Auto industry races to make ventilators during virus crisis

GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File / STEPHANIE KEITHMechanical ventilators needed to treat those suffering from respiratory distress due to COVID-19 are in short supply

The automotive industry is offering its expertise and manpower to the hospital sector as it gears up to build mechanical ventilators during the coronavirus pandemic, an initiative that is being met with some scepticism.

American auto manufacturers General Motors and Ford, French car companies PSA and Renault, Germany's Volkswagen group and Formula 1 engineers have joined the ranks in response to a massive global shortage of the vital piece of medical equipment.

As hospitals around the world face a surge of patients with breathing difficulties from COVID-19, the scarcity of ventilators has forced doctors to make life-or-death decisions.

Repurposing car factories for emergency production has drawn comparisons to World War II, when they were used to build tanks and fighter planes.

But some experts say that in this situation, building critical care ventilators will require different techniques and procedures from what a car factory normally sees.

US President Donald Trump used wartime economy analogies to justify his appeal to the automobile industry as the country grapples with a mounting number of coronavirus cases. He ultimately used a 1950s law concerning defence production to force one of GM's plants to make ventilators.

In France, meanwhile, a consortium of industrial companies has been created -- including PSA and automotive equipment supplier Valeo -- to manufacture "10,000 ventilators by mid-May", President Emmanuel Macron announced Tuesday.

SEAT/AFP/File / HandoutA mechanical ventilator being developed by Spanish automobile manufacturer SEAT at the company's Martorell factory using a windscreen wiper motor

In Spain, Volkswagen's Seat brand has switched to producing ventilators at its Martorell plant near Barcelona.

The proposed model, which uses the adapted motor of a windscreen wiper, is already undergoing testing with the hopes of gaining formal approval from health authorities, Seat said in a statement.

For its part, Mercedes has asked its Formula 1 team, which was idle due to postponed or cancelled Grand Prix races, to get to work.

The six-time world champion team built a less-invasive respiratory device in order to reserve ventilators -- which require breathing tubes and sedation -- for the most severely affected patients.

The team says it could manufacture some 1,000 units a day with the help of six other UK-based F1 teams which have committed to help build the devices.

A version of the device -- which increases air and oxygen flow into the lungs and is often used to treat sleep apnea -- has already been used in hospitals in Italy and China to help COVID-19 patients.

The "Project Pitlane" mission takes advantage of "the core skills of the F1 industry: rapid design, prototype manufacture, test and skilled assembly," Formula 1 said in a statement.

- Dependent on suppliers -

Some look sceptically on the car industry's entry into the world of medical equipment, however.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a non-profit organisation founded after the creation of the atomic bomb and which is known for its symbolic "Doomsday Clock", said in a recent article that car manufacturers are not best placed for assembling medical equipment.

"Ventilators might resemble the pumps and air conditioners used in automobiles, but few automakers build their own -- they buy them from specialised producers," the group pointed out.

University College London (UCL)/AFP/File / James TyeMechanical engineers, doctors and the Mercedes Formula 1 team in conjunction with University College London have adapted a device used to help people who have trouble breathing while sleeping to help COVID-19 patients

While carmakers have under-utilised production capacity at the moment, they are still dependent on suppliers who are often overseas, at a moment when supply chains have nearly ground to a halt, it said in its report.

"Facile images of Ford assembly lines building World War II bombers can only get us so far in solving the ventilator problems of today," the group said.

But car manufacturers say they are up to the task.

Renault has put its "technocentre" outside of Paris, its largest research and development centre in France, to work on developing a prototype using state-of-the-art equipment such as 3D printers

In the world race to get ahead of the coronavirus, time is of the essence.

For Formula 1 and University College London engineers, "it took fewer than 100 hours from the initial meeting to production of the first device," the team said.

This may be a typical lead time in motor racing, but not necessarily in other industries

A LIGHT PAINTING TRIBUTE FOR HEALTH WORKERS VIDEO

The gun in the toilet
Mohamad Ali Harissi  AFP Wednesday 1 April 2020

Baghdad -- When the coronavirus started spreading in neighboring Iran in February, Iraqis immediately turned to sarcasm. One comment stood out: what could it possibly do to us? We have seen it all.

It was my first time back in Baghdad since being posted there in 2014. The city was so different. Yet it hadn’t changed at all.

