Understanding the strength development mechanism of chemically treated sandy soil

Researchers provide insights into how the chemical injection process increases soil strength, paving the way to advancement of next-generation construction

Peer-Reviewed Publication

SHIBAURA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

 

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DESPITE THE USE OF CHEMICAL TREATMENT FOR STRNEGTHENING SANDY SOILS, AN UNDERSTANDING OF HOW IT GAINS STRENGTH IS LACKING. NOW, SCIENTISTS HAVE STUDIED HOW SANDY SOIL IS MADE STRONGER THROUGH THE INJECTION OF CHEMICALS. THE IMAGE ABOVE SHOWS THE DYNAMIC CHANGES IN THE MOLECULAR STRUCTURE OF HYDROGELS OVER TIME, AS REVEALED THROUGH THEORETICAL MODELING.

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CREDIT: SHINYA INAZUMI FROM SHIBAURA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, JAPAN

Chemical injection is a process that enhances sand strength and its water-sealing capacity, making sandy soil suitable for various applications in construction. However, a unified understanding of how this process results in increased strength remains elusive. Some studies in the past have suggested that chemical injection separates soil particles, which causes volume expansion. This creates pockets of vacuum, resulting in "negative pressure," which pulls soil particles together and strengthens it. Increased tensile strength (which determines the load the soil can endure) is also thought to influence this behavior. Other studies have proposed that shrinkage of hydrogels (water-retaining polymeric structures) leads to soil particle compression and confinement, imparting strength to the soil. However, there is still a lack of clear understanding of the underlying mechanism behind strength development of sandy soils.

 

Now, a team of scientists from Japan, led by Professor Shinya Inazumi from the Department of Civil Engineering at Shibaura Institute of Technology, has conducted a thorough investigation into the behavior of chemically injected sandy soil. Talking about the motivation behind this study, Prof. Inazumi says, “We were driven by a passion for sustainable development and the desire to contribute to safer and more efficient construction practices, particularly in the context of climate change and increasing urbanization.” Additionally, the researchers were also motivated by the goal of advancing geotechnical engineering, with the hope that it can have implications for public safety, by enabling the development of technologies that mitigate the risk of natural disasters. Their work was published in the journal Gels on 27 October, 2023.

 

In this study, the researchers first chemically injected sand-gel and hydrogel mixtures with an acidic solution, and conducted various tests. This included the consolidation drainage triaxial compression tests which isolate and measure the “cohesive strength” and the “angle of internal friction” in chemically enhanced soils. This testing method was chosen for its ability to provide accurate insights into soil behavior under static conditions, which is crucial for the safety and reliability of construction soil.

 

Additional techniques for mechanistic and structural analysis included unconfined compression tests, small-angle X-ray scattering, volume shrinkage studies, and theoretical modeling. Notably, this study marks the first instance of independent examination of the effects of dilatancy and hydrogel shrinkage on soil strength development. This distinction holds significance for the field, offering the potential to guide more targeted and efficient soil treatment methods.

 

The experiments revealed that the enhancement of strength in chemically treated sandy soil can be attributed to increased cohesion and the internal friction angle of the soil particles. Moreover, this improvement exhibits no long-term strength loss, and interestingly, the initial weakness of untreated sandy soil can be traced back to the hydrogel itself.

 

This understanding of hydrogels at the molecular level holds immense potential in civil engineering and environmental management. For example, this breakthrough can be used in earthquake-prone regions to enhance building safety, impart seismic resilience, and diminish soil liquefaction risks. Furthermore, flood-prone areas also stand to benefit from this new understanding as the water-sealing properties of these treated soils can mitigate floods and safeguard human settlements and agriculture. In the long term, this technology can also protect coastal communities against rising sea levels, storm surges, and saltwater intrusion.

 

By stabilizing soil and increasing its water retention capacity, the present work yields numerous advantages across various other domains as well. This includes land reclamation, which is crucial for global food security, and pollution mitigation, which is important for curbing leaching into water bodies from landfills. Furthermore, it can also enhance the structural durability of civic infrastructure and ensure mining safety by preventing landslides. As Prof. Inazumi explains, “Our research promises to fill critical knowledge gaps in soil treatment, which can be translated into more efficient and durable construction practices, and ultimately benefit a wide range of industries.”

