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Optimal storage for CO2
Wetlands store about five times more carbon per square meter than forests and 500 times more than oceans. In these ecosystems, plant growth and carbon deposition in the soil stimulate each other. Protecting and restoring such wetlands can help humans reduce atmospheric CO2 concentrations in the face of the climate crisis.
This is one of the findings of a study now (May 2022) published in the international scientific journal Science under the title Recovering wetland biogeomorphic feedbacks to restore the world’s biotic carbon hotspots (DOI: 10.1126/science.abn1479). The international team of authors, including Greifswald-based peatland researcher Prof. Dr. Hans Joosten, also has good news: we are getting better at managing and restoring these ecosystems.
Peatlands, salt marshes, mangrove forests and seagrass beds cover only one percent of the Earth’s total surface, but contain 20 percent of the total carbon sequestered in all ecosystems combined worldwide. This enormous contribution is due to the fact that in these ecosystems plant growth and carbon deposition in the soil stimulate each other. Scientists* from the Netherlands Institute of Oceanography (NIOZ), Utrecht University, Radboud University Nijmegen, the University of Groningen and the University of Greifswald show this in a study integrating their own research data with all recent scientific literature.
“The study shows that wetlands store about five times more carbon per square meter than forests and 500 times more than oceans. Wetlands such as peatlands, salt marshes, mangrove forests and seagrass beds are therefore ‘hotspots’ for CO2 storage.”
– Ralph Temmink, researcher at Utrecht University
These landscapes form with the help of the plants that grow on them. Peat mosses on raised bogs are one example. Together, they retain enormous amounts of rainwater, which stimulates their own growth. Among the living peat mosses, the remains of the dead plantlets pile up. Since this layer, up to ten meters thick in places, is permanently saturated with water, the dead remains are hardly decomposed. The carbon remains and is not released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide.
In fens and coastal marshes, plants hold dead plant remains with their root mat. This releases nutrients, which in turn help plants grow better. As a result, the carbon-rich plant remains accumulate in the wet soil and form a thick layer of soil. This also avoids CO2 emissions, as in raised bogs.
Although wetlands are essential in the fight against climate change, human intervention destroys one percent of these ecosystems worldwide every year. Drainage, reclamation, and pollution disrupt landscape-forming processes and account for about five percent of our annual global CO2 emissions.
More than half of all attempts to restore wetlands fail because the landscape-forming properties of plants are not taken into account, or are inadequately addressed. “Our study shows that peatlands are the world’s most important carbon-storing ecosystems in terms of quantity – second only to the oceans, but covering a much smaller area. That’s why it’s critical to strictly protect the peatlands that are still in good condition and to re-wet and restore the drained, degraded peatlands as quickly as possible. The good news is that we know better and better how to do this on a large scale,” says Hans Joosten, professor of peatland science and paleoecology at the University of Greifswald.
News Operation & Maintenance Processing Technologies
Stabilization of plastic exhaust systems during implementation
According to the exhaust specialist ATEC from Neu Wulmstorf, the Vario roof flange can be mounted on all roofs with high fitting accuracy. The selection is based on the roof pitch and the required nominal size. In addition, the flange is suitable for temperature classes T200 and T250 – and ATEC has had this certified with a general design approval.
The new product combines two components: first, the flange itself, which provides a stable connection between the roof elevation and the roof structure, and second, the optional seal, a self-adhesive vapor retarder. The company provides two versions: for roof pitches between 0° and 30°, and from 30° to 60°, each in eight nominal sizes between DN60/100 and DN250/315. It is also compatible with plastic and metal exhaust systems up to a nominal operating temperature of ≤ 250 °C.
The flange consists of a stainless steel clamp to which two retaining lugs/articulated brackets are welded at the factory. This is accompanied by a cover plate measuring 450 x 450 mm and 0.5 mm thick. With the help of malleable perforated strips, the exhaust pipe together with the Vario roof flange is screwed into place. This allows the Vario to be used flexibly both in new buildings and in existing properties.
News Operation & Maintenance Processing Technologies
Modern user interface impresses international jury
SIG’s new intuitive Human Machine Interface (HMI) “SIG CRUISER” has been awarded the prestigious iF DESIGN AWARD 2022 in Gold – one of the most important design awards in the world. This part of SIG’s next-generation filling technology enables customers to easily control their entire production process. The user interface is designed to make the operator’s job much easier, while reducing the need for training and prior experience.