Aerial view of Baghdad, February 2020. (AFP / Mohamad Ali Harissi)

Despite the relatively stable security situation, casually interrupted by protest clashes and rockets targeting bases hosting US soldiers, the one feeling that was still common amongst its citizens was frustration.

I had been posted to Baghdad between 2011 and 2014, when the city was ruled by car bombs and was besieged by death.

Morgues were visited on a daily basis, where Iraqi families would struggle to identify their loved ones randomly killed in ice cream shops, restaurants, schools, theaters... Everyone had lost someone.
 

Baghdad, February 2020. (AFP/ Mohamad Ali Harissi)

In June 2014, weeks before I left the city, the Islamic State group took over Mosul, driving the country into an even darker tunnel. But defeating IS four years later opened a window of hope.

When I returned this February on an assignment, Baghdad looked as if it was finally catching a breath after a marathon of turbulences that lasted for four decades, since Saddam Hussein came to power.

Baghdad, February 2020. (AFP / Mohamad Ali Harissi)

Just before the novel coronavirus started forcing people to stay at home, fancy cars were roaming the Tigris corniche at night, mesmerizing old houses were being renovated, families peacefully sharing meals at newly opened restaurants, and couples holding hands while walking the streets of the vibrant al-Mansour area on Valentine’s Day.

Many social taboos have been broken over a short period of time. 32-year-old Ahmad told me that the relative calm made people realize that there is more to life than fighting death everyday. “Dignity”, he said.

In an oil rich country where 65% of the population is under 25, young men and women were aspiring to enjoy the same lifestyle of neighboring countries. “I want a country” became the slogan of the protests that broke out in October.

Normality, a cafe in Baghdad, February, 2020. (AFP / Mohamad Ali Harissi)

But corruption remains one of the main challenges. It became so rooted after the US-led 2003 invasion that nothing could be achieved without a bribe. Even ministries were won by the highest bidder.

Sectarianism, lack of basic services, militias controlling businesses, absence of medical care that forced families to travel abroad for treatment, all pushed Iraqis to the edge of depression and desperation.

Many Baghdad residents wanted to leave in 2014, and many still want to escape the endless frustration, deepened recently by the deaths caused by the coronavirus that by end of March had claimed more than 40 victims in their country and more than 2,600 in neighboring Iran.

Protesting in Baghdad, February 2020. (AFP / Mohamad Ali Harissi)

In the historical al-Mutanabi street in central Baghdad, Ali, born in the 1940s, made his living out of colorful suits, flowery ties, and a young photo of himself attached to a motorcycle decorated with plastic flowers.

Standing in the shadow of a statue for the famous Arab poet l-Mutanabi, Ali told me that Baghdad was, and should be again, just like him. “Clean and cheerful”, he said.

Getting better with age -- Ali is "clean and cheerful." Baghdad, 

February, 2020. (AFP / Mohamad Ali Harissi)

But the city looked years away from that.

On my first night back in February, I went out to have dinner in a charming restaurant.

A man was impatiently waiting for his date, couples and friends loudly chatting and laughing, and a family had gathered around a table celebrating with a yellow cake what looked like the birthday of their little son.

I felt a comfort that I had never experienced when I was based there.

But the moment lasted only until I went to the toilet.

Over a metal garbage can, in the corner of the small space, against the background of the sky blue/pink roses wallpaper, someone had left his black gun.

It was a simple reminder that I was still in the same Baghdad I left six years ago.

The gun in the toilet. Restroom in a Baghdad restaurant, 

February, 2020. (AFP / Mohamad Ali Harissi)


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Mohamad Ali Harissi

Smartphone videos produce highly realistic 3-D face reconstructions

by Byron Spice, Carnegie Mellon University

In a 3-D face reconstruction process developed at Carnegie Mellon University, smartphone video of a person, left, is analyzed to produce an imperfect model of the face, middle. Deep learning is then combined with conventional computer vision techniques to complete the reconstruction, right. Credit: Carnegie Mellon University

Normally, it takes pricey equipment and expertise to create an accurate 3-D reconstruction of someone's face that's realistic and doesn't look creepy. Now, Carnegie Mellon University researchers have pulled off the feat using video recorded on an ordinary smartphone.

