Attributing near-surface atmospheric trends in the Fram Strait region to regional sea ice conditions

Arctic sea ice has declined in all seasons accompanied by a rapid atmospheric warming. Here, the focus lies on the wider Fram Strait region where the connection between trends in observed near-surface variables (temperature, humidity, wind speed) and local sea ice conditions are analyzed. Reanalysis data from ERA5 and MERRA-2 for the winters 1992 to 2022 are used for the analyses. To disentangle the impact of the upstream sea ice conditions from other factors influencing atmospheric conditions, separate calculations are applied for on-ice and off-ice flow. During off-ice flow, temperatures increased by more than 9 K within 31 years in the Western Nansen Basin (WNB) and by about 5 K in the Greenland Sea region (GRL). Humidity also increased significantly in both regions but with smaller trends in the GRL region. Trends for wind speed were mostly not significant. Corresponding trends of winter sea ice concentrations based on SSM/I-ASI data show a decrease of -10 % dec&minus;1 in the WNB region with especially large open water areas in 2022. There are clear hints that sea ice variability in the GRL region is strongly influenced by the presence of the Odden ice tongue and thus it shows a decrease of -4.7 % dec&minus;1. For off-ice flow, upstream sea ice conditions in the Fram Strait region influence atmospheric temperatures and humidity up to 500 km downstream of the ice edge. Up to two thirds of the observed temperature variability in both regions can be explained by upstream sea ice variability, which is about 10 % more than for all other wind directions.</p

A lead-width distribution for Antarctic sea ice: a case study for the Weddell Sea with high-resolution Sentinel-2 images

Using Copernicus Sentinel-2 images we derive a statistical lead-width distribution for the Weddell Sea. While previous work focused on the Arctic, this is the first lead-width distribution for Antarctic sea ice. Previous studies suggest that the lead-width distribution follows a power law with a positive exponent; however their results for the power-law exponents are not all in agreement with each other. To detect leads we create a sea-ice surface-type classification based on 20 carefully selected cloud-free Sentinel-2 Level-1C products, which have a resolution of 10 m. The observed time period is from November 2016 until February 2018, covering only the months from November to April. We apply two different fitting methods to the measured lead widths. The first fitting method is a linear fit, while the second method is based on a maximum likelihood approach. Here, we use both methods for the same lead-width data set to observe differences in the calculated power-law exponent. To further investigate influences on the power-law exponent, we define two different thresholds: one for open-water-covered leads and one for open-water-covered and nilas-covered leads. The influence of the lead threshold on the exponent is larger for the linear fit than for the method based on the maximum likelihood approach. We show that the exponent of the lead-width distribution ranges between 1.110 and 1.413 depending on the applied fitting method and lead threshold. This exponent for the Weddell Sea sea ice is smaller than the previously observed exponents for the Arctic sea ice.</p

Building a participatory national consensus on wastewater reclamation and reuse in Palestine

Water scarcity is a major constraint for economic and social development and sustainability of the agricultural sector in Palestine. Rapid population growth and increasing dominance of Israeli occupation over the Palestinian water and land resources exacerbate this problem. Wastewater reuse in agriculture is a potential non-conventional water resource that needs better utilization. Our research studied the enabling environment and the political economy of wastewater reclamation and reuse in Palestine. The research team adopted participatory approach that was based on active involvement of all stakeholders in the various phases and activities of this project. The team organized large number of public meetings and national workshops that gathered policy makers as well as representatives of the stakeholder community. The team also implemented a questionnaire survey to study the public perceptions toward wastewater reuse. The research was concluded by a national symposium that gathered more than 200 persons from this community. The major research findings show a national consensus on the importance of wastewater reclamation and reuse in irrigated agriculture. The results show positive knowledge and perceptions of all stakeholders towards reuse of reclaimed wastewater. It also shows that there is a big gap between various institutions related to the subject. It also shows poor collaboration between the academic/research institutions and policy making. The research also emphasizes the importance of onsite systems, especially grey water, for wastewater treatment and reuse as they are low cost and do not require permission of Israeli occupation. The research has a substantial policy impact as it opened opportunities for participatory approaches and dialogue between policy makers and the entire stakeholders’ communit

Is There an Association Between Attending an Inclusive Educational Setting and the Self-Esteem of Students Without Special Educational Needs?

