From Seattle to space: Science that began at the Allen Institute blasts off to International Space Station

For the first time astronauts will transport Allen Institute cells into space where Cedars-Sinai researchers will study the effects of microgravity.

Business Announcement

ALLEN INSTITUTE

 

IMAGE: CELLS FROM THE SOX2-GFP REPORTER LINE view more 

CREDIT: ALLEN INSTITUTE FOR CELL SCIENCE

SEATTLE — May 18, 2023 — This Sunday (May 21) at 2:37 p.m. PDT1, astronauts from Axiom Space in partnership with Cedars-Sinai will blast off to the International Space Station carrying cells from the Allen Institute for Cell Science, a division of the Allen Institute. There, Axiom Space astronauts will perform experiments and send real-time data back to researchers at Cedars-Sinai as part of their study on the effects of microgravity on human cells.

The experiments are part of the Ax-2 mission, funded by NASA and Axiom Space, and represent a major milestone: It will be the first time Allen Institute-generated cells are flown to space. These cells are part of the publicly available Allen Cell Collection, a suite of human induced pluripotent stem cells gene-edited to illuminate different parts of the cell. 

Images and videos of the cells are available here.

"The original purpose of this collection was to understand how the major organelles or ‘parts’ inside a normal human cell are arranged and how they change as the cell performs different functions or even becomes a different cell type over time. From that foundation we and others can then probe and understand how various perturbations such as human disease affect our cells,” said Ruwanthi Gunawardane, Ph.D., Executive Director of the Allen Institute for Cell Science. “Microgravity is a powerful condition to test the potential and the limits of what cells can do. We never envisioned our cells making it to space when we created this collection, but we’re very excited to see what we can learn from these experiments.”

Specifically, two types of experiments will be conducted during the five-day mission:

1. Cell Proliferation

Using the cell line from the Allen Cell Collection that was gene edited to illuminate specific cell structures, researchers from Cedars-Sinai will explore whether microgravity can be used to improve stem cell proliferation. Earlier studies have shown that stem cells can grow faster in microgravity, and the new mission’s findings could lead to more efficient stem cell production for research and, ultimately, for medical applications.

2. Cell Transfection

Cedars-Sinai researchers will investigate whether DNA can be effectively introduced into the cells (transfection) in microgravity. This early test will be a vital milestone for future experiments, such as introducing stem cell reprogramming factors or modifying the cell’s DNA itself.

Pluripotent stem cells are a useful investigative tool because they transform into nearly any cell type found in the human body. This is important for downstream clinical applications that may use these cells for therapy, such as repairing cardiac tissue after a heart attack.

“The cell lines that the Allen Institute has produced for the community are a tremendous resource,” said Arun Sharma, Ph.D., a stem cell biologist in the Board of Governors Regenerative Medicine Institute, Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cancer Institute, and Smidt Heart Institute at Cedars-Sinai. “These particular cells that are making the journey to space are from a beautiful cell line to work with, because you can see them glowing green when they are most potent. It’s a great visual readout for how healthy our cells will be in microgravity.”

If the experiments successfully demonstrate that pluripotent stem cells can grow better, faster, or more efficiently in microgravity, that insight could open the door to biomedical research in space in service of human health.

 Cells 2 (Video) [VIDEO] | 

About the Allen Institute for Cell Science
Allen Institute for Cell Science, a division of the Allen Institute, an independent, 501(c)(3) nonprofit medical research organization, is dedicated to understanding and modeling cells: the fundamental units of life. By integrating technologies, approaches, models and data into a common standardized framework, the Allen Institute for Cell Science is creating dynamic, visual models of how genetic information is transformed into cellular behavior, and how the molecules and organelles within each cell interact and function as systems. These predictive models will enable the cell science community to better understand the role of cells in both health and disease. The Allen Institute for Cell Science was launched in 2014 with a contribution from founder and philanthropist, the late Paul G. Allen. The data, tools and models from the Allen Institute for Cell Science are publicly available online at allencell.org.

