Tag Archives: climate change

Nano-treatment could help save mangroves from deadly disease

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Seems to be my week for coastal erosion. First, there was my August 23, 2024 posting “Electricity (electrodeposition) could help fight coastal (beach) erosion” and today, August 30, 2024, I’m featuring news I got about a month ago (late July 2024) regarding a special formula to help save mangroves on the Florida coast and other coasts where they are found.

A July 26, 2024 news item on ScienceDaily features news from the University of Central Florida, Note: Links have been removed,

Mangroves and palm trees are hallmarks of the Sunshine State not just for their beauty but for their immense importance to Florida’s coastlines.

Mangroves are crucial because they naturally protect coastal shores from storm damage and serve as vital wildlife habitats around the world.

Scientists at the University of Central Florida are working to preserve mangroves in Florida and across the world from an increasingly prevalent disease-causing variety of fungi that lies dormant but becomes active when the tree is exposed to stressors such as temperature fluctuation, pests or other diseases.

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A July 26, 2024 University of Central Florida (UCF) news release by Eddy Duryea (also on EurekAlert), which originated the news item, describes the disease (which hasn’t yet been formally named) and gives some details about the proposed treatment, Note: Links have been removed,

The disease does not yet have an official name, but it is being referred to by scientists as “Mangrove CNP.” It is caused by a group of fungal pathogens, including Curvularia, Neopestalotiopsis, and Pestalotiopsis, that causes yellowing and spots, and gradually weaken the mangrove until it ultimately dies.

Melissa Deinys, a UCF undergraduate researcher, and Jorge Pereira, a UCF graduate research assistant, are working to help turn the tide by developing and testing a promising nutritional cocktail comprised of nanoparticles to strengthen mangroves and counter the pathogens. The work is through UCF professor Swadeshmukul Santra’s Materials Innovation for Sustainable Agriculture (MISA) center at UCF, which is a U.S. Department of Agriculture-National Institute of Food and Agricultural recognized Center of Excellence.

Mangrove CNP in Florida was first identified as causing mangrove die-offs by Deinys in 2019 in Miami through her work with Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden. Later, the Marine Resources Council, a non-profit organization dedicated to the protection and restoration of Florida’s Indian River Lagoon, verified and cited her efforts.

Deinys and collaborators with the MRC and Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden have determined that about 80% of the mangroves they had sampled have tested positive for at least one of the fungal pathogen species. She says they have sampled over 130 mangroves between the Indian River Lagoon and Miami mangrove populations.

The researchers are treating the mangroves by soaking them in a nutrient solution called “Mag Sun” (MgSuN), which is comprised of magnesium and sulfur nanoparticles. The mixture is a refinement of a previous graduate student’s formula that destroyed bacteria on tomatoes, Pereira says.

“The reason why we choose magnesium is because it is more environmentally friendly, and plants need a lot of magnesium,” he says. “I combined our magnesium formulation with a sodium polysulfide. Sulfur is one of those elements that is ubiquitous in the environment, and the idea is that you can combine both to actually enhance the anti-microbial capacity for both bacteria and fungi and you also supply key nutrients to the plants so that they can grow greener and leafier.”

During lab tests, the researchers say they observed growth inhibition of up to 95% when treated with MgSuN at varying concentrations compared to the untreated control.

The formula acts as a sort of antibiotic and multivitamin, and it has shown great potential in bolstering the health of infected mangroves at nurseries across Florida, Pereira says.

“We’ve done some experiments, and we have tested both in vitro and in plants,” he says. “We’re working with the nurseries, and we’ve seen it does kill the pathogens with no detrimental effects to the mangroves while kickstarting their health. They look great after treatment.”

Deinys is continuing her work with the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, MRC and nurseries across Florida while staying the course on her path to graduation and furthering her research at UCF.

She began studying the fungal pathogens in 2018 in Miami prior to being enrolled at UCF and has seen the mangroves become increasingly affected by the pathogens’ opportunistic nature.

“Back at the botanical gardens where I started, I would see the plants have these pathogens but not to a detrimental effect where we now see these organisms collapsing,” she says. “A mangrove nursery [The Marine Resources Council] had reached out to us, and they told us they had an insect infestation and then the whole population got wiped out by the pathogen. We’re also getting reports from places like Tampa that say areas that have more runoff are having more pathogen-related deterioration compared to 10 years ago.”

The fungi have been well-documented for some time, but volatile temperature changes, frequent storms and other increasing stressors open the door to the fungi taking a hold of the mangroves, Deinys says.

“They’re called opportunistic, and they’re called that for a reason,” she says. “They see a change in the plant and that’s when they start to take effect.”

How the pathogens are acquired is something that remains unclear, Deinys says. Researchers hypothesize it may be introduced through water, wind or insects, but further studies are needed to determine how it is acquired since it poses threat to mangrove health.

“You have to study all possibilities to determine what is the vector,” Deinys says. “We’ve seen papers and literature in other countries that have shown these pathogens for a long time. It’s been difficult because there is a disconnect in mangrove communities because we’re worlds apart and with different languages.”

The MgSuN nutrient solution is a treatment, but not a cure, Deinys says. There still are ample stressors that should be managed and mitigated, such as human-caused habitat destruction, in addition to treating the pathogens.

“I think there’s a big restoration effort to repopulate mangroves,” she says. “But first we need to look at the health of these mangroves and the health of the ecosystem before we determine what more we should do. We’re working with mangrove nurseries to see if we can together develop solutions.”

Maintaining and restoring mangroves is an essential component of ecological stewardship, and it’s a passion that Deinys hopes to continue throughout her career.

“I started this project my freshman year,” she says. “I didn’t want to leave what I was doing, and I came here with a mission. I met with Dr. Santra, our PI, and he wanted to help. He gave me a lot of freedom, and I’m really grateful.”

Deinys says that her research at UCF has been incredibly gratifying.

“There is a sense of community here that I found,” she says. “I joined the lab, and it felt like I found my family and that’s one of the best things to have come out of this experience. This has been one of my life’s passions, and I hope I’ll always stay with this project even after.”

Santra is encouraged by the research conducted by Pereira and Deinys, and he is hopeful it continues to bolster mangrove ecosystems.

“The UCF MISA center is dedicated to solving global problems that threaten agricultural sustainability,” he says. “We are excited to have another crop protection tool in our toolbox for protecting mangroves. I see the future of MagSun as a broad-spectrum fungicide, where GRAS (Generally Recognized As Safe) materials are empowered through nanotechnology.”

Further studies are needed to pinpoint which stressors are affecting the mangroves the most so that scientists can better preserve them, Pereira says.

