Large-scale ocean sanctuaries could protect coral reefs from climate change

About 75% of all tropical reefs have experienced coral bleaching

Peer-Reviewed Publication

OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Earth’s oceans are home to some of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet, but warming temperatures are causing many marine animals, including coral, to die out. A new study into managing the effect climate change has on these organisms says that more international collaboration is needed to ensure the future of the more than 6,000 coral species.

“Coral reefs are an essential ecosystem on our planet,” said Andrea Grottoli, co-author of the study and a professor in earth sciences at the Ohio State University. “Coral reefs are really important for humans in that they provide protection to coastlines from erosion and storms, and they’re essential for certain services like tourism and other parts of the economy.” 

The study, published in the journal Global Change Biology, advocates for the use of mesoscale sanctuaries, or areas that can stretch thousands of miles, often across national boundaries, to protect these ocean environments.

“Global warming is the No. 1 threat to coral reefs right now,“ Grottoli said. “So when we think about coral reef conservation, we can't limit ourselves to arbitrary geographic boundaries.”

Providing a “continuum of conservation” would benefit reefs immensely, Grottoli said. But because conservation policies differ between various governments and politicians, that can make it hard to protect the environment. 

Although coral reefs occupy less than 0.1% of the surface area in Earth’s oceans, about 30% of all marine species are in some way associated with them, Grottoli said. But due to the stress of rising sea temperatures, coral reefs all over the world have experienced higher rates of coral bleaching, or the visible paling of the coral surface. 

Under coral bleaching, the animal’s skeleton, once obscured, becomes visible, and effectively turns the creature a faded, ghostly white. Although bleached coral is not immediately dead, it can lead to mass mortality. Researchers say mass bleaching events are an indicator of an ecosystem’s declining health. 

Many people may be most familiar with coral via the Great Barrier Reef, a complex coral system so large that the living structure can be spotted from space. Located just off the coast of Australia, upwards of 2 million tourists visit the region each year. The attraction brings in an annual estimated economic value of about $36 billion.

Yet despite being the world’s most protected marine area, the GBR was recently hit by another mass bleaching event, the fourth time in only six years. 

While climate change has undoubtedly contributed to the increases in frequency and intensity of these events, warming seas are also changing the composition and architectural complexity of coral reefs. “Under this reality, the future of coral reefs may appear grim,” the paper said.

But there is some good news. Even as the global population of coral dwindles, the genetic diversity of coral species helps ensure that some corals may be able to adapt and recover. And while there is an urgent need to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions, the study also suggests that in the meantime, we need to take broad transdisciplinary approaches to creating both local and large-scale ocean sanctuaries.

Grottoli believes much of the heavy lifting of saving coral will happen through education. 

“People who understand coral reefs, and who understand the value of coral reefs, are much more likely to do something to help protect them,” she said. “If you don’t know anything about coral, and you’ve never seen one, how can you have any empathy or feel any connection to that ecosystem?” 

In her role as president of the International Coral Reef Society, Grottoli and her colleagues even put together a series of actions individuals can take at home to help scientists’ conservation efforts.

This research was supported by the National Science Foundation. 

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Contact: Andrea Grottoli, Grottoli.1@osu.edu

Written by: Tatyana Woodall, Woodall.52@osu.edu

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JOURNAL

Global Change Biology

DOI

10.1111/gcb.16192 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Commentary/editorial

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Coral-bleaching responses to climate change across biological scales

The 2030 Project to marshal faculty to solve climate crisis

Business Announcement

CORNELL UNIVERSITY

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Declaring this the “decisive decade” for climate action, Cornell launched The 2030 Project: A Climate Initiative, which will mobilize world-class faculty to develop and accelerate tangible solutions to the climate challenge. From transforming food and energy systems and reducing greenhouse emissions to advancing environmental justice and shaping policy, Cornell will use practical science to help save the planet before it’s too late.

The 2030 Project, which will marshal the expertise of hundreds of faculty members, debuted May 11 at the Cornell Future Forum in San Francisco – the first in-person event in California since the start of the pandemic.

“We really are an institution like no other,” said President Martha E. Pollack, addressing alumni and friends at the event. “We combine Ivy League scholarship with that land-grant mission. We combine the liberal arts with professions, our rural identity with our urban campuses; we have an incredible depth and breadth of world-leading expertise and a culture of collaboration. And of course, we have a foundational commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging. And I think that this constellation of strengths has really enabled us to be uniquely agile in our response to the changes and challenges of our times.”

