How plants rot: New method decodes hidden decomposers of wood and leaves

Technology developed by a team led by researchers from Goethe University Frankfurt helps in the search for genes with certain functions

Goethe University Frankfurt

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A recent bioinformatics-based study conducted by Goethe University Frankfurt has investigated which organisms possess the enzymatic tools necessary for degrading cellulose in dead wood and leaves.

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Credit: Markus Bernards for Goethe University Frankfurt

FRANKFURT. When a tree dies, it forms the foundation for new life: In a slow, invisible process, leaves, wood and roots are gradually decomposed – not by wind or weather but by millions and millions of tiny organisms. Fungi thread their way through the dead wood and degrade cell walls. Tiny animals such as insect larvae and mites gnaw through the tissue. And something very important happens in the process: The carbon stored in the plant is released, ultimately placing it at the disposal of plants again for the purpose of photosynthesis. But what exactly is responsible for performing this task in the global carbon cycle? And which molecular tools do the organisms use for it? To answer these questions, the researchers have developed a new bioinformatics-based method, which they have now presented in Molecular Biology and Evolution.

18,000 species in the spotlight

This method, called fDOG (Feature architecture-aware directed ortholog search), makes it possible to search in the genetic material of various organisms for genes that have evolved from the same precursor gene. It is assumed that these genes, known as “orthologs”, encode proteins with similar functions. For the current study, the scientists searched for the genes of plant cell wall-degrading enzymes (PCDs). Unlike previous methods, fDOG not only searches through masses of genomic information but also analyzes the architecture of the proteins found – i.e. their structural composition, which reveals a lot about an enzyme’s function.

“We start with a gene from one species, referred to as the seed, and then trawl through tens of thousands of species in the search for orthologous genes,” explains Ingo Ebersberger, Professor for Applied Bioinformatics at Goethe University Frankfurt. “In the process, we constantly monitor whether the genes we find perhaps differ from the seed in terms of function and structure – for example, through the loss or gain of individual areas relevant for function.”

The research team used this method to search for more than 200 potential PCD candidates in over 18,000 species from all three domains of life – bacteria, archaea and eukaryotes (plants, animals, fungi). The result is a detailed global map – with unprecedented accuracy – of enzymes capable of degrading plant cell walls.

Surprising discoveries among fungi and animals

The researchers devised special visualization methods to analyze the vast amounts of data and detect patterns. This revealed characteristic changes in the enzyme repertoire of the fungi under study, indicating a change in lifestyle of certain fungal species: From a decomposing lifestyle – i.e. the degradation of dead plants – to a parasitic lifestyle in which they infest living animals. Such evolutionary transitions are mirrored in characteristic patterns of enzyme loss.

A special surprise in the animal kingdom was the discovery that some arthropods possess an unexpectedly wide range of plant cell wall-degrading enzymes. These enzymes presumably originated from fungi and bacteria and entered the genome of invertebrates via direct gene transfer between different organisms – i.e. horizontal gene transfer. This suggests that they might be able to degrade plant material independently and are not reliant on the bacteria in their intestines, as was previously assumed. In another case, however, it emerged that the potential PCD genes in the analyzed sequence could be ascribed to microbial contamination – an important sign that such data need to be checked very carefully.

New insights into the global carbon cycle

The study shows how fDOG can be used to systematically map biological capabilities across the entire tree of life – from broad-scale overviews to detailed investigations of individual species. With this method, it is possible both to track evolutionary trajectories and to identify players previously overlooked in the global carbon cycle. Since soils contain large amounts of dead plant material and therefore constitute the largest terrestrial carbon sink, the decomposition of plant material is an important driver of the global carbon cycle. “Our method gives us a fresh view of how metabolic capacities are distributed across the tree of life,” says Ebersberger. “We can now conduct multi-scale analyses and in the process detect both recent evolutionary changes and large patterns.”

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Journal

Molecular Biology and Evolution

DOI

10.1093/molbev/msaf120 

Method of Research

Data/statistical analysis

Subject of Research

Animals

Article Title

Feature architecture-aware ortholog search with fDOG reveals the distribution of plant cell wall-degrading enzymes across life

 

Why cheap cigarettes from other states are a costly problem for New York City

Rutgers University

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New York City has the highest cigarette taxes in the nation, but Rutgers Health research indicates that many smokers illegally avoid them.