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1. Subject to change based on conditions. Backup date is May 22

In schools, masks and air cleaners were associated with stopping COVID-19

Study of two Swiss schools shows the virus spread frequently among students during Omicron wave

Peer-Reviewed Publication

PLOS

 

IMAGE: NEW STUDY FINDS THAT MASKING AND PORTABLE AIR CLEANERS WERE ASSOCIATED WITH REDUCING THE SPREAD OF THE VIRUS THAT CAUSES COVID-19 IN TWO SWISS SCHOOLS. view more 

CREDIT: MARCO FILECCIA, UNSPLASH (CC0, HTTPS://CREATIVECOMMONS.ORG/PUBLICDOMAIN/ZERO/1.0/)

A new study shows that masking and portable air cleaners reduced the spread of the virus that causes COVID-19 in two Swiss schools. A team led by Nicolas Banholzer and Kathrin Zürcher of the University of Bern, Switzerland, publish these findings on May 18th in the open access journal PLOS Medicine.

During the early part of the COVID-19 pandemic, public health authorities worldwide closed schools to prevent the virus’ spread. This decision sparked intense debate over the role of school children in transmission – a risk that is still poorly understood. In the new study, researchers used molecular, environmental and epidemiological data to understand how the virus that causes COVID-19 spread in two secondary schools in Switzerland, from January to March 2022 during the Omicron wave. The study included 90 students and looked at viral transmission in classes with and without masking or air cleaners.

The researchers consistently detected salivary and airborne SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, in air samples and samples from students throughout the study period. However, concentrations of airborne SARS-CoV-2 were, on average, 70% lower with mask mandates and 40% lower with air cleaners. The findings suggest that between 2 and 19 infections could be avoided while masks were mandated.

The levels of airborne virus detected within the schools indicated that SARS-CoV-2 was continually transmitting among students, and that mask mandates were highly effective at reducing airborne concentrations, thus potentially preventing transmission. The researchers conclude that this monitoring approach could be used during future epidemics of respiratory viral infections to help understand transmission patterns, and whether suggested infection control measures are effective in reducing transmission.

Coauthor Lukas Fenner adds, “Although our study has several limitations, including the observational nature of our study and that detecting SARS-CoV-2 in the air or aerosols does not necessarily mean transmission, we found that mask mandates reduced transmission in classrooms, and both masks and air cleaners reduced aerosol concentrations.”

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In your coverage, please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper in PLOS Medicine: http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1004226

Citation: Banholzer N, Zürcher K, Jent P, Bittel P, Furrer L, Egger M, et al. (2023) SARS-CoV-2 transmission with and without mask wearing or air cleaners in schools in Switzerland: A modeling study of epidemiological, environmental, and molecular data. PLoS Med 20(5): e1004226. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1004226

Author Countries: Switzerland, South Africa, United Kingdom

Funding: see manuscript

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JOURNAL

PLoS Medicine

DOI

10.1371/journal.pmed.1004226 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

COI STATEMENT

Competing interests: I have read the journal’s policy and the authors of this manuscript have the following competing interests: ME serves on PLOS Medicine’s editorial board. All authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Amputees feel warmth in their missing hand

Peer-Reviewed Publication

ECOLE POLYTECHNIQUE FÉDÉRALE DE LAUSANNE

 

VIDEO: INTERVIEW WITH RESEARCHERS, AMPUTEE view more 

CREDIT: PART I : FOR THE FIRST 2:57 MINUTES, CC-BY-SA , CREDIT: EPFL. PART II: FROM 2:57 - 4:00, COPYRIGHT: CENTRO PROTESI INAIL

“When I touch the stump with my hand, I feel tingling in my missing hand, my phantom hand. But feeling the temperature variation is a different thing, something important... something beautiful,” says Francesca Rossi.

Rossi is an amputee from Bologna, Italy. She recently participated in a study to test the effects of temperature feedback directly to the skin on her residual arm. She is one of 17 patients to have felt her phantom, missing hand, change in temperature thanks to new EPFL technology. More importantly, she reports feeling reconnected to her missing hand.

