Klotho controls the brain-immune system interface in the choroid plexus.

Located within the brain's ventricles, the choroid plexus produces cerebrospinal fluid and forms an important barrier between the central nervous system and the blood. For unknown reasons, the choroid plexus produces high levels of the protein klotho. Here, we show that these levels naturally decline with aging. Depleting klotho selectively from the choroid plexus via targeted viral vector-induced knockout in Klotho flox/flox mice increased the expression of multiple proinflammatory factors and triggered macrophage infiltration of this structure in young mice, simulating changes in unmanipulated old mice. Wild-type mice infected with the same Cre recombinase-expressing virus did not show such alterations. Experimental depletion of klotho from the choroid plexus enhanced microglial activation in the hippocampus after peripheral injection of mice with lipopolysaccharide. In primary cultures, klotho suppressed thioredoxin-interacting protein-dependent activation of the NLRP3 inflammasome in macrophages by enhancing fibroblast growth factor 23 signaling. We conclude that klotho functions as a gatekeeper at the interface between the brain and immune system in the choroid plexus. Klotho depletion in aging or disease may weaken this barrier and promote immune-mediated neuropathogenesis

The true price of external health effects from food consumption

Although global food consumption costs more in terms of impact on human life than money is spent on it, health costs have not been consistently quantified or included in food prices to date. In this paper, a method to determine the external health costs of nutrition and dietetics is developed by employing the cost-of-illness (COI) and true cost accounting (TCA) approaches. This is done exemplarily for the reference country Germany. The results show that 601.50 € per capita and 50.38 billion € in total external health costs are incurred annually due to nutrition. Overall, most costs are accrued through excessive meat consumption (32.56% of costs), deficient whole grain intake (15.42% of costs), and insufficient uptake of legumes (10.19% of costs). Comparing the external health costs with the external environmental costs in Germany, it can be seen that of the total annual costs of around 153.86 billion €, 67.26% originate from environmental impacts and 32.74% from impacts on human life. In order to achieve the 17 Sustainable Development Goals and to increase family as well as public health, there is a need to internalise these external costs into actual food prices

Using Ordinary Digital Cameras in Place of Near-Infrared Sensors to Derive Vegetation Indices for Phenology Studies of High Arctic Vegetation

We thank Mark Gillespie, Nanna Baggesen, and Anne Marit Vik for field assistance. The University in Svalbard (UNIS) provided logistical support. This work was funded by the Norwegian Research Council through the ‘SnoEco’ project (project No. 230970) and Arctic Field Grant (No. 246110/E10). It was supported by the ESA Prodex project ‘Sentinel-2 for High North Vegetation Phenology’ (contract No. 4000110654), the EC FP7 collaborative project ‘Sentinels Synergy Framework’ (SenSyF), funding from The Fram Centre Terrestrial Flagship, also from the EEA Norway Grants (WICLAP project, ID 198571), and from the GRENE Arctic Climate Change Research Project, Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in Japan.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Exploring the eDNA dynamics of the host-pathogen pair Pacifastacus leniusculus (Decapoda) and Aphanomyces astaci (Saprolegniales) under experimental conditions

The oomycete Aphanomyces astaci causes crayfish plague, a disease threatening native European crayfish. It is carried and transmitted by American crayfish species, which are the original hosts of A. astaci. In recent years, environmental DNA (eDNA) methods have been successfully implemented to monitor the spread of both A. astaci and its hosts. However, still little is known about how population density and other environmental factors influence the detectability of this host-pathogen complex. In a mesocosm experiment, we tested the influence of crayfish density, temperature and food availability on the detectability of eDNA for A. astaci and its host, signal crayfish Pacifastacus leniusculus. We also compared eDNA results with crayfish population density measured by catch per unit effort (CPUE) from two lakes with varying crayfish density and A. astaci prevalence. The mesocosm experiment revealed that a limited set of controlled factors can substantially change the detectable amount of eDNA, even though the physical presence of the target organisms remains the same. In cold, clear water, eDNA quantities of both targets increased far more than in a linear fashion with increased crayfish density. However, the presence of food decreased the detectability of crayfish eDNA, presumably through increased microbial-induced eDNA degradation. For A. astaci, where eDNA typically represents living spores, food did not affect the detectability. However, high water temperature strongly reduced it. The increased complexity and variability of factors influencing eDNA concentration under natural conditions, compared to a controlled experimental environment, suggests that establishing a reliable relationship between eDNA quantities and crayfish density is difficult to achieve. This was also supported by field data, where we found minimal correspondence between eDNA quantity and CPUE data. A comparison between quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR) analysis and droplet-digital PCR (ddPCR) analysis revealed higher detection success of the targets in field samples when using qPCR. Overall, our results support eDNA as an effective tool for presence-absence monitoring, but it seems less suited for biomass quantification and population density estimates. Detection of A. astaci and P. leniusculus is not influenced uniformly by respective environmental factors. Consequently, we recommend a strategy of monitoring both targets, where the detection of one may point towards the presence of the other

Soziale externe Kosten: Ein Framework zur Monetarisierung von Tierwohl zur Berechnung wahrer Lebensmittelpreise

Aufbauend auf Mindeststandards an Haltungsbedingungen wird eine Methodik entwickelt, wie Tierwohl monetär als Preisaufschlag auf Lebensmittelpreise dargestellt werden kann

Veganismus für alle? Akzeptanz von veganer Ernährung in der Bevölkerung und Potentiale einer Transformation hin zur nachhaltigen Ernährung

Die geringe Akzeptanz von Veganismus in der Gesellschaft wird mithilfe eines Reviews und einer Konsumierendenbefragung ermittelt. Es werden Ernährungsmuster gebildet, Kaufmotive verglichen und Anreize für den Kauf nachhaltiger Produkte, sowie Faktoren für die Akzeptanz veganer Ernährung beleuchtet

Entwicklung eines Frameworks zur Monetarisierung externer Gesundheitskosten von Lebensmitteln

Basierend auf dem Über- und Unterkonsum von Lebensmitteln werden über einen Cost of Illness Ansatz die Kosten des Lebensmittelkonsums in Deutschland ermittelt. Über einen Risikofaktor werden verlorene krankheitsadjustierte Lebensjahre bestimmt und schließlich marginale Gesundheitskosten errechnet

Auf dem Weg zu wahren Preisen im Lebensmitteleinzelhandel: Die Mehrwertsteuer als Instrument zur Agrar-Transformation

Eine Reform des Mehrwertsteuersystems ist ein möglicher Weg für die Transformation der Agrarwirtschaft. Positive monetäre Anreize für nachhaltige Lebensmittel und negative Anreize für Produkte mit hohen Externalitäten können sowohl auf Verbraucher- als auch auf Erzeugerseite Impulse setzen

Noch ein Label? - Meta-Label als Instrument zur Nachhaltigkeitskommunikation gegenüber Verbrauchern

Ein Meta-Label, das den Verbrauchern Orientierung für einen ökologisch, ökonomisch und ethisch bewussteren Konsum bietet, ist ein mögliches Instrument zur Veränderung und Anpassung der Lebensmittelindustrie an die aktuellen Herausforderungen der Umwelt