Using a smartphone to shoot a continuous video of the front and sides of the face generates a dense cloud of data. A two-step process developed by CMU's Robotics Institute uses that data, with some help from deep learning algorithms, to build a digital reconstruction of the face. The team's experiments show that their method can achieve sub-millimeter accuracy, outperforming other camera-based processes.

A digital face might be used to build an avatar for gaming or for virtual or augmented reality, and could also be used in animation, biometric identification and even medical procedures. An accurate 3-D rendering of the face might also be useful in building customized surgical masks or respirators.

"Building a 3-D reconstruction of the face has been an open problem in computer vision and graphics because people are very sensitive to the look of facial features," said Simon Lucey, an associate research professor in the Robotics Institute. "Even slight anomalies in the reconstructions can make the end result look unrealistic."

Laser scanners, structured light and multicamera studio setups can produce highly accurate scans of the face, but these specialized sensors are prohibitively expensive for most applications. CMU's newly developed method, however, requires only a smartphone.

The method, which Lucey developed with master's students Shubham Agrawal and Anuj Pahuja, was presented in early March at the IEEE Winter Conference on Applications of Computer Vision (WACV) in Snowmass, Colorado. It begins with shooting 15-20 seconds of video. In this case, the researchers used an iPhone X in the slow-motion setting.

VIDEO Normally, it takes pricey equipment and expertise to create an accurate 3D reconstruction of someone's face. Now, Carnegie Mellon University researchers have pulled off the feat using video recorded on an ordinary smartphone. A two-step process developed by CMU's Robotics Institute harvests data from the video, with some help from deep learning algorithms, to build a digital reconstruction of the face. Credit: Carnegie Mellon University

"The high frame rate of slow motion is one of the key things for our method because it generates a dense point cloud," Lucey said.

The researchers then employ a commonly used technique called visual simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM). Visual SLAM triangulates points on a surface to calculate its shape, while at the same time using that information to determine the position of the camera. This creates an initial geometry of the face, but missing data leave gaps in the model.

In the second step of this process, the researchers work to fill in those gaps, first by using deep learning algorithms. Deep learning is used in a limited way, however: it identifies the person's profile and landmarks such as ears, eyes and nose. Classical computer vision techniques are then used to fill in the gaps.

"Deep learning is a powerful tool that we use every day," Lucey said. "But deep learning has a tendency to memorize solutions," which works against efforts to include distinguishing details of the face. "If you use these algorithms just to find the landmarks, you can use classical methods to fill in the gaps much more easily."

The method isn't necessarily quick; it took 30-40 minutes of processing time. But the entire process can be performed on a smartphone.

In addition to face reconstructions, the CMU team's methods might also be employed to capture the geometry of almost any object, Lucey said. Digital reconstructions of those objects can then be incorporated into animations or perhaps transmitted across the internet to sites where the objects could be duplicated with 3-D printer

Virtual reality becomes more real

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Provided by Carnegie Mellon University 

Plant disease primarily spreads via roadsides

by Riitta-Leena Inki, University of Helsinki

To the naked eye, the infection appears as white fungal spore growth covering the plant. A powdery mildew fungus is a common parasite of the ribwort plantain. Credit: Elina Numminen

An analysis based on mathematical statistics more precise than those previously carried out uncovered the reason why powdery mildew fungi on Åland are most abundant in roadsides and crossings. The specific cause was the fact that traffic raises the spores found on roadsides efficiently into the air.


New statistical methods make it possible to identify complex mechanisms in nature that could potentially fundamentally alter our understanding of how diseases spread, among other things.

A recently published study utilised a comprehensive monitoring dataset on fungal diseases and the environmental variables affecting their distribution, collected over several years on Åland by Anna-Liisa Laine, professor of ecology at the University of Helsinki. The findings were published in the PLoS Computational Biology journal.

"Consolidating data collected on the road network, plants and the occurrence of plant diseases is no simple task. It required both new kinds of statistical models and computing power, which were not available only roughly ten years ago," says postdoctoral researcher Elina Numminen from the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Helsinki.

With the adapted statistical model, the researchers were also able to demonstrate how epidemics caused by powdery mildew fungi were usually more extensive and persistent when originating in roadsides compared to epidemics originating in meadows or elsewhere further away from roads.

Plant diseases are common among both wild and cultivated plants, with many plants having a specific powdery mildew fungus of their own. For instance, in the autumn symptoms of such diseases are in evidence on the leaves of many trees.