“Temperature feedback is a nice sensation because you feel the limb, the phantom limb, entirely. It does not feel phantom anymore because your limb is back,” Rossi continues.

Researchers Silvestro Micera and Solaiman Shokur have been keen on incorporating new sensory feedback into prosthetic limbs for providing more realistic touch to amputees, and their latest study focuses on temperature. They stumbled upon a discovery about temperature feedback that far exceeds their expectations.

If you place something hot or cold on the forearm of an intact individual, that person will feel the object’s temperature locally, directly on their forearm. But in amputees, that temperature sensation on the residual arm may be felt­… in the phantom, missing hand.

By providing temperature feedback non-invasively, via thermal electrodes (aka thermodes) placed against the skin on the residual arm, amputees like Rossi report feeling temperature in their phantom limb. They can feel if an object is hot or cold, and can tell if they are touching copper, plastic or glass.  In a collaboration between EPFL, Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies (SSSA) and Centro Protesi Inail, the technology was successfully tested in 17 out of 27 patients. The results are published in Science.

“Of particular importance is that phantom thermal sensations are perceived by the patient as similar to the thermal sensations experienced by their intact hand," explains Shokur, EPFL senior scientist neuroengineer who co-led the study.

 

 

Towards realistic bionic touch

The projection of temperature sensations into the phantom limb has led to the development of new bionic technology, one that equips prosthetics with non-invasive temperature feedback that allows amputees to discern what they’re touching.

“Temperature feedback is essential for relaying information that goes beyond touch, it leads to feelings of affection. We are social beings and warmth is an important part of that,” says Micera, Bertarelli Foundation Chair in Translational Neuroengineering, professor at EPFL and SSSA who also co-led the study.  “For the first time, after many years of research in my laboratory showing that touch and position information can be successfully delivered, we envisage the possibility of restoring all of the rich sensations that one’s natural hand can provide.”

 

Temperature feedback, from well-being to prosthetics

A few years ago, Micera and Shokur got wind of a system that could provide temperature feedback through the skin of healthy subjects, also developed at EPFL and spun-off by Metaphysiks.

Metaphysiks has been developing neuro-haptic technology, MetaTouch, which connects the body with digital worlds. MetaTouch combines touch and temperature feedback to augment physical products for well-being. 

“This breakthrough highlights the power of haptics to improve medical conditions and enhance the quality of life for people with disabilities,” says Simon Gallo, Co-founder and Head of Technology at Metaphysiks.

The EPFL neuroengineers borrowed MetaTouch that provides thermal feedback directly to a user’s skin. With this device, they discovered the thermal phantom sensations and subsequently tested it in 27 amputees.

 

The Minitouch prototype and tests

For the study, Shokur and Micera developed the MiniTouch, a device that provides thermal feedback and specifically built for integration into wearable devices like prosthetics. The MiniTouch consists of a thin, wearable sensor that can be placed over an amputee’s prosthetic finger. The finger sensor detects thermal information about the object being touched, more specifically, the object’s heat conductivity.  If the object is metallic, it will naturally conduct more heat or cold than, for instance, a plastic one.  A thermode, one that is in contact with the skin on the amputee’s residual arm, heats up or cools down, relaying the temperature profile of the object being touched by the finger sensor.

“When we presented the possibility to get back temperature sensation on the phantom limb or the possibility to feel the contact with different materials, we obtained a lot of positive feedback.  And eventually, we were able to recruit more than 25 volunteers in less than two years,” says Federico Morosato who was responsible for organizing the clinical aspect of the trials at Centro Protesi Inail.

The scientists found that small areas of skin on the residual arm project to specific parts of the phantom hand, like the thumb, or the tip of an index finger. As expected, they discovered that the mapping of temperature sensations between the residual arm and the entire projected phantom one is unique to each patient.

