Paul-Crutzen Award from the GDCh Division of Environmental Chemistry & Ecotoxicology

Since 2000, the GDCh Division of Environmental Chemistry & Ecotoxicology has been awarding a prize for an outstanding scientific publication by young scientists in the field of environmental chemistry and ecotoxicology. The prize was named in 2011 after Paul J. Crutzen, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1995 for his work researching the ozone hole. The award is usually given annually and is associated with an award certificate, prize money of 1,000 euros and one-year, free membership in the Division. The Bayer company has been donating the prize money since 2023.

Deadline: 30 April 2024

Objective
The Division of Environmental Chemistry & Ecotoxicology of the German Chemical Society (GDCh) awards the Paul-Crutzen Award once a year to honor an outstanding original publication by a young scientist in the field of environmental chemistry/ecotoxicology in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.

The price
The award comes with a certificate, prize money of 1,000 euros donated by Bayer, and one year's free membership in the Division. The prize will be awarded at the Division conference " Environment 2024 ", which will take place from September 8 to 11, 2024 in Gießen and Homberg (Ohm). Following the award ceremony, the award-winning publication will be presented in a short lecture. The costs of attending the conference will be borne by the Division. The award will be decided by a committee appointed by the Board of the Division .

Nomination/Application
Nominations can be made by the academic supervisor, but applications are also possible. The person proposed or applying must be the first or main author of the publication and should ideally have a doctorate. The publication must have been published between 2022 and 2024 and no later than two years after the completion of the doctorate. The informal proposal with a brief justification must be accompanied by a CV (including contact details), a list of publications, the publication itself and - in the case of an application - a letter of support from the academic supervisor.

submission
Please send all documents summarized in a PDF file by e-mail to the GDCh Office for the attention of Maike Fries.

The Paul-Crutzen Award - donated by Bayer AG - was shared in 2023 and Divisions to Dr. Carolin Seller-Brison and Dr. Florian Monster awarded.

Dr. Carolin Seller-Brison: "Awarded in recognition of the publication entitled “Do biotransformation data from laboratory experiments reflect micropollutant degradation in a large river basin?" prepared as part of her dissertation at the University of Zurich and Eawag? (Water Research 2023, 235, 119908). The use of simulation studies according to OECD guidelines is a widespread procedure in the context of risk assessment and approval of chemicals. In the work mentioned, Carolin Seller describes to what extent the test results measured in the laboratory reflect the actual behavior in the Correctly reflect the environment. To do this, she combined monitoring data from the Rhine catchment area with both inverse modeling and laboratory-based degradation and distribution studies for more than 25 water-relevant pollutants. This work is honored with the Paul-Crutzen Award because it not only produces highly relevant conclusions regarding not only allows laboratory studies to be compared with behavior in the real environment, but also provides an enormous amount of high-quality data - both on the degradation of pollutants in laboratory tests and in the Rhine catchment area, as well as on the use of a wide range of experimental, analytical and model-based techniques."

Dr. Florian Ungeheuer: "Awarded in recognition of the publication entitled: "Nucleation of jet engine oil vapors is a large source of aviation-related ultrafine particles" (Communications Earth & Environment 2022, 3 , 319). Airports are a large source of airborne particles, which can impact air quality and people's health. In the work mentioned, Florian Ungeheuer shows that lubricating oils from aircraft engines make up a significant proportion of such particles and can be detected up to a size of 10-18 nanometers. In addition, he demonstrates through mechanistic studies that these lubricating oils can make a decisive contribution to the formation of such ultrafine particles. This work is honored with the Paul-Crutzen Award because it impressively demonstrates how, through a carefully considered combination of laboratory and field experiments as well as physical and chemical analysis methods, the occurrence of synthetic lubricating oils in ultrafine aerosol particles could be unambiguously attributed to emissions from aircraft engines. In addition, the quantification of the substances and the mechanistic investigations allow consequences for future reduction measures to be derived."

The Paul-Crutzen Award was shared in 2022 and Divisions to Dr. Steffen Breinlinger and Dr. Awarded to Jennifer Susanne Strehse.

Dr. Dipl.-Pharm. Steffen Breinlinger: "Awarded in recognition of the publication entitled “Hunting the eagle killer: A cyanobacterial neurotoxin causes vacuolar myelinopathy” (Science 2021, 371, 1335-1343 ).   With this work, Dr. Breinlinger, to identify a new cyanobacterial toxin as “eagle killer poison” – the name of the toxin, aetocthonotoxin – which is produced by a cyanobacterium growing on the invasive aquatic plant Hydrilla verticillata. Dr. Breinlinger was able to show that toxin production depends on the availability of bromide, which is accumulated by the host plant. This work is honored with the Paul-Crutzen Award because Dr. Breinlinger impressively achieved the identification of the toxin by combining a variety of methods and techniques such as HPLC-HRMS, preparative separation techniques, structure elucidation, imaging mass spectrometry, cultivation experiments with cyanobacteria as well as the development and use of a C. elegans assay. In doing so, he contributed to solving a decades-old mystery and to a better understanding of complex ecotoxicological problems.

Dr. Jennifer Susanne Strehse: "Awarded in recognition of the publication entitled “The explosive trinitrotoluene (TNT) induces gene expression of carbonyl reductase in the blue mussel (Mytilus spp.) – which she produced as part of her work at the Christian Albrechts University in Kiel. “A new promising biomarker for sea-dumped World War relics?” ( Archives of Toxicology 2020, 94 , 4043-4054). The release of chemicals from old ammunition in the North and Baltic Seas is causing growing concern among experts. Trinitrotoluene, better known by its abbreviation TNT, is receiving particular attention. For risk management Compounds typical of explosives require suitable detection methods. In her excellent work, Dr. Strehse developed a specific molecular biomarker in mussels that can be used to detect exposure of filter feeders to TNT. This work is honored with the Paul-Crutzen Award because Dr . Strehse impressively linked interdisciplinary findings from the areas of environmental monitoring, ecotoxicology, analytics, genetics and bioinformatics and combined the results from intensive laboratory work and field experiments. The result is a relevant component for the observation and Management of ammunition in the sea, which contributes to to reduce the risk of damage to the environment or human health - a problem that will continue to concern us worldwide for a long time."

The award was presented to DivisionsAlexander Maximilian Voigt in appreciation of his work in the working group of Dr. Harald Färber at the University Hospital Bonn on the subject: "Association between antibiotic residues, antibiotic resistant bacteria and antibiotic resistance genes in anthropogenic wastewater - An evaluation of clinical influences"
Chemosphere 2020, 241, 125032

In the work, Dr. Together with his co-authors, Voigt investigated the connection between the Literature of antibiotic residues and the development of antibiotic resistance in bacteria. For this purpose, antibiotic-resistant bacteria were cultivated in the laboratory, identified, characterized and analyzed for antibiotic-resistant genes. In municipal wastewater samples, he was able to demonstrate a connection between the concentration of antibiotic-resistant bacteria and the proximity to clinical wastewater contaminated with antibiotics. In order to avoid a further expansion of the formation of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in the wastewater, he proposes a direct, decentralized wastewater treatment of clinical wastewater.

The publication is honored with the Paul-Crutzen Award because it combines chemical, biological and statistical analysis and presents a solution to minimize the spread of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.