharacterized daily carbon cycle. Diel oscillations in TAG concentration comprise 23 ± 11% of primary production by eukaryotic nanophytoplankton representing a global flux of about 2.4 Pg C yr−1. Metatranscriptomic analyses of genes required for TAG biosynthesis indicate that haptophytes and dinoflagellates are active members in TAG production. Estimates suggest that these organisms could contain as much as 40% more calories at sunset than at sunrise due to TAG production.

Beschreibung: This work was supported by a grant from the Simons Foundation, and is a contribution of the Simons Collaboration on Ocean Processes and Ecology (SCOPE award # 329108, B.A.S.V.M.). K.W.B. was further supported by the Postdoctoral Scholarship Program at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution & U.S. Geological Survey.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 4702, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-07076-2.

Beschreibung: The orbital-scale timing of South Asian monsoon (SAM) precipitation is poorly understood. Here we present new SST and seawater δ18O (δ18Osw) records from the Bay of Bengal, the core convective region of the South Asian monsoon, over the past 1 million years. Our records reveal that SAM precipitation peaked in the precession band ~9 kyrs after Northern Hemisphere summer insolation maxima, in phase with records of SAM winds in the Arabian Sea and eastern Indian Ocean. Precession-band variance, however, accounts for ~30% of the total variance of SAM precipitation while it was either absent or dominant in records of the East Asian monsoon (EAM). This and the observation that SAM precipitation was phase locked with obliquity minima and was sensitive to Southern Hemisphere warming provides clear evidence that SAM and EAM precipitation responded differently to orbital forcing and highlights the importance of internal processes forcing monsoon variability.

Beschreibung: This study was partly funded by the German Science Foundation, DFG, IODP Priority Program (grant HA 5751/3-1).

Beschreibung: Conduit geometry affects magma ascent dynamics and, consequently, the style and evolution of volcanic eruptions. However, despite geological evidences support the occurrence of conduit widening during most volcanic eruptions, the factors controlling conduit enlargement are still unclear, and the effects of syn-eruptive variations of conduit geometry have not been investigated in depth yet. Based on numerical modeling and the application of appropriate stability criteria, we found out a strong relationship between magma rheology and conduit stability, with significant effects on eruptive dynamics. Indeed, in order to be stable, conduits feeding dacitic/rhyolitic eruptions need larger diameters respect to their phonolitic/trachytic counterparts, resulting in the higher eruption rates commonly observed in dacitic/rhyolitic explosive events. Thus, in addition to magma source conditions and viscosity-dependent efficiency for outgassing, we suggest that typical eruption rates for different magma types are also controlled by conduit stability. Results are consistent with a compilation of volcanological data and selected case studies. As stability conditions are not uniform along the conduit, widening is expected to vary in depth, and three axisymmetric geometries with depth-dependent radii were investigated. They are able to produce major modifications in eruptive parameters, suggesting that eruptive dynamics is influenced by syn-eruptive changes in conduit geometry.

Beschreibung: Published

Beschreibung: 4125

Beschreibung: 5V. Processi eruttivi e post-eruttivi

Beschreibung: JCR Journal

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 4494, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-22758-z.

Beschreibung: Six velocity sections straddling Cape Hatteras show a deep counterflow rounding the Cape wedged beneath the poleward flowing Gulf Stream and the continental slope. This counterflow is likely the upper part of the equatorward-flowing Deep Western Boundary Current (DWBC). Hydrographic data suggest that the equatorward flow sampled by the shipboard 38 kHz ADCP comprises the Upper Labrador Sea Water (ULSW) layer and top of the Classical Labrador Sea Water (CLSW) layer. Continuous DWBC flow around the Cape implied by the closely-spaced velocity sections here is also corroborated by the trajectory of an Argo float. These findings contrast with previous studies based on floats and tracers in which the lightest DWBC constituents did not follow the boundary to cross under the Gulf Stream at Cape Hatteras but were diverted into the interior as the DWBC encountered the Gulf Stream in the crossover region. Additionally, our six quasi-synoptic velocity sections confirm that the Gulf Stream intensified markedly at that time as it approached the separation point and flowed into deeper waters. Downstream increases were observed not only in the poleward transport across the sections but also in the current’s maximum speed.

Beschreibung: This research was supported by NSF through OCE-1558521 and OCE-1332667 and by a grant from North Carolina to the Renewable Ocean Energy Program.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 660, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-02984-9.

Beschreibung: Efforts to estimate the physical and economic impacts of future climate change face substantial challenges. To enrich the currently popular approaches to impact analysis—which involve evaluation of a damage function or multi-model comparisons based on a limited number of standardized scenarios—we propose integrating a geospatially resolved physical representation of impacts into a coupled human-Earth system modeling framework. Large internationally coordinated exercises cannot easily respond to new policy targets and the implementation of standard scenarios across models, institutions and research communities can yield inconsistent estimates. Here, we argue for a shift toward the use of a self-consistent integrated modeling framework to assess climate impacts, and discuss ways the integrated assessment modeling community can move in this direction. We then demonstrate the capabilities of such a modeling framework by conducting a multi-sectoral assessment of climate impacts under a range of consistent and integrated economic and climate scenarios that are responsive to new policies and business expectations.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 3926, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-22313-w.

Beschreibung: Despite concerted international effort to track and interpret shifts in the abundance and distribution of Adélie penguins, large populations continue to be identified. Here we report on a major hotspot of Adélie penguin abundance identified in the Danger Islands off the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula (AP). We present the first complete census of Pygoscelis spp. penguins in the Danger Islands, estimated from a multi-modal survey consisting of direct ground counts and computer-automated counts of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) imagery. Our survey reveals that the Danger Islands host 751,527 pairs of Adélie penguins, more than the rest of AP region combined, and include the third and fourth largest Adélie penguin colonies in the world. Our results validate the use of Landsat medium-resolution satellite imagery for the detection of new or unknown penguin colonies and highlight the utility of combining satellite imagery with ground and UAV surveys. The Danger Islands appear to have avoided recent declines documented on the Western AP and, because they are large and likely to remain an important hotspot for avian abundance under projected climate change, deserve special consideration in the negotiation and design of Marine Protected Areas in the region.

Beschreibung: We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Dalio Foundation, Inc. through the Dalio Explore Fund, which provided all the financing for the Danger Island Expedition. We would like to thank additional support for analysis from the National Science Foundation (NSF PLR&GSS 1255058 - H.J.L. and P.M.; NSF PLR 1443585 – M.J.P.) and the National Aeronautical and Space Administration (NNX14AC32G; H.J.L. and M.S.). Geospatial support for the analysis of high resolution satellite imagery provided by the Polar Geospatial Center under NSF PLR awards 1043681 & 1559691.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2017. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 7 (2017): 115, doi:10.1038/s41598-017-00091-1.

Beschreibung: Mutations in Fused in Sarcoma/Translocated in Liposarcoma (FUS) cause familial forms of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a neurodegenerative disease characterized by progressive axonal degeneration mainly affecting motor neurons. Evidence from transgenic mouse models suggests mutant forms of FUS exert an unknown gain-of-toxic function in motor neurons, but mechanisms underlying this effect remain unknown. Towards this end, we studied the effect of wild type FUS (FUS WT) and three ALS-linked variants (G230C, R521G and R495X) on fast axonal transport (FAT), a cellular process critical for appropriate maintenance of axonal connectivity. All ALS-FUS variants impaired anterograde and retrograde FAT in squid axoplasm, whereas FUS WT had no effect. Misfolding of mutant FUS is implicated in this process, as the molecular chaperone Hsp110 mitigated these toxic effects. Interestingly, mutant FUS-induced impairment of FAT in squid axoplasm and of axonal outgrowth in mammalian primary motor neurons involved aberrant activation of the p38 MAPK pathway, as also reported for ALS-linked forms of Cu, Zn superoxide dismutase (SOD1). Accordingly, increased levels of active p38 MAPK were detected in post-mortem human ALS-FUS brain tissues. These data provide evidence for a novel gain-of-toxic function for ALS-linked FUS involving p38 MAPK activation.

Beschreibung: We are grateful for funding from NIH/NINDS (R01 NS078145, R01 NS090352, and R21 NS091860 to D.A.B., R01 NS066942A and R21 NS096642 to G.M., R01NS023868 and R01NS041170 to S.T.B.), the ALS Therapy Alliance/CVS Pharmacy (to D.A.B. and G.M.) and the ALS Association (to C.F. and J.M.).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 1124, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-03134-x.

Beschreibung: The ocean’s role in global climate change largely depends on its heat transport. Therefore, understanding the oceanic meridional heat transport (MHT) variability is a fundamental issue. Prevailing observational and modeling evidence suggests that MHT variability is primarily determined by the large-scale ocean circulation. Here, using new in situ observations in the eastern subpolar North Atlantic Ocean and an eddy-resolving numerical model, we show that energetic mesoscale eddies with horizontal scales of about 10–100 km profoundly modulate MHT variability on time scales from intra-seasonal to interannual. Our results reveal that the velocity changes due to mesoscale processes produce substantial variability for the MHT regionally (within sub-basins) and the subpolar North Atlantic as a whole. The findings have important implications for understanding the mechanisms for poleward heat transport variability in the subpolar North Atlantic Ocean, a key region for heat and carbon sequestration, ice–ocean interaction, and biological productivity.

Beschreibung: J.Z. was financially supported by the Postdoctoral Scholar Program at WHOI, with funding provided by the Ocean and Climate Change Institute. This work was also supported by the US National Science Foundation (OCE-1258823 and OCE-1634886), as well as by China’s national key research and development projects (2016YFA0601803), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41521091 and U1606402), the Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology (2015ASKJ01), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (201424001 and 201362048).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 742, doi:10.1038/s41598-017-18757-1.

Beschreibung: In mammals, spinal cord injury (SCI) leads to dramatic losses in neurons and synaptic connections, and consequently function. Unlike mammals, lampreys are vertebrates that undergo spontaneous regeneration and achieve functional recovery after SCI. Therefore our goal was to determine the complete transcriptional responses that occur after SCI in lampreys and to identify deeply conserved pathways that promote regeneration. We performed RNA-Seq on lamprey spinal cord and brain throughout the course of functional recovery. We describe complex transcriptional responses in the injured spinal cord, and somewhat surprisingly, also in the brain. Transcriptional responses to SCI in lampreys included transcription factor networks that promote peripheral nerve regeneration in mammals such as Atf3 and Jun. Furthermore, a number of highly conserved axon guidance, extracellular matrix, and proliferation genes were also differentially expressed after SCI in lampreys. Strikingly, ~3% of differentially expressed transcripts belonged to the Wnt pathways. These included members of the Wnt and Frizzled gene families, and genes involved in downstream signaling. Pharmacological inhibition of Wnt signaling inhibited functional recovery, confirming a critical role for this pathway. These data indicate that molecular signals present in mammals are also involved in regeneration in lampreys, supporting translational relevance of the model.

Beschreibung: We gratefully acknowledge support from the National Institutes of Health (R03NS078519 to OB; R01GM104123 to JJS; R01NS078165 to JRM), The Feinstein Institute for Medical Research and The Marine Biological Laboratory, including the Charles Evans Foundation Research Award, the Albert and Ellen Grass Foundation Faculty Research Award, and The Eugene and Millicent Bell Fellowship Fund in Tissue Engineering.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 266, doi:10.1038/s41467-017-02571-4.

Beschreibung: Because microbial plankton in the ocean comprise diverse bacteria, algae, and protists that are subject to environmental forcing on multiple spatial and temporal scales, a fundamental open question is to what extent these organisms form ecologically cohesive communities. Here we show that although all taxa undergo large, near daily fluctuations in abundance, microbial plankton are organized into clearly defined communities whose turnover is rapid and sharp. We analyze a time series of 93 consecutive days of coastal plankton using a technique that allows inference of communities as modular units of interacting taxa by determining positive and negative correlations at different temporal frequencies. This approach shows both coordinated population expansions that demarcate community boundaries and high frequency of positive and negative associations among populations within communities. Our analysis thus highlights that the environmental variability of the coastal ocean is mirrored in sharp transitions of defined but ephemeral communities of organisms.

Beschreibung: This work was supported by grants from the U.S. National Science Foundation (OCE-1441943) to M.F.P. and the U.S. Department of Energy (DE-SC0008743) to M.F.P. and E.J.A. A.M.M.-P. was partially supported by the Ramon Areces foundation through a postdoctoral fellowship. D.J.M. was supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation (OCE-1314642) and National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (1P01ES021923-01) through the Woods Hole Center for Oceans and Human Health.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 121, doi:10.1038/s41467-017-02504-1.

Beschreibung: Sediments in deep ocean trenches may contain crucial information on past earthquake history and constitute important sites of carbon burial. Here we present 14C data on bulk organic carbon (OC) and its thermal decomposition fractions produced by ramped pyrolysis/oxidation for a core retrieved from the 〉7.5 km-deep Japan Trench. High-resolution 14C measurements, coupled with distinctive thermogram characteristics of OC, reveal hemipelagic sedimentation interrupted by episodic deposition of pre-aged OC in the trench. Low δ13C values and diverse 14C ages of thermal fractions imply that the latter material originates from the adjacent margin, and the co-occurrence of pre-aged OC with intervals corresponding to known earthquake events implies tectonically triggered, gravity-flow-driven supply. We show that 14C ages of thermal fractions can yield valuable chronological constraints on sedimentary sequences. Our findings shed new light on links between tectonically driven sedimentological processes and marine carbon cycling, with implications for carbon dynamics in hadal environments.

Beschreibung: This study is supported by Doc.Mobility Fellowship (P1EZP2_159064) (R.B.) from the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF). This work is also supported by SNF “CAPS-LOCK” project 200021_140850 (T.I.E.), by SNSF grant (133481) (M.S.), and Austrian Science Foundation (P 29678-N28) (M.S.).

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Scientific Reports 8 (2018): 4547, doi:10.1038/s41598-018-22732-9.