Betweenness, for the considered host populations, computed based on their projection to the closest point in the road network. Credit: Elina Numminen

In this study, the researchers examined a powdery mildew fungus that is a common parasite of the ribwort plantain on the Åland Islands. The fungus is primarily dispersed by wind in the summer, as the small fungal spores fly from one plant to another. To the naked eye, the infection appears as white fungal spore growth covering the plant.

Rivers, ocean currents and forest paths also potential routes of transmission


The researchers are interested in disease transmission, as it helps explain the occurrence and biology of diseases. There are plant diseases that spread along riversides, bird migration routes, ocean currents or, for example, air traffic networks, much like human diseases that spread through social networks.

The transmission process determines the abundance and location of occurrence, while the method of transmission determines how the diversity of the disease branches off temporally and spatially, and, in the end, how the disease evolves through natural selection.

Typically, diseases that spread very efficiently and over long distances do not evolve to adapt well to local conditions. They make do in a range of environments and potentially are more harmful to their hosts. On the other hand, there are diseases that spread less efficiently and over shorter distances.

"New techniques in statistical ecology can significantly expand our previous understanding of not only plant diseases but also, say, the distribution of various invasive or threatened species," Numminen notes. What is more, this makes them essential to predicting future environmental change. According to Numminen, distribution and strain estimates may be based on very simple statistical analyses, whose reliability could be boosted by an injection of ecological realism.

The enemy within: How a killer hijacked one of nature's oldest relationships
More information: Elina Numminen et al, The spread of a wild plant pathogen is driven by the road network, PLOS Computational Biology (2020). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1007703
Journal information: PLoS Computational Biology

Scientists take aim at the coronavirus toolkit

by Tom Rickey, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Composite illustration featuring a rendering of the novel coronavirus, with the club-shaped glycoprotein spikes which give such viruses a crownlike, or coronal, appearance. The overlay of protein structures in the square insets are structure models of mature peptides in the SARS-CoV-2 genome. Credit: Timothy Holland | Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

The novel coronavirus sweeping the globe packs 27 proteins, each adopting a unique, often incredibly complex 3-D structure.

Each protein is part of the molecular toolkit that the virus uses to infect, replicate, and spread.

That presents scientists with 27 targets—27 potential opportunities to stop the virus.

Even before the word "coronavirus" inserted itself into the nation's vernacular, a nationwide network of scientists jumped into the effort to start revealing those structures—structures that hold the keys to a vaccine or treatment.

Garry Buchko is part of the endeavor. A PNNL scientist in Richland, Buchko collaborates with scientists at the Seattle Structural Genomics Center for Infectious Disease (SSGCID) to look for any sign of weakness that scientists can use to muck up the virus's inner workings. Creating atomic-level pictures of the protein structures in the viral toolkit is a crucial first step.

A track record against infectious disease

The team has a powerful track record. In the 13 years since its creation, SSGCID has solved the structures of close to 1,300 proteins from over 70 organisms that cause human death and disease. The group has brought discovery to bear on diseases like tuberculosis, plague, Ebola and the flu. The structures help scientists develop better treatments or vaccines against a host of nasty agents that can cause ills ranging from fatigue and food poisoning to difficulty breathing, and sometimes even death.

"We work on well-known infectious disease organisms like malaria and tuberculosis, but we are also tackling lesser-known infectious agents as well. You never know what might become the next threat," Buchko said.

Now, Buchko and his SSGCID collaborators are looking carefully at the coronavirus proteins. Scientists get a lock on many proteins by using X-ray crystallography, which yields an extraordinary snapshot at the atomic level, but some proteins resist the process. That's where Buchko comes in, tackling some of the toughest proteins using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy—a cousin to magnetic resonance imaging used widely in medicine.

"A load of 27 different proteins is fairly large for a virus," said Buchko. "We need to understand the role that each one plays in allowing the virus to hijack human host cells to replicate."

A unique role for NMR in coronavirus research

Buchko does not work directly with the entire coronavirus, known as SARS-CoV-2. Rather, he and his Seattle colleagues use snippets of genetic code to study one protein at a time by growing the individual proteins in bacteria. The individual proteins are harmless.

From there, other scientists at SSGCID solve the bulk of the protein structures using X-rays, while Buchko turns his focus to the subset that resists crystallizing by using NMR. NMR has an added advantage: It allows scientists to watch a protein in action in a way other methods do not.