 

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Reference

Title of original paper: Strength Assessment of Water–Glass Sand Mixtures

Journal: Gels

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/gels9110850

 

 

About Shibaura Institute of Technology (SIT), Japan

Shibaura Institute of Technology (SIT) is a private university with campuses in Tokyo and Saitama. Since the establishment of its predecessor, Tokyo Higher School of Industry and Commerce, in 1927, it has maintained “learning through practice” as its philosophy in the education of engineers. SIT was the only private science and engineering university selected for the Top Global University Project sponsored by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and will receive support from the ministry for 10 years starting from the 2014 academic year. Its motto, “Nurturing engineers who learn from society and contribute to society,” reflects its mission of fostering scientists and engineers who can contribute to the sustainable growth of the world by exposing their over 8,000 students to culturally diverse environments, where they learn to cope, collaborate, and relate with fellow students from around the world.

 

Website: https://www.shibaura-it.ac.jp/en/

 

 

About Professor Inazumi from SIT, Japan

Professor Shinya Inazumi is a faculty member at The College of Engineering, Shibaura Institute of Technology in Tokyo, Japan. He earned his Ph.D. from Kyoto University and has an extensive academic record with over 105 publications and 350 citations. Prof. Inazumi specializes in civil, geotechnical, and environmental engineering and has earned several prestigious awards, including the “ICE Publishing Awards 2020 (Environmental Geotechnics Prize)” from the Institution of Civil Engineers, the “International Research Award” from the International Society for Scientific Network Awards, and the “MEXT Young Scientists’ Prize” from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in 2015.

 

Funding Information

This research received no external funding.

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JOURNAL

Gels

DOI

10.3390/gels9110850 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Strength Assessment of Water–Glass Sand Mixtures

Unraveling paddy soil secrets: Surprising contribution of nonmicrobial mechanisms to CO2 emissions

Peer-Reviewed Publication

NANJING INSTITUTE OF ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES, MEE

 

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GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT.

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CREDIT: ECO-ENVIRONMENT & HEALTH

In a seminal study published recently in the journal Eco-Environment & Health, have shown that natural processes, especially reactions involving certain reactive oxygen species, play a big role in how paddy soils release CO2. This adds to our understanding of the world's carbon balance.

Researchers embarked on a journey to decode several aspects of CO2 emissions. They investigated how CO2 releases and OH production differ across various paddy soils. Furthermore, they delved deep to discern the role of non-living processes in these emissions. A crucial part of their study was also dedicated to observing how the variety and nature of dissolved organic materials in the soil change upon short-term exposure to oxygen.

When oxygen was added to the soil, both CO2 releases and •OH production increased, especially in the top layers, showing how impactful oxygen is on the soil. The study found that living organisms play a major role in CO2 emissions, but during short periods when soil gets more oxygen, reactions from non-living things cause a quick rise in CO2. Additionally, the CO2 released is closely linked to the organic content in the soil's water, underscoring the interplay between the soil's solid and liquid components. Furthermore, after exposing the soil to oxygen, the makeup of these organic materials changed significantly, highlighting the importance of non-living processes in this transformation.

In conclusion, although living microbes play a pivotal role in CO2 emissions from paddy soils, non-living processes, particularly those involving •OH, hold equal significance. Recognizing the intricate interplay between organic carbon and both living and non-living contributors will empower us to devise more effective strategies against global warming.

###

References

DOI

10.1016/j.eehl.2023.08.005

Original Source URL

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eehl.2023.08.005

Funding information

National Natural Science Foundation of China (42130707 and 22176091).

About Eco-Environment & Health

Eco-Environment & Health (EEH) is an international and multidisciplinary peer-reviewed journal designed for publications on the frontiers of the ecology, environment and health as well as their related disciplines. EEH focuses on the concept of "One Health" to promote green and sustainable development, dealing with the interactions among ecology, environment and health, and the underlying mechanisms and interventions. Our mission is to be one of the most important flagship journals in the field of environmental health.

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JOURNAL

Eco-Environment & Health

DOI

10.1016/j.eehl.2023.08.005 

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Nonmicrobial mechanisms dominate the release of CO2 and the decomposition of organic matter during the short-term redox process in paddy soil slurry

 

Danish researchers puncture 100-year-old theory of odd little 'water balloon'

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN - FACULTY OF SCIENCE

 

IMAGE: 

MICHAEL PALMGREN AND MAX MOOG FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN

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CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN

Quinoa and many other extremely resilient plants are covered with strange balloon-like 'bladders' that for 127 years were believed to be responsible for protecting them from drought and salt. Research results from the University of Copenhagen reveal this not to be the case. These so-called bladder cells serve a completely different though important function. The finding makes it likely that even more resilient quinoa plants will now be able to be bred, which could lead to the much wider cultivation of this sustainable crop worldwide.

