Reassessing the role of urban green space in air pollution control.

The assumption that vegetation improves air quality is prevalent in scientific, popular, and political discourse. However, experimental and modeling studies show the effect of green space on air pollutant concentrations in urban settings is highly variable and context specific. We revisited the link between vegetation and air quality using satellite-derived changes of urban green space and air pollutant concentrations from 2,615 established monitoring stations over Europe and the United States. Between 2010 and 2019, stations recorded declines in ambient NO2, (particulate matter) PM10, and PM2.5 (average of -3.14% y-1), but not O3 (+0.5% y-1), pointing to the general success of recent policy interventions to restrict anthropogenic emissions. The effect size of total green space on air pollution was weak and highly variable, particularly at the street scale (15 to 60 m radius) where vegetation can restrict ventilation. However, when isolating changes in tree cover, we found a negative association with air pollution at borough to city scales (120 to 16,000 m) particularly for O3 and PM. The effect of green space was smaller than the pollutant deposition and dispersion effects of meteorological drivers including precipitation, humidity, and wind speed. When averaged across spatial scales, a one SD increase in green space resulted in a 0.8% (95% CI: -3.5 to 2%) decline in air pollution. Our findings suggest that while urban greening may improve air quality at the borough-to-city scale, the impact is moderate and may have detrimental street-level effects depending on aerodynamic factors like vegetation type and urban form.

Substrate-Based Ligand Design for Phenazine Biosynthesis Enzyme PhzF.

The phenazine pyocyanin is an important virulence factor of the pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa, which is on the WHO list of antibiotic resistant "priority pathogens". In this study the isomerase PhzF, a key bacterial enzyme of the pyocyanin biosynthetic pathway, was investigated as a pathoblocker target. The aim of the pathoblocker strategy is to reduce the virulence of the pathogen without killing it, thus preventing the rapid development of resistance. Based on crystal structures of PhzF, derivatives of the inhibitor 3-hydroxyanthranilic acid were designed. Co-crystal structures of the synthesized derivatives with PhzF revealed spacial limitations of the binding pocket of PhzF in the closed conformation. In contrast, ligands aligned to the open conformation of PhzF provided more room for structural modifications. The intrinsic fluorescence of small 3-hydroxyanthranilic acid derivatives enabled direct affinity determinations using FRET assays. The analysis of structure-activity relationships showed that the carboxylic acid moiety is essential for binding to the target enzyme. The results of this study provide fundamental structural insights that will be useful for the design of PhzF-inhibitors.

Engineering new-to-nature biochemical conversions by combining fermentative metabolism with respiratory modules.

Anaerobic microbial fermentations provide high product yields and are a cornerstone of industrial bio-based processes. However, the need for redox balancing limits the array of fermentable substrate-product combinations. To overcome this limitation, here we design an aerobic fermentative metabolism that allows the introduction of selected respiratory modules. These can use oxygen to re-balance otherwise unbalanced fermentations, hence achieving controlled respiro-fermentative growth. Following this design, we engineer and characterize an obligate fermentative Escherichia coli strain that aerobically ferments glucose to stoichiometric amounts of lactate. We then re-integrate the quinone-dependent glycerol 3-phosphate dehydrogenase and demonstrate glycerol fermentation to lactate while selectively transferring the surplus of electrons to the respiratory chain. To showcase the potential of this fermentation mode, we direct fermentative flux from glycerol towards isobutanol production. In summary, our design permits using oxygen to selectively re-balance fermentations. This concept is an advance freeing highly efficient microbial fermentation from the limitations imposed by traditional redox balancing.

The origins of mammal growth patterns during the Jurassic mammalian radiation.

We use synchrotron x-ray tomography of annual growth increments in the dental cementum of mammaliaforms (stem and crown fossil mammals) from three faunas across the Jurassic to map the origin of patterns of mammalian growth patterns, which are intrinsically related to mammalian endothermy. Although all fossils studied exhibited slower growth rates, longer life spans, and delayed sexual maturity relative to comparably sized extant mammals, the earliest crown mammals developed significantly faster growth rates in early life that reduced at sexual maturity, compared to stem mammaliaforms. Estimation of basal metabolic rates (BMRs) suggests that some fossil crown mammals had BMRs approaching the lowest rates of extant mammals. We suggest that mammalian growth patterns first evolved during their mid-Jurassic adaptive radiation, although growth remained slower than in extant mammals.