 

Bionic prosthetics for repairing the human body

Almost a decade ago, Micera and colleagues provided real-time sensory feedback about objects being grasped. They went on to improve touch resolution by providing feedback about an object’s texture and position information in a reliable way. Moreover, they discovered that amputees begin to embody their prosthetic hand if provided with sensory feedback directly into their intact nervous system. The added sensation of temperature feedback is yet another step towards building bionic prosthetics for repairing the human body. Fine-tuning temperature sensations and integrating these into a wearable device that can be mapped out to each patient are part of the next steps.

 

 

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JOURNAL

Science

DOI

10.1126/science.adf6121 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

18-May-2023

Out of the frying pan: Coyotes, bobcats move into human-inhabited areas to avoid apex predators — only to be killed by people

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON

 

IMAGE: THIS IMAGE SHOWS A BOBCAT BEING RELEASED BACK INTO THE WILD IN FEBRUARY 2020 AFTER BEING FITTED WITH A GPS COLLAR AS PART OF THE WASHINGTON PREDATOR-PREY PROJECT. view more 

CREDIT: ZACHARY WARDLE

Link to Google Drive folder containing images:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Wv5Va5E0Pti0kLRogMUdoSnCEIaWlEFy?usp=sharing

Since their protection under the Endangered Species Act, wolf populations have been making a comeback in the continental United States. Conservationists have argued that the presence of wolves and other apex predators, so named because they have no known predators aside from people, can help keep smaller predator species in check.

New research shows that in Washington state, the presence of two apex predators — wolves and cougars — does indeed help keep populations of two smaller predators in check. But by and large the apex predators were not killing and eating the smaller predators, known as mesopredators. Instead, they drove the two mesopredator species — bobcats and coyotes — into areas with higher levels of human activity. And people were finishing the job.

The study — published May 18 in the journal Science by researchers at the University of Washington, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Spokane Tribe of Indians — reports that bobcats and coyotes were more than three times likely to die from human activity, like hunting or trapping, than from the claws and jaws of cougars and wolves.

The findings illustrate how humankind’s growing footprint is changing interactions among other species.

“When cougars and wolves moved into an area, coyotes and bobcats employed a specific strategy to avoid apex predators by moving into more human-impacted regions,” said lead author Laura Prugh, a wildlife ecologist and UW associate professor in the School of Environmental & Forest Sciences. “That indicated to us that coyotes and bobcats likely perceived these large carnivores as a greater threat to them than people. But when we looked at causes of mortality for the mesopredators, humans were by far the largest cause of death.”

For the study, researchers used GPS collars to track the activity of 22 wolves (Canis lupus), 60 cougars (Puma concolor), 35 coyotes (Canis latrans) and 37 bobcats (Lynx rufus) across two study areas in north central and northeastern Washington from winter 2017 to summer 2022 as part of the Washington Predator-Prey Project. The study areas — which included portions of Okanagan, Stevens, Spokane, Pend Oreille and Lincoln counties — consisted of national forests; recreational areas for camping, hunting and fishing; and lands dedicated to agriculture, timber harvesting, ranching and residential use.

Tracking data indicated that, when wolves or cougars moved into their region, bobcats and coyotes would shift their movements accordingly.

“Coyotes and bobcats started using areas that had twice as much human influence compared to where they were before the large carnivores moved in,” said Prugh.

Researchers also attempted to determine the cause of death for any tracked animals that died during the study period. They discovered that areas with high human activity were far more deadly to mesopredators than those without a large human presence.

More than half of the 24 coyotes that died over the course of the study were killed by people. Some were shot after preying on livestock. Humans also killed half of the 22 bobcats that died during the study, including several that were attacking chickens.

In general, humans killed between three and four times more mesopredators in this study than wolves or cougars, both of which typically avoid areas with high levels of human activity.

In the short term, human activity poses little threat to the overall populations of bobcats and coyotes, which are two of the most widespread mesopredators in North America. Neither are endangered, and coyotes in particular are highly adaptable to the presence of people.

But not all mesopredator species are as resilient in human areas as coyotes and bobcats, said Prugh. Others reproduce more slowly or may be vulnerable in multiple ways to human activity. Rodent poisons used to keep away pests, for example, can kill fishers, another mesopredator species.

