Global crop production increased substantially in recent decades due to agricultural intensification and expansion and today agricultural areas occupy about 38% of Earth’s terrestrial surface - the largest use of land on the planet. However, current high-intensity agricultural practices fostered in the context of the Green Revolution led to serious consequences for the global environment. Pesticides, in particular, are highly biologically active substances that can threaten the ecological integrity of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. Although the global pesticide use increases steadily, our field-data based knowledge regarding exposure of non-target ecosystems such as surface waters is very restricted. Available studies have by now been limited to spatially restricted geographical areas or had rather specific objectives rendering the extrapolation to larger spatial scales questionable. Consequently, this thesis evaluated based on four scientific publications the exposure, effects, and regulatory implications of particularly toxic insecticides` concentrations detected in global agricultural surface waters. FOCUS exposure modelling was used to characterise the highly specific insecticide exposure patterns and to analyse the resulting implications for both monitoring and risk assessment (publication I). Based on more than 200,000 scientific database entries, 838 peer-reviewed studies finally included, and more than 2,500 sites in 73 countries, the risks of agricultural insecticides to global surface waters were analysed by means of a comprehensive meta-analysis (publication II). This meta-analysis evaluated whether insecticide field concentrations exceed legally accepted regulatory threshold levels (RTLs) derived from official EU and US pesticide registration documents and, amongst others, how risks depend on insecticide development over time and stringency of environmental regulation. In addition, an in-depth analysis of the current EU pesticide regulations provided insights into the level of protection and field relevance of highly elaborated environmental regulatory risk assessment schemes (publications III and IV). The results of this thesis show that insecticide surface water exposure is characterized by infrequent and highly transient concentration peaks of high ecotoxicological relevance. We thus argue in publication I that sampling based on regular intervals is inadequate for the detection of insecticide surface water concentrations and that traditional risk assessment concepts based on all insecticide concentrations including non-detects lead to severely biased results and critical underestimations of risks. Based on these considerations, publication II demonstrates that out of 11,300 measured insecticide concentrations (MICs; i.e., those actually detected and quantified), 52.4% (5,915 cases; 68.5%) exceeded the RTL for either water (RTLSW) or sediments. This indicates a substantial risk for the biological integrity of global water resources as additional analyses on pesticide effects in the field clearly evidence that the regional aquatic biodiversity is reduced by approximately 30% at pesticide concentrations equalling the RTLs. In addition, publication II shows that there is a complete lack of scientific monitoring data for ~90% of global cropland and that both the actual insecticide contamination of surface waters and the resulting ecological risks are most likely even greater due to, for example, inadequate sampling methods employed in the studies and the common occurrence of pesticide mixtures. A linear model analysis identified that RTLSW exceedances depend on the catchment size, sampling regime, sampling date, insecticide substance class, and stringency of countries` environmental regulations, as well as on the interactions of these factors. Importantly, the risks are significantly higher for newer-generation insecticides (i.e., pyrethroids) and are high even in countries with stringent environmental regulations. Regarding the latter, an analysis of the EU pesticide regulations revealed critical deficiencies and the lack of protectiveness and field-relevance for current presumed highly elaborated FOCUS exposure assessment (publication IV) and overall risk assessment schemes (publication III). Based on these findings, essential risk assessment amendments are proposed. In essence, this thesis analyses the agriculture–environment linkages for pesticides at the global scale and it thereby contributes to a new research frontier in global ecotoxicology. The overall findings substantiate that agricultural insecticides are potential key drivers for the global freshwater biodiversity crisis and that the current regulatory risk assessment approaches for highly toxic anthropogenic chemicals fail to protect the global environment. This thesis provides an integrated view on the environmental side effects of global high-intensity agriculture and alerts that beside worldwide improvements to current pesticide regulations and agricultural pesticide application practices, the fundamental reformation of conventional agricultural systems is urgently needed to meet the twin challenges of providing sufficient food for a growing human population without destroying the ecological integrity of global ecosystems essential to human existence.