Looking through a microscope, it resembles a water balloon. Or a piece of glass art. But it’s just a so-called bladder cell. If you wondered what it was for, you wouldn’t be the first.  For 127 years, even the brightest minds in plant biology believed that the fluid-filled bladders covering the leaves, clustered flowers and stems of a range of hardy plants were something completely different from what they now turn out to be.

The discovery was made thanks to a new piece of research from the University of Copenhagen that completely contradicted the researchers’ expectations. The new insight can probably be used to expand the cultivation of a particularly nutritious and climate-resilient crop.

"Quinoa has been touted as a future-proof crop because it is rich in proteins and highly tolerant of drought and salt, and thus climate change. Scientists believed that the secret to quinoa's tolerance was in the many epidermal bladder cells on the surface of the plant. Until now, it was assumed that they served as a kind of salt dump and to store water. But they don’t, and we have strong evidence for it," says Professor Michael Palmgren from the Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences.

Bulwark against pests

Three years ago, a research group led by PhD student Max Moog and his supervisor Michael Palmgren began studying the epidermal bladder cells of quinoa plants in ways that had never been used before. The hope was to understand the plant’s mechanisms for making it resilient to salt and drought.

To this end, the researchers cultivated mutant plants without bladder cells to compare their reactions to salt and drought with those of wild quinoa plants covered with bladder cells.

To their surprise, the researchers discovered that bladder cells have no positive influence on the plant's ability to tolerate salt and drought. On the contrary, they seem to weaken tolerance. Instead, bladder cells serve as a barrier against pests and disease.

"Whether we poured salt water on the mutant plants without bladder cells or exposed them to drought, they performed brilliantly and against expectations. So, something was wrong. On the other hand, we could see that they were heavily infested with small insects – unlike the plants covered with bladder cells. That's when I realized that bladder cells must have a completely different function," says Max Moog, now a postdoc at the Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences and first author of the study, which has been published in the journal Current Biology.

When the researchers analyzed what is hidden inside the bladder cells, they did not find salt as expected – despite having added added extra salt to the plant. Instead, they found compounds that repel intruders.

"We discovered that bladder cells act as both a physical and chemical barrier against hungry pests. When tiny insects and mites trudge around on a plant covered with bladder cells, they are simply unable to get to the juicy green shoots that they’re most interested in. And as soon as they try to gnaw their way through the bladder cells, they find that the contents are toxic to them," says Michael Palmgren.

Among other things, the epidermal bladder cells of quinoa contain oxalic acid, a compound also found in rhubarb, which acts as a deadly poison on pests.

The experiments also demonstrated that the bladder cells even protect quinoa against one of the most common bacterial diseases in plants, Pseudomonas syringae. This probably happens because the bladder cells partially cover the stomata on the plant’s leaves, a point of entry for many bacterial invaders.

"Our hypothesis is that these bladder cells also protect against other plant diseases like downy mildew, a fungal disease which severely limits quinoa yields," says Max Moog.

The key to extra tolerant 'super-quinoa'

There are thousands of varieties of the South American crop, and the density of bladder cells on the plant's surface varies from variety to variety. But there is much to suggest that density determines how effective a safeguard the bladder cells are.

"Quinoa varieties with a higher density of bladder cells are most likely more robust against pests and diseases. On the other hand, they may be slightly less tolerant of salt and drought. And vice versa. These variations don’t change the fact that quinoa is generally very resistant to salt and drought. But the explanation must be found somewhere other than in the bladder cells," says Max Moog, continuing:

"Due to efforts to expand quinoa cultivation around the world, the new knowledge can be used to adapt the crop to various regional conditions. For example, southern Europe has very dry conditions, while pests are a bigger problem than drought in northern Europe. Here in northern Europe, it would make sense to focus on quinoa varieties that are densely covered with bladder cells."

According to Michael Palmgren, the new results provide a concrete recipe for how to breed "super-quinoa" relatively easily:

"Thus far, these bladder cells have been ignored in the breeding of quinoa. If you want a crop that is extra resistant to pests and diseases, but is still tolerant of salt and drought, one can opt to breed varieties that are densely covered with bladder cells. So, we may now have a tool that allows us to simply cross-breed our way to an extra tolerant 'super-quinoa'," says Michael Palmgren.