Beschreibung: The assembly of membranous extensions such as microvilli and cilia in polarized cells is a tightly regulated, yet poorly understood, process. Peptidylglycine α-amidating monooxygenase (PAM), a membrane enzyme essential for the synthesis of amidated bioactive peptides, was recently identified in motile and non-motile (primary) cilia and has an essential role in ciliogenesis in Chlamydomonas, Schmidtea and mouse. In mammalian cells, changes in PAM levels alter secretion and organization of the actin cytoskeleton. Here we show that lack of Pam in zebrafish recapitulates the lethal edematous phenotype observed in Pam−/− mice and reveals additional defects. The pam−/− zebrafish embryos display an initial striking loss of microvilli and subsequently impaired ciliogenesis in the pronephros. In multiciliated mouse tracheal epithelial cells, vesicular PAM staining colocalizes with apical actin, below the microvilli. In PAM-deficient Chlamydomonas, the actin cytoskeleton is dramatically reorganized, and expression of an actin paralogue is upregulated. Biochemical assays reveal that the cytosolic PAM C-terminal domain interacts directly with filamentous actin but does not alter the rate of actin polymerization or disassembly. Our results point to a critical role for PAM in organizing the actin cytoskeleton during development, which could in turn impact both microvillus formation and ciliogenesis.

Beschreibung: This study was supported by grants DK032949 (to BAE and REM), DK044464 (to JDG) and GM051293 (to SMK) from the National Institutes of Health.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2017. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in The ISME Journal 12 (2018): 1-16, doi:10.1038/ismej.2017.187.

Beschreibung: The rock-hosted subseafloor crustal aquifer harbors a reservoir of microbial life that may influence global marine biogeochemical cycles. Here we utilized metagenomic libraries of crustal fluid samples from North Pond, located on the flanks of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, a site with cold, oxic subseafloor fluid circulation within the upper basement to query microbial diversity. Twenty-one samples were collected during a 2-year period to examine potential microbial metabolism and community dynamics. We observed minor changes in the geochemical signatures over the 2 years, yet the microbial community present in the crustal fluids underwent large shifts in the dominant taxonomic groups. An analysis of 195 metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs) were generated from the data set and revealed a connection between litho- and autotrophic processes, linking carbon fixation to the oxidation of sulfide, sulfur, thiosulfate, hydrogen, and ferrous iron in members of the Proteobacteria, specifically the Alpha-, Gamma- and Zetaproteobacteria, the Epsilonbacteraeota and the Planctomycetes. Despite oxic conditions, analysis of the MAGs indicated that members of the microbial community were poised to exploit hypoxic or anoxic conditions through the use of microaerobic cytochromes, such as cbb3- and bd-type cytochromes, and alternative electron acceptors, like nitrate and sulfate. Temporal and spatial trends from the MAGs revealed a high degree of functional redundancy that did not correlate with the shifting microbial community membership, suggesting functional stability in mediating subseafloor biogeochemical cycles. Collectively, the repeated sampling at multiple sites, together with the successful binning of hundreds of genomes, provides an unprecedented data set for investigation of microbial communities in the cold, oxic crustal aquifer.

Beschreibung: This work was supported by NSF OCE1062006 to JAH and NSF OCE1061827 to BTG. The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation sponsored most of the observatory components at North Pond through grant GBMF1609. The Center for Dark Energy Biosphere Investigations (C-DEBI) (OCE-0939564), a National Science Foundation-funded Science and Technology Centers of Excellence also supported the participation of CGW, JAH and BJT.

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 209, doi:10.1038/s41467-017-02105-y.

Beschreibung: Correction to: Nature Communications 8:172 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-017-00197-0; Article published online: 2 August 2017

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Nature Communications 9 (2018): 305, doi:10.1038/s41467-017-02701-y.

Beschreibung: Correction to: Nature Communications https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-017-01229-5, Article published online 07 November 2017

Beschreibung: © The Author(s), 2017. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in The ISME Journal 12 (2018): 237–252, doi:10.1038/ismej.2017.165.

Beschreibung: Temperate coastal marine environments are replete with complex biotic and abiotic interactions that are amplified during spring and summer phytoplankton blooms. During these events, heterotrophic bacterioplankton respond to successional releases of dissolved organic matter as algal cells are lysed. Annual seasonal shifts in the community composition of free-living bacterioplankton follow broadly predictable patterns, but whether similar communities respond each year to bloom disturbance events remains unknown owing to a lack of data sets, employing high-frequency sampling over multiple years. We capture the fine-scale microdiversity of these events with weekly sampling using a high-resolution method to discriminate 16S ribosomal RNA gene amplicons that are 〉99% identical. Furthermore, we used 2 complete years of data to facilitate identification of recurrent sub-networks of co-varying microbes. We demonstrate that despite inter-annual variation in phytoplankton blooms and despite the dynamism of a coastal–oceanic transition zone, patterns of microdiversity are recurrent during both bloom and non-bloom conditions. Sub-networks of co-occurring microbes identified reveal that correlation structures between community members appear quite stable in a seasonally driven response to oligotrophic and eutrophic conditions.

Beschreibung: PLB is supported by the European Research Council Advanced Investigator grant ABYSS 294757 to Antje Boetius. AF-G is supported by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (Blue Growth: Unlocking the potential of Seas and Oceans) under grant agreement no. (634486) (project acronym INMARE). This study was funded by the Max Planck Society. Further support by the Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute (CSP COGITO) and DFG (FOR2406) is acknowledged by HT (TE 813/2-1) and RA (Am 73/9-1).

Beschreibung: The Arctic Ocean is known to be contaminated by various persistent organic pollutants (POPs). The Fram Strait, the only deepwater passage to the Arctic Ocean (from the Atlantic Ocean), represents an unquantified gateway for POPs fluxes into and out of the Arctic. Polyethylene passive samplers were deployed in vertical profiles in the Fram Strait and in air and surface water in the Canadian Archipelago to determine the concentrations, profiles, and mass fluxes of dissolved polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and organochlorine pesticides. In the Fram Strait, higher concentrations of ΣPCBs (1.3–3.6 pg/L) and dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethanes (ΣDDTs, 5.2–9.1 pg/L) were observed in the deepwater masses (below 1,000 m), similar to nutrient-like vertical profiles. There was net southward transport of hexachlorobenzene and hexachlorocyclohexanes (ΣHCHs) of 0.70 and 14 Mg/year but a net northward transport of ΣPCBs at 0.16 Mg/year through the Fram Strait.

Beschreibung: Just like people are often divided into two opposing categories—early birds and night owls, introverts and extroverts—meteorologists designate two main types of storms. Storms that form through organized convection are long-lived, cover a large area, generate and accumulate more clusters of clouds with time, take place in environments with large-scale circulation, and are triggered by uplifting air from a passing front or low-pressure system. Meanwhile, storms that form through unorganized convection are triggered by a temperature anomaly or change near Earth’s surface, take place in environments without large-scale circulation, and are more chaotic and unpredictable. Of the two types, organized convection is better understood and more ubiquitous, especially in the tropics. But meteorologists still have much to learn about convective organization to better understand and predict the behavior of storms. Here Becker et al. investigated the impact of convective organization on entrainment—a process in which warm, buoyant parcels of air become saturated with moisture; form cumulus clouds; and mix with cooler, drier parcels of air. This causes some cloud droplets to evaporate, cooling down the clouds and making them less buoyant. At this point, either the clouds can dissipate into a popcorn-like formation—which is called unaggregated convection—or other cumulus clouds in the vicinity will pile onto them, forming a larger cloud cluster (aggregated convection). Using a numerical model developed by the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology and the German Weather Service, the team created two simulations of convectional organization over a 312,000-square-kilometer grid with 1-kilometer spacing. One simulation started out with unaggregated convection that remained unaggregated throughout. The other simulated the same conditions but started out with aggregated convection and stayed fully aggregated throughout the simulation. The team found that in the lower levels of the troposphere, where our weather occurs, the rate of entrainment is higher when convection is aggregated. This is due to increased turbulence caused by updrafts. Meanwhile, more buoyancy is maintained during aggregated convection because of a moist layer, or shell, surrounding the convective cluster. The researchers advise that future modeling of convective organization should include simulations of this moist shell. This study sheds light on how convective systems interact with their environments and their behavior (whether by aggregating or dissipating) as they move farther skyward. ( Geophysical Research Letters , https://doi.org/10.1002/2017GL076640, 2018) —Sarah Witman, Freelance Writer

Beschreibung: Joseph B. Walsh. Credit: Benjamin Bennett Joseph B. “Joe” Walsh died on 30 August 2017 at the age of 86 in Adamsville, R.I., where he had lived for many years. Joe was well known in the rock mechanics community, although perhaps underappreciated outside it. The influence of his work is, nonetheless, broad and profound. Seismologists who interpret high velocities of compressional waves compared with those of shear waves (high Vp / Vs ratios) as indicators of high pore pressures, oil explorers who recognize oil and gas zones in tomographic images, and geophysicists identifying high permeability and water content from electrical conductivity measurements all rely on Joe’s foundational work. The reason is because these scientists are not so much measuring the properties of the rock as measuring the influence of its cracks. Joe, in a series of classic papers in the 1960s and 1970s, did the fundamental work establishing the profound effect of cracks on the elastic and transport properties of rock. By recognizing this influence, Joe was able to provide, for example, rational explanations for relationships between the constitutive relations for permeability and for electrical resistivity, to predict how increasing effective pressure changes permeability, and to understand the influence of surface roughness on joint transmissivity or the coefficient of friction. Whole fields of study are based on those beginnings. Early Career Joseph B. Walsh was born in Utica, N.Y., the son of Joseph B. and Ann (née Bowman) Walsh. He grew up in upstate New York before moving to Massachusetts to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), from which between 1952 and 1958 he received bachelor’s, master’s, and doctor of science degrees in mechanical engineering. His D.Sc. work yielded a paper with Frank McClintock in which they developed what became known as the modified Griffith theory for brittle fracture in compression. After graduating from MIT, Joe spent 2 years in industry, including a stint with a consulting company in Stockholm. This job morphed into a globe-circling trip in a VW bug, ending with Joe in California, substantially poorer financially but much richer in experience. Returning to Massachusetts, he applied his skills in solid mechanics as an engineer at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, where he was responsible for the design of the pressure hull for the pioneering submersible Alvin . Joe joined the Geology and Geophysics (later Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences) Department at MIT in 1963, beginning a 25-year collaboration with W. F. Brace. It was a very fruitful combination: Joe did the theory, and Bill did the experiments. The Walsh-Brace period was one of rapid development in rock mechanics on many fronts. A host of graduate students and postdocs (including most of us) were trained under their guidance, many of whom went on to productive research careers in academia and industry. Theory Grounded in Reality Joe’s papers are both succinct and eloquent. He identified the most pertinent elements of each problem and focused his analysis exclusively on those aspects. His chosen tools were pencil, paper, and the fundamental principles of mechanics. Joe arrived at work each day impeccably attired in coat, tie, and slacks. Sitting at his desk, he would dive into his cool mathematical treatments, seemingly abstract but always securely attached to reality. As a result of his training with McClintock, Argon, and others in MIT’s Mechanical Engineering Department, Joe always tested his work with experimental or observational data, thus providing a perfect interface with Brace’s group. A Taste for Conversation and Rugby At lunchtime, he could be found at a local diner, talking to machinists, custodians, or academics.Despite his analytical proclivity, Joe was not detached socially. To all who knew him, he was a quiet, unassuming man with a wry sense of humor. He liked people and had catholic tastes in his choice of company. At lunchtime, he could be found at a local diner, talking to machinists, custodians, or academics. In the evening, he might dine at one of several classic private social clubs in the Back Bay. His gentle demeanor gave no clue that in his younger years he was an avid rugby player and the founding director of the U.S. Rugby Foundation. Joe was equally at ease bantering with a surly waitress or securing a large donation for the rugby foundation from an influential industrial magnate. A Very Active Retirement Joe retired from MIT in 1986 and settled in Rhode Island. In “retirement,” Joe continued to conduct theoretical studies of fluid flow in fractured rocks and of rock friction. He was appointed visiting scholar in the Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences at Brown University in 1999, and he continued in that capacity until his passing, having been reappointed only a few months before. Joe eagerly mined experimental rock friction data at Brown, which he used as a starting point for his analyses. Armed with his famous and formidable yellow legal pad and No. 2 pencil, Joe worked closely with experimentalists at Brown and elsewhere to establish a physical basis for rate and state friction laws. In addition to scientific interactions, Joe also educated younger scientists at Brown by his example about the importance of a proper lunch, the joys of poetry (Joe could, and did, recite many poems from memory), and the meaning of savoir faire. Joe continued his scientific work up to the time of his death. American Geophysical Union president Ralph Cicerone congratulates Joseph Walsh on being named an AGU Fellow in 1993. Credit: AGU Joe’s work often took him overseas: He served as a visiting scientist at the University of Cambridge in England; the University of Edinburgh, Scotland; and the South African Chamber of Mines in Johannesburg. Although his name is not a household word outside the rock mechanics community, Joe has been well recognized for his accomplishments. In 2007, he received the Rock Mechanics Research Award, in 2000 he was honored as a Life Fellow at the University of Cambridge, and in 1993 he was named a Fellow by the American Geophysical Union. —Christopher H. Scholz (email: scholz@ldeo.columbia.edu), Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, Palisades, N.Y.; David L. Goldsby, Department of Earth and Environmental Science, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia; and Yves Bernabé and Brian Evans, Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge

