ReCiPe2016: a harmonised life cycle impact assessment method at midpoint and endpoint level

Purpose

Life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) translates emissions and resource extractions into a limited number of environmental impact scores by means of so-called characterisation factors. There are two mainstream ways to derive characterisation factors, i.e. at midpoint level and at endpoint level. To further progress LCIA method development, we updated the ReCiPe2008 method to its version of 2016. This paper provides an overview of the key elements of the ReCiPe2016 method.

Methods

We implemented human health, ecosystem quality and resource scarcity as three areas of protection. Endpoint characterisation factors, directly related to the areas of protection, were derived from midpoint characterisation factors with a constant mid-to-endpoint factor per impact category. We included 17 midpoint impact categories.

Results and discussion

The update of ReCiPe provides characterisation factors that are representative for the global scale instead of the European scale, while maintaining the possibility for a number of impact categories to implement characterisation factors at a country and continental scale. We also expanded the number of environmental interventions and added impacts of water use on human health, impacts of water use and climate change on freshwater ecosystems and impacts of water use and tropospheric ozone formation on terrestrial ecosystems as novel damage pathways. Although significant effort has been put into the update of ReCiPe, there is still major improvement potential in the way impact pathways are modelled. Further improvements relate to a regionalisation of more impact categories, moving from local to global species extinction and adding more impact pathways.

Conclusions

Life cycle impact assessment is a fast evolving field of research. ReCiPe2016 provides a state-of-the-art method to convert life cycle inventories to a limited number of life cycle impact scores on midpoint and endpoint level.

     

Quality of citizen science data and its consequences for the conservation of skipper butterflies (Hesperiidae) in Flanders (northern Belgium)

Citizen science projects have become important data sources for ecologists. However, opportunistic data are not only characterized by spatial and temporal biases, but probably also contain species identification errors, especially concerning morphologically similar species. Such misidentifications may result in wrongly estimated distribution ranges and trends, and thus in inadequate conservation measures. We illustrate this issue with three skipper butterflies (Hesperiidae) in Flanders (northern Belgium) using photographs uploaded with observations in data portals. Ochlodes sylvanus and Thymelicus lineola records had relatively low identification error rates (1 and 11?%, respectively), but the majority (59?%) of Thymelicus sylvestris records turned out to be misidentified. Using verified records only allowed us to model their distribution more accurately, especially for T. sylvestris whose actual distribution area had hitherto been strongly overestimated. An additional field study on T. sylvestris confirmed the species distribution model output as the species was almost completely restricted to sites with verified records and was largely absent from sites with unverified records. The preference of T. sylvestris for unimproved grasslands was confirmed by the negative correlation between its model-predicted presence and elevated nitrogen and ammonia levels. Thus, quality control of citizen science data is of major importance to improve the knowledge of species distribution ranges, biotope preferences and other limiting factors. This, in turn, will help to better assess species conservation statuses and to suggest more appropriate management and mitigation measures.     

First record of resting cysts of the benthic dinoflagellate Prorocentrum leve in a natural reservoir in Gujan‐Mestras,Gironde, France

The resting cysts of the benthic dinoflagellate Prorocentrum leve from a natural reservoir in Gujan‐Mestras (Gironde, France) were described in this study. The incubated urn‐shaped cysts gave rise to cells of P. leve. Morphological observations through light microscopy and scanning electron microscopy, particularly of the periflagellar platelets, combined with large subunit ribosomal DNA sequences obtained through single‐cell analysis confirm their affinity to the species P. leve. The cysts were characterized by a specific shape and the presence of an anterior plug. This is the first conclusive evidence for fossilizable resting stages within the Prorocentrales, one of the major orders within the Dinophyceae. Palynological treatments show that the cysts and endospores withstand hydrochloric and hydrofluoric acids. Micro‐Fourier transform infrared analysis on single specimens suggests that the composition of the endospore is cellulosic and the cyst wall a more robust, noncellulosic β‐glucan. The spectra overall are similar to other published spectra of resting cysts from autotrophic, planktonic dinoflagellates.     

Expression of effector gene SIX1 of Fusarium oxysporum requires living plant cells

Fusarium oxysporum is an asexual, soil inhabiting fungus that comprises many different formae speciales, each pathogenic towards a different host plant. In absence of a suitable host all F. oxysporum isolates appear to have a very similar lifestyle, feeding on plant debris and colonizing the rhizosphere of living plants. Upon infection F. oxysporum switches from a saprophytic to an infectious lifestyle, which probably includes the reprogramming of gene expression. In this work we show that the expression of the known effector gene SIX1 of F. oxysporum f. sp. lycopersici is strongly upregulated during colonization of the host plant. Using GFP (green fluorescent protein) as reporter, we show that induction of SIX1 expression starts immediately upon penetration of the root cortex. Induction requires living plant cells, but is not host specific and does not depend on morphological features of roots, since plant cells in culture can also induce SIX1 expression. Taken together, F. oxysporum seems to be able to distinguish between living and dead plant material, preventing unnecessary switches from a saprophytic to an infectious lifestyle.     

New trends for metal complexes with anticancer activity

Medicinal inorganic chemistry can exploit the unique properties of metal ions for the design of new drugs. This has, for instance, led to the clinical application of chemotherapeutic agents for cancer treatment, such as cisplatin. The use of cisplatin is, however, severely limited by its toxic side-effects. This has spurred chemists to employ different strategies in the development of new metal-based anticancer agents with different mechanisms of action. Recent trends in the field are discussed in this review. These include the more selective delivery and/or activation of cisplatin-related prodrugs and the discovery of new non-covalent interactions with the classical target, DNA. The use of the metal as scaffold rather than reactive centre and the departure from the cisplatin paradigm of activity towards a more targeted, cancer cell-specific approach, a major trend, are discussed as well. All this, together with the observation that some of the new drugs are organometallic complexes, illustrates that exciting times lie ahead for those interested in 'metals in medicine'.     

