Communications Earth & Environment最新文献

{"title":"Seasonal hotspots of beach litter in the North-East Atlantic linked to aquaculture and river runoff","authors":"Niclas Rieger, Estrella Olmedo, Martin Thiel, Vanessa Sarah Salvo, Daniela Honorato-Zimmer, Nelson Vásquez, Antonio Turiel, Jaume Piera","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01913-7","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01913-7","url":null,"abstract":"Macroplastic pollution is a pervasive global environmental challenge, adversely affecting marine ecosystems, wildlife and human health. Understanding temporal variations is crucial for identifying pollution sources and developing effective mitigation policies. However, in-situ data from beach surveys are often irregular, both spatially and temporally, and highly variable, complicating robust statistical conclusions. Here we employ a Bayesian machine learning framework to investigate seasonal variations, identify regional hotspots and elucidate their anthropogenic drivers. Using data from 3866 surveys across 168 western European beaches, we leverage a spatial log-Gaussian Cox Process to enhance statistical inference by integrating information from nearby beaches. Distinct seasonal patterns emerge, with winter and spring exhibiting the highest pollution levels, while pronounced regional differences highlight seasonal pollution hotspots in the western Iberian Peninsula, French coastline, Irish Sea and Skagerrak region. These peaks are attributed to riverine emissions and aquaculture activities, highlighting the potential impact of these sources on beach pollution. Our findings advocate for enhanced, time-specific monitoring to effectively manage litter hotspots, emphasizing the importance of aquaculture-related plastic emissions. Seasonal variations in beach litter on North East Atlantic coastlines are driven by riverine and aquaculture inputs, and are likely to be exacerbated by adverse weather conditions in the future, according to a machine learning framework informed by beach litter survey data.","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-12"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01913-7.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142754220","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Informative risk analyses of radiative forcing geoengineering require proper counterfactuals","authors":"Walker Raymond Lee, Michael Steven Diamond, Peter Irvine, Jesse L. Reynolds, Daniele Visioni","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01881-y","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01881-y","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-4"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01881-y.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142754205","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Biofouling changes the settling dynamics of macroplastic plates","authors":"James Lofty, Catherine Wilson, Pablo Ouro","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01922-6","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01922-6","url":null,"abstract":"Plastic pollution transported in rivers remains poorly understood due to the diversity of shapes, sizes, and densities of plastics, as well as their complex interactions with biofilms. While previous studies have explored the settling velocities of plastics and their interactions with biofilms, they often overlook how biofouling alters plastic dynamics and settling behaviour. To address this, over 800 settling experiments were conducted to demonstrate that the dynamics and falling velocities of isotropic (spheres) and anisotropic (square and rectangle plates) macroplastics of different densities (1050 to 2200 kg/m3) are significantly impacted by biofouling. Three-dimensional tracking of plastic trajectories revealed that biofilm colonisation on the surface of anisotropic plastic plates triggered them to exhibit more chaotic trajectories, larger horizontal dispersion and higher oscillatory frequencies. These dynamics reduced the average vertical settling velocity of anisotropic biofouled plates by up to 12%—despite greater plastic densities and considering the multimodal distribution of a plate’s fall velocity—compared to their pristine counterparts. Results highlight the necessity of accounting for the intricate multimodal settling dynamics of plastics, including their interactions with biofilms, to provide more reliable predictions of plastic transport and fate in aquatic environments. The trajectories of plastic particles in settling experiments within a water column are more chaotic and slower by up to 12% when colonised with biofilms, relative to pristine particles, even with larger densities.","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-14"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01922-6.