Beschreibung: Declining water quality in inland and coastal systems has become, and will continue to be, a major environmental, social, and economic problem as human populations increase, agricultural activities expand, and climate change effects on hydrological cycles and extreme events become more pronounced. Providing government and nongovernment groups with timely observations on the time and location of anomalous water quality conditions can lead to more informed decisions about the use, management, and protection of water resources. By observing the color of the water, satellite sensors provide information on the concentrations of the constituents that give rise to these colors. These constituents include chlorophyll a (the primary photosynthetic pigment in phytoplankton), total suspended solids (an indicator of sediments and other insoluble material), and dissolved organic matter. Other environmentally relevant optical characteristics include turbidity and water clarity. Varieties of physical and biological phenomena can be inferred from space. This map pinpoints potential biogeochemical hot spots that require further investigations through field sampling. (left) A Landsat 8 true-color image of Boston Harbor, Mass., alongside (right) the corresponding near-surface turbidity map produced via NASA’s Sea-Viewing Wide Field-of-View Sensor (SeaWiFS) Data Analysis System (SeaDAS). Warmer colors represent higher turbidity. The area in the top right of both images is Massachusetts Bay. Credit: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center A 1-day workshop at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center introduced the concept and potential capabilities of a satellite-based, near-real-time water quality monitoring tool. This tool will complement existing field monitoring programs by automatically alerting water resource and ecosystem managers to potentially hazardous water quality conditions, resulting in more timely and informed decision-making. The workshop aimed to identify the next steps toward making a satellite-based, near-real-time water quality monitoring system a reality with input and guidance from end users.The workshop brought together more than 340 environmental specialists, economists, scientists, industry representatives, and legal advisors from state and federal agencies and the private sector. The primary requirements that workshop attendees identified for developing this warning system include automated, near-real-time processing of Landsat-Sentinel imagery, the development of robust anomaly detection algorithms, and support for ongoing implementation and calibration and validation efforts. The workshop further aimed to identify the next steps toward making such a near-real-time system a reality with input and guidance from end users. The workshop featured a series of short presentations on the perspectives of end users on the potential value of satellite data for water quality monitoring. These presentations covered a broad range of topics, including monitoring harmful algal blooms in California, Utah, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Florida; identifying sites for aquacultures in New England; and concerns about pipeline leaks contaminating waterways. Other talks highlighted the need for improved satellite technology (e.g., hyperspectral missions) with sunglint mitigation strategies in the future to enable more precise and accurate estimations of water quality conditions from space. The NASA Goddard team is currently developing a prototype system for select regions to evaluate the performance of such an expedited service.The NASA Goddard team is currently developing a prototype system for select regions (e.g., Florida’s Indian River Lagoon, Lake Mead, and Oregon reservoirs) to evaluate the performance of such an expedited service. The team, in collaboration with water authorities, will initiate algorithm development, prototyping, testing, and implementation of the system. All presentations are available on the meeting’s website. The Water Quality Workshop was sponsored by the NASA Goddard Applied Sciences office. We thank Steve R. Greb, Richard Stumpf, Maria Tzortziou, and Jeremy P. Werdell for serving on the organizing committee. —Nima Pahlevan (email: nima.pahlevan@nasa.gov; @nima_pahlevan), NASA, Greenbelt, Md.; also at Science Systems and Applications, Inc., Greenbelt, Md.; Steve G. Ackleson, Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, D. C.; and Blake A. Shaeffer, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Research Triangle Park, N.C.

Beschreibung: Caves may be dark and eerie, but now they are a little less mysterious. That is, at least, when it comes to what happens to the atmospheric methane that enters the caves. Researchers recently completed the most extensive published study to date of methane concentrations in karst caves. Cave environments are a global sink for methane, they assert, but other scientists have voiced some reservations about that claim. Scientists conducting those initial explorations expected to find higher methane concentrations inside the caves than in the surrounding atmosphere, but they found the opposite.Karst terrains, such as caves, sinkholes, and other formations pockmarked by internal voids, form when soluble rocks such as limestone erode. The most widespread karst caves form when carbon dioxide dissolves in surface waters, creating carbonic acid that disintegrates the limestone. Caves and other karst environments underlie about 14% of Earth’s land, and it’s not well known how this terrestrial subsurface interacts with the atmosphere, said independent biogeochemist Kevin Webster of Tucson, Ariz., who led the new study and was formerly with the University of Arizona in Tucson. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas, and its concentration in the atmosphere is increasing. Scientists are tracing methane’s sources and sinks to help them understand the rate and expected amount of the gas’s accumulation in our planet’s atmosphere. Within the past decade, investigators started measuring methane levels in a few caves and associated karst landscapes. The scientists conducting those initial explorations expected to find higher methane concentrations inside the caves than in the surrounding atmosphere, but they found the opposite, according to Webster. Giuseppe Etiope measures the flux of methane from a cave surface in Kentucky. Credit: Agnieszka Drobniak To find out if methane depletion is unique to only a handful of caves, Webster and his colleagues recently measured the air inside 33 karst caves in the United States and 3 caves in New Zealand, essentially tripling the known data set. From May 2012 to September 2016, they measured methane concentrations, as well as ratios of stable carbon and hydrogen isotopes in the methane. Supporting measurements provided information on the cave air residence times and mixing processes. Thirty-five, or 97%, of the tested caves had methane concentrations lower than those in the outside atmosphere in at least one measurement location, the researchers report in the 1 March issue of Earth and Planetary Science Letters ( EPSL ). Methane Eaters So what’s happening to the methane? Earlier karst cave studies that initially observed the methane depletion proposed two main hypotheses: Methane is oxidized by ions and radicals from the radioactive decay of radon, or methane is consumed by methane-eating microorganisms. However, the researchers doing those studies couldn’t conduct all the measurements needed to distinguish between the two, Webster noted, whereas he and his colleagues made special provisions to collect the essential data. The researchers found the isotopic signature of methanotrophic bacteria, which led them to conclude that those bacteria were the cause of the methane loss.For instance, he and his team report in the EPSL paper, which was first published online on 8 January, that they measured the hydrogen isotope ratios of their methane samples, which had not been done previously in these cave environments, according to Webster. To be able to do so, Webster told Eos , the scientists custom built an inlet for a gas chromatograph–isotope ratio mass spectrometer and used the inlet to preconcentrate the methane. “Preconcentration is necessary because methane is at such low abundance in air” and even less abundant in cave air, Webster explained. Ultimately, the researchers found the isotopic signature of methanotrophic bacteria, which led them to conclude that those bacteria were the cause of the methane loss. The scientists’ novel approach also helped them to solve another mystery. It turns out that the team observed at least two sources of methane entering some of the caves: The main source was the atmosphere outside of the cave, but a minor contribution also came from two different microbial biochemistries. “That was very surprising,” said Webster, given that researchers have previously observed such processes co-occurring only in lake or fen environments. David Mattey, an isotope geochemist at Royal Holloway, University of London, in the United Kingdom, saluted the advance of using hydrogen isotopes to fingerprint different methanogenic sources. Mattey, an original proposer of the microbial depletion pathway who was not involved with the new cave study, noted that the findings by Webster and his team confirm his earlier work. To eliminate contamination, Arndt Schimmelmann fills a plastic bag with cave air to remove any air from external sources prior to collecting a cave air sample in a glass sampling container. Credit: Agnieszka Drobniak Global Sink The fact that nearly all of the studied caves consumed methane suggests to Webster that caves in general do the same. “There is nothing unusual about methane consumption in caves or the minor processes of methane production we observed,” he said. On the basis of their measurements, he and his coauthors contend in their paper that karst environments reduce methane’s atmospheric concentrations worldwide. Because the microbial sources of methane were minor, those emissions did little to offset the net loss of methane in the caves. The next step is to figure out how large the losses are, Webster said. Mattey needs more evidence. “You have to be careful claiming that it might have a global impact,” he said, “because it’s very, very difficult to upscale it from just one or two measurements.” He advised more long-term monitoring as well as reaching a better understanding of fluxes and how the caves are connected to the atmosphere. —Laura G. Shields (lgshields@gmail.com; @LauraGShields), Science Communication Program Graduate Student, University of California, Santa Cruz

Beschreibung: Like river canyons, steep-sided submarine channels are effective transportation systems capable of carrying billions of tons of sediment across distances of hundreds of kilometers. Although previous studies have shown that helical (spiraling) flow around meander bends plays an important role in transporting sediment in rivers, a lack of field measurements from deep-ocean turbidity currents has led to competing models describing their motion around curves. To settle this controversy, Azpiroz-Zabala et al. present the first deep-ocean measurements of turbidity currents around a submarine channel bend. Using an acoustic Doppler current profiler anchored downstream of a meander at a depth of 2,000 meters in Congo Canyon, the team acquired the velocity-depth profiles of 10 flows that occurred between December 2009 and March 2010. Surprisingly, despite having variable thicknesses ranging from 16 to 75 meters and durations lasting from 8 hours to 10 days, nearly all of the turbidity currents displayed the same helical flow structure. It consisted of two stacked cells rotating in opposite directions, with the bottom cell revolving in the direction opposite to helical flows observed in rivers. These results are consistent with models of other types of stratified flows and support the hypothesis that the same mechanism that forms circulation cells in other geophysical flows (such as rivers and saline flows)—the interaction of competing pressure gradients—also applies to turbidity currents. These difficult-to-obtain measurements show that the type of circulation a large-scale flow will exhibit depends upon the extent to which the current is stratified. The resulting helical flow causes the sediment to slosh from side to side, to gather at the inner bend, or to be continuously overturned. In combination with fluid turbulence, these processes keep sediment in suspension across long distances and thus play a crucial role in the ability of turbidity currents to transport enormous amounts of sediment from the continental shelf all the way to the deep-ocean floor. ( Geophysical Research Letters , https://doi.org/10.1002/2017GL075721, 2017) —Terri Cook, Freelance Writer

Beschreibung: A new scorecard that rates members of Congress on how they voted on environmental issues found that 46 Republican senators scored a 0% in 2017. The average score for all Republican senators was 1%, according to the League of Conservation Voters (LCV), a nonprofit environmental group based in Washington, D. C., that released the scorecard on Monday. This is the lowest average score for Republican senators since LCV began tracking this issue in 1970, according to the group. In contrast, 2e7 Democratic senators earned a 100% on the scorecard, with Democrats averaging 93%. The low Republican average score means that those senators “voted against the environment and public health at every opportunity,” the LCV report states. On the House side, 124 Republicans received a zero, with House GOP members overall receiving an average score of 5%. Among House Democrats, 84 earned a 100% score, and House Democrats overall earned a 94% average score. “The Republican-led Congress repeatedly refused to stand up to President Trump’s extreme antienvironmental agenda and his attacks on our air, water, land, wildlife.”“At the federal level, 2017 was an unmitigated disaster for the environment and public health, with President Trump and his cabinet quickly becoming the most antienvironmental administration in our nation’s history,” Tiernan Sittenfeld, LCV’s senior vice president for government affairs, said at a briefing on Monday to release the report. “The Republican-led Congress repeatedly refused to stand up to President Trump’s extreme antienvironmental agenda and his attacks on our air, water, land, wildlife. This is particularly shameful in a year when climate change–fueled hurricanes and wildfires caused so much devastation. Fortunately, Senate Democrats, led by Sen. Schumer”—the Senate minority leader from New York—“maintained a green firewall of defense to block any egregious events throughout 2017.” Votes That Were Counted The report graded members of Congress on the basis of specific votes that LCV and other environmental and conservation organizations determined were key indicators. On the Senate side, members were scored on how they voted in 19 instances. These included eight votes to confirm the administration’s cabinet or subcabinet nominees, whom the report labeled as “historically anti-environmental.” Among them was Environmental Protection Agency administrator Scott Pruitt. The report said that Pruitt “has aggressively gutted the agency from the inside.” Other votes counted in the scorecard were the recent tax bill that opens the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to fossil fuel development and legislation that would threaten drinking water and public lands. An environmental voting scorecard issued by the League of Conservation Voters shows a sharp drop in Senate Republican scores between 2016 and 2017. Credit: League of Conservation Voters Sen. Whitehouse said that the low scores for Republicans in both houses “very clearly show a party that has been completely captured by the polluting industries.”In the Senate, “what this year’s results show is a dramatic crash on the Republican side of the aisle, which is in many respects a very sad testament to what has become of the GOP,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) said at the briefing. Only 14 Senate Republicans scored zero in 2016 compared with the 46 who did in 2017. House numbers were fairly stable, with 122 House members receiving a zero in 2016 compared with 124 with that score in 2017. Whitehouse said that the low scores for Republicans in both houses “very clearly show a party that has been completely captured by the polluting industries.” At least one Republican senator, Thad Cochran of Mississippi, paid little regard to his LCV grade of zero. “As a lifelong Republican, Sen. Cochran tends not to score highly with liberal activist groups,” a spokesperson for the senator told Eos . “Senator Cochran’s career reflects a careful understanding of the importance of protecting and preserving our nation’s natural resources. He has a strong record of making decisions on environmental issues that are in the best interests of Mississippi and our nation, and supporting legislation and policies that promote cooperative conservation programs.” Looking at Votes by Climate Caucus Members For House members, LCV graded 35 votes on issues related to public lands, climate change, water resources, clean air, deregulation of environmental rules, and other environment-relevant topics. The average environmental voting record for House Republicans falls far below that for Democrats, according to the League of Conservation Voters. Credit: League of Conservation Voters Republican House members who belong to the bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus averaged a 16% score, which is more than 3 times higher than the overall Republican average, according to the report. However, the report concluded that members of the caucus, which was founded in 2016 to explore policy options on climate change, need to do more. “Joining the caucus can be an important step, but it’s simply not enough,” the report states. “We need these Republican members to vote for climate action, to lead on real solutions, and to push their colleagues and party leadership to do better.” “We don’t think the scorecard accurately captures the emerging work being done by the caucus to develop bipartisan solutions to climate change.”The head of a group that has worked closely with the caucus said the scorecard is valuable but that it does not provide the whole picture about the importance of the caucus. “We think the scorecard plays the essential role of providing pressure on members of Congress to do better on environmental issues, especially climate change. However, we don’t think the scorecard accurately captures the emerging work being done by the caucus to develop bipartisan solutions to climate change,” Mark Reynolds, executive director of the Citizens’ Climate Lobby (CCL), said in a statement provided to Eos . The lobby is a grassroots advocacy organization based in Coronado, Calif., that focuses on national policies to address climate change. A CCL analysis published on Wednesday found that 15 of the 34 caucus members who are Republicans improved their environmental voting scores since joining the caucus, despite the fact that only 5 of the 35 tracked votes are “climate-relevant.” “Much is happening behind the scenes, thanks to the caucus, and we think patience will eventually be rewarded with major legislation to address climate change,” Reynolds added. —Randy Showstack (@RandyShowstack), Staff Writer