Vergleiche in sozialen Interaktionen sind zentral für das individuelle Selbstwertgefühl. Inwiefern heterogene Bezugsgruppen hinsichtlich sozialen und ethnischen, aber auch körperlichen, geistigen und kognitiven Merkmalen und Voraussetzungen, wie sie nicht erst seit Ratifizierung der UN-Behindertenrechtskonvention in Klassen des allgemeinen Bildungssystems zu finden sind, das Selbstwertgefühl bedingen, ist noch unzureichend beantwortet. Qualitative Studien zeigen bislang, dass Schüler:innen ohne sonderpädagogischen Förderbedarf (SPF) selbstwertförderliche Erfahrungen machen, sobald sie eine inklusive Umgebung besuchen. Quantitative Arbeiten deuten dagegen auf einen negativen Zusammenhang zwischen inklusivem Lernkontext und individuellem Selbstwertgefühl hin. Allerdings wurden in bisherigen Arbeiten meist nur Merkmale des Lernkontextes oder des Individuums als Prädiktoren herangezogen. Mit Daten des Nationalen Bildungspanels wird daher untersucht, ob Zusammenhänge zwischen dem Besuch einer inklusiven Klasse an Regelschulen und dem Selbstwertgefühl von Schüler:innen ohne SPF unter Kontrolle individueller und kontextueller Merkmale bestehen. Mehrebenenanalysen zeigen, dass Schüler:innen ohne SPF generell und auch bei einer zunehmend inklusiven Klassenkomposition von einem geringeren Selbstwertgefühl berichten als Peers in Klassen ohne Schüler:innen mit SPF. Dieser Zusammenhang besteht nicht mehr, sobald für den besuchten Bildungsgang und die sozioökonomische Klassenkomposition kontrolliert wird.Comparisons in social interactions are central to the individual self-esteem. The extent to which heterogeneous reference groups in terms of social and ethnic, but also physical, mental and cognitive characteristics and prerequisites, as they can be found in classes of the general education system not only since the ratification of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with disabilities, determine self-esteem, is still insufficiently answered. Qualitative studies have so far shown that students without special educational needs (SEN) gain self-esteem promoting experiences as soon as they attend inclusive environments. However, quantitative ones indicate a negative association between inclusive learning environment and individual self-esteem. Up to now, mainly either characteristics of the environment or of the individual have been used as predictors. Data of the National Educational Panel Study are used to examine whether there is an association between attending an inclusive class in regular schools and the self-esteem of students without SEN under control of individual and contextual characteristics. Multilevel analyses show, that in general and in terms of an increasingly inclusive class composition students without SEN report lower self-esteem than peers attending classes without students with SEN do. This association no longer exists as soon as course of education and socioeconomic class composition are controlled

Satellite Observations for Detecting and Forecasting Sea-Ice Conditions: A Summary of Advances Made in the SPICES Project by the EU’s Horizon 2020 Programme

The detection, monitoring, and forecasting of sea-ice conditions, including their extremes, is very important for ship navigation and offshore activities, and for monitoring of sea-ice processes and trends. We summarize here recent advances in the monitoring of sea-ice conditions and their extremes from satellite data as well as the development of sea-ice seasonal forecasting capabilities. Our results are the outcome of the three-year (2015–2018) SPICES (Space-borne Observations for Detecting and Forecasting Sea-Ice Cover Extremes) project funded by the EU’s Horizon 2020 programme. New SPICES sea-ice products include pancake ice thickness and degree of ice ridging based on synthetic aperture radar imagery, Arctic sea-ice volume and export derived from multisensor satellite data, and melt pond fraction and sea-ice concentration using Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) radiometer data. Forecasts of July sea-ice conditions from initial conditions in May showed substantial improvement in some Arctic regions after adding sea-ice thickness (SIT) data to the model initialization. The SIT initialization also improved seasonal forecasts for years with extremely low summer sea-ice extent. New SPICES sea-ice products have a demonstrable level of maturity, and with a reasonable amount of further work they can be integrated into various operational sea-ice services.</jats:p

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A Consistent Combination of Brightness Temperatures from SMOS and SMAP over Polar Oceans for Sea Ice Applications

Passive microwave measurements at L-band from ESA&rsquo;s Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission can be used to retrieve sea ice thickness of up to 0.5&ndash;1.0 m. Since 2015, NASA&rsquo;s Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission provides brightness temperatures (TB) at the same frequency. Here, we explore the possibility of combining SMOS and SMAP TBs for sea ice thickness retrieval. First, we compare daily TBs over polar ocean and sea ice regions. For this purpose, the multi-angular SMOS measurements have to be fitted to the SMAP incidence angle of 40 ∘ . Using a synthetical dataset for testing, we evaluate the performance of different fitting methods. We find that a two-step regression fitting method performs best, yielding a high accuracy even for a small number of measurements of only 15. Generally, SMOS and SMAP TBs agree very well with correlations exceeding 0.99 over sea ice but show an intensity bias of about 2.7 K over both ocean and sea ice regions. This bias can be adjusted using a linear fit resulting in a very good agreement of the retrieved sea ice thicknesses. The main advantages of a combined product are the increased number of daily overpasses leading to an improved data coverage also towards lower latitudes, as well as a continuation of retrieved timeseries if one of the sensors stops delivering data

Developing viral genomic data-specific classification models

Le séquençage ADN d'échantillons complexes contenant plusieurs espèces est une technique de choix pour étudier le paysage viral d'un milieu donné. Or les génomes viraux sont difficiles à identifier, de par leur extrême variabilité et la relation étroite qu'ils entretiennent avec leurs hôtes. Nous proposons de nouvelles pistes de recherche pour apporter une solution spécifique aux séquences virales afin de répondre au besoin d'identification pour lequel les solutions génériques existantes n'apportent pas de réponse satisfaisante.DNA sequencing of complex samples containing various living species is a choice approach to study the viral landscape of a given environment. Viral genomes are hard to identify due to their extreme variability and the tight relationship they have with their hosts. We hereby provide new leads for the development of a virusesspecific solution to the need for accurate identification that hasn't found a satisfactory solution in the existing universal software so far