Most cigarette packs littered on city streets came from out-of-state sources or bore no tax stamps, according to a study that suggests widespread evasion of the city's steep tobacco taxes.

Researchers who collected 252 discarded cigarette packs from across the city's five boroughs found that only 16.6% bore the proper New York City tax stamp, down from 39.3% in 2011 and 23.7% in 2015 when other teams conducted the same experiment.

The findings, published in Tobacco Control, based on systematic collection from 30 census tracts in February 2024, offer a unique window into consumption patterns by using litter as a proxy for where smokers obtain cigarettes.

“It’s arbitrage,” said Kevin Schroth, a researcher at Rutgers Institute for Nicotine and Tobacco Studies and lead author of the study. “If something is cheaper in one place and more expensive in another, people will find ways to profit by purchasing in the cheap place and selling in the expensive one. And because we can compare our findings to prior work, we can see that it may be a growing problem for New York City’s tax collection. What’s interesting, though, is that despite this trend, New York City’s smoking rates are still declining. This might mean that part of a shrinking smoking population is very determined to get cheap, untaxed cigarettes.”

The research revealed a notable geographic shift in cigarette trafficking patterns. Georgia emerged as the primary source of illicit cigarettes, accounting for 27.8% of the littered packs and surpassing Virginia’s 20.6%. Packs with no tax stamps (which likely come from North Carolina or Indian reservations) comprised 20.2% of the sample, nearly doubling from 12.1% in 2015.

The study also highlighted the outsized role of Newport, a menthol brand that made up 43.3% of all collected packs. Some 89.9% of Newport packs lacked New York City tax stamps. This high percentage of menthol packs raises issues about smuggling’s impact on health equity, the researchers said. Menthol use is far higher among Black and Latino smokers than white smokers, and cheaper illicit menthols may make it more difficult for people to quit.

With state and city taxes totaling $6.85 per pack plus a $1.01 federal tax, cigarettes sold legally in New York City are among the highest taxes in the nation. By contrast, cigarettes face 37 cents in taxes in Georgia and 60 cents in Virginia, allowing smugglers and their customers to split more than $6 in tax savings on every pack. (New Jersey’s tax of $3 per pack might make it a destination for individual city smokers who want to save money without going far, but it appears to be too high for smugglers.) North Carolina imposes a 45-cent tax and does not require tax stamps. Indian reservations do not impose taxes or require stamps.

Schroth, who previously worked with the New York City Health Department on cigarette tax enforcement, described a retail system where legitimate and illicit cigarettes operate side by side. Some store owners hide untaxed cigarettes in secret compartments beneath counters or above drop ceilings, he said, while customers use code phrases like "special price" to signal their interest in tax-free products.

Local agencies conduct store sweeps, but cracking a supply chain that stretches down Interstate 95 is difficult.

Schroth said the most promising fix lies upstream. He pointed to a federal “track and trace” system Congress authorized in 2009 that would assign unique identifiers to packs and record transfers from manufacturer to distributor to retailer.

“With track and trace, you could pick up a littered pack in New York and see that it moved through a specific warehouse and into a specific store in Georgia,” Schroth said. “That lets you focus enforcement on the points feeding the illicit market. It could also reveal sources of unstamped packs. The FDA would have to follow its rule making process to execute this Congressional mandate.”

The persistence of illicit trade creates a paradox for public health officials: While cigarette taxes are designed both to generate revenue and discourage smoking, the study's findings suggest they are high enough that a significant portion of the city's estimated 565,000 adult smokers may be circumventing the price increases meant to push them toward quitting.

Still, smoking rates in New York City have continued to decline even as tax evasion appears to have increased. Adult smoking fell from 14.3% in 2015 to 9.7% in 2022, below both the national average of 11.6% and the rest of New York State at 12.3%.

The researchers acknowledged limitations in their methodology, noting uncertainty about whether people who litter cigarette packs are more likely to buy smuggled cigarettes than others. However, they argued that comparing litter samples over time using identical methods provides valuable insights into changing patterns of tax compliance.