Beschreibung: Earth system models contain dozens if not hundreds of parameters that are not easily definable or accurately tunable over most of the Earth, meaning these models do not fulfill their true potential as tools for simulating or predicting weather and climate. Ricciuto et al. [2018] extend the mathematical technique called Polynomial Chaos (PC), a method to determine uncertainty in dynamical systems, with a new Bayesian compressive sensing (BCS) algorithm to applications at very high dimensions like those found in complex Earth system models. Interesting applications, such as sensitivity analysis, parameter optimization and distribution estimation are possible. With the help of PC-BCS, the sensitivity indices within models can be directly computed, and is demonstrated to be a more effective means of optimizing the land surface parameters of the Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM). Citation: Ricciuto, D., Sargsyan, K., & Thornton, P. [2018]. The impact of parametric uncertainties on biogeochemistry in the E3SM land model. Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems , 10. https://doi.org/10.1002/2017MS000962 —Paul A. Dirmeyer, Editor, JAMES

Beschreibung: Rooftop gardens. Seedlings sprouting on windowsills. The clucking of chickens in a metropolitan backyard. These and more are small harbingers of the expansion of urban agriculture around the world. More than half of the world’s population lives in cities, a figure that the United Nations expects to increase to 67% by 2050—yet urbanized land makes up just 1% of the Earth’s surface. Because of this, urban planners are working to make cities more resilient, habitable, and adaptable to change. In a new paper, Clinton et al. have developed a framework to estimate the environmental benefits of urban agriculture on a global scale—current and future. The team envisions a scenario in which over the next few decades, cities around the world adopt intensive efforts to expand urban agriculture. Using Google Earth Engine, a free platform for processing global satellite data, the researchers analyzed data sets on population, urban landscapes, meteorology, terrain, and food and agriculture. They developed national estimates for the entire globe of ecosystem services provided by urban agriculture, finding that existing vegetation in urban areas provides the equivalent of about $33 billion each year. In more specific terms, the team estimates that urban agriculture, if deployed across all available vacant land, rooftops, and building façades, could produce 100–180 million tons of food, save about 14–15 billion kilowatt hours of energy, sequester 100,000–170,000 tons of nitrogen, and offset roughly 2 trillion cubic feet of storm runoff each year. Projected out, the researchers estimate that dramatically increasing urban agriculture efforts around the globe has the potential to positively influence food production, nitrogen fixation, energy savings, pollination, climate regulation, soil formation, and the biological control of pests, services that are worth, as a whole, as much as $160 billion. The team’s findings show that urban agriculture has the ability to improve food security and ecosystem health on a global scale. Although its impacts vary from country to country, the results are promising. This study is a thorough look at the importance of urban agriculture, especially in the face of global climate change and unsustainable urban development practices around the world. ( Earth’s Future , https://doi.org/10.1002/2017EF000536, 2018) —Sarah Witman, Freelance Writer

Beschreibung: In 2017, more than 200 students participated in the Virtual Poster Showcase (VPS), a program of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) that is designed to help students share research without traveling to an in-person conference. This program has been continually advancing in size and scope since it was created in 2013. Embellishments added last year helped to scale up the program as well as to add value for participants.Four embellishments added to VPS in 2017 helped to scale up the program as well as to add value for the student participants and their faculty and research advisers. A year ago, two high school instructors helped pilot the participation of 21 groups of high school juniors and seniors in VPS. Some of these students stated that they expected the experience to strengthen their college applications. A university instructor incorporated VPS into the curriculum of her spring graduate course in science communication. This meant that all aspects of the VPS process (abstract submission, poster creation, a video presentation of the student’s project, participation in a peer evaluation component, and responses to feedback from professionals serving as judges) were considered for the students’ final grades in the course. As part of a partnership between AGU and the American Geosciences Institute, all 447 VPS abstracts from 2015 onward are now available and searchable within GeoRef, the world’s largest database of geoscience abstracts. A geographic information system (GIS) map of all VPS participants, their abstracts, and the location of each lead author’s institution has been created to share the abstracts with the entire Earth and space science community. This GIS visualization is a project between University of Texas at El Paso professor Raed Aldouri and his GIS class. The link will be publicized in the coming weeks after all the 2017 abstracts have been added to the GIS. Global Participation In 2017, VPS offered spring and fall showcases that have continued to draw students from around the globe. For the third year in a row, the fall showcase attracted U.S. undergraduate students who had completed summer research programs known as Research Experience for Undergraduates (REUs). The National Science Foundation funds those programs nationwide. VPS is not just for those in the United States or just for undergraduate students. Nearly half of the participants in VPS’s 2017 events were graduate students from around the world. Overall, VPS’s non-U.S. participants in 2017 came from 15 countries and five continents. Building Student Confidence Taking part in the Virtual Poster Showcase continues to increase students’ confidence levels in preparing and presenting posters.Taking part in the Virtual Poster Showcase continues to increase students’ experience with preparing and presenting research. Nearly four out of five students in the 2017 showcases reported a boost in confidence in their poster preparation and presentation skills. Survey respondents also said that having a VPS abstract will ultimately help them in the next steps of their careers. During the two VPS events in 2017, presentations featured a wide array of research that spanned many subdisciplines within the Earth and space sciences, from environmental degradation caused by zinc smelting to modeling solar wind parameters in the Martian atmosphere. The first-place winners of the spring and fall showcases are listed below. Information about other winners can be found on the Virtual Poster Showcase recognition page. Spring 2017 winners: Graduate showcase: Babak Jalalzadeh Fard, Northeastern University, “Effective mitigation and adaptation strategies for public health impacts of heatwaves for Brookline, MA” Undergraduate showcase: Jacob Smith, Clemson University, “The effect of atmospheric CO2 on the chemical weathering of silicate minerals as measured by cation flux in the vadose zone” High school showcase: Hannah Kim, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, “The effect of disease resistance on the bacterial community of the fecal microbiome of Crassostrea virginica ” Fall 2017 winners: Graduate showcase: Ruadhan Magee, University of Queensland, Australia, “Magma dynamics recorded in clinopyroxene megacrysts: Investigating the destructive 1669 eruption of Mount Etna” Undergraduate showcase: Caitlin Hoeber, San Jose State University, “Spatial and temporal effects on diversity of Monterey Bay’s microbiome” Each first-place winner of the graduate and undergraduate showcases will receive a travel grant to attend the 2018 AGU Fall Meeting in Washington, D. C., along with complimentary meeting registration. Spring Showcase Open for Abstracts Register and submit your abstracts today.The 2018 spring showcase is accepting abstracts until Tuesday, 13 March, 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time. VPS offers an excellent means for students to share their research and get valuable feedback from their peers and professionals in the Earth and space sciences. Register and submit your abstracts today at http://vps.agu.org, or message vps@agu.org to learn more about how you can participate in future showcases. To everyone who helped make VPS a continued success this past year, AGU’s Virtual Poster Showcase staff offers its heartfelt thanks. It is only through the generous volunteerism of professionals who sign up as VPS judges and through the VPS program’s collaborations with other professional societies and individuals within the scientific community that the VPS program can continue to strive toward AGU’s mission of advancing Earth and space science. —Pranoti M. Asher (email: pasher@agu.org), Manager, Higher Education, AGU; and Nathaniel Janick, Career Services Coordinator, AGU

Beschreibung: The 2017 hurricane season was especially severe in the Northern Hemisphere. When Hurricane Harvey hit Houston, Texas, in August, so much water fell on the city that the ground sank beneath the weight of it. Hurricane Irma followed closely on its heels, and Puerto Rico is still reeling from Hurricane Maria, which swept through in late September. There is no doubt that swiftly and accurately measuring hurricane conditions to predict their behavior before landfall could safeguard lives—and lifesaving infrastructure. With this goal in mind, Foti et al. demonstrate a new satellite remote sensing technique that uses reflected GPS signals to measure ocean wind speeds during hurricanes. The Global Navigation Satellite System–Reflectometry (GNSS-R) technique takes measurements of Earth surface conditions by reading GPS signals after they bounce off Earth’s surface. This method can sense many surface properties like ocean roughness, wind speed, soil moisture, and sea ice. A previous study used this technique to record hurricane winds from an aircraft, but the new research shows that the same technique also works from satellite altitudes to sense ocean surface roughness in hurricane wind conditions. To prove that the technique was sensitive enough to be used from space, the researchers used data from a GNSS Receiver Remote Sensing Instrument mounted onto a satellite 635 kilometers above the ocean. For this study, the scientists used data collected between May 2015 and October 2016, during which time Hurricane Joaquin, Hurricane Jimena, and Typhoon Chan-hom occurred. The researchers compared the GNSS-R satellite measurements with data from other sources, including tropical cyclone best track data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Centers for Environmental Information; two climate reanalysis products; and a spaceborne scatterometer, a tool that uses microwave radar to measure winds near the surface of the ocean. They found that the GNSS-R satellite data successfully sensed wind speed conditions in each hurricane compared with these other data sources. They also captured rapid changes in wind speed that occur around the eye of the cyclone, which did not appear to be affected by any data loss, like what can be caused by heavy precipitation in other satellite data. There are still uncertainties, however. The wind speed algorithm the scientists used was developed for low to moderate winds, below 67 miles per hour (30 meters per second). As a result, the authors conclude that the GNSS-R technique needs further validation at high wind speeds. Although the GNSS-R technique could improve wind speed measurements and hurricane research in the future, the scientists conclude that more work needs to be done to develop the technique and improve the accuracy of the high wind speeds it measures. ( Geophysical Research Letters , https://doi.org/10.1002/2017GL076166, 2017) —Alexandra Branscombe

Beschreibung: A congressional panel yesterday heard testimonies about the impact of and fight against sexual harassment in the sciences. Four women prominent and successful in their fields spoke about the need to reform not just the laws but also a harmful culture that considers such behaviors permissible and fosters systemic inequity. The entire scientific community, especially those in leadership positions, must strive to change a culture that treats harassment as commonplace.“We talk a lot about getting more women in the sciences,” said Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (D-Ore.), but “we need to be able to keep them there when they get there.” Bonamici sits on the Subcommittee on Research and Technology of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, which held the hearing. According to the witnesses, antiharassment policies must grow more comprehensive and include more input from experts; findings and procedures require greater transparency, and violations must provoke tangible consequences. Overall, the entire scientific community, especially those in leadership positions, must strive to change a culture that treats harassment as commonplace, they said. “We cannot afford to lose another brilliant scientist because she did not feel safe in her lab,” said Rep. Daniel Lipinski (D-Ill.), ranking member of the subcommittee. Clarity, Transparency, and Informed Policy Making No standard harassment policy prevails at American universities and research institutions, nor is there a consistent definition of what actions constitute harassment, some witnesses noted. The four witnesses who testified before the House Subcommittee on Research and Technology on 27 February. From left to right are Rhonda Davis, Kathryn Clancy, Kristina Larsen, and Chris McEntee. Credit: House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology Kathryn Clancy, an associate professor of anthropology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, explained that antiharassment policies need to be explicit about acceptable and unacceptable behaviors, easily accessible to all, and taught as part of standard workplace training. They also need to address the problems actually occurring in that workplace, said Clancy, who conducts research on workplace climate in the sciences. “We need to do a lot more of the hard work, not just slapping on a policy and saying ‘OK, sexual harassment is fixed,’” Clancy said. Scientific institutions should ask themselves, “What is the culture at our organization, and is this the culture that we want?” she added. Attorney Kristina Larsen told the subcommittee that many antiharassment policies focus mainly on legality and the potential for litigation, instead of addressing more prevalent, but technically legal, smaller harassments. Larsen represents women and underrepresented minorities in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields who are facing discrimination, harassment, and retaliation. “Don’t write a zero-tolerance policy until you’re really clear on what you’re not tolerating,” she advised in her testimony. We need to base policies on “the conduct that is actually damaging” to victims and not worry “about whether it is legal or illegal under the law,” she said. Fieldwork Amplifies Problems Field research conducted far from a formal academic environment increases the need to have clear and explicit ethical policies and codes of conduct, said Chris McEntee, executive director and CEO of the American Geophysical Union, publisher of Eos . “A very small number of people, who were actually harassed, even knew what the reporting mechanism was” at field sites.“The Earth and space sciences typically involve remote field settings,” she noted in her testimony. “When coupled with a male-dominated environment and power structure, these situations can amplify the problem.” Clancy highlighted that field research brings added uncertainty about antiharassment policies. “In field sciences, we found that the majority of our respondents were not aware of a code of conduct or sexual harassment policy for their field site. And [only] a very small number of people, who were actually harassed, even knew what the reporting mechanism was,” she said. Principal investigators, supervisors, and field site directors should develop and enforce implicit and explicit codes of conduct and bear responsibility for them, she added. Making Consequences for Harassers Real Witnesses and members of Congress at the hearing lauded the National Science Foundation (NSF) for its 8 February decision requiring grant-seeking universities to maintain clear antiharassment policies and to report policy violations to NSF. “No taxpayer dollars should be awarded to a university researcher who engages in harassment and inappropriate behavior toward a colleague or student under their charge,” Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), who chairs the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, said during yesterday’s hearing. Subcommittee chairwoman Barbara Comstock (left) speaks with witness Rhonda Davis of NSF (right) after the hearing. Credit: Kimberly M. S. Cartier Rhonda Davis, head of NSF’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion, who also testified at the hearing, noted that NSF’s new guidelines were prompted by the fact that American universities do not have a universal ethics policy regarding sexual or other types of harassment or any requirement for universities to develop such policies beyond the scope of federal protections, like Title IX. Consistent and visible enforcement of antiharassment policy will help mitigate the harassment “epidemic,” said Clancy, citing her research. “Across workplaces, it’s consistent that if you have consequences…you do see less harassment in those workplaces,” she explained. The fear of backlash for reporting harassment falls on the targets of harassment, not the harassers, said McEntee, who encouraged sanctions against harassers for violating ethics policies. “People don’t change because they feel the light; people change because they feel the heat.”“People don’t change because they feel the light; people change because they feel the heat,” said Larsen. “And there is no heat in academics….We have a problem with enforcement.” Davis said that NSF’s new policy includes independent and anonymous avenues for anyone, including students, to report harassment directly to NSF, which may reduce the fear of backlash. Culture Change Needed All of the witnesses called for culture change in the scientific community, where, they said, harassment is allowed to persist and is deemed tolerable. “Let’s move away from a culture of compliance and towards a culture of change,” Clancy said, by “focusing on the behaviors we want to see.” “I see you, and I think of you, and I thank you for getting up every day, and I derive strength from you.”Clancy and McEntee called for more well informed training in how to recognize harassing and harmful behavior and how to safely diffuse a situation from the outside. This type of bystander intervention, especially from those in leadership positions, they explained, would have a twofold effect: first, showing the harasser that such behavior is not acceptable or tolerated in the workplace and, second, demonstrating that vulnerable persons are visible, heard, and supported by those with the power to effect change. Speaking directly to victims of sexual harassment, Clancy added, “I see you, and I think of you, and I thank you for getting up every day, and I derive strength from you. I hope you know how much you mean to those of us who do this work.” —Kimberly M. S. Cartier (@AstroKimCartier), News Writing and Production Intern