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142754216","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Host species and temperature drive beech and Scots pine phyllosphere microbiota across European forests","authors":"Daniela Sangiorgio, Joan Cáliz, Stefania Mattana, Anna Barceló, Bruno De Cinti, David Elustondo, Sofie Hellsten, Federico Magnani, Giorgio Matteucci, Päivi Merilä, Manuel Nicolas, Dario Ravaioli, Anne Thimonier, Elena Vanguelova, Arne Verstraeten, Peter Waldner, Emilio O. Casamayor, Josep Peñuelas, Maurizio Mencuccini, Rossella Guerrieri","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01895-6","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01895-6","url":null,"abstract":"Tree-microbe interactions are essential for forest ecosystem functioning. Most plant–microbe research has focused on the rhizosphere, while composition of microbial communities in the phyllosphere remains underexplored. Here, we use 16S rRNA gene sequencing to explore differences between beech and Scots pine phyllospheric microbiomes at the European continental scale, map their functional profiles, and elucidate the role of host trees, forest features, and environmental factors such as climate and atmospheric deposition in phyllosphere microbiota assembly. We identified tree species and the associated foliar trait (specifically carbon:nitrogen ratio) as primary drivers of the bacterial communities. We characterized taxonomical and functional composition of epiphytic bacteria in the phyllosphere of beech and Scots pine across an environmental gradient from Fennoscandia to the Mediterranean area, with major changes in temperature and nitrogen deposition. We also showed that temperature and nitrogen deposition played a crucial role in affecting their assembly for both tree species. This study contributes to advancing our understanding on factors shaping phyllosphere microbial communities in beech and Scots pine at the European continental scale, highlighting the need of broad-scale comparative studies (covering a wide range of foliar traits and environmental conditions) to elucidate how phyllosphere microbiota mediates ecosystem responses to global change. Phyllosphere microbiota of beech and Scots pine at European continental scale is influenced by the host species and associated foliar traits, as well as by temperature and nitrogen deposition, according to 16S rRNA gene sequencing analyses on leaf epiphytic microbes.","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-10"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01895-6.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142754219","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Decoupling of redox processes from soil saturation in Arctic tundra","authors":"Erin C. Rooney, Erin VanderJeugdt, Sumant Avasarala, Imtiaz Miah, Matthew J. Berens, Lauren Kinsman-Costello, Michael N. Weintraub, Elizabeth M. Herndon","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01927-1","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01927-1","url":null,"abstract":"Permafrost thaw in warming Arctic landscapes alters hydrology and saturation-driven biogeochemical processes. Models assume that aerobic respiration occurs in drained soils while saturated soils support methanogenesis; however, saturated soils maintain redox gradients that host a range of anaerobic metabolisms. We evaluated how redox potential and redox-active solutes vary with soil moisture in the active layer of permafrost-affected acidic and non-acidic tundra hillslopes. Oxidizing conditions persisted in highly permeable organic horizons of both unsaturated tussock tundra and saturated wet sedge meadows. Redox potential decreased with depth in all soils as increasing soil bulk density restricted groundwater flow and oxygen diffusion. High concentrations of dissolved iron, phosphate, and organic carbon coincided with redox boundaries below the soil surface in acidic tundra, indicating active iron redox cycling and potential release of adsorbed phosphate during iron (oxyhydr)oxide dissolution. In non-acidic tundra, weatherable minerals affected nutrient dynamics more than redox-driven iron cycling, especially in low-lying, saturated areas where thaw reached mineral soils. The role of thaw depth and the ability of saturated soils to maintain oxidizing conditions in organic surface layers highlight the importance of soil physical properties and hydrology in predicting biogeochemical processes and greenhouse gas emissions. Redox potential and the cycling of redox-active solutes are decoupled from soil moisture in the active layer of permafrost-affected areas, according to a field study conducted in the tundra areas of Alaska’s North Slope.","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-9"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01927-1.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142754234","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Polar ice sheets are decisive contributors to uncertainty in climate tipping projections","authors":"Jonathan P. Rosser, Ricarda Winkelmann, Nico Wunderling","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01799-5","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01799-5","url":null,"abstract":"The Earth’s climate is a complex system including key components such as the Arctic Summer Sea Ice and the El Niño Southern Oscillation alongside climate tipping elements including polar ice sheets, the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, and the Amazon rainforest. Crossing thresholds of these elements can lead to a qualitatively different climate state, endangering human societies. The cryosphere elements are vulnerable at current levels of global warming (1.3  °C) while also having long response times and large uncertainties. We assess the impact of interacting Earth system components on tipping risks using an established conceptual network model of these components. Polar ice sheets (Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets) are most decisive for tipping likelihoods and cascading effects within our model. At a global warming level of 1.5  °C, neglecting the polar ice sheets can alter the expected number of tipped elements by more than a factor of 2. This is concerning as overshooting 1.5  °C of global warming is becoming inevitable, while current state-of-the-art IPCC-type models do not (yet) include dynamic ice sheets. Our results suggest that polar ice sheets are critical to improving understanding of tipping risks and cascading effects. Therefore, improved observations and integrated model development are crucial. The polar ice sheets are key contributors to the uncertainty of future climate change projection, according to an analysis using an Earth system network model to assess the contribution of six Earth system components at 1.5 and 4.0 °C of warming.","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-11"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01799-5.