“It’s very important to understand the stressors, and we need to really address if it’s a change in temperature, if it’s runoff or if it’s an additional pathogen,” he says. “In the meantime, we need to do something to prevent this damage from occurring.”

Researchers’ Credentials

Deinys graduated from BioTECH @ Richmond Heights High School, a conservation biology magnet school, where she began her research journey at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden and specialized in botany. In Fall 2022, Deinys joined UCF and became a member of the Santra Lab the following spring. She is an undergraduate research assistant working towards her bachelor’s degree in biotechnology.

Pereira graduated from Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras with a degree in industrial chemistry. He joined Santra’s lab in 2020 and is currently a graduate research assistant and working toward his doctoral degree in chemistry.

Santra holds a doctorate in chemistry from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur. After graduating, he worked at the University of Florida (UF) as a postdoctoral researcher and later as a research assistant professor at the UF Department of Neurological Surgery and Particle Engineering Research Center. In 2005, Santra joined UCF as an assistant professor at the NanoScience Technology Center, the Department of Chemistry and the Burnett School of Biomedical Sciences. He is the director of the UCF Materials Innovation for Sustainable Agriculture center, a USDA-NIFA-recognized Center of Excellence.

They don’t seem to have published a paper about their work but there is this video,

After sugar-free meals, soil bacteria respire more CO2

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Scientists have found out more about how carbon cycles through the environment in a June 11, 2024 news item on ScienceDaily,

When soil microbes eat plant matter, the digested food follows one of two pathways. Either the microbe uses the food to build its own body, or it respires its meal as carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere.

Now, a Northwestern University [Illinois, US]-led research team has, for the first time, tracked the pathways of a mixture of plant waste as it moves through bacteria’s metabolism to contribute to atmospheric CO2. The researchers discovered that microbes respire three times as much CO2 from lignin carbons (non-sugar aromatic units) compared to cellulose carbons (glucose sugar units), which both add structure and support to plants’ cellular walls.

These findings help disentangle the role of microbes in soil carbon cycling — information that could help improve predictions of how carbon in soil will affect climate change.

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Caption: Image of soil with a close-up of a bacterium and the cellular pathways involved in carbon dioxide productions. Available substrates from soil organic matter are processed through specific pathways with different amount of carbon dioxide output flux.. Credit: Aristilde Lab/Northwestern University

A June 11, 2024 Northwestern University news release (also received via email and on EurekAlert), which originated the news item, explains what this research means, Note: Links have been removed,

“The carbon pool that’s stored in soil is about 10 times the amount that’s in the atmosphere,” said Northwestern University’s Ludmilla Aristilde, who led the study. “What happens to this reservoir will have an enormous impact on the planet. Because microbes can unlock this carbon and turn it into atmospheric CO2, there is a huge interest in understanding how they metabolize plant waste. As temperatures rise, more organic matter of different types will become available in soil. That will affect the amount of CO2 that is emitted from microbial activities.”

An expert in the dynamics of organics in environmental processes, Aristilde is an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at Northwestern’s McCormick School of Engineering and is a member of the Center for Synthetic Biology and of the Paula M. Trienens Institute for Sustainability and Energy. Caroll Mendonca, a former Ph.D. candidate in Aristilde’s laboratory, is the paper’s first author. The study includes collaborators from the University of Chicago.

‘Not all pathways are created equally’

The new study builds upon ongoing work in Aristilde’s laboratory to understand how soil stores — or releases — carbon. Although previous researchers typically tracked how broken-down compounds from plant matter move individually through bacteria, Aristilde’s team instead used a mixture of these compounds to represent what bacteria are exposed to in the natural environment. Then, to track how different plant derivatives moved through a bacterium’s metabolism, the researchers tagged individual carbon atoms with isotope labels.

“Isotope labeling allowed us to track carbon atoms specific to each compound type inside the cell,” Aristilde said. “By tracking the carbon routes, we were able to capture their paths in the metabolism. That is important because not all pathways are created equally in terms of producing carbon dioxide.”

Sugar carbons in cellulose, for example, traveled through glycolytic and pentose-phosphate pathways. These pathways lead to metabolic reactions that convert digested matter into carbons to make DNA and proteins, which build the microbe’s own biomass. But aromatic, non-sugar carbons from lignin traveled a different route — through the tricarboxylic acid cycle.

“The tricarboxylic acid cycle exists in all forms of life,” Aristilde said. “It exists in plants, microbes, animals and humans. While this cycle also produces precursors for proteins, it contains several reactions that produce CO2. Most of the CO2 that gets respired from metabolism comes from this pathway.”

Expanding the findings

After tracking the routes of metabolism, Aristilde and her team performed quantitative analysis to determine the amount of CO2 produced from different types of plant matter. After consuming a mixture of plant matter, microbes respired three times as much CO2 from carbons derived from lignin compared to carbons derived from cellulose.

“Even though microbes consume these carbons at the same time, the amount of CO2 generated from each carbon type is disproportionate,” Aristilde said. “That’s because the carbon is processed via two different metabolic pathways.”

In the initial experiments, Aristilde and her team used Pseudomonas putida, a common soil bacterium with a versatile metabolism. Curious to see if their findings applied to other bacteria, the researchers studied data from previous experiments in scientific literature. They found the same relationship they discovered among plant matter, metabolism and CO2 manifested in other soil bacteria.

“We propose a new metabolism-guided perspective for thinking about how different carbon structures accessible to soil microbes are processed,” Aristilde said. “That will be key in helping us predict what will happen with the soil carbon cycle with a changing climate.”

The study, “Disproportionate carbon dioxide efflux in bacterial metabolic pathways for different organic substrates leads to variable contribution to carbon use efficiency,” was supported by the National Science Foundation (grant numbers CBET-1653092 and CBET-2022854).

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Disproportionate Carbon Dioxide Efflux in Bacterial Metabolic Pathways for Different Organic Substrates Leads to Variable Contribution to Carbon-Use Efficiency by Caroll M. Mendonca, Lichun Zhang, Jacob R. Waldbauer, and Ludmilla Aristilde. Environ. Sci. Technol. 2024, 58, 25, 11041–11052 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.4c01328 Publication Date:June 11, 2024 Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by American Chemical Society.

This paper is open access and has a Creative Commons licence: CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0..

Electricity (electrodeposition) could help fight coastal (beach) erosion

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I live in a coastal region and a few months ago our local municipal voted down an initiative that included some mitigation for beach erosion. So, this research caught my eye.

Caption: An artistic impression of how electricity could be used to strengthen coastlines. Credit: Northwestern University

An August 22, 2024 news item on phys.org announces an unexpected approach to dealing with coastal erosion,

New research from Northwestern University has systematically proven that a mild zap of electricity can strengthen a marine coastline for generations—greatly reducing the threat of erosion in the face of climate change and rising sea levels.