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Journal

Tobacco Control

DOI

10.1136/tc-2025-059387 

Method of Research

Experimental study

Subject of Research

Not applicable

Article Title

Cigarette trafficking in New York City: now and then

Article Publication Date

26-Aug-2025

Majority of oncology staff at Moroccan Cancer Institute affected by burnout

“Burnout is highly prevalent among oncology healthcare professionals in Morocco, particularly among young female nurses”

Impact Journals LLC

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Figure 2. Modeling relationships between burnout dimensions using structural equation modeling (SEM).
Abbreviations: EE: Emotional Exhaustion; DP: Depersonalization; PA: Personal Accomplishment.

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Credit: Copyright: © 2025 Errami et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

“Burnout is highly prevalent among oncology healthcare professionals in Morocco, particularly among young female nurses.”

BUFFALO, NY — August 28, 2025 — A new research paper was published in Volume 12 of Oncoscience on July 31, 2025, titled “Burnout among oncology nurses and technicians in Morocco: Prevalence, risk factors, and structural equation modeling.”

In this study, Imane Errami, Saber Boutayeb, and Hassan Errihani from the Faculty of Medicine and Pharmacy at University Mohammed V of Rabat investigated the prevalence of burnout among oncology nurses, technicians and administrative staff in Morocco. The study revealed high levels of burnout, which is particularly concerning for public health and healthcare system sustainability.

Burnout is a growing issue in the medical field worldwide, especially in high-stress environments like oncology. This study focused on healthcare professionals at the National Institute of Oncology in Rabat, a major cancer treatment center in Morocco. Using a validated psychological tool called the Maslach Burnout Inventory and a statistical approach known as structural equation modeling, researchers assessed the severity of burnout in 91 participants and identified key risk factors.

“A cross-sectional study was conducted from September to December 2024 at the National Institute of Oncology in Rabat.”

The study found that over 60% of participants showed signs of severe burnout. Over 70% reported moderate to high emotional exhaustion, while more than half showed signs of depersonalization, reflecting emotional detachment from patients. In contrast, about a quarter of participants reported low personal accomplishment in their professional roles. Younger staff, women, nurses, and those working frequent night shifts were the most affected.

Many participants also reported insufficient sleep, limited physical activity, and dissatisfaction with their salaries and working conditions. More than 80% expressed a desire to leave the profession.

The study provides important insight into the emotional challenges faced by oncology staff, especially frontline workers who manage long hours and emotionally draining situations. It highlights that burnout is driven by multiple factors, including high workload, poor work-life balance, lack of recognition, and frequent workplace conflict. Emotional exhaustion was found to be the key factor that triggered other symptoms of burnout, including detachment and reduced job satisfaction.

The authors call for urgent institutional changes to support healthcare workers. Suggested measures include reducing workload, improving working conditions, offering financial incentives, and promoting ongoing training and psychological support. These recommendations align with international guidelines that emphasize organizational, rather than individual, solutions to burnout.

This study underscores the urgent need to address systemic stressors within healthcare systems, particularly in oncology. By improving the work environment and recognizing the critical roles of oncology personnel, health institutions can better safeguard both staff well-being and patient care outcomes.

Continue reading: DOI: https://doi.org/10.18632/oncoscience.623

Correspondence to: Imane Errami – imane_errami@um5.ac.ma 

Video short: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_oIr-BmzyWo

Keywords: cancer, burnout, oncology, healthcare professionals, risk factors

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About Oncoscience: 

Oncoscience is a peer-reviewed, open-access, traditional journal covering the rapidly growing field of cancer research, especially emergent topics not currently covered by other journals. This journal has a special mission: Freeing oncology from publication cost. It is free for the readers and the authors.

Oncoscience is indexed and archived by PubMed, PubMed Central, Scopus, META (Chan Zuckerberg Initiative) (2018-2022), and Dimensions (Digital Science).

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For media inquiries, please contact media@impactjournals.com.