The research results add a new dimension to our knowledge about quinoa. Until now, very little was known about how the plant defends itself against attacks from hostile organisms.

"Now we know, quinoa isn’t just tolerant of non-biological stressors like drought and salt, but also of biological influences such as pests and pathogenic bacteria. And at the same time, we’ve found the secret of these odd-looking bladder cells. This research is an example of how what’s established doesn’t always turn out to be what’s true," concludes the professor.

The bladders, with which the surfaces of many quinoa varieties are completely covered, look like small balloons on a stem.

Juicy shoots of the quinoa plant are covered with small bladders (left). To the right is a mutant plant completely free of bladder cells. Blue arrows point to thrips – small insects that are serious pests and by which the mutant is attacked more severely.

Epidermal bladder cells seen through a microscope.

 Video of pests (thrips) trying [VIDEO] |

Video of pests (thrips) attack [VIDEO] |

 

[BOX:] WHAT IS A BLADDER CELL?

• Epidermal bladder cells are fluid-filled hair structures on the leaves, stems and surfaces of a variety of plants. A few plants, including quinoa, are often completely covered with them.
   
• Bladder cells are actually a form of trichomes. Trichomes are hairlike structures that most plants have. As a rule, trichomes look completely different and appear more like the hairs on the leaves of stinging nettles.
   
• In 1896, Austrian plant physiologist Gottlieb Haberlandt proposed that bladder cells serve as water reservoirs.
   
• The number of bladder cells on a plant is predetermined. A very young leaf has the same number of bladder cells as an old leaf, but the density on the young leaf is greater because of its smaller size. As such, young leaves, which are most attractive to pests, are better protected.
   
• Bladder cells are found in members of the Amaranth family (e.g., quinoa and white goosefoot) and the Aizoaceae family (including ice plant), which combined, include approximately 3840 species worldwide.

 

[BOX:] ABOUT THE STUDY

• Thousands of quinoa varieties exist, with researchers currently studying just over 100 of them.
   
• Researchers combed a field of more than a million quinoa plants on the Danish island of Lolland to find a variant without epidermal bladder cells to use as a mutant plant in their experiments. The reactions in the mutant plant were compared with those in wild quinoa varieties.
   
• The study has been published in the scientific journal Current Biology.
   
• The researchers behind the study are Max Moog, Xiuyan Yang, Amalie K. Bendtsen, Christoph Crocoll and Michael Palmgren from the University of Copenhagen; Lin Dong and Merijn R. Kant from the University of Amsterdam, Netherlands; Tomohiro Imamura and Masashi Mori of Ishikawa Prefectural University, Japan and John C. Cushman of the University of Nevada, USA.
   
• The research is funded by the Novo Nordisk Foundation and the University of Copenhagen and the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship Programme.

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JOURNAL

Current Biology

DOI

10.1016/j.cub.2023.09.063 

ARTICLE TITLE

Epidermal bladder cells as a herbivore defense mechanism

 

New remote sensing dataset improves global land change tracking

Peer-Reviewed Publication

JOURNAL OF REMOTE SENSING

 

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SCIENTISTS FROM SUN YAT-SEN UNIVERSITY DEVELOPED A LARGE-SCALE ANNOTATED DATASET (GLOBE230K) FOR HIGH GENERALIZED GLOBAL LAND COVER MAPPING. THE ANNOTATED PATCHES PROVIDE CUES TO HELP CLASSIFICATION TOOLS DISTINGUISH CROPLAND, FOREST, WETLAND, GRASSLAND, AND MORE

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CREDIT: [QIAN SHI, SUN YAT-SEN UNIVERSITY]; [DA HE, SUN YAT-SEN UNIVERSITY]; [ZHENGYU LIU, SUN YAT-SEN UNIVERSITY]; [XIAOPING LIU, SUN YAT-SEN UNIVERSITY]; [JINGQIAN XUE, SUN YAT-SEN UNIVERSITY]

Tracking unprecedented changes in land use over the past century, global land cover maps provide key insights into the impact of human settlement on the environment. Researchers from Sun Yat-sen University created a large-scale remote sensing annotation dataset to support Earth observation research and provide new insight into the dynamic monitoring of global land cover.

