It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Wednesday, November 05, 2025
Leibniz-HKI once again recognized for its personnel management oriented on equal opportunities
“TOTAL E-QUALITY” Award and Sustainability Prize 2025
Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology - Hans Knöll Institute -
Christine Vogler (center), Equal Opportunities Officer at Leibniz-HKI, accepted the TOTAL E-QUALITY award and the Sustainability Award. Left: Ulla Weber, Chair of the Board of TOTAL E-QUALITY Deutschland and Central Equal Opportunities Officer at the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Sciences. Right: Maresa Feldmann, Equal Opportunities Officer for the City of Dortmund and member of the Board of TOTAL E-QUALITY Deutschland e. V.
Credit: Michael Voigt, TOTAL E-QUALITY Deutschland e. V.
The award for the years 2025 to 2027 recognizes the Leibniz-HKI’s commitment to a sustainable, equitable, and inclusive research culture. “The fact that we have received this rating for the fifth time and have now also been awarded the Sustainability Prize shows that our long-term measures for greater diversity are having an effect,” says Christine Vogler, Equal Opportunities Officer at Leibniz-HKI. “For us, equal opportunities is not a one-off project, but an integral part of our institute’s identity, which we will continue to pursue with determination.”
The TOTAL E-QUALITY award is presented annually by the association TOTAL-E-QUALITY Deutschland e. V. and is valid for three years. In its statement, the jury praised the Leibniz HKI’s equal opportunity-oriented personnel and organizational policy, which excellently fulfills the TOTAL E-QUALITY standards in all areas of activity. Particular emphasis was placed on the comprehensive equality strategy, which is both structurally anchored at Leibniz-HKI and encompasses an inclusive organizational culture. The institute’s equality goals are regularly reviewed by the Leibniz Association as part of external evaluations.
Among the measures that particularly distinguish Leibniz-HKI are the workshop series “Female Empowerment@Leibniz-HKI,” which specifically supports postdoctoral women in their career development on topics such as mental load and conflict management and is supplemented by individual career counseling and networking meetings, as well as the book club “Science meets Society,” which draws attention to topics such as gender equality, diversity, and discrimination in science and reflects the Leibniz-HKI’s socio-political commitment to equal opportunities. The book club, which is organized in collaboration with the Cluster of Excellence “Balance of the Microverse”, aims to promote open exchange among employees on socially relevant topics and to advance the development of an inclusive and reflective organizational culture.
The Leibniz-HKI is also actively involved in promoting girls and young women in STEM careers, for example by participating in Girls’ Day (Forsche Schüler-Tag) and through a wide range of public relations work on women in science through portraits, events, and a presence on social media.
Around 450 people work at the Leibniz-HKI, slightly more than half of whom are women. One-third of all employees come from abroad. Gender parity prevails at all levels in the scientific field. Even the highest management positions are filled in a gender-equitable manner. In administration and technology, the proportion of women is as high as 64%.
This year’s TOTAL E-QUALITY award ceremony was held under the motto “HERE TO STAY” and focused on the factors for successful, diversity-friendly onboarding and long-term employee retention. Nationwide, 61 organizations from business, science, and administration were honored, including numerous institutes of the Leibniz Association.
This year, the association TOTAL E-QUALITY Deutschland e. V. awarded five organizations, including Leibniz-HKI, with a Sustainability Prize.
Credit
Michael Voigt, TOTAL E-QUALITY Deutschland e. V.
The award ceremony took place at the Lichthof conference hotel in Gelsenkirchen, Germany.
Credit
Michael Voigt, TOTAL E-QUALITY Deutschland e. V.
FAU’s CAROSEL offers new ‘spin’ on monitoring water quality in real time
Jordon Beckler, Ph.D., and Mason Thackston (in the water) test their new device, the Chamber ARray for Observing Sediment Exchanges Long-term or CAROSEL for short.
Beneath the surface of lakes and coastal waters lies a hidden world of sediment that plays a crucial role in the health of aquatic ecosystems. “Benthic fluxes” of nitrogen and phosphorus, such as releases of these dissolved nutrients from sediments to their overlying waters, can fuel algae growth and toxic harmful algal blooms (HABs), which degrade water quality, disrupt wildlife and recreation, and reduce property values.
Sediments act as a natural archive, offering historical insights into ecosystem health. However, to fully understand nutrient exchanges between sediment and water, scientists rely on measurements of benthic fluxes, like the amount of nitrogen transported across the sediment/water interface in typical units of pounds per square meter of sediment area per day. Traditional monitoring methods are slow, costly and challenging, and while newer autonomous systems show promise, few studies have explored how these systems can reveal how sediments contribute to or sustain HABs – an essential step in managing and protecting aquatic ecosystems. For example, in Florida’s Lake Okeechobee, benthic nutrient fluxes are the dominant source of nutrients fueling algal growth in this shallow turbid water body.
Florida Atlantic UniversityHarbor Branch Oceanographic Institute researchers are the first to continuously track the exchanges of different forms of nitrogen between bottom sediments and the overlying water. Most importantly, their novel approach enables measuring how much ammonium (NH₄⁺) is released from sediments in real time, multiple times a day, over an extended period – offering an unprecedented, detailed view of this critical nutrient exchange and preferred nutrient source of algal blooms.