The 2030 project seeks to solve the climate crisis through faculty’s existing interdisciplinary collaborations, dissolving academic silos and fostering unlikely partnerships to tackle one of the gravest challenges humanity has ever faced.

“We know that the climate is changing,” said Benjamin Z. Houlton, the 

Ronald P. Lynch Dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, who will serve as the co-chair of the new initiative. “It’s bad and it’s getting worse. We know why it’s happening. We can solve it. All those things are true at the same time.

“Climate is not some partisan future, some threat that’s lurking behind the scenes,” he said. “It’s trying to figure out – in places like California, where many of you have experienced drought, heat waves, wildfires and continuing whiplash events – how to solve atmospheric change.”

Houlton said the world needs a systemic, comprehensive, holistic set of scalable solutions that must be equitable and inclusive. There is a brief, rapidly closing window, he said, to solve what the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change calls a “code red” climate scenario.

Co-chairing the project with Houlton is David Lodge, the Frank S. DiSalvo Director of the Cornell Atkinson Center for Sustainability, who said the project will embrace all of Cornell’s expertise to move research, insight and discovery into large-scale impact and solutions.

Project leadership also includes Lynden Archer, the Joseph Silbert Dean of Engineering, and Ray Jayawardhana, the Harold Tanner Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. It will be managed by Ben Furnas ’06, the project’s executive director.

“This project is a manifestation of Cornell’s nimble, open enthusiasm to attract researchers and faculty and students all across the university to take action on climate,” Furnas said recently. “As an ambition, the 2030 Project will mobilize Cornell and connect to our community and the state and then scale our research to the world – which is certainly part of Cornell’s DNA as a land-grant institution.” 

For now, Houlton said, university expertise will drive collaborative research and teaching in four core areas: materials of the future, energy systems of the future, food and farm of the future, and society and policies of the future.

“We have the objective of making sure that every green electron that we generate actually gets used,” said Lindsay Anderson, associate professor of biological and environmental engineering (CALS), and the interim director of the Cornell Energy Systems Institute, speaking at the 2030 Project panel at the event. “Our energy – particularly our electric power system – is a huge contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. If we can decarbonize our energy system, we will have a big impact on climate change.”

This 2030 Project brings together Cornell’s in-house strengths, she said.

“If we’re going to tackle these large problems at the forefront, then we’re all going to need to work together. And not only my industry, but this collaborative culture that [Cornell has] is a unique opportunity,” said Anderson, who is also the Norman R. Scott Sesquicentennial Faculty Fellow and the Kathy Dwyer Marble and Curt Marble Faculty Director for Energy at Cornell Atkinson.

Greeshma Gadikota, assistant professor and Croll Sesquicentennial Fellow in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, where she directs the Sustainable Energy and Resource Recovery Group, spoke about using Earth Source Heat – a project now in the testing phase – as a way to keep campus warm in the winter, instead of using carbon-based methods.

“If we can try and decarbonize the university, we can be an example for the rest of the world on how to decarbonize institutions,” she said. “These solutions are not just for Cornell. These are also for the rest of the world.”

Geoff Coates, Tisch University Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology (A&S), discussed plastics and finding new, advanced materials as a key to decarbonization.

Coates said that about 100 pounds of plastic, created from natural gas, is made annually for every person on Earth.

“We’re adding carbon dioxide into the atmosphere to make plastics and that’s unsustainable,” he said. “As we start to decarbonize transportation, energy, chemicals – especially plastics – that’s next on our list. We’re going to have to fix that.

“We’re not just polluting the atmosphere,” Coates said. “We’re polluting the Earth, the soil, water. About 40% of our plastics get landfilled.”

Coates’ lab is working on putting carbon dioxide into the plastic, rather than releasing it into the atmosphere.

“We’re trying to flip the script,” he said. “The chemical industry unfortunately has a 60-year start on us, but I’m trying to completely change the way we make plastics.”

A second panel, discussing “Computer Science for a Better World and Sustainable Future” featured Carla Gomes, the Ronald C. and Antonia V. Nielsen Professor of Computing and Information Science, in the Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science; Alex Flecker, professor in ecology and evolutionary biology (CALS); and Dan Fink, senior research associate, Lab of Ornithology. The panel was moderated by Kavita Bala, dean of Cornell Bowers CIS.