 

In their study, published Oct 16 in the Journal of Remote Sensing, the team examined how global land use/landcover (LULC) has undergone dramatic changes with the advancement of industrialization and urbanization, including deforestation and flooding.

 

“We urgently need high-frequency, high-resolution monitoring of LULC to mitigate the impact of human activities on the climate and the environment,” said Qian Shi, a professor from Sun Yat-sen University.  

 

Global LULC monitoring relies on automatic classification algorithms that classify satellite remote sensing images pixel by pixel. Data-driven deep learning methods extract intrinsic features from the remote sensing images and estimate the LULC label of each pixel.

 

In recent years, researchers have increasingly employed a method called semantic segmentation for remote sensing image classification tasks in deep-learning for global land cover mapping. Instead of classifying images as a whole, semantic segmentation classifies every pixel or element with certain labels.

 

“Different from recognizing the commercial scene or residential scene in an image, the semantic segmentation network can delineate the boundaries of each land object in the scene and help us understand how land is being used,” Shi said.

 

This sort of high-level semantic understanding cannot be achieved without the context information of each pixel; geographical objects are closely connected to the surrounding scenes, which can provide cues for the prediction of each pixel. For example, airplanes berth in airports, ships dock in harbors, and mangroves generally grow shoreside.

 

However, the performance of semantic segmentation is limited by the number and quality of training data, and the existing annotation data are usually insufficient in quantity, quality, and spatial resolution, according to Shi.

 

To top things off, the datasets are usually sampled regionally and lack diversity and variability, making data-driven models difficult to scale globally.  

 

To address these drawbacks, the research team proposed a large-scale annotation dataset, Globe230k, for semantic segmentation of remote sensing image. The dataset has three advantages:

 

• Scale - the Globe230k dataset includes 232,819 annotated images with adequate size and a spatial resolution;
• Diversity - the annotated images are sampled from worldwide regions with coverage area of over 60,000 square kilometers, indicating a high variability and diversity;
• Multimodal features - the Globe230k dataset not only contains RGB bands but also other important features for Earth system research such as vegetation, elevation, and polarization indices.

 

The team tested the Globe230k dataset on several state-of-the-art semantic segmentation algorithms and found that it was able to evaluate algorithms crucial to characterizing land cover, including multiscale modeling, detail reconstruction, and generalization ability.

 

“We believe that the Globe230k dataset could support further Earth observation research and provide new insights into global land cover dynamic monitoring,” Shi said.

 

The dataset has been made public and can be used as a benchmark to promote further development of global land cover mapping and semantic segmentation algorithm development.

 

The research is supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China and the National Natural Science Foundation of China

 

Other contributors include Da He, Zhengyu, Liu, Xiaoping Liu and Jingqian Xue all from Sun Yat-sen University and the Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory for Urbanization and Geo-simulation.

 

 

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JOURNAL

Journal of Remote Sensing

DOI

10.34133/remotesensing.0078 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Imaging analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Globe230k: A Benchmark Dense-Pixel Annotation Dataset for Global Land Cover Mapping

 

Chinese Medical Journal article reveals key insights on the trends of asthma mortality

Scientists analyze and compare asthma mortality rates between China and the United States during the last three decades

Peer-Reviewed Publication

CACTUS COMMUNICATIONS

 

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THE PREVALENCE OF ASTHMA HAS BEEN ON THE RISE, AND ITS BURDEN ON INDIVIDUALS AND COUNTRIES IS INCREASING. ANALYZING ASTHMA MORTALITY RATES, AS DONE IN THIS ARTICLE, CAN HELP REVEAL POTENTIAL AREAS OF IMPROVEMENT

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CREDIT: NIAID

Asthma is among the most common chronic respiratory diseases in the world. Characterized by inflammation and narrowing of the airways, it can trigger serious bouts of coughing and breathing problems. Unfortunately, asthma is becoming increasingly prevalent, with a total of over 262 million cases reported worldwide in 2019.

Interestingly, both the prevalence and mortality rates of asthma vary greatly across different regions. For example, its prevalence in the United States (US) was ~11% in 2019, which is four times greater than its prevalence in China in the same year. On the other hand, asthma mortality rates have been consistently higher in China than in the US. Understanding how well these countries are dealing with this disease is challenging because most studies have used rather basic analytic methods that provide limited insights. 