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An August 22, 2024 Northwestern University news release (received via email and also found on EurekAlert) by Amanda Morris, which originated the news item, delves further into the topic, Note: Links have been removed,

In the new study, researchers took inspiration from clams, mussels and other shell-dwelling sea life, which use dissolved minerals in seawater to build their shells.

Similarly, the researchers leveraged the same naturally occurring, dissolved minerals to form a natural cement between sea-soaked grains of sand. But, instead of using metabolic energy like mollusks do, the researchers used electrical energy to spur the chemical reaction.

In laboratory experiments, a mild electrical current instantaneously changed the structure of marine sand, transforming it into a rock-like, immoveable solid. The researchers are hopeful this strategy could offer a lasting, inexpensive and sustainable solution for strengthening global coastlines.

The study will be published on Thursday (Aug. 22 [2024]) in the journal Communications Earth and the Environment, a journal published by Nature Portfolio.

“Over 40% of the world’s population lives in coastal areas,” said Northwestern’s Alessandro Rotta Loria, who led the study. “Because of climate change and sea-level rise, erosion is an enormous threat to these communities. Through the disintegration of infrastructure and loss of land, erosion causes billions of dollars in damage per year worldwide. Current approaches to mitigate erosion involve building protection structures or injecting external binders into the subsurface.

“My aim was to develop an approach capable of changing the status quo in coastal protection — one that didn’t require the construction of protection structures and could cement marine substrates without using actual cement. By applying a mild electric stimulation to marine soils, we systematically and mechanistically proved that it is possible to cement them by turning naturally dissolved minerals in seawater into solid mineral binders — a natural cement.”

Rotta Loria is the Louis Berger Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Northwestern’s McCormick School of Engineering. Andony Landivar Macias, a former Ph.D. candidate in Rotta Loria’s laboratory, is the paper’s first author. Steven Jacobsen, a mineralogist and professor of Earth and planetary sciences in Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, also co-authored the study.

Sea walls, too, erode

From intensifying rainstorms to rising sea levels, climate change has created conditions that are gradually eroding coastlines. According to a 2020 study by the European commission’s Joint Research Centre, nearly 26% of the Earth’s beaches will be washed away by the end of this century.

To mitigate this issue, communities have implemented two main approaches: building protection structures and barriers, such as sea walls, or injecting cement into the ground to strengthen marine substrates, widely consisting of sand. But multiple problems accompany these strategies. Not only are these conventional methods extremely expensive, they also do not last.

“Sea walls, too, suffer from erosion,” Rotta Loria said. “So, over time, the sand beneath these walls erodes, and the walls can eventually collapse. Oftentimes, protection structures are made of big stones, which cost millions of dollars per mile. However, the sand beneath them can essentially liquify because of a number of environmental stressors, and these big rocks are swallowed by the ground beneath them.

“Injecting cement and other binders into the ground has a number of irreversible environmental drawbacks. It also typically requires high pressures and significant interconnected amounts of energy.”

Turning ions into glue

To bypass these issues, Rotta Loria and his team developed a simpler technique, inspired by coral and mollusks. Seawater naturally contains a myriad of ions and dissolved minerals. When a mild electrical current (2 to 3 volts) is applied to the water, it triggers chemical reactions. This converts some of these constituents into solid calcium carbonate — the same mineral mollusks use to build their shells. Likewise, with a slightly higher voltage (4 volts), these constituents can be predominantly converted into magnesium hydroxide and hydromagnesite, a ubiquitous mineral found in various stones.

When these minerals coalesce in the presence of sand, they act like a glue, binding the sand particles together. In the laboratory, the process also worked with all types of sands — from common silica and calcareous sands to iron sands, which are often found near volcanoes.

“After being treated, the sand looks like a rock,” Rotta Loria said. “It is still and solid, instead of granular and incohesive. The minerals themselves are much stronger than concrete, so the resulting sand could become as strong and solid as a sea wall.”

While the minerals form instantaneously after the current is applied, longer electric stimulations garner more substantial results. “We have noticed remarkable outcomes from just a few days of stimulations,” Rotta Loria said. “Then, the treated sand should stay in place, without needing further interventions.”

Ecofriendly and reversible

Rotta Loria predicts the treated sand should keep its durability, protecting coastlines and property for decades.

Rotta Loria also says there is no need to worry negative effects on sea life. The voltages used in the process are too mild to feel. Other researchers have used similar processes to strengthen undersea structures or even restore coral reefs. In those scenarios, no sea critters were harmed.

And, if communities decide they no longer want the solidified sand, Rotta Loria has a solution for that, too, as the process is completely reversible. When the battery’s anode and cathode electrodes are switched, the electricity dissolves the minerals — effectively undoing the process.

“The minerals form because we are locally raising the pH of the seawater around cathodic interfaces,” Rotta Loria said. “If you switch the anode with the cathode, then localized reductions in pH are involved, which dissolve the previously precipitated minerals.”

Competitive cost, countless applications

The process offers an inexpensive alternative to conventional methods. After crunching the numbers, Rotta Loria’s team estimates that his process costs just $3 to $6 per cubic meter of electrically cemented ground. More established, comparable methods, which use binders to adhere and strengthen sand, cost up to $70 for the same unit volume.

Research in Rotta Loria’s lab shows this approach also can heal cracked structures made of reinforced concrete. Much of the existing shoreside infrastructure is made of reinforced concrete, which disintegrates due to complex effects caused by sea-level rise, erosion and extreme weather. And if these structures crack, the new approach bypasses the need to fully rebuild the infrastructure. Instead, one pulse of electricity can heal potentially destructive cracks.

“The applications of this approach are countless,” Rotta Loria said. “We can use it to strengthen the seabed beneath sea walls or stabilize sand dunes and retain unstable soil slopes. We could also use it to strengthen protection structures, marine foundations and so many other things. There are many ways to apply this to protect coastal areas.”

Next, Rotta Loria’s team plans to test the technique outside of the laboratory and on the beach.

The study, “Electrodeposition of calcareous cement from seawater in marine silica sands,” was supported by the Army Research Office (grant number W911NF2210291) and Northwestern’s Center for Engineering Sustainability and Resilience.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Electrodeposition of calcareous cement from seawater in marine silica sands by Andony Landivar Macias, Steven D. Jacobsen & Alessandro F. Rotta Loria. Communications Earth & Environment volume 5, Article number: 442 (2024) DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-024-01604-3 Published: 22 August 2024

This paper is open access.

Using copper to mitigate climate change?

