The Economic Impact of Environmentally Sustainable Transport in Germany

The economic assessment of the Environmentally Sustainable Transportation (EST) scenarios developed throughout this paper are part of Phase 3 of the overall project, which is on social and economic assessment and on devising packages of instruments that - if implemented - would result in attaining EST.  Two methods were chosen for the assessment of the scenarios: a qualitative evaluation based on a simplified cybernetic model (SCM) and a system dynamics model (SDM). In the assessment with the simplified cybernetic model, a conservative baseline has been chosen in order to start with a scenario that incorporates some pessimistic views of the industry. The aim is to show that, even in this case, an economic disaster will not occur.  The System Dynamics Model ESCOT was designed to consider the ecological and technical aspects of a transition towards sustainable transportation. It is important that ESCOT considers not only first round effects but also secondary effects, which makes it a powerful instrument for the assessment of such large ecological changes. The economic assessment of environmentally sustainable scenarios shows that the departure from car and road freight oriented transport policy is far from leading to an economic collapse. The effects concerning economic indices are rather low, even though the measures proposed in the EST-80% scenario designate distinct changes compared to today’s transport policy. The impacts on some economic indicators, however, are clearly negative. With an expansion of the time period for the transition in the EST-50% scenario we derived even more encouraging results than for EST-80%

Climate Change and Transport

The transport sector is currently the second largest emitter of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, which is the main anthropogenic greenhouse gas (IPCC, 2013). On the global perspective, transport emissions are increasing fast and they might soon catch up with those from the electricity and heat provision sector (IEA, 2015). In 2010 transport generated about 7.0 gigatonnes of direct greenhouse gas emissions. Mainly driven by fast development of emerging economies, transport might double its emissions by 2050 (IEA, 2015). Decarbonising transport is seen as more challenging compared to other sectors (cf. Creutzig et al., 2015). The fifth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) indicates that the increase in global average surface temperature is very likely due to the observed raise in anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions and the target to keep global warming below 2L requires severe efforts by the society (IPCC, 2015). In contradiction, transport has not been in the focus of the political agenda (Creutzig et al., 2015) – mainly because policy makers believe that the economy is strongly dependent on cheap mobility and they fear to annoy their voters. The scientific community should strengthen their proclamation that current societies are still focusing on inefficient and oil dependent mobility technologies. Non-motorised modes, public transport, and electric vehicles might provide competitive and efficient abatement options with further social benefits in the future (Creutzig, 2015; Jochem et al., 2015). Otherwise, the ongoing increase in greenhouse gas emissions from transport will highly probably continue for the next decades, due to the rising global vehicle fleet and increasing volumes in freight transport and aviation

Generation of anti-TLR2 intrabody mediating inhibition of macrophage surface TLR2 expression and TLR2-driven cell activation

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Toll-like receptor (TLR) 2 is a component of the innate immune system and senses specific pathogen associated molecular patterns (PAMPs) of both microbial and viral origin. Cell activation via TLR2 and other pattern recognition receptors (PRRs) contributes to sepsis pathology and chronic inflammation both relying on overamplification of an immune response. Intracellular antibodies expressed and retained inside the endoplasmatic reticulum (ER-intrabodies) are applied to block translocation of secreted and cell surface molecules from the ER to the cell surface resulting in functional inhibition of the target protein. Here we describe generation and application of a functional anti-TLR2 ER intrabody (αT2ib) which was generated from an antagonistic monoclonal antibody (mAb) towards human and murine TLR2 (T2.5) to inhibit the function of TLR2. αT2ib is a scFv fragment comprising the variable domain of the heavy chain and the variable domain of the light chain of mAb T2.5 linked together by a synthetic (Gly₄Ser)₃amino acid sequence.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Coexpression of αT2ib and mouse TLR2 in HEK293 cells led to efficient retention and accumulation of TLR2 inside the ER compartment. Co-immunoprecipitation of human TLR2 with αT2ib indicated interaction of αT2ib with its cognate antigen within cells. αT2ib inhibited NF-κB driven reporter gene activation via TLR2 but not through TLR3, TLR4, or TLR9 if coexpressed in HEK293 cells. Co-transfection of human TLR2 with increasing amounts of the expression plasmid encoding αT2ib into HEK293 cells demonstrated high efficiency of the TLR2-αT2ib interaction. The αT2ib open reading frame was integrated into an adenoviral cosmid vector for production of recombinant adenovirus (AdV)-αT2ib. Transduction with AdVαT2ib specifically inhibited TLR2 surface expression of murine RAW264.7 and primary macrophages derived from bone marrow (BMM). Furthermore, TLR2 activation dependent TNFα mRNA accumulation, as well as TNFα translation and release by macrophages were largely abrogated upon transduction of αT2ib. αT2ib was expressed in BMM and splenocytes over 6 days upon systemic infection with AdVαT2ib. Systemic transduction applying AdVαT2ib rendered immune cells largely non-responsive to tripalmitoyl-peptide challenge. Our results show persistent paralysis of TLR2 activity and thus inhibition of immune activation.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The generated anti-TLR2 scFv intrabody inhibits specifically and very efficiently TLR2 ligand-driven cell activation <it>in vitro </it>and <it>ex vivo</it>. This indicates a therapeutic potential of αT2ib in microbial or viral infections.</p