Computational sustainability, Gomes said, may be the foundation for helping other scientific fields achieve environmental action. Flecker discussed how artificial intelligence enabled strategic hydropower planning across the Amazon basin; and Fink demonstrated how AI adjusts for gaps in citizen science data and how it can promote sustainability.

“This is the decisive decade. We used to think that we could just cut emissions or capture carbon. We are past the point of thinking in terms of either/or cases,” Houlton said. “We need to think about silver buckshot, not silver bullets.”

-30-

Adopting low-carbon energy can reduce racial disparities in air pollution

Certain groups exposed to more air pollution than others. Cleaner fuels could help.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - DAVIS

 

IMAGE: WORKERS INSTALL SOLAR PANELS OVER A PARKING LOT AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS. view more 

CREDIT: GREGORY URQUIAGA/UC DAVIS

Switching to low carbon fuels for transportation, cooking, heating, power generation and other needs would help fight climate change and also reduce racial and ethnic disparities in exposure to air pollution, according to researchers at the University of California, Davis.

Research published in the journal Science of the Total Environment found that differences in exposure to fine and ultrafine particle pollution could be reduced between 20 and 40% in 2050 if solar, wind and electric sources were used rather than fossil fuels.

The findings factor in California’s ban on the sale of new gas-powered passenger vehicles beginning in 2035 and illustrate the need to focus beyond transportation pollution, which has been a significant source of climate-damaging emissions.  

“Even though transportation pollution has been largely decreased by 2050, the other sectors will still be important,” said Yiting Li, a Ph.D. candidate in atmospheric sciences who is the first author on the journal article. 

Energy, climate and emissions

The UC Davis researchers analyzed future energy use and emissions scenarios in four regions – the San Francisco Bay area including Sacramento, San Joaquin Valley, Los Angeles and San Diego. The energy scenarios ranged from business as usual to strict reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

All California residents benefitted from improved air quality when low-carbon fuels, carbon capture or other actions were adopted, the analysis showed.

The analysis also showed that adopting low-carbon fuels can help address some of the historical imbalances in air pollution exposure. For example, Black residents experience higher levels of pollution than white residents in Los Angeles, but the detailed analysis carried out in the study showed that using larger quantities of low-carbon fuels reduced those exposure disparities.  Similar results were found in other regions, with the groups living closest to the urban cores benefitting the most.

“Not only does it improve air quality, but it also shrinks the disparity among different groups,” said Michael Kleeman, the study’s senior author and professor of civil and environmental engineering who is also a member of the Atmospheric Science Graduate Group and the Institute for Transportation Studies. “It levels the playing field for all California residents.”

Environmental justice and low carbon fuels

Knowing this information can help round out policy discussions about cutting pollution levels by incorporating environmental justice aspects, the researchers said.  

“We often talk about low carbon fuels and greenhouse gas reductions, but there’s not a lot of talk about public health,” Kleeman said. “The public health benefits associated with low carbon fuels should be a part of these conversations.” 

The study also estimated that adopting low-carbon fuels would prevent thousands of deaths in California each year through improved air quality. In economic terms, the total public health benefits were estimated to be approximately $20 billion annually.

Anikender Kumar and Yin Li from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering also contributed to the analysis.

Funding for the research came from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

 

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JOURNAL

Science of The Total Environment

DOI

10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.155230 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

ARTICLE TITLE

Adoption of low-carbon fuels reduces race/ethnicity disparities in air pollution exposure in California

Next-generation weather reporting: versatile, flexible, and economical sensors

Osaka Metropolitan University scientists devised a flexible, multi-tasking, inexpensive sensor that can be mounted on everyday objects for real-time measurement of rain volume and wind speed

Peer-Reviewed Publication

OSAKA METROPOLITAN UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: A VERSATILE, FLEXIBLE SENSOR SHEET CAN BE EASILY FIXED TO A WIDE RANGE OF SURFACES TO SIMULTANEOUSLY MONITOR RAIN VOLUME AND WIND SPEED. THE SENSOR MEASURES THE ELECTRICAL RESISTANCE GENERATED WHEN RAINDROPS HIT ITS SURFACE AT DIFFERENT WIND SPEEDS AND PROVIDES SENSOR DATA, WHICH IS ANALYZED THROUGH RESERVOIR COMPUTING. view more 