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A July 4, 2024 news item on phys.org announces research into copper that mitigates climate change,

Carbon in the atmosphere is a major driver of climate change. Now researchers from McGill University have designed a new catalyst for converting carbon dioxide (CO2) into methane—a cleaner source of energy—using tiny bits of copper called nanoclusters. While the traditional method of producing methane from fossil fuels introduces more CO2 into the atmosphere, the new process, electrocatalysis, does not.

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A July 4, 2024 Canadian Light Source (CLS) news release (also received via email) by Rowan Hollinger, which originated the news item, delves further into the research, Note: A link has been removed,

“On sunny days you can use solar power, or when it’s a windy day you can use that wind to produce renewable electricity, but as soon as you produce that electricity you need to use it,” says Mahdi Salehi, Ph.D. candidate at the Electrocatalysis Lab at McGill University. “But in our case, we can use that renewable but intermittent electricity to store the energy in chemicals like methane.”

By using copper nanoclusters, says Salehi, carbon dioxide from the atmosphere can be transformed into methane and once the methane is used, any carbon dioxide released can be captured and “recycled” back into methane. This would create a closed “carbon loop” that does not emit new carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. The research, published recently in the journal Applied Catalysis B: Environment and Energy, was enabled by the Canadian Light Source (CLS) at the University of Saskatchewan (USask).

“In our simulations, we used copper catalysts with different sizes, from small ones with only 19 atoms to larger ones with 1000 atoms,” says Salehi. “We then tested them in the lab, focusing on how the sizes of the clusters influenced the reaction mechanism.”

“Our top finding was that extremely small copper nanoclusters are very effective at producing methane,” continues Salehi. “This was a significant discovery, indicating that the size and structure of the copper nanoclusters play a crucial role in the reaction’s outcome.”

The team plans to continue refining their catalyst to make it more efficient and investigate its large-scale, industrial applications. Their hope is that their findings will open new avenues for producing clean, sustainable energy.

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Researcher Mahdi Salehi describes his work in a video provided by the Canadian Light Source (CLS),

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Copper nanoclusters: Selective CO2 to methane conversion beyond 1 A/cm² by Mahdi Salehi, Hasan Al-Mahayni, Amirhossein Farzi, Morgan McKee, Sepideh Kaviani, Elmira Pajootan, Roger Lin, Nikolay Kornienko, Ali Seifitokaldani. Applied Catalysis B: Environment and Energy Volume 353, 15 September 2024, 124061 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apcatb.2024.124061 Available online 9 April 2024, Version of Record 12 April 2024.

This paper is open access. Under a Creative Commons license

Comments on today’s (September 20, 2023) media briefing for the US National Science Foundation’s (NSF) inaugural Global Centers Competition awards

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I almost missed the briefing but the folks at the US National Science Foundation (NSF) kindly allowed me to join the meeting despite being 10 minutes late. Before launching into my comments, here’s what we were discussing,

From a September 20, 2023 NSF media briefing (received via email),

U. S. National Science Foundation Media Briefing on the Inaugural Global Centers Awards  

Please join the U.S. National Science Foundation this Wednesday September 20th from 12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST for a discussion and Q&A on the inaugural Global Centers Competition awards. Earlier this week, NSF along with partner funding agencies from Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom — announced awards totaling $76.4 million for the inaugural Global Centers Competition. These international, interdisciplinary collaborative research centers will apply best practices of broadening participation and community engagement to develop use-inspired research on climate change and clean energy. The centers will also create and promote opportunities for students and early-career researchers to gain education and training in world-class research while enhancing diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility.

NSF will have a panel of experts on hand to discuss and answer questions about these new Global Centers and how they will sync talent across the globe to generate the discoveries and solutions needed to empower resilient communities everywhere.

What: Panel discussion and Q&A on NSF’s Global Centers

When: 12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST, Wednesday, September 20th, 2023

Where: This briefing [is over.]

Who: Scheduled panelists include…

Anne Emig is the Section Chief for the Programs and Analysis Section in the National Science Foundation Office of International Science and Engineering

Dr. Tanya Berger-Wolf is the Principal Investigator for the Global Centers Track 1 project on AI and Biodiversity Change as well as the Director of the Translational Data Analytics Institute and a Professor of Computer Science Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, as well as Evolution, Ecology, and Organismal Biology at the Ohio State University

Dr. Meng Tao is the Principal Investigator for the Global Centers Track 1 project Global Hydrogen Production Technologies Center as well as a Professor, School of Electrical, Computer and Energy Engineering at Arizona State University

Dr. Ashish Sharma is the Principal Investigator for the Global Centers Track 1 project Clean Energy and Equitable Transportation Solutions as well as the Climate and Urban Sustainability Lead at the Discovery Partners Institute, University of Illinois System

Note: This briefing is only open to members of the media

I’m glad to have learned about this effort and applaud the NSF for its outreach efforts. By comparison, Canadian agencies (I’m looking at you, Natural Sciences and Engineering Council of Canada [NSERC] and Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada [SSHRC]) have a lot to learn.

There’s a little more about the Global Centers Competition awards in a September 18, 2023 NSF news release,

Today [September 18, 2023], the U.S. National Science Foundation — along with partner funding agencies from Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom — announced awards totaling $76.4 million for the inaugural Global Centers Competition. These international, interdisciplinary collaborative research centers will apply best practices of broadening participation and community engagement to develop use-inspired research on climate change and clean energy. The centers will also create and promote opportunities for students and early-career researchers to gain education and training in world-class research while enhancing diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility.

“NSF builds capacity and advances its priorities through these centers of research excellence by uniting diverse teams from around the world,” said NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan. “Global Centers will sync talent across the globe to generate the discoveries and solutions needed to empower resilient communities everywhere.”

Global Centers are sponsored in part by a multilateral funding activity led by NSF and four partner funding organizations: Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), Canada’s Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) and Social Science and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), and the United Kingdom’s UK Research and Innovation (UKRI).

Both collectively and independently, the centers will support convergent interdisciplinary research collaborations focused on assessing and mitigating the impacts of climate change on society, people, and communities. Outcomes from Global Centers’ activities will inform and catalyze the development of innovative solutions and technologies to address climate change. Examples include: enhancing awareness of critical information; advancing and advocating for decarbonization efforts; creating climate change adaptation plans tailored to specific localities and groups; using artificial intelligence to study responses of nature to climate change; transboundary water issues; and scaling the production of next-generation technologies aimed at achieving net zero. Several projects include partnerships with tribal groups or historically Black colleges and universities that will broaden participation.

“The National Science Foundation Global Centres initiative provides students and researchers a platform to advance innovative and interdisciplinary research and gain education and training opportunities in world-class research while also enhancing diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility,” said NSERC President Alejandro Adem. “We at NSERC look forward to seeing the outcomes of the work being done by some of Canada and the world’s best and brightest minds to tackle one of the biggest issues of our time.”