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Journal

Oncoscience

DOI

10.18632/oncoscience.623 

Method of Research

News article

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Burnout among oncology nurses and technicians in Morocco: Prevalence, risk factors, and structural equation modeling

 

Data science uncovers patterns in health service use linked to child mortality

Washington University in St. Louis

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Children in sub-Saharan Africa have the world’s highest rates of under-5 mortality at 74 deaths per 1,000 live births, which is 14 times higher than the risk for children in North America and Europe. In 2021, sub-Saharan Africa accounted for more than 80% of under-5 mortality worldwide. Sadly, the causes of death, such as diarrhea, malaria and preterm birth, are mostly preventable or treatable.

An interdisciplinary team of artificial intelligence (AI) and global health researchers at Washington University in St. Louis sought to determine how the use of reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health services may affect these stark rates. Previous research has found such services are critical in improving child health and preventing death; the question was how, and who, are using such services.

Using statistical learning to analyze a decade of data from 31 sub-Saharan African countries, the team identified key socioeconomic factors — such as maternal education and place of residence — that are strongly associated with whether mothers use available health services. Results of the research were published online Aug. 22 in Nature Communications.

Claire Najjuuko, a doctoral student at WashU, analyzed a dataset of more than 9,000 births that resulted in death before age 5 availed by the Demographic and Health Survey program. She applied multilevel latent class analysis to 16 health service indicators, identifying three distinct groups of mothers — low, medium and high service users — and classifying countries into three categories based on overall service utilization patterns. She then applied multinomial regression to reveal how socioeconomic factors are linked to service usage patterns across different groups.

“Our study shows a strong link between socioeconomic factors and maternal and child health services use,” said Najjuuko, who is co-advised by Chenyang Lu, the Fullgraf Professor in computer science and engineering at the McKelvey School of Engineering and director of the university’s AI for Health Institute, and Fred M. Ssewamala, formerly at the Brown School at WashU and now a professor of poverty studies at New York University.

Some of the 16 variables that Najjuuko used as indicators of accessing maternal and child health services included pregnancy care, health facility-based deliveries, postpartum care, breastfeeding and protective practices such as using improved sanitation facilities, access to safe drinking water and use of clean cooking fuels.

“We found high breastfeeding practices in young mothers of low socioeconomic status, likely because they have the time, and it’s the only option because they don’t have alternative nutrition for their babies,” Najjuuko said.

However, the same group also had lower odds of the mother having education, employment, living in urban areas or being in a high wealth tier.

The medium-utilization group was characterized by a mixed panel, including high prenatal and postpartum care use, yet low rates of institutional delivery, likely due to accessibility barriers, such as finding transportation to a hospital to give birth.

Najjuuko said the high-utilization group also had the highest prevalence of protective practices such as using improved sanitation facilities, having access to clean drinking water and using clean cooking fuels in their homes.

“This group additionally had a high proportion of met need for family planning, the recommended births spacing, marrying at above 18 years old and utilization of a wide continuum of care services before, during and after delivery, which included majority of the 16 health service utilization indicators covered,” Najjuuko said.

In addition to the individual-level grouping, Najjuuko also grouped the data by country. The researchers found that the coverage and use of these services varied by country due to socioeconomic, behavioral and cultural differences. More than half of the 31 countries had relatively high rates of use of maternal and child health services, likely because these countries have improved accessibility to such services. However, other countries had a more fragmented utilization landscape.

“Our findings show a strong link between socioeconomic status and maternal and child health services use,” Najjuuko said. “We need to target strategies toward the most socioeconomically disadvantaged groups. There have been other studies aimed at improving socioeconomic standing of families. It is a key to help people get out of poverty or to get more education and get knowledge about access to these life-saving services.”

Lu said the dataset is invaluable for improving public health and policymaking.

“This multi-country dataset gives us really valuable insights to help shape health policies,” Lu said. “A lot of things we might assume — like going to a health facility for childbirth — actually show big differences across Africa, according to this survey. Policymakers can use these data-driven results because there’s so much information to help guide their decisions. For example, as Claire mentioned, some mothers know they should go to a hospital but can’t because of barriers like transportation. These findings give clear, precise insights about what kinds of policies could work in different countries and help policymakers make the best use of resources.”