Against this backdrop, a research team from Huazhong University of Science and Technology and NHC Key Laboratory of Respiratory Diseases, both in Wuhan, China, decided to conduct a more detailed comparative analysis of asthma mortality in China and the US. Their study, which was led by Professor Xiansheng Liu, was published in the Chinese Medical Journal and made available online on October 26, 2023. “The risk factors for asthma mortality in China and the US were investigated to provide public health recommendations for reducing mortality,” says Prof. Liu.

To carry out their analysis, the team used data spanning the period 1990–2019 from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019, one of the largest assessments of the impact of various diseases and their associated risk factors throughout the world. To gain deeper insights into asthma mortality, the researchers employed an age–period–cohort (APC) model. This approach has been gaining traction as a valuable method to analyze the incidence and mortality trends of chronic diseases. Simply put, this model allowed them to use an advanced approach to study the effects of age, time period, and birth cohort on asthma mortality separately, unlike simple descriptive methods.

The results revealed substantial differences in asthma mortality between China and the US. First, China had higher asthma mortality rates compared to the US from 1990 to 2019. However, this gap markedly narrowed over time. And second, men had higher asthma mortality rates than women in China, whereas in the US, the case was just the opposite!

A finer analysis showed that asthma mortality rates were also different between the two countries when grouped by age. Infants, young children, and the elderly were the most affected groups in China, whereas in the US, asthma mortality rates increased slowly with age, exponentially increasing after the age of 80 years.    

The researchers also found that smoking, a high body-mass index (BMI), and occupational exposure to asthmagens (asthma-inducing or -triggering particles) were the factors most strongly related to asthma mortality. In China, smoking was the leading risk factor related to asthma mortality, especially for males. The situation was different in the US, as Prof. Liu remarks: “Compared with China, high BMI is a larger public health challenge in the US, where it ranked first in the risk factors of asthma-related death.”

Interestingly, asthma mortality rates in China, albeit higher than in the US, have shown a considerably larger decline over the past three decades. This highlights the effects of China’s transition to a middle-income economy and improvements in the management of asthma risk factors at the individual and societal levels.

Taken together, these findings paint a more complete picture of how asthma mortality varies over time in China and the US. The novel insights provided by the researchers could be leveraged to further reduce asthma mortality. Prof. Liu concludes: “This study on asthma mortality can help focus on at-risk populations who might benefit the most from targeted interventions, such as tobacco control, obesity prevention and treatment, available medical services for the aging population, and practical and pragmatic guidance in the assessment and management of occupational asthma by clinicians and so on.” 

Let us hope a more thorough understanding of the epidemiology of asthma will pave the way to new solutions to lessen its burden on individuals and societies alike.

 

***

Reference

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1097/CM9.0000000000002855

 

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JOURNAL

Chinese Medical Journal

DOI

10.1097/CM9.0000000000002855 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Secular trends of asthma mortality in China and the United States from 1990 to 2019

Falling Walls 2023: How open and interdisciplinary science can tackle the climate crisis

Meeting Announcement

FRONTIERS

 

IMAGE: 

FRED FENTER, CLIMATE ACTION FUTURE

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CREDIT: FRONTIERS/ FALLING WALLS FOUNDATION

Open access publisher Frontiers and the Frontiers Research Foundation joined this year’s Falling Walls Science Summit held on 7-9 November in Berlin, Germany. The Falling Walls Science Summit is a prominent gathering that unites experts from various scientific disciplines to explore groundbreaking research and foster collaborative solutions for the challenges of our time. As a global platform for scientific exchange, this annual event serves as a catalyst for innovation, fostering interdisciplinary dialogue, and promoting breakthrough thinking.  

The three-day event includes inspiring keynotes, thought-provoking discussions, and exciting pitches from some of the most innovative minds in science and technology, exploring how scientific breakthroughs can pave the way towards a more equitable and sustainable future. These breakthroughs cover a diverse range of topics, from physical sciences, life sciences, sciencepreneurship, art and science, and planetary health to discovering earth and space, emerging talents, engineering and technology, and social sciences and humanities.    