To do so, Buchko inserts a small glass tube containing the dissolved protein, itself just one ten-thousandth the width of a human hair, into a machine four times the weight of an Asian elephant. He does the protein prep work late at night, when laboratory staffing is minimal and social distancing is easy.

Then he heads home and, remotely, manipulates the experiments happening inside the NMR located in the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory, a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science user facility at PNNL. The protein in the spectrometer is surrounded by a very strong magnetic field, thousands of times stronger than the typical MRI, and then pumped with additional radiofrequency energy to watch how individual atomic nuclei respond.

In this way, he can look in incredible detail at not just a single protein but at tiny segments—for instance, specific amino acids in precise locations. Indeed, scientists can monitor the environment of almost every carbon, nitrogen, and hydrogen atom in the protein.

Ultimately, after weeks of data collection, Buchko is left with thousands of pieces of data. He feeds that into a computer program to calculate the position of every single atom, resulting in a complete 3-D reconstruction of the protein. That's crucial information for scientists around the globe who are working on ways to stop the virus, supplying them with a how-to guide to identify viral vulnerabilities.

"In our current work, our hope is that others can use our findings as blueprints for drug design. Perhaps they will be able to pluck out a specific site on the protein for targeting that will weaken the virus's virulence," said Buchko, who has a joint appointment at Washington State University's School of Molecular Biosciences.

His findings, like those of his SSGCID counterparts, will be deposited in a bank—the Protein Data Bank, a public database of protein structures that the group shares with the scientific community so that scientists worldwide can exploit the team's findings to make further discoveries.

Ready to meet the coronavirus challenge

Immediately when the coronavirus threat became known in January, the SSGCID team switched its work to focus on the problem. The SSGCID is a consortium funded in whole or in part with federal funds from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, under contract no. HHSN272201700059C.

It seemed a natural shift, since the team, headed by Peter Myler of the Seattle Children's Research Institute, is funded to learn more about important infectious diseases. Within just a few weeks, participants at the University of Washington had solved the structure of the virus's spike protein, which allows the virus to bind to cells inside our lungs.

"This shows the value of basic research," Buchko said. "It's because we look at these fundamental questions constantly that we had everything in place to address key questions related to this coronavirus. Our colleagues were able to solve the structure of the spike protein so quickly because we had people in place, ready to work together and act very rapidly.

"In research, you never know what will lead to the 'ah-ha' moment. You never know what will become topical. Fifteen years ago, I determined structures of proteins that no one gave a hoot about, but every now and then I get calls from people very interested in some of these protein structures. What we do now increases the odds of someone else solving both current problems but also problems of which we're not yet aware."

Tackling infectious disease – one protein at a time

Provided by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Smaller than expected phytoplankton may mean less carbon sequestered at sea bottom

by Steve Lundeberg, Oregon State University

Photographed during NASA's North Atlantic Aerosols and Marine Ecosystems Study. Credit: Luis Bolaños, OSU.

A study that included the first-ever winter sampling of phytoplankton in the North Atlantic revealed cells smaller than what scientists expected, meaning a key weapon in the fight against excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere may not be as powerful as had been thought.

Thus, commonly used carbon sequestration models might be too optimistic.

The Oregon State University research into the microscopic algae, part of NASA's North Atlantic Aerosols and Marine Ecosystems Study, was published this week in the International Society for Microbial Ecology Journal.

The findings are significant because the spring phytoplankton bloom in the North Atlantic "is probably the largest biological carbon sequestration mechanism on the planet each year, and the size of cells determines how fast that carbon sinks," said the study's corresponding author, OSU College of Science microbiology researcher Steve Giovannoni.

OSU postdoctoral researcher Luis Bolaños is the lead author.

Phytoplankton are microscopic organisms at the base of the ocean's food chain and a key component of a critical biological carbon pump. Most float in the upper part of the ocean, where sunlight can easily reach them.

The tiny plants have a big effect on the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by sucking it up during photosynthesis. It's a natural sink and one of the largest ways that CO2, the most abundant greenhouse gas, is scrubbed from the atmosphere. Understanding how and why phytoplankton bloom every spring is critical to learning how the Earth's living systems could respond to global climate change.