The awards are divided into two tracks. Track 1 are Implementation grants with co-funding from international partners. Track 2 are Design grants meant to provide seed funding to develop the teams and the science for future competitions. Many additional countries are involved in Track 2 and will increase global engagement.

There are seven Track 1 Global Centers that involve research partnerships with Australia, Canada, and the U.K. Each Track 1 Global Center will be implemented by internationally dispersed teams consisting of U.S. and foreign researchers. U.S. researchers will be supported by NSF up to $5 million over four to five years, while foreign researchers will be supported by their respective country’s funding agency (CSIRO, NSERC, SSHRC and UKRI) with a comparable amount of funds.

There are 14 Track 2 Global Centers that are at the community-driven design stage. These centers’ teams involve U.S. researchers in partnerships with foreign researchers from any country. NSF will provide the U.S. researchers up to $250,000 of seed funding over a two-year period. These multidisciplinary, international teams will coordinate the research and education efforts needed to become competitive for Track-1 funding in the future.

“Our combined investment in Global Centers enables exciting researcher and innovation-led international and interdisciplinary collaboration to drive the energy transition,” said UKRI CEO, Dame Ottoline Leyser. “I look forward to seeing the creative solutions developed through these global collaborations.”

Kirsten Rose, Acting Chief Executive of CSIRO, said as Australia’s national science agency, CSIRO is proud to be part of a strong national contribution to solving this critical global challenge. “Partnering with the NSF’s Global Centers means Australia remains at the global forefront of work to build a clean hydrogen industry, build integrated and equitable energy systems, and partnering with regions and industries for a low emissions future.”

Track 1 (Implementation)

  • Global Hydrogen Production Technologies (HyPT) Center
    Grant number: 2330525
    Arizona State University and U.S. partner institutions: University of Michigan, Stanford University and Navajo Technical University.
    Quadrilateral research partnership with Australia, Canada, and the U.K.
    Critical and Emerging Tech: green hydrogen (renewable energy generation).
     
  • Electric Power Innovation for a Carbon-free Society (EPICS)
    Grant number: 2330450
    The Johns Hopkins University and U.S. partner institutions: Georgia Institute of Technology, University of California, Davis, and Resources for the Future.
    Trilateral research partnership with Australia and the U.K.
    Critical and Emerging Tech: renewable energy storage.
     
  • Global Nitrogen Innovation Center for Clean Energy and Environment (NICCEE)
    Grant number: 2330502
    University of Maryland Center for Environmental Sciences and U.S. partner institutions: New York University and University of Massachusetts Amherst.
    Trilateral research partnership with Canada and the U.K.
    Critical & Emerging Tech: green ammonia (bioeconomy + agriculture).
     
  • Understanding Climate Change Impacts on Transboundary Waters
    Grant number: 2330317
    University of Michigan and U.S. partner institutions: Cornell University, College of the Menominee Nation, Red Lake Nation and University of Wisconsin–Madison.
    Bilateral research partnership with Canada.
    Critical and Emerging Tech: N/A.
     
  • AI and Biodiversity Change (ABC)
    Grant number: 2330423 
    The Ohio State University and U.S. partner institutions: University of Pittsburgh and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
    Bilateral Research partnership with Canada.
    Critical and Emerging Tech: AI.
     
  • U.S.-Canada Center on Climate-Resilient Western Interconnected Grid
    Grant number: 2330582                
    The University of Utah and U.S. partner institutions: University of California San Diego, The University of New Mexico, and The Nevada System of Higher Education.     
    Bilateral Research partnership with Canada.
    Critical and Emerging Tech: AI.
     
  • Clean Energy and Equitable Transportation Solutions
    Grant number: 2330565
    University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and U.S. partner institutions: University Corporation for Atmospheric Research and Arizona State University.
    Bilateral Research partnership with the U.K.
    Critical and Emerging Tech: N/A
     

Track 2 (Design)

  • Developing Solutions to Decarbonize Emissions and Fuels
    Grant number: 2330509              
    University of Maryland, College Park.
    International collaboration with Japan, Israel, and Ghana.             
     
  • Enhanced Wind Turbine Blade Durability
    Grant number: 2329911              
    Cornell University.
    International collaboration with Canada, the UK, Norway, Denmark, and Spain.
     
  • Building the Global Center for Forecasting Freshwater Futures
    Grant number: 2330211
    Virginia Tech.
    International collaboration with Australia.
     
  • Climate Risk and Resilience: Southeast Asia as a Living Lab (SEALL)
    Grant number: 2330308
    University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
    International collaboration with Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, and India.
     
  • Climate-Smart Food-Energy-Water Nexus in Small Farms
    Grant number: 2330505              
    The University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture.        
    International collaboration with Argentina, Brazil, Guatemala, Panama, Cambodia, and Uganda.
     
  • Center for Household Energy and Thermal Resilience (HEaTR)
    Grant number: 2330533              
    Cornell University.
    International collaboration with India, the U.K, Ghana, and Singapore.
     
  • Enabling interdisciplinary wildfire research for community resilience
    Grant number: 2330343              
    Oregon State University.
    International collaborations with Australia and the U.K.
     
  • SuReMin: Sustainable, resilient, responsible global minerals supply chain
    Grant number: 2330041              
    Northwestern University.
    International collaboration with Chile.
     
  • Nature-based Urban Hydrology Center
    Grant number: 2330413              
    Villanova University.
    International collaboration with Canada, the U.K, Switzerland, Ireland, Australia, Chile, and Turkey.
     
  • A multi-disciplinary framework to combat climate-induced desert locust upsurges, outbreaks, and plagues in East Africa
    Grand number: 2330452
    Georgia State University.
    International collaboration with Ethiopia.
     
  • US-Africa Research Center for Clean Energy
    Grant number: 2330437
    Georgia Institute of Technology.
    International collaborations with Rwanda.
     
  • Equitable and User-Centric Energy Market for Resilient Grid-interactive Communities
    Grant number: 2330504
    Santa Clara University.
    International collaboration with Canada.
     
  • Energy Sovereignty for Indigenous Peoples (ESIP)
    Grant number: 2330387
    University of North Dakota.
    International collaboration with Canada.
     
  • Blue Climate Solutions
    Grant number: 2330518              
    University of Rhode Island.
    International collaboration with Indonesia.