Parasites in food webs: the ultimate missing links

Parasitism is the most common consumer strategy among organisms, yet only recently has there been a call for the inclusion of infectious disease agents in food webs. The value of this effort hinges on whether parasites affect food‐web properties. Increasing evidence suggests that parasites have the potential to uniquely alter food‐web topology in terms of chain length, connectance and robustness. In addition, parasites might affect food‐web stability, interaction strength and energy flow. Food‐web structure also affects infectious disease dynamics because parasites depend on the ecological networks in which they live. Empirically, incorporating parasites into food webs is straightforward. We may start with existing food webs and add parasites as nodes, or we may try to build food webs around systems for which we already have a good understanding of infectious processes. In the future, perhaps researchers will add parasites while they construct food webs. Less clear is how food‐web theory can accommodate parasites. This is a deep and central problem in theoretical biology and applied mathematics. For instance, is representing parasites with complex life cycles as a single node equivalent to representing other species with ontogenetic niche shifts as a single node? Can parasitism fit into fundamental frameworks such as the niche model? Can we integrate infectious disease models into the emerging field of dynamic food‐web modelling? Future progress will benefit from interdisciplinary collaborations between ecologists and infectious disease biologists.     

A BAC-based integrated linkage map of the silkworm Bombyx mori

Background

In 2004, draft sequences of the model lepidopteran Bombyx mori were reported using whole-genome shotgun sequencing. Because of relatively shallow genome coverage, the silkworm genome remains fragmented, hampering annotation and comparative genome studies. For a more complete genome analysis, we developed extended scaffolds combining physical maps with improved genetic maps.

Results

We mapped 1,755 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers from bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) end sequences onto 28 linkage groups using a recombining male backcross population, yielding an average inter-SNP distance of 0.81 cM (about 270 kilobases). We constructed 6,221 contigs by fingerprinting clones from three BAC libraries digested with different restriction enzymes, and assigned a total of 724 single copy genes to them by BLAST (basic local alignment search tool) search of the BAC end sequences and high-density BAC filter hybridization using expressed sequence tags as probes. We assigned 964 additional expressed sequence tags to linkage groups by restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis of a nonrecombining female backcross population. Altogether, 361.1 megabases of BAC contigs and singletons were integrated with a map containing 1,688 independent genes. A test of synteny using Oxford grid analysis with more than 500 silkworm genes revealed six versus 20 silkworm linkage groups containing eight or more orthologs of Apis versus Tribolium, respectively.

Conclusion

The integrated map contains approximately 10% of predicted silkworm genes and has an estimated 76% genome coverage by BACs. This provides a new resource for improved assembly of whole-genome shotgun data, gene annotation and positional cloning, and will serve as a platform for comparative genomics and gene discovery in Lepidoptera and other insects.     

Interoperability with Moby 1.0--it's better than sharing your toothbrush!

The BioMoby project was initiated in 2001 from within the modelorganism database community. It aimed to standardize methodologiesto facilitate information exchange and access to analyticalresources, using a consensus driven approach. Six years later,the BioMoby development community is pleased to announce therelease of the 1.0 version of the interoperability framework,registry Application Programming Interface and supporting Perland Java code-bases. Together, these provide interoperable accessto over 1400 bioinformatics resources worldwide through theBioMoby platform, and this number continues to grow. Here wehighlight and discuss the features of BioMoby that make it distinctfrom other Semantic Web Service and interoperability initiatives,and that have been instrumental to its deployment and use bya wide community of bioinformatics service providers. The standard,client software, and supporting code libraries are all freelyavailable at http://www.biomoby.org/.      

Prediction of peak pressure from clinical and radiological measurements in patients with diabetes

Background

Various structural and functional factors of foot function have been associated with high local plantar pressures. The therapist focuses on these features which are thought to be responsible for plantar ulceration in patients with diabetes. Risk assessment of the diabetic foot would be made easier if locally elevated plantar pressure could be indicated with a minimum set of clinical measures.

Methods

Ninety three patients were evaluated through vascular, orthopaedic, neurological and radiological assessment. A pressure platform was used to quantify the barefoot peak pressure for six forefoot regions: big toe (BT) and metatarsals one (MT-1) to five (MT-5). Stepwise regression modelling was performed to determine which set of the clinical and radiological measures explained most variability in local barefoot plantar peak pressure in each of the six forefoot regions. Comprehensive models were computed with independent variables from the clinical and radiological measurements. The difference between the actual plantar pressure and the predicted value was examined through Bland-Altman analysis.

Results

Forefoot pressures were significant higher in patients with neuropathy, compared to patients without neuropathy for the whole forefoot, the MT-1 region and the MT-5 region (respectively 138 kPa, 173 kPa and 88 kPa higher: mean difference). The clinical models explained up to 39 percent of the variance in local peak pressures. Callus formation and toe deformity were identified as relevant clinical predictors for all forefoot regions. Regression models with radiological variables explained about 26 percent of the variance in local peak pressures. For most regions the combination of clinical and radiological variables resulted in a higher explained variance. The Bland and Altman analysis showed a major discrepancy between the predicted and the actual peak pressure values.

Conclusion

At best, clinical and radiological measurements could only explain about 34 percent of the variance in local barefoot peak pressure in this population of diabetic patients. The prediction models constructed with linear regression are not useful in clinical practice because of considerable underestimation of high plantar pressure values. Identification of elevated plantar pressure without equipment for quantification of plantar pressure is inadequate. The use of quantitative plantar pressure measurement for diabetic foot screening is therefore advocated.