Progress-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung

The most recent eruption of Fernandina volcano in the Galapagos Islands took place in March 2024. Subsequently, during the latter part of 2024 and the first half of 2025, the volcano showed clear signs of edifice inflation, as informed by geodetic InSAR and GPS data. The InSAR analysis allowed us to identify changes in deformation patterns and localized accelerations, mainly in areas near the caldera and its interior. Finally, on November 17, 2025, IGEPN seismic stations registered a swarm of volcano-tectonic (VT) earthquakes on Fernandina’s northern flank, beginning with a 4.4 (MLv) earthquake. GPS stations showed co-seismic displacements, accompanied by significant deformation, also observed by InSAR (TerraSAR-X & Sentinel-1). Despite this sequence of signals, the seismic activity — 106 VTs located beneath the edifice —did not culminate in an eruption, as there were no lava flows nor detectable gases emitted to the surface. The inflationary pattern has diminished, but we remain attentive to further activity that could portend a future eruption, especially if there are MLv 4-5 VT events beneath the edifice. On previous occasions, these larger earthquakes have heralded an imminent eruption. Our next step is to model geodetic data to obtain a source model and its depth. While Fernandina Island is uninhabited, frequent tourist vessels pass by the shoreline to observe Galapagos wildlife and to observe lava flows entering the sea, as was the case in March 2024.

Zusammenfassung Um beim Drehen die Standzeit von Werkzeugen und die Produktqualität zu optimieren, wird ein optoelektronisches Sensorsystems für in situ Werkzeugverschleißmessungen an einer Drehmaschine realisiert. Das Sensorsystem besteht aus einem chromatisch-konfokalen Sensor, präzisen Linearachsen und einem Roboterarm. Um trotz einer Roboterpositionierunsicherheit von 50 μm die geforderten Wiederholgenauigkeiten zu erreichen, wird ein Werkzeugkoordinatensystem (WKS) basierend auf den unverschlissenen Kantenbereichen des Werkzeugs eingeführt. Im Experiment mit einer optisch kooperativen Referenzkugel wird eine Repositionierunsicherheit von 6 μm nachgewiesen, d.h. die Positionierunsicherheit konnte um fast eine Größenordnung reduziert werden. Darüber hinaus zeigen erste Messungen von Geometrie und Verschleiß an verschiedenen Werkzeugen eine gute Übereinstimmung mit Referenzmessungen und belegen die Eignung des Sensorsystems für Werkzeugverschleißmessungen.

The impact of climate change on the intensity of mid-latitude cold air outbreaks is a debated topic due to uncertainty associated with internal atmospheric dynamics. Here, we employ an event-based storyline approach in which the evolution of the large-scale atmospheric circulation is nudged to reanalysis data at different global warming levels based on historical and high-emission scenario simulations. We thereby quantify the thermodynamic climate-change effects of pre-industrial, 2ºC and 4ºC warmer climates compared to present-day climate for three cold surges in East Asia during the winter 2020/21. The strongest warming occurs over northeast Asia, reaching up to +12ºC in a +4ºC warmer climate and caused by the advection of less cold air from winter ice-free regions in the Arctic, where the change of surface air temperature exceeds +20ºC. In contrast, over southern China, a moderate cooling is present from pre-industrial to present-day climates, due to the observed and expected increase in aerosol concentration, which peaks by the mid-21st century and alters the radiative balances. This cooling effect is likely to persist well into a +2ºC-warmer climate; however, it may become undetectable at the end of the 21st century (+4ºC warming). In summary, our findings underscore the important thermodynamic impact associated with Arctic amplification and cooling effect of aerosol-induced changes in the radiation budget on East Asian cold extremes.

The total meridional heat transport (MHT) is relatively stable across different climates. Nevertheless, the strength of individual processes contributing to the total transport are not stable. Here we investigate the MHT and its main components especially in the atmosphere, in five coupled climate model simulations from the Deep-Time Model Intercomparison Project (DeepMIP). These simulations target the Early Eocene Climatic Optimum (EECO), a geological time period with high CO2 concentrations, analogous to the upper range of end-of-century CO2 projections. Preindustrial and early Eocene simulations at a range of CO2 levels (1x, 3x and 6x preindustrial values) are used to quantify the MHT changes in response to both CO2 and non-CO2 related forcings. We found that atmospheric poleward heat transport increases with CO2, while the effect of non-CO2 boundary conditions (e.g., paleogeography, land ice, vegetation) is causing more poleward atmospheric heat transport on the Northern and less on the Southern Hemisphere. The changes in paleogeography increase the heat transport via transient eddies at the mid-latitudes in the Eocene. The Hadley cells have an asymmetric response to both the CO2 and non-CO2 constraints. The poleward latent heat transport of monsoon systems increases with rising CO2 concentrations, but this effect is offset by the Eocene topography. Our results show that the changes in the monsoon systems’ latent heat transport is a robust feature of CO2 warming, which is in line with the currently observed precipitation increase of present day monsoon systems.