For Canadian researchers who are interested, there’s a National Science Foundation Global Centres webpage on the NSERC website, which answers a lot of questions about the programme from a Canadian perspective. The application deadline for both tracks was May 10, 2023 and there’s no information (as of September 20, 2023) about future competitions. Nice to see the social science and humanities included in the form of a funding agency. (I think this might be the one compliment I deliver to a Canadian funding initiative this year. 🙂

For American researchers, there’s the NSF’s Global Centers webpage; for UK researchers, there’s the United Kingdom’s Research and Innovation’s Global Centres in clean energy and climate change webpage; and for Australian researchers, there’s the CSIRO’s National Science Foundation Global Centers webpage. Application deadlines have passed for all of these competitions and there’s no information (as of September 20, 2023) about future competitions.

A few comments

News about local and international affairs (see Seth Borenstein’s September 20, 2023 Associated Press article “UN chief warns of ‘gates of hell’ in climate summit, but carbon polluting nations stay silent”) and one’s own personal experience with climate issues can be discouraging at times so it’s heartening to see these efforts. Kudos to the organizers of the Global Centers programme and I wish all the researchers success.

Given how new these centers are, it’s understandable that the panelists would be a little fuzzy about specific although they’ve clearly considered and are attempting to address issues such as sharing data, trust, and outreach to various stakeholders and communities.

I wish I’d asked about cybersecurity when they were talking about data. Ah well, there was my question about outreach to people over the age of 50 or 55 as so much of their planning was focused on youth. The panelists who responded (Dr. Tanya Berger-Wolf, Dr. Meng Tao, and Dr. Ashish Sharma) did not seem to have done much thinking about seniors/elders/older people.

I believe bird watching (as mentioned by one of the panelists) does tend to attract older people but citizen science or other hobbies/programmes mentioned may or may not be a good source for seniors outreach. Almost all science outreach tilts to youth including citizen science.

With the planet is not doing so well and with the aging populations in Canada, the US, many European countries, China, Japan, and I’m sure many others perhaps some new thinking about ‘inclusivity’ might be in order. One suggestion, start thinking about age groups. In the same way that 20 is not 30, is not 40, so 55 is not 65, is not 75. One more thing, perhaps take into account life experience. Something that gets forgotten is that a lot of the programmes that people take for granted and a lot of the technology people use today was developed in the 1960s (e.g. Internet). That old person? Maybe it’s someone who founded the UN’s Environment Program (I was teaching a nanotechnology course in a seniors programme and asked students about themselves; I was intimidated by her credentials).

In the end, this Global Center initiative is heartening news.

Smart City tech brief: facial recognition, cybersecurity; privacy protection; and transparency

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This May 10, 2022 Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) announcement (received via email) has an eye-catching head,

Should Smart Cities Adopt Facial Recognition, Remote Monitoring Software+Social Media to Police [verb] Info?

The Association for Computing Machinery, the largest and most prestigious computer science society worldwide (100,000 members) has released a report, ACM TechBrief: Smart Cities, for smart city planners to address 1) cybersecurity; 2) privacy protections; 3) fairness and transparency; and 4) sustainability when planning and designing systems, including climate impact. 

…

There’s a May 3, 2022 ACM news release about the latest technical brief,

The Association for Computing Machinery’s global Technology Policy Council (ACM TPC) just released, “ACM TechBrief: Smart Cities,” which highlights the challenges involved in deploying information and communication technology to create smart cities and calls for policy leaders planning such projects to do so without compromising security, privacy, fairness and sustainability. The TechBrief includes a primer on smart cities, key statistics about the growth and use of these technologies, and a short list of important policy implications.

“Smart cities” are municipalities that use a network of physical devices and computer technologies to make the delivery of public services more efficient and/or more environmentally friendly. Examples of smart city applications include using sensors to turn off streetlights when no one is present, monitoring traffic patterns to reduce roadway congestion and air pollution, or keeping track of home-bound medical patients in order to dispatch emergency responders when needed. Smart cities are an outgrowth of the Internet of Things (IoT), the rapidly growing infrastructure of literally billions of physical devices embedded with sensors that are connected to computers and the Internet.

The deployment of smart city technology is growing across the world, and these technologies offer significant benefits. For example, the TechBrief notes that “investing in smart cities could contribute significantly to achieving greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets,” and that “smart cities use digital innovation to make urban service delivery more efficient.”

Because of the meteoric growth and clear benefits of smart city technologies, the TechBrief notes that now is an urgent time to address some of the important public policy concerns that smart city technologies raise. The TechBrief lists four key policy implications that government officials, as well as the private companies that develop these technologies, should consider.

These include:

Cybersecurity risks must be considered at every stage of every smart city technology’s life cycle.

Effective privacy protection mechanisms must be an essential component of any smart city technology deployed.

Such mechanisms should be transparently fair to all city users, not just residents.

The climate impact of smart city infrastructures must be fully understood as they are being designed and regularly assessed after they are deployed

“Smart cities are fast becoming a reality around the world,”explains Chris Hankin, a Professor at Imperial College London and lead author of the ACM TechBrief on Smart Cities. “By 2025, 26% of all internet-connected devices will be used in a smart city application. As technologists, we feel we have a responsibility to raise important questions to ensure that these technologies best serve the public interest. For example, many people are unaware that some smart city technologies involve the collection of personally identifiable data. We developed this TechBrief to familiarize the public and lawmakers with this topic and present some key issues for consideration. Our overarching goal is to guide enlightened public policy in this area.”

“Our new TechBrief series builds on earlier and ongoing work by ACM’s technology policy committees,” added James Hendler, Professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Chair of the ACM Technology Policy Council. “Because many smart city applications involve algorithms making decisions which impact people directly, this TechBrief calls for methods to ensure fairness and transparency in how these systems are developed. This reinforces an earlier statement we issued that outlined seven principles for algorithmic transparency and accountability. We also note that smart city infrastructures are especially vulnerable to malicious attacks.”

This TechBrief is the third in a series of short technical bulletins by ACM TPC that present scientifically grounded perspectives on the impact of specific developments or applications of technology. Designed to complement ACM’s activities in the policy arena, TechBriefs aim to inform policymakers, the public, and others about the nature and implications of information technologies. The first ACM TechBrief focused on climate change, while the second addressed facial recognition. Topics under consideration for future issues include quantum computing, election security, and encryption.

About the ACM Technology Policy Council

ACM’s global Technology Policy Council sets the agenda for ACM’s global policy activities and serves as the central convening point for ACM’s interactions with government organizations, the computing community, and the public in all matters of public policy related to computing and information technology. The Council’s members are drawn from ACM’s global membership. It coordinates the activities of ACM’s regional technology policy groups and sets the agenda for global initiatives to address evolving technology policy issues.

About ACM

ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, is the world’s largest educational and scientific computing society, uniting educators, researchers and professionals to inspire dialogue, share resources and address the field’s challenges. ACM strengthens the computing profession’s collective voice through strong leadership, promotion of the highest standards, and recognition of technical excellence. ACM supports the professional growth of its members by providing opportunities for life-long learning, career development, and professional networking.