CREDIT: KUNIHARU TAKEI, OMU

Have you ever been trapped in an unexpected torrential downpour? Weather forecasting systems have always tried to anticipate adverse weather events. These systems, however, are heavily dependent on bulky, stationary, expensive equipment such as weather radar, impeding timely updates on local weather conditions for personal use. Tackling this gap in knowledge and practicality, a research team from Osaka Metropolitan University and the University of Tokyo developed an attachable and lightweight sensor sheet that features a flexible resistive sensor and a reservoir computing analysis. This single device allows simultaneous real-time measurement of raindrop volume and wind speed, reporting weather information when attached to umbrellas, cars, or houses. Research lead Professor Kuniharu Takei of Osaka Metropolitan University noted, “The findings open up a promising economical approach to weather reporting, contributing to disaster preparedness and greater community safety.”

To determine rain volume, the sensor measures the electrical resistance generated when a raindrop hits its surface. It is protected by a superhydrophobic silicone sheet of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS), which is infused with graphene and further processed with a laser. The superhydrophobic silicone repels water droplets, ensuring the durability and stability of the sensor. Laser texturing allows constant control and measurement of the behavior of water droplets, be they staying, sliding, bouncing, or splitting on the sensor surface. The sensor can be easily fixed to a wide range of surfaces and remains functional when flat or bent. Testing changes in rain volume estimations with the sensor mounted at various angles showed no significant differences, suggesting that the sensor can be attached to hand-carried items such as umbrellas. If widely adopted, it would be possible to obtain mass data that enables the development of real-time local weather maps.

Wind speed has a significant effect on water droplet behavior, indicating the need to measure wind speed at the same time as raindrop volume. Conventionally, measuring multiple pieces of weather data requires multiple sensors, increasing power consumption. Going beyond this traditional practice, the researchers made use of a machine learning algorithm called reservoir computing (RC) to analyze the output data. Changes in rain and wind conditions resulted in resistance changes, which were detected by the sensor and then recorded as time-series data. Such data was used to train the machine, which predicted the pattern and reported rain volume and wind speed as output information.

Even though there is still more work to be done to further improve its accuracy, the sensor is expected to be a mainstay of next-generation weather sensing. The study progresses the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals on resilient infrastructure, sustainable cities, and climate action. “We believe this device can contribute to realizing the ultimate Internet-of-Things society, which is safe, secure, comfortable, and disaster-free,” concluded Professor Takei, “and we would like to engage actively in industry-government-academia collaboration that promotes such practical applications.”

Paper information
The article, “A Multi-Tasking Flexible Sensor via Reservoir Computing,” was published in Advanced Materials (DOI 10.1002/adma.202201663) on April 20, 2022.

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About OMU
Osaka Metropolitan University is a new public university formed by a merger between Osaka City University and Osaka Prefecture University in April 2022. For more science news, see https://www.upc-osaka.ac.jp/new-univ/en-research/, and follow @OsakaMetUniv_en, and search #OMUScience.

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JOURNAL

Advanced Materials

DOI

10.1002/adma.202201663 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

A Multi-Tasking Flexible Sensor via Reservoir Computing

Discovered: 150-year-old platypus and echidna specimens that proved some mammals lay eggs

Reports and Proceedings

UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE

 

IMAGE: ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF THE UNIVERSITY MUSEUM OF ZOOLOGY IN THE STORIES view more 

CREDIT: JACQUELINE GARGET

Jars of tiny platypus and echidna specimens, collected in the late 1800s by the scientist William Caldwell, have been discovered in the stores of Cambridge’s University Museum of Zoology.

At the time of their collection, these specimens were key to proving that some mammals lay eggs – a fact that changed the course of scientific thinking and supported the theory of evolution.

This unique collection had not been catalogued by the Museum, so until recently staff had been unaware of its existence. The exciting find was made when Jack Ashby, Assistant Director at the Museum, was doing research for a new book on Australian mammals.

“It’s one thing to read the 19th century announcements that platypuses and echidnas actually lay eggs. But to have the physical specimens here, tying us back to that discovery almost 150 years ago, is pretty amazing,” said Ashby.