Beschreibung: New details released yesterday about the administration’s $7.47 billion funding request for the National Science Foundation (NSF) for fiscal year (FY) 2019 show that proposed budgets related to the geosciences are slated for two of the three biggest monetary and percentage increases among the agency’s major funding accounts. The Directorate for Geosciences (GEO) requests $853 million, a 3.3% increase above the FY 2017 spending level. The Office of Polar Programs, which operates as part of GEO, gets a 14.3% boost, bringing its requested funding to $534.5 million. This assumes that Congress goes along with the White House’s request. The budget request “would allow NSF to build on the important work done by our directorates within individual fields by encouraging convergence among different disciplines in science and engineering.”Only the budget for NSF’s Office of Integrative Activities fares better among the agency’s major accounts. The office’s $537 million requested budget, a 27.7% increase, includes funding for midscale research infrastructure and for several new areas known as “convergence accelerators,” which are initiatives to leverage resources across the agency to support innovative science. This information (see Table 1) updates earlier budget materials released by NSF on 12 February. The budget request “would allow NSF to build on the important work done by our directorates within individual fields by encouraging convergence among different disciplines in science and engineering and collaboration with partners in different disciplines in science and engineering and collaboration with partners in different sectors,” NSF director France Córdova said in a statement. “Investments that incorporate such an approach will accelerate U.S. innovation.” Table 1. National Science Foundation’s FY 2019 Budget Request to Congressa   FY 2017 Actualb FY 2019 Requestb Changeb Percentage Change Research and Related Activities 6,006.5 6,150.7 144.2 2.4 Geosciences (GEO) 825.6 853.0 27.4 3.3 Office of Polar Programs (OPP) 467.9 534.5 66.7 14.3 Biological Sciences (BIO) 742.2 738.2 −4.1 −0.5 Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) 935.9 925.4 −10.5 −1.1 Engineering (ENG) 930.9 921.4 −9.5 −1.0 Mathematical and Physical Sciences (MPS) 1,362.4 1,345.3 −17.1 −1.3 Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences (SBE) 270.9 246.2 −24.7 –9.1 Office of International Science and Engineering (OISE) 49.0 48.5 −0.5 −0.9 Integrative Activities (IA) 420.3 536.7 116.5 27.7 U.S. Arctic Research Commission 1.4 1.4 0.0 −0.7 Education and Human Resources 873.4 873.4 0.0 0.0 Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction 222.8 94.7 −128.1 −57.5 Agency Operations and Award Management 382.1 333.6 −48.4 −12.7 National Science Board 4.3 4.3 0.1 1.2 Office of Inspector General 15.1 15.4 0.3 1.7 Total, NSF 7,504.1 7,472.0 −32.1 −0.4 aSources: “National Science Foundation FY 2019 Budget Request to Congress” and “Summary Table.” bValues in millions of U.S. dollars, rounded to the nearest $0.1 million. A Look at the Geosciences Budget In the FY 2019 request, funding for the geosciences does well overall, although some divisions within GEO decline about 6% (see Table 2). “GEO supports the [budget] request and is confident that it will allow significant advancement of knowledge about how the Earth works” and in other specific programs, GEO directorate head William Easterling told Eos. However, “with an overall NSF budget that is flat from FY17, and with the priorities of investing in [other NSF initiatives], some reductions in other areas are inevitable.” As part of a whopping 37.4% increase, GEO’s Division of Integrative and Collaborative Education and Research would receive $30 million to fund the Navigating the New Arctic (NNA) program. NNA would establish an observing network “to document and understand the Arctic’s rapid biological, physical, chemical, and social changes,” according to NSF budget documents. The agency’s proposed budget includes funding for 10 “big ideas,” which are programs at the frontiers of science and engineering that the agency has selected for investment.NSF calls NNA a “big idea.” In all, the agency’s proposed budget includes funding for its 10 big ideas, which are programs at the frontiers of science and engineering that the agency has selected for investment. In addition to NNA, GEO programs contribute to several other big ideas funded by other agency divisions: Harnessing the Data Revolution for 21st Century Science and Education (funded at $30 million), Understanding the Rules of Life ($30 million), and INCLUDES (Inclusion across the Nation of Communities of Learners of Underrepresented Discoverers in Engineering and Science; $20 million). “Virtually all areas of research supported by GEO are needed to advance the Big Ideas (NNA and others) and so we see broad opportunities for the Geosciences community within those investments,” Easterling told Eos . Table 2. Directorate for Geosciences Budget Request for FY 2019 a FY 2017 Actualb Revised FY 2019 Requestb Changeb Percentage Change Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences (AGS) 253 239 −14 −5.6 Earth Sciences (EAR) 179 169 −10 −5.5 Integrative and Collaborative Education and Research (ICER) 76 105 29 37.4 Ocean Sciences (OCE) 317 340 23 7.2 Total 826 853 27 3.3 aSources: “National Science Foundation FY 2019 Budget Request to Congress” and “Directorate for Geosciences.” bValues in millions of U.S. dollars, rounded to the nearest million. In a budget proposed to go up 7.2%, GEO’s Division of Ocean Sciences (OCE) receives $174.8 million for infrastructure and $40 million for the Ocean Observatories Initiative. The ocean sciences also will benefit from a $28.7 million request for the $255.6 million Regional Class Research Vessel project, which is included in NSF’s Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction funding account. However, the envisioned FY 2019 funding supports construction of only two of three regional class research vessels for which Congress appropriated money in FY 2017. “In FY 2017, [Public Law] 115-31 appropriated $121.88 million in funding to facilitate the planning and construction of three vessels. In the context of the President’s overall fiscal goals intended to maintain spending restraint, this Budget Request supports construction of the two vessels,” NSF budget documents note. Easterling expressed satisfaction with the proposed GEO budget despite some expected belt-tightening in certain areas. The proposal “will allow investments in NSF’s Big Ideas to begin, and it will allow important investments in research infrastructure through the start of modernization of McMurdo Station and through commitment to a second Regional Class Research Vessel for modernizing the academic fleet,” Easterling said. Polar Funding The Antarctic infrastructure project is “a necessity for maintaining U.S. scientific and geopolitical eminence across the continent of Antarctica.”For its Office of Polar Programs (OPP), the NSF funding proposal includes $420.2 million for infrastructure, an increase of 21.3%. That includes $103.7 million in FY 2019 for the Antarctic Infrastructure Modernization for Science (AIMS) construction project. In the budget document, the agency describes the $355 million project, which will modernize major facilities at McMurdo Station, as “a necessity for maintaining U.S. scientific and geopolitical eminence across the continent of Antarctica.” OPP director Kelly Falkner told Eos that “we would be delighted to take [on] the long-needed, major overhaul of McMurdo Station to set the [U.S. Antarctic Program] on a more robust, sustainable pathway.” —Randy Showstack (@RandyShowstack), Staff Writer

Beschreibung: Jules Verne’s adventure novels Five Weeks in a Balloon and Around the World in 80 Days highlighted some of the great technological advances of the late 19th century that revolutionized travel and captured the imagination of the public [ Verne, 1863, 1873]. Among those inspired by the novels was Nellie Bly, an American journalist for the New York World , who set off in November 1889 to complete a journey by rail and steamship, following Verne’s imagined path around the world in a record 72 days [ Bly, 1890] (Figure 1). Fig. 1. In 1889–1890, real-life New York World reporter Nellie Bly completed Jules Verne’s imagined path (shown here) around the world in slightly less than Verne’s “80 days.” Neither Bly’s journey nor Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days actually involved balloon travel, but Verne’s book drew on his previous novel Five Weeks in a Balloon. The earlier novel inspired the idea of incorporating balloon travel for one leg of the trip in the 1956 movie Around the World in 80 Days that has become a beloved misconception about Verne’s later book. Credit: Roke/Wikimedia Commons CC BY-SA 3.0 Bly’s accounts demonstrated how new technology, such as the transcountry railroads in the United States and India and the Suez Canal, brought exotic destinations within reach. The revolutionary development of submarine cables and the electric telegraph allowed Bly to keep her editors, and the larger connected world, aware of her progress in near-real time. The France-U.S. collaborative Stratéole 2 project is planning its own series of balloon trips, which will circle the world near the equator for 80 days (more or less), as did these fictional and factual 19th century adventurers, demonstrating new technology and sending new observations from the voyage back via satellite. Drifting with the Winds Scientists with the Stratéole 2 project will release superpressure balloons, designed to drift in the lower stratosphere, from the Seychelles islands in the Indian Ocean (Figure 2). Superpressure balloons contain a fixed amount of helium sealed inside an envelope that does not stretch. This type of balloon is not fully inflated when it is launched, but it expands to its full volume as it rises to an altitude where the gas density inside the balloon matches the density of the surrounding air and where it drifts with the wind. Fig. 2. Early test flights of the French National Center for Space Studies superpressure balloon system during February–May 2010 followed a tropical route. The flight durations of the three balloons were 92, 78, and (yes!) 80 days. The traces of the balloon paths show some wave structure, and the balloon paths reversed direction when the quasi-biennial oscillation, a periodic east–west oscillating feature in tropical lower stratospheric winds, changed phase. Credit: A. Hertzog Each balloon will carry as many as four instruments. As they collect their high-accuracy measurements of meteorological variables, chemical tracers, clouds, and aerosols, their horizontal motions are nearly identical to those of the surrounding air mass. These measurements will advance our knowledge and understanding of cirrus clouds, aerosols, and equatorial waves in the tropical tropopause layer (TTL; the transition region between the troposphere and the stratosphere) and in the lower stratosphere. Shown here is a fully inflated superpressure balloon in the lab at the French National Center for Space Studies (CNES). Credit: Philippe Cocquerez, CNES The Stratéole 2 research program will begin with a five-balloon technology validation campaign in Northern Hemisphere (boreal) fall–winter 2018–2019, followed by 20 balloon flights in boreal fall–winter 2020–2021. In the second campaign, 10 balloons will fly at an altitude near 20 kilometers, just above the TTL, and another 10 will fly near 18 kilometers, within the TTL. From past experience, we expect each balloon to fly for more than 2 months. Typically, a balloon will fly for about 84 days before chaotic atmospheric motions or interactions with Rossby waves push it outside of the deep tropics. A final 20-balloon campaign in 2023–2024 will drift in the opposite direction because of the shifting phase of the quasi-biennial oscillation (QBO), a dominant, periodic east–west oscillating feature in tropical lower stratospheric winds. Challenges Aloft The Stratéole 2 campaign targets the TTL, the primary entry point for tropospheric air into the stratosphere. As air slowly ascends across the TTL, the coldest temperatures encountered at the cold point tropopause (CPT) freeze water vapor into ice crystals. The formation of ice crystals dehydrates the air and regulates the amount of humidity reaching the global stratosphere, giving the TTL an outsized importance considering its geographic extent. The ice crystals form thin cirrus clouds, which have a global impact on the balance between incoming solar radiation and radiation reflected back into space at tropical latitudes. Water vapor and cirrus feedbacks are extremely important in climate system models. The underlying processes that control the formation and sublimation (direct conversion of ice crystals to water vapor) of these clouds remain strongly debated. These processes involve the interplay of deep convection, microphysics, aerosols, wave-induced temperature variations with timescales ranging from minutes to weeks, and the balance of forces driving large-scale slow ascent of air in the tropics. The superposition of wave-induced fluctuations on the average upwelling motion forces the temperatures in the TTL to extreme values at the CPT—less than –94°C at times and well below those expected from radiative equilibrium. These same waves also drive the QBO, which has an important long-range indirect influence on high-latitude seasonal forecasts. The waves, generated by convection below, transport momentum vertically across the TTL and drive QBO wind variations as the momentum dissipates in the stratosphere. Satellite and in situ observations can track the wind reversals of the QBO, but most general circulation models cannot replicate the QBO using current methods. This shortcoming is due to a combination of inadequate spatial resolution and a lack of small-scale wave drag applied at the subgrid scale. Even when models do simulate the QBO, doubts remain on the contribution from various families of waves with different scales and frequencies. As a result, even models that internally generate a QBO were unable to forecast the anomalous disruption of the oscillation that occurred in February 2016 [ Osprey et al., 2016]. Science Objectives This superpressure balloon, shown here at launch, is not fully inflated. As it rises, the volume of helium sealed inside increases until the spherical balloon is fully inflated, giving the balloon a fixed density. Once the balloon has reached the atmospheric level where the air has the same density, it drifts with the wind, providing accurate wind measurements. Credit: Philippe Cocquerez, CNES The overarching objectives of Stratéole 2 are to explore processes that control the transfer of trace gases and momentum between the equatorial upper troposphere and lower stratosphere. The instruments will provide fine-scale measurements of water vapor, temperature, and aerosol/ice at the balloon gondola and also within several kilometers below flight level, documenting air composition and investigating the formation of cirrus in the upper TTL. The balloons also provide unique measurements of equatorial waves over the full spectrum from high-frequency buoyancy waves to planetary-scale equatorial waves, providing information needed to improve representation of these waves in climate models. Stratéole 2 balloons will sample the whole equatorial band from 20°S to 15°N, thus complementing the widespread (but limited-resolution) spaceborne observations and the high-resolution (but geographically restricted) airborne and ground-based measurements from previous field missions. Past balloon campaign measurements sampling the Antarctic stratospheric vortex [see Podglajen et al., 2016] have been used to make accurate estimates of wave momentum fluxes as well as to explain springtime stratospheric ozone loss rates; we expect similar successes with our current campaigns. Stratéole 2 balloon flights will collect measurements over oceanic areas that are otherwise devoid of any stratospheric wind measurements.Other Stratéole 2 science objectives include contributions to operational meteorology and satellite validation. Wind analyses and forecasts have notably large errors in the tropics because sparse tropical wind measurements cannot be modeled in a straightforward way through their dynamical relation to temperature, as they are at higher latitudes. Thus, reducing these errors requires a higher density of measurements. Stratéole 2 balloon flights will address this data shortage by providing unprecedented, accurate wind observations in the equatorial regions of the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere. In particular, the project will collect measurements over oceanic areas that are otherwise devoid of any stratospheric wind measurements. The data will also contribute to the validation of Atmospheric Dynamics Mission Aeolus (ADM-Aeolus) wind products. An innovative European Space Agency mission, ADM-Aeolus, due to be launched in September 2018, is designed to perform the first spaceborne wind lidar measurements, providing unprecedented global coverage. The ensemble of Stratéole 2 instrumentation includes in situ measurements of pressure, temperature, and winds every 30 seconds and less frequently sampled observations of ozone, aerosols, water vapor, and carbon dioxide, plus remotely sensed cloud structure from microlidar and directional radiative fluxes. Instruments providing profiles will include GPS radio occultation receivers that measure temperature profiles to the side of the balloons. Novel reel-down devices suspended as far as 2 kilometers directly below the balloons will also provide profiles to explore the fine-scale distribution of temperature, aerosol/ice, and humidity. Capturing temperature variations in high-resolution profiles, in particular, from the unique balloon platform, is an approach that will provide new insight into equatorial wave processes. Measuring ozone in combination with water vapor and carbon dioxide enables us to discover correlations among these tracers that describe transport processes at the top of the TTL, including convective overshoots that rapidly transport air from the surface into the TTL. Data Dissemination Within 12 months of the end of each balloon campaign, the Stratéole 2 data set will be freely available to the scientific community.The Stratéole 2 data policy is in compliance with World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Resolution 40 (WMO Cg-XII) on the policy and practice for the exchange of meteorological and related data and products. Within 12 months of the end of each balloon campaign, the Stratéole 2 data set will be freely available to the scientific community through the Stratéole 2 Data Archive Center (S2DAC), which is scheduled to launch its website in July 2018. S2DAC will collect and make available the balloon observations and associated ground-based and satellite data, reanalyses, and model outputs. The S2DAC includes a primary, full repository at the Dynamic Meteorology Laboratory (LMD) in France and a secondary mirror site at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) in Boulder, Colo., in the United States. In addition, during the balloon campaigns, a subset of the Stratéole 2 data set, specifically flight-level winds, will be disseminated on the Global Telecommunication System for their assimilation in numerical weather prediction systems. We invite and encourage the use of Stratéole 2 data by the broader scientific community, and potential users can watch for future campaign updates on the project website. Up, Up, and Away In the spirit of Verne’s imagined use of new technologies and Bly’s real-world application of those technologies to explore the world, the Stratéole 2 campaign will scientifically explore the tropical tropopause and lower stratosphere from a long-duration superpressure balloon platform. The use of multiple balloons will permit extensive exploration of the finely layered features and unique processes occurring in this remote part of the atmosphere. With the involvement of the broader scientific community, analyses of the Stratéole 2 measurements hold promise to provide a new and deeper understanding of these processes and the connections of this region to global chemistry, dynamics, and climate variability. Acknowledgments Major funding for the Stratéole 2 campaign is provided by France’s National Center for Space Studies (CNES) and National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), as well as the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF).