<p>During the last two decades, modern societies have gradually understood the urge to tackle the climate change challenge, and consequently, a growing number of national and international initiatives have been launched with the aim of better understanding the Earth System. In this context, Earth System Modelling (ESM) has rapidly expanded, leading to a large number of research groups targeting the many components of the system at different scales and with different levels of interactions between components. This has led to the development of increasing number of models, couplings, versions tuned to address different scales or scenarios, and model-specific compilation and operating procedures. This operational complexity makes the implementation of multiple models excessively time consuming especially for less experienced modellers.</p><p>ESM-Tools is an open-source modular software written in Python, aimed to overcome many of the difficulties associated to the operation of ESMs. ESM-Tools allows for downloading, compiling and running a wide range of ESM models and coupled setups in the most important HPC facilities available in Germany. It currently supports multiple models for ocean, atmosphere, biochemistry, ice sheet, isostatic adjustment, hydrology, and land-surface, and six ocean-atmosphere and two ice-sheet-ocean-atmosphere coupled setups, through two couplers (included modularly through ESM-Interface). The tools are coded in Python while all the component and coupling information is contained in easy-to-read YAML files. The front-end user is required to provide only a short script written in YAML format, containing the experiment specific definitions. This user-friendly interface makes ESM-Tools a convenient software for training and educational purposes. Simultaneously, its modularity and the separation between the component-specific information and tool scripts facilitates the implementation and maintenance of new components, couplings and versions. ESM-Tools team of scientific programmers provides also user support, workshops and detailed documentation. The ESM-Tools were developed within the framework of the project Advance Earth System Model Capacity, supported by Helmholtz Association and has become one of the main pillars of the German infrastructure for Climate Modelling.</p>

Abstract To investigate the role of tides in Weddell Sea ocean‐ice shelf melt interactions, and resulting consequences for ocean properties and sea ice interactions, we develop a regional ocean‐sea ice model configuration, with time‐varying ocean boundary and atmospheric forcing, including the deep open ocean (at 2.5–4 km horizontal resolution), the southwestern continental shelf (≈2.5 km), and the adjacent cavities of eastern Weddell, Larsen, and Filchner‐Ronne ice shelves (FRIS, 1.5–2.5 km). Simulated circulation, water mass, and ice shelf melt properties compare overall well with available open ocean and cavity observational knowledge. Tides are shown to enhance the kinetic energy of the time‐varying flow in contact with the ice shelves, thereby increasing melt. This dynamically driven impact of tides on net melting is to almost 90% compensated by cooling through the meltwater that is produced but not quickly exported from regions of melting in the Weddell Sea cold‐cavity regime. The resulting systematic tide‐driven enhancement of both produced meltwater and its refreezing on ascending branches of, especially the FRIS, cavity circulation acts to increase net ice shelf melting (by 50% in respect to the state without tides, ≈50 Gt yr−1). In addition, tides also increase the melt‐induced FRIS cavity circulation, and the meltwater export by the FRIS outflow. Simulations suggest attendant changes on the open‐ocean southwestern continental shelf, characterized by overall freshening and small year‐round sea ice thickening, as well as in the deep southwestern Weddell Sea in the form of a marked freshening of newly formed bottom waters.

Die Innovationsfahigkeit gewinnt durch die Globalisierung des Wettbewerbs zunehmend an Bedeutung. Dabei kommt den Metropolregionen eine wichtige Rolle zu. Die Autoren haben sechs deutsche Metropolregionen und aussagekraftige Innovationsindikatoren ausgewahlt und untersuchen, welche dieser Regionen erfolgreich waren.

[1] The European summer 2003 is a prominent example for an extreme hot and dry season. The main mechanisms that contributed to the growth of the heat wave are still disputed and state-of-the-art climate models have difficulty to realistically simulate the extreme conditions. Here we analyse simulations using recent versions of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts seasonal ensemble forecasting system and present, for the first time, retrospective forecasts which simulate accurately not only the abnormal warmth but also the observed precipitation and mid-tropospheric circulation patterns. It is found that while the land surface hydrology plays a crucial role, the successful simulations also required revised formulations of the radiative and convective parameterizations. We conclude that the predictability of the event was less due to remote teleconnections effects and more due to in situ processes which helped maintain the dry surface anomalies occurring at the beginning of the summer.

Visual detection of whales during seismic surveys for mitigation purposes is a labor intensive and exhaustive task, feasible only during daylight hours. These constraints are overcome by the MAPS (Marine Mammal Perimeter Surveillance) system, which employs a ship‐borne, 360°, cooled thermal imager in conjunction with a newly developed automated whale detector, which processes this video stream in real time to alert observers to the possible presence of whales and to provide night time vision. MAPS was developed and extensively tested during three recent expeditions into the polar oceans, providing IR footage of far over 1000 whale spouts at up to 5 km distance.