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142754204","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Author Correction: Marsh restoration in front of seawalls is an economically justified nature-based solution for coastal protection","authors":"Ernie I. H. Lee, Heidi Nepf","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01918-2","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01918-2","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-1"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01918-2.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142754217","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Weathering crust formation outpaces melt-albedo feedback on blue ice shelves of East Antarctica","authors":"Giacomo Traversa, Biagio Di Mauro","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01896-5","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01896-5","url":null,"abstract":"The penetration of shortwave radiation beneath glacier surfaces has the potential to induce melting leading to the formation of a porous white layer commonly known as weathering crust. Very little is known about its role in the Antarctic Ice Sheet. Here we provide unprecedented observational evidence for the weathering crust formation over blue ice areas of ice shelves of the Northern Victoria Land in austral summer 2022–2023, by means of in-situ and remote-sensing observations. Then, we estimated the radiative impact of the weathering crust, demonstrating a predominant negative albedo feedback over blue ice areas (on 93% of the study area), with respect to positive melt-albedo feedback (supraglacial-pond formation). Furthermore, weathering crust occurred after a period of increasing temperature, relative humidity, low wind speed and clear sky conditions. Moreover, we claim that this new process should be included in regional climate modelling of the Antarctic Ice Sheet. Weathering crust formation over blue ice areas of ice shelves may lead to negative albedo feedback in Antarctic coasts, according to in-situ and remote-sensing observations.","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-9"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01896-5.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142754190","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Restoration of forestry-drained boreal peatland ecosystems can effectively stop and reverse ecosystem degradation","authors":"Merja Elo, Santtu Kareksela, Otso Ovaskainen, Nerea Abrego, Jenni Niku, Sara Taskinen, Kaisu Aapala, Janne S. Kotiaho","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01844-3","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01844-3","url":null,"abstract":"Ecosystem restoration will increase following the ambitious international targets, which calls for a rigorous evaluation of restoration effectiveness. Here, we present results from a long-term before-after control-impact experiment on the restoration of forestry-drained boreal peatland ecosystems. Our data comprise 151 sites, representing six ecosystem types. Species-level vegetation sampling has been conducted before, two, five, and ten years after restoration. With joint species distribution modelling, we show that, on average, not restoring leads to further degradation, but restoration stops and reverses this trend. The variation in restoration outcomes largely arises from ecosystem types: restoration of nutrient-poor ecosystems has a higher probability of failure. Yet, the ten-year study period is insufficient to capture the restoration effects in slow-recovering ecosystems. Altogether, restoration can effectively halt the biodiversity loss of degraded ecosystems, although ecosystem attributes affect the outcome. This variability in outcomes underlies the need for evidence-based prioritization of restoration efforts across ecosystems. Restoration halts and reverses degradation of boreal peatlands in nutrient-rich ecosystems, though the impact may be weak in nutrient-poor ones, according to a long-term experiment in Finland comprising 151 sites and 6 ecosystem types","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-11"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11599035/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142750260","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Author Correction: Summer heatwaves on the Baltic Sea seabed contribute to oxygen deficiency in shallow areas","authors":"Kseniia Safonova, H. E. Markus Meier, Matthias Gröger","doi":"10.1038/s43247-024-01858-x","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s43247-024-01858-x","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":10530,"journal":{"name":"Communications Earth & Environment","volume":" ","pages":"1-3"},"PeriodicalIF":8.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-024-01858-x.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142694859","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}