He added: “I knew from experience that there isn’t a natural history collection on Earth that actually has a comprehensive catalogue of everything in it, and I suspected that Caldwell’s specimens really ought to be here.” He was right: three months after Ashby asked Collections Manager Mathew Lowe to keep an eye out, a small box of specimens was found in the Museum with a note suggesting they were Caldwell’s. Ashby’s investigations confirmed this was indeed the case.

Until Europeans first encountered platypuses and echidnas in the 1790s, it had been assumed that all mammals give birth to live young. The question of whether some mammals lay eggs then became one of the biggest questions of 19th century zoology, and hotly debated in scientific circles. The newly discovered collection of little jars represents the huge scientific endeavour that went into solving this mystery.

“In the nineteenth century, many conservative scientists didn’t want to believe that an egg-laying mammal could exist, because this would support the theory of evolution – the idea that one animal group was capable of changing into another,” said Ashby.

He added: “Lizards and frogs lay eggs, so the idea of a mammal laying eggs was dismissed by many people – I think they felt it was degrading to be related to animals that they considered ‘lower life forms.’”

The newly discovered collection includes echidnas, platypuses and marsupials at varying life stages from fertilised egg to adolescence. Caldwell was the first to make complete collections of every life stage of these species – although not all of the specimens have been found in the Museum.

For 85 years, European naturalists had been attempting to find proof that platypuses and echidnas lay eggs – including by asking Aboriginal Australians – but any results they sent home were ignored or dismissed.

William Caldwell was sent to Australia in 1883 - with substantial financial backing from the University of Cambridge, the Royal Society and the British Government - to resolve the long-standing mystery.

In an extensive search Caldwell collected around 1,400 specimens with the help of a large group of Aboriginal Australians. In 1884 the team eventually found an echidna with an egg in her pouch, and a platypus with one egg in her nest and another just about to be laid.

This was the definitive proof Caldwell had been looking for, and the news was sent around the world. The colonial scientific establishment was apparently only willing to accept this result now that it had been confirmed by ’one of their own’.

Ashby says that over the last two centuries, scientists have consistently belittled Australian mammals by describing them as strange and inferior. He believes that this language continues to affect how we describe them today, and undermines efforts to conserve them.

“Platypuses and echidnas are not weird, primitive animals - as many historic accounts depict them - they are as evolved as anything else. It’s just that they’ve never stopped laying eggs,” he said, adding, “I think they’re absolutely amazing and definitely worth valuing.”

The quill-covered echidnas are the most widespread mammal in Australia. They cover the whole continent and have adapted to live in all climates - from snow-covered mountains through to the driest deserts.

Platypuses are one of the only mammals that can detect electricity, and one of the only mammals to produce venom. With a tail like a beaver, a flat bill, and webbed feet like a duck, when the first specimens were brought to Europe people thought they were fakes that had been sewn together.

Both platypuses and echidnas have a unique combination of traits that 19th century scientists thought should only exist individually in either mammals, reptiles or birds. This made them central to debates around evolution.

Ashby’s new book, Platypus Matters: The Extraordinary Story of Australian Mammals, is published in the UK on 12 May, 2022 by HarperCollins. https://harpercollins.co.uk/products/platypus-matters-the-extraordinary-story-of-australian-mammals-jack-ashby?variant=39546207338574

CAPTION

Jack Ashby, Assistant Director of University Museum of Zoology, holds a newly discovered Caldwell specimen

CREDIT

Jacqueline Garget

CAPTION

A preserved echidna from the newly discovered collection by William Caldwell

CREDIT

Jacqueline Garget

CAPTION

Newly discovered echidna specimen collected by William Caldwell

CREDIT

Jacqueline Garget

CAPTION

Newly discovered echidna specimen, suspected to have been collected by William Caldwell

CREDIT

Jacqueline Garget

CAPTION

Newly discovered echidna specimen collected by William Caldwell

CREDIT

Jacqueline Garget

CAPTION

Platypus specimen in the Cambridge University Museum of Zoology

CREDIT

University of Cambridge

Effectively removing emerging contaminants in wastewater treatment plants

Treating wastewater from domestic, institutional, and industrial sources requires efficient processes.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

INSTITUT NATIONAL DE LA RECHERCHE SCIENTIFIQUE - INRS

 