Constructive approach to limiting periodic orbits with exponential and power law dynamics

In dynamical systems limit cycles arise as a result of a Hopf bifurcation, after a control parameter has crossed its critical value. In this study we present a constructive method to produce dissipative dynamics which lead to stable periodic orbits as time grows, with predesigned transient dynamics. Depending on the construction method a) the limiting orbit can be a regular circle, an ellipse or a more complex closed orbit and b) the approach to the limiting orbit can follow an exponential law or a power law. This technique allows to design nonlinear models of dynamical systems with desired (exponential or power law) relaxation properties.Comment: 17 pages, 6 figure

Analyzing the Power Spectrum of the Little Bangs

In this talk we discuss the analogy between data from heavy-ion collisions and the Cosmic Microwave Background. We identify p_T correlations data as the heavy-ion analogy to the CMB and extract a power-spectrum from the heavy-ion data. We define the ratio of the final state power-spectrum to the initial coordinate-space eccentricity as the transfer-function. From the transfer-function we find that higher $n$ terms are suppressed and we argue that the suppression provides information on length scales like the mean-free-path. We make a rough estimate of the mean-free-path and find that it is larger than estimates based on the centrality dependence of v_2.Comment: 4 pages, talk given at Hard Probes 2010, Eilat, Israe

Star Formation Properties in Barred Galaxies(SFB). I. Ultraviolet-to-Infrared Imaging and Spectroscopic Studies of NGC 7479

Large-scale bars and minor mergers are important drivers for the secular evolution of galaxies. Based on ground-based optical images and spectra as well as ultraviolet data from the Galaxy Evolution Explorer and infrared data from the Spitzer Space Telescope, we present a multi-wavelength study of star formation properties in the barred galaxy NGC 7479, which also has obvious features of a minor merger. Using various tracers of star formation, we find that under the effects of both a stellar bar and a minor merger, star formation activity mainly takes place along the galactic bar and arms, while the star formation rate changes from the bar to the disk. With the help of spectral synthesis, we find that strong star formation took place in the bar region about 100 Myr ago, and the stellar bar might have been $\sim$10 Gyr old. By comparing our results with the secular evolutionary scenario from Jogee et al., we suggest that NGC 7479 is possibly in a transitional stage of secular evolution at present, and it may eventually become an earlier type galaxy or a luminous infrared galaxy. We also note that the probable minor merger event happened recently in NGC 7479, and we find two candidates for minor merger remnants.Comment: 33 pages, 10 figures, 4 tables; accepted for publication in AJ, 142, 3

Radial distribution of stars, gas and dust in SINGS galaxies. I. Surface photometry and morphology

We present ultraviolet through far-infrared surface brightness profiles for the 75 galaxies in the Spitzer Infrared Nearby Galaxies Survey (SINGS). The imagery used to measure the profiles includes GALEX UV data, optical images from KPNO, CTIO and SDSS, near-IR data from 2MASS, and mid- and far-infrared images from Spitzer. Along with the radial profiles, we also provide multi-wavelength asymptotic magnitudes and several non-parametric indicators of galaxy morphology: the concentration index (C_42), the asymmetry (A), the Gini coefficient (G) and the normalized second-order moment of the brightest 20% of the galaxy's flux (M_20). Our radial profiles show a wide range of morphologies and multiple components (bulges, exponential disks, inner and outer disk truncations, etc.) that vary not only from galaxy to galaxy but also with wavelength for a given object. In the optical and near-IR, the SINGS galaxies occupy the same regions in the C_42-A-G-M_20 parameter space as other normal galaxies in previous studies. However, they appear much less centrally concentrated, more asymmetric and with larger values of G when viewed in the UV (due to star-forming clumps scattered across the disk) and in the mid-IR (due to the emission of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons at 8.0 microns and very hot dust at 24 microns).Comment: 66 pages in preprint format, 14 figures, published in ApJ. The definitive publisher authenticated version is available online at http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/703/2/156

Subjective Cognitive Complaints in Participants of the Healthy Brain Ageing Study (HeBA)

Subjective cognitive complaints (SCC) have the potential for earlier detection of Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease. Currently, the results of the completed online survey in the frame of the HeBA study reveal that 23% of the Luxembourgish participants have SCC with the SCC group having a higher prevalence rate of depression