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Najjuuko C, Xu Z, Kizito S, Lu C, Ssewamala FM. Patterns of maternal, newborn, and child health services utilization, and associated socioeconomic disparities in sub-Saharan Africa: Multilevel latent class analysis. Nature Communications. Published online Aug. 22 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-61350-8. 

This study was supported in part by funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Researcher Resilience Training grant (R25MH118935-01), the AI for Health Institute and the Fullgraf Foundation.  

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Journal

Nature Communications

 

Was Jesus’ crucified body wrapped in the Shroud of Turin? A newly discovered Medieval document is the earliest written evidence to suggest not

World-leading Shroud of Turin expert says findings are “further historical evidence that even in the Middle Ages, they knew that the Shroud was not authentic”

Taylor & Francis Group

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Newly uncovered medieval evidence is the latest to cast doubt on the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin, the linen cloth many believe was used to wrap the crucified body of Jesus. 

 

Following analysis, this recently discovered, previously unknown ancient document has become one of the oldest dismissals of the famous 14-foot cloth – and the oldest written evidence known to-date. 

 

Findings, published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Medieval History, show a highly-respected, Norman theologian Nicole Oresme had rejected the Shroud, with this future bishop claiming it as a “clear” and “patent” fake – the result of deceptions by ‘clergy men’. 

 

Bearing a faint imprint image of the front and back of a naked man, consistent with traditional accounts of Jesus of Nazareth after his death by crucifixion, the Shroud’s genuineness is still being questioned to this day – with many supporters of its authenticity maintaining their belief.  

 

This is despite ever-growing new research. For example, one paper this summer, published in the journal Archaeometry concluded – using 3D analysis – that the material had been wrapped around a sculpture, rather than Jesus’ body. 

 

Previous radiocarbon dating of the Shroud has also determined the linen was produced at the end of the 13th or 14th century. 

 

“This now-controversial relic has been caught up in a polemic between supporters and detractors of its cult for centuries,” explains Dr Nicolas Sarzeaud, the lead author of this new study, out today.  

 

Dr Sarzeaud is a researcher in history at the Université Catholique of Louvain, in Belgium, and a fellow of the Villa Médicis, the French Academy, in Rome, Italy. His focus is on the history of relics and images – and more specifically on the question of traces in the West in the late Middle Ages. 

 

His new paper is important, he explains, as it shows that a statement – found by renowned historians Alain Boureau and Béatrice Delaurenti – within a treatise by Oresme is now the first-ever written, ‘official’, and highly respected rejection of the Shroud presented to-date.  
 

This is rather than the previously known account written in 1389 by the bishop of Troyes, Pierre d’Arcis, who rejected the Shroud as a fraud and reported that a predecessor of his had done likewise in around 1355. 
 
Dr Sarzeaud says Oresme – who later became the Bishop of Lisieux, in France – was a particularly important figure at the time and well-regarded for his attempts to provide rational explanations for so-called miracles and other phenomena. He was influential, too, for his works on economics, mathematics, physics, astrology, astronomy, and philosophy. 
 
“What has been uncovered is a significant dismissal of the Shroud,” Dr Sarzeaud states. 

 

“Oresme asserts: ‘I do not need to believe anyone who claims: “Someone performed such miracle for me”, because many clergy men thus deceive others, in order to elicit offerings for their churches. ‘This is clearly the case for a church in Champagne, where it was said that there was the shroud of the Lord Jesus Christ, and for the almost infinite number of those who have forged such things, and others.’ 

 

“Nicole Oresme did not choose just any venerated object as an example of a fraud orchestrated by the clergy. Oresme chose the claim of the Champenoise (Lirey) shrine to possess the Shroud as a striking example of lies fabricated by the clergy.  

 

“What makes Oresme’s writing stand out is his attempt to provide rational explanations for unexplained phenomena, rather than interpreting them as divine or demonic. The philosopher even rated witnesses according to factors such as their reliability, and also cautioned against rumour. 

 
“Nicole Oresme was unwilling to compromise his scholarly approach for pastoral purposes, it was essential for him to denounce all errors and manipulations.” 