As the ocean pulls in atmospheric carbon dioxide, phytoplankton use the CO2 and sunlight for photosynthesis: They convert them into sugars the cells can use for energy, producing oxygen in the process.

The phytoplankton cells absorb that CO2 eventually sinking to the bottom of the ocean as they die. The planet's ecological health depends on regular plankton blooms such as the spring event in the North Atlantic in which huge numbers of phytoplankton accumulate over thousands of square miles.

The larger project that Bolaños and Giovannoni were part of, the North Atlantic Aerosols and Marine Ecosystems Study, was led by Michael Behrenfeld of the OSU College of Agricultural Sciences. The team used ship- and aircraft-based measurements and satellite and ocean sensor data to help clarify the annual phytoplankton cycles and their relationship with atmospheric aerosols.

Aerosols are minute particles suspended in the atmosphere that can affect the Earth's climate and radiation budget—by bouncing sunlight back into space and, in the lower atmosphere, by modifying the size of cloud particles, which changes how clouds reflect and absorb sunlight.

Researchers with NASA's North Atlantic Aerosols and Marine Ecosystems Study. Credit: Luis Bolaños, OSU.

Bolaños, Giovannoni and their collaborators sampled phytoplankton in the western North Atlantic in both early winter and spring to try to get a handle on how the phytoplankton community transitioned between those seasons.

In earlier research, Behrenfeld found that the increase in numbers of phytoplankton, shown by chlorophyll and carbon concentrations, begins in midwinter when growth conditions are at their worst rather than being started by the onset of spring weather.

"The surface layer of the North Atlantic is deeply mixed in winter by storms and temperature-dependent 'convective' mixing," Behrenfeld explained. "This causes phytoplankton to be spread more thinly in the water, making it tough for the tiny animals that eat phytoplankton to track their prey. The reduction in feeding enables the phytoplankton to get a head start in growth as an opening act to the massive bloom that occurs once the winter storms fade and conditions for growth get better. By spring's end, the grazers have made up the lost ground, eating the phytoplankton as it grows and bringing the bloom to an end."

About half of the organisms in the spring bloom that the researchers sampled could not be genetically traced to the winter samples, Bolaños said.

"This suggests that there are life history strategies by which phytoplankton that are undetectable in winter can rise to high numbers in the spring, or there is a quick community turnover due to the circulation of water masses," he said.

Bolaños added that diatoms, thought to dominate phytoplankton blooms in the North Atlantic, often were not a big part of the samples' genetic profiles, and when they were a big part, the cells were small—either of the nano-phytoplankton variety or at the smaller end of the micro-phytoplankton scale.

"Biogeochemical models are often influenced by the perception that North Atlantic phytoplankton blooms are composed of large cells," he said. "That perception has been perpetuated by models that assume that diatoms are uniformly large cells. But they're not."

Algorithms that predict carbon export from satellite-sensed chlorophyll tend to assign high export rates to phytoplankton blooms on the belief, based on observations from the eastern North Atlantic, that large diatoms dominate at their climax.

The findings of this study, Giovannoni said, suggest that extrapolating those observations to the western North Atlantic may not be a valid practice.

"We're not certain whether our new observations of small phytoplankton in the western North Atlantic are due to physical differences between the western and eastern North Atlantic, ocean warming and higher atmospheric CO2 concentrations, or constraints of earlier research methods," he said. "There's also a chance our observations were an anomaly, a coincidence. We don't know for sure."

Cells less than 20 micrometers in diameter made up most of the phytoplankton biomass in the study samples. Diatoms were important contributors but not the main component of biomass.

"We found that diverse, small phytoplankton taxa were unexpectedly common in the western North Atlantic and that regional influences play a large role in community transitions during the seasonal progression of blooms," Giovannoni said. "The profoundly contrasting composition of the winter community, and the domination by small taxa that we found in the spring, are system features that alter our perspective and are areas for future research. Our results could have major implications for understanding how the blooms affect regional carbon biogeochemistry—the multispecies blooms we describe can have lower carbon export efficiencies than the models typically allow for."

Phytoplankton bloom in the North Atlantic

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More information: Luis M. Bolaños et al, Small phytoplankton dominate western North Atlantic biomass, The ISME Journal (2020). DOI: 10.1038/s41396-020-0636-0

Journal information: ISME Journal 

Provided by Oregon State University 

The young Brazilians fighting for the Amazon
by Vitoria Velez

Fishermen and children are seen in the river in Bauana, a village in the heart of the Brazilian Amazon, on March 14

Maria dreams of being the next Greta Thunberg. Kelita is studying in the first-ever university program in the Amazon. Fabio is helping his family do its part to fight climate change through sustainable agriculture.