IMAGE: RESEARCHER JEAN-FRANÇOIS BLAIS, WATER TREATMENT AND ENVIRONMENTAL DECONTAMINATION EXPERT AT INRS view more 

CREDIT: JOSÉE LECOMPTE

Currently, treatment systems let, on average, half of the emerging contaminants found in wastewater go through. However, scientists are developing new technologies to make infrastructure more efficient and remove the remaining contaminants that would otherwise be discharged into waterways. Jean-François Blais, water treatment and environmental decontamination expert at the Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS), collaborated with Canadian scientists to review current and emerging treatment technologies. Through this review, the team determined the removal efficiency of a particular type of contaminant that causes hormonal disruption: endocrine disruptors.

Efficient technologies

One of the most promising technologies is ozonation. Ozone, a powerful oxidizing gas, breaks down pollutants through a chemical reaction. This very technology was chosen for the Jean-R.-Marcotte wastewater treatment plant, where all of Montréal’s wastewater converges. Another promising method in water treatment is adsorption with activated carbon. In addition to being inexpensive, this material can effectively filter and absorb contaminants regardless of whether it is in powder or granular form.

In his review, Professor Blais also focused on electro-oxidation processes and membrane bioreactors. The first method uses two electrodes to degrade pollutants. The second combines a membrane (to filter out some of the contaminants) and biological organisms (to degrade what passes through it).

These two approaches are being developed at INRS, in Professor Patrick Drogui’s Laboratory of Environmental Electrotechnologies and Oxidative Processes.

“All of these emerging technologies have the advantage of being able to be added to existing treatment plants, mostly downstream of the current systems,” explains Professor Blais.

Ultimately, they could improve the performance of existing water treatment technologies without requiring major changes to municipal facilities.

The issue of Lac Saint-Charles

These different wastewater treatment options have real-world implications for municipalities. The City of Québec, in particular, quickly became interested in these innovative treatment methods following concerns about the water quality of its main water supply, Lac Saint-Charles. It therefore mandated the INRS team to find effective solutions to this problem, as well as to connect its sewer system.

“Many remote residences are using septic tanks and absorption fields,” says Blais. We wanted to identify alternatives, like stand-alone treatment systems for homes, to connect them without sacrificing the health of our bodies of water.”

In April 2021, Professor Blais, Professor Sophie Duchesne, Research Officer Geneviève Rioux, and Priscille Ahossi, master’s student in Professional Studies in Water Sciences, submitted an assessment and recommendation report outlining solutions the City could implement.

About the study

The article “A comprehensive review on current technologies for removal of endocrine disrupting chemicals from wastewaters,” by Dariush Azizi, Ayman Arif, David Blair, Justine Dionne, Yves Filion, Yassine Ouarda, Ana Gisell Pazmino, Rama Pulicharla, Victoria Rilstone, Bhagyashree Tiwari, Leah Vignale, Satinder Kaur Brar, Pascale Champagne, Patrick Drogui, Valérie Langlois, and Jean-François Blais, was published in Environmental Research’s 2022 special issue on endocrine disrupting chemicals, in collaboration with the Intersectoral Centre for Endocrine Disruptor Analysis (ICEDA).

About INRS
INRS is a university dedicated exclusively to graduate level research and training. Since its creation in 1969, INRS has played an active role in Québec’s economic, social, and cultural development and is ranked first for research intensity in Québec. INRS is made up of four interdisciplinary research and training centres in Québec City, Montréal, Laval, and Varennes, with expertise in strategic sectors: Eau Terre Environnement, Énergie Matériaux Télécommunications, Urbanisation Culture Société, and Armand-Frappier Santé Biotechnologie. The INRS community includes more than 1,500 students, postdoctoral fellows, faculty members, and staff.

Source :

Audrey-Maude Vézina
Service des communications et des affaires publiques de l’INRS
418 254-2156
audrey-maude.vezina@inrs.ca
Twitter
Facebook

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JOURNAL

Environmental Research

DOI

10.1016/j.envres.2021.112196 

The origin of life: A paradigm shift

Peer-Reviewed Publication

LUDWIG-MAXIMILIANS-UNIVERSITÄT MÜNCHEN

According to a new concept by LMU chemists led by Thomas Carell, it was a novel molecular species composed out of RNA and peptides that set in motion the evolution of life into more complex forms

Investigating the question as to how life could emerge long ago on the early Earth is one of the most fascinating challenges for science. Which conditions must have prevailed for the basic building blocks of more complex life to form? One of the main answers is based upon the so-called RNA world idea, which molecular biology pioneer Walter Gilbert formulated in 1986. The hypothesis holds that nucleotides – the basic building blocks of the nucleic acids A, C, G, and U – emerged out of the primordial soup, and that short RNA molecules then formed out of the nucleotides. These so-called oligonucleotides were already capable of encoding small amounts of genetic information.