Beschreibung: Many of the natural disasters that make the news headlines are related to extreme or unusual weather events. In an open-access article recently published in Reviews in Geophysics , Steptoe et al. [2018] examine extreme atmospheric hazards effecting different countries and regions around the world, and their connections with the global climate system. The editor asked the authors to explain more about these hazards and describe how scientific insights can be used by governments, communities and corporations involved in disaster risk reduction. What do you mean by “extreme atmospheric hazards”? Extreme atmospheric hazards are high impact weather events, typically judged by human or financial losses, caused by processes occurring in the Earth’s atmosphere. The atmospheric processes responsible for extreme events are themselves often influenced by some other large-scale component of the Earth’s atmosphere-ocean system, such as ocean-wide changes to sea-surface temperatures. Why is it important to understand regional extreme atmospheric events in the wider context of large scale atmosphere-ocean processes? In atmospheric science, the links that connect large scale changes in the atmosphere or ocean (such as widespread changes in temperature or humidity in an ocean basin) with localized hazards relating to regional weather conditions (such as extremes of rainfall or temperature) are collectively referred to as teleconnections. Most local extreme events may be related to temporal changes in the large scale dynamics of the climate system. Large scale changes are predicted by weather and climate models more skillfully than local extremes so understanding the link is vital to understanding impacts. There are many different kinds of teleconnection, typically named after the geographic location in which they are observed. Because any one teleconnection may influence weather conditions in multiple remote locations, understanding the interplay between regional extremes and teleconnections helps us to understand how different extreme hazards occurring in widely separate locations can have a common origin. In our review, we examined 16 different regional hazards and their interplay with eight different teleconnections. Connections between 10 key drivers of global weather and climate (acronyms around left of circle in bold) and 16 regional extreme weather events (right). Credit: Steptoe et al., 2018, Figure 3 Can you give a specific example of a regional atmospheric hazard and its connection to global teleconnections? In our review, we find that rainfall over China shares the most connections with global drivers. We summarized academic papers that have identified links to six teleconnections including large scale atmosphere-ocean processes in both Northern and Southern Hemispheres. The regional hazard with the strongest single linkage to a teleconnection are windstorms over Europe, and their connection to the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). The NAO describes a varying pattern in surface pressure across the North Atlantic. For European windstorms, the NAO pattern has a strong steering effect on winds high in the atmosphere, which in turn influences the path stormy weather takes as it approaches Europe. Which is the most significant process that influences multiple hazards across different regions at the same time. Our investigation finds that El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) influence 15 regional hazards. ENSO describes variations in sea-surface temperatures in the equatorial Pacific. In some cases, this connection is relatively well understood (for example, the way it influences rainfall over South Africa) and in other cases work is still being carried out to better understand the connection (such as its influence on Mexican rainfall). How does a scientific understanding of these teleconnections help to understand the risks and prepare for extreme events? Extreme events are the occasions that pose the greatest risk to communities and livelihoods. Hence, understanding the sorts of climatic situations where extremes events are more likely to happen represents one important facet of disaster risk management. By understanding the teleconnections and their associated hazards, it becomes possible to develop mitigation methods tailored to, and in advance of, potential risks. For example, the relationship between rainfall in South and Southeast Asia is driven by connections with the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) and ENSO. Understanding this complex relationship may offer a predictive insight into rainfall and potential hazards, such as flood or drought, for the coming season. This predictive insight in one aspect the scientific community can contribute to in order to enable advanced planning to mitigate against potential risks. How may these insights influence organizations to better plan for, and respond to, multi-hazard risks? Atmospheric science makes an important contribution to understanding hazard risk in areas such as California which is susceptible to wildfires. Credit: U.S. Forest Service International policies reflect the growing understanding of atmospheric hazards and their interconnectivity. Throughout the UN Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015 – 2030, multi-hazard resilience is a consistent theme, reflected in guidance towards “inclusive and risk-informed” decision making and in the context of managing disaster risk effectively. In practice, these insights have contributed to multi-hazard approaches being adopted in early warning systems across the globe. The Regional Integrated Multi-Hazard Early Warning System for Africa and Asia (RIMES) provides monitoring and data services to local tsunami centers and national meteorological services, as well partnering with research organizations on projects implementing early warning systems in-country, such as early flood warning in Bangladesh. For private sector groups, such as the insurance industry, knowledge of the relationship between teleconnections and hazards can be vitally important when underwriting exposure, as it may increase their risk of multi-hazard losses across different regions. —Hamish Steptoe, Met Office, UK; email: hamish.steptoe@metoffice.gov.uk; Sarah Jones, JBA Risk Management, UK; and Helen Fox, Office for National Statistics, UK

Beschreibung: Environmental remediation efforts in low- and middle-income countries have yet to be evaluated for their cost effectiveness. To address this gap we calculate a cost per Disability Adjusted Life Year (DALY) averted following the environmental remediation of the former lead smelter and adjoining residential areas in Paraiso de Dios, Haina, the Dominican Republic, executed from 2009 to 2010. The remediation had the effect of lowering surface soil lead concentrations to below 100 mg/kg and measured geometric mean blood lead levels (BLLs) from 20.6 μg/dL to 5.34 ug/dL. Because BLLs for the entire impacted population were not available, we use environmental data to calculate the resulting disease burden. We find that before the intervention 176 people were exposed to elevated environmental lead levels at Paraiso de Dios resulting in mean BLLs of 24.97 (95% CI: 24.45–25.5) in children (0–7 years old) and 13.98 μg/dL (95% CI: 13.03–15) in adults. We calculate that without the intervention these exposures would have resulted in 133 to 1,096 DALYs and that all of these were averted at a cost of USD 392 to 3,238, depending on assumptions made. We use a societal perspective, meaning that we include all costs regardless of by whom they were incurred and estimate costs in 2009 USD. Lead remediation in low- and middle-income countries is cost effective according to World Health Organization thresholds. Further research is required to compare the approach detailed here with other public health interventions.

Beschreibung: Rotavirus is the most common cause of diarrheal disease among children under 5. Especially in South Asia, rotavirus remains the leading cause of mortality in children due to diarrhea. As climatic extremes and safe water availability significantly influence diarrheal disease impacts in human populations, hydroclimatic information can be a potential tool for disease preparedness. In this study, we conducted a multivariate temporal and spatial assessment of 34 climate indices calculated from ground and satellite Earth observations to examine the role of temperature and rainfall extremes on the seasonality of rotavirus transmission in Bangladesh. We extracted rainfall data from the Global Precipitation Measurement and temperature data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer sensors to validate the analyses and explore the potential of a satellite-based seasonal forecasting model. Our analyses found that the number of rainy days and nighttime temperature range from 16°C to 21°C are particularly influential on the winter transmission cycle of rotavirus. The lower number of wet days with suitable cold temperatures for an extended time accelerates the onset and intensity of the outbreaks. Temporal analysis over Dhaka also suggested that water logging during monsoon precipitation influences rotavirus outbreaks during a summer transmission cycle. The proposed model shows lag components, which allowed us to forecast the disease outbreaks 1 to 2 months in advance. The satellite data-driven forecasts also effectively captured the increased vulnerability of dry-cold regions of the country, compared to the wet-warm regions.

Beschreibung: New dam construction is known to exacerbate malaria transmission in Africa as the vectors of malaria— Anopheles mosquitoes—use bodies of water as breeding sites. Precise environmental mechanisms of how reservoirs exacerbate malaria transmission are yet to be identified. Understanding of these mechanisms should lead to a better assessment of the impacts of dam construction and to new prevention strategies. Combining extensive multi-year field surveys around the Koka Reservoir in Ethiopia and rigorous model development and simulation studies, environmental mechanisms of malaria transmission around the reservoir were examined. Most comprehensive and detailed malaria transmission model, HYDREMATS, was applied to a village adjacent to the reservoir. Significant contributions to the dynamics of malaria transmission are shaped by wind profile, marginal pools, temperature, and shoreline locations. Wind speed and wind direction influence Anopheles populations and malaria transmission during the major and secondary mosquito seasons. During the secondary mosquito season, a noticeable influence was also attributed to marginal pools. Temperature was found to play an important role, not so much in Anopheles population dynamics, but in malaria transmission dynamics. Change in shoreline locations drives malaria transmission dynamics, with closer shoreline locations to the village making malaria transmission more likely. Identified environmental mechanisms help in predicting malaria transmission seasons and in developing village relocation strategies upon dam construction to minimize the risk of malaria.

Beschreibung: No abstract is available for this article.

Beschreibung: Valley fever is endemic to the southwestern United States. Humans contract this fungal disease by inhaling spores of Coccidioides spp. Changes in the environment can influence the abundance and dispersal of Coccidioides spp., causing fluctuations in valley fever incidence. We combined county-level case records from state health agencies to create a regional valley fever database for the southwestern United States, including Arizona, California, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah. We used this data set to explore how environmental factors influenced the spatial pattern and temporal dynamics of valley fever incidence during 2000–2015. We compiled climate and environmental geospatial data sets from multiple sources to compare with valley fever incidence. These variables included air temperature, precipitation, soil moisture, surface dust concentration, normalized difference vegetation index, and cropland area. We found that valley fever incidence was greater in areas with warmer air temperatures and drier soils. The mean annual cycle of incidence varied throughout the southwestern United States and peaked following periods of low precipitation and soil moisture. From year-to-year, however, autumn incidence was higher following cooler, wetter, and productive springs in the San Joaquin Valley of California. In southcentral Arizona, incidence increased significantly through time. By 2015, incidence in this region was more than double the rate in the San Joaquin Valley. Our analysis provides a framework for interpreting the influence of climate change on valley fever incidence dynamics. Our results may allow the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to improve their estimates of the spatial pattern and intensity of valley fever endemicity.

Beschreibung: Much concern has been raised about the increasing threat to air quality and human health due to ammonia (NH 3 ) emissions from agricultural systems, which is associated with the enrichment of reactive nitrogen (N) in southern Asia (SA), home of more than 60% the world's population (i.e., the people of West, central, East, South, and Southeast Asia). Southern Asia consumed more than half of the global synthetic N fertilizer and was the dominant region for livestock waste production since 2004. Excessive N application could lead to a rapid increase of NH 3 in the atmosphere, resulting in severe air and water pollution in this region. However, there is still a lack of accurate estimates of NH 3 emissions from agricultural systems. In this study, we simulated the agricultural NH 3 fluxes in SA by coupling the Bidirectional NH 3 exchange module (Bi-NH 3 ) from the Community Multi-scale Air Quality model with the Dynamic Land Ecosystem Model. Our results indicated that NH 3 emissions were 21.3 ± 3.9 Tg N yr −1 from SA agricultural systems with a rapidly increasing rate of ~0.3 Tg N yr −2 during 1961−2014. Among the emission sources, 10.8 Tg N yr −1 was released from synthetic N fertilizer use, and 10.4 ± 3.9 Tg N yr −1 was released from manure production in 2014. Ammonia emissions from China and India together accounted for 64% of the total amount in SA during 2000−2014. Our results imply that the increased NH 3 emissions associated with high N inputs to croplands would likely be a significant threat to the environment and human health unless mitigation efforts are applied to reduce these emissions.