Future studies would need to investigate how mesopredators use space and resources in areas with high human activity, and what the risks of these shifts are to people.

“These are not trivial shifts in territory or space,” said Prugh. “There are real consequences.”

The findings also add a wrinkle to a working theory of wildlife-human interactions called the human shield hypothesis. Under the hypothesis, the presence of predators in a region causes prey species to move to areas with higher human activity. In Yellowstone National Park, for example, elk have at times moved near hiking trails, which wolves and other large carnivores typically avoid.

But the impact of humans in Yellowstone is typically smaller compared to other types of recreational areas or farms, grazing lands and residential developments – leaving some scientists to wonder if humans would be much of a “shield” in those areas.

“In these areas with higher levels of human activity, it was unknown whether a mesopredator would perceive the apex predator or humans as the greater threat,” said Prugh. “Here, we found that bobcats and coyotes perceived their apex predators as the greater threat, but their strategy of avoiding those large carnivores backfired by bringing them into contact with a much more effective predator: us.”

Co-authors are UW postdoctoral researcher Calum Cunningham; former UW researcher Rebecca Windell; Brian Kertson, a biologist with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife; Taylor Ganz, a UW doctoral student in environmental and forest sciences; Savanah Walker with the Spokane Tribe of Indians; and Aaron Wirsing, UW professor of environmental and forest sciences. The research was funded by the National Science Foundation, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Australia Fulbright Program.

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For more information, contact Prugh at lprugh@uw.edu.

Grant numbers: DEB-1652420, 16-07846

Reference: Prugh LR, Cunningham CX, Windell RM, Kertson BN, Ganz TR, Walker SL and Wirsing AJ. “Fear of large carnivores amplifies human-caused mortality for mesopredators.” Science 2023. DOI: 10.1126/science.adf2472

A note from Science for journalists: “Advance copies of embargoed papers may be obtained by registered reporters from our press package, SciPak, at https://www.eurekalert.org/press/scipak/. For reporters having difficulties accessing the paper from the press package, please have them contact scipak@aaas.org. After embargo lift, anyone may view a copy of your manuscript at https://www.science.org/journal/science.”

This video shows UW researchers trapping a bobcat in 2020, fitting it with a GPS collar and releasing it as part of the Washington Predator-Prey Project:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYPCD6yKNHs [Credit: Calum Cunningham]

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JOURNAL

Science

DOI

10.1126/science.adf2472 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Fear of large carnivores amplifies human-caused mortality for mesopredators

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

18-May-2023

This image taken by a game camera at night shows a coyote wearing a GPS collar in September 2018 as part of the Washington Predator-Prey Project.

CREDIT

Savanah Walker

Fear of large predators drives smaller predators into areas they perceive as safer, but where risk is greater

Peer-Reviewed Publication

AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE (AAAS)

Medium-sized carnivorous species – mesopredators like coyotes or bobcats – tend to move into human-dominated areas to avoid predation by larger carnivores, a phenomenon also known as the “human shield” effect. However, according to a new study, doing so places these safety-seeking species at considerably greater risk for mortality due to human activities. The findings describe a “paradox of the lethal human shield” for mesopredators, which could become an increasingly important driver of carnivore community dynamics and ecological trophic structures as species restoration and recovery efforts expand the coexistence of large predators and humans in shared landscapes. Although the use of human shields has been linked to increased wildlife survival rates in some instances, it also has the potential to impose increased risk for human-caused mortality through hunting, human-wildlife conflict removals, or vehicular collisions. However, the interacting dangers posed by large carnivores and humans affect the behavior and mortality of smaller predators remains poorly understood. Using data from radio-collared coyotes and bobcats (mesopredators), as well as wolves and cougars (sympatric large carnivores), Laura Prugh and colleagues investigated the movements of these animals in relation to one another and in relation to substantial human activities across northern Washington state. Prugh et al. found that smaller predators tended to move away from the larger predators into areas with greater human influence, suggesting the smaller species perceived humans to be less of a threat than larger carnivores. However, rather than shielding mesopredators and improving their overall survival, the authors discovered that the human-caused mortality rates for mesopredators were more than three times higher than large-carnivore-caused mortality in these areas. Prugh et al. suggest that this scenario could represent an ecological trap. “Despite uncertainty among underlying behavioral and evolutionary processes, the study by Prugh et al. highlights the ecological implications of human influence on relationships among multiple trophic levels,” write Chris Darimont and Ishana Shukla in a related Perspective.