The Falling Walls Foundation and Frontiers partnered to organize the Climate Action Future plenary table on 8 November, which addressed the slow and inadequate progress in climate action. Featuring a group of leaders in science, policy, and academic publishing, the plenary investigated the reasons behind the failure, emphasized the need to reinvigorate COP process with solution-driven methods in mind, and explored the role of open science in accelerating solutions, mobilizing stakeholders, and triggering a Green Renaissance. Vivienne Parry OBE, science journalist, author, and former BBC presenter, moderated the discussion, which featured: 

• Johan Rockström, Director, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research  

• Massamba Thioye, Executive, The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 

• Lars Peter Riishøjgaard, Director, Global Greenhouse Gas Watch, World Meteorological Organization  

• Lee Howell, Executive Director, Villars Institute  

• Frederick Fenter, Chief Executive Editor, Frontiers   

Johan Rockström, director of the Potsdam Institute, emphasized the importance of the upcoming COP28 to be one of change, as the climate emergency is one of the most pressing challenges of our time. “Now we need to deliver. We need to be accountable; we need to align with science, we need to put the money on the table, and we have to do it in an equitable way. Now it’s time to pull up our sleeves and get serious. COP28 must be the mitigation COP. It must be the meeting when we start really showing credible pathways to phase out fossil fuels.”    

Panelists also talked about other essential steps to bring about systemic change and restore the planetary boundaries. Massamba Thioye, executive of the UNFCCC, captured these key areas when he said: “We will not be able to address the challenge of climate and sustainability if we do not do something with our inner development goal. This can be articulated around three main principles: caring, sharing, and daring. Firstly, we need to genuinely care about the well-being and needs of the people and the planet. Secondly, we need to share knowledge, which is why open science is extremely important. And thirdly, we need to set goals and targets not on the basis of what we believe is possible, but on what is needed.” 

The plenary echoed the three principles of caring, sharing, and daring raised by Thioye. Frederick Fenter, chief executive editor at Frontiers, highlighted the significance of sharing knowledge through open science and doing so with urgency. He referenced the lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic and how openly shared research through the CORD-19 dataset sparked innovation, resulting in millions of lives saved. This same can, and must, be done with the climate crisis. Fenter said: “Open science has to be part of the toolkit of solutions in terms of addressing the climate emergency.”   

To unlock the world’s science, Fenter introduced the Open Science Charter, an initiative by the Frontiers Research Foundation, which urges governments, research institutions, and funders, as well as industry leaders to commit and act in four main areas: 

1. Universal and unrestricted access to scientific knowledge by 2030: Commit to transitioning all published research articles to fully open-access models by the end of the decade. 

1. Uphold peer-review quality: Preserve and champion the core values of scientific publishing, including registration, validation, certification, and perpetual conservation of scientific findings.  

1. Transparent pricing linked to quality: Adopt transparent financial models that directly correlate the price of publication with the quality of services offered.  

1. Strengthen trust in science: Make the knowledge available to the public who helped pay for it and who will benefit from its deployment 

The theme of accelerating solutions for the most effective mitigation developed in the Climate Action Future plenary table was picked up and further discussed during the Planetary Boundary Science: Advancing Science to Save the Planet round table, organized by the Frontiers Research Foundation and the Falling Walls Foundation. The round table examined the type of science needed to make progress and how to get the right stakeholders on board. Jean-Claude Burgelman, director of the Frontiers Planet Prize, professor of Open Science Policy (Free University of Brussels), and former Head of Unit for Open Science Policy at the European Commission, moderated the round table, which included: 

• Johan Rockström, Director, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research  

• Wendy Broadgate, Global Hub Director, Future Earth  

• Maria Nilsson, Professor, Umeå University, Frontiers Planet Prize national champion 2023, Sweden  

• Paul Behrens, Associate Professor, Leiden University, Frontiers Planet Prize international champion 2023, the Netherlands   

Despite the high-quality science being done within different fields, there is a greater need for more interdisciplinary science. Wendy Broadgate, global hub director at Future Earth, said: “The planet is a system of interconnected cycles, and we need very interconnected science to understand the systems themselves, how we people are perturbing those systems, and what solutions we need to bring our behavior and our activities back within planetary boundaries.”  

This type of science is crucial to serve as a “voice of the earth system,” said director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research Johan Rockström, and guide sustainable development with respect to the planetary boundaries. It’s made possible in part by funding institutions and initiatives like the Frontiers Planet Prize, which was launched in 2022. Jean-Claude Burgelman, director of the Frontiers Planet Prize, said: “The Frontiers Planet Prize is a competition based on scientific excellence, contributing to better understanding [of planetary science], showing potential ways forward and potential ways to scale, connecting several of the boundaries so that we don't have micro solutions, but rather something that can be planetary.”   

Platforms like this also help bring more awareness to the latest discoveries among decisive stakeholders like policymakers and forward-thinking businesses. Opening these lines of communication and ensuring scientists are part of the thoughtful dialogue that considers the needs, concerns, and motivations of each party is key as everyone plays an important role in helping our planet. 