As such single-stranded RNA molecules could also combine into double strands, however, this gave rise to the theoretical possibility that the molecules could replicate themselves – i.e. reproduce. Only two nucleotides fit together in each case, meaning that one strand is the exact counterpart of another and thus forms the template for another strand.

In the course of evolution, this replication could have improved and at some stage yielded more complex life. “The RNA world idea has the big advantage that it sketches out a pathway whereby complex biomolecules such as nucleic acids with optimized catalytic and, at the same time, information-coding properties can emerge,” says LMU chemist Thomas Carell. Genetic material, as we understand it today, is made up of double strands of DNA, a slightly modified, durable form of macromolecule composed of nucleotides.

However, the hypothesis is not without its issues. For example, RNS is a very fragile molecule, especially when it gets longer. Furthermore, it is not clear how the linking of RNA molecules with the world of proteins could have come about, for which the genetic material, as we know, supplies the blueprints. As laid out in a new paper published in Nature, Carell’s working group has discovered a way in which this linking could have occurred.

To understand, we must take another, closer look at RNA. In itself, RNA is a complicated macromolecule. In addition to the four canonical bases A, C, G, and U, which encode genetic information, it also contains non-canonical bases, some of which have very unusual structures. These non-information-coding nucleotides are very important for the functioning of RNA molecules. We currently have knowledge of more than 120 such modified RNA nucleosides, which nature incorporates into RNA molecules. It is highly probable that they are relicts of the former RNA world.

The Carell group has now discovered that these non-canonical nucleosides are the key ingredient, as it were, that allows the RNA world to link up with the world of proteins. Some of these molecular fossils can, when located in RNA, “adorn” themselves with individual amino acids or even small chains of them (peptides), according to Carell. This results in small chimeric RNA-peptide structures when amino acids or peptides happen to be present in a solution simultaneously alongside the RNA. In such structures, the amino acids and peptides linked to the RNA then even react with each other to form ever larger and more complex peptides. “In this way, we created RNA-peptide particles in the lab that could encode genetic information and even formed lengthening peptides,” says Carell.

The ancient fossil nucleosides are therefore somewhat akin to nuclei in RNA, forming a core upon which long peptide chains can grow. On some strands of RNA, the peptides were even growing at several points. “That was a very surprising discovery,” says Carell. “It’s possible that there never was a pure RNA world, but that RNA and peptides co-existed from the beginning in a common molecule.” As such, we should expand the concept of an RNA world to that of an RNA-peptide world. The peptides and the RNA mutually supported each other in their evolution, the new idea proposes.

According to the new theory, a decisive element at the beginning was the presence of RNA molecules that could adorn themselves with amino acids and peptides and so join them into larger peptide structures. “RNA developed slowly into a constantly improving amino acid linking catalyst,” says Carell. This relationship between RNA and peptides or proteins has remained to this day. The most important RNA catalyst is the ribosome, which still links amino acids into long peptide chains today. One of the most complicated RNA machines, it is responsible in every cell for translating genetic information into functional proteins. “The RNA-peptide world thus solves the chicken-and-egg problem,” says Carell. “The new idea creates a foundation upon which the origin of life gradually becomes explicable.”

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JOURNAL

Nature

DOI

10.1038/s41586-022-04676-3 

ARTICLE TITLE

A prebiotically plausible scenario of an RNA–peptide world

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

11-May-202

Extreme storms could help protect beaches from sea level rise, new study finds

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF NEW SOUTH WALES

Images in the wake of violent coastal storms usually focus purely on the extensive damage caused to beaches, dunes, property, and surrounding infrastructure.

However, a new international study has shown that extreme weather events could help protect beaches from the impact of sea level rise – by bringing in new sand from deeper waters or from nearby beaches.