Beschreibung: While there have been substantial efforts to quantify the health burden of exposure to PM 2.5 from solid fuel use (SFU), the sensitivity of mortality estimates to uncertainties in input parameters has not been quantified. Moreover, previous studies separate mortality from household and ambient air pollution. In this study, we develop a new estimate of mortality attributable to SFU due to the joint exposure from household and ambient PM 2.5 pollution and perform a variance-based sensitivity analysis on mortality attributable to SFU. In the joint exposure calculation, we estimate 2.81 (95% confidence interval: 2.48–3.28) million premature deaths in 2015 attributed to PM 2.5 from SFU, which is 580,000 (18%) fewer deaths than would be calculated by summing separate household and ambient mortality calculations. Regarding the sources of uncertainties in these estimates, in China, India, and Latin America, we find that 53–56% of the uncertainty in mortality attributable to SFU is due to uncertainty in the percent of the population using solid fuels and 42–50% from the concentration-response function. In sub-Saharan Africa, baseline mortality rate (72%) and the concentration-response function (33%) dominate the uncertainty space. Conversely, the sum of the variance contributed by ambient and household PM 2.5 exposure ranges between 15 and 38% across all regions (the percentages do not sum to 100% as some uncertainty is shared between parameters). Our findings suggest that future studies should focus on more precise quantification of solid fuel use and the concentration-response relationship to PM 2.5 , as well as mortality rates in Africa.

Beschreibung: New analyses are revealing the scale of pollution on global health, with a disproportionate share of the impact borne by lower-income nations, minority and marginalized individuals. Common themes emerge on the drivers of this pollution impact, including a lack of regulation and its enforcement, research and expertise development, and innovative funding mechanisms for mitigation. Creative approaches need to be developed and applied to address and overcome these obstacles. The existing “business as usual” modus operandi continues to externalize human health costs related to pollution, which exerts a negative influence on global environmental health.

Beschreibung: Dengue is the most important human arboviral disease in Singapore. We classified residential areas into low-rise and high-rise housing and investigated the influence of urban drainage on the distribution of dengue incidence and outdoor breeding at neighborhood and country scales. In Geylang area (August 2014 to August 2015), dengue incidence was higher in a subarea of low-rise housing compared to high-rise one, averaging 26.7 (standard error, SE = 4.83) versus 2.43 (SE = 0.67) per 1,000 people. Outdoor breeding drains of Aedes aegypti have clustered in the low-rise housing subarea. The pupal density per population was higher in the low-rise blocks versus high-rise ones, 246 (SE = 69.08) and 35.4 (SE = 25.49) per 1,000 people, respectively. The density of urban drainage network in the low-rise blocks is double that in the high-rise ones, averaging 0.05 (SE = 0.0032) versus 0.025 (SE = 0.00245) per meter. Further, a holistic analysis at a country-scale has confirmed the role of urban hydrology in shaping dengue distribution in Singapore. Dengue incidence (2013–2015) is proportional to the fractions of the area (or population) of low-rise housing. The drainage density in low-rise housing is 4 times that corresponding estimate in high-rise areas, 2.59 and 0.68 per meter, respectively. Public housing in agglomerations of high-rise buildings could have a positive impact on dengue if this urban planning comes at the expense of low-rise housing. City planners in endemic regions should consider the density of drainage networks for both the prevention of flooding and the breeding of mosquitoes.

Beschreibung: Communities in Australia's Murray-Darling Basin face the challenge of trying to achieve social, economic and environmental sustainability; but experience entrenched conflict about the best way to achieve a sustainable future, especially for small rural communities. Integral ecology is a philosophical concept that seeks to address community, economic, social and environmental sustainability simultaneously. Its inclusive processes are designed to reduce stakeholder conflict. However, to date the application of the integral ecology concept has been largely qualitative in nature. This study developed a quantitative integral ecology framework, and applied this framework to a case study of the Riverina, in the Murray-Darling Basin. Seventy-seven community-focused initiatives were assessed, ranked and quantified. The majority of the community-focused ranked initiatives did not exhibit all aspects of integral ecology. Initiatives typically prioritized either i) economic and community development or ii) environmental health; rarely both together. The integral ecology framework developed here enables recommendations on future community initiatives and may provide a pathway for community leaders and other policy-makers to more readily apply integral ecology objectives. Further research refining the framework's operationalization, application and implementation to a wider-scale may enhance communities’ capacity to develop and grow sustainably.

Beschreibung: The 2015 Paris Agreement aims to limit global warming to well below 2 K above pre-industrial levels, and to pursue efforts to limit global warming to 1.5 K, in order to avert dangerous climate change. However, current greenhouse gas emissions targets are more compatible with scenarios exhibiting end-of-century global warming of 2.6 - 3.1 K, in clear contradiction to the 1.5 K target. In this study, we use a global climate model to investigate the climatic impacts of using solar geoengineering by stratospheric aerosol injection to stabilize global-mean temperature at 1.5 K for the duration of the 21 st century against 3 scenarios spanning the range of plausible greenhouse gas mitigation pathways (RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP8.5). In addition to stabilizing global mean temperature and offsetting both Arctic sea-ice loss and thermosteric sea-level rise, we find that solar geoengineering could effectively counteract enhancements to the frequency of extreme storms in the North Atlantic and heatwaves in Europe, but would be less effective at counteracting hydrological changes in the Amazon basin and North Atlantic storm track displacement. In summary, solar geoengineering may reduce global mean impacts but is an imperfect solution at the regional level, where the effects of climate change are experienced. Our results should galvanize research into the regionality of climate responses to solar geoengineering.

Beschreibung: Even if global warming is kept below +2°C, European agriculture will be significantly impacted. Soil degradation may amplify these impacts substantially and thus hamper crop production further. We quantify biophysical consequences and bracket uncertainty of +2°C warming on calories supply from ten major crops and vulnerability to soil degradation in Europe using crop modelling. The Environmental Policy Integrated Climate (EPIC) model together with regional climate projections from the European branch of the Coordinated Regional Downscaling Experiment (EURO-CORDEX) were used for this purpose. A robustly positive calorie yield change was estimated for the EU Member States except for some regions in Southern and South-Eastern Europe. The mean impacts range from +30 Gcal ha –1 in the north, through +25 and +20 Gcal ha –1 in Western and Eastern Europe, respectively, to +10 Gcal ha –1 in the south if soil degradation and heat impacts are not accounted for. Elevated CO 2 and increased temperature are the dominant drivers of the simulated yield changes in high-input agricultural systems. The growth stimulus due to elevated CO 2 may offset potentially negative yield impacts of temperature increase by +2°C in most of Europe. Soil degradation causes a calorie vulnerability ranging from 0 to 80 Gcal ha –1 due to insufficient compensation for nutrient depletion and this might undermine climate benefits in many regions, if not prevented by adaptation measures, especially in Eastern and North-Eastern Europe. Uncertainties due to future potentials for crop intensification are about two to fifty times higher than climate change impacts.

Beschreibung: Systemic threats to food-energy-environment-water systems require national policy responses. Yet complete control of these complex systems is impossible and attempts to mitigate systemic risks can generate unexpected feedback effects. Perverse outcomes from national policy can emerge from the diverse responses of decision-makers across different levels and scales of resource governance. Participatory risk assessment processes can help planners to understand sub-national dynamics and ensure that policies do not undermine the resilience of social-ecological systems and infrastructure networks. Researchers can play an important role in participatory processes as both technical specialists and brokers of stakeholder knowledge on the feedbacks generated by systemic risks and policy decisions. Here, we evaluate the use of causal modeling and participatory risk assessment to develop national policy on systemic water risks. We present an application of the Risks and Options Assessment for Decision-Making (ROAD) process to a district of Vietnam where national agricultural water reforms are being piloted. The methods and results of this project provide general insights about how to support resilient decision-making, including the transfer of knowledge across administrative levels, identification of feedback effects, and the effective implementation of risk assessment processes.

Beschreibung: As global average sea-level rises in the early part of this century there is great interest in how much global and local sea level will change in the forthcoming decades. The Paris Climate Agreement's proposed temperature thresholds of 1.5 °C and 2 °C have directed the research community to ask what differences occur in the climate system for these two states. We have developed a novel approach to combine climate model outputs that follow specific temperature pathways to make probabilistic projections of sea-level in a 1.5 °C and 2 °C world. We find median global sea-level projections for 1.5 °C and 2 °C temperature pathways of 44 cm and 50 cm respectively. The 90% uncertainty ranges (5-95%) are both around 48 cm by 2100. In addition, we take an alternative approach to estimate the contribution from ice sheets by using a semi-empirical global sea-level model. Here we find median projections of 58 cm and 68 cm for 1.5 °C and 2 °C temperature pathways. The 90% uncertainty ranges are 67 cm and 82 cm respectively. Regional projections show similar patterns for both temperature pathways, though differences vary between the median projections (2-10 cm) and 95 th percentile (5-20 cm) for the bulk of oceans using process-based approach and 10-15 cm (median) and 15-25 cm (95th percentile) using the semi-empirical approach.

Beschreibung: To contribute to a quantitative comparison of climate engineering (CE) methods, we assess atmosphere-, ocean-, and land-based CE measures with respect to Earth system effects consistently within one comprehensive model. We use the Max Planck Institute Earth System Model (MPI-ESM) with prognostic carbon cycle to compare solar radiation management (SRM) by stratospheric sulfur injection and two carbon dioxide removal methods: afforestation and ocean alkalinization. The CE model experiments are designed to offset the effect of fossil-fuel burning on global mean surface air temperature under the RCP8.5 scenario to follow or get closer to the RCP4.5 scenario. Our results show the importance of feedbacks in the CE effects. For example, as a response to SRM the land carbon uptake is enhanced by 92 Gt by the year 2100 compared to the reference RCP8.5 scenario due to reduced soil respiration thus reducing atmospheric CO 2 . Furthermore, we show that normalizations allow for a better comparability of different CE methods. For example, we find that due to compensating processes such as biogeophysical effects of afforestation more carbon needs to be removed from the atmosphere by afforestation than by alkalinization to reach the same global warming reduction. Overall, we illustrate how different CE methods affect the components of the Earth system, we identify challenges arising in a CE comparison, and thereby contribute to developing a framework for a comparative assessment of CE.

Beschreibung: Anthropogenic land use and land cover change, including local environmental disturbances, moderate rates of wind-driven soil erosion and dust emission. These human-dust cycle interactions impact ecosystems and agricultural production, air quality, human health, biogeochemical cycles, and climate. While the impacts of land use activities and land management on aeolian processes can be profound, the interactions are often complex and assessments of anthropogenic dust loads at all scales remain highly uncertain. Here, we critically review the drivers of anthropogenic dust emission and current evaluation approaches. We then identify and describe opportunities to: (1) develop new conceptual frameworks and interdisciplinary approaches that draw on ecological state-and-transition models to improve the accuracy and relevance of assessments of anthropogenic dust emissions; (2) improve model fidelity and capacity for change detection to quantify anthropogenic impacts on aeolian processes; and (3) enhance field research and monitoring networks to support dust model applications to evaluate the impacts of disturbance processes on local to global-scale wind erosion and dust emissions.

Beschreibung: Methane accounts for 20% of the global warming caused by greenhouse gases, and wastewater is a major anthropogenic source of methane. Based on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) greenhouse gas inventory guidelines and current research findings, we calculated the amount of methane emissions from 2000 to 2014 that originated from wastewater from different provinces in China. Methane emissions from wastewater increased from 1349.01 Gg to 3430.03 Gg from 2000 to 2014, and the mean annual increase was 167.69 Gg. The methane emissions from industrial wastewater treated by wastewater treatment plants (E It ) accounted for the highest proportion of emissions. We also estimated the future trend of industrial wastewater methane emissions using the artificial neural network model. A comparison of the emissions for the years 2020, 2010 and 2000 showed an increasing trend in methane emissions in China and a spatial transition of industrial wastewater emissions from eastern and southern regions to central and southwestern regions and from coastal regions to inland regions. These changes were caused by changes in economics, demographics and relevant policies.

Beschreibung: Risk-based water resources management is based on the premise that water managers should invest up to the point where the marginal benefit of risk reduction equals the marginal cost of achieving that benefit. However, this cost-benefit approach may not guarantee robustness under uncertain future conditions, for instance under climatic changes. In this paper, we expand risk-based decision analysis to explore possible ways of enhancing robustness in engineered water resources systems under different risk attitudes. Risk is measured as the expected annual cost of water use restrictions, whilst robustness is interpreted in the decision-theoretic sense as the ability of a water resource system to maintain performance—expressed as a tolerable risk of water use restrictions—under a wide range of possible future conditions. Linking risk attitudes with robustness allows stakeholders to explicitly trade-off incremental increases in robustness with investment costs for a given level of risk. We illustrate the framework through a case study of London’s water supply system using state of the art regional climate simulations to inform the estimation of risk and robustness.

Beschreibung: Particulate matter with the diameter smaller than 2.5 micrometers (PM2.5) poses health threats to human population. Regardless of efforts to regulate the pollution sources, it is unclear how climate change caused by greenhouse gases (GHGs) would affect PM2.5 levels. Using century-long ensemble simulations with Community Earth System Model 1 (CESM1), we show that, if the anthropogenic emissions would remain at the level in the year 2005, the global surface concentration and atmospheric column burden of sulfate, black carbon, and primary organic carbon would still increase by 5-10% at the end of 21st century (2090-2100) due to global warming alone. The decrease in the wet removal flux of PM2.5, despite an increase in global precipitation, is the primary cause of the increase in the PM2.5 column burden. Regionally over North America and East Asia, a shift of future precipitation toward more frequent heavy events contributes to weakened wet removal fluxes. Our results suggest climate change impact needs to be accounted for to define the future emission standards necessary to meet air quality standard.