 

Dr Sarzeaud adds: “When viewed in the broader history of relics and devotional images, this case gives us an unusually detailed account of clerical fraud – a topic typically treated generically in satire or theological debates on the potential for superstitious devotion, but very rarely documented in the form of concrete accusations of fraud against a clerical institution. 

 

“Oresme’s assessment of the Shroud, too, actually prompted him to be more broadly suspicious of the word of clergy all together.” 

 

Commenting on Dr Sarzeaud’s findings, world-leading Shroud of Turin expert Professor Andrea Nicolotti says the results are “further historical evidence that even in the Middle Ages, they knew that the Shroud was not authentic”. 

 

“The other technological and scientific evidence, which points in the same direction, remains unchanged,” adds Professor Nicolotti, who is a Professor of History of Christianity and Churches, at the University of Turin. 
 
“This new discovery of Oresme’s conclusion is particularly important because it confirms that at the time of its composition, likely in the 1370s, that a shroud had been fraudulently presented as authentic in Lirey. And this was widespread news, reaching as far as Paris.  

 

“This allowed Oresme to cite it in one of his books, confident that his readers would understand what he was talking about.  

 

“Oresme’s opinion is very important because it comes from a person who was not personally involved in the dispute – and therefore had no interest in supporting his own position.  

 

“With this document the story we already knew from other sources is perfectly confirmed.” 

 

In addition to the revelation of Oresme’s document, a main feature of Sarzeaud’s paper is its detailed history mapping of the physical journey of the Shroud during this period. 

Sarzeaud says Oresme would have assessed the Shroud, as it had found its way to Lirey – a village in France’s Champagne region. (As such, the controversial relic was known as the Shroud of Lirey in medieval times.) 

 

Oresme, Dr Sarzeaud explains, referenced the Shroud in a document written between 1355 and 1382, most likely after 1370. He hypothesizes that Oresme learned about the Lirey fraud when he was a scholar and a counsellor to the king in the 1350s. 

 

It was displayed in Lirey until around 1355 when the Bishop of Troyes ordered its removal. This followed extensive investigations adding evidence that it was not authentic and people had been paid to ‘fake miracles’. 

 

It was then hidden away for more than three decades until it was granted permission from Pope Clement VII to be displayed once more – but under the strict instruction that worshippers were to be told that it was as a ‘figure or representation of the Shroud’ and it should be exposed as so.  

 

It was formally announced as a fake in a memorandum for Pope Clement VII in 1389. The bishop even asked Charles VI of France to halt further displays of the Shroud – referring to it as ‘a manufactured cloth, artificially portrayed’.  

Today, many centuries on, replicas are exposed all over the world; but the Shroud is rarely shown to the public. 
 
So, what does Dr Sarzeaud feel about what Oresme’s conclusion of the Shroud of Turin mean for its authenticity? 

“The Shroud is the most documented case of a forged relic in the Middle Ages, and one of the few examples of a cult denounced and stopped by the Church and clerics,” he explains.  
 
“Although we generally consider people from this era to be credulous, Oresme provides a precious example of medieval critical thinking, evaluating testimonies and dismissing evidence not corroborated by any real evidence – so, naturally, I agree with his assessment. 

“It is striking that, of the thousands of relics from this period, it is the one most clearly described as false by the medieval Church that has become the most famous today.” 

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Journal

Journal of Medieval History

DOI

10.1080/03044181.2025.2546884 

Method of Research

Content analysis

Subject of Research

Not applicable

Article Title

A New Document on the Appearance of the Shroud of Turin from Nicole Oresme: Fighting False Relics and False Rumours in the Fourteenth Century

Article Publication Date

28-Aug-2025

 

When waves meet the shore

Washington University in St. Louis

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About 71% of Earth’s surface is covered by the vast oceans. When winds blow over the sea surface, they transfer energy to the water, creating waves. Some of these waves, under the force of strong winds, break and produce tiny airborne droplets that become sea spray aerosols. This process happens across all oceans and is one of the world’s largest sources of aerosols. Despite decades of research, scientists still do not fully understand its impact on the planet’s climate, especially how much it contributes to particles that form clouds, known as cloud condensation nuclei. 