The study, led by Dr Mitchell Harley from the UNSW Water Research Laboratory, is published today in Nature Communications Earth & Environment.

“We know that extreme storms cause major coastal erosion and damage to beachfront properties”, Dr Harley says.

“For the first time we looked not just above water, where the impacts of extreme storms are easy to see, but also deep down below the water as well.

“What we found was that hundreds of thousands of cubic metres of sand was entering these beach systems during these events – that’s similar to the scale of what engineers use to nourish a beach artificially.

“This could potentially be enough to offset some of the impacts of sea level rises caused by climate change, such as retreating coastlines, and by several decades in the long-term.

“It’s a new way of looking at extreme storms.” 

Wave after wave

In collaboration with researchers from University of Plymouth and Autonomous University of Baja California, the study examined three coastlines across Australia, the United Kingdom and Mexico. Each was subject to a sequence of extreme storms or extended storm clusters, followed by a milder period of beach recovery.

In Australia, researchers studied Narrabeen beach in Sydney in the wake of a 2016 storm which famously ripped a swimming pool away from a property overlooking the coastline.

Using high-resolution measurements of the beach and seabed, they were able to show that sediment gains were sufficient to theoretically offset decades of projected shoreline retreat.

“For the first time, we were able to mobilise specialised monitoring equipment to get really accurate measurements before and after a storm,” Dr Harley says.

“We used a combination of a twin engine aeroplane equipped with a Lidar scanner, drones and jet skis going back and forth along the beach taking measurements below the surface right before and after the storm hit.

“This was how we were able to get an accurate picture of the volume of sand moving for each storm.”

In the UK, researchers of the Coastal Processes Research Group of the University of Plymouth have studied Perranporth beach in Cornwall since 2006 using a combination of monthly beach topographic surveys and quasi-annual bathymetric surveys.

Here, the impact of the extreme 2013/14 and 2015/16 winters resulted in very significant losses of sand from the intertidal beach and dune system. However, when looking at the total sand budget, including the underwater part of the beach, it was observed that by 2018 the beach had gained 420,000 cubic metres of sand.

“We are not quite sure whether this extra sand has come from offshore or from around the corner, or even both, but we do now understand that extreme waves can potentially contribute positively to the overall sand budget, despite causing upper beach and dune erosion,” said Professor Gerd Masselink, who leads the Coastal Processes Research Group.

Bruun rule

Exactly how much a coastline might change due to sea level rise is a key question facing coastal managers as they plan for the escalating impacts of climate change.

In the past, this has been estimated using a simple approach known as the Bruun rule. This rule states that for a given metre of sea-level rise, the coastline is expected to retreat between roughly 20 and 100 metres, depending on the steepness of the coast.

Using the Bruun rule, global sea-level rise caused by climate change has been projected to result in a large retreat or loss of almost half of the world’s sandy beaches by the end of this century.

“The Bruun rule however has been criticised for its simplicity, as it doesn’t take into account the many complex factors about how individual beaches respond to sea-level rise,” Prof. Masselink says.

“This includes the presence of sand stored in deeper water immediately off the coast – and its potential to be mobilised during extreme weather events.”

Dr Harley says these findings highlight that extreme storms need to be considered in long-term projections of sediment movements on beaches.

“It further reinforces that we really need to be doing a beach-by-beach understanding of how our beaches are going to change as global sea-level rise continues.”

Looking past the eye of the storm

Dr Harley says there are so few measurements of the seabed immediately off our coastlines that it’s hard to tell how much sand could potentially be mobilised in the future.

While these findings are from only three extreme storm sequences, it potentially changes how people can understand the long-term future of our coastlines.

“We’re only scraping the surface here. We need to repeat these types of monitoring measurements for more storms and different types of coastal settings under various conditions,” he says.

“Only then, will we be able to get a clearer understanding of how much sand is stored off the coast that could potentially help buffer the impacts of sea level rise – and a clearer picture of what our beaches could look like in the year 2100 and beyond.”

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JOURNAL

Nature Communications

DOI

10.1038/s43247-022-00437-2 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

SINGLE EXTREME STORM SEQUENCE CAN OFFSET DECADES OF 2 SHORELINE RETREAT PROJECTED TO RESULT FROM SEA-LEVEL RISE

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

12-May-2022

COI STATEMENT

The authors declare no competing interests.