Chlorinated paraffins in particulate matter associated with asthma and its relative symptoms in school-aged children and adolescents: A cross-sectional survey in South China.

Particulate matter (PM) and contaminants attached to PM can increase the risk of respiratory diseases. However, the health risk assessment of chlorinated paraffins (CPs), an emerging pollutant occupying a high proportion of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) in PM, remains scarce. This study aimed to evaluate the association between PM-bound CPs and asthma, along with relative symptoms, in school-aged children and adolescents.

Active and passive organic carbon fluxes during a bloom in the Southern Ocean (South Georgia).

The Controls Over Mesopelagic Interior Carbon Storage (COMICS) cruise DY086 took place aboard the RRS Discovery in the South Atlantic during November and December, 2017. Physical, chemical, biogeochemical and biological data were collected during three visits to ocean observatory station P3, off the coast of South Georgia, during an austral spring bloom. A diverse range of equipment including CTD-rosette, Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler (ADCP), net deployments, marine snow catchers (MSCs), Stand Alone Pump System (SAPS) and PELAGRA Sediment Traps were used to produce a comprehensive, high-quality dataset.

Projected changes of the emission and transport of organic pollutants and metals from shipping in European seas 2018-2050.

The ChemicalDrift model is applied to predict concentrations of metals and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons emitted from shipping in European seas in 2050, compared to 2018. Sources include antifouling paints (AFPs), discharge water from scrubbers and atmospheric deposition. The fate of pollutants in the marine environment is presented, highlighting the effect of degradation and volatilization, with seasonal and regional differences.

A European aerosol phenomenology - 9: Light absorption properties of carbonaceous aerosol particles across surface Europe.

Carbonaceous aerosols (CA), composed of black carbon (BC) and organic matter (OM), significantly impact the climate. Light absorption properties of CA, particularly of BC and brown carbon (BrC), are crucial due to their contribution to global and regional warming. We present the absorption properties of BC (b) and BrC (b) inferred using Aethalometer data from 44 European sites covering different environments (traffic (TR), urban (UB), suburban (SUB), regional background (RB) and mountain (M)).

New particle formation from isoprene under upper-tropospheric conditions.

Aircraft observations have revealed ubiquitous new particle formation in the tropical upper troposphere over the Amazon and the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Although the vapours involved remain unknown, recent satellite observations have revealed surprisingly high night-time isoprene mixing ratios of up to 1 part per billion by volume (ppbv) in the tropical upper troposphere. Here, in experiments performed with the CERN CLOUD (Cosmics Leaving Outdoor Droplets) chamber, we report new particle formation initiated by the reaction of hydroxyl radicals with isoprene at upper-tropospheric temperatures of -30 °C and -50 °C.

Source apportionment of ultrafine particles in urban Europe.

There is a body of evidence that ultrafine particles (UFP, those with diameters ≤ 100 nm) might have significant impacts on health. Accordingly, identifying sources of UFP is essential to develop abatement policies. This study focuses on urban Europe, and aims at identifying sources and quantifying their contributions to particle number size distribution (PNSD) using receptor modelling (Positive Matrix Factorization, PMF), and evaluating long-term trends of these source contributions using the non-parametric Theil-Sen's method.

From thaw till fall: Interacting hydrology, carbon cycle, and greenhouse gas dynamics in a subarctic stream-lake continuum.

Carbon-water interaction studies between aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems are especially needed today in Arctic and Boreal regions, as they are facing drastic warming and precipitation shifts. Despite the importance of streams in the carbon cycle, northern stream-based studies are scarce, owing to a lack of measurements throughout the north, and possibly skewing global greenhouse gas estimates. We used a combination of multiscale measurements to quantify water sources (HO isotope proxies), carbon availability (dissolved in/organic carbon concentrations) and quality (water absorbance, SUVA -index), microbial community structure (16S rRNA sequencing), and carbon dioxide (CO) and methane (CH) fluxes and concentrations.

Contrasting forest management strategies: Impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem services under changing climate and disturbance regimes.

Natural disturbances may compromise the past and ongoing efforts to increase carbon sequestration and halt biodiversity loss in boreal forests. Measures to minimize the effects of forest disturbances i.e.

The potential of high temporal resolution automatic measurements of PM composition as an alternative to the filter-based manual method used in routine monitoring.

Under the EU Air Quality Directive (AQD) 2008/50/EC member states are required to undertake routine monitoring of PM composition at background stations. The AQD states for PM speciation this should include at least: nitrate , sulfate , chloride (Cl), ammonium (NH4), sodium (Na), potassium (K), magnesium (Mg), calcium (Ca), elemental carbon (EC) and organic carbon (OC). Until 2017, it was the responsibility of each country to determine the methodology used to report the composition for the inorganic components of PM.