A new generation of young Brazilians from the Amazon region are seeking to reshape the fight for the world's largest rainforest, which is shrinking before their eyes.

The first Youth of the Forest Conference recently brought together 287 of them to discuss what they can do to fight rampant wildfires, deforestation from logging, farming and mining, and apathy about the rapid loss of one of Earth's most important natural resources.

AFP profiles three of them.

Amazonian Greta

Maria Cunha, 26, is from Sao Raimundo, a small village in a protected reserve whose residents live off fishing and gathering.

A volunteer forest ranger with a degree in sustainable production techniques, she says saving the Amazon will require working with the people who know it best: its inhabitants.

"We are the guardians of the forest. We live here and depend on the rainforest for practically everything. If we don't protect our forests, how will we live?" she added.

She is already seeing the impact of climate change at home, she said: hotter weather, lower water levels on the rivers, fewer fish.

Maria Cunha, 26, is a volunteer forest ranger with a degree in sustainable production techniques

Animals are feeling the impact, too.

"They come into our yard looking for food because they can't find enough, because of fires and deforestation," she said.

She fears it could "all disappear in the near future" if others her age don't act.

She sees Thunberg, the 17-year-old Swedish climate activist, as a role model.

"I dream of being the next Greta, an empowered girl fighting for her rights," she said.

Prodigal daughter

Kelita do Carmo left the rainforest at 13 years old, moving to the city of Manaus, to work as a nanny.

Eight months later, she was back home in Bauana, a village of stilt houses on the banks of the Jurua River.

"I learned to appreciate things here," she said.

Now 22, she is studying to become a teacher, part of the first-ever degree program offered in the rainforest.

The program aims to supply teachers to far-flung rainforest villages. It is a joint project by the Amazonas Sustainable Foundation—which sponsored the Youth of the Forest Conference—and Amazonas State University in Manaus.

It includes coursework on sustainable agriculture and the environment.

Sixteen-year-old Fabio Gondim, who lives in the community of Bauana, picks acai fruit

A boat speeds down the Jurura River in the Brazilian Amazon

Kelita do Carmo (C) attends class as part of a program offered by the Amazonas Sustainable Foundation

Farmer, math whizz

Fabio Gondim dreams of becoming a math teacher one day.

At 16 years old, he is already an expert farmer.

He helps his family harvest acai, a fruit in high demand for its health properties, and cassava, which they use to make flour.

A natural athlete, he can scale a 10-meter (33-foot) acai palm in a flash.

"It never crossed my mind to leave" the rainforest, he said.

"I wouldn't want to live in the city. Everything is easier here. The forest provides our food and our income."

He is helping his family adopt more sustainable farming techniques, such as clearing fewer trees to farm cassava.

"We have to keep fighting for the Amazon," he said.

"It's what's sustaining the world."


Explore furtherSimulations show parts of Amazon could switch from carbon sink to carbon source by 2050

© 2020 AFP

Malaysia makes massive seizure of pangolin scales

Pangolin scales are used in traditional Chinese medicine, and the animal could have been a possible vector in the novel coronavirus making a leap to humans

Malaysian authorities seized about six tonnes of pangolin scales and smashed a smuggling syndicate, officials said Wednesday, as the country clamps down on rampant wildlife trafficking.

The pangolin, the world's most heavily trafficked mammal, is believed to have possibly been a vector in the leap of the novel coronavirus from animal to human at a market in China's Wuhan city last year.

Its body parts fetch a high price on the black market as they are commonly used in traditional Chinese medicine, although scientists say they have no therapeutic value.

The haul was found Tuesday at a port outside the capital Kuala Lumpur, hidden inside a container along with a shipment of cashew nuts, said customs department chief Paddy Abdul Halim.

Officials said they had detained two people for questioning, and the operation had put a smuggling syndicate out of operation.

They could be jailed for up to three years if convicted of breaking wildlife protection laws.

It was not immediately clear if the scales originally came from Malaysia or elsewhere. Malaysia is often used as a transit point for smuggling wildlife across the region.