Their secret weapon? A new device called CAROSEL – short for Chamber ARray for Observing Sediment Exchanges Long-term. The CAROSEL is a smart, underwater monitoring system designed to study how nutrients and other chemicals move between lake or ocean sediments and the water above. Unlike older methods that required two boat (or ship) trips and manpower to deploy and retrieve instrumentation packages to obtain only a single benthic flux data time point, the CAROSEL works automatically, taking multiple measurements each day without human help for periods of several weeks.
For the study, researchers tested the CAROSEL in a shallow freshwater retention pond on the FAU Harbor Branch campus in Fort Pierce. The goal was to better understand the interplay of nutrients and oxygen over both day and multi-day cycles, enabling better insights into the total nitrogen available as a function of the time of day and the weather. However, it also improved estimates of the nutrients removed from this pond system over time. These retention ponds – found all over Florida – are a common Best Management Practice (BMP) employed as part of the state’s regulations to do just that: eliminate the nutrients flowing to coastal estuaries.
Results of their research, published in the journal Limnology & Oceanography, also reveal that oxygen fluxes in the water followed a daily rhythm: increasing during the day from photosynthesis and decreasing at night due to respiration. Conversely, sediments consistently consumed oxygen from the overlying water. The sediments also released NH₄⁺ throughout the study, while the water column showed signs of nitrogen being added during the day and broken down at night – a surprising finding considering photosynthetic growth during the day would be expected to consume nutrients.
After rainstorms, both NH₄⁺ and nitrate fluxes changed quickly, showing how sensitive these processes are to the environment. It was also clear that nitrogen removal through nitrification/denitrification – the main process desired in these BMP systems – was intense but also highly variable over time. Uniquely, the CAROSEL captured high-frequency, real-time data, revealing sharp, short-term fluctuations in nutrient and oxygen exchange. These findings challenge the common assumption that sediment processes are slow or steady, and underscore how tools like the CAROSEL can uncover the hidden, dynamic forces shaping water quality.
“What’s most exciting is that CAROSEL gave us a detailed, hour-by-hour view of how weather and environmental changes directly affect the chemistry between the lake bottom and the water above,” said Jordon Beckler, Ph.D., senior author, an associate research professor at FAU Harbor Branch and an FAU Sensing Institute (I-SENSE) fellow. “That level of detail helps us untangle the complex chain reactions happening in lakes and estuaries – something that’s been incredibly hard to do until now with such low-resolution conventional benthic flux data. We see this technology as a powerful new tool for understanding how these fluxes drive ecosystem dynamics, especially given the explosion of harmful algal blooms globally over the last few decades. I see sediments, which cover about 70% of the Earth’s surface, as the next water, soil or air – for which we already have developed an appreciation for their health and conservation.”
This detailed view will help scientists understand how quickly nutrients cycle and how factors like light, temperature and storms drive those changes – key to improving water quality monitoring and management. The CAROSEL shows strong potential as a tool for tracking and responding to issues like nutrient pollution, HABs, low oxygen “dead zones,” carbon cycling, and even organic and heavy metal contaminants amid shifting environmental conditions.
“What makes the CAROSEL especially valuable is its versatility – it’s designed to work in both freshwater and marine environments and can be adapted to monitor a wide range of substances, from nutrients like ammonium and nitrate to other parameters such as carbon dioxide or dissolved organic carbon. We’ve specifically designed the CAROSEL to accept any underwater sensor that exists on the market today,” said Mason Thackston, first author and graduate research assistant at FAU Harbor Branch. “That flexibility means we can tailor the system to different ecosystems and research needs. I’m currently gearing up for two new funded projects, one to establish a baseline for benthic nutrient fluxes in an area planned to be dredged in the Northern Indian River Lagoon, and another to directly monitor legacy nutrient fluxes in Lake Okeechobee. We also see great promise for improving our understanding of the nutrient dynamics of BMPs in Florida, which are presently underperforming with respect to expectations.”
Study co-authors are Donald Nuzzio, Ph.D., president of Analytical Instrument Systems, Inc.; and Csaba Vaczo, a mechanical engineer at FAU Harbor Branch.
This work was supported by the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute Foundation and an FAU I-SENSE seed grant, as well as the Florida Department of Environmental Protection Innovative Technologies for HAB Mitigation Program, for supporting research directly leading to the conception of the CAROSEL (Grant #MN016).
- FAU -
The Chamber ARray for Observing Sediment Exchanges Long-term or CAROSEL for short.
Mason Thackston testing the Chamber ARray for Observing Sediment Exchanges Long-term or CAROSEL for short.
Credit
Hannah Bridgham, FAU Harbor Branch
About Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute: Founded in 1971, Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute at Florida Atlantic University is a research community of marine scientists, engineers, educators, and other professionals focused on Ocean Science for a Better World. The institute drives innovation in ocean engineering, at-sea operations, drug discovery and biotechnology from the oceans, coastal ecology and conservation, marine mammal research and conservation, aquaculture, ocean observing systems and marine education. For more information, visit www.fau.edu/hboi.