To support and sign The Open Science Charter, please visit here. 

More insights from the 2023 Falling Walls Science Summit sessions can be found on the Frontiers blog and Frontiers Policy Labs commentary. 

Full recordings of each session are available here: 

Climate Action Future plenary table 

Planetary Boundary Science round table 

KIT is planning for climate research in space

The CAIRT satellite mission aims to clarify how the Earth's atmosphere reacts to climate change

Grant and Award Announcement

KARLSRUHER INSTITUT FÜR TECHNOLOGIE (KIT)

 

IMAGE: 

THE EARTH'S ATMOSPHERE ABOVE TIMMINS, CANADA IN AUGUST 2022, PHOTOGRAPHED BY THE GLORIA SCIENTIFIC INSTRUMENT FROM A BALLOON (PHOTO: KIT)

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CREDIT: KIT

ESA's decision to further pursue the CAIRT (changing-atmosphere infrared tomography) satellite mission as one of two projects was confirmed by the ESA Programme Board for Earth Observation on Tuesday (21.11.2023). "For us, this means that the mission is now entering Phase A - which makes our plans much more concrete," explains Professor Björn-Martin Sinnhuber from the Institute of Meteorology and Climate Research at KIT, who is coordinating the scientific work. "If ESA ultimately selects our proposal, we should be able to get data in the early 2030s." By then, CAIRT could be launched into orbit as the ESA Earth Explorer 11 satellite. The purpose of the mission is to obtain urgently needed data on changes in the Earth's atmosphere. These data are expected to improve understanding of the links between atmospheric circulation, the exact composition of the atmosphere and regional climate changes.

Space tomograph for the atmosphere

The centerpiece of CAIRT is an imaging infrared spectrometer to measure a large number of trace gases, aerosols and atmospheric waves with unprecedented spatial resolution. "We are familiar with tomography as a tool for medical diagnostics," says Sinnhuber. "Basically, the same thing happens here, just a bit bigger. It's a kind of space tomograph for the entire Earth's atmosphere." CAIRT will regularly measure the atmosphere at an altitude of five to 115 kilometers in the infrared range with a horizontal resolution of around 50 by 50 kilometers and a vertical resolution of one kilometer.

The planned mission builds on many years of experience in atmospheric remote sensing at KIT. In recent years, KIT researchers have already carried out pioneering work with remote sensing from balloons and airplanes. "Together with Forschungszentrum Jülich, we have developed the scientific instrument GLORIA, which can be seen as a kind of prototype for CAIRT," explains Dr. Michael Höpfner, who heads the research with GLORIA at KIT and is also involved in CAIRT. GLORIA has already made some great scientific observations, most recently new findings on the transport of aerosols after extensive forest fires in Canada during the PHILEAS measurement campaign with the HALO research aircraft, but on high-altitude balloons as well. "With the CAIRT satellite mission, we can take this to a new level because we will then receive global measurements on a daily basis," says Höpfner. 

About CAIRT

KIT coordinated the proposal for the satellite concept for the CAIRT mission, building on a longstanding joint initiative with the Forschungszentrum Jülich. The scientific objectives are defined and consolidated in close cooperation by an international panel of experts from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), the Institute of Applied Physics "Nello Carrara" (IFAC) of the Italian Research Council, the Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia (IAA-CSIC), the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in France, the Royal Belgian Institute of Space Aeronomy (BIRA-IASB), the University of Leeds and the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, the University of Oulu in Finland and the Finnish Meteorological Institute as well as the University of Toronto in Canada.

ESA Press  Release “Cairt and Wivern Earth Explorer candidates go forward”

Further Information: https://www.cairt.eu/

Details on the KIT Climate and Environment Center

 

Being “The Research University in the Helmholtz Association”, KIT creates and imparts knowledge for the society and the environment. It is the objective to make significant contributions to the global challenges in the fields of energy, mobility, and information. For this, about 9,800 employees cooperate in a broad range of disciplines in natural sciences, engineering sciences, economics, and the humanities and social sciences. KIT prepares its 22,300 students for responsible tasks in society, industry, and science by offering research-based study programs. Innovation efforts at KIT build a bridge between important scientific findings and their application for the benefit of society, economic prosperity, and the preservation of our natural basis of life. KIT is one of the German universities of excellence.