Aquatic macrophytes can contribute to the retention of organic contaminants in streams, whereas knowledge on the dynamics and the interaction of the determining processes is very limited. The objective of the present study was thus to assess how aquatic macrophytes influence the distribution and the fate of organic contaminants in small vegetated streams. In a first study that was performed in vegetated stream mesocosms, the peak reductions of five compounds were significantly higher in four vegetated stream mesocosms compared to a stream mesocosm without vegetation. Compound specific sorption to macrophytes was determined, the mass retention in the vegetated streams, however, did not explain the relationship between the mitigation of contaminant peaks and macrophyte coverage. A subsequent mesocosm study revealed that the mitigation of peak concentrations in the stream mesocosms was governed by two fundamentally different processes: dispersion and sorption. Again, the reductions of the peak concentrations of three different compounds were in the same order of magnitude in a sparsely and a densely vegetated stream mesocosm, respectively, but higher compared to an unvegetated stream mesocosm. The mitigation of the peak reduction in the sparsely vegetated stream mesocosm was found to be fostered by longitudinal dispersion as a result of the spatial distribution of the macrophytes in the aqueous phase. The peak reduction attributable to longitudinal dispersion was, however, reduced in the densely vegetated stream mesocosm, which was compensated by compound-specific but time-limited and reversible sorption to macrophytes. The observations on the reversibility of sorption processes were subsequently confirmed by laboratory experiments. The experiments revealed that sorption to macrophytes lead to compound specific elimination from the aqueous phase during the presence of transient contaminant peaks in streams. After all, these sorption processes were found to be fully reversible, which results in the release of the primarily adsorbed compounds, once the concentrations in the aqueous phase starts to decrease. Nevertheless, the results of the present thesis demonstrate that the processes governing the mitigation of contaminant loads in streams are fundamentally different to those already described for non-flowing systems. In addition, the present thesis provides knowledge on how the interaction of macrophyte-induced processes in streams contributes to mitigate loads of organic contaminants and the related risk for aquatic environments.

Engineered nanoparticles are emerging pollutants. Their increasing use in commercial products suggests a similar increase of their concentrations in the environment. Studying the fate of engineered colloids in the environment is highly challenging due to the complexity of their possible interactions with the main actors present in aquatic systems. Solution chemistry is one of the most central aspects. In particular, the interactions with dissolved organic matter (DOM) and with natural colloids are still weakly understood. The aim of this work was to further develop the dedicated analytical methods required for investigating the fate of engineered colloids in environmental media as influenced by DOM. Reviewing the literature on DOM interactions with inorganic colloids revealed that a systematic characterization of both colloids and DOM, although essential, lacks in most studies and that further investigations on the fractionation of DOM on the surface of engineered colloids is needed. Another knowledge gap concerns the effects of DOM on the dynamic structure of colloid agglomerates. For this question, analytical techniques dedicated to the characterization of agglomerates in environmental media at low concentrations are required. Such techniques should remain accurate at low concentrations, be specific, widely matrix independent and free of artefact due to sample preparation. Unfortunately, none of the currently available techniques (microscopy, light scattering based methods, separation techniques etc.) fulfills these requirements. However, a compromise was found with hydrodynamic chromatography coupled to inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (HDC-ICP-MS). This method has the potential to size inorganic particles in complex media in concentration ranges below ppb and is element specific; however, its limitations were not systematically explored. In this work, the potential of this method has been further explored. The simple size separation mechanism ensures a high flexibility of the elution parameters and universal calibration can be accurately applied to particles of different compositions and surface chemistries. The most important limitations of the method are its low size resolution and the effect of the particle shape on the retention factor. The implementation of HDC coupled to single particle ICP-MS (HDC-SP-ICP-MS) offers new possibilities for the recognition of particle shape and hence the differentiation between primary particles and homoagglomerates. Therefore, this coupling technique is highly attractive for monitoring the effects of DOM on the stability of colloids in complex media. The versatility of HDC ICP MS is demonstrated by its successful applications to diverse samples. In particular, it has been used to investigate the stability of citrate stabilized silver colloids in reconstituted natural water in the presence of different types of natural organic matter. These particles were stable for at least one hour independently of the type of DOM used and the pH, in accordance with a coauthored publication addressing the stability of silver colloids in the River Rhine. Direct monitoring of DOM adsorption on colloids was not possible using UV and fluorescence detectors. Preliminary attempts to investigate the adsorption mechanism of humic acids on silver colloids using fluorescence spectroscopy suggest that fluorescent molecules are not adsorbed on silver particles. Several solutions for overcoming the encountered difficulties in the analysis of DOM interactions are proposed and the numerous perspectives offered by further developments and applications of HDC-(SP)-ICP-MS in environmental sciences are discussed in detail.