This is indeed a brief. I recommend reading it as it provides a very good overview to the topic of ‘smart cities’ and raises a question or two. For example, there’s this passage from the April 2022 Issue 3 Technical Brief on p. 2,

… policy makers should target broad and fair access and application of AI and, in general, ICT [information and communication technologies]. This can be achieved through transparent planning and decision-making processes for smart city infrastructure and application developments, such as open hearings, focus groups, and advisory panels. The goal must be to minimize potential harm while maximizing the benefits that algorithmic decision-making [emphasis mine] can bring

Is this algorithmic decision-making under human supervision? It doesn’t seem to be specified in the brief itself. It’s possible the answer lies elsewhere. After all, this is the third in the series.

Making carbon capture more efficient and cheaper with graphene filters

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Years ago someone asked me if there was any nanotechnology research into carbon capture. I couldn’t answer the question at the time but since then I’ve been on the lookout for more on the topic. So, I’m happy to add this February 25, 2021 news item on Nanowerk to my growing number of carbon capture posts (Note: A link has been removed),

One of the main culprits of global warming is the vast amount of carbon dioxide pumped out into the atmosphere mostly from burning fossil fuels and the production of steel and cement. In response, scientists have been trying out a process that can sequester waste carbon dioxide, transporting it into a storage site, and then depositing it at a place where it cannot enter the atmosphere.

The problem is that capturing carbon from power plants and industrial emissions isn’t very cost-effective. The main reason is that waste carbon dioxide isn’t emitted pure, but is mixed with nitrogen and other gases, and extracting it from industrial emissions requires extra energy consumption – meaning a pricier bill.

Scientists have been trying to develop an energy-efficient carbon dioxide-filter. Referred to as a “membrane”, this technology can extract carbon dioxide out of the gas mix, which can then be either stored or converted into useful chemicals. “However, the performance of current carbon dioxide filters has been limited by the fundamental properties of currently available materials,” explains Professor Kumar Varoon Agrawal at EPFL’s School of Basic Sciences (EPFL Valais Wallis).

Now, Agrawal has led a team of chemical engineers to develop the world’s thinnest filter from graphene, the world-famous “wonder material” that won the Physics Nobel in 2010. But the graphene filter isn’t just the thinnest in the world, it can also separate carbon dioxide from a mix of gases such as those coming out of industrial emissions and do so with an efficiency and speed that surpasses most current filters.

…

A March 3, 2021 Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) press release (also on EurekAlert but published February 25, 2021), which originated the news item, delves further into the topic,

“Our approach was simple,” says Agrawal. “We made carbon dioxide-sized holes in graphene, which allowed carbon dioxide to flow through while blocking other gases such as nitrogen, which are larger than carbon dioxide.” The result is a record-high carbon dioxide-capture performance.

For comparison, current filters are required to exceed 1000 gas permeation units (GPUs), while their carbon-capturing specificity, referred to as their “carbon dioxide/nitrogen separation factor” must be above 20. The membranes that the EPFL scientists developed show more than ten-fold higher carbon dioxide permeance at 11,800 GPUs, while their separation factor stands at 22.5.

“We estimate that this technology will drop the cost of carbon capture close to $30 per ton of carbon dioxide, in contrast to commercial processes where the cost is two-to-four time higher,” says Agrawal. His team is now working on scaling up the process by developing a pilot plant demonstrator to capture 10 kg carbon dioxide per day, in a project funded by the Swiss government and Swiss industry.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Millisecond lattice gasification for high-density CO2– and O2-sieving nanopores in single-layer graphene by Shiqi Huang, Shaoxian Li, Luis Francisco Villalobos, Mostapha Dakhchoune, Marina Micari, Deepu J. Babu, Mohammad Tohidi Vahdat, Mounir Mensi, Emad Oveisi and Kumar Varoon Agrawal. Science Advances 24 Feb 2021: Vol. 7, no. 9, eabf0116 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abf0116

This paper appears to be open access.

Keep your building cool with super paint

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As temperatures rise and the Arctic melts, scientists are searching for ways to keep us and our buildings cool without adding unduly to our current problems. A July 8, 2020 University of California at Los Angeles news release (also on EurekAlert) announces a new paint,

A research team led by UCLA materials scientists has demonstrated ways to make super white paint that reflects as much as 98% of incoming heat from the sun. The advance shows practical pathways for designing paints that, if used on rooftops and other parts of a building, could significantly reduce cooling costs, beyond what standard white ‘cool-roof’ paints can achieve.

The findings, published online in Joule, are a major and practical step towards keeping buildings cooler by passive daytime radiative cooling — a spontaneous process in which a surface reflects sunlight and radiates heat into space, cooling down to potentially sub-ambient temperatures. This can lower indoor temperatures and help cut down on air conditioner use and associated carbon dioxide emissions.

“When you wear a white T-shirt on a hot sunny day, you feel cooler than if you wore one that’s darker in color — that’s because the white shirt reflects more sunlight and it’s the same concept for buildings,” said Aaswath Raman, an assistant professor of materials science and engineering at UCLA Samueli School of Engineering, and the principal investigator on the study. “A roof painted white will be cooler inside than one in a darker shade. But those paints also do something else: they reject heat at infrared wavelengths, which we humans cannot see with our eyes. This could allow buildings to cool down even more by radiative cooling.”

The best performing white paints currently available typically reflect around 85% of incoming solar radiation. The remainder is absorbed by the chemical makeup of the paint. The researchers showed that simple modifications in a paint’s ingredients could offer a significant jump, reflecting as much as 98% of incoming radiation.

Current white paints with high solar reflectance use titanium oxide. While the compound is very reflective of most visible and near-infrared light, it also absorbs ultraviolet and violet light. The compound’s UV absorption qualities make it useful in sunscreen lotions, but they also lead to heating under sunlight – which gets in the way of keeping a building as cool as possible.

The researchers examined replacing titanium oxide with inexpensive and readily available ingredients such as barite, which is an artist’s pigment, and pow[d]ered polytetrafluoroethylene, better known as Teflon. These ingredients help paints reflect UV light. The team also made further refinements to the paint’s formula, including reducing the concentration of polymer binders, which also absorb heat.

“The potential cooling benefits this can yield may be realized in the near future because the modifications we propose are within the capabilities of the paint and coatings industry,” said UCLA postdoctoral scholar Jyotirmoy Mandal, a Schmidt Science Fellow working in Raman’s research group and the co-corresponding author on the research.