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JOURNAL

Science

DOI

10.1126/science.adf2472 

ARTICLE TITLE

Fear of large carnivores amplifies human-caused mortality for mesopredators

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

19-May-2023

Unmanaged global forests have limited carbon sequestration potential

Peer-Reviewed Publication

AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE (AAAS)

Even if all direct human management of global forests ended immediately, their carbon sequestration potential would not be enough to curb ongoing climate change, according to a new study. The findings suggest that the planet’s current forests have only limited remaining carbon storage potential – even under the most unlikely of scenarios – to substantially mitigate atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) without major reductions in emissions. By capturing and storing carbon in biomass and soil organic matter, forests are integral to the global carbon cycle. As a result, the planet’s forests are often considered a central component in climate change policymaking, and many climate mitigation plans rely on forest-based carbon storage strategies to complement hard reductions in anthropogenic carbon emissions to achieve carbon neutrality. Despite this, the total amount of carbon that could realistically be stored in global forests remains poorly understood, nor has it been fully considered in climate mitigation strategies and policies. To address this, Caspar Roebroek and colleagues investigated the natural limits to additional carbon accumulation in the biomass of existing forests in the hypothetical absence of all direct human forest management activities, including wood harvesting, planting, and fire suppression, for example. Combining global maps of forest biomass in natural and managed forests with a novel machine learning, Roebroek et al. discovered that, under current climatic conditions and atmospheric CO2 concentrations, and the removal of all human forest management activities, existing global forests could increase their aboveground biomass by an additional ~44.1 petagrams of carbon. According to the authors, this represents an increase of roughly 15% more carbon than is currently stored in global forests, which would only offset about 4 years of worth of anthropogenic CO2 under current emission rates.

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JOURNAL

Science

DOI

10.1126/science.add5878 

ARTICLE TITLE

Releasing global forests from human management: How much more carbon could be stored?

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

19-May-2023

POLITICAL ECOLOGY

In years after El Niño, global economy loses trillions

Study: Global downturn after Pacific climate pattern persists for several years

Peer-Reviewed Publication

DARTMOUTH COLLEGE

 

IMAGE: BY 2003, LOWER-INCOME TROPICAL NATIONS HAD EXPERIENCED THE GREATEST RESIDUAL LOSSES ON GROSS DOMESTIC PRODUCT (GDP) AS A RESULT OF THE 1997-98 EL NIÑO. THE COLOR SCALE INDICATES PERCENTAGE SHIFT IN GDP AS A RESULT OF THE 1997-98 EL NIÑO, FROM THE HIGHEST GAIN (BLUE) TO THE HIGHEST LOSS (RED). view more 

CREDIT: CHRIS CALLAHAN

In the years it strikes, the band of warm ocean water spanning from South America to Asia known as El Niño triggers far-reaching changes in weather that result in devastating floods, crop-killing droughts, plummeting fish populations, and an uptick in tropical diseases.

With El Niño projected to return this year, Dartmouth researchers report in the journal Science that the financial toll of the recurring climate pattern can persist for several years after the event itself—and cost trillions in lost income worldwide. The study is among the first to evaluate the long-term costs of El Niño and projects losses that far exceed those estimated by previous research.

El Niño is the warm phase of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, the natural cycle of warm and cold temperatures in the tropical Pacific Ocean that includes La Niña, El Niño’s cooler counterpart. El Niño alters weather patterns worldwide and, in the United States, typically results in wetter, warmer winters for the West Coast and a milder hurricane season on the Atlantic seaboard.