Peatland Fungal Community Responses to Nutrient Enrichment: A Story Beyond Nitrogen.

Anthropogenically elevated inputs of nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), and potassium (K) can affect the carbon (C) budget of nutrient-poor peatlands. Fungi are intimately tied to peatland C budgets due to their roles in organic matter decomposition and symbioses with primary producers; however, the influence of fertilization on peatland fungal composition and diversity remains unclear. Here, we examined the effect of fertilization over 10 years on fungal diversity, composition, and functional guilds along an acrotelm (10-20 cm), mesotelm (30-40 cm), and catotelm (60-70 cm) depth gradient at the Mer Bleue bog, Canada.

Real-time measurement of metals in submicron aerosols with particle-into-liquid sampler combined with micro-discharge optical emission spectroscopy.

The paper presents a novel technique for quantifying trace metals in aerosol samples in real time. Airborne metals were continuously collected for one week near the Baltic Sea in Finland using a particle-into-liquid sampler (PILS). The collected liquid samples were analyzed for metals using micro-discharge optical emission spectroscopy (µDOES).

Enhanced detection of aromatic oxidation products using NO chemical ionization mass spectrometry with limited nitric acid.

Nitrate ion-based chemical ionization mass spectrometry (NO -CIMS) is widely used for detection of highly oxygenated organic molecules (HOMs). HOMs are known to participate in molecular clustering and new particle formation and growth, and hence understanding the formation pathways and amounts of these compounds in the atmosphere is essential. However, the absence of analytical standards prevents robust quantification of HOM concentrations.

European pollen reanalysis, 1980-2022, for alder, birch, and olive.

The dataset presents a 43 year-long reanalysis of pollen seasons for three major allergenic genera of trees in Europe: alder (Alnus), birch (Betula), and olive (Olea). Driven by the meteorological reanalysis ERA5, the atmospheric composition model SILAM predicted the flowering period and calculated the Europe-wide dispersion pattern of pollen for the years 1980-2022. The model applied an extended 4-dimensional variational data assimilation of in-situ observations of aerobiological networks in 34 European countries to reproduce the inter-annual variability and trends of pollen production and distribution.

Plant diversity drives positive microbial associations in the rhizosphere enhancing carbon use efficiency in agricultural soils.

Expanding and intensifying agriculture has led to a loss of soil carbon. As agroecosystems cover over 40% of Earth's land surface, they must be part of the solution put in action to mitigate climate change. Development of efficient management practices to maximize soil carbon retention is currently limited, in part, by a poor understanding of how plants, which input carbon to soil, and microbes, which determine its fate there, interact.

Water Vapor Adsorption-Desorption Hysteresis Due to Clustering of Water on Nonporous Surfaces.

Water vapor is continuously adsorbed onto and desorbed from all kinds of surfaces depending on changes in relative humidity. Adsorption-desorption hysteresis of water that occurs on various nonporous surfaces and extends down to low relative humidities has been reported for decades, but remains unexplained. Here we show experimentally that such hysteresis is a common phenomenon on metal oxide and mineral surfaces and can be divided into two distinct categories based on the wettability of the adsorbent surface.

Long-term exposures to low concentrations of source-specific air pollution, road-traffic noise, and systemic inflammation and cardiovascular disease biomarkers.

Objectives: Air pollution and traffic noise are detrimental to cardiovascular health. However, the effects of different sources of these exposures on cardiovascular biomarkers remain unclear. We explored the associations of long-term exposure to source-specific air pollution (vehicular exhausts and residential woodsmoke) at low concentrations and road-traffic noise with systemic inflammation and cardiovascular disease biomarkers.

Deforestation amplifies climate change effects on warming and cloud level rise in African montane forests.

Tropical montane forest ecosystems are pivotal for sustaining biodiversity and essential terrestrial ecosystem services, including the provision of high-quality fresh water. Nonetheless, the impact of montane deforestation and climate change on the capacity of forests to deliver ecosystem services is yet to be fully understood. In this study, we offer observational evidence demonstrating the response of air temperature and cloud base height to deforestation in African montane forests over the last two decades.

Modelling alternative harvest effects on soil CO and CH fluxes from peatland forests.

Over the last century, many peatlands in northern Europe have been drained for forestry. Forest management with different harvesting regimes has a significant impact on soil water status and consequently on greenhouse gas emissions from peat soils. In this paper, we have used the process-based JSBACH-HIMMELI model to simulate the effects of alternative harvesting regimes, namely non-harvested (NH), selection harvesting (SH; 70 % of stem volume harvested) and clear-cutting (CC; 100 % of stem volume harvested), on soil CH and CO fluxes in peatland forests.