Beyond the advance, the authors suggested several long-term implications for further study, including mapping where such paints could make a difference, studying the effect of pollution on radiative cooling technologies, and on a global scale, if they could make a dent on the earth’s own ability to reflect heat from the sun.

The researchers also noted that many municipalities and governments, including the state of California and New York City, have started to encourage cool-roof technologies for new buildings.

“We hope that the work will spur future initiatives in super-white coatings for not only energy savings in buildings, but also mitigating the heat island effects of cities, and perhaps even showing a practical way that, if applied on a massive, global scale could affect climate change,” said Mandal, who has studied cooling paint technologies for several years. “This would require a collaboration among experts in diverse fields like optics, materials science and meteorology, and experts from the industry and policy sectors.”

Here’s a link (also in the news release) to and a citation for the paper,

Paints as a Scalable and Effective Radiative Cooling Technology for Buildings by Jyotirmoy Mandal, Yuan Yang, Nanfang Yu, Aaswath P. Raman. Joule DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joule.2020.04.010 Published: May 29, 2020

This paper is behind a paywall.

Glass sponge reefs: ‘living dinosaurs’ of the Pacific Northwest waters

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Glass sponges in Howe Sound. Credit: Adam Taylor, MLSS [Marine Life Sanctuaries Society]

One of them looks to be screaming (Edvard Munch, anyone?) and none of it looks how I imagined an oceanic ‘living dinosaur’ might. While the news is not in my main area of interest (emerging technology), it is close to home. A June 1, 2020 University of British Columbia news release (also on EurekAlert) describes the glass sponge reefs (living dinosaurs) in the Pacific Northwest and current concerns about their welfare,

Warming ocean temperatures and acidification drastically reduce the skeletal strength and filter-feeding capacity of glass sponges, according to new UBC research.

The findings, published in Scientific Reports, indicate that ongoing climate change could have serious, irreversible impacts on the sprawling glass sponge reefs of the Pacific Northwest and their associated marine life – the only known reefs of their kind in the world.

Ranging from the Alaska-Canada border and down through the Strait of Georgia, the reefs play an essential role in water quality by filtering microbes and cycling nutrients through food chains. They also provide critical habitat for many fish and invertebrates, including rockfish, spot prawns, herring, halibut and sharks.

“Glass sponge reefs are ‘living dinosaurs’ thought to have been extinct for 40 million years before they were re-discovered in B.C. in 1986,” said Angela Stevenson, who led the study as a postdoctoral fellow at UBC Zoology. “Their sheer size and tremendous filtration capacity put them at the heart of a lush and productive underwater system, so we wanted to examine how climate change might impact their survival.”

Although the reefs are subject to strong, ongoing conservation efforts focused on limiting damage to their delicate glass structures, scientists know little about how these sponges respond to environmental changes.

For the study, Stevenson harvested Aphrocallistes vastus, one of three types of reef-building glass sponges, from Howe Sound and brought them to UBC where she ran the first successful long-term lab experiment involving live sponges by simulating their natural environment as closely as possible.

She then tested their resilience by placing them in warmer and more acidic waters that mimicked future projected ocean conditions.

Over a period of four months, Stevenson measured changes to their pumping capacity, body condition and skeletal strength, which are critical indicators of their ability to feed and build reefs.

Within one month, ocean acidification and warming, alone and in combination, reduced the sponges’ pumping capacity by more than 50 per cent and caused tissue losses of 10 to 25 per cent, which could starve the sponges.

“Most worryingly, pumping began to slow within two weeks of exposure to elevated temperatures,” said Stevenson.

The combination of acidification and warming also made their bodies weaker and more elastic by half. That could curtail reef formation and cause brittle reefs to collapse under the weight of growing sponges or animals walking and swimming among them.

Year-long temperature data collected from Howe Sound reefs in 2016 suggest it’s only a matter of time before sponges are exposed to conditions which exceed these thresholds.

“In Howe Sound, we want to figure out a way to track changes in sponge growth, size and area and area in the field so we can better understand potential climate implications at a larger scale,” said co-author Jeff Marliave, senior research scientist at the Ocean Wise Research Institute. “We also want to understand the microbial food webs that support sponges and how they might be influenced by climate cycles.”

Stevenson credits bottom-up community-led efforts and strong collaborations with government for the healthy, viable state of the B.C. reefs today. Added support for such community efforts and educational programs will be key to relieving future pressures.

“When most people think about reefs, they think of tropical shallow-water reefs like the beautiful Great Barrier Reef in Australia,” added Stevenson. “But we have these incredible deep-water reefs in our own backyard in Canada. If we don’t do our best to stand up for them, it will be like discovering a herd of dinosaurs and then immediately dropping dynamite on them.”

Background:

The colossal reefs can grow to 19 metres in height and are built by larval sponges settling atop the fused dead skeletons of previous generations. In northern B.C. the reefs are found at depths of 90 to 300 metres, while in southern B.C., they can be found as shallow as 22 metres.

The sponges feed by pumping sea water through their delicate bodies, filtering almost 80 per cent of microbes and particles and expelling clean water.

It’s estimated that the 19 known reefs in the Salish Sea can filter 100 billion litres of water every day, equivalent to one per cent of the total water volume in the Strait of Georgia and Howe Sound combined.

Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,

Warming and acidification threaten glass sponge Aphrocallistes vastus pumping and reef formation by A. Stevenson, S. K. Archer, J. A. Schultz, A. Dunham, J. B. Marliave, P. Martone & C. D. G. Harley. Scientific Reports volume 10, Article number: 8176 (2020) DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-65220-9 Published 18 May 2020

This paper is open access.

Almost finally, there’s a brief video of the glass sponges in their habitat,

Circling back to Edvard Munch,

Courtesy of www.EdvardMunch.org [downloaded from https://www.edvardmunch.org/the-scream.jsp]

Here’s more about the painting, from The Scream webpage on edvardmunch.org,

Munch’s The Scream is an icon of modern art, the Mona Lisa for our time. As Leonardo da Vinci evoked a Renaissance ideal of serenity and self-control, Munch defined how we see our own age – wracked with anxiety and uncertainty.

Essentially The Scream is autobiographical, an expressionistic construction based on Munch’s actual experience of a scream piercing through nature while on a walk, after his two companions, seen in the background, had left him. …

For all the times I’ve seen the image, I had no idea the inspiration was acoustic.

In any event, the image seems sadly à propos both for the glass sponge reefs (and nature generally) and with regard to Black Lives Matter (BLM). A worldwide conflagration was ignited by George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020. This African-American man died while saying, “I can’t breathe,” as a police officer held Floyd down with a knee on his neck. RIP (rest in peace) George Floyd while the rest of us make the changes necessary, no matter how difficult to create a just and respectful world for all. Black Lives Matter.