Traffic, a group that monitors animal trafficking, praised authorities for "prioritising wildlife even while countries are focused on dealing with the coronavirus pandemic", spokeswoman Elizabeth John said.

Malaysia torches 2.8 tonnes of African pangolin scales

Landmark study concludes marine life can be rebuilt by 2050

by King Abdullah University of Science and Technology

An international study recently published in the journal Nature that was led by Marine Scientists at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) Professors Carlos Duarte and Susana Agustí lays out the essential roadmap of actions required for the planet's marine life to recover to full abundance by 2050. 

Credit: King Abdullah University of Sscience and Technology (KAUST)

An international study recently published in the journal Nature, led by KAUST Professors Carlos Duarte and Susana Agustí, lays out the essential roadmap of actions required for the planet's marine life to recover to full abundance by 2050.

The project brings together the world's leading marine scientists working across four continents, in 10 countries and from 16 universities, including KAUST, Aarhus University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Colorado State University, Boston University, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile, Sorbonne Universite, James Cook University, The University of Queensland, Dalhousie University and the University of York.

"We are at a point where we can choose between a legacy of a resilient and vibrant ocean or an irreversibly disrupted ocean," said Carlos Duarte, KAUST professor of marine science and the Tarek Ahmed Juffali research chair in Red Sea ecology.

"Our study documents recovery of marine populations, habitats and ecosystems following past conservation interventions. It provides specific, evidence-based recommendations to scale proven solutions globally," Duarte added.

Although humans have greatly altered marine life to its detriment in the past, the researchers found evidence of the remarkable resilience of marine life and an emerging shift from steep losses of life throughout the 20th century to a slowing down of losses—and in some instances even recovery—over the first two decades of the 21st century.

The evidence—along with particularly spectacular cases of recovery, such as the example of humpback whales—highlights that the abundance of marine life can be restored, enabling a more sustainable, ocean-based economy.

The review states that the recovery rate of marine life can be accelerated to achieve substantial recovery within two to three decades for most components of marine ecosystems, provided that climate change is tackled and efficient interventions are deployed at large scale.

"Rebuilding marine life represents a doable grand challenge for humanity, an ethical obligation and a smart economic objective to achieve a sustainable future," said Susana Agusti, KAUST professor of marine science.

By studying the impact of previously successful ocean conservation interventions and recovery trends, the researchers identified nine components integral to rebuilding marine life, salt marshes, mangroves, seagrasses, coral reefs, kelp, oyster reefs, fisheries, megafauna and the deep sea.

By stacking a combination of six complementary interventions called "recovery wedges," the report identifies specific actions within the broad themes of protecting species, harvesting wisely, protecting spaces, restoring habitats, reducing pollution and the mitigation of climate change.

Credit: King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST)

The actions recommended include opportunities, benefits, possible roadblocks and remedial actions, giving a tangible roadmap to deliver a healthy ocean that would provide huge benefits for people and the planet.

If all recovery wedges are activated at scale, recovery timescales of previously damaged marine life show that the abundance of marine life can be recovered within one human generation, or two to three decades, by 2050.

A key element identified for success is the mitigation of climate change by reducing global greenhouse gas emissions. Impacts from realized and unavoidable climate change already limit the scope for rebuilding tropical corals to a partial—rather than substantial—recovery. The goal of rebuilding the abundance of marine life can only succeed if the most ambitious goals within the Paris Agreement are reached.

Success largely depends on the support of a committed, resilient global partnership of governments and societies aligned with the goal. It will also require a substantial commitment of financial resources, but the new study reveals that the ecological, economic and social gains from rebuilding marine life will be far-reaching.

The review is timely, as nations consider their actions to conserve biodiversity beyond 2020 and as the Kingdom leads its G20 partners as the group's 2020 president into novel, pragmatic approaches to tackling the climate challenge and protecting coral reefs and other vulnerable marine ecosystems.

"We have a narrow window of opportunity to deliver a healthy ocean to our grandchildren's generation, and we have the knowledge and tools to do so. Failing to embrace this challenge—and in so doing condemning our grandchildren to a broken ocean unable to support high-quality livelihoods—is not an option," Duarte said.Scientists call on government to increase ambition to save our ocean

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More information: Rebuilding marine life, Nature (2020). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-020-2146-7 , https://nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2146-7