About Florida Atlantic University:
Florida Atlantic University serves more than 32,000 undergraduate and graduate students across six campuses along Florida’s Southeast coast. Recognized as one of only 21 institutions nationwide with dual designations from the Carnegie Classification - “R1: Very High Research Spending and Doctorate Production” and “Opportunity College and University” - FAU stands at the intersection of academic excellence and social mobility. Ranked among the Top 100 Public Universities by U.S. News & World Report, FAU is also nationally recognized as a Top 25 Best-In-Class College and cited by Washington Monthly as “one of the country’s most effective engines of upward mobility.” As a university of first choice for students across Florida and the nation, FAU welcomed its most academically competitive incoming class in university history in Fall 2025. To learn more, visit www.fau.edu.
Study area overview of Asian drylands showing (A) national and provincial boundaries, (B) elevation in meters, and (C) current land cover classification (2020).
Across Asia's vast drylands, a new study reveals a critical imbalance between degradation and recovery. Researchers analyzed two decades of satellite data and developed an integrated ecohealth-neutrality framework to track how land ecosystems have changed from 2000 to 2020. The findings show that while ecohealth began improving after 2012, degradation still dominates, with about 22% of the region's land (196 million hectares) remains degraded, compared to only 13% (119 million hectares) showing recovery. This 8% “land debt” indicates the fragile balance between human activity and ecosystem resilience. The study calls for tailored restoration strategies to close this gap and achieve land degradation neutrality (LDN) across Asia by 2030.
Drylands, covering over 40% of Earth's surface, sustain billions of people who depend on them for food, water, and livelihoods. Yet these ecosystems, especially in Asia, are rapidly losing their vitality due to overgrazing, deforestation, and climate stress. One in three hectares of Asian dryland is now degraded, with crop yields projected to drop by half by mid-century. Despite major restoration programs like the Great Green Wall and Landscape Partnership Asia, progress has remained fragmented. Facing these persistent challenges, scientists recognized the urgent need for a continent-wide monitoring approach to quantify ecohealth changes, understand their drivers, and determine whether restoration efforts are keeping pace with degradation.
A team from the Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, together with partners from Rwanda, Belgium, and New Caledonia, has mapped the ecological health of Asia's drylands. Their research, published (DOI: 10.34133/remotesensing.0897) on October 10, 2025, inJournal of Remote Sensing, integrates the Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) framework with a regional ecohealth assessment model to track ecosystem vitality, soil moisture, and land use dynamics over 20 years. The results reveal a compelling story of recovery and degradation, showing that Asia's drylands remain in fragile equilibrium between continued decline and measurable improvement.
The study examined dryland regions stretching from Central Asia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan, to East Asia, encompassing Mongolia and China’s arid provinces of Xinjiang, Gansu, Ningxia, and Nei Mongol. Using high-resolution satellite data, researchers quantified ecosystem vitality and land provisioning capacity by combining indicators such as vegetation indices (NDVI), soil moisture, topography, and land cover. They found that ecohealth declined steadily until 2012 but began improving thereafter, especially in East Asia, where large-scale afforestation and conservation programs took effect. Gansu, Ningxia, and Nei Mongol emerged as “bright spots” of recovery, while Central Asia, particularly Kazakhstan, remains the most degraded. Within the LDN framework, about 22% of land showed signs of degradation and 13% improvement, leaving a “land debt” of 76.9 million hectares that must be restored to achieve balance. The research identifies land use change, urbanization, and mismanaged water systems as major drivers of degradation, while reforestation and sustainable rangeland management offer promising paths toward recovery.
“LDN is more than a target; it's a test of our ability to coexist with the land,” said Dr Yaning Chen, corresponding author of the study. “Our satellite-based framework reveals that while East Asia’s drylands are bouncing back through science-driven restoration, Central Asia's ecosystems remain vulnerable to unsustainable irrigation and land use. Achieving neutrality means more than offsetting losses, it requires understanding local realities and strengthening cooperation across borders. Only by aligning human activity with ecological resilience can we restore the health of Asia's drylands.”
The findings provide a practical blueprint for achieving the UN's Sustainable Development Goal 15.3 on LDN. By identifying where and why ecohealth declines, the framework helps policymakers target interventions such as drought-tolerant afforestation, efficient water management, and climate-smart agriculture. The study's “avoid-reduce-reverse” pyramid offers a stepwise strategy: prevent new degradation, rehabilitate affected areas, and enhance ecosystem resilience. This approach can be applied to other arid regions worldwide, linking scientific monitoring with community action. Ultimately, restoring Asia's drylands is not only about reclaiming lost land; it's about securing the ecological foundation for sustainable development and human well-being.
Study area overview of Asian drylands showing (A) national and provincial boundaries, (B) elevation in meters, and (C) current land cover classification (2020).
The Journal of Remote Sensing, an online-only Open Access journal published in association with AIR-CAS, promotes the theory, science, and technology of remote sensing, as well as interdisciplinary research within earth and information science.
