Gefahrstoff-Substitution — Innovation durch erfolgreiches Zusammenwirken von Wirtschaft, Staat und Zivilgesellschaft

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Isotopes for improved management of nitrate pollution in aqueous resources: review of surface water field studies

Background  

Environmental agencies have to take measures to either reduce discharges and emissions of nitrate or to remediate nitrate-polluted water bodies where the nitrate concentrations exceed threshold values. Isotope data can support the identification of nitrate pollution sources and natural attenuation processes of nitrate.     

Tutor choice and imitation accuracy during song learning in a wild population of the Puget Sound white-crowned sparrow

Songbirds learn to sing by modeling their songs on the songs of other males through a process of social learning. Models of social learning predict that animals should be selective in what and when they learn. In this study, we asked whether young males in a wild population of the Puget Sound white-crowned sparrow, Zonotrichia leucophrys pugetensis, were selective in their choice of tutor models and what factors influenced how accurately they imitated tutors’ songs. We first examined two strategies for tutor choice: whether pupils have a conformity bias and/or a preference for high-quality tutors. In keeping with a conformity bias, tutors that sang song types that were relatively common within a radius of about 500 m of their territory were more likely to be imitated than were tutors that sang rarer song types. Most potential tutors were not imitated by pupils. Aspects of tutor quality, such as age, pairing status, and survival to the next year had no effect on whether a tutor’s song was imitated. Secondly, we tested whether pupil repertoire size, pupil quality, and local abundance of tutor models affected the accuracy of song imitations. We found a trade-off between repertoire size and tutor imitation accuracy with males that sang two or more song types developing significantly poorer imitations than males that sang one type. We discuss possible functions of a conformity learning strategy and factors that could produce a trade-off between imitation accuracy and repertoire size.     

Regionalization of climate scenarios impacts on maize production and the role of cultivar and planting date as an adaptation strategy

Understanding climate change and its impacts on crops is crucial to determine adaptation strategies. Simulations of climate change impacts on agricultural systems are often run for individual sites. Nevertheless, the scaling up of crop model results can bring a more complete picture, providing better inputs for the decision-making process. The objective of this paper was to present a procedure to assess the regional impacts of climate scenarios on maize production, as well as the effect of crop cultivars and planting dates as an adaptation strategy. The focus region is Santa Catarina State, Brazil. The identification of agricultural areas cultivated with annual crops was done for the whole state, followed by the coupling of soil and weather information necessary for the crop modeling procedure (using crop model and regional circulation models). The impact on maize yields, so as the effect of adaptation strategies, was calculated for the 2012–2040 period assuming different maize cultivars and planting dates. Results showed that the exclusion of non-agricultural areas allowed the crop model to correctly simulate local and regional production. Simulations run without adaptation strategies for the 2012–2040 period showed reductions of 11.5–13.5 % in total maize production, depending on the cultivar. By using the best cultivar for each agricultural area, total state production was increased by 6 %; when using both adaptation strategies—cultivar and best planting date—total production increased by 15 %. This analysis showed that cultivar and planting date are feasible adaptation strategies to mitigate deleterious effects of climate scenarios, and crop models can be successfully used for regional assessments.     

Environmental information system for visualizing environmental impact assessment information

The Institute of Environmental Engineering at the University of Pannonia has undertaken the challenge to develop an online environmental information system. This system is able to receive and process the collected environmental data via Internet. The authors have attached importance to the presentation of the data and have included other comprehensible information for laymen as well in order to work out visualisation techniques that are expressive and attract attention for environmental questions through the developed information system. The ways of visualizing physical and chemical parameters of surface water and the effects of motorway construction were examined.     

