Staubfilterung und immissionshistorische Aspekte am Beispiel fassadenbegrünenden Wilden Weines (Parthenocissus tricuspidata)

Goal and Scope

At the present, air borne particulate matter is in the focus of public and scientific interest. In this context, it makes sense to remember the buffer function of vegetation for particulate air pollutants, notwithstanding technical and traffic management measures. Since trees with large and dense crowns might be able to shade windows and minimise the turbulent dilution of pollutants, natural-scientific results and socio-scientific aspects will point to the potentials of vertical greening with creeping plants.

Methods

To differentiate the endogenous and exogenous element fractions, the pollution caused by dust that covers the façade climbing creepers leaves was removed by a polyvinyl-butyrale based stripping method. The cleaning success is proven by SEM-Scans. The results of cleaned and not cleaned leaf-samples from an inner-city vertical greening for the element concentrations of Al, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, Ni, Pb, Pt, Rh, Sb and Zn between 1991 and 1997 are shown by AAS- and ICP-MS analyses.

Results and Conclusion

The results show the increasing element concentrations during the course of the separate vegetation periods. Due to the long investigation period, it is possible to detect historical aspects concerning pollution, such as the end of the use of leaded fuel and the introduction of the catalytic converters. The comparison of dust deposition data from different cities shows the relevance of the pollution filtering by vertical greenings with Japanese Creeper. The comparison of investigation results of sycamore leaves refer to entirely different filtering characteristics of the leaf-surfaces.

Recommendation and Perspective

If appropriate planning and maintenance is assured, vertical greening can be a useful contribution for air pollution control and neighbourhood improvement. As selected results from a survey show, from the citizens point of view, the aesthetical and psychosocial aspects of well-being are of more relevant than ecological arguments. Therefore it seems to be wise to implement the combined fields of interest.     

Behavior of sartans (antihypertensive drugs) in wastewater treatment plants,their occurrence and risk for the aquatic environment

Pharmaceuticals and other anthropogenic trace contaminants reach wastewaters and are often not satisfactorily eliminated in sewage treatment plants. These contaminants and/or their degradation products may reach surface waters, thus influencing aquatic life. In this study, the behavior of five different antihypertonic pharmaceuticals from the sartan group (candesartan, eprosartan, irbesartan, olmesartan and valsartan) is investigated in lab-scale sewage plants. The elimination of the substances with related structures varied broadly from 17 % for olmesartan up to 96 % for valsartan. Monitoring data for these drugs in wastewater effluents of six different sewage treatment plants (STPs) in Bavaria, and at eight rivers, showed median concentrations for, e.g. valsartan of 1.1 and 0.13 μg L^?1, respectively. Predicted environmental concentrations (PEC) were calculated and are mostly consistent with the measured environmental concentrations (MEC). The selected sartans and the mixture of the five sartans showed no ecotoxic effects on aquatic organisms in relevant concentrations. Nevertheless, the occurrence of pharmaceuticals in the environment should be reduced to minimize the risk of their distribution in surface waters, ground waters and bank filtrates used for drinking water.     

The World on a Collision Course and the Need for a New Economy

The first part of the paper is an attempt to demonstrate that what we are going through at the present time is not just an economic-financial crisis, but a crisis of humanity. It seems that for the first time in human history several crises converge to simultaneously reach their maximum level of tension. The dominant economic model is to a great degree responsible for the world’s collision course. Hence a number of myths that sustain the model are listed and analyzed. It is argued that a new economy, coherent with the problematiques of the twenty first century, needs urgently to be devised. The second part proposes the foundations for a new economy based on five fundamental postulates that allow the construction of transdisciplinary, holistic, and systemic visions to adequately understand the interdependence of all the elements that sustain life. It is stressed that it is no longer acceptable that Universities still teach economic theories of the nineteenth century in order to tackle twenty first century problems that have no precedence.     

A disaggregated emissions inventory for Taiwan with uses in hybrid input‐output life cycle analysis (IO‐LCA)

This paper reports on a life‐cycle analysis (LCA) of Taiwan's “agriculture and forestry”, “crude petroleum, coal and natural gas extraction” and “electricity generation” sectors, revealing for the first time Taiwan's CO₂ and CH₄ emissions inventories and matching Taiwan's input‐output sectors. Integrated hybrid input‐output life cycle analysis is used to disaggregate the electricity generation sector into nuclear, hydro, gas, oil and coal, and cogeneration. Results show that the fossil‐fuel‐related electricity sub‐sectors have higher CO₂ emissions intensity than the remaining sectors in the economy and that the “paddy rice” sector is Taiwan's most CH₄‐intensive sector, making rice cultivation an important source of CH₄ emissions. This work is vital to sound policy decisions concerning power generation, coal, and agriculture and forestry at the national level.     

Human Neuroblastoma: From Basic Science to Clinical Debut of Cellular Oncogenes

MYCN  , which identifies a group of patients who have a particularly dire prognosis. Amplified MYCN is used today as a prognostic marker on which therapy design is based to a large extent. An unusual aspect of neuroblastoma is the high rate at which tumors regress spontaneously, even in infants with extensive liver involvement and numerous subcutaneous nodules. Identifying the molecular and cellular basis of spontaneous regression could result in improved therapeutic approaches. Neuroblastoma is a model tumor with many fascinating aspects but has remained a challenge to the pediatric oncologist