Compared with the open oceans, the shallow waters along shorelines cover only a tiny fraction of the sea surface. However, many observation stations for marine aerosols are located near shorelines, and their measurements are often used to study aerosols over open oceans. This raises an important question: Do nearshore sea spray aerosols really reflect what happens in open oceans, in terms of how they form, how high their concentrations are, and how much they contribute to cloud condensation nuclei? 

An international team of researchers led by Jian Wang, professor of energy, environmental & chemical engineering in the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis, found that strong wave breaking along the shore, particularly during high wave periods, can produce large amounts of sea spray aerosols, significantly increasing both the number of cloud condensation nuclei and the mass of airborne particles in coastal regions. The aerosol generation process at the shoreline is fundamentally different from that in the open oceans. As a result, using coastal aerosol measurements to estimate sea spray aerosols in the open oceans can lead to gross overestimations.

Results from the research were published Aug. 27, 2025, in Science Advances.  

Wang and his team, including Shengqian Zhou, a postdoctoral researcher in Wang’s lab and first author of the paper, also found that swell waves — long-traveling waves that form far away from the coast and are not directly linked to local wind — often dominate wave energy in coastal regions. Because wave energy, not local wind speed, controls sea spray production near shorelines, the concentration of sea spray aerosols near shorelines often shows little correlation with wind speed. This is against the common assumption that wind speed can be used to estimate sea spray aerosol emissions. 

“Storms over the open oceans generate wind waves,” Zhou said. “After the storm passes, these waves will be transformed into swell waves and can keep traveling for thousands of kilometers. When they eventually reach the shore region, even on calm, windless days, they can break due to friction with the seafloor or by crashing directly against shorelines, which releases part of their energy into the atmosphere in the form of sea spray.”

Their data showed that the contribution of sea spray aerosols to cloud condensation nuclei and aerosol mass concentration can increase by more than three times and exceed 10 micrograms per cubic meter. These effects are widespread, because a large fraction of coastlines around the world regularly experience strong waves. An analysis of wave statistics near 12 coastal atmospheric observatories, ranging from the North Atlantic to Australia, found that high-wave periods occur during more than half the time in some seasons at several stations, and swell waves play dominant roles.

“We knew that this shoreline wave breaking generates sea spray aerosols, but many researchers focused on particles larger than 1 micrometer, which can dominate the mass concentration but few in number,” Wang said. “Our study shows that this shoreline wave breaking generates numerous small particles that make a large contribution to the coastal cloud condensation nuclei. This means that many previous studies using coastal measurements to study sea spray aerosols over open oceans likely overestimated their contributions to cloud condensation nuclei and thus the effects on clouds and climate.”

In addition, nearshore sea spray may also have substantial environmental impacts in the coastal regions. When the waves are high, the particulate matter (PM) mass concentration increases, and that is an important consideration for air quality.

While the sea salt itself may not be harmful, Zhou said, the pollutants in the sea water, such as biogenic toxins, harmful algae and other anthropogenic pollutants, are emitted into the atmosphere by the sea spray and subsequently inhaled by humans. This may strongly affect public health, especially in coastal regions with high waves, polluted seawater and dense populations.

“Existing regional models do not include shoreline aerosol production, or they calculate it incorrectly by relying on local wind speed,” Zhou added. “This makes it difficult for models to accurately capture the real abundance and variations of sea spray aerosols on coastal environment. A deeper understanding of this aerosol production process is needed to better assess and predict the potential environmental and health impacts on communities along coastlines.” 

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Zhou S, Salter M, Bertram T, Brito Azevedo E, Reis F, Wang J. Shoreline wave breaking strongly enhances the coastal sea spray aerosol population: climate and air quality implications. Science Advances, Aug. 27, 2025. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adw0343.

Funding for this research was provided by Office of Biological and Environmental Research of the U.S. Department of Energy Atmospheric System Research Program (DE-SC0021017, DE-SC0021985); Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet) (2020-05025); Scientific and technical cooperation project between Los Alamos National Laboratory and the University of the Azores (548320 ENA/ARM); and the McDonnell Academy Global Incubator Seed Grant from Washington University in St. Louis.