Traditional Driver Assistance Systems (DAS) like for example Lane Departure Warning Systems or the well-known Electronic Stability Program have in common that their system and software architecture is static. This means that neither the number and topology of Electronic Control Units (ECUs) nor the presence and functionality of software modules changes after the vehicles leave the factory. However, some future DAS do face changes at runtime. This is true for example for truck and trailer DAS as their hardware components and software entities are spread over both parts of the combination. These new requirements cannot be faced by state-of-the-art approaches of automotive software systems. Instead, a different technique of designing such Distributed Driver Assistance Systems (DDAS) needs to be developed. The main contribution of this thesis is the development of a novel software and system architecture for dynamically changing DAS using the example of driving assistance for truck and trailer. This architecture has to be able to autonomously detect and handle changes within the topology. In order to do so, the system decides which degree of assistance and which types of HMI can be offered every time a trailer is connected or disconnected. Therefore an analysis of the available software and hardware components as well as a determination of possible assistance functionality and a re-configuration of the system take place. Such adaptation can be granted by the principles of Service-oriented Architecture (SOA). In this architectural style all functionality is encapsulated in self-contained units, so-called Services. These Services offer the functionality through well-defined interfaces whose behavior is described in contracts. Using these Services, large-scale applications can be built and adapted at runtime. This thesis describes the research conducted in achieving the goals described by introducing Service-oriented Architectures into the automotive domain. SOA deals with the high degree of distribution, the demand for re-usability and the heterogeneity of the needed components. It also applies automatic re-configuration in the event of a system change. Instead of adapting one of the frameworks available to this scenario, the main principles of Service-orientation are picked up and tailored. This leads to the development of the Service-oriented Driver Assistance (SODA) framework, which implements the benefits of Service-orientation while ensuring compatibility and compliance to automotive requirements, best-practices and standards. Within this thesis several state-of-the-art Service-oriented frameworks are analyzed and compared. Furthermore, the SODA framework as well as all its different aspects regarding the automotive software domain are described in detail. These aspects include a well-defined reference model that introduces and relates terms and concepts and defines an architectural blueprint. Furthermore, some of the modules of this blueprint such as the re-configuration module and the Communication Model are presented in full detail. In order to prove the compliance of the framework regarding state-of-the-art automotive software systems, a development process respecting today's best practices in automotive design procedures as well as the integration of SODA into the AUTOSAR standard are discussed. Finally, the SODA framework is used to build a full-scale demonstrator in order to evaluate its performance and efficiency.

Thematik dieser Arbeit ist das dreidimensionale Image-Warping für diffuse und reflektierende Oberflächen. Das Warpingverfahren für den reflektierenden Fall gibt es erst seit 2014. Bei diesem neuen Algorithmus treten Artefakte auf, sobald ein Bild für einen alternativen Blickwinkel auf eine sehr unebene Fläche berechnet werden soll. In dieser Arbeit wird der Weg von einem Raytracer, der die Eingabetexturen erzeugt, über das Warpingverfahren für beide Arten der Oberflächen, bis zur Optimierung des Reflective-Warping-Verfahrens erarbeitet. Schließlich werden die Ergebnisse der Optimierung bewertet und in den aktuellen sowie zukünftigen Stand der Technik eingeordnet.