The award has been presented annually since 1954 by the iF Industrie Forum Design for outstanding achievements in product design. The company impressed the 132-member jury, which is made up of independent design experts from around the world, and won the award in the “User Interface (UI)” category. Out of nearly 11,000 entries, SIG CRUISER was awarded gold as one of 73 outstanding design achievements.
The judges made the following statement, “With a user-centric approach and sound development methodology, SIG CRUISER provides consistency from the store floor to the top floor, ensuring quick response times and convenience for both the operator and the service team. The user interface is exceptionally simple and user-friendly in terms of operations, layout and graphics, allowing a single operator to control the entire line.”
Today’s competitive environment requires companies to increase production and margins and optimize available equipment. To get the most out of filling lines, it is critical to reduce the risk of downtime and to interconnect, automate and monitor lines for maximum efficiency. The new user interface makes it possible to control the entire filling line. It displays KPIs in an intuitive way.
“This prestigious global design award is the result of the good cooperation between SIG and our partner, HMI Project GmbH. We are very proud that SIG CRUISER stood out from thousands of submissions and convinced the 132-member jury to award an iF DESIGN AWARD in Gold.”
– Stefan Mergel, Senior Product Manager Equipment
Ingredients & Auxiliary Materials News Pharmaceuticals Processing Technologies
Innovative insights into emergence and classification into subtypes
One of the deadliest tumor types is pancreatic cancer . The disease is often only discovered in locally advanced or metastasized tumor stages, when surgical intervention comes too late. Researchers led by Dr. Ivonne Regel of LMU Klinikum in Munich have now gained important new insights into the causes of tumor development. They have also succeeded in defining different tumor subtypes based on differences in their metabolic programs. Funded by the Wilhelm Sander Foundation, they are thus making a significant contribution to early detection and to individualized medicine in order to improve the chances of recovery for pancreatic cancer patients.
Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma, also known as pancreatic cancer, is a relatively rare but particularly malignant disease. It represents the fourth leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the European Union, and only about 10 percent of patients survive the first five years after diagnosis. This is due to aggressive growth and late diagnosis of the tumor. Pancreatic cancer often manifests itself only after other organs have already been affected and metastases are present. To improve the chance of cure for pancreatic cancer patients, it is of great urgency to find new biomarkers for early detection. Another essential step is to identify tumor-specific signaling pathways that cause aggressive disease progression in order to identify new targets for therapeutic approaches.
TLR3/IRF3/IRF7 signaling pathway critical for pancreatic cancer development
Pancreatic cancer development is a dynamic process involving tissue damage and inflammatory response in the pancreas. When pancreatitis occurs, the organ has a self-healing mechanism. Normal pancreatic cells can divide to replace damaged tissue. Molecules released during inflammatory and tissue-damaging processes are recognized by cell receptors, relaying signals that promote cell survival and division.
However, in pancreatic cells, this can contribute to cell degeneration and promote the development of pancreatic cancer. Researchers led by Dr. Ivonne Regel were able to show for the first time that the signaling pathway plays an important role in inflammatory responses not only in immune cells, but is also active in pancreatic cells of precursor lesions and tumor cells. This activation of the signaling pathway has an important function in pancreatic cancer development. Genetically-altered mice lacking a functional signaling pathway are unable to develop pancreatic carcinomas (see Figure). Similarly, it was genetically knocked out in pancreatic tumor cells using CRISPR/Cas9 gene scissors. These genetically modified tumor cells exhibited significantly less aggressive behavior in cell culture experiments and also showed greatly reduced metastasis in animal models.
“For the first time, we were able to demonstrate that an active signaling pathway in pancreatic cells contributes to the development of pancreatic cancer and also supports the formation of metastases.”
– Ivonne Regel
Dr. Regel’s team has made another exciting discovery: In pancreatic tumor cells, the signaling pathway surprisingly does not regulate known target genes; instead, evidence was found for epigenetic modifications. These are regulatory modifications to DNA and packaging proteins (histones) that influence the activity of genes. Thus, the current research results indicate that activation of the signaling pathway in tumor cells leads to high levels of transcription of specific tumor-promoting genes.
These genes primarily regulate tumor cell metabolism. This is particularly important because metabolites of tumor cells can be found in the blood of patients and can be used as biomarkers. “My team and I have succeeded in identifying different subtypes of pancreatic cancer from the blood of cancer patients based on differences in their metabolic programs” said Dr. Regel. “In further studies, we now want to find out to what extent the development of pancreatic cancer subtypes is regulated by the signaling pathway.”