Root exudation, phosphorus acquisition, and microbial diversity in the rhizosphere of white lupine as affected by phosphorus supply and atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration

White lupine (Lupinus albus L.) was used as a phosphorus (P)-efficient model plant to study the effects of elevated atmospheric CO(2) concentrations on (i) P acquisition, (ii) the related alterations in root development and rhizosphere chemistry, and (iii) the functional and structural diversity of rhizosphere microbial communities, on a P-deficient calcareous subsoil with and without soluble P fertilization. In both +P (80 mg P kg(-1)) and -P treatments (no added P), elevated CO(2) (800 micromol mol(-1)) increased shoot biomass production by 20 to 35% and accelerated the development of cluster roots, which exhibit important functions in chemical mobilization of sparingly soluble soil P sources. Accordingly, cluster root formation was stimulated in plants without P application by 140 and 60% for ambient and elevated CO(2) treatments, respectively. Intense accumulation of citrate and increased activities of acid and alkaline phosphatases, but also of chitinase, in the rhizosphere were mainly confined to later stages of cluster root development in -P treatments. Regardless of atmospheric CO(2) concentrations, there was no significant effect on accumulation of citrate or on selected enzyme activities of C, N, and P cycles in the rhizosphere of individual root clusters. Discriminant analysis of selected enzyme activities revealed that mainly phosphatase and chitinase contributed to the experimental variance (81.3%) of the data. Phosphatase and chitinase activities in the rhizosphere might be dominated by the secretion from cluster roots rather than by microbial activity. Alterations in rhizosphere bacterial communities analyzed by denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) were related with the intense changes in root secretory activity observed during cluster root development but not with elevated CO(2) concentrations.     

Determination of the minimum ignition energy on the basis of a statistical approach

Based on existing MIE test results and new measurements, a statistical analysis for the MIE of hydrogen, ethene and propane is made by means of the logistic regression. The conditions necessary to carry out such an approach are discussed. It is shown that MIE values which are connected with a certain ignition probability could be determined adequately and lead to a more sophisticated result, also with regard to measurement uncertainties. This, in turn, leads to a better comparability and a higher informative content. At the same time, the MIEs of hydrogen, ethene and propane are reviewed. In doing so, a useful contribution to the discussion concerning the MIE of propane is made.     

Biomolecules preserved in ca. 168 million year old fossil conifer wood

Biomarkers are widely known to occur in the fossil record, but the unaltered biomolecules are rarely reported from sediments older than Paleogene. Polar terpenoids, the natural products most resistant to degradation processes, were reported mainly from the Tertiary conifers, and the oldest known are Cretaceous in age. In this paper, we report the occurrence of relatively high concentrations of ferruginol derivatives and other polar diterpenoids, as well as their diagenetic products, in a conifer wood Protopodocarpoxylon from the Middle Jurassic of Poland. Thus, the natural product terpenoids reported in this paper are definitely the oldest polar biomolecules detected in geological samples. The extracted phenolic abietanes like ferruginol and its derivatives (6,7-dehydroferruginol, sugiol, 11,14-dioxopisiferic acid) are produced only by distinct conifer families (Cupressaceae s. l., Podocarpaceae and Araucariaceae), to which Protopodocarpoxylon could belong based on anatomical characteristics. Therefore, the natural product terpenoids are of great advantage in systematics of fossil plant remains older than Paleogene and lacking suitable anatomical preservation.     

Bidirectional coupling of macroscopic and microscopic pedestrian evacuation models

In this contribution, a combination of a macroscopic and a microscopic model of pedestrian dynamics using a bidirectional coupling technique is presented which allows to obtain better predictions for evacuation times. While the macroscopic model is derived from dynamic network flow theory, the microscopic model is based on a cellular automaton. Output from each model is fed into the other, thus establishing a control cycle. As a result, the gap between the evacuation times computed by both models is narrowed down: The coupled model considers both optimized routing strategies as well as microscopic effects. Accordingly the typical underestimation of evacuation times by purely macroscopic approaches is reduced. At the same time the microscopic model is enhanced by a steering component which reflects the macroscopic knowledge and the impact of supervising personnel on the distribution of pedestrian flows.