Beschreibung: In light of the Paris Agreement, it is essential to identify regional impacts of half a degree additional global warming to inform climate adaptation and mitigation strategies. We investigate the effects of 1.5 ° C and 2.0 ° C global warming above pre-industrial conditions, relative to present day (2006–2015), over the Asian-Australian monsoon region (AAMR) using five models from the Half a degree Additional warming, Prognosis and Projected Impacts (HAPPI) project. There is considerable inter-model variability in projected changes to mean climate and extreme events in 2.0 ° C and 1.5 ° C scenarios. There is high confidence in projected increases to mean and extreme surface temperatures over AAMR, as well as more-frequent persistent daily temperature extremes over East Asia, Australia and northern India with an additional 0.5 ° C warming, which are likely to occur. Mean and extreme monsoon precipitation amplify over AAMR, except over Australia at 1.5 ° C where there is uncertainty in the sign of the change. Persistent daily extreme precipitation events are likely to become more frequent over parts of East Asia and India with an additional 0.5 ° C warming. There is lower confidence in projections of precipitation change than in projections of surface temperature change. These results highlight the benefits of limiting the global-mean temperature change to 1.5 ° C above pre-industrial, as the severity of the above effects increases with an extra 0.5 ° C warming.

Beschreibung: The most common approaches to detection and attribution of extreme weather events using FAR or RR (Fraction of Attributable Risk or Risk Ratio) answer a particular form of research question, namely, “What is the probability of a certain class of weather events, given global climate change, relative to a world without?” In a set of recent papers, Kevin Trenberth et al. (2015) and Theodore Shepherd (2016) have argued that this is not always the best tool for analyzing causes, or for communicating with the public about climate events and extremes. Instead, they promote the idea of a “storyline” approach, which ask complementary questions, such as “How much did climate change affect the severity of a given storm?” From the vantage of history and philosophy of science, a proposal to introduce a new approach or to answer different research questions—especially those of public interest—does not appear particularly controversial. However, the proposal proved highly controversial, with the majority of detection and attribution scientists reacting in a very negative and even personal manner. Some suggested the proposed alternatives amount to a weakening of standards, or an abandonment of scientific method. Here, we address the question: Why is this such a controversial proposition? We argue that there is no “right” or “wrong” approach to D&A in any absolute sense, but rather that in different contexts society may have a greater or lesser concern with errors of a particular type. How we view the relative risk of over-estimation vs. under-estimation of harm is context-dependent. [250]

Beschreibung: The impacts of land use have been shown to have considerable influence on regional climate. With the recent international commitment to limit global warming to well below 2°C, emission reductions need to be ambitious and could involve major land-use change (LUC). Land-based mitigation efforts to curb emissions growth include increasing terrestrial carbon sequestration through reforestation, or the adoption of bioenergy crops. These activities influence local climate through biogeophysical feedbacks however it is uncertain how important they are for a 1.5 degree climate target. This was the motivation for HAPPI-Land: the Half a degree Additional warming, Prognosis and Projected Impacts – Land use scenario experiment. Using four Earth System Models we present the first multi-model results from HAPPI-Land and demonstrate the critical role of land use for understanding characteristics of regional climate extremes in low-emission scenarios. In particular, our results show that changes in temperature extremes due to LUC are comparable in magnitude to changes arising from half a degree of global warming. We also demonstrate that LUC contributes to more than 20% of the change in temperature extremes for large land areas concentrated over the Northern Hemisphere. However, we also identify sources of uncertainty that influence the multi-model consensus of our results including how LUC is implemented and the corresponding biogeophysical feedbacks that perturb climate. Therefore our results highlight the urgent need to resolve the challenges in implementing LUC across models to quantify the impacts and consider how LUC contributes to regional changes in extremes associated with sustainable development pathways.

Beschreibung: Worldwide, humans are facing high risks from natural hazards, especially in coastal regions with high population densities. Rising sea levels due to global warming are making coastal communities’ infrastructure vulnerable to natural disasters. The present study aims to provide a coupling approach of vulnerability and resilience through restoration and conservation of lost or degraded coastal natural habitats to reclamation under different climate change scenarios. The Integrated Valuation of Ecosystems and Tradeoffs (InVEST) model is used to assess the current and future vulnerability of coastal communities. The model employed is based on seven different bio-geophysical variables to calculate a Natural Hazard Index (NHI) and to highlight the criticality of the restoration of natural habitats. The results show that roughly 25 percent of the coastline and more than 5 million residents are in highly vulnerable coastal areas in China, and these numbers are expected to double by 2100. Our study suggests that restoration and conservation in recently reclaimed areas have the potential to reduce this vulnerability by 45 percent. Hence, natural habitats have proved to be a great defense against coastal hazards and should be prioritized in coastal planning and development. The findings confirm that natural habitats are critical for coastal resilience and can act as a recovery force of coastal functionality loss. Therefore, we recommend that the Chinese government prioritize restoration where possible and conservation of the remaining habitats for the sake of coastal resilience to prevent natural hazards from escalating into disasters.

Beschreibung: During the last few decades, the global agricultural production has risen and technology enhancement is still contributing to yield growth. However, population growth, water crisis, deforestation and climate change threaten the global food security. An understanding of the variables that caused past changes in crop yields can help improve future crop prediction models. In this paper, we present a comprehensive global analysis of the changes in the crop yields and how they relate to different large-scale and regional climate variables, climate change variables and technology in a unified framework. A new multilevel model for yield prediction at the country level is developed and demonstrated. The structural relationships between average yield and climate attributes as well as trends are estimated simultaneously. All countries are modeled in a single multilevel model with partial pooling to automatically group and reduce estimation uncertainties. El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI), geopotential height anomalies (GPH), historical carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration and country-based time series of GDP per capita as an approximation of technology measurement are used as predictors to estimate annual agricultural crop yields for each country from 1961 to 2013. Results indicate that these variables can explain the variability in historical crop yields for most of the countries and the model performs well under out-of-sample verifications. While some countries were not generally affected by climatic factors, PDSI and GPH acted both positively and negatively in different regions for crop yields in many countries.

Beschreibung: Bioenergy Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) has been proposed to reduce atmospheric CO 2 concentrations, but concerns remain about competition for arable land and freshwater. The synergistic integration of algae production, which does not require arable land or freshwater, with BECCS (called “ABECCS”) can reduce CO 2 emissions without competing with agriculture. This study presents a techno-economic and life-cycle assessment for co-locating a 121-ha algae facility with a 2,680-ha eucalyptus forest for BECCS. The eucalyptus biomass fuels combined heat and power generation (CHP) with subsequent amine based carbon capture and storage (CCS). A portion of the captured CO 2 is used for growing algae and the remainder is sequestered. Biomass combustion supplies CO 2 , heat, and electricity, thus increasing the range of sites suitable for algae cultivation. Economic, energetic, and environmental impacts are considered. The system yields as much protein as soybeans while generating 61.5 TJ of electricity and sequestering 29,600 t of CO 2 per year. More energy is generated than consumed and the freshwater footprint is roughly equal to that for soybeans. Financial break-even is achieved for product value combinations ranging from 1) algal biomass sold for $1,780/t without a carbon credit to 2) algal biomass sold for $100/t with a carbon credit of $396/t. Sensitivity analysis shows significant reductions to the cost of carbon sequestration are possible. The ABECCS system represents a unique technology for negative emissions without reducing protein production or increasing water demand, and should therefore be included in the suite of technologies being considered to address global sustainability.

Beschreibung: Extreme events are of interest worldwide given their potential for substantial impacts on social, ecological, and technical systems. Many climate-related extreme events are increasing in frequency and/or magnitude due to anthropogenic climate change, and there is increased potential for impacts due to the location of urbanization and the expansion of urban centers and infrastructures. Many disciplines are engaged in research and management of these events. However, a lack of coherence exists in what constitutes and defines an extreme event across these fields, which impedes our ability to holistically understand and manage these events. Here, we review 10 years of academic literature and use text analysis to elucidate how six major disciplines--climatology, earth sciences, ecology, engineering, hydrology, and social sciences--define and communicate extreme events. Our results highlight critical disciplinary differences in the language used to communicate extreme events. Additionally, we found a wide range in definitions and thresholds, with more than half of examined papers not providing an explicit definition, and disagreement over whether impacts are included in the definition. We urge distinction between extreme events and their impacts, so that we can better assess when responses to extreme events have actually enhanced resilience. Additionally, we suggest that all researchers and managers of extreme events be more explicit in their definition of such events as well as be more cognizant of how they are communicating extreme events. We believe clearer and more consistent definitions and communication can support transdisciplinary understanding and management of extreme events.

Beschreibung: To maintain the chance of keeping the average global temperature increase below 2°C and to limit long-term climate change, removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere (Carbon Dioxide Removal, CDR) is becoming increasingly necessary. We analyze optimal and cost-effective climate policies in the Dynamic Integrated Assessment Model of Climate and the Economy (DICE2016R) and investigate i) the utilization of (ocean) CDR under different climate objectives, ii) the sensitivity of policies with respect to carbon cycle feedbacks, and iii) how well carbon cycle feedbacks are captured in the carbon-cycle models used in state-of-the-art integrated assessment models. Overall, the carbon cycle model in DICE2016R shows clear improvements compared to its predecessor, DICE2013R, capturing much better long-term dynamics and also oceanic carbon outgassing due to excess oceanic storage of carbon from CDR. However, this comes at the cost of a (too) tight short-term remaining emission budget, limiting the model suitability to analyze low emission scenarios accurately. With DICE2016R, the compliance with the 2°C goal is no longer feasible without negative emissions via CDR. Overall, the optimal amount of CDR has to take into account i) the emission substitution effect and ii) compensation for carbon cycle feedbacks.

Beschreibung: The 2015/2016 El Niño has been classified as one of the three most severe on record. El Niño teleconnections are commonly associated with droughts in southern Africa and high precipitation in eastern Africa. Despite their relatively frequent occurrence, evidence for their hydrological effects and impacts beyond agriculture is limited. We examine the hydrological response and impact pathways of the 2015/2016 El Niño in eastern and southern Africa, focusing on Botswana, Kenya, and Zambia. We use in situ and remotely sensed time series of precipitation, river flow, and lake levels complemented by qualitative insights from interviews with key organizations in each country about awareness, impacts, and responses. Our results show that drought conditions prevailed in large parts of southern Africa, reducing runoff and contributing to unusually low lake levels in Botswana and Zambia. Key informants characterized this El Niño through record high temperatures and water supply disruption in Botswana and through hydroelectric load shedding in Zambia. Warnings of flood risk in Kenya were pronounced, but the El Niño teleconnection did not materialize as expected in 2015/2016. Extreme precipitation was limited and caused localized impacts. The hydrological impacts in southern Africa were severe and complex, strongly exacerbated by dry antecedent conditions, recent changes in exposure and sensitivity and management decisions. Improved understanding of hydrological responses and the complexity of differing impact pathways can support design of more adaptive, region-specific management strategies.

Beschreibung: Though urban agriculture (UA), defined here as growing of crops in cities, is increasing in popularity and importance globally, little is known about the aggregate benefits of such natural capital in built-up areas. Here, we introduce a quantitative framework to assess global aggregate ecosystem services from existing vegetation in cities and an intensive UA adoption scenario based on data-driven estimates of urban morphology and vacant land. We analyzed global population, urban, meteorological, terrain, and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) datasets in Google Earth Engine to derive global scale estimates, aggregated by country, of services provided by UA. We estimate the value of four ecosystem services provided by existing vegetation in urban areas to be on the order of $33 billion annually. We project potential annual food production of 100–180 million tonnes, energy savings ranging from 14 to 15 billion kilowatt hours, nitrogen sequestration between 100,000 and 170,000 tonnes, and avoided storm water runoff between 45 and 57 billion cubic meters annually. In addition, we estimate that food production, nitrogen fixation, energy savings, pollination, climate regulation, soil formation and biological control of pests could be worth as much as $80–160 billion annually in a scenario of intense UA implementation. Our results demonstrate significant country-to-country variability in UA-derived ecosystem services and reduction of food insecurity. These estimates represent the first effort to consistently quantify these incentives globally, and highlight the relative spatial importance of built environments to act as change agents that alleviate mounting concerns associated with global environmental change and unsustainable development.

Beschreibung: The Paris Agreement of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change aims not only at avoiding +2°C warming (and even limit the temperature increase further to +1.5 o C), but also sets long-term goals to guide mitigation. Therefore, the best available science is required to inform policy makers on the importance of and the adaptation needs in a +1.5 o C warmer world. Seven research institutes from Europe and Turkey integrated their competencies to provide a cross-sectoral assessment of the potential impacts at a pan-European scale. The initial findings of this initiative are presented and key messages communicated. The approach is to select periods based on global warming thresholds rather than the more typical approach of selecting time periods (e.g. end of century). The results indicate that the world is likely to pass the +1.5 o C threshold in the coming decades. Cross-sectoral dimensions are taken into account to show the impacts of global warming that occur in parallel in more than one sector. Also, impacts differ across sectors and regions. Alongside the negative impacts for certain sectors and regions, some positive impacts are projected. Summer tourism in parts of Western Europe may be favoured by climate change; energy demand decreases outweigh increases over most of Europe and catchment yields in hydropower regions will increase. However, such positive findings should be interpreted carefully as we do not take into account exogenous factors that can and will influence Europe such as migration patterns, food production and economic and political instability.

Beschreibung: Governments around the world have agreed to end hunger and food insecurity and to improve global nutrition, largely through changes to agriculture and food systems. However, they are faced with a lot of uncertainty when making policy decisions, since any agricultural changes will influence social and biophysical systems, which could yield either positive or negative nutrition outcomes. We outline a holistic probability modeling approach with Bayesian Network (BN) models for nutritional impacts resulting from agricultural development policy. The approach includes the elicitation of expert knowledge for impact model development, including sensitivity analysis and value of information calculations. It aims at a generalizable methodology that can be applied in a wide range of contexts. To showcase this approach, we develop an impact model of Vision 2040, Uganda's development strategy, which, among other objectives, seeks to transform the country's agricultural landscape from traditional systems to large-scale commercial agriculture. Model results suggest that Vision 2040 is likely to have negative outcomes for the rural livelihoods it intends to support; it may have no appreciable influence on household hunger but, by influencing preferences for and access to quality nutritional foods, may increase the prevalence of micronutrient deficiency. The results highlight the tradeoffs that must be negotiated when making decisions regarding agriculture for nutrition, and the capacity of BNs to make these tradeoffs explicit. The work illustrates the value of BNs for supporting evidence-based agricultural development decisions.