The researchers spent two years examining global economic activity in the decades following the 1982-83 and 1997-98 El Niño events and found a "persistent signature" of slowed economic growth more than five years later. The global economy bled $4.1 trillion and $5.7 trillion, respectively, in the half-decade after each of these events, most of it borne by the world’s poorest nations in the tropics.

The researchers project that global economic losses for the 21st century will amount to $84 trillion as climate change potentially amplifies the frequency and strength of El Niño—even if current pledges by world leaders to reduce carbon emissions come to fruition. The researchers estimate that the El Niño predicted for 2023 alone could hold the global economy back by as much as $3 trillion by 2029.

Lead author Christopher Callahan, a doctoral candidate in geography at Dartmouth, said the study addresses an ongoing debate about how quickly societies rebound from major climate events such as El Niño.

"We can say with certainty that societies and economies absolutely do not just take a hit and recover," said Callahan, adding that their data suggested a downturn after El Niño could last as long as 14 years, if not longer.

"In the tropics and places that experience the effects of El Niño, you get a persistent signature during which growth is delayed for at least five years," he said. "The aggregate price tag on these events has not ever been fully quantified—you have to add up all the depressed growth moving forward, not just when the event is happening."

Senior author Justin Mankin, an assistant professor of geography, said the findings highlight a critical and understudied factor shaping the economic toll of global warming—year-to-year variations in climate conditions. While these swings are largely independent from global warming, they can amplify or diminish its effects. Once described as the "trunk of the tree of climate variability," El Niño is the largest and most important source of year-to-year climate variation, altering weather around the world and resonating across national economies.

When it comes to climate change, world leaders and the public rightfully focus on the unabated rise in the global average temperature, Mankin said. "But if you're estimating the costs of global warming without considering El Niño, then you are dramatically underestimating the costs of global warming."

"Our welfare is affected by our global economy, and our global economy is tied to the climate," Mankin said. "When you ask how costly climate change is, you can start by asking how costly climate variation is. We're showing here that such variation, as embodied in El Niño, is incredibly costly and stagnates growth for years, which led us to cost estimates that are orders of magnitudes larger than previous ones."

Callahan and Mankin found that the 1982-83 and 1997-98 events caused the gross domestic product of the United States to be approximately 3% lower in 1988 and 2003 than it would have been otherwise. But in 2003, the GDPs of coastal tropical nations such as Peru and Indonesia were lower by more than 10%.

“The global pattern of El Niño’s effect on the climate and on the prosperity of different countries reflects the unequal distribution of wealth and climate risk—not to mention the responsibility for climate change—worldwide,” Mankin said. “El Niño amplifies the wider inequities in climate change, disproportionately impacting the least resilient and prepared among us.”

"The duration and magnitude of the financial repercussions we uncovered suggests to me that we are maladapted to the climate we have," he said. "Our accounting dramatically raises the cost estimate of doing nothing. We need to both mitigate climate change and invest more in El Niño prediction and adaptation because these events will only amplify the future costs of global warming.”

The 2023 El Niño is predicted to come at a time when sea-surface temperatures are at an all-time high, Callahan said. The last major El Niño occurred in 2016 and made that year the hottest in recorded history. Global warming has only intensified in the seven years since. In addition, the world is coming out of an extended La Niña and the two phases can strengthen each other. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration projects the chances of El Niño setting in by late summer as higher than 80%.

"The deck is potentially stacked for a really big El Niño," Callahan said. "Our results suggest that there will likely be a major economic toll that depresses economic growth in tropical countries for potentially up to a decade. The result could be trillions of dollars in productivity lost globally relative to a world without this El Niño."

The paper "Persistent effect of El Niño on global economic growth" was published May 18, 2023, by Science. The research was funded by a Graduate Research Fellowship (1840344) from the National Science Foundation; the Wright Center for the Study of Computation and Just Communities in Dartmouth’s Neukom Institute for Computational Science; and the Nelson A. Rockefeller Center for Public Policy and the Social Sciences.

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JOURNAL

Science

DOI

10.1126/science.adf2983 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Persistent effect of El Niño on global economic growth

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

18-May-2023